South Asia Archives - Public Seminar

Democracy

What Is Illiberal Democracy?

Scholars discuss Trump, Modi, and Erdoğan

February 20, 2025 • by Senem Aydin-Düzgit, Mark Frazier, Jeffrey C. Isaac and Pratap Bhanu Mehta

In November 2024, the India China Institute at The New School hosted the online panel "Trajectories of Authoritarianism in Democratic Regimes," which featured scholars Pratap Bhanu Mehta, Senem Aydin-Düzgit, and Jeffrey C. Isaac in conversation with moderator Mark W. Frazier about patterns of takeover, decay, and distrust of political institutions ...

South Asia

The Future for India’s Opposition

Democracy remains at risk

June 24, 2024 • by Udeepta Chakravarty

This result is certainly a setback for Modi, the BJP, and the Hindu nationalist Right more broadly; it is certainly a respite for opposition forces. But it would be foolhardy to celebrate this moment as a victory....

South Asia

The World’s “Largest Democracy”?

Modi leads India down a dark path

May 30, 2024 • by Udeepta Chakravarty

Corrosive nationalism and monarchic consciousness have become so normalized that other political forces, including the opposition, are now mimicking Modi’s practices....

Activism

The Art of Contemplating Justice

An excerpt from Studies into Darkness: The Perils and Promise of Free Speech

November 1, 2022 • by Amar Kanwar

When you look at any crime, it is investigated by an agency, the police, or the criminal justice system of any society. The process of justice is based on an investigation that is in turn based on the collection of evidence. Only evidence defined as permissible by law is presented ...

Democracy

Political Meaning and Significance of the Farmer’s Protests in India

January 26, 2021 • by Udeepta Chakravarty

The purpose of the article is to elucidate the political meaning and significance of the Kisan Andolan. It is not to evaluate the contents of the new farm laws nor is it to assess the merits and demerits of the counter claims made by farmer unions and organisations. The article is ...

Political Meaning and Significance of the Farmer’s Protests in India

Politics

The Indian Media is Blaming Muslims for the Coronavirus Pandemic

Disease has made a bad situation for India’s ethnic minorities worse

November 16, 2020 • by Vedika Inamdar and Pooja George

In March of 2020, just before the official coronavirus-related lockdown in India, a Tablighi Jamaat religious gathering took place in the Nizamuddin Markaz Mosque in New Delhi. The event was attended by 8000-9000 followers from India and abroad. Less than a month later, nearly 4,300 participants tested positive for COVID-19. The ...

The Indian Media is Blaming Muslims for the Coronavirus Pandemic

Climate & Ecology

Empire and Ecology in the Bengal Delta: The Making of Calcutta

A webinar view, featuring author Debjani Bhattacharyya and commenter Kasia Paprocki

July 15, 2020 • by Claire Potter

The event was hosted and moderated by Claire Potter, co-executive editor at Public Seminar & professor of history at The New School for Social Research. Save the date: our next Public Seminar book talk is on Wednesday, July 22, featuring Ted Widmer, author of Lincoln on the Verge: Thirteen Days to ...

Empire and Ecology in the Bengal Delta: The Making of Calcutta

Democracy

The Story of Indian Democracy Written in Blood and Betrayal

BJP thinks it is going to Indianize Kashmir. Instead, we will see, potentially, the Kashmirization of India.

September 5, 2019 • by Pratap Bhanu Mehta

The narrative supporting a radical move on Kashmir is familiar. Article 35(a) was a discriminatory provision and had to go. Article 370 was not a mechanism for integration but a legal tool for separatism. The Indian state, despite the horrendous violence it has used in the past, has never had ...