Truth as Interpretation There can be different versions of truth from what has been already accepted as truth. In 1951, renowned Japanese moviemaker Akira Kurosawa made one of the greatest movies in history, titled Rashomon. No other movie must have better investigated the philosophy of truth and justice than this movie. Rashomon establishes that it is possible for us to[Read More...]
One of the most inspiring aspects of the freedom movement in India was the combination of struggle and constructive work. While several great freedom fighters contributed to this idea, the most important contribution to this concept was made by Mahatma Gandhi. This has attracted worldwide attention and rightly so. Gandhiji understood very well that the freedom movement involves long-term commitment,[Read More...]
6th February 2021 marks the 16th anniversary of Comrade Saketh Rajan’s Martyrdom. The name Saketh Rajan needs no introduction in the revolutionary communist circles of India. It is important to remember Comrade Saketh Rajan and the path he took in order to liberate the people of this country from the clutches of Imperialism, Comprador Big Bourgeoisie and Big Landlords. Comrade[Read More...]
My encounter with tribal cuisine has been rather fresh. Till very recently, not only was I unaware of the enviable variety of the tribal palate, its nutritional value and ecological ethos too were beyond my comprehension. It should be made clear in the offing that my tryst with tribal gastronomy is limited to my area of field study in Southwest[Read More...]
It was in 2007 that I first came across the name of Sunil Kumar while reading an undergraduate course on medieval India at Delhi University. His newly published book on The Emergence of the Delhi Sultanate, 1192-1286 (Permanent Black, 2007) had already become talk of the town by that time. In fact, he was among very few active scholars working[Read More...]
‘Follow your dreams and don’t be frightened of orthodoxy’ A woman who at eighty-eight brought out her autobiography based on the urgings of among others, Alice Walker, author of the Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Colour Purple , and Doris Lessing, the Nobel Laureate — only much later. Like Lessing’s The Golden Notebook, her biography is called The Brass Notebook. Does it talk anti-war or feminism or[Read More...]
This is one of a series of heaven-based stories, written as fantasy yet very relevant to our times. The first part of the series appeared in Countercurrents.org dated December 11, 2020 under the title ‘ Mahatma Gandhi Returns to Earth’. Gandhi had managed to get the clearance from heaven authorities for his one-day visit to Earth ,but after returning from[Read More...]
Capital punishment is the most premeditated of murders – Albert Camus What could be worse than death? The answer perhaps would be to know exactly when one is going to die. Locked up in a condemned cell, time crawls like a snail for someone who is on death row. Every waking hour of the day and night, the thought of[Read More...]
Dr. K.S.Chalam, Ex-In charge Chairman, U.P.S.C a Constitutional position (equivalent to Supreme Court Judge) during 2005-2011, is a well-known Political Economist, Educationist and a Scholar of Dravidian Studies. Prof K.S.Chalam is known throughout the country as the facilitator of Academic Staff College concept and was likewise recognised for his Studies on Higher Education, Political Economy of Development. At UPSC, he[Read More...]
The importance of a multi-disciplinary approach for understanding crucial issues is well-established both at academic and policy levels. Nevertheless we need to ask, despite the need for this being well-established, whether this is being neglected frequently in public discourse, and perhaps to a lesser extent, even at policy and academic levels? One reason for this unintentional neglect is that public[Read More...]
