Bharat Bhushan Indians, obsessed with Pakistan going down the tube, seem unable to smell the rot that has set in Nepal’s polity and administration. Nepal’s Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal, aka Prachanda, is facing one of the worst corruption scandals to have hit the country since it became a democracy. If he acts against the… Read More A scandal in Kathmandu rocks the Prachanda govt and threatens the system
First posted July 14, 2012 The word ‘nationalism’ itself dates from the early nineteenth century and marked the increasing use of national identity in order to make political claims. So to argue that national identity is pre-political is itself a political statement. It is becoming chic among some of Europe’s young elites to call for… Read More Alternatives to the nationalism of the conspicuously ignorant: Markha Valenta
When British people say ‘we do pageantry like nobody else’, they are indirectly admitting that we depend disproportionately upon the past to give meaning to the present. Jeremy Seabrook It may have been the grey of the London sky and the tender green of new leaves on plane trees along the Mall that lent to… Read More The Underlying Sadness Beneath the Glittering Coronation of Charles and Camilla
By Alexander Zinoviev, from Homo Sovieticus, a novel that was originally published in 1985 and is included in Boredom, an anthology that was published in January by M.I.T. Press and Whitechapel Gallery. Translated from the Russian by Charles Janson. Soviet people are trained to write Reports about everything. It is an indispensable element of the Communist organization… Read More Lord of the Files (Homo Sovieticus)
Bharat Bhushan Union minister of state for law and justice, Satyapal Singh Baghel, made a statement that there were very few tolerant Muslims, and even those who appear to be tolerant use it as “a mask” to stay in public life; to become governors, vice presidents and vice-chancellors. Nobody reacted; not the Opposition parties, not… Read More Indian Union Minister’s hate speech about Muslims liable for prosecution
First posted September 10, 2012 NB: This book is one of the most moving and illuminating memoirs I have ever read, its sad it’s not available in India. I hope a far-sighted publisher will publish it. And I am proud to say that the author has been a close friend of mine for 33 years.… Read More Yudit Kiss: The Summer My Father Died
First posted August 01, 2015 I got out my tape-recorder. My mum frowned. She wasn’t expecting that. “Is it for the Marx Memorial Library?” Because that was what old communists did: donated their body for medical research and their history for class analysis. But I just wanted to record what had happened. To remember Us.… Read More Jo McMillan – Lenin, mum and me: my communist childhood
Peter Pomerantsev The powerful were meant to be afraid of the truth. Journalists were meant to “hold truth to power”. Evidence was meant to destroy wrongdoers as sunlight does a vampire. Find the evidence, the logic went, and the powerful could be shamed and brought to justice. Historically, the powerful would try to censor and… Read More What happens when leaders disregard the truth? Putin and Trump are about to find out
Mukul Kesavan To watch an election show as an anti-majoritarian spectator in the time of Narendra Modi is a traumatic business for two reasons. One, you mostly lose and two, sometimes even the ones you win, you lose. There was a moment during the Karnataka results show when the Congress’s leads dropped to a bare… Read More BJP-bin Dakshin
The BJP has grown and thrived by evoking the worst in this country’s citizens. It cannot be the presumption that what has been evoked, and what is on display, will disappear on its own by not facing up to it. This is just wishful thinking. What is the point of an opposition that is afraid… Read More The call for banning the Bajrang Dal shows rare electoral courage
