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All Those Demanding a New Constitution Are Fighting for a Less Equal India

In his recent article, titled
There’s a case for ‘we the people’ to embrace a new Constitution https://www.livemint.com/opinion/online-views/theres-a-case-for-we-the-people-to-embrace-a-new-constitution-11692021963182.html  14 Aug 2023 Bibek Debroy,  highlighted the Hindu right's real problem with the Constitution.. ...the three recent Bills on criminal justice are examples. Partly, one reclaims our forgotten heritage; Sengol is a metaphor for that.

what about the Seventh Schedule and local bodies? If development is correlated with urbanization, why have we set up these rural-urban silos, exemplified in the 73rd and 74th amendments?

what’s the Supreme Court’s role... There are articles in the Constitution that impede executive efficiency, at least for all-India services. What about electoral reform and the Rajya Sabha’s role?

..Should one subject specific geographical areas to special laws, thereby never mainstreaming them? (This isn’t only about Article 370 as there are others.) If reforms are about markets and a refocused and reduced role for government, what sense do we make of the Directive Principles of State Policy?

All Those Demanding a New Constitution Are Fighting for a Less Equal India https://thewire.in/politics/all-those-demanding-a-new-constitution-are-fighting-for-a-less-equal-india  Runyani .. the ideologues and leaders from the Hindu right have been asserting that this constitution is a colonial legacy, based on the Government of India Act of 1935 of the British and does not reflect ‘Indian values’

As the Constitution was implemented, the RSS mouthpiece rejected it and demanded the Manusmriti as the Constitution. An editorial in Organiser on Novemner 30, 1949 read: “But in our Constitution, there is no mention of the unique Constitutional development in Ancient Bharat. Manu’s laws were written long before Lycurgus of Sparata or Solon of Persia.

https://indianexpress.com/article/india/bibek-debroy-article-for-new-constitution-pm-panel-says-not-our-view-8897462/ “The recent article by Dr @bibekdebroy was in his personal capacity. In no way do they reflect the views of EAC-PM or the Government of India,” the EAC-PM posted Thursday evening. The EAC-PM is an independent body constituted to give advice on economic and related issues to the Government of India, specifically to the Prime Minister.

Gaddar, Who Symbolised Revolutionary Politics, Leaves Behind Questions on Social Transformation

He transcended the political through aesthetics and politicised the symbolic. For a generation, he symbolised the spirit and politics of revolutionary change, primarily in Telangana, but his songs travelled well beyond.

https://thewire.in/rights/gaddar-who-symbolised-revolutionary-politics-leaves-behind-questions-on-social-transformation 

Revolutionary balladeer Gaddar passed away on Sunday, August 6. He leaves behind a legacy that will last for a very long time and with it a number of questions that hold the promise of rethinking the processes of social transformation.

Gaddar rose to unprecedented fame in the 1990s, when he walked into the open from a life in the ‘underground’. He was part of the revolutionary movement that later came to be known as the Maoists. For a generation, he symbolised the spirit and politics of revolutionary change, primarily in Telangana, but his songs travelled well beyond. He was neither a trained singer nor a writer. He spontaneously reflected the rebellious spirit of Telangana. He symbolised the energy of the time of revolutionary politics and was its greatest makings. His songs were not just an art but a phenomenon. His songs were listened to and appreciated cutting across classes. He had a unique reach into the drawing rooms and playing recorders of the rich and dominant castes.

by Ajay Gudavarthy

09/08/2023

A Salute to Achyut Yagnik

A Salute to Achyut Yagnik, the One-Man Storehouse of Knowledge on Gujarat https://thewire.in/society/a-salute-to-achyut-yagnik-the-one-man-storehouse-of-knowledge-on-gujarat

He was always “Achyut Bhai”, always available for a spot of conversation, or a dialogue if you preferred, or a declamation if you had the discipline of patience. Either way, it was always a rewarding encounter.

(SETU – Centre for Social Knowledge and Action) resembled an ashram in its bare austerity but suggested the ambience of a coffee house, where over many cups of syrupy tea – and the smoke of his never-extinguished cigarette – the visiting interlocutor could get tutored into the nuances of the latest developments, be it the Navnirman Movement, the anti-reservations riots of 1981, the 1985-86 communal flare-up, the anti-Narmada dam movement, the 1990-92 Ayodhya violence, or the horrible, horrible 2002 carnage.

Achyut Bhai himself personified the very idea of a robust civil society – keeping a firm distance from the wielders of power in Gandhinagar yet willing to engage with “authority” on behalf of the poor and the underprivileged. He was available to any NGO, any movement, any group wanting to correct this or that economic injustice in any part of Gujarat