India Archive
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Understanding Tamil Nadu’s commitment to public services: An institutional perspective
Posted on December 31, 2010 | No CommentsMy doctoral dissertation on the question of why Tamil Nadu has an impressive commitment to providing basic public services such as roads, water, electricity and education. -
Why even those who oppose Naxalism should support Binayak Sen
Posted on December 31, 2010 | No CommentsBinayak Sen has just received a life-term jail sentence for sedition or waging war against the state. The specific crime, according to the judgement, was that he conveyed three letters written by a Maoist leader to a Calcutta-based trader. This was supported by a broader claim that Binayak Sen and his wife Ilina have known Maoists, and that Binayak even had Maoist literature at his home! Callous evidence The evidence presented for the critical claims of the case have been disputed. He met Narayan Sanyal several times in jail, under the supervision of jailors and was searched before and after... -
Toothpaste, hair oil, and democracy
Posted on December 15, 2010 | No CommentsA recent survey says that Dalits of Uttar Pradesh have started using toothpaste and hair oil more regularly. Will it have an impact on democracy? Economic and Political Weekly recently carried the report of the survey by Devesh Kapur and others (Kapur et al. 2010). The paper argued that there have been important changes in grooming, eating practices and ceremonial consumption patterns of Dalits, and in general a rapid erosion of discriminatory practices that stigmatised the Dalits of Uttar Pradesh. This interesting survey draws attention to perceived discrimination, and how it has changed since the 1990s. The authors draw attention... -
Has the Bihari citizen spoken?
Posted on December 11, 2010 | No CommentsThe 2010 Bihar election clearly reflected people’s voice, but sustained engagement by all sections of the society would be required for these voices to shape the government. In a press conference following the massive victory in the election, the Chief Minister Nitish Kumar remembered the massive changes that have happened in the electoral atmosphere of Bihar. As soon as the election got over, we would visit hospitals or families of dead people. It did not look like an election; it looked like war, he recalled. He also characterised erstwhile strategies of political parties during elections as logon ka kayal kam,... -
Should India seek a position in the Security Council?
Posted on October 12, 2010 | No CommentsEver since I got interested in foreign policy issues during my high school days, there has been one strident demand by India’s Ministry of External Affairs: to get a permanent membership in the Security Council of United Nations. Today, India re-entered the Security Council by being elected as a non-permanent member, a post it will hold for the next two years. This has been greeted with euphoria in the country, and some are hoping that the clout of this position can help India to bargain for a permanent seat in the Security Council with its veto power. India has consistently... -
Fatehpur Sikri: Non-stop harassment of tourists
Posted on August 5, 2010 | No CommentsVisit to Fatehpur Sikri, a gorgeous world-heritage monument, became a nightmare thanks to non-stop harassment by “guides” and others. I recently visited Fatehpur-Sikri near Agra with my friend, Dr. K, and faced the worst harassment I ever have in my life (to give you the context, she is a tall-blonde-white-American girl). The process starts at least 2 KMs before one could reach the 16th century monument. Our taxi driver warned us to lock the doors of our car well before we could enter the area, and we realized why in just a few minutes. A gang of “guides” tried to... -
Thoughts on Tamil television
Posted on June 1, 2010 | No CommentsThere is almost an invariant formula for a Tamil television serial: a catchy title song with an amateurish dance, three units of sentiment, one unit of crying (with joy or sorrow), and one unit of suspense towards the end. The formula gets repeated at least ten times a day across television channels. Where is imagination? — The schizophrenia of the production houses between producing movies and television is fascinating. Women in Tamil television come through as strong, thinking, acting characters. The woman of the movies is typically a diva in trouble dependent on the hero to be rescued. Heroes have... -
Asset creation in private lands using NREGA: Problems & opportunities
Posted on September 24, 2009 | No CommentsNational Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) is primarily a programme aimed at creating public assets that would be useful for the society at large. When NREGA was created, it relaxed this principle by allowing projects in private lands of selected marginalised communities including SCs and STs. The Minister for Rural Development is now trying to extend this by permitting works in private lands owned by small and marginal farmers who are not SCs and STs. This proposal has been welcomed by some like Mihir Shah and has been sharply criticised by Aruna Roy and Jean Drèze among others. I believe... -
What is NREGA-2?
Posted on September 11, 2009 | No CommentsThe Minister for Rural Development, Mr C P Joshi has announced that he will revamp NREGA with some major changes, and the new scheme of things has been informally labelled “NREGA-2”. News reports have indicated that the new scheme will be unveiled on the birthday of Rajiv Gandhi. As of now the Ministry has not made available for public discussion the set of changes that will be made, but some ideas have been making their way to the media periodically. This article synthesizes these ideas, and provides links to articles debating the so-called NREGA-2. -
Salsa in Madras: Social dance in a conservative city
Posted on September 3, 2009 | No CommentsMadras is one of those conservative cities that likes to keep its boys and girls at a safe distance. To take an example, parents clamour to get their children enrolled in colleges that are rather strict about this, and colleges have responded to this with enthusiasm. One famous college made a rule that girls will sit at the front of the college bus and boys behind and there will be a firewall of teachers in between. To counter this attraction other colleges have come up with separate roads and staircases inside the campus for boys and girls. In this context...
