What language should children be taught in?
Most middle-class urban homes in India are likely to have grandparents who cannot speak English, parents who speak it reasonably and a young generation for whom it is their primary…
Anger sans reason
One wonders as to how long it will take India and Pakistan to start regretting their part in the affair of the so-called Indian Premier League’s snub to Pakistani cricketers,…
MFN status in perspective
Pakistan’s decision to grant the most favored nation (MFN) status to India has generated a lot of debate. But let’s put the issue in the correct perspective. 1. “MFN” is…
Gut reaction
Both Pakistan and India have recently “successfully test-fired” several missiles capable of carrying conventional and nuclear warheads. Militarily, this is a great achievement, especially in a world where, apart from…
The gun or Ajay Devgan
This is a set of familiar, old key words. Depalpur. Faridkot. A young Pakistani boy crossing over to India… . It even involves a famous name that rhymes with ‘gun’.…
Implications of water issue
BY creating millions of acre feet of live storage for water on the six rivers of the region, India is violating the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT). On the completion by…
A nuclear night for South Asia?
A Doomsday scenario for South Asia has been painted in a book by an American writer who quotes Bill Clinton as saying that Pakistan and India had come dangerously close…
The slave’s dream
“Democracy in India is only a top dressing on an Indian soil, which is essentially undemocratic.” Arundhati Roy? Wrong. It’s Dr Bhim Rao Ambedkar, the Dalit leader who wrote India’s…
Escape from reality
Though book launchings do sometimes bring together a sizeable group of the literati, the publication of Ikram Sehgal’s account of his escape from an Indian camp for prisoners of war…
The death of Bal Thackeray
The news that the cosmopolitan city of Bombay (Mumbai) – India’s financial centre – was in lockdown to mourn the death of Bal Thackeray, the head of the Muslim-hating Shiv…
