Articles by Sumanta Banerjee

In denouncing Bush for threatening Iraq or Sharon for shooting down Palestinian civilians or the BJP-led government for presiding over the massacre of Muslims, it is either a despot like Saddam Hussein who provides us with a cause for fighting US imperialism or felons like Laloo Yadav who become the rallying points for the battle against the Sangh parivar's communalism. Where is the alternative?

The resumption of the Indo-Pak dialogue appears to have been hinged on the conduct of 'free and fair' elections in Pakistan as well as Jammu and Kashmir. Now, although the US has given both Vajpayee and Musharraf clean chits on that count, there appear to be no signs of new initiatives between the two countries. In fact in the post poll scenario, the influence of the hawks on their respective governments appear to be set to increase.

It is not surprising that the Nepal government is eager to brand the Maoists as terrorists and tie its actions against them to the US-led anti-terrorist campaign and obtain arms and ammunition. The Maoists have become a threat to the monarch and the ruling interests, rallying as they have the hitherto dispossessed mainly from the depressed castes from far-flung rural areas against local feudal lords.

The ringmaster's leash is tightening on both India and Pakistan. While the US military presence has become overt in Pakistan, in India its covert hand is looming large. Instead of resisting these pressures, the two countries persist in their obduracy, refusing to follow the dictates of common sense by beginning a process of ending the 50-year old bloody dispute over Kashmir.

While pillorying the BJP - which must surely be done - there is a tendency to treat with kid gloves this gang of self-seeking politicians who have made the NDA government possible. More than the BJP, it is these elements, both within and outside the ruling NDA, who need to be branded with the badge of infamy. Systematically decimated in this game of manoeuvre and manipulation indulged in by these allies of the BJP are ideologies which bear the traces of democratic norms, moral principles, secular values and socialist belief.