The economist and political commentator who was appointed to a four-member team of the UN to recommend reforms to the global financial system critiques Budget 2010 Economist and political commentator Prabhat Patnaik, currently vice-chair of the Kerala Planning Board, is a strong critic of the government’s economic policies. In 2008, Patnaik, who has taught at JNU since the 1970s, was appointed to a four-member team of the UN to recommend...

Much of the daylight robbery in the name of Commonwealth Games has been justified in the name of "National Prestige" and "World class aspirations. Whether all these surreptitious measures will eventually deliver the games is an open question? The Commonwealth is a 'friendly' association of those 72 colonies which were once part of the British Empire and rose to free nationhood - some through protracted struggle and others through negotiation. In...

A recent survey carried out by the TNUEF brings to light details of the discrimination Dalits in Madurai have faced for generations. OVER seven decades have rolled by since the freedom fighter A. Vaidhyanatha Iyer successfully led Dalits into the Meenakshi temple in Madurai, overcoming all the impediments posed by the casteist forces that were hell-bent on thwarting the historic event. But the stark reality is that “hidden apartheid” against...

I have been an advisor to The Energy and Resources Institute or Teri, a distinguished visiting fellow there since 1996, except when I was the chairman of the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission, the director-general of the National Council of Applied Economic Research, the chairman of the Institute for Social and Economic Change and on boards of management and economic research institutions. This disclaimer is intended to forestall motives being ascribed...

Dr U Jaikumaran is breathless with excitement over the phone. “The next five days will be hectic and crucial in our war against hunger. We have to transplant rice on 300 acres in just five days.” Dr Jaikumaran, a professor at the Kerala Agriculture University (KAU), has been building a Food Security Army (FSA) – men and women in green uniforms organised into nine regiments and 24 battalions – who are...