A core feature of the ‘Telangana model’ of social development that goes beyond electoral representation is a direct synergy between civil society and social activism that has the potential to influence public opinion and electoral outcomes.

After the formation of the state in 2014, the KCR government rightly focused on welfare. But recently, it is suffering because of alleged misgovernance and the perceived arrogance of KCR.

Those who supported the messaging of 'appeasement' of the minorities did not hate them to the extent of making them politically invisible.

He transcended the political through aesthetics and politicised the symbolic. For a generation, he symbolised the spirit and politics of revolutionary change, primarily in Telangana, but his songs travelled well beyond.

Neither economically weak caste Hindus nor upwardly mobile Dalit-Bahujans represent the majority of their respective communities. Yet both wish to speak for their social segments.

Democracy needs ethics. People could make such a choice in 1977 after the period of the Emergency. It was an ethical choice to oust Indira Gandhi. It is a similar choice people are being asked to make but in a vastly different historical context that is far more pragmatic.

The next round of the Bharat Jodo Yatra that the Congress is planning needs to go beyond the message of compassion. Compassion without assurance of welfare will look both as a privilege and indifference.

Democracies were earlier linked to cosmopolitan globalism, but today they are being propelled by civilisational imagination.

While silence on communal matters may help opposition parties avoid immediate polarisation in favour of electoral dividends, it runs the risk of making them look redundant and irrelevant.

The recent national executive meeting of the BJP held in Hyderabad has indicated that it is recalibrating its strategy from its sole reliance on Hindu-Muslim polarisation, in line with changing social dynamics in Telangana.

The recent assembly elections have once again brought to the fore how much the BJP has changed the political landscape, and why no longer anachronistic beliefs about Indian politics work. 

Each grouping is trying to borrow something from the other to add to its own successful formula.

The BJP's "Machiavellian" strategies will continue to work as long as Dalit-Bahujan politics ignores the need for an economic programme.

The rise of IPS officer Praveen Kumar in Telangana to bring about Dalit unity is fraught with contradictions.

The rise of IPS officer Praveen Kumar in Telangana to bring about Dalit unity is fraught with contradictions.

The RSS does acknowledge diversity, but wants to create a hierarchical order.

Given that all those who endorsed majoritarianism and believed in the 'supreme leader' are also at the receiving end now, they do not know who to blame, except to hallucinate that things are either not that bad or will get better soon.

With an indifferent regime and media blacking out protests, farmers need to recalibrate their strategy to bring together a diverse set of groups across various sectors and regions to challenge the BJP.

One is unsure where and by whom a conspiracy is being hatched. Under these conditions, to trust is to be foolish and to think of a possible conspiracy lurking is the more prudent thing to do.

The BJP's tactics of painting the farmers as Khalistanis has failed. If anti-CAA protests are to resume after the pandemic, lessons need to be learnt from the movement against the farm laws.