Sparsh

Harvard professor Larry Lessig is one of our foremost authorities on copyright issues, with a vision for reconciling creative freedom with marketplace competition. 1- The Indian state of Bihar has long been a byword for bad governance. It was however governed particularly badly between 1990 and 2005, and has since experienced something of a ‘governance miracle’. How can we account for the 1990–2005 deterioration? Through this working paper - State Incapacity by Design: Understanding the Bihar Story , we will understand that the low state capacity is often a political choice . 2- La Grande Revolution, Encore? A comparison between France of 1787 with present USA as both had financed an overseas war with borrowed money. 3- The War Dogma : This article appears in the July issue of Agenda/Infochange for the theme on the ‘Limits of Freedom’. An insight on Dantewada and Operation Green Hunt. 4- Playing fast and loose by Pratap Bhanu Mehta : A overview of tussle on Janlokpal Bill ...

Few things reveal a nation better than what it censors. Human societies that allow the free expression of ideas do better than those that don’t allow new ideas. The evidence is all around for us to see and judge. The renaissance was the triumph of ideas over church power after a long struggle. The ignorance and lethargy of the poor are the direct result of the whole economic, social and political domination. It is the failure of elites and policy makers that failed in creating inclusive growth. Hence, the violence emerges from the poor neighborhood or a specific region. State can't arm people to fight insurgency; it will only lead to legalization of violence with state backing it. The order can't be maintained by violating spirit of law in the first place. Hence, they opt for torture technique to suppress the will of people. The other strategy to deal with challenges to legitimacy of state is by promoting and reinforcing identity politics within a system of...

When the Rebels become the tyrants, Revolution takes on a new meaning. We can consider Libya a perfect example of that. Still, US government is backing Libyan rebels to achieve democracy and liberty in their nation while supporting Arab league authoritarian rule in Saudi, Bahrain or Yemen. Why ? Only vested interests in Saudi and hidden agenda in Libya ! As pointed by a journalist : Libyan assets are mainly in the US and Europe, and they amount to hundreds of billions of dollars: the US Treasury froze $30bn of liquid assets, and US banks $18bn. What is to happen to interest on these assets? The absence of any specific arrangement assets are turned into a booty, an interest-free loan, in this instance, to US Treasury and US banks. And the logic of western policy is permanent support for the Saudi elite and its guarantee of “stability” and "oil"in the region. Timothy Garton Ash, Professor of European Studies at Oxford University, coined the term refolution to describe the hyb...

1- State legitimacy and resistance : State derives its legitimacy from its institutions. Its these institutions that give State credibility and roots to live in the society of hostile crowds. 2- The ‘Viral’ Revolutions of Our Times – Post national Reflections by Aditya Nigam 3- Interview to Devinder Sharma :- On Food Crisis and Corruption. An Interview with One World South Asia: "Corruption has fuelled India's economic growth. 4- Growth and other concerns by Amartya Sen 5- Comments and Responses by the author : Socialism of 21st Century : Author Sunil 6-  An Interview with Guernica Magazine . In the wake of sedition charges by the Indian government, Arundhati Roy describes the stupidest question she gets asked, the cuss-word that made her respect the power of language, and the limits of preaching nonviolence. 7- The multi-individual society By Pratap Bhanu Mehta - An look on liberalism and multiculturalism. 8- Reluctant heroes : International recognition o...

A Day Trip to My Alma Mater : One of the best memoir and evaluation done by alumni on IIT system. The Disadvantages of an Elite Education : Our best universities have forgotten that the reason they exist is to make minds, not careers. - By William Deresiewicz what do *you* want to do?! -- Author points correctly that forget science, everyone should be prioritizing their activities and asking themselves - is this *really* something *I* want to do?! Amusing Ourselves To Death : PBH: Huxley Vs. Orwell: Infinite Distractions Or Government Oppression? My Wishlist of Reading : Yayaver on Flipkart Reality is both good and bad depending on our view. Torture, suicide and terrorism are the three blind mice of our era with no one knowing clearly which of them is leading us astray. And all of them are born out of religion. They have played a major role in the grisly battle between terror and retribution. Similarly, prostitution is only product of repressed sexuality and marriage with...

The Communists say that there are the only two means of establishing communism. The first is violence. Nothing short of it will suffice to break up the existing system. The other is dictatorship of the proletariat. I quote here an old premise of political theory: for a state to be functional and effective, it must retain a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence. I am in love with opinions of Emma Goldman on the goals, ends, means and values attached with the revolution. I am reproducing her views with the help of wikiquote. What is Cause of revolution? I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from convention and prejudice, should demand the denial of life and joy. I insisted that our Cause could not expect me to become a nun and that the movement would not be turned into a cloister. If it meant that, I did not want it. "I want freedom, the right to self-expression, everybody's right to beautiful, radiant ...

I was reading Emma Goldman's view on revolution that are based on her observation on Russian revolution. They are indeed astute and written with intense understanding of the failure of the communist revolution to turn into just state. The inherent tendency of the State is to concentrate, to narrow, and monopolize all social activities; the nature of revolution is, on the contrary, to grow, to broaden, and disseminate itself in ever-wider circles. In other words, the State is institutional and static; revolution is fluent, dynamic. These two tendencies are incompatible and mutually destructive. The State idea killed the Russian Revolution and it must have the same result in all other revolutions, unless the libertarian idea prevail. Revolution is indeed a violent process. But if it is to result only in a change of dictatorship, in a shifting of names and political personalities, then it is hardly worth while. It is surely not worth all the struggle and sacrifice, the stupendous lo...

Continuing our exploration of the blind faith, this part of essay will focus on Denialism. First part of the trilogy was on Prohibition . Generally, Denialism is taken as choosing to deny reality as a way to avoid an uncomfortable truth. It is much more than that. Denialism is not simply the knee-jerk refusal to accept the truth; it is a deliberate and often sophisticated attempt to create a kind of pseudo scholarship. Attacks on scientific consensus employ the simulacra of scholarship and a deceptively readable idiom. Those who debunk the deniers tend to be old-fashioned rationalists or committed activists. Neither group are particularly well suited to looking at the deeper reasons behind denialism, warns Keith Kahn-Harris. We can better read about denialism in this essay Unreasonable Doubt in much precise analytical way. Just quoting one paragraph here - But one of the most serious failings of a rational, scientific enlightenment is its propensity to be turned against itself,...

Liberty will not descend to a people; a people must raise themselves to liberty. It is a privilege that must be earned before it can be enjoyed. It's a quote by a 19th century English cleric and writer, Charles Caleb Colton, which can be found in his 1820 publication "Lacon, or Many Things in Few Words, addressed to those who think". When a state becomes involved in any cultural or physical warfare, the identities of people began to change in the public. New symbols have to be waved loud and pertaining to exhibitionism. There is always persecution of people with different opinion that party high command found is seen in every communist nation. Ethnically targeted state repression in Balkan countries where Slovak, Czech, Muslims, Serbs Croats and Roma people are targeting each other based on demographic strength. While the worse form comes in the military dictatorship where authority exploit the majority for their like in Burma and North Korea. There is nothing to compa...

I am not talking about human rights today. I am asking a burning question : Do some Lives are less worthy than others? Today, an American life is equivalent to thousands Iraqi lives. Genocide in Iraq and Palestine is taking place. And all of the world is mute spectator. Do I have to rephrase the cynical quote from Animal Farm to describe about human lives in tis situation : All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others. The article War and the American Republic by Namit Sir has prompted me to write on this issue. I detest military as it shows brute force in countering the intelligent arguments. The ultimate purpose of a military is as a primarily destructive force to be utilised in only the direst of circumstances. But, as the authority resides in fewer hand in any society or world politics, military power is used to constantly wage war or to exploit millions for elite few. Embed here is the lecture of Noam Chomsky to understand power structur...

I will start the first part of trilogy on the blind faith. Trilogy will be composed of the essay on Prohibition, Denialism and Irrationality. This is an attempt born out of my anger on the ignorance, intolerance and indifference surrounding us. The need to confront violence and injustice began through questioning taboos and rituals. Overall, I am not here to worship what is known, but to question it. Prohibition When a small authorising groups such as state, businessmen or priestly class of a given population disapproves of and/or feels threatened by an activity in which a smaller group of that population engages, and seeks to render that activity legally prohibited. Most of the Blasphemy Laws, censor rules on piece of art like books, movies or music form in this category. Prohibitions are used as a tool to maintain status quo of the authority in the power. Authority wants everything to be governed and monitored by too much closeness. It is all done in name of protectin...

I was watching the movie ' Full Metal Jacket ' yesterday. The movie sparked the issue about violence in my mind. Why did authorising state take its stand more violently against dissidents than democratic states? The contents which authority is unaware, that is treated as treasonable due to fear of the losing power by unknown. There are attempts to de-legitimize and criminalize all dissent and opposition to its policies. Bounding of law to maintain order without even hearing voices of dissidents create havoc situation in the society. Christopher Hitchens summarises dictatorship governance as : The true essence of a dictatorship is in fact not its regularity but its unpredictability and caprice; those who live under it must never be able to relax, must never be quite sure if they have followed the rules correctly or not. Thus, the ruled can always be found to be in the wrong. The ability to run such a "system" is among the greatest pleasures of arbitrary authority. T...