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EPW: A Unique Journal
The Economic & Political Weekly has been able to successfully raise, elaborate and theorise on those aspects of economic and social reality that one finds around oneself. And it has been successful to a remarkable degree. Of course, one also comes across some academic economists who regard themselves as purists, and when it comes to EPW, have an attitude of disdain for the kind of writing it employs. This should be regarded as par for the course.
I started reading the Economic & Political Weekly (EPW) with some degree of regularity around 1974, when I was pursuing my PhD at the University of Rochester in Rochester, New York. My coursework was over and I was looking for a dissertation topic. Rochester was a highly mathematical, mainstream school. My dissertation, therefore, had to be in the mainstream mould for any faculty member to be seriously interested to be on my research committee. I used to spend long hours in the main library of the university, the Rush Rhees Library. The library was and continues to be in a magnificent building at the centre of River Campus of the University of Rochester. There was a grand reading hall on the first floor, which had several hundred periodicals, neatly placed on shelves along the walls. One of the journals was the EPW of Bombay (now Mumbai).
There used to be just a handful of readers at any one time on any given day in this large hall, and as far as I could tell, there were hardly any takers for EPW. I, therefore, usually had the privilege of being the first reader of the latest issue of EPW. That was, of course, an age well before the advent of the internet. Our news lifeline to India used to be the weekly international editions of the Hindustan Times and the Statesman, published on thin tissue paper. These were both well-produced, representing the mainstream press, and gave a very concise account of the news from India.
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