Treatment of Prisoners

What should constitute a crime and why a criminal should be punished have defied universally acceptable answers. It is not a crime to kill thousands in an undeclared war in Iraq, Kosovo or Chechenya. Yet a 13-year-old boy spent five days in a US j... Continue reading

Lessons from the migrant worker mess

The much-maligned migrant worker lubricates the wheels of the Indian economy. We know his value when he is not available; then the machine grinds to a halt.

Estimates vary but their numbers could be up to 120 million, more than the populat... Continue reading

China’s aggression is a trap

Speculations are being made about the motives that have driven China’s recent actions on India’s borders. One view is that it is the continuation of that nation’s hegemonic belligerence towards its neighbors and half-brothers lik... Continue reading

China has become a fascist state

Fascism and Communism have much in common. Both have a totalitarian, single party regime headed by an all-powerful leader. The party is above the individual and any rights of the individual. For both of these ideologies, armed conflict is the mean... Continue reading

Law and (Dis)order in China

When Mao took over in 1949, his Red Guards had all the power and no responsibility. A person had to be only branded an enemy of the revolution and then the revolutionaries had the freedom to do what they liked with him. There were no trials and no... Continue reading

China and Indo-Pacific QUAD

What’s in a name? So mused the 16th century bard in Romeo and Juliet. There were no Communists in that age. To them, words are the essence of ideology and the tools of their dialectic. Even the word “dialectic” is a tool and Comm... Continue reading

The Hutongs and China’s introversion

In the first part of this article, we saw how the key to the building of the Great Wall of China lies in China’s historical introversion and xenophobia. The design of living spaces in China reflects the same desire of excluding the “ot... Continue reading