WHAT IS THE COCKROACH JANTA PARTY’S roadmap? It has three pillars, party spokesperson Saurav Das told Senior Special Correspondent Kanu Sarda—defending electoral integrity, building a youth network nationwide and exerting pressure without joining existing political alliances.
The cover article co-written with Correspondent Badar Bashir looks at this roadmap and what lies beyond. In an accompanying guest column, former home secretary G.K. Pillai says that while it is unreasonable to expect the Election Commission of India to be infallible, the best way for it to defend itself is to follow the Constitution and be transparent.
While the EC row rocks the national capital, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has completed 25 years in public office. Senior Assistant Editor Pratul Sharma looks at his longevity in politics and the many storms that he has weathered.
This issue also leans heavily on international affairs. Chief of Bureau (Delhi) Namrata Biji Ahuja interviewed High Commissioner Christopher Cooter, Ottawa’s man in New Delhi, about the reset in India-Canada relations. The relationship had slid to deep lows during prime minister Justin Trudeau’s time, and is on the rebound now. Both countries must be secretly thanking US President Donald Trump for this gift, I guess. Cooter said that Canada is determined to put more of India in its Indo-Pacific strategy.
Senior Assistant Editor K. Sunil Thomas interviewed UAE Minister of State Noura bint Mohamed Al Kaabi. The minister was in India to drive the cultural part of India-UAE relations. For example, the UAE is lending artefacts to India’s National Maritime Heritage Complex in Lothal, Gujarat.
Closer to home, Chief of Bureau (Chennai) Lakshmi Subramanian brings to light a spate of teenage pregnancies in Tamil Nadu. With financial pressures increasing on families, social media making inroads into young minds and cell phones amplifying the reach of predatory messaging, children are at grave risk.
The story of Aishwarya, 17, who wanted to become an IT professional but is now babysitting her eight-month-old child, affirms my view that life is all about choices. Sometimes, choices are thrust upon us. Sometimes, we make a judgment error, and the dreams of a better tomorrow become even harder to achieve.
On the events scene, THE WEEK held its second metabolic health summit in Thiruvananthapuram, with Health Minister K. Muraleedharan as the chief guest. He said the state was actively pushing for screening at the primary care level to bend the cardiometabolic curve.
In @leisure, Special Correspondent Anjuly Mathai interviewed Kader Attia, curator of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale. Anjuly raised an important question: viewers often struggle to relate to or understand the artwork. “Sometimes, people from the contemporary art world take for granted that others have the vocabulary to understand their art,” Attia told her. “I’m also a professor of art, and for me, being inclusive is extremely important.” I hope his intent shows in the upcoming Biennale.
Elsewhere in @leisure, a former spy chief reviews another spy chief’s book, and the review is equally cloak-and-dagger. Our popular columnist K.C. Verma reviews A.S. Dulat’s Our Kind of Games, but he doesn’t share everything he saw in the volume. At least, that is the feeling I got, dear KC.
And he leaves us with a tantalising paragraph: “The book will certainly trigger a few parlour games among the old Kashmir hands to identify the fictional characters. While a few are obvious, several will remain question marks.”
Now I must find myself an old Kashmir hand. Point me in the right direction, dear reader.
