Mainstream Weekly

During mid June, two incidents in Indian Space came to limelight, 120 top level scientists quit the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), while a private firm Skyroot, has successfully placed Vikram- 1 carrying small-payload satellites in orbit. Prime Minister Narendra Modi immediately congratulated Skyroot, saying the effort breaks the monopoly of the public sector and promotes the nation’s self-reliance.

The youth-led protests of the Cockroach Janta Party, or CJP, are not simply expressions of anger over examination irregularities. They represent a demand that the Government of India fulfil one of its most important constitutional responsibilities: providing accessible, equal, reliable and high-quality education.

Students and youth are often dismissed by geriatric people as apolitical, depoliticised, lazy, immoral, unconcerned, and materialistic—too busy with their own lives, glued to digital platforms and social media. Acting on such perceptions, the ruling classes have taken India’s young for granted.

Home > 2026 > The Waning Sting of Sangh Parivar’s Smears | K. Sahadevan Mainstream, Vol 64 No 19, July 30, 2026 (Double Issue) Wednesday 29 July 2026, by For nearly a decade, the RSS and other Sangh Parivar organisations have systematically deployed a campaign of smear and slander against individuals and groups who dare to protest the Modi government’s policies perceived as anti-people.

One might say, for example, the major corporations represent national interest ‘what is good for General Motors, is good for America’. Indeed, the corporate responsibility that is the lack of accountability or representation, is common refrain in many protests. The concept of the public goods and services were thus developed in the light of a legal theory that considered the public as patrimony of the state and the principle of general interest as an attribute of sovereign.

We are witnessing a youth movement that began in the capital and is gaining strength day by day, spreading to different parts of the country while inspiring hope and aspiration among all those who believe in democracy. Sparked by examination irregularities, it continues to draw more students and young people, particularly from the middle class, along with increasing support from India’s liberal intelligentsia.

July 28, 2026 ‘kaise akash mein surakh nahin ho sakta, ek patthar to tabiyat se uchhalo yaaro’ –-Dushyant Kumar They Lifted A Book and made a hole in the sky. Remember the young woman in Mumbai who stood with her arms flung wide and brought a police van to a halt? Remember the young woman at Jantar Mantar, thin from many days without food, lifting the Constitution of India above her head, not in anger, but in the way one lifts a lamp.

July 23, 2026 There Must Be National Conversation On Academic Issues And Rights Forty-six years ago, I participated in the "Job or Jail" campaign organized by the All India Students’ Federation (AISF). Those memories returned with remarkable clarity on Sunday, July 19, when I spent nearly four hours with students at the AISF stall at Jantar Mantar, where four students were on a hunger strike. The heat was relentless, and the crowd was so dense that breathing itself became difficult.

24 July 2026 To The Prime Minister of India The Union Home Minister The Lt. Governor of NCT of Delhi The Commissioner of Police, Delhi Subject: Condemnation of Brutal Police Action Against Peaceful Student Protesters in Delhi on 20 July 2026 and Urgent Call for Accountability and Dialogue We, the members of the Constitutional Conduct Group, a collective of former civil servants belonging to the All India Services and the Central Services with no political affiliation and committed to the...

The first non-Congress governments were formed in many states after the fourth general elections in 1967 and in Delhi Jana Sangh was elected to the Delhi Metropolitan Council, an advisory body with considerable powers to run the Delhi Administration.