Editorials

Pakistan police to-day [December 13] opened fire at two places in Chittagong in East Pakistan, injuring 12 persons, according to a Radio Pakistan broadcast monitored here [New Delhi] to-night. A violent crowd attacked a food train during the Opposition-sponsored province-wide hartal to-day. When the police interfered, the crowd attacked them. …

In Telangana, the TRS banked on its regional appeal to keep the Congress out again In continuing with its politics of regional identity, the Telangana Rashtra Samithi won a second term in office in India’s newest State, pushing the national party, the Congress, to a distant second. TRS leader K. …

Having survived a party challenge, the British PM should spell out London’s next steps British Prime Minister Theresa May has survived a trust vote on her Conservative party stewardship. But there is little sign that the bitter infighting within the ruling party will abate. Nor is there any assurance that …

The pursuit of solitude has led tothe decline of Goa A poet who recently spoke of the need for solitude as a precondition for writing said that solitude made life simple, for example in terms of how much cooking was needed to sustain the person. She added that only the …

Lacking personnel, funds and motivation, the thana is not structured to enforce the rule of law The death of inspector Subodh Kumar Singh, shot while trying to control a mob of cow vigilantes in Bulandshahr district of Uttar Pradesh, is a vivid expression of the contempt of our ruling classes, …

The death penalty is error-ridden, arbitrarily imposed and unfairly targets the poor As a punishment, the death penalty makes no sense: how does killing a person who has killed a person show that killing is wrong? Most of the civilised world has abolished it. India certainly does not need it …

India urgently needs the return of a thriving legal culture that uncompromisingly calls out political posturing On Monday, Justice S.R. Sen of the Meghalaya High Court observed in a judgment that “anybody opposing… Indian laws and the Constitution cannot be considered… citizens of the country.” The case involved the denial …

The Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi, told the Rajya Sabha to-day [December 12, New Delhi] that the conditions which President Ayub of Pakistan had made in his offer of no-war pact with India “have made it rather difficult for us to consider it.” President Ayub had said that certain things …

Why the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill is so deeply contested What is the proposal? The winter session of Parliament may see the government push for the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill of 2016. The proposed law, which amends the original Citizenship Act of 1955, mandates that Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis and Christians …

By fleeing India, Vijay Mallya hasonly helped establish the charges against him The judicial order in the United Kingdom allowing the extradition of businessman Vijay Mallya marks a rare victory for India in getting back a fugitive from the law from another jurisdiction. Coming shortly after the United Arab Emirates …

The Congress may have won this roundof elections, but it needs more allies Post-poll alliances between parties, shaped as they are by intractable realities, are easier to form than pre-poll alliances that have to reconcile competing expectations of the prospective partners. Soon after the results of the Assembly elections were …

The Congress needs to continue to introspect afterthese victories rather than celebrate The political map of India had largely turned saffron in 2014. This has changed after the recent Assembly elections with the Congress registering a convincing victory in Chhattisgarh and just falling short of a majority in Rajasthan and …

A solid syllabus can enable children to hold governments to account on sustainability Thousands of schoolchildren demonstrated on the streets of Australian cities at the end of November. They were protesting against their government’s lacklustre response to climate change. Their protest march coincided with the G20 summit in Argentina. The …

There are substantive reasons for the questions being raised about the new GDP back series Without in any way impugning the integrity of the Central Statistics Office (CSO), most knowledgeable people are asking: if most important indicators of the Indian economy were better in 2004-2014, how is the GDP growth …

As the BJP’s seal of inevitability is cracked, the Congress must diversify its narrative Election results have an inevitability, a closure once they are announced. The very numbers add to a sense of objectivity and abstraction. The results sound like a pool table score, with the Congress having retained the …

The internal affairs committee of the Cabinet to-day [December 11, New Delhi] discussed the political situation in Kerala, with Special reference to the proposed creation of Malappuram district having a Muslim majority. While recognising that the question fell within the State jurisdiction and the Centre could not direct the Nambudiripad …

The Congress’s performance in the Hindi heartland will enthuse it in the run-up to 2019 For a party that had appeared to be lost in the political wilderness over the past few years, the Congress has plenty to cheer about following the results in the recent round of Assembly elections. …

K. Chandrasekhar Rao’s welfare schemes helped the TRS surge ahead despite discontentment in some regions The Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS), led by K. Chandrasekhar Rao, popularly known as KCR, has registered a huge win in the Assembly elections. This can be seen as a vote for welfare. The formation of …

The Congress has placed itself firmly as the nucleus of any anti-BJP formation Of the few States where the Congress confronts the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) face to face, three will likely have Congress Chief Ministers now. Last year, the party gave the BJP a scare in the fourth, Gujarat. …

The situation created by Urjit Patel’s resignation should be used to push through much-needed reforms Among the quintessential traits of a central banker is to be unpredictable in action so that the markets can be kept guessing. Urjit Patel exhibited this quality in ample measure when he announced his decision …