In his tribute to Syama Prasad Mookerjee, one of the tallest leaders of modern India, Acharya JB Kripalani, expressed and articulated the emotions of millions of his countrymen when he movingly wrote, ‘I wish to record the great and passionate love that he had for Bharat Mata and her unity. …

Before his lonely and confined death on June 23, 1957 at the age of 52, in then faraway Srinagar – then Governor of West Bengal H.C. Mookerjee describing Syama Prasad’s death had said, ‘what has added to the poignancy of our grief is that he died in detention, while still …

One of the observations that BJP President Amit Shah made last week while addressing intellectuals and eminent citizens during his tour of Chattisgarh, was that the Congress was a special purpose vehicle (SPV) for seeing freedom through and that it had no single binding ideological thread. Shah had also observed …

The actual problem in our politics-infested and elitism-smacking intellectual climate is not with Gandhi being described in the manner that BJP president Amit Shah has done When Mahatma Gandhi’s ship docked at Marseilles on September 11, 1931, and he was on his way to the 1st Round Table conference convened by …

“These three years have been particularly traumatic for the India baiters, while Prime Minister Modi’s action invests in the consolidation and validation of Indian nationhood, they also unsettle those whose business in the last seven odd decades has been to dilute Indianness, it is they who feel threatened and ill …

The summer of manufactured grievances is upon us once more, a periodic and unfailing cycle, seen in repeated clockwork regularity in the last three years. The high priests and articulators of this summer of grievances sit in the rarefied and acclimatised climes of privileged quarters of various cities and towns …

The CPI(M) and its politbureau-centric leaders some of whom are nearly out of job within the party itself like comrade Prakash Karat have recently wished that the Indian army ‘suffer irreparable damage’ in its operation against terrorists in the Valley and against those whose work is to facilitate, aid, abet …

Just as he was gearing up to play the most crucial innings of his life, Dave suddenly decided to ‘get off the track’, leaving behind for those he inspired and touched, bewilderment and silence of the Narmada Prime Minister Narendra Modi called him a friend and described him as a …

So dominant, so focused, and so compelling has been the India narrative that Narendra Modi has succeeded in generating, in the last three years, that it is continuously and ceaselessly occupying centre stage in all our debates and discussions. The Indian dream, the Indian growth story, the Indian civilisational dimensions, …

Historian Ramchandra Guha’s academic capacities may be considerable, but they are severely compromised by the biases he holds, and which colour his opinions Cricket historian Ramchandra Guha recently called Professor BB Kumar, the newly appointed Chairman of the Indian Council for Social Science Research (ICSSR), a “semi-literate Sanghi”. These words …

When asked what advice would he give the Left-wing writers, leading British conservative philosopher and writer Roger Scruton replied “acknowledge the legitimacy of disagreement”. Scruton’s description of the Left and Communist intelligentsia, and his analysis of their methods of political and intellectual impositions are applicable in the Indian context as …

As one increasingly heard and followed Prime Minister Narendra Modi, especially from November, when he made one of his most “disruptionist” announcements of demonetisation, one could not but help recall the words of deep prescience that Dr S Radhakrishnan, philosopher, statesman and former President of India, spoke in the Constituent …

On a recent visit to Myanmar, I called on Daw Than Than Nu, daughter of the first Prime Minister of Myanmar, the legendary U Nu. I had carried along with me a collage of photographs of U Nu with Dr. Syama Prasad Mookerjee, from the time when Dr. Mookerjee, as …

Observers and political practitioners have spoken of the organisational restructuring of the BJP as a challenge that needs to be addressed. But the party has already initiated the process ever since Amit Shah took over While inaugurating the second BJP State library named after the Jana Sangh stalwart and social reformer Nanaji Deshmukh, in …