-The Hindu A retelling of Rabindranath Tagore’s celebrated play Muktadhaara, often interpreted as Tagore’s nationalist critique of colonial exploitation, came under fire from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party’s culture police on Saturday evening here. Tamasha Naa Hua, directed by noted director Bhanu Bharti, was staged at the city’s famous Bharat Bhawan cultural centre as part of the Rangmandal theatre festival on Saturday evening. Muktadhaara considered one of Tagore’s finest plays is about the...

-The Hindu The combined power of the mobile phone, the Internet and the social media was on display in the crisis that led to thousands of people from the northeast fleeing Bangalore. What became clear was that rumour-mongers did not belong exclusively to either the northeast or the Muslim community. There were also other groups who may have helped fan the panic. In mid-July this year, a Pakistani news portal, columnpk.com, carried...

-The Hindu If India were to relax visa restrictions and allow open immigration, Pakistan could witness the largest exodus of minorities since 1947, especially from the remote areas of Sindh, Balochistan and other disturbed areas where kidnappings, forcible conversions, marriages of minor girls, ransacking of residences, robbing of commercial establishments and religious persecution continues unabated. The state apparatus is either non-existent or a mute spectator. This opinion was voiced by an overwhelming...

-The Friday Times How are demographics changing in Assam and Bengal? And what does this mean for 'indigenous' communities? Garga Chatterjee considers the argument for territorial purity The Assam state of the Indian Union has seen violence flare up suddenly from July 6th. With more than 40 people reported dead and upwards of one and a half lakh displaced in a week, the Kokrajhar riots between Bodos and Muslims have again brought...

-The Economic Times Ethnic conflict in Assam, like in some other parts of the north-east is decades old, but has increased in frequency since the late 1970s. An extremely militant agitation ostensibly to throw out 'foreigners' , but targeted more generally against all non-Assamese people, gripped the state from 1979 to 1985 . It was led by the All-Assam Students Union (AASU). One of the factors that gave the agitation ground support was...