Nijjar-Pannun Episodes Show India Is a Victim of Its Own Vishwaguru Propaganda
In his piece for The Indian Express, Sanjaya Baru – political commentator and media advisor of the erstwhile Prime Minister of India, Dr Manmohan Singh – argues that the Indian government is “imparting a false sense of pride and confidence” with their continually proffered ‘Vishwaguru’ narrative, despite having “limited geopolitical space” in the global context.
From time to time, when the going gets good, New Delhi’s political leaders imagine that India has “arrived”. In the past, there were any number of individuals and institutions who put in place some balancers to such thinking. Over the past decade, every such institution has been intellectually corrupted into joining the political bandwagon. India is not yet a “Vishwaguru”. India is not yet an “indispensable” power. India’s influence in its own neighbourhood has gone down in this past decade.Sanjaya Baru, for The Indian Express
Referring to the accusations levied against an Indian government official by the United States Department of Justice, of plotting to mow down Khalistani separatist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, Baru alleges the Indian policy-makers are being the victims of their self-created phantasmagoria, wherein, a delusional overestimation has resulted in the coalescence of “rhetoric & reality.”
Pick Your Horses in Five Elections
As India awaits the results of the assembly elections in five states, Member of Parliament and former Minister of Finance, P Chidambaram predicts the outcomes and their subsequent repercussions in his piece for The Indian Express.
The stakes are high for the Congress which is in play in all the five states. The BJP is in play in only three states where it is in direct contest with the Congress – Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. Its fortunes have rapidly declined in Telangana resulting in a direct contest between the BRS (the incumbent) and the Congress. In Mizoram, the principal players are the two regional parties, MNF (the incumbent) and ZPM. Given the past record, the Congress is a third player, the BJP is a pretender.P Chidambaram, for The Indian Express
Envisaging a Congress triumph in Chattishgarh, a surprise in Telangana, and nip and tuck contests in Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, Chidambaram claims the results – albeit not to be considered a “forerunner to the national election” – will decide the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) “principal challenger” in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
In Delhi Murder Verdict, a Plea To Make Cities Safe
As the four convicted in the murder of journalist Soumya Vishwanath were sentenced to life imprisonment, 25 years after the crime was committed in Delhi, Lalita Panicker pleads for safe urban mobility, especially for women, in her piece for Hindustan Times.
Anyone who has used public transport like buses or trains can attest to the fact that the system is designed much more for able-bodied men than for women, children, the elderly and differently-abled persons. This might affect their access to public transport for different reasons like education, economic opportunities and leisure activities. Lack of safety and the increase in crimes against women in public spaces and public transport are significant factors for the declining female labour force participation rate in India.Lalita Panicker, for Hindustan Times
Averring ways of making the Indian cities more safe, Panicker says the focus should be on “youth-led decision making,” wherein, the nation’s “informed and active” youth will lead the drive for a future that is more inclusive and invulnerable.
There’s a Growing Loneliness Economy To Tap
Writing for Economic Times, Indian Statistical Institute professor Atanu Biswas claims the ever-expanding global plight of loneliness has effectuated the emergence of a nascent – and still, largely untapped – “marketing opportunity goldmine.”
Deemed the 'loneliness economy,' an expanding cohort of businesses is sensing the opportunity to provide attractive, marketed relationships as a means of reducing social isolation. The promise of facilitated human contact has turned into a marketing opportunity goldmine, as evidenced by the proliferation of co-living and collaborative workspaces, not to mention thousands of dating sites. A number of services - such as providing rented companions, hugging apps, massive open online courses, robot pets - have rapidly become popular in different countries.Atanu Biswas, for Economic Times
Amid the success of dating apps, and the subsequent creation of loneliness deterrents, Biswas argues the “most ineffable human problem” could be solved by a booming business plausibility.
Choice That’s Not a Choice
Not predicting results, but analysing campaigns of BJP and Congress in the assembly elections across five states, political columnist Tavleen Singh claims the Indian voters are being made to choose between two “clones”, who turned to “freebies” as the last resort of tipping the scales in their favour, in her piece for The Indian Express.
Is it not time for Modi to rediscover that poverty needs elimination and not alleviation? This ugly word has been the Congress Party's favourite for too long. It requires poverty to always exist so that leaders like Rahul Gandhi can wander about showing empathy (always on camera) with people who remain disadvantaged and desperate after decades of poverty alleviation. He has managed in quite an extraordinary way to turn this carefully choreographed noblesse oblige into his main economic policy. Poverty alleviation has been, for very long, the mainstay of Congress economics, and its only real achievement has been to confine millions of Indians in the degradation of extreme poverty.Tavleen Singh, for The Indian Express
Elaborating on how handouts-heavy schemes are being furnished to win over the voters, Singh argues it will only result in a fund inadequacy for “real development” – that is – good schools, healthcare, roads, sanitation, housing and electricity.
On Identity, Comfort and Uniforms
Citing a personal anecdote where a female security guard spoke about the discomfort of changing her sari for the duty uniform, author Anuradha Goyal argues about the desideratum of uniforms in workforces where dress codes do little to delineate someone’s identity, in her piece for The New Indian Express.
When and where and why did we decide that tight-fitting synthetic uniforms, absolutely unfit for our weather, must be worn by people in service industries? Why do women have to wear men’s clothing irrespective of their comfort levels? If you say it helps you being agile, then please tell me if you can run more comfortably in a well fitted ladies’ suit or ill-fitting tight pants that makes you conscious because you are not used to wearing it.Anuradha Goyal, for The New Indian Express
Referring to the “colonial hangover” of schools still sticking to ties, despite its incompatibility with the hot and humid Indian climate, Goyal speaks about the need of reassessing the redundancy of uncomfortable uniforms.
Is Green an Islamic Colour?
Writing for Mid-Day, mythologist and author Devdutt Pattanaik debunks the “Sanatani Hindutva” notion of a presumptive association between the colour green and Islam, whilst, on the contrary, the colour has multiple sacred connotations in Hindu mythology.
Since green is the dominant colour of the Pakistan flag, many Sanatani Hindutva folks see it as the colour of Islam. They downplay this colour which is part of the Indian flag, and prefer orange instead. In doing so, they wipe out the ancient Hindu legacy of using green colour for gods and goddesses.Devdutt Pattanaik, for Mid-Day
Goddess Gauri – states Pattanaik – is often draped in green to represent nature’s fertility after monsoon rains, while Mysore paintings portray Lord Rama in green, owing to it being the colour of love-god Kama, in Natya Shastra.
Why India Must Gird Itself for Pak-Afghan Showdown
Referring to Hashmatullah Shahidi – captain of Afghanistan men’s cricket team – dedicating his team’s triumph over Pakistan to the 1.7 million Afghan refugees in Pakistan who are being deported, former Union minister Manish Tewari argues the ongoing Pak-Afghan conflict has presented India with a “unique opportunity” to strengthen diplomatic ties with the latter, in his piece for Deccan Chronicle.
The current state of affairs between Pakistan and Afghanistan provides a unique opportunity to India. The Taliban may not be India’s preferred choice but statecraft is on the basis of given reality. How then should India approach that Taliban-controlled territory? Through finetuned calibration. For starters, letting the Afghan Embassy run by the representatives of the erstwhile regime shut shop in Delhi may not have been the most pragmatic thing to do. It decreased India’s leverage.Manish Tewari, for Deccan Chronicle
Tewari makes a case for offering “humanitarian assistance” to Afghanistan, provided the Taliban offers relaxation on their restraint – especially on women – as Pakistan continue demanding the expulsion of rebels.
Henry Kissinger, the Dark Lord of Foreign Policy
Writing about Henry Kissinger – the United States' Secretary of State to Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford – foreign policy commentator Shyam Bhatia recalls the quondam contemptuous American views about India in his piece for The New Indian Express.
Their derogatory slang, coupled with a sense of racial and intellectual superiority, invokes comparisons with British colonials such as Winston Churchill, for whom Indians were a “beastly people with a beastly religion” and who said, “All Indian leaders will be of low calibre and men of straw.” Kissinger used similar language more than 25 years after the end of the Second World War when he described Indira Gandhi as a ‘bitch’ and Indians as ‘bastards’. The context was Mrs Gandhi’s November 1971 visit to Washington, when she tried to head off the looming Bangladesh liberation war in East Pakistan.Shyam Bhatia, for The New Indian Express
Stating how Kissinger was responsible for preventing India from “overrunning” Pakistan in 1971, and also encouraging China to “take action” against India in the same year, Bhatia reflects on the significant amelioration of Indo-American ties since then.
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