In a 2024 op-ed published in the Indian Express, Manish Sabharwal and Ashish Dhawan (the latter a philanthropist and a founder-trustee of Ashoka University) posed an important question: “Isn’t it impossible to decide which disciplines matter more: The sciences that lengthen our lives or the humanities that make those longer lives worth living?” The article … Continue reading THE BINARY OF THE HUMANITIES AND THE SCIENCES – HIRA
Category: Economics
USAID and the Fall of the Global Aid Order — Ritabrata Chakraborty
Kent Nishimura/Reuters In late February 2025, as the disruptive policy orders of US President Donald Trump were generating their cascading effects globally, India's first three clinics directed towards transgender people faced an unforeseen closure. Located in Hyderabad, Pune and Kalyan, these clinics faced the tightening of funding caused by the halting of USAID, the word … Continue reading USAID and the Fall of the Global Aid Order — Ritabrata Chakraborty
Of Gains and Divides: Stock Markets and Persisting Paradoxes—Ritabrata Chakraborty
Picture Courtesy: Mint If one has even casually followed the news stream over the last few years, a running theme concerning the economy has been consistent. It is the stock markets having a strong run (‘bullish’ in finance parlance), with abundant capital flowing in, while economies worldwide have been battling runaway inflation and tepid growth … Continue reading Of Gains and Divides: Stock Markets and Persisting Paradoxes—Ritabrata Chakraborty
Neoliberalism and the Politics of Mental Health—Yanis Iqbal
Illustration courtesy: Olivia Newland In its neoliberal phase, capitalism no longer exists as a historical force with capabilities to play a progressive role. On the contrary, it keeps nakedly “asserting its power all the way to the historical limit of its viability”, as Istvan Meszaros puts it. Breaching these limits, neoliberalism, becomes a ‘counter-historical’ force. … Continue reading Neoliberalism and the Politics of Mental Health—Yanis Iqbal
Ahmed Chhafa’s ‘The Village Poor and Rural Class-Struggle’—Translated by Pritha Banerjee
Ahmed Chhafa [Sofa] (1943-2001) with his teacher, Professor Abdur Razzaq (left). Let us take a village. Assume that it contains a total population of 2000, which includes its men and women, infants and adolescents, young and the old. It is known to all that none of us lives alone in this society. Kith and kin, … Continue reading Ahmed Chhafa’s ‘The Village Poor and Rural Class-Struggle’—Translated by Pritha Banerjee
Mask, Maker, and the Market: Dispatches on Chhau from Charida—Debayan Das
A Chhau mask depicting Goddess Durga Introduction Chhau is a unique tribal martial dance performed in the month of Chaitra across villages in the states of Jharkhand, West Bengal and Odisha, by mostly all-men troupes. Its practice in these three states gave rise to three different schools or styles of Chhau: Seraikela, Purulia and Mayurbhanj. … Continue reading Mask, Maker, and the Market: Dispatches on Chhau from Charida—Debayan Das
Economics and the Ethics of Inequality—Ritabrata Chakraborty
Image Courtesy: Getty Images "Can we turn our backs on equality? No government is legitimate that does not show equal concern for the fate of all those citizens over whom it claims dominion and from whom it claims allegiance. Equal concern is the sovereign virtue of political community-without it, government is only tyranny-and when a … Continue reading Economics and the Ethics of Inequality—Ritabrata Chakraborty
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