This year as we commemorate the 150th birth anniversary of Swami Abhedananda, we must meditate on the spiritual nationalist’s epochal contribution to India’s selfhood. Such a rekindling of interest is imperative for the success of our national quest for an integral self-reliance This year and 2017 mark crucial centennial and …

The Prime Minister has laid the foundation for a grand narrative of India. He has spoken about the country being civilisationally distinct, but his concept of Indian exceptionalism goes beyond harmonising with the world and aims to weave coalitions of cultures From Tokyo to Madrid and from St Petersburg to …

While lighting the Savarkar Flame in the precincts of the Cellular Jail last week, BJP president Amit Shah had said the flame would serve as an inspiring reminder for us, of all those valiant revolutionaries who smilingly faced the gallows in their quest for India’s freedom. This act of igniting …

The lighting of the Savarkar Jyoti at Cellular Jail will not only keep ignited the flame of freedom, it should also re-kindle a genuine interest in this period of our independence struggle, an interest that may culminate in a grand memorial someday Life in a jail”, wrote Vinayak Damodar Savarkar …

The CPI(M) and the communists parties in general refuse to see the writing on the wall; that of their nearing political decimation. They continue to remain active as a disruptive element on the political canvas, injecting violence and falsehood to maintain their hold When in power or in majority, the …

The Assembly elections results of May 19 are a decisive pointer to the cluelessness and lack of direction of the Congress Party, especially under the tutelage and control of its first “dynasty”. With all his melodrama, cheap pot-shots, tactics of stalling Parliament and lending support to forces and formations that …

Those who seek to deconstruct or repudiate the cultural idea of India, will fail to understand, let alone appreciate, the faith of the multitude that congregated at Ujjain for the Kumbh and participated in activities which have been part of our heritage for ages French philosophe Voltaire was convinced that all knowledge …

Prime Minister Modi’s Bodh Gaya initiative has made it clear that India’s objective is to activate its past civilisational linkages and to restructure them to the exigencies of the present, where it seeks to pursue a pragmatic foreign policy of multi-alignment and multi-engagement It was in September 2015, that Prime …

Seven-odd decades ago when the first atomic bomb was exploded in Los Alamos, Robert Oppenheimer, the diehard physicist who led the project, was struck by what he saw. What dominated Oppenheimer’s mind that point of time when one of the most decisive moments of human history unfolded by was not …

When India’s “Parrot Lady” of 12th century vintage accompanied the PM back from his state visit to Canada, it was deeply symbolic of a civilisational state reclaiming her cultural-civilisational footprints and space. It was profoundly symbolic of India— after centuries of cultural marginalisation—finally stirring to recognise her civilisational-self and to …

Sri Aurobindo’s concept of internationalism was to have nations before ‘inter’, but today, a number of organisations and individuals, with no known allegiance to the nation, continue to stymie India’s march, by either placing various hurdles or vocally advocating its dissolution I note with satisfaction the discussion my last week’s …

Sri Aurobindo’s vision of India had no place for pseudo-secularism, vote-bank politics and repudiation of Bharatiya civilisation. The Sage was also the quintessential internationalist, yet his internationalism was not a rootless cosmopolitanism but steeped in Sanatana Dharma Trinamool Congress Member of Parliament and Harvard historian, Sugata Bose, recently quoted the …

A number of inane debates are being forced on our national life today—debates that would have made Indian revolutionary nationalists and thinkers from the past cast an eye of dismay. None of them, for example, would have ever countenanced the possibility of having a debate on whether ‘Bharat Mata ki …

An indicator of the relevance of a political party is when it continues to grow and widen its base and acceptability and when it nurtures a democratic approach and spirit right from the grassroots upward. As the Bharatiya Janata Party entered its 36th year of existence on April 6,  2016 …