Category Archives: Articles

Girilal Jain, who died last week, was one of India’s foremost journalists. He discussed the changing face of Indian journalism in an interview with Chandan Mitra, then editor of The Sunday Observer, in October 1990. Excerpts: What in your opinion is the most fundamental change Indian journalism has undergone during … Read More →

On reflection, Mr P V Narasimha Rao should be regretting the message of congratulations he sent to Mr Nawaz Sharif on the latter’s reinstatement as Pakistan’s prime minister by that country’s supreme court in an unprecedented display of ‘independence’. Mr Sharif survives in office but precariously. The prime minister’s own … Read More →

Not many of our politicians can be said to be overburdened with principles. But hardly any one of them can be said to be a practitioner of realpolitik either. This paradox is not particularly difficult to explain. Our politicians are mostly small-time operators who do not allow any principle, or … Read More →

AFTER Mr John Mallot’s visitation to New Delhi, it difficult to believe that there exists a realistic basis for Indo-US under­standing and cooperation in the near future. All fond hopes in this regard have turned out to be illusions. Mr Mallot could not have been more patronizing and insulting. As … Read More →

THE Kerala government’s decision to make Friday the weekly holiday in place of Sunday for Muslim-majority schools in the state has attracted criticism from some Muslim leaders and intellec­tuals on the ground that while such “token” gestures do not help solve problems of the community’s “educational, economic and social backwardness”, … Read More →

Pakistan may well have reached the end of the road and it may not be possible for it to take a turn back. To suggest this possibility is not to dramatize the reality and certainly not to underestimate the damage it can inflict on our country weighed down by corruption, … Read More →

The external affairs ministry’s response to the Organisation of Islamic Conference’s unqualified endorsement of Pakistan’s stand on Jammu and Kashmir is under­standable as a public stance. Only one sentence, which suggests that it feels entitled to membership of this forum of Muslim states, is excep­tionable. Apparently, some smart Alec in … Read More →

Pakistan faces a period of grave uncertainty, possibly the gravest since its birth, in both international and domestic terms. The current upheaval resulting from the clash between   President Ghulam Ishaq Khan and Mr Nawaz Sharif, and the latter’s dismissal from the office of prime minister, only spotlights this reality. The … Read More →

While the CPM’s decision to vote against the Union budget is not likely to bring down the Narasimha Rao government, it unsettles the much trumpeted plan to forge a common anti-BJP front. For it shows that the CPM, which has to be a key player in such a front, has … Read More →