Namita Bhandare

Compared to the geeky earnestness of her brother, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra is a star. Her belated entry will not stop a likely UPA defeat, but you have to credit her with putting up a fight, writes Namita Bhandare. Priyanka-Gandhi-Vadra-waves-during-her-public-meeting-for-giving-final-touch-to-Sonia-Gandhi-poll-campaign-in-Raebareli-HT-photo-Deepak-Gupta If the Congress campaign suddenly seems to have shifted to a more combative mode, it has […]

A slap on Arvind Kejriwal’s face or Narendra Modi’s admission of his marriage to Jashodaben attracts more attention than real issues. Has any other poll been so dominated by personalities, asks Namita Bhandare. The BJP candidate standing from my constituency has multiple criminal charges against him but my affable neighbour at the polling booth where

A slim optimism lies in the start to a conversation of a changed India, an India where women outnumbered men as voters in all five of the recently held assembly elections. HT Image A slim optimism lies in the start to a conversation of a changed India, an India where women outnumbered men as voters

With very few exceptions, politics no longer attracts the brightest and the cleanest. In an environment where we assume sab neta chor hain we opt for the least unattractive. HT Image The names have begun trickling in and speculation is rife. The BJP has announced that former Karnataka chief minister BS Yeddyurappa, forced to step

Paid news undermines democracy. Yet, as a sting operation goes public, why aren’t we more concerned? HT Image You didn’t need a survey to predict the reactions. As TV channel News Express broadcast a sting operation that showed as many as 11 polling agencies willing to tweak results for a price, the reactions by political

We attack students because they look a certain way, we hound out Africans from neighbourhoods because ‘they are not like us’, we tie up books in lengthy litigation because we find their ideas unpalatable. This has become our national sport. Namita Bhandare writes. The debris of intolerance is all around us. Not protests nor black

AAP’s failure would be a severe setback to any future would-be reformer. And any success of its increasingly visible vigilante-style politics will send absolutely the wrong signal of a ‘success formula’ to rival parties. Namita Bhandare writes. In Birbhum West Bengal, a village decides that the girl must be gang-raped as ‘punishment’ for falling in

Men say they are scared by this new environment. Far too many women have lived in fear of the old environment. It’s time to pack the dinosaurs off to the museum, writes Namita Bhandare. I hear a great lament these days. Aggressive women are killing romance in the workplace with their flurry of complaints (young

Political parties are slowly realising that women constitute the largest vote-bank and they need to at least look concerned. But, dressed-up manifestos and sops like saris and pressure cookers won’t cut it any longer. Namita Bhandare writes. HT Image I am a woman. When I vote, I do not cast my ballot because my husband

The SP deserves to lose. That’s a small compensation for those who live under open skies in the Muzaffarnagar riot relief camps, scrambling to rebuild what is left of their lives. Namita Bhandare writes. ‘Live communities don’t wait for five years.’ Akhilesh Yadav might want to heed these words attributed to his party’s mentor, Ram

Apart from expressions of disapproval in meetings, Modi has been silent and it’s not clear whether he is upset that his development agenda is being hijacked, lacks the clout to shake off the RSS or is playing the good cop/bad cop where he will make the right noises about governance, leaving the Hindutva brigade free

Sexual harassment is an abuse of power, a betrayal of trust and one of India’s worst-kept secrets. But one thing has changed, and it is the refusal of an increasing number of women to remain silent, writes Namita Bhandare. You could say it’s just another week in the life of working women in India. A