The Citizenship Amendment Bill has stringent applicability criteria. It is not —as it is being made out to be — an open invitation to minority groups in neighbouring countries In the mid-1990s, the then Asom Gana Parishad (AGP) government in Assam had proposed Scheduled Tribe (ST) status to six groups in the state — Tai-Ahoms, […]
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अफवाहों से घिरा नागरिकता विधेयक
यह पिछली सदी के आखिरी दशक की बात है जब असम में असम गण परिषद सरकार ने राज्य के छह समूहों को अनुसूचित जनजाति यानी एसटी का दर्जा देने की पहल की। इनमें ताई-अहोम, मोरान, मटक, कोच राजबोंगशी आदि जनजाति समूहों के नाम शामिल हैं। इस प्रस्ताव को संसद में खारिज कर दिया गया। कालांतर […]
The BJP’s new challenge
Party machine has to be aggressively geared up for the election. It needs centralised inspiration, but decentralised initiative. Morgan Harper Nichols is an American lyricist and gospel musician. One of her year-end songs goes something like this. “This year will not end/ Like last year at all./ You have learned to be free./ You have […]
Gentle, Yet ‘Atal’
For the first time, the birth anniversary of Atalji would be celebrated after he left his physical existence. The man who established connect with almost four generations of Bharat strongly provided the nationalist narrative through his journalism, poetry, speeches, foreign policy, public policy and even politics. Through his politics of positivity and humility, he would […]
How Vajpayee held the democratic polity in high esteem
For Vajpayee, ‘Country is a temple and we are all its priests. We must sacrifice our lives at the altar of the national god’. In his famous address to the parliament after his government lost the vote of confidence in 1996, Vajpayee exhorted: “These power games will go on. Governments come and governments go. Parties […]
‘Three Warnings’ of BR Ambedkar
Dr Ambedkar raised the spectre of India losing its independence once again if the Constitution was not adhered to in letter and spirit Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar was the prime architect of the Indian Constitution. He put his heart and soul into it and gave to a complex and diverse country like India a comprehensive document […]
Despite the People
Kerala government is pitting itself against the faithful by imposing top-down reform at Sabarimala “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.” In his 1921 classic The Second Coming, W B Yeats talks about the failure of the system, leading to anarchy all around. “Things fall apart, the centre cannot […]
Art of the Possible
As a non-political young activist, I used to abhor phrases like ‘politics is the art of the possible’. I used to think that it is rank opportunism to think that way. This is because in the RSS, I had been trained to believe that it is ideology that should guide us at every level, and […]
After #MeToo, a better India
The movement has highlighted the need for workplaces to be free of harassment and intimidation. Moving forward, society must make women’s equality an article of faith. #MeToo has become a strong movement in India. It is courageous on the part of those large number of women who are coming out in the open with their […]
A Study in Greatness
Two great men belonging to two successive generations have revolutionised world politics in the last century. As their influence went far beyond the countries they were from and spread all over the world in the past five decades, they became an inspiration to the struggles of oppressed people everywhere. They were Gandhi and Mandela: the […]