Reflex Action

Now that the Supreme Court has made it clear that the Ayodhya title suit is not its priority and even the hearing date will be decided next January, the saffron parties are getting agitated about the construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya. “We have other priorities,” a bench led by Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi had said last week.

Not a week goes without reports about the deliberate destruction of the autonomy and robustness of the institutions critical for the Indian democracy. Last week was the turn of the Central Bureau of Investigation (‘CBI’), aka ‘caged parrot’. No one was under any illusion about CBI’s autonomy or its independence, but the events of the last week even surprised, rather shocked the known sceptics too.

The political storm that was brewing in Sri Lanka for quite some months under an apparently tranquil surface has now broken out in full force. In a quick succession of events, President Maithripala Sirisena has dismissed his prime minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and appointed Mahinda Rajapaksa in his place and “prorogued” parliament till November 16.

Official data are like audited corporate financial accounts that hide more than they reveal. Just as some of the latest top level governments statements that claims 80 percent of the mobile handsets are now manufactured in India and the country “was able to save around Rs. three trillion in cell phone import bills during the last four years”. They reveal, at best, only one side of the story. The real story is that the so-called high domestic production led to much higher telecom imports, mostly components, during this period.

The media and political build-up was cut short abruptly. Almost laconically, CJI Ranjan Gogoi read out the order. The matter will be listed in January to decide which court and when this matter will be heard. It can be heard in January or February or May whatever.

The Lok Sabha elections for 2019 in Bihar promise to be a significant political battle between the backward and upper castes. There is simmering discontent in all the caste groups, irrespective of their class character and economic profile that the coalition governments have failed to improve their conditions. While the backward castes and dalits with leaders like Nitish Kumar, Sushil Modi, Ram Vilas Paswan etc feel that all the benefits have been conned by the upper caste people, who, however, the opposite to be true.

Sadly, the Central Bureau of Investigation, India’s premier investigative agency, has been described as “Comical Bureau”, “Bureau of Intrigues” and headlines in newspapers, reflecting internal tussle inside the CBI, screamed “CBI vs CBI”. Why this prestigious agency has come to such a pass? Possibly, its misuse by the political parties—Congress or the BJP— when in power, to meet their political ends. The agency has been losing its credibility.

“The Opportunity Costs of Socialism,” published on Tuesday by the White House’s Council of Economic Advisors, attempts to smear socialism—worker ownership of production—as a bankrupt ideology. The 72-page paper uses the 200th anniversary of socialist thinker Karl Marx’s birth as a jumping-off point for condemning everyone who doesn’t pray at the altar of the free market. Not even capitalist social democracies like Norway and Sweden are spared from blistering attacks.

We know how the world views Taj Mahal as a beautiful monument of love. We also know that the world considers Bangalore and Hyderabad as Indian versions of Silicon Valley. But we never knew that there is a world famous stretch of land near an airstrip in Nagpur and it happens to be owned by Anil Ambani. The discovery has been made possible by the Rafale deal with Dassault Aviation.

While the Rafale fighter jet deal will entail huge financial losses for the country, the agreement for the world’s largest nuclear power project at Jaitapur in an ecologically diverse and fragile region like Konkan, along with attendant concerns of the safety of EPRs, an unsteady French nuclear industry and its inexperienced Indian counterparts, will pose serious challenges to the environment, biodiversity, health and livelihoods of lakhs of people in and around the region.