Hot Head

There is more to it than merely depreciation of the Indian rupee
Sanjay Kapoor Delhi

I remember what food rations meant in the 1960s and ‘70s. Long queues would form in front of the ration or fair price shops as soon as word got around that the trucks carrying wheat or rice had arrived. Sometimes, the arrival of food grain turned out to be plain rumour — causing great anger and anxiety amongst those who went back with empty bags. India was still not self-sufficient in food grain and was forced to import it from the US and other countries. Much of the wheat that India got from the US’s PL-480 was resent as it was rumoured to be for cattle.

The most willing recipients of such dubious videos were Al Jazeera, BBC and Al-Arabiya. Western print media too gave legitimacy to these events while deploying a manifestly sectarian prism
Sanjay Kapoor Delhi 

There is so much fear and loathing for the police that it is difficult to say anything charitable about them.

Big stories, ironically, do not show up on the front pages of newspapers. They are either tucked away in the inside pages or not given any space at all.

Sahara revisited...

The Bangladesh upsurge is a watershed moment in the life of South Asian Islam which is accommodating, deeply secular and has enriched the culture of this region. Can Pakistan see a Shahbag?
Sanjay Kapoor Delhi

As a teenager in the Lucknow of the mid-’70s, I recall cycling once to the older part of the city famous for Awadhi cuisine and high culture. Accompanied by a friend who claimed to know the area well, we set out on a quest to find Lucknow’s famous red light locality. “That’s where we have to go,” my friend gestured enthusiastically towards a dark lane choked with the random clutter of small-time traffic.

When Cairo’s Tahrir Square erupted against President Mohammed Morsi’s attempts to usurp all powers, the divide was clearly visible. On one side were the Islamists, represented by the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafis, and on the other were the secularists, animated by Muslim liberals, Coptic Christians and many of those keen to protect the secular ethos of the Gamal Abdel Nasser era. Women provided the spine to this opposition to Morsi as they feared losing their rights once the sharia laws began to sideline existing ones.