South Asia Citizens Web

Most of its population are still poor. The row over British aid shows how many people confuse rapid growth with wealth. . . . aid – which is about poor people, not poor countries.

The Sangh Parivar is systematically following its “Indianisation reforms” in schools run by its affiliates.

Contrary to the dominant narrative that areas where Naxalites are strong are where the state has been absent, for the last 100-150 years, there has been a gradual expansion of the state in tribal areas regardless of whether the people want it or not. However, the state has been expanding in the wrong areas. You have an extension of the forest department, the bureaucracy, the patwari and the forest guard. But at the same time there is no state presence in the form of school teachers, healthcare workers and other services.

Anti-globalisation activists often called themselves anti-capitalist, and used the terms interchangeably. But if globalisation is capitalism by another name, why not simply call it capitalism? Substituting ‘globalisation’ for ‘capitalism’ implies that the real enemy is international capital: and that is dangerous. Opposition to global capital has been a defining feature of fascism since Hitler wrote, in Mein Kampf, ‘that the hardest battle would have to be fought not against hostile nations but against international capital’. At best, selective opposition to international capital propagates the illusion that capitalism can solve problems of poverty and unemployment so long as it remains national. At worst, it condones barbaric oppression and exploitation by indigenous capitalists, and encourages racism and xenophobia. Globalisation may be a phase of capitalism, but anti-globalisation can never be anti-capitalist, because genuine opposition to capitalism doesn’t distinguish between ‘national’ and ‘international’ capital, or support the former against the latter.

“I have submitted through my nine affidavits to the Nanavati commission so far which provide unchallengeable evidences about the sabotage of Criminal Justice system, intimidation of witnesses, use of punishment and rewards to coerce officers to implement Modi governments covert agenda of Hindu sectarian mobilization. But all these have been ignored by the SIT,’’ Sreekumar’s letter says.

The former DGP further states that even after submitting the evidence to the SIT in 2008, he was neither called for examination nor made a witness during the ongoing trial in the riot case of naroda patiya [Gujarat]. See full text of the letter.