Bloody Mary

The Dhritarashtra syndrome

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 08:29:49 +0530

Even clever political heavyweights are blind about their sons. There is a well known syndrome in Indian politics known as the Dhritarashtra syndrome. Last week as expelled Samajwadi Party

From Three Idiots to a Nation Of Idiots

editor@ibnlive.com — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 06:20:50 +0530

Before I went to see Three Idiots watching the film had become something of a sacred duty. Friends telephoned from Mumbai and hissed furiously, "You mean you haven't seen Three

Over to you, citizens of India. It's time to demand justice for Ruchika

editor@ibnlive.com — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 08:15:29 +0530
Our criminal justice system has once again failed. Once again the ghost of a young girl cries out to be heard. In a country that celebrates its woman president, its

Speaking the language of change

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 02:09:06 +0530
2009 marks the return of the English-speaking politician. Environment and Forests Minister Jairam Ramesh is India's new king of climate, leading our country's charge against Western nations who are

No fear of the law

editor@ibnlive.com — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 12:07:01 +0530
Shiv Sena attack on IBN shows the police are non existent in daily lives. After the Shiv Sena's attack on the offices of IBN7 and IBN Lokmat, email messages,

Curtain call

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 12:54:01 +0530
Buddhadeb Bhattacharyya is a Shakespearan tragic hero Defeat sometimes begins at the moment of victory. In 2006, the ruling Left Front had thundered back to power in

Rich Behaving Poorly

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 12:05:46 +0530
Two seemingly unconnected events point to our most urgent contemporary dilemma: how should the rich behave in a country of the poor? Just a week after Corporate Affairs minister Salman

Fight the apartheid

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 12:19:35 +0530
Union HRD minister Kapil Sibal's education reforms, particularly for schools, have electrified students, teachers and parents. The 10th standard Board exam will now be optional for CBSE schools, grades will

FTN Blog: For the BJP, Jinnah is about politics, not history

editor@ibnlive.com — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 08:23:16 +0530
If only the BJP has read Jaswant Singh's book - Jinnah India-Partition Independence before expelling him! Actually, the thesis in the book is not new. Many earlier writers such as

No checks please, I'm a Bollywood star

editor@ibnlive.com — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 09:08:56 +0530
Ah, India and its ridiculous VIP syndrome again! Once again the syndrome of Don't-You-Know-Who-I-Am. Once again politicians are outraged that actor Shah Rukh Khan was questioned at Newark airport in

In August company

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 02:14:19 +0530
Lets make a pledge this 15th August 15th August is approaching. We are getting ready to celebrate that great document that forms the foundation of our modern

'Don't you know I am a VIP?'

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 04:24:58 +0530
Representatives of "the people" are outraged that former president APJ Abdul Kalam was made to pass through security checks on a flight from New Delhi to the US on the

FTN Blog: Bahuguna Joshi's words were horrifying, but not anti-Dalit

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 02:18:08 +0530
Thursday was a day when we heard two kinds of words. On the one hand, meaningless words of diplomatic gobbledygook from India and Pakistan about "debracketing" and "cautious optimism". On

FTN Blog: Our cities are geared for the rich

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 12:50:20 +0530
The metro accident in Delhi and the waterlogging in Mumbai motivated us to start a discussion on which way our cities are heading. Face The Nation on Tuesday

The Morality Budget

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 03:10:18 +0530
Transforming Indian attitudes might have to be as slow as reforming the economy The reinterpretation of Section 377 by the Delhi High Court, decriminalizing consenting adult homosexual sex, is

A People's Cabinet

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 03:17:21 +0530
The UPA has a social charter, it also needs a democratic charter In the early 1990s, when the economy was new but our mindsets were old, your humble columnist,

Voting for the nation

editor@ibnlive.com — Tue, 19 May 2009 11:41:26 +0530
Elections 2009 produced a national mandate, above caste and region The most "issue-less" election has thrown up the most magnificent result. It was a grueling marathon five week campaign:

The Elf Of Elections

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 13 May 2009 01:32:50 +0530
In politics, as in business, there's no place for monopolies anymore Covering the election campaign in 2004, your humble columnist had spotted a funny little creature, and had

A deadly quiet

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 12:45:21 +0530
The EC may be jeopardizing electioneering
Is the world's largest democracy undertaking the magnificent ritual of electing its rulers? The prevailing atmosphere is funereal and deathly quiet. The only

Pappu pass ho gaya!

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 12:02:47 +0530
Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has shattered myths about the babalog neta
Pappu can't dance, saala, goes the popular song from a recent film. But anyone observing the

Panties and Perverts

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 02:22:16 +0530
Two Indias are pulling in different directions Both the zealot and the sex symbol claim to be the defining face of a new India. Pramod Muthalik, Sri Ram Sene

Mirror Image of the future?

editor@ibnlive.com — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 12:29:26 +0530
India could soon become another Pakistan. A disconnected elite living in heavily guarded villas or speeding down highways in gleaming Pajeros with tinted glass in the front and gunmen

The worst of times, the best of times

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 07:10:24 +0530
Assembly elections in the aftermath of 26/11 have sent a dignified message. Every action has acquired an unimaginable almost ridiculous trajectory. A friend laughs and sits back in her

Trouble at Om

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 03:31:20 +0530
Hindu rage is the newest threat to civil society. Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur is a woman representing "Hinduism". Yet she is accused of killing innocents in bomb blasts at

Those blasted theories

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 12:40:23 +0530
It is October in India. October of the silken sun and blossoming trees. October is a holy time. Durga comes sweeping down from the mountains. Iftaar dinners are in full

Howdy pardner

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:49:03 +0530
A decade ago Jairam Ramesh wrote an insightful essay entitled "Yankee Go Home But Take Me With You". It was an analysis of the elaborate hypocrisy of the Indian political

Chaos theory in the Hindu cosmos

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 01:17:04 +0530
Earlier this year when L K Advani released his memoirs, My Country My Life, his contribution to Indian public life was hailed. Advani was credited with creating a "bipolarity" in

Red Letter Day

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 03:27:12 +0530
A letter to the Left Lal Salaam Comrades! Your tenure in government seems to have ended. How different things were four years ago! Four years ago you were

1..2..3..statue!

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 07:15:59 +0530
A courageous newspaper editor, whose commitment to his home state of Maharashtra has never been in doubt was attacked last week at his home by fellow Maharashtrians. His windows were

The rise of the tropical modern

editor@ibnlive.com — Sun, 01 Jun 2008 04:17:12 +0530
When Kareena Kapoor attained "size sero", there were fears of an apocalypse of suicidal dieting among young Indian women. Instead our level-headed behenji brigade (with the exception of a few

City of dreadful knights

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 07 May 2008 02:29:46 +0530
Ah, the great Indian city! The lack of urban infrastructure destroying the infrastructure of the human soul. By 2020 Mumbai will have a population of 20 million. Bangalore, already with

Back to anger and hatred

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 12:45:25 +0530
"It's all one skin and bone, one piss and shit, one blood, one meat. From one drop, a universe. Who's a Brahmin? Who's a shudra?

Rahulbaba and Mahi

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 10:51:50 +0530
The Congress could learn a few things from the Indian cricket team. Two young Indian men are on a unique journey. Rahul Gandhi, 37 year old MP from Amethi

Farming the colonial dream

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 02:39:12 +0530
Those who speak for "the farmer" are destroying him.
As this Budget approaches, there are many worries about the future of "the India economic story". The National

Disinvest the Bharat Ratna

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 07:43:41 +0530
The current clamour over India's national jewel or the Bharat Ratna is priceless to say the least. The furore began, in fact, with a story by a canny young television

The politics of seeing

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 10:41:15 +0530
The "chappan ki chaati" or 56 inch chest as Narendra Modi likes to describe himself as campaigned like a whirlwind in the Gujarat assembly elections, addressing thousands of meetings and

Narendrabhai & Buddhababu: separated at birth

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 23 Nov 2007 08:42:13 +0530
Historian Sumit Sarkar is not known to mince his words. His 'Modern India' is a magisterial left wing sweep of the Indian independence movement in which the struggles of "non

Casualties of an accident

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 08:56:59 +0530
Manmohan Singh failed to usher in a new era of educated politicians
"I am a politician by accident," the prime minister said at the Hindustan Times Leadership summit, "I

A Mythical Bridge To Voters

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 07:31:52 +0530
In the Valmiki Ramayan, the character Ahalya, was transformed from a stone into a beautiful woman because Lord Rama merely stepped on her. In a similar way Lord Ram has

No power to the people

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 09:07:37 +0530
The nuke deal controversy shows a chilling distance
between politicians and people The fracas over the Indo-US Nuclear deal, 123 Agreement and Hyde Act has revealed one chilling fact.

The Cult of the Sex Goddess

editor@ibnlive.com — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 01:12:42 +0530
In its 60th year as an independent nation, India has just elected its first woman president. Yet the ascent of the demure Pratibha Patil - with her covered head and

Shshsh... Muslim!

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 07:51:23 +0530
A conspiracy of silence has followed the conspiracy of terror. There is a certain chilling predictability about the list of convicts, a dreadful Orwellian litany of sameness. After a

Rather a dull Party

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 12:54:01 +0530
The Presidential elections of 2007 have illustrated writer Martin Jacques' famous phrase, "The End Of Politics." Politics, wrote Jacques in the Nineties, is fast becoming a "backward sector". The central

Goan the right way

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 08:47:19 +0530
Snatching victory from the jaws of defeat, the hapless (and astonished) Congress party has secured (along with its ally the NCP) 19 seats in the Goa Assembly elections and is

Uttar Pradesh Private Limited

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 11 May 2007 09:28:45 +0530
A dalit ki beti has become Uttar Pradesh ki rani: Mayawati has created a historic win in Uttar Pradesh. "Caste" and "religion" are the dominant words used to describe UP's

Bharat's first citizen

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 08:29:32 +0530
NR Narayana Murthy is one of Mother India's most admirable sons. He is a homegrown capitalist, the boy next door who made good at home and abroad, the son of

Hurley in the morning

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 07:29:44 +0530
A range of outraged critics have expressed their fury at the media's coverage of the Elizabeth Hurley Arun Nayyar wedding. Similar fears of a "trivial" "sensational" media were voiced during

Memories of the Samjhauta Express

editor@ibnlive.com — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 11:24:47 +0530
On a freezing January night three years ago two journalists queued up to board the train to Pakistan. The Attari-Samjhauta Express stood at the Old Delhi railway station decorated with

A reformer for the poor

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 16 Feb 2007 09:28:20 +0530
Franz Kafka's 'Metamorphosis' has haunted West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee since his university days. There are many interpretations of the play, the most popular one, being how a salesman

Kumbh 2007

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 19 Jan 2007 09:00:04 +0530
The Ardh Kumbh is in progress in Allahabad. It is not perhaps as grand as the Mahakumbh of 2001. The crowds are less formidable. The sadhu samaj not on full

Citizen 2006

editor@ibnlive.com — Sat, 30 Dec 2006 05:35:44 +0530
Behold, a new baby! Pushing its way through tubes blocked by national apathy. Bumping against a diseased uterus overgrown with tumours from the colonial past. And breaking free of the

A murderous society

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 22 Dec 2006 10:28:44 +0530
After an acquittal now a conviction. Manu Sharma, son of the well connected Haryana politician Vinod Sharma, has been sentenced to life imprisonment for murdering Jessica Lal. After Sharma's acquittal

8 pc growth of social change

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 24 Nov 2006 10:46:33 +0530
Two and a half years after the inauguration of the government of the aam admi, there are different analyses of the record of the Manmohan Singh government. If the golden

Qaum or country?

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 27 Oct 2006 11:11:27 +0530
In 2005, Imrana Bibi of Charthawal village in UP was raped by her father-in-law. A year later, a Muzaffarnagar sessions court has now sentenced her rapist, Ali Mohamad to ten

Patron saint of the shopping mall

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 29 Sep 2006 10:27:49 +0530
A wonderful new film has given us a new word. "Gandhigiri" has entered the popular lexicon. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was never more trendy. The young are buying books on him.

We don't need no education

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 07:42:47 +0530
Those who believe that India's hopes reside in its youth might glance at the events of the recent week and take off their rose- tinted glasses. In Madhav College in

House of Spirits

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 04 Aug 2006 08:18:29 +0530
Monsoon sessions of Parliament are generally turbulent. Under hovering rainclouds, the mid-year gathering of peoples representatives generally sees the rage of the long summer reach boiling point. But if you

The Cosmic Glass Ceiling

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 07 Jul 2006 01:05:48 +0530
Not one but two women have created a storm of protest by claiming that they have entered the shrine of Sabrimala. The Sabrimala shrine, where women between the ages of

From India Shining to India Snorting

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 09 Jun 2006 01:19:58 +0530
On the face of it, as Atal Bihari Vajpayee said, Rahul Mahajan is just a youth who made a mistake. The night before he was to take his father's ashes

Secession of the successful

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 12 May 2006 06:55:52 +0530
The term "secession of the successful" is a particularly evocative term. This phrase occurs in the late JK Galbraith's works as well as in the writings of other economists and

On shaky ground

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 14 Apr 2006 10:35:04 +0530
Twenty-seven per cent reservation of seats for OBCs, in all IITs, IIMs and central universities proposes Arjun Singh, Minister for Human Resource Development, who has inevitably been reminded of social

Varanasi's religion

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 17 Mar 2006 10:29:52 +0530
Never was there a greater contrast between Hinduism and Hindutva. Three bomb blasts shattered the calm of 2,500-year-old Varanasi on Tuesday, March 7. Immediately, the political party that claims to

Rang de Bizarre

editor@ibnlive.com — Tue, 21 Feb 2006 09:47:53 +0530
Five badly behaved but photogenic young louts, and their hanger-on girl, regularly gather at night at a geographical feature resembling the Grand Canyon. There they take deep slugs of beer.

Re-write the Purusa-Sukta

editor@ibnlive.com — Thu, 09 Feb 2006 01:46:41 +0530
There is a wonderful work on the Indian caste system called Homo Hierarchicus by Louis Dumont. Some critics have called Dumont's book an oversimplification, others have called it Orientalist, but

An old party needs new gatecrashers

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 12:54:18 +0530
The Husain Sagar lake in Hyderabad is almost as well known for its suicides as its beauty. Across Rayalseema, Telengana and coastal Andhra, farmers drink endosulfan pesticide to end their

The argumentative Hindu

editor@ibnlive.com — Sat, 31 Dec 2005 04:06:58 +0530
Lal Krishna Advani is not your average Mr Nice Guy. He described the Ayodhya movement that led to the demolition of the Babri masjid in 1992, as a mass awakening

Corrupt MP or BIMARU MP?

editor@ibnlive.com — Fri, 30 Dec 2005 04:28:19 +0530
Gosh, what a turbulent winter session of parliament! First the drama over the Volcker Committee report and the exit of Natwar Singh. Then the daily walkouts over the NDA's ridiculous