Articles by GPD

Even before the trial of Saddam has begun the American president has started discussing the sentence the deposed Iraqi president should get. The neo-conservatives who dominate the power lobbies in Washington do not seem to mind such blatant interference in the legal system of another sovereign state. But then Americans think that all empires except its own are evil.

Talks between India and Pakistan should begin and begin early. The two countries are at a point in history where they might well discover that going under with or without Kashmir is unlikely to lead them to a particularly bright future.

Maharashtra evidently does not need its heroes. The birth centenary of Gopal Mukund Huddar has come and gone with scarcely anyone remembering him. From being a 'sarkaryawaha' of the RSS, Huddar went on to fight in the Spanish civil war and join the Communist Party of India. He ended up being not entirely acceptable to both the worlds he traversed. But that does not matter in the final analysis. In our dismal and post-ideological times the memory of somebody like Huddar can keep the principle of hope alive.

There are two major bodies mainly of writers and theatre people to 'manage' the affairs relating to literature and theatre in the land of the Marathas. It is less than clear what exactly these organisations do. The net result is that the establishment seems to rule supreme.

The National Board of Secondary Education has obviously not heard of Premchand and so when it found that a book by him had been prescribed for one of its courses, it promptly had it removed. But when writers are unconcerned about what murky deals are struck in connection with a 'vishwa' conference of and in their own language, they should not be surprised at what has happened to the Premchand text.