An evening with actor Shyams family on November 2, 2013The seven-week India visit reportage must end on a very personal note. One of my earliest memories (I had just turned four) was the news that actor Shyam had died in a tragic accident. Since ours was a film-going family, that topic kept on being discussed with a great deal of grief and sorrow. In […]
Leninism, Gramsci, culture: predicaments of Indian Communism II on October 26, 2013Professor Bhagwan Josh develops a sophisticated appreciation of Nehru’s left bloc, which rejected Leninism but not socialism. Instead of relying on the working class crushed by wage slavery, and thus unable to lead the struggle, Nehru broadened it to include the peasantry, the youth and anti-imperialist intellectuals and others. Subhash Chandra Bose was on the […]
A fellowship at Jawaharlal Nehru University on October 12, 2013My seven-week lecture tour of India mainly on my Punjab partition book but also on the garrison state culminated with a two-week fellowship, March 9-March 22 2013, at the Department of Historical Studies at India’s very prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU). Professor Bhagwan Singh Josh, a Punjabi whose book, The Communist Movement in Punjab I […]
The civilian half on the war on terror on October 1, 2013If Pakistan is committed to fighting the war on terror, what purpose a dialogue with the Pakistani Taliban will serve is still unknown. The dialogue means that Pakistan is shying away from fighting the war on terror. However, the question is this: can Pakistan fight the war on terror? It seems that Pakistan has divided […]
A Lahoria in Amritsar on September 28, 2013I arrived in Amritsar from Chandigarh in the morning of March 4, 2013. Professor Parminder Singh of the Guru Nanak Dev University had kindly come to fetch me. The next two days I spent in his company. Needless to say the hospitality was as warm and generous as you would expect from a theth (traditional) […]
To the other Punjab: first stop Chandigarh on September 21, 2013On March 2, 2013, I left Delhi for Chandigarh. It was the first on my list of cities I would visit and deliver lectures on the partition of the Punjab. During 2003-2005, I had been in the Indian Punjab and Haryana several times to do field research for my Punjab partition book. I was to […]
An obituary too soon: Ishfaque Bokhari Lyallpuri on September 14, 2013It happens sometimes that one gets to know a fellow human being who one feels has been a part of one’s life forever. Professor Ishfaque Bokhari Lyallpuri was definitely one such person I had the privilege of getting in touch with roughly a year ago via the ubiquitous Internet. We never could meet as the […]
Bangalore: the IT capital of India on August 11, 2013On Friday February 16, 2013, I arrived in the Indian Silicon Valley, Bangalore from Mumbai. I was now in the Karnataka state deep down in south India. The very talented journalist and writer, Aakar Patel, received me very warmly. I had been reading his articles in the Pakistani and Indian media and found them delightfully […]
Tipu Sultan, Mysore and Seringapatam on August 3, 2013I grew up listening to my father describe Tipu Sultan (the Tiger of Mysore) as a great warrior who fought the British and gained their respect even when he died fighting them. It had always been my desire to see for myself one day what all was there to know about that hero of my […]
Tipu Sultan, Mysore and Seringapatamm on August 3, 2013I grew up listening to my father describe Tipu Sultan (the Tiger of Mysore) as a great warrior who fought the British and gained their respect even when he died fighting them. It had always been my desire to see for myself one day what all was there to know about that hero of my […]