Forthright
The Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act was enacted for a compelling and necessary purpose: to protect vulnerable communities from genuine discrimination, humiliation, violence, wrongful dispossession, and atrocities. There can be no argument against such protection. But precisely because the law is powerful, its provisions cannot be allowed to become a convenient…
The Delhi Police appears to have learnt something from the Jantar Mantar experience. With more than 700 protesters detained on October 2 during the demonstration demanding the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, the message is clear: the administration does not want a political protest to turn into a law-and-order challenge. But the real…
The Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games were expected to be another opportunity for Bharat to consolidate its emergence as a serious sporting power in Asia. Instead, the campaign has raised uncomfortable questions. Whatever the final tally when the Games conclude on Sunday, the contrast with Hangzhou 2023 is too stark to be brushed aside as a statistical…
There is a difference between exposing genuine weaknesses in Bharat’s education system and constructing an exaggerated narrative around them. The latest portrayal by The Economist, with its description of Bharat’s education system as a “misery machine” and its suggestion that young people are being driven towards rebellion, appears to cross that line. The problem is…
The Narendra Modi government appears to have finally decided that demographic change cannot remain a subject of political whispers, partisan accusations or selective outrage. The Union Home Ministry’s decision to seek detailed, district-wise and religion-wise information from States and Union Territories is therefore significant—not because it prejudges the outcome, but because a nation of Bharat’s…
The BJP has spent years making parivarvaad one of its most potent political weapons against the Congress. Prime Minister Narendra Modi repeatedly attacks dynastic politics, entitlement and the tendency of political families to treat public life as hereditary property. Fair enough. But there is an uncomfortable question the BJP cannot duck: Does its anti-dynasty principle…
The Opposition has every constitutional right to question the government, scrutinise institutions and protest against policies it disagrees with. But there is a line between legitimate opposition and repeatedly casting constitutional institutions in a political light without establishing the charge. The Election Commission of India cannot become the latest casualty of this politics. With the…
The Delhi court’s decision to allow US national Matthew Aaron VanDyke, an accused in an NIA case involving alleged links with ethnic armed groups and training in drone warfare, to travel back to the United States raises questions that go far beyond the individual case. The issue is not whether an accused is entitled to…
Yesterday it was Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. Today it is Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. Tomorrow, who knows? The Cockroach Janta Party (CJP), which began as a satirical digital movement and has rapidly transformed itself into a national pressure group, now believes it can issue 48-hour ultimatums to constitutional authorities and threaten nationwide agitation…
There is a growing tendency in a section of the media to manufacture a controversy first and explain the facts later. The latest attempt revolves around the Election Commission of India and the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. What is being presented as evidence of an institutional rupture may, on closer examination, simply…
