Female MPs and their right to pose for calendars
• Date published: September 2, 2010
New political face : Women won more seats in the Czech parliament than ever before in May. To tout its new face, one party decided to present them as pin-up girls. Katerina Klasnova here is the Vice-Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies. Photograph: Public Affairs
Anything being done for the first time generates a lot of interest, both in the media as well as among the consuming public who devour such coverage. So when it comes to female MPs posing in a glam calendar, the interest generated is bound to be on the higher side. As it was when the Public Affairs (VV – Veci verejne) party in the Czech Republic started selling a 2011 calendar featuring photographs of some of its leading female members, including four newly sworn-in lawmakers, clad in revealing outfits and posing provocatively.
Food for thought: It is time to junk Haldirams and Nestlé
• Date published: September 2, 2010
It's an irony of sorts. One of the most popular food chains in India is arguably one of the worst when it comes to food safety. Haldirams has been rated Red in Greenpeace's Safe Food Guide version 2.0 that ranks 25 of the most popular food companies which hold a major share of the market in the country. Based on their responsibility towards Indian consumer on the GM food issue, the Guide categorises companies as Green, Yellow and Red.
Apart from Haldirams, other major companies that have made it to the Red list include Nestlé, Pepsico, Cargill, Hindustan Unilever Ltd, Britannia, Godrej Hersheys Ltd, MTR, Parle Biscuits Pvt Ltd, Agrotech, Surya Foods, Amul, GSK, FieldFresh (Bharathi Enterprises] and Kelloggs. These companies have not taken any concrete steps to provide Indian consumers with GM free food for now or in future thereby being irresponsible, says Greenpeace. Now, that kind of blacklists half of one's favourites in the market that sees little or no regulation.
I feel betrayed by the Indian government, says Muivah on Manipur visit
• Date published: September 1, 2010
For a man on a mission of reaching out to his people, the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN) general secretary has been a busy man. The backdrop of talks with the Indian government makes Thuingaleng Muivah busier still. But he doesn’t keep you waiting. He doesn’t keep you waiting because he is not the kind.
The glint in his eyes is unmistakable, as he comes forward to greet me. As he exchanges pleasantries, it is evident he doesn’t forget things. He recollects my interactions with him long before the NSCN signed the ongoing ceasefire with the Indian government in 1997.
You don’t expect such a man to forget his homeland, much though he may have been away for years at a length. And he couldn’t forget his own home either. So the home front is what we start talking about.
The hoax about the Indian national anthem and Bengali, the sweetest language
• Date published: August 23, 2010
The online world is one of such hoaxes that it gets my goat quite too often. My mailboxes (I have loads of them, and they collectively get me hundreds of mails every day) collect email hoxes far too many for my sanity. Either I am too steeped in work or simply too lethargic to respond to the senders. The average sender, usually, is a friend who is blissfully naive or unaware of email hoaxes or both. He or she would have, in turn, got the mail from some friend of his/hers and would have forwarded it to me in good faith.
There have been two which have been doing the rounds for close to a year, both involving UNESCO. One claims that the Indian national anthem has been declared by UNESCO as the best in the world, and the second is about the UN organisation naming Bengali as the sweetest language. I am at the receivieng end of both hoaxes since I happen to be an Indian and also a Bengali by birth.
I feel betrayed by the Indian government, says Muivah on Manipur visit
For a man on a mission of reaching out to his people, the National Socialist Council of Nagalim (NSCN) general secretary has been a busy man. The backdrop of talks with the Indian government makes Thuingaleng Muivah busier still. But he doesn’t keep you waiting. He doesn’t keep you waiting because he is not the kind.
The glint in his eyes is unmistakable, as he comes forward to greet me. As he exchanges pleasantries, it is evident he doesn’t forget things. He recollects my interactions with him long before the NSCN signed the ongoing ceasefire with the Indian government in 1997.
You don’t expect such a man to forget his homeland, much though he may have been away for years at a length. And he couldn’t forget his own home either. So the home front is what we start talking about.
Stripping bare the riot masterminds
Ten years is a numerically compulsive occasion for retrospection. Both for Javed, Teesta and their team, and for those well-wishers like us who have seen them wage a lonely battle since 1993. The introspection bit has to be done by the rest.