Column

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the father of the nation, did say that he is a Hindu; at the same time he went on to say that religion is a private matter for him. His greatest disciple Jawaharlal Nehru was a rationalist agnostic. He laid the foundations of secular India where the matters related to religion were supposed to be dealt with at social or personal level. Nearly six decades after the death

Banning of books, opposing cricket team and singers from Pakistan is not very new in India. We had seen the banning of Satanic Verses, digging of cricket pitch in Wankhede stadium in Mumbai to oppose the Indo-Pak match, the disruption of the gazal program of Ghulam Ali in Mumbai amongst many others. The intensity of this intolerance has grown by leaps and bounds in the recent times. The music

Adityanath Yogi, Chief Minister of UP seems to be on the name changing spree. In his latest move he has changed the name of famous city of UP, Allahabad to Prayagraj. Prayag is the meeting point of rivers and since this city is the meeting point of Ganga, Yamuna and probably of invisible Sarswati, this name might have been chosen by him in his attempts to remove the Islamic touch to the names of

We live in a democratic society where all of us supposed to be equal. In pre-industrial society the inequality was very much there and it was based on birth. In Indian society this inequality, the one based on birth, pertained to caste and gender. Leftovers of this inequality are very much there even in today’s society. One aspect of this has been pertaining to entry of women in places of worship

Do organizations say what they intend to do? Not necessarily. This came out clearly from the three long lectures by RSS Sarsanghchalak Mohan Bhagwat. The event was supposed to be a dialogue, but the maximum of dialogue one could see was his answering few questions at the end of lectures. This normal practice of answering the questions was underlined strongly, as probably this must have been novel

The violence in Bheema Koregon is still reverberating. We recall that on January 1st, thousands of dalits returning from Bheema Koregaon were beaten up. In that context the names of Milind Ekbote and Sambhaji Bhide cropped up as the instigators of violence. The probe is on. In the context of this earlier five activists, Mahesh Raut, Rona Wilson, Surendra Gadling, Shoma Sen and Sudhir Dhawale

Like people of all regions and religions, a large number of Hindus have been migrating to all the parts of world. The reason behind this is better pastures and better living standards in those places. In most parts of the world one can see a substantial number of Hindus and people of Indian origin. The concentration of these émigrés is particularly more in richer countries. Earlier large number of

With the loss of Atal Bihari Vajpayee, the ex-Prime minster of India, many obituaries poured in praising his liberalism and amicable nature. Many of them described him as ‘Right man in the wrong party’. This is the most prevalent image about him. He is perceived as a Right man for his accommodating nature during Governments under his leadership. His brilliant oratory stands out without any doubt

Recently anti-dalit atrocity laws were first diluted inserting the clause of anticipatory bail. Following this there were serious protests all over. In these protests, the anti dalit nature of present ruling dispensation, BJP led NDA was highlighted. Under the pressure of the protests, the government had to bring in a bill to restore its previous provisions. The Lok Sabha on Monday (August 6, 2018

The violence against religious minorities has been on the rise during last few years. Many a reports tell us not only about the overall rise in the violence but also about the portents of violence orchestrated in the name of Mother Cow and nationalism in recent times. It has increased the insecurity among the religious minorities to no end; leading to ghettotization, which has started affecting