Innholdsfortegnelse for September 9, 2019 i India Today

No single issue has featured as frequently on the INDIA TODAY cover as Jammu and Kashmir. Since 1975, the state has been on our cover 27 times. Our 28th cover story arrives at a historic juncture—when India’s most troubled state has ceased to be a state. The region has been under an unprecedented lockdown and communications blackout since August 5 when the NDA government dismantled Articles 370 and 35A, while bifurcating the state into the Union territories of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh. This is the biggest move since 1949 when the government inserted Article 370 into the Constitution giving the state a special status. With the ‘dilution’ of Article 370, the government has presented the people of the state with a fait accompli with enormous implications. In one fell…

The case against P. Chidambaram is based on his alleged involvement in the violation of foreign investment laws/ money-laundering by INX Media, a firm founded by former media barons Indrani and Peter Mukerjea (both currently facing a charge of murder). In 2007, when Chidambaram was finance minister, INX Media sought permission from the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) to source foreign direct investment (FDI) and to further invest a part of those funds. The FIPB approved Rs 4.6 crore of FDI, but did not permit downstream investments in other group companies. However, INX Media took in over Rs 305 crore and went ahead with its investment plan. In early 2008, the finance ministry’s Financial Intelligence Unit flagged these FDI inflows. The investigation was referred to the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which…

It’s a startling plan. One that defies logic, even to those well-versed with policymaking in modern, nationalist, digital India. In Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s maiden Budget, she announced that, to promote a less-cash economy, all charges would be waived for ‘certain debit cards’ and other digital payments. The merchant discount rate (MDR) would become zero. The MDR is what a merchant pays for accepting a card payment—a rupee or so for every Rs 100 received. That rupee compensates the players in the digital-payments chain. The merchant saves on cash handling, and gets customers who prefer digital payments and who spend more than cash users. The new proposal is like telling all retail outlets: you will henceforth sell everything at the price that you buy. Margins are banished. Ignoring the views…

And speaking of embarrassing. A video has gone viral of a doctor in Kashmir telling the BBC’s Hindi service about the problems faced by patients and physicians who have had no access to the Internet since August 5. He held a placard to emphasise that he was not protesting but requesting the Centre to restore connectivity. Nothing ‘inflammatory’ or controversial was said, but the video ends with him being led into a police van. Weeks into a de facto siege, it remains shocking that people in Kashmir, Indian citizens as we keep being reminded, risk arrest when they speak their minds to a journalist while ostensibly living in a democratic country with a free press.…

On August 22, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) grilled Raj Thackeray for over eight hours about an alleged case of money laundering. This led to the state opposition rallying behind the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) president, terming the interrogation a political vendetta. But highly-placed sources insist the ED found suspicious transactions by the MNS leader’s real estate firm, Matoshree Infrastructure. The firm allegedly sold some flats ‘on paper’ and then repurchased them at a higher value. The source claims Rs 78 crore was credited to Thackeray’s account after this sale and repurchase. Thackeray has kept mum so far, and with state elections just two months away, the BJP might like him to stay that way.…

The game of one-upmanship between Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot and deputy CM Sachin Pilot continues. When Gehlot criticised the Centre for scuttling Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Srinagar, Pilot obliquely asked him to focus on the state. The Congress government had missed an opportunity when the court let off Pehlu Khan’s killers, he said, adding that the government should have immediately ordered a fresh investigation after it took over in December. —Sandeep Unnithan with Kiran Tare, Rohit Parihar, Jeemon Jacob and Romita Datta…

Even as India celebrated the increase in its national tiger numbers, wildlife officials in Rajasthan were downbeat. The 2018 Management Effectiveness Evaluation (MEE), an audit of India’s tiger reserves by the Union ministry for environment, forests and climate change, downgraded two of Rajasthan’s reserves—Ranthambore and Sariska—from ‘good’ to ‘fair’. The report notes the slow growth of Sariska’s tiger population and raises fears that poor management and the absence of a long-term plan puts the reserve at risk of losing its big cats. Rajasthan has three tiger reserves—Ranthambore, Sariska and Mukundara Hills—which, together, are home to 69 tigers, up from 45 in 2014. Embarrassed at the dressing down, Rajasthan forest officials have sprung to their defence and even offered an analysis of what went wrong. They have identified a 2016 decision…

Telangana chief minister K. Chandrashekar Rao (KCR) is pushing for far-reaching administrative reforms in a declared bid to provide responsive, corruption-free governance. In long closed-door meetings held on August 20, followed by a five-hour field visit the next day, KCR told the state’s 33 district collectors that various measures had to be introduced to make the administration more accountable. Among the proposed steps is the forthcoming new revenue bill, which promises greater efficiency and transparency through the use of information technology and introduction of timelines for corruption-free delivery of services. The bill will empower district collectors to act against officers and elected representatives entangled in financial irregularities or misuse of funds. “Outdated revenue laws, mostly enacted by the British, have caused immense loss to the people and the state,” KCR…

Arun Jaitley, who passed away on August 24 at the age of 66 after a prolonged illness, led a life most unordinary. From a fairly ordinary, middle-class beginning—his first chamber being his father’s office in Old Delhi’s Chandni Chowk area—Jaitley rose to the highest echelons of Executive office. What made the political ascent even more remarkable was that he was never a ‘mass leader’ nor, like many of his peers in government, did he rise through the ranks of his party’s ideological parent—the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. His influence and power only grew with time. Whether it was while the BJP had L.K. Advani at the helm or the Narendra Modi-Amit Shah duo, Jaitley was indispensable. He had an uncanny ability to connect with people from different backgrounds and parties. He…

You have to have a cool eye and a warm heart. You have to have silence inside you,” offers Raghu Rai in An Unframed Portrait, a film made by his daughter, Avani. It’s excellent advice for photographers and visual artists from one of the stalwarts of Indian photography. But as it turns out, it’s also apt advice for those considering Rai’s oeuvre, which, vast as it is, deserves a cool eye and a little inner quiet. His photos, unlike what the West was used to, were seemingly chaotic. He saw as only an Indian can Rai has photographed the country for over 50 years since he landed his first job as a professional photographer in 1965 covering urgent news stories for The Statesman. By the time he joined India Today…

After Leila, a 40-year-old sex worker in Istanbul, dies, her mind retains consciousness for another 10 minutes and 38 seconds. In those moments, she remembers her life growing up in a small town in Turkey, her departure to Istanbul, and the years of work, relative freedom and friendships that have preceded her death. Her memories form a portrait of sex work in Istanbul in the 1970s and ’80s when laws and attitudes were particularly inhuman towards sex workers whose lives lay at the intersection of socio-economic pressures, desire, religion and politics. In some of the novel’s most rewarding sections, Shafak shows the reader the conservative and familial forces that bring Leila and other young people who will eventually become her friends in the city. The story of their pasts is…

In his essay The Great Derangement, Amitav Ghosh argues that the modern novel celebrates ‘bourgeois regularity’ to the point of derangement. This is how literature and politics are complicit: both literary and political choices have focused on securing a settlement in the wilderness, a secure, focused narrative. There is a protagonist who narrows down time and space, and tells a story within such confines. This explains why the climate change novel never took off except in the marginalised genre of science fiction, as there is little chance for uncanny forces to destabilise a human narrative. Ghosh sought to rectify this in Gun Island, where tropical spiders appear in Europe and unexpected migration flows over time might allow a Bengali warning to save your life at a Venetian construction site. John…

JANUARY 2008 The finance ministry finds anomalies in FDI inflows to INX Media. The case is transferred to the ED, which later refers the case to the CBI MAY 2017 The CBI registers an FIR against INX Media for violation of FIPB rules, naming P. Chidambaram’s son, Karti, as an accused FEBRUARY 2018 Karti is arrested at Chennai airport by the CBI in connection with the case and brought to Delhi. After 23 days in jail, Karti is granted bail JULY 2018 P. Chidambaram applies for interim protection from arrest. The high court grants his plea JULY 2019 Former INX Media owner Indrani Mukerjea turns approver for the CBI, alleging that a deal was struck between INX and Karti for $1 million, in exchange for help in resolving the FIPB…

A recent report commissioned by the Haryana State Legal Services Authority to study conditions in the state’s 19 prisons alleged that nearly half the prisoners surveyed had suffered “inhuman treatment, including torture”. This month, a court in Kerala granted bail to a police sub-inspector accused of torturing a man being held at the Nedumkandam police station, who died in custody. In Uttar Pradesh, a man who tried to report the kidnapping and rape of his wife to police suffered what news reports described as “third degree torture”. In Gujarat, an RTI request revealed 214 custodial deaths between 2015 and 2018, as tabulated by the state’s human rights commission (but the Union home ministry reports only 40 custodial deaths in that period.) The National Crime Records Bureau reports hundreds of custodial…

THE HEALTH OF RESERVES Rajasthan’s MEE score (on 100) fell from 65.8 in 2014 to 55.7 in 2018. In the same period, Kerala’s score rose from 88.7 to 90.2, Tamil Nadu’s from 75.4 to 82 and Madhya Pradesh’s from 79.4 to 81.9. Among the reserves, Pench improved from 89.5 in 2014 to 93.7 and Periyar from 91.1 to 93.7. Ranthambore’s score fell from 71.8 to 59.4, Sariska’s from 73.39 to 58.59 and Mukundara’s from 52.4 to 49.2. BIOTIC PRESSURE Ranthambore faces intense biotic pressure as around 24,000 families and 240,000 heads of cattle live within two kilometres of its periphery. Further, two million pilgrims visit the nearby Ganesh temple every year. There are 26 villages inside Sariska, and 25,000 vehicles carry 120,000 visitors to nearby temples every year. These impose…

Van Khandeshwari, MORENA During the raid, state police found this chilling plant to be stocked with hundreds of kilos of chemicals, oils and detergents. Thousands of litres of ‘synthetic milk’ were being produced and sent forward to packaging and distribution units Maa Kailadevi, MORENA During this raid, 36,000 litres of synthetic milk, 1,400 tins of refined oil, 550 bags of caustic soda, 17 cans of hydrogenated fats and 550 bags of skimmed milk powder were seized. The ‘milk’ was bound for Aligarh, Meerut, Kanpur and Agra Gopal Ice Factory, BHIND In the raid on this location, the STF seized 2,000 litres of synthetic milk, 1,000 kg of mawa and 1,500 kg of synthetic paneer…

In his Independence Day address, Prime Minister Narendra Modi warned against the “population explosion” that was holding back India’s development. While it’s true that India is still in a phase of population growth, that phenomenon is heavily concentrated in states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and Rajasthan; overall, Indian population growth appears to have stabilised, with a noticeable downtrend towards the replacement rate (the number at which the population neither grows nor diminishes) of 2.1. In fact, most of South India now has low, European-level birth rates. Thanks largely to the North, by 2027, India is expected to overtake China as the world’s most populous nation. India currently has a high working-age population, but, by 2050, a projected slowdown in fertility rates is seen creating a very large population of over-60s,…

@ShougatDasgupta Hashtag Wars Pakistani hashtag activists worked overtime to make their suggestion to boycott Indian products trend on Twitter. The response from their Indian counterparts was to laugh. Can Pakistan do without India, they asked, without our products, whether cultural or essential to survival? As with the increasingly quixotic manoeuvres of the Pakistani government, seeking international intervention over the abrogation of Article 370 and the ensuing communications blackout, our neigbour’s Twitterati are beginning to seem desperate. Those tweeting in India may scoff, but this Pakistani ‘movement’ to boycott Indian products mirrors the pathological paranoia of many Indians who are outraged when a Pakistani actor appears in an Indian film, or an Indian pop star plays a gig in Pakistan, or who refuse to buy Pakistani-grown mangoes because they don’t want…

The Muslim-majority NWFP elected a Congress government in 1946—but it was dismissed in 1947 Since Narendra Modi took charge as prime minister in 2014, there has been an increasing trend—primarily among Sangh Parivar leaders—to attribute the historical mistakes India made to the country’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. There could be some legitimacy to these claims, but it is also part of a concerted propaganda campaign. In the first week of August, a surprise voice joined this chorus—former president Pranab Mukherjee, considered one of the closest confidants of Nehru’s daughter and former prime minister Indira Gandhi. Speaking at the launch of India’s Lost Frontier: The Story of the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan, authored by former textiles secretary Raghvendra Singh, Mukherjee blamed Nehru for ignoring the conspiracy hatched by British…

Congress MP Shashi Tharoor recently endorsed party leader Jairam Ramesh’s statement that demonising PM Modi would not help the Congress regain its credibility. However, Tharoor’s stand attracted the ire of his party colleagues in Kerala. Kerala’s leader of the opposition Ramesh Chennithala and state PCC chief Mullappally Ramachandran said there was no need to show the PM in a positive light. Lok Sabha MP K. Muraleedharan went so far as to ask Tharoor to join the BJP. Tharoor has said he doesn’t want their unsolicited advice. If this turns into a war of words, Tharoor will likely have the upper hand.…

By appointing three deputy chief ministers—Dr C.N. Ashwathnarayan, Laxman Savadi and Govind Karjol—on August 26, the Bharatiya Janata Party has sent a clear message to senior leaders that it is grooming a second rung of leadership in Karnataka. BJP national president Amit Shah and general secretary B.L. Santhosh have taken this decision with a long-term view to strengthen the party under a new leadership and reduce the dependence on the older lot, who have built the party from scratch in Karnataka. Political observers believe the move will put said senior leaders on notice. “It’s a clear signal to Yediyurappa, former CM and now cabinet minister Jagadish Shettar, K.S. Eshwarappa, Umesh Katti, Arvind Limbavali and R. Ashoka that they won’t call the shots in Karnataka anymore,” says Bengalurubased political analyst A.…

Devendra Fadnavis is the first Maharashtra chief minister to embark on a tour of the state seeking another mandate to govern. The month-long Mahajanadesh yatra will see him cover 30 districts, 157 assembly constituencies and over 4,000 km. In an interaction with Kiran D. Tare, Fadnavis affects the confidence of a man who is certain of a triumphant return to power. ‘I shall return’ goes the tagline of the yatra. Excerpts: Q. What made you embark on a statewide tour? The BJP has a tradition of yatras. While in opposition, we launched the sangharsh (struggle) yatra. Now, when in power, we are on a samvad (dialogue) yatra to have a dialogue with the people. I am taking word of the government’s work to the people, judging their responses and seeking…

PAPA, DEKHIYE HUM SHAADI kar liye hain. Yeh sab dikhawati nahin hai (Papa, I got married. This is for real),” says Kirti in a video shot at an undisclosed location and posted on YouTube. A streak of vermilion in the parting of her hair, the woman from Bihar’s West Champaran district urges her parents to let her and husband Nitesh Yadav, with whom she eloped, live peacefully. She even warns them against harassing her in-laws. “You will be held responsible if anything untoward happens. You have already threatened my husband’s family. We will not tolerate this anymore,” she declares. Nitesh, too, makes an appeal to his father-in-law: “Please stop harassing us, or we’ll have to approach the police.” Kirti’s father, from the Barhai (carpenter) caste, had filed a case of…

CHATRAPATHI (2005) His first film with S.S. Rajamouli, which marked him as an action star BILLA (2009) Remake of a hit Tamil action thriller, where he is both the hero and the villain MR PERFECT (2011) He charmed audiences with his confused lover act in this romance MIRCHI (2013) Another action flick and his biggest hit before Baahubali BAAHUBALI: THE BEGINNING (2015) & BAAHUBALI: THE CONCLUSION (2017) These two essays, playing two valorous kings, set him on his way to national stardom…

In the two stories that run parallel through Jeanette Winterson’s new novel Frankissstein, the older one is strangely more gripping, even though we know how it ends. Mary Shelley, suffering a rainy week in a mansion with her husband and Lord Byron, among others, thinks up the scariest story of her time—the tale of Victor Frankenstein, a ‘modern Prometheus’ who envisions a better human being but ends up creating a monster. The later story is also about a scientist, Victor Stein, who develops artificial intelligence that goes on to learn by itself, to a point where even its inventors cannot control it or predict how it will evolve. Winterson does not simply enter Shelley’s mind, she wears Shelley’s skin. In Shelley’s voice she creates the palpable unease as well as…

What do you do if your sister is a serial killer? If you are Korede, the central protagonist in Oyinkan Braithwaite’s debut novel, you finish the job. You scrub the blood methodically with bleach and then you heave a dead body across a landing and down to your car below. My Sister, the Serial Killer opens with a deadpan narration of a crime scene somewhere in an apartment in Lagos, Nigeria, and is as promising a start as you can get. Ayoola, the titular sister, is a serial killer—of her boyfriends in particular—and Korede, a nurse, is the cleanup crew. Blood might be icky, but ultimately it is thicker than water. The opener sets up the leitmotif for what is to come: a sister’s loyalty in the face of repeated…

NEW YORK AND GOABASED COMPOSER, MULTI-INSTRUMENTALIST AND PRODUCER KARSH KALE, WHOSE NEW SINGLE ‘DISAPPEAR’ FEATURES VOCALS AND LYRICS BY DELHI-BASED ELECTRONIC MUSICIAN KOMOREBI AKA TARANA MARWAH, TALKS ABOUT HIS UPCOMING PROJECTS, THE STATUS OF HIS NEXT ALBUM AND RELEASING MUSIC IN THE PLAYLIST ERA Q What do you look for in a collaborator? I tend to be drawn to storytellers, no matter what they do, whether they’re instrumentalists or producers or songwriters, singers. People like guitarist Warren Mendonsa of Blackstratblues, for instance. If I’m explaining an arrangement to him, he then takes that to the next level. Q. This year, you’ve done the electronica project Little Whale, ‘Disappear’ and the score for Gully Boy. What else do you have in store for 2019? Right now, I’m working on all the…

Q. You have had a crazy schedule, shooting three films back to back… My dad said to me, “What is going on? Why don’t you want to stop?” It was so nice to hear that. It’s been an exhausting and fascinating two years. This year I realised how much I love what I do. Q. You have been struck by the reactions to Saaho trailer and songs in the South… We had an audio launch in Hyderabad and there was Prabhas mania all over. Almost one lakh people turned up for it. You had to see it to believe it. I am glad I am doing such a larger-than-life film. I gave two years to it. From shooting to its release, I finished shooting four films. Q. What was more…