The Ram Janambhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute has brought to the fore the critical issue of the nature of the Indian State as nothing else has since partition and independence in 1947. The secularist-versus-Hindu-Rashtra controversy is, of course, not new. In fact, it has been with us since the twenties when some … Read More
It is as easy to empathise with, and indeed even admire, Chandra Shekhar as it is to predict that the government he has chosen to set up and head may not last more than a few months. The first point can be taken care of quite quickly. If VP Singh … Read More
It is not particularly surprising either that ‘secular’ nationalism and ‘Hindu’ nationalism should be treated by a number of Westernized intellectuals as if they were polar opposites or that their hostility towards the principal exponent of Hindu nationalism, the Bharatiya Janata Party, should have become unusually sharp and bitter in … Read More
His earlier promise (or threat) to be ready to move to the opposition benches notwithstanding (September 17 aboard the plane on the way back from the Mandal rally in Madras), it could have been easily predicted, as it was in this column last Sunday, that V.P. Singh will not resign … Read More
The BJP leadership deserves to be warmly commended for its October 17 decision to withdraw support from the VP Singh government in case the latter blocks LK Advani’s rathyatra to Ayodhya and the construction of the proposed Rama temple at the Janmabhoomi site in that holy city. In a basic … Read More
As in 1940 when the demand for a separate homeland was put forward by the Muslim League, Indian Muslims stand on a crossroads 50 years later today. As then, they have taken a wrong turn, this time on the Ram Janambhoomi issue. As then, they have been egged on by … Read More
It is not for us as observers either to commend or condemn acts of self-immolation by young boys and girls, many of them still in their teens, in protest against V.P. Singh’s decision to implement the Mandal Commission ‘report’. We can only try to understand the phenomenon and its possible … Read More
Regardless of what happens in coming days and weeks the issue is joined, as never before since independence, between the forces of national integration and disintegration. This is the implication of the widespread student revolt against V.P. Singh’s decision to Mandalise India, with the students representing the forces of national … Read More
Ill-conceived, if not unprincipled, anti-Congressism has produced a Frankenstein which threatens to overwhelm not only many of its architects but also the country itself. If steps are not taken quickly enough to contain the monster, it will inflict enormous damage on us all. To put it plainly, the government headed … Read More
The bell tolls for Raja V.P. Singh. He has to go. The question is how and when. The search for a new leader has started in the Janata Dal in right earnest. Biju Patnaik appears to have taken the initiative, though he would not admit it. At the time of … Read More
