Tavleen Singh
Tavleen Singh, a leading Columnist associated with The Indian Express. Find all Columns from Tavleen Singh here.
Articles By Tavleen Singh
Fifth Column: Rafale was reckless campaign, Congress has to focus on chinks in Modi’s armour
Nehru’s economic policies may have taken us down the wrong road but it says something for him that not even ‘rightist’ Mr Modi has been able to step away from the socialist road. What he has stepped away from is Nehru’s political legacy, which was his deep commitment to the fundamental principles of democracy.
Fifth Column: An adda with the Finance Minister
I wanted to ask Nirmala Sitharaman if she was ashamed that in a country of more than a billion people there were only 5,000 super-rich Indians.
Sending my son Aatish Taseer to exile is not just wrong but evil
I have to say that I am truly horrified that this was done without my even being given a hearing. Of course, as the BJP’s Twitter trolls tell me gleefully, I could go to court.
Fifth column: Losing the Kashmir narrative to Modi government’s childish kind of triumphalism
India has compelling reasons for the abrogation of Article 370. But, so far, they have been put before the world so badly that it is Pakistan that has taken control of the narrative.
Fifth column: Menacing hyper-nationalism defined BJP’s election campaigns and voters rejected it
The BJP may well form governments again in both these states but the truth is that in this seeming victory lies hidden a warning that Narendra Modi would do well to heed.
Wealth creators must never be forced to live at the mercy of looters
Wealth creators must never be forced to live at the mercy of looters. This is something that happens only in bad countries.
Mr Bhagwat, your belief that talk of lynchings is just an attempt to defame India is wrong
Lynching has a specific context. It does not mean a riot, it does not mean any old act of public violence, it means a public hanging or stoning to death by a mob. It means punishing someone in such a manner that others will see it as a warning and a lesson.
PM needs to reassure Muslims that bile spewed against them does not reflect what he feels
It could be time for the Prime Minister to speak up. He took too long in his first term to condemn the lynchings, so by then it was not just Muslims who were being targeted but Dalits as well.
Why TV coverage of Howdy Modi tour has made me more than slightly ashamed
Ironically it is Narendra Modi who has always had a difficult relationship with the media from his days as chief minister, so when he became prime minister he stopped the practice of taking journalists with him on Air India One. It turns out he did not need to.
Fifth column: Sanitation is a human right
It is because we in India did not want to talk about it that until the Swachh Bharat campaign Indians continued to ‘defecate everywhere’.
Fifth Column: Remember 9/11 and why it happened
Kashmir may once have been a problem between Hindus and Muslims, but for many years now the real problem has been the spread in the Valley of jihadist Islam.
Surprised to find how important Hindutva could be in modern India
Having grown up believing that Hindutva was a dangerous, divisive ideology, I find myself surprised at how important an idea it could be for our times.
Kashmir problem is likely to become a bigger headache for Delhi than it was before
Pakistan has been morbidly fixated on Kashmir since 1947. Children are taught in schools that Kashmir is the ‘unfinished business’ of Partition and that Pakistan will not be whole till it is taken away from India. Several unsuccessful attempts have been made to do this.
It is hard to feel sympathy for Chidambaram because as Home Minister he never tried curbing powers of agencies
It is hard to feel sympathy for political leaders when they become victims of the system they have created.
Nothing scares Pakistanis more than the possibility that India could succeed and Pakistan fail
The core problem is that if India becomes a mighty economic superpower and Pakistan remains a bankrupt nuclear power, then the whole exercise of breaking India to make a nation for the ‘pure’ could become meaningless.
Manner of 370 abrogation was wrong, but if it brings back Kashmir’s magic, it will be worthwhile
To use a sledgehammer to abrogate Article 370 was unwise and risky. But, if it can bring back the magic that Kashmir once had long, long ago, then the risk will be worthwhile.
Now, win the peace
In Kashmir, there is a weariness with the old. If the new is rung in, Article 370 could become a fading memory
Fifth column: Modi’s aura shrinks and nothing is working well for the PM
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will find it hard to continue lecturing India about values and morality in his Mann ki Baat if he is seen to be sheltering rapists and other criminals in his fold.
With Budget 2019, the signal that FM Sitharaman sends is that rich Indians deserve to be penalised
When the Finance Minister says proudly that high taxes will affect less than 5,000 rich Indians, the signal she sends is that rich Indians deserve to be penalised.
RSS cannot be described as India’s deep state
Since the election results, the new ‘secular’ myth that is carefully and deliberately being created is that Narendra Modi is a pawn of the RSS. And, that it is the RSS that is the real ‘deep state’. It is unfortunate that even Rahul Gandhi seems to believe this.