The conceit of the anti-democrat
Those who do not subscribe to the elite narrative on corruption are considered politically backward and their democratic choices unworthy of respect
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44 comments
A handshake across the Himalayas
China and India are destined to be together. They should work hand in hand if Asia is to become the anchor of world peace
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15 comments
When the levee breaks
Last August, Ojulu sat smoking a cigarette outside his thatch-roofed hut in Pino village when a rising tide of water seeped through the reed fence. “The water came in the morning,” Ojulu said, “An...
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4 comments
Time to put garbage on the table
With no long-term planning and policy reforms, the country’s burgeoning waste management problem is set to become a health and environmental crisis
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12 comments
Wanted, an Afghan statesman
With prospects for peace in Afghanistan and the region at stake, Hamid Karzai needs to end the uncertainties surrounding next year’s presidential election
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7 comments
RECENT OPINION LEADERS
May 16, 2013
A to-do list for the new Law Minister
With only a year to go before the Lok Sabha elections, the new Law Minister has his work cut out for him. On paper, Kapil Sibal is perhaps the United Progressive Alliance’s best man for the job. A...
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18 comments
May 14, 2013
India’s defence needs FDI
Last Friday, the Ministry of Defence took yet another step to signal that it is serious about turning around the pathetic state of India’s defence industry. It did so by requesting proposals from...
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33 comments
May 12, 2013
Frontiers without doctors
India has achieved major organisational and technological successes but the health system’s performance is abysmal. This cannot be attributed to poverty. It is poor health that places India 134th...
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7 comments
May 10, 2013
France confronts its famous malaise
A year ago, there was a sense of euphoria in France. Francois Hollande had just swept Nicolas Sarkozy and his Conservatives out of power, and the Socialists were jubilant over a hard-won victory f...
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4 comments
May 8, 2013
When development triggers caste violence
On the evening of November 7, 2012, a crowd numbering over 1000 people burst into three Dalit settlements in Dharmapuri, north-western Tamil Nadu, and laid them waste. Over a period of several hou...
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18 comments
May 6, 2013
Between life and death, the crucial difference
The Supreme Court, in the course of just one month, has rendered two judgments that appear to be contradictory. As both the judgments have been rendered by the same Bench, comprising two judges, t...
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5 comments
May 4, 2013
Weapon that has more than symbolic value
Since India became a declared nuclear weapon state in May 1998, there has been a concerted campaign, particularly by non-proliferation lobbies in western countries, echoed by analysts in China and...
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21 comments
May 2, 2013
An ecosystem to save, or squander
This is a challenging time in India’s development history where a number of tenets of environmental governance are being questioned by the imperative of growth. Environmental governance in India i...
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11 comments
May 15, 2013
Two neighbours, and dealing with them
When I worked in the Prime Minister’s Office of Indira Gandhi from 1981 to 1984, she told me that she could visualise a time in the future when India and Pakistan would have normal, even friendly,...
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14 comments
May 13, 2013
Fomenting hemispheric hostility
Wrapping up a lightning tour of Latin America — the first of his second term and his sixth overall — United States President Barack Obama this week summed up his views on the hemisphere in fond re...
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7 comments
May 11, 2013
Minorities in a Naya Pakistan
Naya Pakistan is the new buzzword in the country. It is the campaign slogan of Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, and it speaks to those who are seeking not only a new leadership but also new...
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9 comments
May 9, 2013
Beware the lemming impulse
Israel and the West are on the brink of making a suicidal mistake in Syria, and only one man can prevent it. That man is the United States President, Barack Obama. As recent reports in the New...
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13 comments
May 7, 2013
The false allure of liberating CBI
As a nation we remain self-absorbed in our own hypocrisies. And perhaps there is no greater misconceived a hypocrisy than the notion that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) should be — and,...
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68 comments
May 5, 2013
Sunny future
Solar is the most secure of all energy sources, since it is abundantly available in India. With crippling electricity shortages, the price of electricity traded internally touched Rs. 7 a unit for...
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20 comments
May 3, 2013
America’s politics of convenience
After the Boston Marathon bombers struck on April 15, killing four in their wake and injuring 264, the initial caution about ethno-religious stereotyping of “Islamic extremists” appears to have gi...
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27 comments