https://znetwork.org/author/badriraina/ Independent Left News, Analysis, Vision and Strategy Wed, 07 Jan 2026 22:55:47 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://znetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/cropped-Z_logo_512-32x32.png https://znetwork.org/author/badriraina/ 32 32 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/thank-you-trump-for-your-new-national-security-strategy-now-we-know-what-we-may-do/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/thank-you-trump-for-your-new-national-security-strategy-now-we-know-what-we-may-do/#respond Wed, 07 Jan 2026 22:00:44 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1293186 No dentist ever extracted a troublesome molar as cleanly and swiftly as Trump has extracted poor Maduro from Caracas. There are reports that not mere military might but very canny spy and money power operating over a long period made this extraction possible – a throwback, if you like, to the treachery of old world [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/thank-you-trump-for-your-new-national-security-strategy-now-we-know-what-we-may-do/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/peddling-lord-ram-as-a-slick-commercial-acronym/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/peddling-lord-ram-as-a-slick-commercial-acronym/#respond Mon, 22 Dec 2025 15:43:56 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292616 The revanchist government of the day was clearly canny enough to understand that removing Mahatma Gandhi’s name from the rural employment guarantee scheme (MGNREGA) which was an enforceable right-to-work budgeted endowment would be seen as an egregious enormity, a veritable red line even for compliant Hindu followers. So, they pressed into service the only entity that could [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/peddling-lord-ram-as-a-slick-commercial-acronym/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/testing-the-waters-with-bill-to-replace-mgnrega-the-right-wing-moves-towards-the-final-obliteration/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/testing-the-waters-with-bill-to-replace-mgnrega-the-right-wing-moves-towards-the-final-obliteration/#respond Thu, 18 Dec 2025 16:47:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292496 Who does not know that Gandhi has always been a thorn in the side of the right-wing for having defined swaraj as the unity of Hindus and Muslims in independent India. One of the pioneering flagship programmes of the erstwhile United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government led by the late Manmohan Singh was the Mahatma Gandhi National [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/testing-the-waters-with-bill-to-replace-mgnrega-the-right-wing-moves-towards-the-final-obliteration/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-democracy-fretting-to-be-a-dictatorship/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-democracy-fretting-to-be-a-dictatorship/#respond Thu, 11 Dec 2025 16:46:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292238 There is this difference between Donald Trump and Narendra Modi: during his electioneering for the United States’ presidency, Trump had forthrightly declared, “I will be a dictator from day one.” Endowed with Asiatic genius, Narendra Modi continues to make flashy avowals of his alleged commitment to constitutional rule. However, his everyday governance suggests a penchant for [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-democracy-fretting-to-be-a-dictatorship/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-commission-deadly-serious-about-enforcing-democracy/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-commission-deadly-serious-about-enforcing-democracy/#respond Mon, 01 Dec 2025 16:39:26 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291824 Notice the example the Election Commission of India is setting for wishy-washy democracies of the world. The electoral process must be enforced in double quick time, even if you die doing so. There are the morons who quibble that it is an oxymoron to hold that democracy must be enforced. These are so obviously Macaulay’s leftovers. And [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-commission-deadly-serious-about-enforcing-democracy/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-indian-citizen-has-had-a-confusing-constitution-day/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-indian-citizen-has-had-a-confusing-constitution-day/#respond Fri, 28 Nov 2025 18:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291740 On the 26th day of November, 2025, as we celebrated “Constitution Day,” two very opposed signals about the republic invited us to clear our heads about what it means to be a citizen of India, and what text it is that ought to guide the further exertions of our lawfully elected governments towards “development”. On [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-indian-citizen-has-had-a-confusing-constitution-day/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-indigenous-replications-of-project-macaulay/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-indigenous-replications-of-project-macaulay/#respond Thu, 20 Nov 2025 16:46:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291494 In an unsurprisingly puerile Ramnath Goenka Lecture, Narendra Modi has re-invoked the favourite cultural hobby-horse of the “indigenous,” upper caste, North-Indian elite. By introducing English language and education to India in 1835, Macaulay was instrumental in successfully enslaving the Indian psyche, and forging a class of Indians fit only to serve British colonial purposes. That British [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-indigenous-replications-of-project-macaulay/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/chicaneries-contradictions-justifications/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/chicaneries-contradictions-justifications/#comments Wed, 12 Nov 2025 17:55:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291142 Now who doesn’t know that Donald Trump’s mission in Presidency is to stop all wars. Which is why he seems poised to begin one against Venezuela. Gratuitously. If Putin is a thug for invading Ukraine, Trump cannot but be an emancipator in the bad lands where Leftists still exist. Putin may cry hoarse that Ukraine still retains Nazi [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/chicaneries-contradictions-justifications/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/good-muslim-bad-muslim-so-also-good-hindu-bad-hindu-shri-bhagwat-ji/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/good-muslim-bad-muslim-so-also-good-hindu-bad-hindu-shri-bhagwat-ji/#respond Tue, 11 Nov 2025 16:59:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291134 In yet another peroration on the occasion of the centenary celebrations of the RSS, Shri Mohan Bhagwat, with characteristic balance and good sense, has cautioned us not to club all Muslims in one “bracket”. He has underscored how only some Indian Muslims speak of “Ghazwa e Hind”, or practise “Love Jihad”. Thus he admonishes us [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/good-muslim-bad-muslim-so-also-good-hindu-bad-hindu-shri-bhagwat-ji/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-deterioration-of-the-concept-of-communal-into-vote-bank/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-deterioration-of-the-concept-of-communal-into-vote-bank/#respond Wed, 29 Oct 2025 18:19:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1290589 In the area of Humanist studies in sociology it is perhaps hard to find a more endearing concept than that of the “communal.” Be it Latin, French, German, or English, all extensive etymological studies show how the word denoted that which is general, collective, public, “Held in common” – a history that was to lead [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-deterioration-of-the-concept-of-communal-into-vote-bank/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-illusion-and-reality-of-sanatan-and-social-hierarchy/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-illusion-and-reality-of-sanatan-and-social-hierarchy/#respond Thu, 09 Oct 2025 15:45:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1289733 It seems our Sanatan continues to ride a dual horse of convenience when it comes to caste identities: it speaks of caste either as birth-related or karmically-acquired as it suits whatever case may be in hand. Mulling the Manusmriti text which lays down that the killing of a Brahmin is the most heinous of sins, many bewildered Hindus [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-illusion-and-reality-of-sanatan-and-social-hierarchy/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/shooting-democracy-dead-during-a-television-debate/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/shooting-democracy-dead-during-a-television-debate/#respond Fri, 03 Oct 2025 14:32:03 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1289456 Printu Mahadevan, a spokesperson of the Bharatiya Janata Party, has been pleased to make it known to Rahul Gandhi that he  “will be shot in the chest”  should he encourage Gen Z like movements in India. Just to remind ourselves: Rahul Gandhi is both leader of the second biggest national party and leader of the opposition in [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/shooting-democracy-dead-during-a-television-debate/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/delhi-riots-case-are-the-accused-to-be-tried-or-simply-held/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/delhi-riots-case-are-the-accused-to-be-tried-or-simply-held/#respond Wed, 24 Sep 2025 18:21:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1288982 Umar Khalid and others have been in jail now for five long years, awaiting trial for having allegedly incited riots in the capital in 2020. The trial has not begun, and is not likely to for some time. This could be for one of two reasons: either the state does not have a good case, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/delhi-riots-case-are-the-accused-to-be-tried-or-simply-held/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/three-recent-vignettes-from-sanatan-politics/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/three-recent-vignettes-from-sanatan-politics/#respond Sat, 20 Sep 2025 14:42:27 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1288795 The following three snapshots illustrate how everyday political interactions in New India are steadily reshaping democracy along the twin axes of feudal entitlement and authoritarian intolerance. The first comes from Debu Sarai in Bihar. Asked by Union textiles minister Giriraj Singh of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) whether he was receiving government benefits, a Muslim [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/three-recent-vignettes-from-sanatan-politics/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-the-light-of-nepals-upheaval-president-murmus-admonition-comes-not-a-day-too-soon/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-the-light-of-nepals-upheaval-president-murmus-admonition-comes-not-a-day-too-soon/#respond Thu, 11 Sep 2025 15:47:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1288425 Tucked away in a corner of page 7 of The Indian Express of September 10 is an all-important story. It carries news of an admonition from the honourable President of India – one that has not come a day too soon, given the upheavals in the neighbouring country of Nepal. The President has underlined a truth that [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/in-the-light-of-nepals-upheaval-president-murmus-admonition-comes-not-a-day-too-soon/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/let-the-130th-amendment-move-be-the-last-straw/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/let-the-130th-amendment-move-be-the-last-straw/#respond Fri, 22 Aug 2025 15:49:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1287636 There are times in history when the invitation to engage in debate about a patently disingenuous gambit is a call to be complicit with it. Think of the many arguments that were made lauding the positive features of the Emergency of 1975: Trains ran on time; nobody dared come late to office; fractious public protests [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/let-the-130th-amendment-move-be-the-last-straw/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/mohan-bhagwats-socialism-rethink-and-the-wider-battle-within-the-sangh-bjp/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/mohan-bhagwats-socialism-rethink-and-the-wider-battle-within-the-sangh-bjp/#respond Fri, 15 Aug 2025 16:30:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1287349 Quite recently, the right-wing, led by the RSS, spoke for the umpteenth time in favour of erasing the word “Socialism” from the Preamble to the Constitution of India. It is no historical secret, of course, that these forces have remained linked to private ownership of productive forces in opposition to an economic model in which [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/mohan-bhagwats-socialism-rethink-and-the-wider-battle-within-the-sangh-bjp/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/who-is-a-true-indian/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/who-is-a-true-indian/#respond Sat, 09 Aug 2025 16:44:43 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1287100 In 1974, at the end of a three-hour long talk given by me to a civil society gathering in Madison, Wisconsin, I was asked a truly profound, if troubling, question: “Sir, keeping in mind the incredible diversities of cultural identity and expression in India straddling myriads of languages, castes, religious faiths, colours of skin, economic [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/who-is-a-true-indian/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/indias-democracy-on-a-precipice-will-the-state-take-a-step-back-in-bihar/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/indias-democracy-on-a-precipice-will-the-state-take-a-step-back-in-bihar/#respond Sun, 27 Jul 2025 15:03:09 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286616 When the Constitution of India granted the right of universal adult franchise to citizens, it did not, unlike the American system, require Indians above 18 years of age to register suo motu as voters. The task of ensuring that every Indian above the age of eighteen cast their vote was entrusted to the Election Commission of India by [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/indias-democracy-on-a-precipice-will-the-state-take-a-step-back-in-bihar/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/elected-to-power-powerless-in-srinagar-the-long-wait-for-the-restoration-of-jammu-kashmirs-statehood/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/elected-to-power-powerless-in-srinagar-the-long-wait-for-the-restoration-of-jammu-kashmirs-statehood/#respond Wed, 23 Jul 2025 17:41:45 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286518 Long before the assembly elections were finally held in the Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir, this columnist had anticipated that the answer to the question that whether statehood would follow or not, or of what kind, would depend on the nature of the results in those elections. Thus, I may be pardoned for saying [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/elected-to-power-powerless-in-srinagar-the-long-wait-for-the-restoration-of-jammu-kashmirs-statehood/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-right-wing-putsch-on-secularism-and-socialism/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-right-wing-putsch-on-secularism-and-socialism/#respond Thu, 17 Jul 2025 15:48:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286320 The crude fact, of course, is that however these contested terms may be enshrined in the Preamble of the constitution, the last decade or so has for all intents and purposes hollowed both of their content and neutered their sanctity. On April 24, 1973, three years prior to the passing of the 42nd Amendment Act of the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-right-wing-putsch-on-secularism-and-socialism/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/unimpeded-mass-murder-safari-style/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/unimpeded-mass-murder-safari-style/#respond Fri, 27 Jun 2025 18:39:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285551 You just may have noticed that a new ingenious modality of mass murder has been in operation in Gaza. Call it game-hunting, safari style. Recall how when some royals used to be taken on a tiger shoot, a bait would be tied to a tree so a big cat could be drawn to it for the dignitary’s convenient [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/unimpeded-mass-murder-safari-style/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-moment-of-truth-for-india-an-admission-of-failure-by-modi/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-moment-of-truth-for-india-an-admission-of-failure-by-modi/#respond Thu, 26 Jun 2025 15:47:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285466 Imagine that the one country which India regards as the epicentre of terrorism, namely, Pakistan, should be having it so good even as Indian delegations have been making India’s case to the West. There could be no more poignant admission of the failure of India’s diplomatic outreach to America and Europe than Prime Minister Narendra [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/a-moment-of-truth-for-india-an-admission-of-failure-by-modi/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/perhaps-this-is-why-the-innocent-men-tourists-died-in-pahalgam/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/perhaps-this-is-why-the-innocent-men-tourists-died-in-pahalgam/#respond Tue, 27 May 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284248 Now, at last, we know why 26 innocent men, mostly tourists, died at the hands of terrorists in Pahalgam: it was not because there was an intelligence failure, nor because no policemen patrolled the fatal site. It was because their women did not fight to save them. Had these women studied the life and work [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/perhaps-this-is-why-the-innocent-men-tourists-died-in-pahalgam/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/is-modis-friend-up-to-mischief-or-is-he-telling-the-truth/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/is-modis-friend-up-to-mischief-or-is-he-telling-the-truth/#respond Thu, 15 May 2025 15:45:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283747 Why is it that to this minute there is no statement from the Indian prime minister contradicting the litany of perverse Trump talk on Kashmir? There is that old saying: “fools in high places are dangerous”. Might we add, a ravenously narcissistic one in the highest place in the world even more so. Is Modi [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/is-modis-friend-up-to-mischief-or-is-he-telling-the-truth/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-pahalgam-voices-that-ought-to-shame-the-sectarian-zealot/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-pahalgam-voices-that-ought-to-shame-the-sectarian-zealot/#respond Tue, 06 May 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283411 Himanshi and Vinay Narwal were married a week before the young naval officer was murdered by Islamist terrorists at a meadow  near Pahalgam. Yet while sectarian vigilantes have been busy carrying out vendetta across the country against Kashmiri Muslims – students, vendors etc – the one person who might have been expected with justification to seek [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/from-pahalgam-voices-that-ought-to-shame-the-sectarian-zealot/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/rebuked-by-kashmiris-let-not-pakistans-general-munir-succeed-in-other-parts-of-india/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/rebuked-by-kashmiris-let-not-pakistans-general-munir-succeed-in-other-parts-of-india/#respond Tue, 29 Apr 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283123 The denominational terrorist killings in Pahalgam, instigated by Pakistani Army chief Asim Munir’s invocation of the pernicious two-nation theory have had a salutary consequence in the valley. For the first time in living memory, Kashmiri Muslims came out in thousands after Friday prayers to denounce the evil, sectarian design alien to the common Kashmiri psyche. Carrying the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/rebuked-by-kashmiris-let-not-pakistans-general-munir-succeed-in-other-parts-of-india/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/asim-munir-you-got-that-wrong/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/asim-munir-you-got-that-wrong/#respond Thu, 24 Apr 2025 15:45:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1282918 The dastardly targeted killings of Hindu tourists in Pahalgam in pursuance of the “two-nation theory” as recently recalled by the Pakistan army chief Asim Munir, must be read as a misbegotten attempt to defame Kashmiris in the name of Islam. Munir had better acknowledge to his bigoted heart that the brand of Islam which informs his fulminations [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/asim-munir-you-got-that-wrong/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/hamlet-hashmi-the-play-is-the-thing/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/hamlet-hashmi-the-play-is-the-thing/#respond Tue, 15 Apr 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1282517 You may recall that in the iconic play, The Tragedy of Hamlet, the Prince of Denmark, it is revealed to the young prince that his father, the erstwhile king of Denmark, was murdered by his uncle Claudius and his mother Gertrude who, just three months after the funeral, entered into wedlock with the uncle ascending the throne [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/hamlet-hashmi-the-play-is-the-thing/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-new-global-disorder-matches-climate-catastrophe/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-new-global-disorder-matches-climate-catastrophe/#respond Sun, 09 Mar 2025 15:22:59 +0000 In the good book, the Evangelist promises “a new heaven and a new earth” with the Second Coming of Christ. For now, what we can see is that the second coming of Donald J. Trump promises to bring with it a new earth alright, leaving the subject of a new heaven for theological disputation as may or [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-new-global-disorder-matches-climate-catastrophe/feed/ 0