In the recent past, we have witnessed a drastic increase in the practice of renaming cities, railway stations, and other public places…. There have been vigorous debates on name-changing on social media, newspapers, magazines, and in academia. A typical justification is that such renaming reclaims past glories and cultures that had been suppressed by Muslim ‘invaders’…. India’s self-image as a nation has been moulded out of opposition to the British through a largely inclusive freedom struggle…. The BJP-led governments at the Centre and State levels,

Certain organisations have decided to launch a fundraising campaign, called ‘Sri Ram Janmabhoomi Mandir Nirman Dhan Sangrah Abhiyan’ for the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya from January 15 in Madhya Pradesh…. A 100-strong police contingent is more than adequate to deal with a crowd double that size also, even without killing people. There is no rioter in the country who could continue rioting after the police have fired a couple of rounds in the air and made their intentions of upholding the law clear. The

The ‘Arnab Goswami bubble’ has burst. The WhatsApp chats that are in the public domain are a part of the chargesheet filed by the Mumbai Police in a case related to the alleged TRP scam being investigated by them. What emerges from these chats has less to do with the man seemingly at the centre of the controversy; Arnab Goswami is only incidental to the story. But this is not about an individual; it’s about the levels to which some of our institutions have

It has taken just three days for the worst apprehensions and suspicions of the farmers to be confirmed, viz, that running out of options the government would toss the ball into the SC's lap: the public statement of the Agriculture Minister on January 8 that " the farmers could go to the Supreme Court,” was a dead give away that this is what the government was planning…. The protests did not raise any legal questions which needed to be adjudicated upon, the farmers had

In the aftermath of the “insurrection” by a pro-Trump mob at the Capitol, the Hindutva ecosystem in India showed a bizarre spectacle: Donald Trump appeared in it as an alien who it has never encountered before until his supporters rampaged through Capitol. In this new propaganda, the Hindutva firmament seeks to foster an extraordinary amnesia: that it and Narendra Modi has been the greatest cheerleaders of Donald Trump (and by implication, his ideology of White supremacism), both in India and America…. But in this

….I asked Bajrangi, “Narendrabhai, that day, did Narendrabhai extend support on the day Naroda Patiya happened?”  “Usne to sab Ram nam kar diya na yaar, nahi to kiski taqat thi, sab uska hi hath hai bhai, nahi to police ko instruction dewe to gad phad dewe police.” (It was his hand which was behind this, otherwise if he had instructed the police, the police would have torn the rioters apart.) After the killing stopped, Bajrangi told me, he was asked by the police to leave the

Days after booking Ragini Tiwari alias Janki Behen – a self-proclaimed Hindutva leader – after a video went viral where she openly threatened to end the ongoing farmers’ protest with violence similar to the riots in Northeast Delhi’s Jafrabad in February, investigation has revealed she uploaded the video when she was in Bihar. Police now plan to summon her for questioning. Police said that after registering an FIR under IPC Section 153 (wantonly giving provocation with intent to cause riot) against her at Jafrabad

A 19-year-old Kashmiri is battling for life in hospital after he was critically injured in an attack by goons in Punjab’s Patiala district on Sunday, police and his colleagues said. The injured, who works as a catering boy in Patiala city, has been identified as Danish Kumar, a resident of the Dooru area of Anantnag district in Kashmir…. He is currently under medical supervision in ICU of Rajendra Hospital in Patiala and has undergone two surgeries since admission , said Umar, a friend of Danish.

Commenting for the first time on Republic TV editor Arnab Goswami’s Whatsapp chats which indicated that he may have had prior knowledge of the 2019 Balakot airstrikes, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi joined the opposition chorus and demanded that a parliamentary committee enquire into the matter.  “…Giving official secrets to a journalist is a criminal act,” Gandhi said, while attacking Prime Minister Narendra Modi directly over the leak. “You will see that no inquiry will be conducted as the prime minister was the one who