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Haj subsidy: Should it continue or be withdrawn

By Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay Tue, Apr 03, 2012 5:42PM UTC View Comments

Should Haj subsidy be done away with in India? This question which has repeatedly surfaced in the past two decades bounced back in limelight once again with foreign minister SM Krishna disclosing that the government was having “second thoughts” on continuing an airfare subsidy given to Indian Muslims for the Haj pilgrimage. This was in...

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Looking beyond Muslim vote-banks – the idea of community?

By Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay Thu, Feb 09, 2012 1:22AM UTC View Comments

An earlier post by this author went into the arguments by two differently oriented commentators who contended that there was nothing called the ‘Muslim vote bank’. My post developed the argument and tried tracing the evolution of the myth. I also developed an argument – that virtually no community displayed a singular political behaviour any...

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Elections in India: The vote-bank theory has run its course

By Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay Tue, Feb 07, 2012 2:33AM UTC View Comments

Two recent pieces argued forcefully against the idea of a Muslim vote bank. The first one takes off from the edict issued by the Imam of Delhi’s Jama Masjid asking Muslims to cast their lot – and ballots – with the Samajwadi Party. The other one begins with the assertion that despite scholars consistently questioning...

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Assembly poll 2012: Battle for supremacy begins in real earnest

By Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay Mon, Feb 06, 2012 2:48AM UTC View Comments

On February 6 when the sun goes down, the election campaign for the first phase of assembly elections in India’s most populous state – Uttar Pradesh – will officially cease. The polls on February 8 will kick-off an almost month-long punctuated election that besides determining who will govern the state for the next five years...

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Three Salmans: Different strokes, different tales

By Nilanjan Mukhopadhyay Wed, Jan 11, 2012 3:28AM UTC View Comments

Muslims account for 20 percent or more of voters in almost one hundred assembly constituencies in Uttar Pradesh. It is natural that they are in focus in this phase of old style identity-driven politics, unfolding one again in India after a year-long hiatus during middle-class led politics with graft as the key issue. Two Salmans...

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