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In his weekly column Across The Aisle for The Indian Express, senior Congress leader P Chidambaram raises some pertinent questions about the three new criminal laws that came into effect at the beginning of this month.
He asks, "Why has the new law retained ‘death penalty’ that has been abolished in many democratic countries? Why has the cruel and dehumanising punishment of ‘solitary confinement’ been introduced?"
In his column for Hindustan Times this week, Karan Thapar draws some lessons from the recent British Parliamentary elections.
For one, the House of Commons in the new session has 13 percent MPs who are of Black/Asian or ethnic minority origin. He argues, "In comparison, Muslims are nearly 15% of India’s population and in proportionate terms there should be 74 Muslim MPs in the Lok Sabha. There are just 24."
"More tellingly, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party doesn’t have a single Muslim Lok Sabha MP," he writes.
Thapar also compares Rishi Sunak's resignation and the Conservatives debating "what sort of party they need to become if they’re to return to power," with the Congress' "worst defeat" in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections following which, as he writes, "No one resigned. The party did not debate its future."
Columnist Tavleen Singh, in The Indian Express, writes that Prime Minister Modi's visit to Russia "did not look good for the Prime Minister. Or for India."
She says, "Putin is in every sense a vile dictator (...) It might be in India's national interest to continue our relationship with him, but can we make it more transactional than it seemed on this visit?"
In their piece for Hindustan Times, Delhi historian Narayani Gupta and architect Narayan Moorthy write about how in recent years, monsoon in Delhi has also led to floods and drains overflowing across the city, becoming an equaliser among people.
They write, "Can we look for systemic solutions to bring back the sense of vocation, respect and reward for professionals like government engineers and planners — so that they attract our best talent? Their actions have such multiplicative effects on the lives of all citizens, so much more than political representatives."
Writing for The Times of India, Swaminathan S Anklesaria Aiyar focuses on the 2023 Annual Survey of Education Report. According to the report, he writes, "About a quarter of all youth (14-18 years) cannot read a class 2 text fluently in their regional language. Only 43% can solve simple division sums."
He argues that the education system in India needs a complete overhaul, starting with schools first. He suggests:
Ian Bremmer, in his piece for Hindustan Times, writes about the "perfect political storm" that the Democrats in the US are facing, with worries increasing about Biden's age, as are doubts that "an unproven candidate" would "quickly flounder."
He writes, "For now, the Democratic Party is paralysed. Ousting a sitting president would be an enormous political gamble; sticking with a stumbling incumbent might carry even more risk."
Writing for Financial Express, Tushar Bhaduri argues that while there was "much talk about matches at Euro 2024 being boring," the one-on-one contests have been fascinating.
He says, "Games don’t need to have a tennis scoreline to generate interest. The fact remains that the overall level of European football is ridiculously high."
Swapan Dasgupta, writes for The Times of India, about how a recent visit to Washington DC opened his eyes to how "the understanding of the impulses driving Trump Republicans are clouded in prejudice and blind hate."
If Trump wins the US Presidential elections later this year, he writes, "the different strands of thought that make up the NatCon worldview" will impact US-India ties too.
In The New Indian Express this week, film journalist Namrata Joshi says that 2024 seems to be the year of "female fellowship" and female solidarity in Indian cinema – right from Rajesh A Krishnan’s Crew, Payal Kapadia’s Cannes Grand Prix winner All We Imagine As Light, Shuchi Talati’s Sundance-feted Girls Will Be Girls, Christo Tomy’s Ullozhukku, Sandhya Suri’s Santosh, to Kiran Rao's Laapataa Ladies.
She writes, "Creating space for themselves in the face of the predominant pan-Indian male cinema, these small but consequential sisterhood stories are more long-distance runners than multi-crore bro-code winners."
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