A potpourri is Indian culture
INDIAN culture as any other is a malleable commodity, which makes it happily difficult to define as yours and mine. In essential ways, it is the opposite of what today’s…
Poll verdict slams cancel culture
PAKISTAN’S voters have reprimanded anti-democratic power centres for seeking to ‘cancel’ political opponents. Voters ensured that Imran Khan’s popularity increased in inverse proportion to the reported repression he and his…
Indian elections
THE Islamophobic rhetoric being employed by Narendra Modi for this election campaign has become shrill. Pakistan has nearly always been an electoral issue in India. However, this time, it is…
Deadly culture wars
“I come bearing an olive branch in one hand, and the freedom fighter’s gun in the other. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hand.” — Yasser Arafat,…
A culture of neglect
THE Sindh government’s culture department recently invited bids to engage ‘experienced’ event managers to help it organise a weeklong centenary celebration of Mohenjo-Daro next month in London and Paris. One…
Poll verdict slams cancel culture
PAKISTAN’S voters have reprimanded anti-democratic power centres for seeking to ‘cancel’ political opponents. Voters ensured that Imran Khan’s popularity increased in inverse proportion to the reported repression he and his…
The facade of Indian democracy
Seventy-five years ago, India gained freedom and declared itself a secular state. The constitution of the world’s largest democracy provides for “freedom of conscience and the right of all individuals…
Why are Indian farmers protesting, and what can Modi do?
As an army of resolute Indian farmers keeps up its blockade of New Delhi, Prime Minister Narendra Modi faces potentially the trickiest challenge yet to his authority and reform agenda.…
Dilip Kumar an Indian metaphor
ONE sees a few good reasons to miss Dilip Kumar every Aug 5, starting this week. It was on this day that his most popular movie Mughal-i-Azam was released in…
Foreigners and other Indians
THE 1648 treaty of Westphalia created the modern template of nation-states out of collapsing empires and kingdoms in Europe. That prescription is still not fitting everyone’s need (or greed), giving…
