By Sidharth Mishra

Delivering the Independence Day address this year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced opening the gates of the Sainik Schools in every state for girls. A few days later, the Supreme Court directed the opening of the gates of the much-admired National Defence Academy (NDA), which imparts graduate-level training, to young women.

Criticizing a Supreme Court order in public is not easy, so the veterans from the armed forces largely poured vitriol on the WhatsApp groups. Much of the criticism was not founded on any solid argument but for the ‘hurt pride’ of ceding turf to the other gender. One such criticism was that charity should begin at home and that there should be a greater number of women in judiciary too.

By Sidharth Mishra

The onset of economic liberalisation during the 1990s saw a major change in the Indian media too. The coming of computers, new printing technology, communication networks and easy import of news print heralded this major change.

Technology ensured newspapers expanded network with single edition papers converting to multiple editions with focus on the regional news and soft stories. Nobody understood this demand of the news market better than Chandan Mitra, who passed away in the early hours of this Thursday, after fighting a debilitating illness for about a year.

Mitra in his innings first as the executive editor of Hindustan Times for a few years and later as editor-owner of The Pioneer for several years encouraged the genre which is largely identified as civic journalism and feature writing. Print journalism till the coming of the 1990s had largely been identified with political stories but here was an editor who was pushing for a strong city page with a lot of impactful local news.

By Sidharth Mishra

The return of Taliban in Kabul could well have its repercussions in Delhi, even outside the diplomatic circles. It’s not just about the usual “terror-attack” kind of stories or the “miserable lives” they are portrayed to be living in the colonies of Delhi.  The Kabuliwalas (those who belong to Kabul) have long been entrenched with trade links in the national Capital and other parts of the country.

The Kabuliwalas, however, have not always, as portrayed in Rabindranath Tagore’s short story, been involved in trading just dry-fruits and carpets. Tagore’s famous story was made into a film by Bimal Roy with the same title in 1961. Balraj Sahni playing the iconic Kabuliwala. The film’s songs, written by Prem Dhawan and Gulzar, put to music by Salil Choudhury and sung by Manna Dey, Mohammed Rafi and Hemant Kumar, were an icing on the cake.

By Sidharth Mishra

During the early years of my career in journalism, some very sound lessons were given by the veterans then; the foremost being to question the government. The role of the fourth estate gets transformed into that of an adjunct of the government’s propaganda machinery if media gives up its ‘sense of enquiry’.

Last week the Delhi government went to town claiming it was going to bring world-class education to 30 government schools by tying up with an examination body based abroad. The advertisements were supplemented by equally big write-up lapping up the move, with none raising an eye brow.

By Sidharth Mishra

With elections in few states now round the corner, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is once again on his ‘power charity’ binge promising free 300 units of power in Punjab, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and Goa. He is hawking the Delhi Model of subsidizing power charges.

It’s true that Kejirwal has subsidized power charges since 2014 but this was made possible through the power reforms which was implemented in Delhi in 2002. If a present-day researcher on power reforms in the national Capital were to do a project, the keywords would be SBI Caps, Discom, Transco, Genco and power theft.

By Sidharth Mishra

By Sidharth Mishra

Judicial interventions are often decried by the governments of the day as judicial activism. Judicial activism has been described variously by those affected by it. Some say it to be a practice in the judiciary wherein judgments are delivered based on ‘personal opinions’ rather than on existing laws. The other view is that it’s a practice in judiciary of protecting or expanding individual rights through decisions that depart from established precedent or are independent of or in opposition to supposed constitutional or legislative intent.

By Sidharth Mishra

The political parties of every hue in our country have great belief in what Irish dramatist George Bernard Shaw had said. The creator of classics like  Man and Superman, Pygmalion and Saint Joan, Shaw exercised great influence over western theatre, culture and politics during his lifetime and thereafter. He once observed, “A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always count on Paul’s support.” Shaw’s comment was inspired by the Biblical saying, “to unclothe Peter to clothe Paul.”

Last week on getting the diesel tank of my vehicle filled, I was rattled as the fuel pump helper raised a bill of Rs 3600. In 2013-14, when the Achche Din (good days as promised by challenger to the throne Narendra Modi) were still to dawn, the tank of a similar vehicle would get filled for Rs 2200. Thanks to the lockdown, as the need for filling the fuel tank arose after quite a while but the price of diesel came to actually pinch.