By Sidharth Mishra

The bitter criticism of the film ‘Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl’ by the establishment and a section of the retired members of the top brass of the Indian Air Force (IAF) has left several admirers of the force asking what was the complaint about. This writer for one didn’t find anything in the film which could qualify for gratuitous depiction of either the IAF or its male officers.

By Sidharth Mishra

The other day somebody shared a video link of an old television debate where I featured. Then came the query, why aren’t you debating on television these days? I replied that since I am out of sync with the style of the debate which is in vogue now, I opt out of the few offers that come my way especially when they need a dozen people peeping out of the windows on the screen.

By Sidharth Mishra

Soon after India won the inaugural T20 World Cup in 2007, a hoarding went up outside Ranchi airport. It said, ‘welcome to the city of world cup winning captain’. Mahendra Singh Dhoni belongs to Ranchi, a city that was not known as a cricketing destination till this boy with long golden locks from the HEC Colony broke onto the national scene. His locks and helicopter shots mesmerised no less than Pakistan’s martial law administrator Parvez Musharraf, who once famously said that he would not ‘cede even an inch’ to make India happy.

Musharraf’s appreciation of Dhoni, however, left millions living east of the Wagah border proud. By December 30, 2014 when Mahendra Singh Dhoni decided to retire from test cricket, Ranchi had become a cricketing pilgrimage, next only to the vintage Eden Gardens of Kolkata in East Zone. He used his resources and network to get the better of no less than Tatas, who controlled cricket in undivided Bihar and then Jharkhand from their industrial capital at Jamshedpur. The Jharkhand Cricket Association has now named the Southern stand of the stadium at Ranchi as MS Dhoni Stand.

By Sidharth Mishra

Former Union Minister Shatrughan Sinha and late film actor Sushant Singh Rajput worked in the same Mumbai film industry and also came from the same state of Bihar. The similarity ends here. While Sinha has had a very long innings and has closely identified with his roots winning the title of ‘Bihari Babu’, Rajput’s career pales in comparison. Actually, till his suicide made headlines, not very many would have known that the talented actor came from Bihar.

By Sidharth Mishra

In the midst of the crisis caused by Coronavirus swamping the national Capital, an emerging human tragedy which has failed to find focus is the state of the 12 Delhi University college, which are funded by the Delhi government. There has been no disbursement of salary for the teachers and non-teaching staff of these colleges since the month of April this year.

These colleges are – Shaheed Sukhdev College of Business Studies, Bhim Rao Ambedkar College, Mahrishi Valmiki B.Ed College, Maharaja Agrasen College, Shaheed Rajguru Women’s College, Deen Dayal Upadhyay College, Indira Gandhi College of Physical Education, Bhaskaracharya College, Acharya Narendra Dev Women’s College, Keshav Mahavidyalay, Bhagini Nivedita Women’s College and Aditi Women’s Mahavidyalaya.

In addition to the salary, there has been no encashment of the medical bills, pension bills and retirement benefits. The situation has arisen following the Delhi government going almost bankrupt in the midst of the Corona crisis. There are also reports of doctors working in Delhi government-run hospitals not being paid their salary.

By Sidharth Mishra

The spread of Covid-19 pandemic in India in the past three months has been variously described and compared. The most cited comparison has been the spread of Spanish Flu in 1918. It has been looked at largely from the lens of being a health issue. In doing so we miss a very pertinent point that the spread of pandemic in 1918 was in an India which was a colony and the counter led by a government which was colonial, not accountable to the dying masses.

Fast forward to 2020, we have elected governments at all the three levels – grassroots (panchayats/municipal bodies), states and the Centre. The model so far has been that the Centre has limited its role to being a nodal agency as far as prevention and containment at Ground Zero goes. It has allowed the state governments to variously draw their roadmaps suitable for implementation at the district level.

By LT GEN NS BRAR (RETD)

Listen in the north, my boys, 
there’s trouble in the wind;
Tramp o’ Cossack hooves in front, 
                  grey great coats behind.
                  Trouble on the Frontier of a most amazin’ kind ..
                  —Rudyard Kipling, Mutiny of the Mavericks

By Sidharth Mishra

The loss of the Bharatiya Janata Party at the hands of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the Delhi Assembly elections held in February this year, made two very clear conclusions – one that BJP Delhi unit president Manoj Tiwari failed to enthuse the substantial migrant voters and also that the saffron party lost it traditional Vaishya (Baniya) vote to the rival party.