Opinion

By Patricia Álvarez Sánchez Languages are constellations of words shared by all those speakers who are immersed in a specific linguistic environment. Despite their surprising variety — there are about 7,000 — linguistics tries to analyse them and determine their structure. This relatively recent discipline, which has many schools and approaches, has also investigated the […]

By Jayashri Kulkarni At the beginning of each year, many people make vows to either do or not do something to improve their life in some way. The fresh start of a new year is magically equated with a fresh start to life and often imbued with renewed hope that this year things will be […]

For some time, the Earth’s natural resources have been depleted faster than they can be replaced. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has set a 2030 deadline to reduce heat-trapping emissions by half to avoid climate change that is both irreversible and destructive. With colleagues, we coauthored a climate emergency warning paper in 2019. It […]

By Hugh Breakey Over the past two years, our lives have changed in unprecedented ways. In the face of the pandemic, we have been required to obey demanding new rules and accept new risks, making enormous changes to our daily lives. These disruptions can challenge us to think differently about ethics – about what we […]

By Dina Matar Hundreds of journalists killed or arrested, rising numbers of female media workers targeted, floods of misinformation and hate speech and ineffectual or hostile governments unable or unwilling to protect the public’s right to know. The 2021 press freedom index released recently by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) makes for grim reading. The report […]

By KSS Seshan As the 72nd anniversary of our Republic Day is fast approaching, let us recount how our Constitution came to be written before it was adopted in 1950. The evolution and framing of our Constitution is irrevocably linked to our freedom struggle and it makes interesting reading. The present generation needs to be […]

By Atul K Shah It may be the season for peace on Earth and goodwill to all men, but you don’t have to look very far in the financial pages to find stories about businesses doing exactly the opposite. NatWest, for example, has just agreed to pay US$35 million to the US authorities after pleading […]

Legitimising centralised control over agriculture may mean farmers’ freedom remains just a promise

For more than 70 years, Gross Domestic Product, or GDP, has been the key yardstick by which nations have measured economic progress. But GDP is designed to exclusively account for the monetary benefits accrued from economic activity. It is blind to the degradation of the natural environment, finite resources and human well-being. It’s time we […]

By James Dawes Autonomous weapon systems – commonly known as killer robots – may have killed human beings for the first time ever last year, according to a recent United Nations Security Council report on the Libyan civil war. History could well identify this as the starting point of the next major arms race, one […]

Rebuild trust in cooperatives through an appropriate policy that operates at State level

The economic turmoil that India is witnessing for some time now is said to have been reversed by the present government. Claims of breaking chains to implement new reforms float on the surface of Indian trust. Ironically, despite the promised claims and talks for reforms, India slipped to the 108th position in the Economic Freedom […]

By J R Janumpalli It is a general refrain from a disappointed section of Telangana society, the disgruntled ‘dual citizens’ of Telugu States in Hyderabad and the opposition parties, “what new have we got in Telangana State which was not there earlier” — the same politics, the same political parties and the same administration, etc. […]

As someone who has admired Nagarjuna’s acting, I was pleasantly surprised to see his pledge to adopt 1,000 acres of Reserve Forests for biodiversity and climate protection. Unlike Hollywood, where celebrities such as Leonardo DiCaprio have used their star value to promote conservation and climate change action, India’s film celebrities have in general been reticent. […]

By Claudio Bozzi Images of what appeared to be US warships emerged from China last month, but they were not anywhere near an ocean. In fact, they were thousands of kilometres away, in a desert in western China. Military experts said the mock-ups of US warships were part of a new target range developed by […]

By B Yerram Raju In the context of the stress faced by the justice dispensing system for several reasons, chief of them being the huge pendency of cases, the Government of India thought it expedient to provide a new forum and procedure for resolving international and domestic commercial disputes quickly culminating in setting up of […]

By Ekta Kishore, Viswanath Pingali The recent Economic Survey suggests that more than 54.6% of our workforce depends on agriculture and allied industries as their source of livelihood, contributing a little over 17% to our country’s Gross Value Added. However, degrading soil quality, shifting weather patterns, low mechanisation rates, unavailability of manual labour, sub-optimal irrigation […]

By Nayakara Veeresha Nov 26, 2021, will remain as one of the milestones in the history of our nation. Reason: the government’s decision to repeal the farm laws that were enacted in 2020 and halted by the Supreme Court in January, 2021. The day is commemorated as Constitution Day or Samvidhaan Divas or National Law […]

By Robert Huish, Simon C Darnell In ordering a diplomatic boycott, but not an athletic boycott, of the Beijing Winter Olympics, US President Joe Biden effectively pulled his goalie from the net.China and the United States continue to face off over how “people and economies should be governed.” Following a virtual summit, Biden and China’s […]

By D Bala Venkatesh Varma Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted President of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, for the 21st Annual Summit in New Delhi on 6th December. Though by normal diplomatic standards this official visit was a short one — President Putin was in Delhi for less than four hours — its timing and […]

If we are serious about limiting global warming, we should only burn a small fraction of our known fossil fuel reserves

By Robert Thomson US President Joe Biden’s online ‘Summit for Democracy’ is being heralded by its organisers as the start of democratic renewal. Leaders from governments, civil society and business will discuss what can be done to strengthen democracy. The White House argues such action is urgently needed, as democracies around the world are under […]

By Louise Grogan The lack of food security in Afghanistan may soon become a threat to the stability of many other countries. Without a radical change of western policy towards the Taliban, millions of people will make their way to anywhere they can find food. The arrival of the poorest of the poor in neighbouring […]

By Renaud Foucart Facebook’s approach to users’ data has just been dealt a major blow from the European court of justice (ECJ). In an answer to a question from Germany’s highest court, the ECJ’s advocate general – whose opinion is not binding but is generally followed by the court – has made an essential clarification […]