Latest news with #post-Emergency
Hans India
23-05-2025
- Politics
- Hans India
MyVoice: Views of our readers 23rd May 2025
Mizoram's literacy milestone is a wake-up call for India Mizoram's remarkable achievement as India's first fully literate state (announced by its Chief Minister Lalduhoma on Wednesday) deserves celebration as also a serious reflection. In a country struggling with vast educational gaps, Mizoram's success (a literacy rate of 98.2 per cent, surpassing the Centre's 95 per cent benchmark for full literacy) offers not just inspiration but a workable model. Its approach—community involvement, consistent government policy, and cultural respect for education—proves that literacy isn't a luxury; it's a matter of will. Kerala has a literacy rate of 96.2 per cent. Other states with far more resources continue to fall behind. Why? This isn't just about statistics. Literacy transforms lives. It empowers people to think, vote, and build. It's ironic that while we pump money into tech and infrastructure, we ignore the human foundation—education. If Mizoram can do it, what excuse do we have as regards the backwardness in other states? India needs to stop celebrating isolated successes and start ensuring that every citizen can read, write, and prosper in life. Md Hasnain, Patna A major blow to Maoists The Maoist movement received a body-blow on Wednesday with the killing of its top leader Nambala Kesava Rao, alias Basavaraju, general secretary of the outlawed CPI (Maoist) in Chhattisgarh's Maad in an encounter with security forces. Basavaraju carried a reward of ₹ 1.5 crore on his head. Incidentally, he is the third member of the organisation's top body to be gunned down this year with Jagan and Uday being the other two. Quite expectedly, the entire political leadership has hailed the killing, while Union Home Minister Amit Shah reiterated that naxalism would be eliminated by next March. On that count, the banned outfit's members are facing a situation like the post-Emergency days in 1977. They suspended armed struggle and mobilsed masses before launching the CPI-ML (People' s War) which was translated into MCCI before taking the present name CPI (Maoist). Meanwhile, the security forces honed their skills by using technology in jungle warfare. It is time the authorities put an end to the mayhem in the dense forest, where most Maoists operate from. Pratapa Reddy Yaramala, Tiruvuru, NTR Dist Paying the price for waging a mindless war The country is witnessing a determined phase of mopping up operations against Maoists by the security forces in different states. This is in tune with the government's resolve to eradicate Maoism and Naxalism by 2027. The elimination of Basavaraju and 26 other Maoists in the dense forest in Bastar region is one of the most significant operations in recent times. These misguided radicals are waging a mindless war against the state on borrowed notions from China and Russia despite being highly educated. Interestingly, there are several pseudo-secular groups seeking a soft approach while dealing with such anti-nationals. It is both astonishing and astounding. KR Parvathy, Mysuru Herald case: ED asserts prima facie case There is a prima facie case against Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi in the National Herald case. The fact is that Dr Subramanyam Swamy won't take up issues without content or basis. More so where the top family of INC is concerned. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) took up investigation with right earnestness and culled out evidence enough to be qualified as prima facie, meaning the case is fit for a full-scale investigation. The Congress party is not able to challenge but always plays the political victim card. This puzzle should be cleared, once and for all. The NDA government should know that it is okay if a particular issue is used to corner the opponent, albeit for a limited time and cause. Overuse is bound to boomerang. This simple logic should not be missed by the ruling party. If there is substance and evidence, rather than mudslinging the Gandhi family, why not bring the issue to its logical end? Govardhana Myneedu, MG Road, Vijayawada
The Hindu
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- The Hindu
review of Kiran Nagarkar's Asides, Tirades, Meditations — Selected Essays
When a writer has written only three or four novels, we may consider each one to be distinct from the rest, so the reader is fully entitled to, say, read and re-read Kiran Nagarkar's Cuckold while ignoring Ravan and Eddie. We give ourselves permission to pick and choose because life is short, and because writers are not uniformly brilliant. In his introduction to Asides, Tirades, Meditations: Selected Essays by Kiran Nagarkar, Salil Tripathi places Nagarkar in a post-Emergency context of renewed expansiveness, so the reading of this book seems especially apt after an election that seemed to unmute our voices. But the appearance of topicality is a trick that books have. Nagarkar died in 2019, so in reading these essays we must set aside the democratic constriction and release of the past half decade. On writing The first essay in the collection is on writing, on how, even for those who are sure they are writers, the beginnings can be arbitrary, the first published work a matter of chance, and the aftermath, when reviewers and interviewers seem to miss the point, incredibly frustrating. Other essays that stand out include the ones on Gore Vidal, on memory and airbrushing, and on Shiva's blue throat. In this last, Nagarkar talks of Shiva as the artist, who leaps to swallow the poison churned out of the ocean and saves the world. He also writes in this essay about the artist as a god, about novels that should be backed by solid research but not burdened with it. He writes about characters who are mere mouthpieces and have no convincing life of their own. He evokes the creation of literature through research, agendas, metaphor, technique, all of which may be essential, but they are not sufficient without an animating spark, what he calls the 'breath of life'. Filing the miscellany The volume contains reviews and reactions to films that will mean little to readers under 60, and many of the pieces are rambling, and sometimes self-confessedly ranting, lacking the artful construction we expect from an essay. The volume is a dutiful filing of all the miscellany of an important writer, and it would have been in keeping with that purpose to give the year of publication for each essay. The age and context in which their sentiments were expressed is not always apparent, and many of them seem somehow more dated because they are undated. A year of publication, in the 1980s, is mentioned for a meditation on leprous Bombay, with dire predictions of the city falling to bits, and the reading experience is better for it. Revisiting novels It may be unconventional in a review of one book to direct readers to another one instead, but our excuse is that Nagarkar himself frequently revisits his novels in this volume. It seems unusual for a writer to explain his own works instead of leaving that task to a literary critic of a later era. A breathtaking novel like Cuckold, playing with love, politics, court intrigues, and Meera's bhakti poetry, needs no explanation or afterword. Nagarkar created a human being from the shadowy figure of Meera's husband, about whom almost nothing is known historically. And we are with this character from page one. He is more than plausible, he is alive. The author of such a work need not point and say, 'See what I did there?' Yet, in more than one essay, he explains how he chose the subject, how he visited Meera's birthplace, and even how his novel was interpreted. While plodding through all that, the reader may wonder whether Cuckold was all that brilliant. The answer is yes, it was, and it still is. Asides, Tirades, Meditations: Selected Essays; Kiran Nagarkar, Bloomsbury, ₹699. The reviewer is a writer and editor based in Palakkad, Kerala.
