India Today 23 January 2023

Time is a continuum, like a flowing river. Our calendars put dams on it to assess what has happened and what it may foretell for the future. When looking ahead, there are certain predictable events—elections, for example. In 2023, a series of important assembly polls line the coming months—Tripura, Meghalaya and Nagaland in February; Karnataka in the summer; the grand trifecta of Madhya Pradesh-Rajasthan-Chhattisgarh in early winter; winding up with another showstopper in Telangana. We know from experience that the import for next year’s general election may be limited. Still, as Group Editorial Director Raj Chengappa says in his essay, the Opposition space is no longer static—with Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra and Arvind Kejriwal’s advance to national party status for his Aam Aadmi Party. The persona of Prime Minister…

For sharp analysis on topical issues by the editors of INDIA TODAY, log on to www.indiatoday.in/india-today-magazine-insight DEFENCE | Why India is eyeing Predator armed drones from the US By Pradip R. Sagar Military experts say armed drones will scale up the Indian military’s offensive capabilities against China in the Himalayan borders and terrorist hideouts in PoK https://bit.ly/3W2jbJu FROM THE STATES | ANDHRA-TELANGANA Why Andhra-Telangana asset division has become a legal battle By Amarnath K. Menon The Andhra government, in its petition in the Supreme Court, says 245 key institutions and corporations have not been apportioned between the two states even after eight years https://bit.ly/3ZmtHyh HEALTH | Five health trends that will dominate 2023 By Sonali Acharjee From cervical cancer prevention to optimum mental health and going traditional with food, the big focus areas in the year 2023…

An annual festival which acts as a showcase of local folk and classical performance traditions as well as art, Chennai Sangamam - Namma Ooru Thiruvizha is back on a grand scale this year. Last year, owing to COVID, the festival was held as a one-day celebration, with over 400 performers from around Tamil Nadu displaying different traditional styles of art and culture. The celebration was held at the Island Grounds, Chennai, on March 21st, 2022 and attracted thousands of spectators. Organised jointly by the Department of Tourism and the Department of Arts and Culture, Tamil Nadu, the Namma Ooru Thiruvizha festival is a way to support local traditional artists who faced pandemic-induced unemployment during COVID due to a shortage of opportunities to perform. This year the festival is back in a much bigger…

The thought that Joshimath is crumbling under its own weight will make a variety of travellers feel as if a cherished part of the earth is giving way under their feet. The beautiful hill town, perched at a height of 6,000 feet in Uttarakhand’s Chamoli district, is not another remote dot on the map. It’s the gateway to the revered Badrinath temple, the storied Hemkund Sahib gurdwara, a precious World Heritage site in the shape of the Valley of Flowers, the snow sports resort Auli, and any number of high-altitude treks in the surrounding mountainscape. There’s also strategic significance: the town hosts the brigade headquarters of the Indian army and Indo-Tibetan - Border Police (ITBP), which guard the Indo-China border in this sector of the Middle Himalayas. It has not happened…

The last few days of 2022 saw the usually reticent Jain community taking to the roads in protest in many cities of north India. The immediate trigger was two issues—a feeling in the community that the Centre was dilly-dallying on its demand to protect the sanctity of one of the community’s holiest pilgrimage spots, Sammedh Shikharji on Parasnath mountain in Giridih district, Jharkhand; and secondly, government inaction over the desecration of the Charan Paduka of Lord Adinath in the Shetrunjay Hills in Palitana town, Bhavnagar, Gujarat in November 2022. Miscreants also broke a CCTV camera installed there later in mid-December. With the protests heating up, the BJP government at the Centre and in Gujarat moved swiftly to reassure the rich and powerful minority community of their support. For Palitana, the Gujarat…

South Chhattisgarh, often in the news for Left-wing extremism-linked violence, has been rocked by a series of communal incidents in the past three weeks. Tribal Hindus have allegedly attacked tribal Christian converts in the Narayanpur and Kondagaon districts of the state, with hundreds of tribal Christians being forced to flee their native village homes. Call it an ethnic conflict with a twist because, in many cases, members of the two sides are related to each other. What has led to a situation wherein tribal has turned against tribal? The ruling Congress blames the BJP for attempting to sow discord, even as the latter calls the attacks ‘spontaneous’. In the latest incident on January 2, a protest called by tribal Hindus after a minor altercation involving Christians—which was led by Roop Singh…