India Today

india today

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: Aroon PurieGROUP EDITORIAL DIRECTOR: Raj ChengappaGROUP CREATIVE EDITOR: Nilanjan Das;GROUP PHOTO EDITOR: Bandeep SinghMANAGING EDITORS: Kai Jabir Friese, Rajesh JhaCONSULTING EDITOR: Ajit Kumar Jha (Research)EXECUTIVE EDITORS: S. Sahaya Ranjit, Sandeep Unnithan MUMBAI: M.G. Arun DEPUTY EDITORS: Prachi Bhuchar, Uday Mahurkar, Manisha Saroop HYDERABAD: Amarnath K. Menon CHANDIGARH: Asit JollySENIOR EDITORS: Shweta Punj, Sasi Nair, Alokparna Das JAIPUR: Rohit PariharSENIOR ASSOCIATE EDITORS: Kaushik Deka, Ashish Mukherjee MUMBAI: Suhani Singh, Kiran Dinkar Tare; PATNA: Amitabh SrivastavaASSOCIATE EDITORS: Shougat Dasgupta, Chinki Sinha KOLKATA: Romita Sengupta; BHOPAL: Rahul Noronha; THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Jeemon Jacob ASSISTANT EDITOR: PUNE: Aditi S. PaiPHOTO DEPARTMENT: Vikram Sharma (Deputy Photo Editor), Rajwant Singh Rawat, Yasir Iqbal (Principal Photographers), Chandra Deep Kumar (Senior Photographer); MUMBAI: Mandar Suresh Deodhar (Chief Photographer), Danesh Adil Jassawala (Photographer); KOLKATA: Subir Halder (Principal Photographer); CHENNAI:…

from the editor-in-chief

Indians, it is often said, don’t cast their vote but vote their caste. The reason is not far to seek. The caste system, in which each of the four major castes is sub-divided into 3,000 castes and over 25,000 sub-castes, and which has governed what professions Indians take up, who they marry, eat or mingle with, is over a thousand years old. Parliamentary democracy in India is only a little over 70 years old.The rise of caste-based politics in post-Independence India saw parties looking past the limited appeal of single-caste vote banks to forge caste solidarities—from the KHAM or Kshatriya/Harijan/Adivasi/Muslim coalition used by the Congress in Gujarat in the ’70s and ’80s to the AJGAR or Ahir/Jat/Gurjar/Rajput formula used by Charan Singh to carve a vote base in western…

secret source of funds

(Illustration by SIDDHANT JUMDE) On April 12, the Supreme Court issued an interim order refusing to stay the anonymous electoral bonds scheme while also directing political parties to provide details of donations received through such bonds in a sealed cover to the Election Commission by May 30, a week after the results of the Lok Sabha poll are declared. This means that information on donors of electoral bonds will not be available to the public before the polls.In effect, the Supreme Court order rejected the plea of the petitioners—the CPI(M) and Association of Democratic Reforms—that the names of donors of electoral bonds be made public to ensure transparency in the poll process. The petition was filed last year, immediately after the launch of the electoral bond scheme. It had sought…

the rafale ghost rises again

THIS WON’T FLY Youth Congress members protest the Rafale deal The controversy over the purchase of the Rafale fighter aircraft got a fresh lease of life on April 10 when the Supreme Court ruled that classified documents accessed by the media could be used as evidence for a review petition. A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, including Chief Justice Ranjan Gogoi, disregarded the government’s contention that the documents were ‘stolen’ and, therefore, could not be considered as part of the review petition. The petitioners, including former Union ministers Arun Shourie and Yashwant Sinha, had on January 2 approached the court to consider a review petition based on the new evidence carried in The Hindu.The classified defence ministry documents, suggesting dissent in the ministry over the Rs 59,000 crore…

what you read in election season

It has been almost a month since the Election Commission of India (EC) brought social media content by/ for political parties under the ambit of the model code of conduct (MCC). From March 20, social media giants such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter and Google have also been following a ‘Voluntary Code of Ethics’ accepted by the EC. They have also given assurance that any political advertising will be pre-certified by the EC’s Media Certification and Monitoring Committee.Yet, the menace of fake news continues unabated. Take, for instance, a two-page fake letter circulating on social media since April 14. Supposedly written by BJP stalwart M.M. Joshi to party patriarch L.K. Advani, the letter claims the BJP will get only 120 seats in the ongoing Lok Sabha election. A week earlier,…

and the winner is...

Prime Minister Narendra Modi clearly loves the world, and you’d think the world loves him back. Or at least some countries. Modi, after all, counts foreign policy as his strong suit. In quick succession, this month, Modi has received awards from the UAE and Russia. Real awards, not the ‘UNESCO Best PM’ award that thousands of people on social media have periodically claimed since 2016 that Modi has won. Would Indians vote for Modi regardless of foreign baubles? Of course. The bling just helps bolster Modi’s claim to being a player on the global stage. 5 Honours granted by foreign governments to PM Modi: Saudi (April 3, 2016), Afghanistan (June 4, 2016), Palestine (February 10, 2018), UAE (April 4, 2019), Russia (April 12, 2019) 12 Years after…