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Research Abstracts: Congress
| Title: | The politics-kinship nexus in India: Sonia Gandhi versus Sushma Swaraj in the 1999 general elections
| | Author: | Uwe Skoda | | Publication: | Contemporary South Asia / Carfax Publishing, part of the Taylor & Francis Gr | | Enumeration: | vol. 13, no. 3, pp. 273-285, September 2004 | | Abstract: | The general elections in India in 1999 saw a direct contest for a parliamentary seat between Indian National Congress President Sonia Gandhi and Sushma Swaraj, a prominent politician in the Bharatiya Janata Party and former Health Minister. Although the competition took place formally in the rather unknown constituency of Bellary in Karnataka, it got enormous coverage in the north Indian media. This election contest was fought to a large extent on the basis of kinship. On the one hand, Swaraj styled herself a swadeshi beti (Indian daughter) in contrast to Gandhi as a videshi bahu (foreign daughter-in-law), thereby hinting at the latter's Italian origin. On the other hand, Gandhi stressed the relation to her illustrious family, especially her late husband Rajiv Gandhi and deceased mother-in-law Indira Gandhi, both former prime ministers of India. This article uses the 1999 contest between Gandhi and Swaraj to explore the nexus of politics and kinship in India. Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | State and religious diversity: reflections on post-1947 India | | Author: | Singh Gurhapal | | Publication: | Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions / Routledge | | Enumeration: | Vol. 5, No. 2.pp. 205 - 225 /Autumn 2004 | | Abstract: | This article critically reviews the assumptions underlying state secularism in India since 1947 against the policies of different regimes in managing religious diversity. It reflects on how the construction of secularism was adapted to Indian conditions in ways which enabled it to coalesce with existing traditions of statecraft and the religious ideals of Mohandas K. Gandhi, on the one hand, and the modernist outlook of Jawaharlal Nehru, on the other. This fine balance, it is suggested, was seriously compromised by post-1947 Congress governments. Since the 1980s state secularism has also been under attack by the political forces mobilised by Hindutva and 'anti-secularists' who draw their inspiration from neo-Gandhism and post-colonial theory. Despite the critiques offered by these two schools of thought, a general assessment of the post-1947 experience, this article argues, suggests that Nehru's ideals offer the most promising prospectus of building democracy in a religiously diverse society such as India. More broadly the Indian experience offers interesting lessons about the current debate on the place of organised religions in public life.
Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | Encountering (cultural) nationalism, Islam and gender in the body politic of India
| | Author: | Das R. | | Publication: | Social Identities / Carfax Publishing, part of the Taylor & Francis Gr | | Enumeration: | vol. 10, no. 3, pp. 369-398/ May 2004 | | Abstract: | In this article, I analyse how the ideology of Hindutva has been manipulated by the contemporary Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government of India to locate an internal enemy along religious lines to support its nationalist agenda, with subsequent implications for gender. Following a brief introduction to the literature of nationalism, with special reference to nationalism as an 'invented tradition' and the role of 'ideology as doxa', I situate the case of post-colonial Indian nationalism whereby I highlight how a complexity of 'social imaginaries' and 'identities' have been used by the post-colonial Indian state leaders as constituting the 'mental state' of India. I contrast the conceptions of a political/territorial nationalism as evidenced under the Congress with that of the emerging Hindu/cultural nationalism under the contemporary BJP and highlight how the BJP, like the colonialists but with subtle differences, has sought to replay the re-construction of Islam/Indian Muslims as Others to the supposedly Hindu India. Interweaving feminism to support its nationalist project becomes an integral part of the BJP's nationalist/communalist agenda. Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | State and Religious Diversity: Reflections on Post-1947 India | | Author: | Singh Gurharpal | | Publication: | Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions / Frank Cass Publishers | | Enumeration: | vol. 5, no. 2, pp. 205-225, Autumn 2004 | | Abstract: | This article critically reviews the assumptions underlying state secularism in India since 1947 against the policies of different regimes in managing religious diversity. It reflects on how the construction of secularism was adapted to Indian conditions in ways which enabled it to coalesce with existing traditions of statecraft and the religious ideals of Mohandas K. Gandhi, on the one hand, and the modernist outlook of Jawaharlal Nehru, on the other. This fine balance, it is suggested, was seriously compromised by post-1947 Congress governments. Since the 1980s state secularism has also been under attack by the political forces mobilised by Hindutva and 'anti-secularists' who draw their inspiration from neo-Gandhism and post-colonial theory. Despite the critiques offered by these two schools of thought, a general assessment of the post-1947 experience, this article argues, suggests that Nehru's ideals offer the most promising prospectus of building democracy in a religiously diverse society such as India. More broadly the Indian experience offers interesting lessons about the current debate on the place of organised religions in public life. Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | A History of Hindu Grievance Exploited | | Author: | Mark Tully | | Publication: | Art Newspaper | | Enumeration: | Vol. 14, p.23, February 2004 | | Abstract: | In India, the militant Hindu group the Sabhaji Brigade has reacted violently to a perceived insult to the devout Hindu warrior Shiva in a recent book by Professor James Laine, but this sense of grievance does not grow in unfertile ground. In multifaith India, there is a history that feeds Hindu grievance, and Hindu nationalists claim that resistance from such minority communities as Christians and Muslims has prevented India from becoming a Hindu nation; they also highlight any concession made to such communities. The weak response to aggressive Hinduism by the government of the secular Congress Party and the banning of Laine's book on Shiva do not bode well for the future of India as a multifaith society. Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | India's Embattled Secularism | | Author: | Mukul Kesavan | | Publication: | The Wilson Quarterly | | Enumeration: | vol. 27, no. 1, p. 61-7 / (Winter 2003) | | Abstract: | Part of a special section on religious strife. Secularism in India rose out of the peculiar circumstances of anti-imperial nationalism. Because colonial nationalism had to prove to the Raj that the variety of India could be gathered under the umbrella of one movement, the nationalism of the Indian National Congress did its best to keep every species of Indian on board. After most Muslims left India for Pakistan in 1947, the Congress's peculiarly Indian secularism continued to hold up well. The 1980s and 1990s saw the rise of the Hindu chauvinist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), however. The Hindu Right is implacably opposed to the Congress's pluralist construction of secularism because its political identity depends on the demonization of Muslims as the enemy Other. The BJP and its affiliates are committed to the transformation of a pluralist and secular republic into a Hindu nation. Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | Constitutional Centring: Nation Formation and Consociational Federalism in India and Pakistan | | Author: | Adeney K. | | Publication: | Commonwealth and Comparative Politics / Frank Cass Publishers (T&F) | | Enumeration: | vol. 40, no. 3, pp. 8-33, Nov.2002 | | Abstract: | This article examines, elucidates and explains the different processes through which India and Pakistan, products of the same colonial regime and institutional frameworks, attempted to create and 'centre' their 'nations'. Both regimes were concerned with state and nation building, and both were ethnically diverse. The Congress and the Muslim League participated in, and influenced the debates on, constitution formation before independence. In assessing the constitutional preferences before independence, especially the Cabinet Mission Plan, this article supports the revisionist account of partition. Jinnah's preference for centralised consociational accommodation was compatible with a united India, whereas Nehru's preference for a centralised majoritarian federation was not. This article questions Lijphart's argument that India should be understood as a confirming case for consociational theory. A central assumption is that decentring of a nation should not be understood in negative terms but has been a force for stabilisation. Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | Constitutional Centring: Nation Formation and Consociational Federalism in India and Pakistan | | Author: | Adeney Katharine | | Publication: | Commonwealth and Comparative Politics / Routledge(Imprint) of Taylor and Francis Group | | Enumeration: | Vol. 40, No. 3 pp. 8 - 33 /November 01, 2002 | | Abstract: | This article examines, elucidates and explains the different processes through which India and Pakistan, products of the same colonial regime and institutional frameworks, attempted to create and 'centre' their 'nations'. Both regimes were concerned with state and nation building, and both were ethnically diverse. The Congress and the Muslim League participated in, and influenced the debates on, constitution formation before independence. In assessing the constitutional preferences before independence, especially the Cabinet Mission Plan, this article supports the revisionist account of partition. Jinnah's preference for centralised consociational accommodation was compatible with a united India, whereas Nehru's preference for a centralised majoritarian federation was not. This article questions Lijphart's argument that India should be understood as a confirming case for consociational theory. A central assumption is that decentring of a nation should not be understood in negative terms but has been a force for stabilisation.
Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | India: Economy, Politics and Government | | Author: | (n/a) | | Publication: | Business Intelligence Report : India / World of Information | | Enumeration: | vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 1-62, 2001 | | Abstract: | Even with a parliamentary majority, the ruling right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has had to tread a fine line with its 24 coalition partners in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), attempting to appease both moderates and religious fundamentalists. BJP leader, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, has promoted a broadly liberal economic agenda while claiming to uphold a commitment to secular and inclusive politics. However, in his attempts to appease hardliners within the Rashtriya Swayamseval Sangh (RSS), the BJP's founding organisation, and Siv Sena, the Hindu fundamentalists within the NDA, he has used political and financial patronage, has increased the power of the increasingly politicised Hindu priestly class and taken an increasingly belligerent line with Pakistan over the Kashmir issue. Like the Congress party which held sway over India through much of its post-independence history, the BJP-led government has also been mired in corruption.
World of Information Business Intelligence Reports allow access to concise, clear coverage of current political and economic developments in over 100 countries. Alongside contributions from journalists and regional experts from around the world, they contain a wide variety of sectoral analysis and background information. Each Report contains an introductory overview commissioned from one of World of Information's network of contributors, an extensive list of key facts and features of the country, including macroeconomic indicators and details regarding national population, labour market and public services. The economy section focuses on monetary, fiscal and trade conditions before analysing sectoral, infrastructure and regulatory developments. Natural resources including agriculture and minerals, industry and service sectors are covered. A five-year table of key indicators invaluable for research into economic trends accompanies the report. Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
| Title: | Freedom Homespun -- National Independence and Textile Production in India
| | Author: | Bean, Susan S. | | Publication: | Asian Art & Culture | | Enumeration: | vol. 9, p. 52-67, (Spring/Summer 1996) | | Abstract: | The writer discusses the significance of spinning for the program for national
independence in India. Textile manufacture had been the principal industry in India; silk,
cotton, and woolen fabrics had been exported worldwide. British rule and Western industrialization resulted in India becoming, conversely, an importer of cloth and an
exporter of raw cotton and silk fiber. Ghandi, who believed that the decline in textile
manufacture was a main cause of poverty and subjugation in India, saw spinning as central
to the alleviation of poverty, the achievement of self-sufficiency and independence, the
creation of national unity, and the nurture of spiritual strength for India's political and
moral battle. Under Ghandi's leadership, the Indian National Congress decided to boycott
foreign textiles, to require its members to spin cotton and wear homespun cloth, and to
adopt a flag that incorporated the spinning wheel. Although spinning as a way of achieving
self-discipline and spiritual enlightenment did not survive, spinning and homespun cloth
are monuments to Ghandi and the nationalist movement. Source of Abstract: Provided by Publisher | | Tools: |
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