Speak up. Speak out.
A few days ago, the police violently swooped down on hordes of peaceful protestors gathered in Delhi. Just a month ago a journalist in Mumbai was arrested by the government railway police and slapped...
View ArticleSome more equal than others
I wrote last week about how India’s first-time attempt to measure inequality within the country revealed significant disparity in the development of individual states, such as a yawning gap between...
View ArticleView from the bottom
There was one thought that lingered in my mind long after an interview with the 2011 Magsaysay prize winner, Neelima Mishra (Read interview). Mishra peppered her conversation with an unwavering faith...
View ArticleHard working MPs or hardly working?
A vibrant Parliament is considered the hallmark of a democracy. Its rebuke then certainly provides some food for thought, especially when it comes from someone closely associated with the working of...
View ArticleIs some corruption inevitable?
A few incidents on the sidelines of India’s fight against corruption sparked my interest about the place of corruption in a nation’s path to development. Industrialist Adi Godrej suggested legitimising...
View ArticlePausing the hour-glass this New Year’s eve
The start of every year is predictably a time for much introspection and great anticipation. As we flip the calendar once again, here’s pausing the hour-glass on five big development issues which...
View ArticleTo strike or not is the question
The call by most major trade unions for a country-wide mega strike on Tuesday piqued my interest in the relevance of workers’ unions in this era of globalisation. At a time when India undergoes...
View ArticleA shitty affair!
It was his pseudonym “Mr Toilet” that first caught my attention but Jack Sim had me all ears once he started off on a topic that grabbed headlines this fortnight but is rarely spoken about...
View ArticleAge-old concerns
The Union Cabinet this week gave its assent to a bill that raised the age of legal sex in India from 16 to 18. It gave the go ahead to the Protection of Children Against...
View ArticleMen versus women, an outdated formula
An email I received from a men’s organisation might have been the trigger, but the question has been floating around waiting to be debated. Is it time for the Indian government to re-examine its...
View ArticleWhat’s in the US election for us?
As the race towards the US presidential election heats up, there is a growing interest in India, as to what is in it for us. Soon after presidential candidates Democrat and President Barack Obama and...
View ArticleA new year that clings to old promises
We began last year with curtains lifted off a dismal reality of Indian society—an overwhelming preference for the boy child, and we are ending this one with our most sordid truth lying exposed—that...
View Article“No one protected me”
With those four words, American playwright and feminist Eve Ensler lifted the curtains off one of the harshest truths of sexual violence in our midst. She retraced how her mother, brother and sister...
View ArticleDo India’s new surrogacy norms discriminate against gay parenting?
I have been receiving a flurry of reactions after my article in yesterday’s TOI about new visa norms introduced by the Union home ministry for foreigners seeking to rent-a-womb in India. The norms...
View ArticleWill CSR remain another buzzword?
Volunteering, philanthropy and adopting causes are passé. Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) seems to be the latest buzzword in the development sector, as was evident at the NGO India 2013...
View ArticleOperation clean up voter list needed
97 milllion voters were added to the voter lists for the upcoming 2014 general election but only 11 million were deleted. Does the size of the Indian electorate tell the whole story? Recent news that...
View ArticleWhat do political parties promise our cities?
Rapid urbanization it is often said, is one of the biggest transitions facing India today. The expanding urban footprint was captured by the Census 2011 findings which showed that 31.16 per cent of...
View ArticleCorruption thrives in secret places
Our city governments must ditch culture of opacity, embrace concept of open data. “Government ought to be all outside and no inside…Everybody knows that corruption thrives in secret places, and avoids...
View ArticleDon’t force us to vote: Instead of compulsory voting, focus on other...
Elections to local governments in India are seeing attempts to make voting mandatory in some states, with varying penal provisions being introduced to get citizens to the booth. Gujarat was one of the...
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