In these troubled times, and despite what the apologists for a particular political regime want to say, these are definitely troubled times; three thousand Catholics, over half of them the rural poor, congregated at a church in Patna to acknowledge the source of their faith. And for so many who came, this was an act […]
I attended the First Vinay Kanth Memorial Lecture at the Bharatiya Nritya Kala Mandir conference hall. One reason I went was to ‘catch up’ with familiar faces I knew would be there , ( fully well knowing that most of the catching up would be a wave, a smile, and a nod), but it would […]
It is indeed ironical that on the day the government ‘celebrates’ Balika Divas, a posse of male policemen let loose their ire on a girl student in Benaras Hindu University and beat her up. The girl was part of a larger gathering of students who were protesting the callous, disgustingly patriarchal , and insensitive attitude […]
Sometime between Deepawali and Chhat, news trickled in from the vernacular press that a four year old girl had been abused by two women teachers at the prestigious St. Xavier’s School in Patna,the capital of Bihar. At first glance, one was not amused.Having been associated with the campaign against child abuse in Bihar since 1997, […]
The festive season is upon us with less of the festive ‘spirit’ in the Boondocks of Bihar. By now, every dhobi and his donkey knows that this blessed state is dry. The Chief Minister in his role as Master Nanny has shut down the elite watering holes and deprived the well heeled of their single […]
The politically motivated post-mortem of the ‘surgical strikes’ of September 29 are enough to make all sensible Indians queasy. Looking at the way politicians and their supporters on both sides of the political and ideological divide have tried to milk this incident on TV and the social media has made me want to puke. As […]
India’s sportspeople with ‘different abilities’ did even better than the ‘normal athletes’, bringing home Olympic gold. Will events like the Paralympics change our views about the ‘physically challenged’? The prevailing view of disability in the past was where the individual was seen as ill and the condition was an individual ‘problem’. Perceptions of disability were […]
The most striking thing about Saint Teresa of Calcutta is her simple slogan and sign language used when asked why on earth she was doing what she did… scrounging for souls in the blackest alleyways the world over. Her answer, five fingers of her tiny palm spread out, practically in your face would be : […]
Ever since the ‘new dispensation’ of the Right Wing BJP has come to power, the nature of public discourse has shifted from ‘development’ to ‘demagogy’. Never before have such regressive narratives been heard than in the past two years. Just pause to think about what topics are hitting the airwaves over the past month or so. […]
The political climate of India is fast becoming critically polarised. The nature of discourse is being vitiated by divisive, shallow diatribe. Parliament, supposedly the platform for enlightened, purposeful discussion and farsighted legislation has been all but reduced to a ridiculous circus of shallow, shouting, sloganeering, and slanderous attention seekers. Where the political leadership in the […]
While the flavour of the month is climate change and the environment, let’s consider a new World Bank study on ‘Leveraging Urbanization in South Asia: Managing Spatial Transformation for Prosperity and Livability’. Quite a mouthful, that title! Making cities “inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable” is one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) adopted by […]
Bihar ranks first among the states in terms of rural housing shortage (42.10 lakhs), says census data. Back in 1947, Bihar was probably the first state in the country to enact a separate law, namely the Bihar Privileged Persons Homestead Tenancy Act, for providing security of tenure to landless rural households. Since then the Bihar […]
