Studies in Indian Politics

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Latest documents

• Book review: Elizabeth Chatterjee and Matthew McCartney, eds. Class and Conflict: Revisiting Pranab Bardhan’s Political Economy of India

  Elizabeth Chatterjee and Matthew McCartney, eds. Class and Conflict: Revisiting Pranab Bardhan’s Political Economy of India. Delhi: Oxford University Press. 2019. 299 pages. ₹1,395

• The Double Life of Dissent: Art, Politics and the Predicaments of Democracy in India

  The article focuses on two moments in India’s political history, in which out-rightly expressed dissent underlines analytical shifts in the nature and course of the country’s democracy. It asks two questions: First, what does a self-proclaimed, democratic state do with peaceful dissenting artists? The second question follows from this. If indeed the state stigmatizes and suppresses that dissent, what does the artist do? By foregrounding the relationship between the dissent and offence-taking, the article shows the increasingly complex changes in the nature of the democratic state, role of the art market therein, the dynamic patterns of dissent itself, which underline the cyclic outbursts of violence against artists.

• Book review: Florian Matthey-Prakash, The Right to Education in India: The Importance of Enforceability of a Fundamental Right

  Florian Matthey-Prakash, The Right to Education in India: The Importance of Enforceability of a Fundamental Right (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2019), 446 pp. ₹1,495.

• Teaching Political Science in the Margins
• Dhirubhai L. Seth 1936-2021: Commemorating Intellectual Politics
• New Education Policy: Notes from Academic Hinterlands
• Did the Poona Pact Disenfranchise the ‘Depressed Classes’? An Analysis of the 1936–1937 and 1945–1946 Provincial Elections

  This article contests the conventional view that the ‘Depressed Classes’ lost out on representation by agreeing to joint electorates in the Poona Pact. It analyses the results of the elections to the provincial legislatures in British India that took place in 1936–1937 and 1945–1946 under the Government of India Act, 1935, to concretely appraise the working of the Poona Pact. The article argues that reserved seats, primary elections and cumulative voting redeemed the ability of the Poona Pact to provide both descriptive and substantive representation for the ‘Depressed Classes’.

• Book review: Paul Wallace (Ed.), India’s 2019 Elections: The Hindutva Wave and Indian Nationalism

  Paul Wallace (Ed.), India’s 2019 Elections: The Hindutva Wave and Indian Nationalism (New Delhi: SAGE Publications, 2020), 428 pp. ₹1,395 (Hardback). ISBN: 978-93-5388-244-0.

• Behind the Popular Narrative: Negotiating Life and Political Engagement in Conflicted Kashmir

  The article focuses on the subaltern system of micro appropriations or Jugaads used by young Kashmiris to survive within precarious situations inflicted due to armed conflict. More particularly, it argues that such Jugaads are invoked by the subaltern consciousness of Tehreeq-e-Azadi, which offers space for not just the negotiation with the state but also the creative improvisation of daily political actions. It is illustrated that young people’s political participation is entangled with the attempts to overcome the uncertainty around their lives, thereby offering them pragmatic solutions in advancing their interests. It is further elaborated that the existing polarization between separatism and mainstream is obscure at the experiential level, living within precarious situations has taught young people to silently craft possibilities of a good life without looking confrontational to either side. The article argues that localized forms of engagement are crucial for a comprehensive understanding of how modern states operate.

• Concepts, Methods and Indian Politics: A Conversation with Sudipta Kaviraj

Featured documents

• Communal Violence in Twenty-first Century India: Moving Beyond the Hindi Heartland

  Using communal violence data between 2006 and 2017, this study challenges the idea that communal violence is primarily an issue in the Hindi Heartland. The data demonstrates how Karnataka and West Bengal are also witnessing rising levels of communal violence. The study goes on to take a closer look ...

• After Silent Revolution: Most Marginalized Dalits and Local Democracy in Uttar Pradesh, North India

  There exists a widely held view that a ‘silent revolution’ is occurring in North India. However, a scanty literature deals with how this revolution has changed the distribution of political opportunities on the ground. Drawing on longitudinal and long-term ethnographic research conducted between...

• The Politics of Knowledge in Development: An Analytical Frame

  The parameters of modern knowledge systems are clearly showing fault lines—that if there is a continuation of the technological systems at the heart of development, neglecting the twin issues of ecology and equity—there is a serious threat to human existence. This article seeks to answer a specific ...

• BJP’s Ideological Hegemony: Combining Religious Conservatism and Nationalism

  This article explores popular support for two key dimensions of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s recent ideological dominance in Indian politics. We examine public opinion on assertive nationalism and religious conservatism. The article analyses data from an individual-level survey conducted among...

• Book Review: Suryakant Waghmore, Civility against Caste: Dalit Politics and Citizenship in Western India

  Suryakant Waghmore, Civility against Caste: Dalit Politics and Citizenship in Western India. New Delhi: SAGE Publications. 2013. 235 pages. ₹ 750....

• Lockdown Anthropology and Online Surveys: Unprecedented Methods for Unprecedented Times
• Candidate Caste Effects in Uttar Pradesh Elections

  This article assesses the impact of a candidate’s caste on the probability of voting for a party. Candidate caste effects may be pronounced in multiethnic societies and patronage democracies. This is demonstrated for four political parties in Uttar Pradesh (India) across three state elections....

• Dalit Parties and the Dilemmas of Democratization in Tamil Nadu

  In 1999, the largest Dalit movement organization in Tamil Nadu abandoned a decade-long boycott of elections and entered party politics as the Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (Liberation Panther Party, VCK). The focus of this article will be on the processes of institutionalization both into...

• Electing the Ruling Party and the Opposition: Voter Deliberations from Sangam Vihar, Delhi, Lok Sabha Elections 2014

  On the basis of an electoral ethnography done in an urban periphery of Delhi, this article presents an interpretive account of Indian national elections 2014. At a time when sovereignty travels to a locality—in this case an unauthorized settlement known as Sangam Vihar—how do people deliberate on...

• Governance, Public Service Delivery and Trust in Government

  Several studies in the past show that the work done by the incumbent government helps the ruling party to get re-elected. However, most of these studies focus on re-election and do not look at the impact assessment of governance on trust in government, which is a precursor of re-election. To fill...