Scholar-Patriots, Ten Lessons in Intellectual Practice, The Telegraph
Those seeking religious or spiritual instruction may need a guru, who teaches and even orders them toward what he considers the correct path. The shishya is asked to follow the guru implicitly and even blindly. [...]
Gandhi vs Lenin, The Telegraph
I recently came across a book with the intriguing title, Lenin and Gandhi. Its author was the Austrian writer René Fülöp-Miller. The book was published originally in French; what I read was the English translation, [...]
Friends and Icons, The Telegraph
In terms of ancestry, I am a fourth-generation resident of Bengaluru. My paternal great-grandfather moved here in the 19th century from a village in the Thanjavur district, to become a lawyer. His children were raised [...]
Vishwa-Bully, The Telegraph
Ever since Narendra Modi became Prime Minister in May 2014, the BJP and the RSS have loudly proclaimed their ambition to make our country a ‘Vishwa-Guru’—Teacher to the World. With every passing month, however, they [...]
Justice for the Kashmiris, The Telegraph
In August 2015—almost exactly ten years ago—I visited the Kashmir Valley, and spoke to a cross-section of people from different walks of life. One of them was the journalist Shujaat Bukhari. In January 2015 I [...]
Modi vs Indira, The Telegraph
In early June, the senior Congress leader, Jairam Ramesh, began using the hashtag, Emergency@11, in his daily posts charging the Modi Government with various errors, mistakes and crimes. This was in anticipation of what Ramesh [...]