World Affairs, Volume 186, Issue 3, Page 825-829, FALL 2023.
The right to apostasy recognised? Reaffirming the right to religious freedom
Disruptive Technologies for Security and Defence: Temporality, Performativity and Imagination
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Role of Preschool Teachers in Early Childhood Care and Education: A Study of Anganwadis/Anganwadi Schools Located in Scheduled Caste Colonies of Telangana State
Contemporary Voice of Dalit, Ahead of Print.
In India, ICDS provides early childhood education to children (3–6 years) under the supervision of Anganwadi Teacher (AWT). The study concluded that out of 42 AWTs, the majority are Schedule caste (SC) teachers and have more than 10 years of experience and only half of the AWTs have an intermediate and above qualification. The study also revealed that three-quarters of preschool children were from the SC community, and the rest came from other communities. The vast majority of AWCs have building blocks, charts, picture books and carpets, but the vast majority (65%) lack a first aid box. As per the study, the most difficult challenges for SC AWTs in organizing preschool education are as follows: insufficient space for class activities, material storage and indoor games; children’s irregularities, other responsibilities; parental migration, English medium schools and a lack of basic amenities, all of which impede proper pre-school education implementation.
In India, ICDS provides early childhood education to children (3–6 years) under the supervision of Anganwadi Teacher (AWT). The study concluded that out of 42 AWTs, the majority are Schedule caste (SC) teachers and have more than 10 years of experience and only half of the AWTs have an intermediate and above qualification. The study also revealed that three-quarters of preschool children were from the SC community, and the rest came from other communities. The vast majority of AWCs have building blocks, charts, picture books and carpets, but the vast majority (65%) lack a first aid box. As per the study, the most difficult challenges for SC AWTs in organizing preschool education are as follows: insufficient space for class activities, material storage and indoor games; children’s irregularities, other responsibilities; parental migration, English medium schools and a lack of basic amenities, all of which impede proper pre-school education implementation.
Dalit Writing in Hindi and Politics of Resistance and Recognition from Within: A Thematic Reading of Selected Narrative by Kausalya Baisantri
Contemporary Voice of Dalit, Ahead of Print.
Hindi Dalit literature has been produced for over a century but is yet to be acknowledged by a larger mainstream audience. In this article, it is examined how generations of Dalit women lived. Experience of Hindi Dalit literature was constructed by several social, political, ideological and economic factors that together obscured the cultural identity of Dalit women. Using narrative text Dohra Abhishaap, an autobiography and testimonio in nature, written by Kausalya Baisantri, Hindi Dalit author as an entry point, this essay analyses the explicit and implicit mechanisms of Dalit women oppression that have averted Dalit women writers from consolidating their distinct identity. This article examines critically on the discourse regarding the subaltern’s failure to speak and/or be heard, and reflects Hindi Dalit literature’s triumph over casteist struggles to relegate it to the periphery. I argue that Dalit autobiographies/testimonio are indeed a medium towards change and development to represent the ‘silenced voices’.
Hindi Dalit literature has been produced for over a century but is yet to be acknowledged by a larger mainstream audience. In this article, it is examined how generations of Dalit women lived. Experience of Hindi Dalit literature was constructed by several social, political, ideological and economic factors that together obscured the cultural identity of Dalit women. Using narrative text Dohra Abhishaap, an autobiography and testimonio in nature, written by Kausalya Baisantri, Hindi Dalit author as an entry point, this essay analyses the explicit and implicit mechanisms of Dalit women oppression that have averted Dalit women writers from consolidating their distinct identity. This article examines critically on the discourse regarding the subaltern’s failure to speak and/or be heard, and reflects Hindi Dalit literature’s triumph over casteist struggles to relegate it to the periphery. I argue that Dalit autobiographies/testimonio are indeed a medium towards change and development to represent the ‘silenced voices’.
Anticipating the Threat of Democratic Majoritarianism: Ambedkar on Constitutional Design and Ideology Critique, 1941–1948
Studies in Indian Politics, Volume 11, Issue 1, Page 66-84, June 2023.
This article analyses B. R. Ambedkar’s works written between 1941 and 1948, and it discerns a central set of concerns and arguments in this otherwise diverse corpus. It argues that since universal franchise as a political principle is uncontroversial, Ambedkar’s primary concern is geared towards the danger of democratic majoritarianism in a society riven by historically, legally and ideologically determined forms of inequality and their logic—a danger that can only be addressed at the dual levels of institutional design and ideological critique. Reading together Pakistan or the Partition of India and What Congress and Gandhi have done to the Untouchables, the initial sections argue that Ambedkar was critical of Congress and Muslim league politics because he saw in them both, albeit in distinct ways, the affirmation of religious identity as central to the formulation of political identity. Such an orientation, in the actual mechanics of mass politics and constitutional negotiation, is therefore read as inevitably leading to conflicts including demands for Partition, but at the same time such politics avoided fundamental questions of internal critique and instituted forms of socialized inequality. It is in this context, and the imminence of Partition, that the article analyses Ambedkar’s argument for the need of both a specific institutional design (constitutional provisions) and an ideology critique (his historical research including Who were the Sudras and The Untouchables). The analysis of the demand for partition and the category of the minority can only be understood through Ambedkar’s acute historical and theoretical understanding of the nation and its history, as well as the normative demands required for institutional justice, as will be shown through a reading of this corpus.
This article analyses B. R. Ambedkar’s works written between 1941 and 1948, and it discerns a central set of concerns and arguments in this otherwise diverse corpus. It argues that since universal franchise as a political principle is uncontroversial, Ambedkar’s primary concern is geared towards the danger of democratic majoritarianism in a society riven by historically, legally and ideologically determined forms of inequality and their logic—a danger that can only be addressed at the dual levels of institutional design and ideological critique. Reading together Pakistan or the Partition of India and What Congress and Gandhi have done to the Untouchables, the initial sections argue that Ambedkar was critical of Congress and Muslim league politics because he saw in them both, albeit in distinct ways, the affirmation of religious identity as central to the formulation of political identity. Such an orientation, in the actual mechanics of mass politics and constitutional negotiation, is therefore read as inevitably leading to conflicts including demands for Partition, but at the same time such politics avoided fundamental questions of internal critique and instituted forms of socialized inequality. It is in this context, and the imminence of Partition, that the article analyses Ambedkar’s argument for the need of both a specific institutional design (constitutional provisions) and an ideology critique (his historical research including Who were the Sudras and The Untouchables). The analysis of the demand for partition and the category of the minority can only be understood through Ambedkar’s acute historical and theoretical understanding of the nation and its history, as well as the normative demands required for institutional justice, as will be shown through a reading of this corpus.
Democracy in South Asia: An Expanding ‘Imagination’
Studies in Indian Politics, Volume 11, Issue 1, Page 39-48, June 2023.
Democracy has become an accepted lexicon among ruling elites and the general public through the twentieth century. However, there are also doubts about its strength in the current century. Looking at survey data, this article attempts a first-cut analysis of citizens’ commitment to democracy. Taking an elected government as the primary principle of democracy, do citizens make concessions to non-elected decision-making processes? This article focuses on the five countries of South Asia to answer this question and arrives at the conclusion that there is often a large gap between a broader acceptance of democratic government as a principle and the more nuanced acceptance of democratic government as a necessary element of democracy.
Democracy has become an accepted lexicon among ruling elites and the general public through the twentieth century. However, there are also doubts about its strength in the current century. Looking at survey data, this article attempts a first-cut analysis of citizens’ commitment to democracy. Taking an elected government as the primary principle of democracy, do citizens make concessions to non-elected decision-making processes? This article focuses on the five countries of South Asia to answer this question and arrives at the conclusion that there is often a large gap between a broader acceptance of democratic government as a principle and the more nuanced acceptance of democratic government as a necessary element of democracy.
On the Editions of Dr B. R. Ambedkar’s The Buddha and His Dhamma
Studies in Indian Politics, Volume 11, Issue 1, Page 85-101, June 2023.
This article seeks to outline the history of the addition of references to what is often considered Dr B. R. Ambedkar’s magnum opus, his posthumously published The Buddha and His Dhamma (1957). It discusses the original edition, the 1961 Hindi translation by Bhadant Anand Kausalyayan, which was the first to add references, the 1992 reprint of the original edition as Volume 11 of the collection Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches published by the Government of Maharashtra, and the 2011 ‘critical edition’ edited by Aakash Singh Rathore and Ajay Verma and published by Oxford University Press. Through a critical appraisal of these editions, the article aims to press the general need turned urgent for scholars of Ambedkar to produce competent scholarly editions of Ambedkar’s texts, especially his later writings, which were left incomplete and unpublished during his lifetime.
This article seeks to outline the history of the addition of references to what is often considered Dr B. R. Ambedkar’s magnum opus, his posthumously published The Buddha and His Dhamma (1957). It discusses the original edition, the 1961 Hindi translation by Bhadant Anand Kausalyayan, which was the first to add references, the 1992 reprint of the original edition as Volume 11 of the collection Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar: Writings and Speeches published by the Government of Maharashtra, and the 2011 ‘critical edition’ edited by Aakash Singh Rathore and Ajay Verma and published by Oxford University Press. Through a critical appraisal of these editions, the article aims to press the general need turned urgent for scholars of Ambedkar to produce competent scholarly editions of Ambedkar’s texts, especially his later writings, which were left incomplete and unpublished during his lifetime.
Hindu Nationalism and Right-wing Ecology: RSS, Modi and Motherland Post-2014
Studies in Indian Politics, Volume 11, Issue 1, Page 102-117, June 2023.
This article analyses the environmental politics of Hindu nationalism in India after 2014, which is deeply enmeshed with aggressive nationalism. Taking as its case study articles, newspaper reports and visuals published in the Organiser, a leading magazine of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), it focuses on four ubiquitous environmental themes—imagination of a great Hindu motherland; icons of mother embodied in river and animal; climate change and renewable energy and the idealization of Prime Minister Modi as an environmental saviour—that are visible in its pages. Through these themes, India is projected as a great ancient ecological Hindu nation while hatred and violence are directed against ‘polluted’ Muslims. The ascendancy of Hindu nationalists to power since 2014 has indeed resulted in radical changes which have signalled multiple governmental ‘green’ initiatives and brought climate change and renewable energy to the centre stage. However, and as this article illustrates, these are couched in an optic of purity and pollution, as well as caste and religion, on the one hand, and mobilization of corporations and mega ‘clean’ industrial projects, on the other, which are propagated in the name of people, development and environment.
This article analyses the environmental politics of Hindu nationalism in India after 2014, which is deeply enmeshed with aggressive nationalism. Taking as its case study articles, newspaper reports and visuals published in the Organiser, a leading magazine of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), it focuses on four ubiquitous environmental themes—imagination of a great Hindu motherland; icons of mother embodied in river and animal; climate change and renewable energy and the idealization of Prime Minister Modi as an environmental saviour—that are visible in its pages. Through these themes, India is projected as a great ancient ecological Hindu nation while hatred and violence are directed against ‘polluted’ Muslims. The ascendancy of Hindu nationalists to power since 2014 has indeed resulted in radical changes which have signalled multiple governmental ‘green’ initiatives and brought climate change and renewable energy to the centre stage. However, and as this article illustrates, these are couched in an optic of purity and pollution, as well as caste and religion, on the one hand, and mobilization of corporations and mega ‘clean’ industrial projects, on the other, which are propagated in the name of people, development and environment.
Editorial Note
Studies in Indian Politics, Volume 11, Issue 1, Page 7-7, June 2023.