A Hindu fanatic may burn himself on a pyre, but he will never light the fire of Inquisition under another being – Swami Vivekananda. A people who have traditionally been strangers to the idea of religious persecution are now at the end of their tether, unable to control their … Read More
The Supreme Court’s unfortunate decision to entertain a public interest litigation on the new school curriculum has cast a shadow over the academic year, even as millions of students prepare to report to school next month. The petition has been filed by activists who will enhance their personal profiles with … Read More
Some revolutions come with a whisper. The Kanchi Shankaracharya’s ultimately unsuccessful mediation in the Ayodhya imbroglio is a momentous happening, because it has somewhat diminished the State’s absolute right to dictate the agenda on matters pertaining to the deeply held religious convictions of the people. For the first time since … Read More
American journalist Daniel Pearl’s carefully planned and ruthlessly executed murder by men who felt no compunctions about filming the gory episode, is a grim reminder that both the ideology and the ideologues behind the twin towers tragedy in New York are still alive and kicking. In our part of the … Read More
As Muslim nations, leaders and intellectuals begin responding to growing international concerns over fundamentalism, it may be worthwhile for the United Nations and human rights bodies to consider if the practice of religious-criminal law in several Islamic countries is consistent with the ethos and values of the modern world. Muslims … Read More
Three seemingly unrelated events coincided on Republic Day and made my heart bleed. Now, as the anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi’s martyrdom approaches, I feel we have moved so far from the vision of wiping every tear from every eye that we are not even embarrassed by the duplicity with which … Read More
Unbelievable at it seems, the Centre is said to be parleying with a host of Mumbai-walas to decide which supercilious secularist should be rescued from oblivion and gifted the Bharat Ratna. None of the names doing the rounds inspires confidence, though this may not matter much given the manner in … Read More
Marxism is the most aggressive of the monocultures seeking to decimate India’s unique civilization, because it has no genuine creed, no core values, of its own. Hence it lacks a sense of the sacred or even the ethical, and relies wholly on the vitality of violence to achieve its ends. … Read More
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Digvijay Singh could hardly have realized the irony in his statement, “most of the controversies about history are because too many non-historians are talking about how history should be written.” Alas, instead of taking a leaf from his own book, Singh spoke expansively about the politicization … Read More
An inscrutable destiny, Mahakaal, has presented modern India with a strange paradox. Punjab, land of the Vedas, and Uttar Pradesh, quintessential Aryavarta where Vedic civilization reached its pinnacle, are caught in a peculiar face-off between History and Dharma, even as both states prepare for assembly elections in the forthcoming year. … Read More
