Counterview

  By Jag Jivan   India faces an accelerating heat crisis that threatens the health, livelihoods, and economic stability of hundreds of millions of people — and current policy responses are failing to keep pace, according to a new white paper published in April 2026 by Harvard University's Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability.

By Jag Jivan   A new National Sample Survey (NSS) report on household health consumption reveals that private healthcare facilities account for the majority of hospitalisations in Gujarat , placing a significant financial burden on families. 

By A Representative   In a strongly worded communication addressed to top central government officials, a power and climate policy analyst from Karnataka has questioned the rationale behind India's continued push for pumped storage projects (PSPs), citing a recent multi-billion rupee investment commitment by Adani Green Energy towards battery energy storage systems (BESS).

By A Representative   India’s edible oil imports are shifting from price-led buying to supply-driven sourcing as geopolitical tensions in West Asia combine with climate shocks and energy market volatility, according to the Indian Vegetable Oil Producers’ Association (IVPA).

By Vikas Meshram*  India has long called itself an agricultural nation. School textbooks remind us that “the farmer is the backbone of the nation.” Yet what this backbone has endured over the past three decades is a story of relentless despair. Between 1995 and 2023, at least 394,206 farmers and agricultural labourers ended their lives—an average of 13,600 deaths every year. In 2022, one farmer or farm worker was dying by suicide every hour.

By Mohd Ziyaullah Khan*  On April 7, 2026, Manipur witnessed yet another heartbreaking incident. A rocket projectile struck a home in Bishnupur , killing a four-year-old boy and his newborn sister. The attack shattered whatever fragile calm existed and reignited anger across the Imphal Valley . Massive torch rallies followed. 

By Harsh Thakor*  ​One of the most celebrated revolutionaries of Iran, Hamid Ashraf can be said to have lit a new dawn in the history of the country. As the legendary leader of the People’s Fedayeen Guerrilla Organization (OIPFG) during the 1970s, he acted as a catalyst for the armed struggle against the Shah’s autocracy. An unwavering intellectual who bridged the gap between theory and action, Ashraf became a symbol of resistance whose legacy continues to resonate. This year on June 29th, we commemorate the 50th anniversary of his martyrdom—a moment to reflect on a man who transformed from a middle-class student into the "most wanted man in Iran."

​By Ravi Ranjan*  ​ Santosh Chaturvedi is a significant figure in contemporary Hindi literature and the academic world. Beyond his editorial tenure at "Kathā" and his leadership as Principal of Mahamati Prannath Mahavidyalaya, his creative output—most notably his poetry collections Pahalī bāra and Dakkhina kā bhī apanā pūraba hōtā hai—establishes him as a writer of profound sensitivity. His poem " Dubhāṣie " (The Interpreters) elevates linguistic mediation from a technical process to a vast philosophy of human compassion and cultural bridges.  

By Jag Jivan    A sweeping policy report released by the Foundation for Economic Development (FED) argues that India’s minimum wage regime has become counterproductive, pricing millions of workers out of formal employment and costing the economy an estimated $60 billion in unrealised low-skill exports annually.

By Rajiv Shah   A  landmark study , “The mortality burden from COVID in low-income settings: evidence from verbal autopsies in India”, using verbal autopsies of 20,000 deaths reveals that only one-third of India’s pandemic excess mortality was directly caused by SARS-CoV-2 . The rest — a hidden toll running into millions — was the collateral damage of a healthcare system brought to its knees. 

By Jag Jivan   A sweeping policy report released by the Foundation for Economic Development (FED) argues that India’s minimum wage regime has become counterproductive, pricing millions of workers out of formal employment and costing the economy an estimated $60 billion in unrealised low-skill exports annually.

By Prof. Hemantkumar Shah*  At 55, Jyotiraditya Scindia served as a Member of Parliament from 2001 to 2020 with the Congress before switching to the BJP in 2020. A scion of the Gwalior royal family , educated at Harvard University and Stanford University with degrees in BA and MBA, he embodies what is often described as elite polish and global exposure.

By Ram Puniyani*  A new phrase—“corporate jihad”—has been manufactured to malign educated Muslim youth. The term surfaced in Nashik, where allegations against Muslim employees of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) were amplified into a narrative of conversion conspiracies.  

By A Representative   At least six young men from Sopore have been detained under the Public Safety Act (PSA) following student protests earlier this month over alleged harassment of a girl at a government higher secondary school.   The protests began on April 13 after serious allegations were raised against a teacher.

By Vikas Meshram*  On April 24, seven out of ten Rajya Sabha members of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) announced their merger into the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Rajya Sabha Chairman C. P. Radhakrishnan accepted this claim, pushing the BJP’s standalone strength in the Upper House to 113. For the first time, the National Democratic Alliance crossed the majority mark in the Rajya Sabha. This event is not merely the story of an internal split within one party; it simultaneously sheds light on the true nature of AAP, the opportunism of defecting leaders, the BJP’s political strategies, and the ongoing weakening of the anti-defection law.

By A Representative   The Chenchu Solidarity Forum (CSF), an independent collective advocating for the rights of the Chenchu Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG), has raised serious concerns over what it describes as a “misleading” public narrative around the relocation of Adivasi communities from the Amrabad Tiger Reserve. In a press release, the forum alleged that a rally held on April 27 in Achampet projecting that there is no forcible relocation of Adivasis was largely dominated by non-Adivasis and did not reflect the genuine sentiments of the Chenchu community.

By Jag Jivan   A new  National Sample Survey  (NSS) report on  household health consumption  reveals that  private healthcare facilities  account for the majority of  hospitalisations in Gujarat , placing a significant financial burden on families. 

By Jag Jivan  Marking International Workers’ Memorial Day , fresh data from Gujarat has highlighted a troubling pattern of fatalities and injuries in the construction sector, with activists pointing to weak enforcement of safety norms and rising climate-related risks .

By Bharti Rawat*   It is April 2026, and India is on fire. Nineteen of the world’s twenty hottest cities are in India. Temperatures in several regions are already touching 42–45°C, and the India Meteorological Department has warned that intense heatwaves will persist through June. This is not merely a climate story. It is a public health emergency—one that is killing people, destroying livelihoods, and exposing a catastrophic failure of the state to protect its most vulnerable citizens.

By Bharti Rawat*  India’s public health story is often framed as one of steady progress—rising institutional deliveries , expanding insurance schemes, and broader access to care. Yet beneath these gains lies a quieter, more persistent crisis: the financial shock of falling ill.

By Bharat Dogra  One of India’s most significant peace initiatives unfolded in the Chambal Valley between 1959 and 1978, when nearly 650 dacoits voluntarily surrendered. The largest wave came in 1972, with about 500 laying down arms in a single year.  

By Ravi Ranjan*  The image is seared into recent memory: millions of migrant workers, stripped of wages and hope, walking hundreds of miles back to their villages. For many, this was not a joyful homecoming but a desperate flight for survival. Leeladhar Mandloi ’s Hindi poem, ‘Ve Laut Nahīm Rahe’ (‘They Are Not Returning’), captures this tragedy with startling precision. Written before the COVID-19 lockdowns, the poem has become painfully prophetic, exposing the deep contradictions between India’s development narrative and the dignity of its working poor.

By Bhabani Shankar Nayak*  The recent viral story of a DoorDash driver delivering two bags of McDonald’s to President Donald Trump at the White House on April 13, 2026 , has captured public attention in the United States. The driver, Sharon Simmons , a Republican from Fayetteville, Arkansas , has also been campaigning against a proposed “ tax on tips .” At 58, a grandmother of ten, Simmons has reportedly completed over 14,000 deliveries since 2022, averaging about ten trips a day. Far from easing into retirement, she continues to work to finance her husband’s cancer treatment.

By Ilya Ganpantsura   Nations forged in the shadow of empire often face a paradox: the harder they struggle to define themselves, the greater the temptation to deny parts of their own past. Ukraine today stands at precisely this crossroads—seeking to consolidate a coherent national identity while wrestling with the layered, and often uncomfortable, inheritances of history.

By Jag Jivan   Marking  International Workers’ Memorial Day , fresh data from  Gujarat  has highlighted a troubling pattern of fatalities and injuries in the construction sector, with activists pointing to weak enforcement of safety norms and rising  climate-related risks .

By Nava Thakuria*  After months of uncertainty, the Press Council of India (PCI) has got its chairman, with Justice Ranjana Prakash Desai assuming charge on 24 April 2026. The retired judge of the Supreme Court of India , nominated for a second term of three years, earlier served as PCI chairperson from 17 June 2022 to 16 December 2025. However, the quotas for working journalists remain vacant, as seven members to represent professional journalists (other than editors) and six members to represent journalist-editors are yet to be selected to complete the 15th Council.

By Harsh Thakor*  Raghu Rai, hailed as the “father of Indian photojournalism,” passed away at the age of 83 at a New Delhi hospital after battling cancer that had spread to his brain. His career, spanning over half a century, chronicled indelible images of India’s political leaders, spiritual icons, and everyday life. Rai’s family confirmed his death and announced that his funeral would take place at Lodhi Crematorium, marking the end of an era in Indian visual culture. Rai spent more than six decades focusing his lens on the subcontinent’s joys, tragedies, and contradictions with an intensity few could match. He was the man who defined Indian photojournalism for half a century, whose pictures often conveyed more than a thousand words ever could, especially his classic images of Indira Gandhi. Raghu Rai did not merely photograph India; he explored and analysed it with patience, rigour and empathy. His camera traversed power, poverty, faith, tragedy, politics, streets, s...

By Shamsul Islam  "What is now happening to Marx's theory has, in the course of history, happened repeatedly to the theories of revolutionary thinkers and leaders of oppressed classes fighting for emancipation. During the lifetime of great revolutionaries, the oppressing classes constantly hounded them, received their theories with the most savage malice, the most furious hatred and the most unscrupulous campaigns of lies and slander. After their death, attempts are made to convert them into harmless icons, to canonize them, so to say, and to hallow their names to a certain extent for the "consolation" of the oppressed classes and with the object of duping the latter, while at the same time robbing the revolutionary theory of its substance, blunting its revolutionary edge and vulgarizing it." [ Lenin in State and Revolution , 1917]

By A Representative   On the 40th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster , the National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) has demanded an immediate moratorium on all new nuclear fission-based power plants in India and a time-bound, planned phaseout of nuclear energy worldwide, warning that the “ nuclear-industrial-military complex ” continues to threaten humanity’s very existence.

By Mohd. Ziyaullah Khan*  Amid growing political debate over delimitation and constitutional amendments, one structural fact often gets overlooked: the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) cannot pass a constitutional amendment on its own. Under India’s Constitution , such an amendment requires a two-thirds majority in both Houses of Parliament. In the Lok Sabha , where the NDA holds around 293 seats, it falls significantly short of the required 362. In the Rajya Sabha , with roughly 134–140 seats, it still needs an additional 15–25 members to cross the threshold. This gap is not merely numerical; it represents a constitutional veto in the hands of the opposition.  

By Ravi Ranjan*  Badri Narayan 's Hindi poem " Duḥkha-Purāṇa " (The Sorrowful Chronicle) achieves something rare in contemporary poetry: it transforms the seemingly simple experience of "being left behind" into a profound meditation on human exclusion . Through images of birds breaking from their flock, a calf separated from the herd, a deer failing to rejoin its group, and finally a person stranded on a shore as a boat disappears into deepening dusk, the poem builds what scholar Ravi Ranjan calls a " multilayered metaphor for exclusion ." Unlike traditional puranas that celebrate gods, kings, and victors, Narayan proposes a counter-narrative—a chronicle of those continuously dispossessed from community, association, and development.

By Harsh Thakor*  Selecting the best teams in Test cricket history is a deeply subjective venture. In this feature, I have ranked the finest sides in order of merit, attempting to strike a balance between statistical achievements and the sheer strength or talent within a squad.

By Vikas Meshram*  In Sajjangarh block of Rajasthan’s Banswara district, most of the population belongs to tribal communities. The people live scattered across hills and hamlets, with neither adequate irrigation nor stable livelihoods. Families here depend on rain-fed agriculture and daily-wage labor. When rains fail or crops are lost, entire families migrate to cities like Ahmedabad for construction work — sometimes for more than six months a year. The deepest toll falls on women’s health, children’s education, and the social fabric of the family. Climate change has only sharpened these hardships.

By Bharat Dogra  For decades, the ravines of the Chambal Valley evoked images of fear and lawlessness, becoming almost synonymous with the reign of dacoit gangs. This reputation, however, began to change with a remarkable experiment in non-violent transformation led by Gandhian thinkers and grassroots activists. What unfolded between the 1960s and 1970s remains one of the most striking examples of negotiated peace and moral persuasion in modern India.

By Bashir Pathan*  Gujarat Gas Limited (GGL), the authorized supplier of Piped Natural Gas ( PNG ) in Morbi , has stated that it is supporting the revival of the region’s ceramic industry by ensuring uninterrupted gas supply and price stability amid recent geopolitical disruptions .

By A Representative   The All India Lawyers Union (AILU), in a joint effort with the Students’ Federation of India and the Democratic Youth Federation of India, has issued a scathing press statement following a fact-finding mission into recent labor unrest in Noida . The delegation, which visited the area on April 16 and 18, 2026, alleges that the Uttar Pradesh Police have carried out mass, indiscriminate arrests of workers and bystanders following protests over minimum wages . 

By A Representative   Former Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) leader  Nandini Oza in an incisive social media post has said that while many were “surprisingly shocked” by Raghav Chadha leaving AAP to join BJP , she herself was “shocked long long ago” when colleagues from people’s movements, including former associates from NBA, joined AAP. 

By Mohd Ziyaullah Khan*  When Raghav Chadha, a Rajya Sabha member from the Aam Aadmi Party, reportedly deleted several tweets criticising the Bharatiya Janata Party and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, it did not take long for speculation to ignite. In today’s hyper-documented digital age, such moves rarely go unnoticed. 

By Y.S. Gill  As we marked the birth anniversary of Vladimir Lenin (born April 22, 1870), there couldn't perhaps be no better tribute to his legacy than doing exactly what he did: applying a ruthless, materialist critique to the specific conditions of our times. If Lenin were to analyse the 21st-century digital economy, he would have recognised that the fundamental mechanics of capitalism have not changed—only the technology has. Here is a comprehensive formulation of how the struggle against modern Western imperialism can serve as the ultimate catalyst for a global revolution, led by the " new proletariat " and grounded in the enduring lessons of The State and Revolution and Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism .

By Rajiv Shah    India’s human capital outcomes in health and education remain below global averages, with the latest World Bank report warning that learning levels and health indicators are stagnating compared to peer countries such as Vietnam and Peru. The report highlights persistent gaps in maternal education, child nutrition, and learning outcomes, underscoring the urgent need for investment in homes, neighborhoods, and workplaces.

By Dr Amitav Banerjee, MD, Epidemiologist  In disease eradication, the last mile is crucial. Even a single case can keep smoldering and can start the fire with a vengeance, since immunity of the population goes down. In malaria, this immunity is weak and ill-defined and is called “ premunity .” This is a form of incomplete protection that depends on low-level persistent infection, giving rise to “ stable malaria ” in endemic regions. Here there are no overt outbreaks, as survivors into adulthood have “premunity,” but these populations are likely to have high infant mortality rates due to malaria. 

By Palla Trinadha Rao  The constitutional promise of justice, dignity, and self-governance for tribal communities in India remains only partially realised. While the framers of the Constitution sought to address the historical marginalisation of tribal societies through special provisions, the framework reflected compromise—prioritising administrative control over genuine empowerment. This article revisits that unfinished vision by situating the Fifth Schedule within its historical, legal, and institutional context, and argues for a shift towards a rights-based, community-centred model of governance.

By Bharat Dogra  Recent violence following discontent and strikes in Noida, near Delhi , has prompted many experienced commentators to express serious concern about the increasing difficulties faced by workers in India. In a statement released on April 22, the Delhi Union of Journalists (DUJ) expressed concern over the worsening conditions of workers in Noida, as well as the severe police action against them, in which some journalists were also injured. 

By Vikas Meshram*  There are moments in history when multiple crises converge, and their combined impact proves far more severe than each crisis in isolation. India today stands at precisely such a difficult crossroads. The war smouldering in West Asia, a weakening monsoon due to El Niño , declining industrial productivity, and a slowdown in international investment—taken together—have pushed the Indian economy into a complex bind. To understand the depth of this situation, one must look beyond headline numbers and examine the structural realities and geopolitical entanglements beneath them.

By A Representative   The Hudson Institute ’s “New India Conference,” held on April 23, featured senior figures from India’s ruling political ecosystem, including RSS General Secretary Dattatreya Hosabale and BJP foreign affairs head Vijay Chauthaiwale . The event also included U.S. officials and former diplomats such as Kurt Campbell, Kenneth Juster, and Nisha Biswal, alongside India’s Ambassador to the U.S., Vinay Kwatra.  

By Bhabani Shankar Nayak*  “India, China are hell holes,” posted President Trump on his Truth Social account. He claimed that Indian and Chinese migrants “have done more damage to this nation than all the mafia families put together. Gangsters with laptops. They’ve robbed us blind, treated us like second-class citizens, let the ‘turd world’ triumph, stepped on our flag, et cetera.” Such outrageous, racist rants should surprise no one. 

By Guillermo R. Barreto  When one person hurts another, common sense dictates that the person should apologize and, preferably, make amends for the harm they may have caused. Apologize, make amends, and ensure it won’t happen again. These seem like basic rules of coexistence. Coexistence among people, but also among sectors of a society and among entire nations. History shows us that coexistence is not the norm. Colonialism and exploitation have been present, but the perpetrators of these crimes rarely acknowledge them.

By Bharat Dogra   The Chambal region in central India has long drawn national and global attention for its remarkable peace initiative—the voluntary surrender of over 600 dacoits . The pressing question now is whether this legacy can be carried forward to strengthen non‑violent thinking and action as a means of reducing distress, destruction, and violence in society.  

By Harsh Thakor*  Even as Iran grapples with an existential crisis as a result of the war with US and Israel, there appears little effort among the more aware sections across the world to recall the contribution of Ali Shariati, who offered a radical reinterpretation of Islam, transforming it into an instrument of social change by fusing religious tradition with revolutionary consciousness. 

By A Representative   The Jawaharlal Nehru University Teachers’ Association has opposed a proposal to introduce a 5% supernumerary quota for wards of university employees, including teachers, calling it a “regressive” shift in admission policy and demanding its immediate withdrawal. In a statement issued after its General Body meeting held on April 21, the association said members had “unanimously decided to oppose” the move, which it attributed to a unilateral decision by Vice Chancellor Santishree Dhulipudi Pandit . The body maintained that the proposal “stemmed not from any demand raised by teachers” and described it as an outcome of “absolute control over the decision-making process.”

By Bharat Dogra   Recent proposals, including constitutional amendments to provide 33% reservation for women in state and central legislatures, have sparked wide discussion. In this context, it is important to examine the experiences of women leaders in rural decentralization, where reservations have existed for decades. Many women elected to village councils (panchayats) have set inspiring examples of leadership, particularly those who rose from poor families and marginalized communities. Their achievements remain significant even today.