The Dauphin and the Figurehead

Timing is everything, and with a number of state elections soon, leading to the general election next year, cynicism and opportunism are manifest. The Congress-led…

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Bureaucracy-The Power that be

All private secretaries to Union ministers are equal, but S.R. Bhatia is more equal. Bhatia is the private secretary to Prakash Chand Sethi, the Union…

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Mysterious U-Turn

Although it is a blasphemous thought, it has cropped up in many a legal mind during the last few weeks: if bets were placed on…

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Political Compulsion

Two experts on Soviet studies, both lecturers in major universities, were informed late last month by the University Grants Commission (UGC) that their applications for…

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Caste Abuse

It was a grim warning for all users of intemperate language, and particularly for citizens of India who continue to believe that caste bestows special…

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DEMOCRACY DIES IN DARNESS

The Washington post adopted this four-word slogan “Democracy Dies in Darkness” in February 2017, its first in 140 years. It was used by its owner…

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Off the Blocks

For the second time in five years, I was struck by how apposite Rud-yard Kipling’s poem ‘If’ is in relation to Narendra Modi. At one…

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