Voting Is Not the End of Responsibilities
With the NDA (National Democratic Alliance) securing a landslide victory in the Bihar Assembly elections, P Chidambaram asks why the results were the way they were despite high unemployment, poverty, and migration.
In his weekly column for The Indian Express, the former Finance Minister highlights the roles played by several stakeholders, including Tejashwi Yadav, Rahul Gandhi, and Prashant Kishor—including where they might have gone wrong on the campaign trail.
Most of all, he makes the argument that the Election Commission played a "questionable" role by announcing the SIR exercise on the eve of the polls.
"The ECI turned a blind eye to the Mukhyamantri Mahila Rojgar Yojana that was launched by the prime minister ten days before the polling dates were announced. The transfer of Rs 10,000 was started before the announcement and continued during the campaign period; the ECI did not stop it at any stage. The money transfer was a blatant bribe to the voters."P Chidambaram
Death Defied
In an article for The Telegraph, Gopalkrishna Gandhi pays homage to the character of Durga in Satyajit Ray's cult classic Pather Panchali.
As 18 November 2025 will mark a year since the passing of Uma Dasgupta, the actor who portrayed Durga, Gandhi writes, "Uma knew Durga. Uma became Durga," adding, "Durga in the story is its life, its soul. Uma is Durga’s life and her soul."
He adds that Pather Panchali and its Durga are "deathless" not because as a story they are so, but because the characters are not studio figures and have been choreographed "by life from life".
"Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay and Satyajit Ray have written and directed their great works. But each one of us scripts and directs them each time we read, see or recall them. With Durga who is Uma and Uma who is Durga by our side."Gopalkrishna Gandhi
Zohran Mamdani’s Multitudes and India’s Soft Power
"He may not represent India formally, yet he reflects some of its finest possibilities—pluralism, intellectual curiosity, and the capacity to juggle contradictions," writes Nirupama Rao in an article in The New Indian Express, speaking about New York mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani.
Rao says that at a time when politics seems to crystallise difference, Mamdani embodies the opposite impulse: fluidity.
"He is of Hindu and Muslim descent, Indian and African, American by citizenship but global by imagination—he stands as a reminder that identity is layered and has multiple convergences," Rao writes, adding:
"Celebrating Mamdani’s story is not about claiming him. It is about recognising the Indian imagination at work in the wider world—the idea that many truths can coexist, that one can be rooted without being lost. His lineage and sensibility mirror the subcontinent’s own civilisational trait: synthesis. We are not a monolith, but a mosaic."Nirupama Rao
From Smog to Silence
In an article for Greater Kashmir, Surinder Singh Oberoi speaks about the repetitive cycle that plays out each year, with Delhi NCR getting englufed by smog during the winter—and how different stakeholders, including politicians, doctors, and meteorologists, react "always late, always in panic, and always as if surprised".
Calling it a "well-rehearsed tragedy", Oberoi says that once the air clears, our conscience clears with it, and we go back to our old routines until the next November.
"This is not a natural disaster. It is a man-made failure of policy, of governance, and most dangerously, of civic sense," Oberoi says, adding:
"That question must haunt not only policymakers but every Delhiite. Where is the accountability? Why have Supreme Court orders, environmental fines, and public outrage yielded so little? Why has Delhi, the seat of India’s political power, become its environmental embarrassment? Every winter, Delhi becomes a cautionary tale. The world watches in disbelief as Delhi turns unlivable."Surinder Singh Oberoi
India’s Merger Debate: Bigger Banks or Better Banks?
With another round of public sector bank mergers on the horizon, says TCA Ranganathan, policymakers are again signalling ambition to create “world-class” institutions.
In an opinion piece for Deccan Herald, Ranganathan argues that while bigger banks are presumed to be stronger, more resilient, and globally relevant, India's economic structure raises doubts about whether size alone can deliver competitiveness or resilience.
"India’s PSB system does not lack scale or ambition, it lacks agility," he writes, adding:
"Granting increased independence will require greater policy confidence in regulatory strength, warranting continual enhancements to regulatory capability lest India’s lenders fall victim to the newer risks, just as IndusInd Bank reminds us. As Clemenceau warned, 'Generals always prepare to fight the last war, not the next.'"TCA Ranganathan
Missing Women in the Assemblies, Parliament
"In politics, the arithmetic is clear: if you're not going to field women candidates, you're not going to get women legislators," says Namita Bhandare in an article for Hindustan Times, speaking about the Bill that provides 33 percent reservation for women in Parliament, and is yet to be implemented.
Bhandare makes the case of women's active participation in electoral politics by taking a recent example: the Bihar polls, during which women turned out in greater numbers than men to cast their ballots.
"Women voters are exercising their ballot with greater enthusiasm than ever," she says, adding:
"Parties believe women will vote for them if they get cash handouts. The low representation has not yet become a poll issue. This is on us. Unless we demand and get reservation, not sometime in the nebulous future, but now, it will not come to us on a platter. Equality was promised to us by the framers of our Constitution. If you ask me, 33% does not cut it any more. It’s time to talk 50-50."Namita Bhandare
Pak Army’s Sweeping Powers In New Law Puts Top Court, Govt At Field Marshal’s Mercy
Speaking about the 27th Amendment to Pakistan's Constitution, which has given sweeping powers to the armed forces and compromised the powers of the Supreme Court, Kamal Davar says that the country's Army Chief, Asim Munir, will now be in full control of the armed forces, including the Army, Navy and Air Force.
In an article for Deccan Chronicle, Davar says that the "neutering" of the Supreme Court removes whatever checks it previously had on Pakistani politicians and the leadership of the armed forces.
"Though Asim Munir and the Pakistan military may be gloating over their capture of absolute power, this fragile stability and its likely implications should propel India to further strengthen its security posture. The export of terror to Jammu and Kashmir and other parts of India will be given renewed impetus, and many more responses on the lines of Operation Sindoor will have to be unleashed as required."Kamal Davar
Women Cricketers and Their Pure, Subtle Skills
In an article for The Tribune, Pradeep Magazine draws out the differences between men's and women's cricket—particularly the areas where the latter has surpassed the former.
"Women’s subtle skills and delicate touch have breached the men’s cricketing bastion dominated by brute force and muscular strength," Magazine writes.
In the commercial world we live in, which has little love for preserving anything unless it doles out profits, Magazine says, the Indian team's World Cup win has made women's cricket more susceptible to "market forces".
"Women’s cricket, despite its limited resources and exposure, gender biases and societal conditioning, has shown finesse and virtuosity that is fast vanishing from men’s cricket. For the moment, let us celebrate the resilience and mental fortitude of women cricketers, apart from their obvious, pure skills."Pradeep Magazine
Congress is Bihar’s Biggest Loser
"The Congress lost, and will continue to lose until it admits that its grassroots muscles have withered and died across India," writes Tavleen Singh in her weekly column for The Indian Express, speaking about the party's abysmal performance in the recently concluded Bihar polls.
Singh says that if the party were to introspect, it would be forced to admit that Rahul Gandhi has failed to raise political issues that matter to voters.
While Gandhi has been seen mingling with the country's poorest citizens and trying to put himself in their shoes, and there is nothing wrong for a "political prince" to discover what life is like for the lowly and the destitute, Singh says, there must be some purpose to this exercise.
"If after all this effort he cannot come up with the sort of new economic and political ideas that would revive the party that was his inheritance, then it is simply a waste of time. If he stopped treating the Congress party as if it was a private family estate instead of a political party, he might find ways to revive its dead roots."Tavleen Singh