Four Indian intellectuals who were murdered for their ideas (2013-2017)

Narendra Dabholkar (1945-2013) ‘Remember Gandhi. Remember what we did to him’: last threat to Narendra Dabholkar PUNE: Well-known rationalist and anti-superstition crusader Narendra Dabholkar was on Tuesday shot dead by two unidentified assailants while on a morning walk near Omkareshwar temple here. The 67-year-old activist was shot from close range and died on the spot. Police said the… Read More Four Indian intellectuals who were murdered for their ideas (2013-2017)

Ramachandra Guha: Reading about Mussolini’s Italy in Modi’s India

I read a lot of biographies, these often set in other countries than my own. A book I have just finished is Benedetto Croce and Italian Fascism, by the Canadian scholar, Fabio Fernando Rizi. It uses the life of a great philosopher to tell a larger story of the times he passed through. Reading Rizi’s book,… Read More Ramachandra Guha: Reading about Mussolini’s Italy in Modi’s India

‘The Poets of Rapallo’ Review: Ezra Pound’s Fascist Paradise

If biology was the soil of fascism, history and aesthetics were the manure.. Percy Shelley called poets the “unacknowledged legislators of the world.” No poet sought acknowledgment more enthusiastically than Ezra Pound. No poet legislated so ambitiously or disastrously, either. Pound was the impresario of Modernism. He stripped the Victorian padding from the verse of… Read More ‘The Poets of Rapallo’ Review: Ezra Pound’s Fascist Paradise

A Christian theologian warns against Christian fascism in the USA, fueled by an ideologically corrupted judiciary

NB: This is the kind of detailed documentation that we require in India. Those interested in studying the jurisprudence of lawlessness further could read William Scheuerman’s book: The End of Law. DS Chris Hedges: Fascists in our midstSupreme Court rulings, including the overturning of Roe v. Wade, herald the ascendancy of Christian fascism in the United States…… Read More A Christian theologian warns against Christian fascism in the USA, fueled by an ideologically corrupted judiciary

Anjan Basu: The Crisis in Civilisation that Rabindranath Tagore red-flagged Is back upon us

NB: A very well written and timely reminder. My two caveats are 1) with the word back; and 2) with the positioning of the word crisis. It is not ‘back’, because after the Napoleonic wars it never went away; and a more appropriate title description  of our time (with due respect to Gurudev), would be… Read More Anjan Basu: The Crisis in Civilisation that Rabindranath Tagore red-flagged Is back upon us

Bharat Bhushan: New Bharatiya Janata Party's troubled road ahead / Sickular Libtard: Nupurgate and after

NB: Amidst all the flames of outrage, let me add a small reminder taken from daily life: it is not merely the speaking of factual data that counts, what counts more is the manner of speech, the way in which we speak what we think is the truth. In all religious traditions, there are theories… Read More Bharat Bhushan: New Bharatiya Janata Party's troubled road ahead / Sickular Libtard: Nupurgate and after

Totally illegal, says ex-CJ of Allahabad High Court; bulldozer cases in limbo / Owaisi's questions for Yogi govt

NB: Our honourable senior judges may kindly let us know if they have totally abandoned their constitutional duty to exercise oversight on the actions of the executive. In face of their silence, may we assume that this kind of hooliganism by the Yogi government will be allowed to continue with impunity? Should we also assume… Read More Totally illegal, says ex-CJ of Allahabad High Court; bulldozer cases in limbo / Owaisi's questions for Yogi govt

What the Veneration of Gandhi’s Killer Says About India. By Yasmeen Serhan

Imagine an America in the not-so-distant future. A right-wing populist politician has just been reelected president of the United States, stirring a wave of ethnonationalism not seen since the Trump presidency. Amid the country’s nativist turn, a cult of personality forms around John Wilkes Booth, the actor who fatally shot President Abraham Lincoln at Ford’s… Read More What the Veneration of Gandhi’s Killer Says About India. By Yasmeen Serhan