Electoral Politics

Can inequality be unscrupulous? If yes, what are the conditions within which such a form could become bearable, if not absolutely justifiable? It is imperative to address the first question with reference to scrupulous forms of inequality.

From Lucknow to Lutyens: The Power and Plight of Uttar Pradesh by Abhigyan Prakash, Gurugram: HarperCollins Publishers, 2022; pp xxxii + 239, `599.

The spontaneous joy and enthusiasm among the Bodo people, notwithstanding the recent Bodo Peace Accord signed on 27 January 2020, needs to be interrogated in the context of “fractured identity” of Bodos and a perennial trend of “demographic challenge” that the history of the area is embedded in. Moreover, the changing contours of electoral politics in the wake of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s rise in the north-east (referred here as the “rising tide of saffron”) need examination. It is pertinent to argue that the accord, under the pretext of fulfilling their demands, may herald an unprecedented shift in the electoral politics and identity assertions of the Bodos.

Much of the scholarship on Bangladesh’s founding places it within a narrative of repetition. It either repeats the partitions of 1905 or 1947 or the creation of India and Pakistan as postcolonial states. This paper argues instead for the novelty of Bangladesh’s creation against the postcolonial state, suggesting that it opened up a new history at the global level in which decolonisation was replaced by civil war as the founding narrative for new states.

This paper examines the history of largely understudied women’s rights activists in the early years of East Pakistan. While they collided with West Pakistani activists—and the central state—on matters of culture, identity, and political and economic issues, they actively cooperated with West Pakistani counterparts to fight gender discrimination and to demand reform in women’s rights from the state.