South Asia Citizens Web

Perhaps the left can learn few things also from neighbouring Nepal which shares similar social composition like our Indian society and has been undergoing tremendous churning and where leftists of various hues find themselves in better appreciation of caste question

As news filtered in of extended life sentences for 31 persons for the brutal slaughter 10 years ago in Naroda Patiya, a working-class suburb of Ahmedabad, my eyes clouded over. I remembered my first meetings with the traumatised survivors of the massacre in the crowded relief camps in the city, a full decade earlier. I was heartsick and stunned by their stories of incredible cruelty. I wondered if they would ever heal and hope again, and how we would defend the idea of India from the assaults of hatred

Is the term fascism relevant to India? The answer lies in what we understand by the term. I use it generically, to refer to the emergence of right-wing dictatorships marked by ultra-nationalist ideologies, the abolition of the rule of law and the destruction of democratic institutions. Fascism invades the public sphere with controlled mobs, and possesses a genocidal instinct towards imaginary “internal enemies.” There were many ingredients to this exterminism, including Social-Darwinism and eugenics. But the articulation of national unity via the bestowal of an inferior status upon an entire community was a central feature.

After mushroom growth of seminaries, organised religious groups and some alleged extremist outfits are now making significant inroads into the education sector by opening and operating English medium schools in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Fata to compete with the conventional private educational institutions.

Television documentary about the expelled maoist Sabyasachi Panda’s letter to the maoist party leaders in India on the question of violence and democracy.