Gujarat - Himal Southasian (Page 3)

Lumpens in the constabulary: Gujarat

It was in the mid-1950s that Justice AN Mullah castigated the police, calling it the "biggest organised goonda (goon) force" in India. Many events have occurred since then

By Subhash Gatade

/ 1 Oct 2003

The judge, the prosecutor and Best Bakery

The verdict is out and it inspires no confidence, either in the police or in the judiciary.

By Biraj Swain and Somnath Vatsa

/ 1 Sep 2003

Dalits and Adivasis: Cannon fodder for Hindutva?

Gujarat's 'mobs' are not a random mix of Hindu activists. Rather, they are the designed outcome of the RSS-VHP-BJP strategy to weaken Dalit-Adivasi activism and turn

By Praful Bidwai

/ 1 May 2002

Riot cheerleaders: The anomaly of Hindu women in violence

Once only passive witnesses to public violence, Hindu Gujarati women have taken a prominent role in the ongoing attacks on Muslims in the state. While the roots of this phenomenon

By D Parthasarathy

/ 1 May 2002

India’s self-goal in Gujarat

The evil now consuming Gujarat emerged from the BJP's communal 'laboratory experiments' in the state. The massacres of Muslims thus do not represent a failure but

By Ranjit Dev Raj

/ 1 May 2002

The social engineering of Gujarat

The ongoing violence and its broadening social and geographical base in the state is a consequence of the political recasting of social identities. The winter moon had already risen over

By Hemant Babu

/ 1 May 2002

Letter from Ahmedabad

The contradictions of modern Gujarat Writing this letter takes me back to when I first came to Ahmedabad five years ago and fell in love with the city. Gujarat, the

By Anjana Rajbhandary

/ 1 May 2002

As the communal carnage in Gujarat enters its third month, the Vajpayee government has fashioned a three-pronged strategy: brazen out the opprobrium, attack domestic and international critics of Narendra Modi

By Praful Bidwai

/ 1 May 2002

‘Gujarat’ and the Pakistani state

The stark horror of what is happening in and around Ahmedabad must alert Pakistanis to their own reality. In India, at least, extremism can be combated by the public will.

By Aasim Sajjad Akhtar

/ 1 Apr 2002

Communalism at Large

The BJP's weaknesses as a political party make it doubly dangerous as far as the non-Hindu minorities of India are concerned. Of the many liturgies of nationalism in

By The Editors

/ 1 Apr 2002

Hell’s Angels

LESSER HUMANS 59 minutes directed by K. Stalin produced by Drishti Media Collective

By Mari Marcel Thekaekara

/ 1 May 2001

Dam insecurity

How a critically important South Asia-wide meeting on the future of large dams was scuttled because of the Government of Gujarat's influence over the Government of India. In

By Himanshu Thakkar

/ 30 Sep 1998