Scroll Ideas
By Shoaib Daniyal
We’ll chew it up, break it down and explore it from every angle possible.
Scroll IdeasJul 12, 2022
What Congress manifesto actually says about 'wealth redistribution'
Usually, manifestos exist on the sidelines of Indian politics – they are barely even read.
But for this election, the Congress manifesto is creating waves for its programme of social and economic equity. Prime Minister Modi has accused the Congress of wanting to "redistribute" the wealth of Hindus to Muslim – a point that fact checkers have said is false.
The Congress has also been criticised by many for being too aggressively "socialist" and attacking private property.
To explain and unpack what the Congress says about equity and redistribution, for Scroll Ideas, Shoaib Daniyal talks to Praveen Chakravarty, a key member of the party's manifesto committee.
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
Producer: Rahat Touhid
How Hindutva ecosystem spreads viral conspiracy theories
Tales of love jihad, Muslim appeasement, population growth and forced conversions are made up – yet are incredibly popular throughout India. Social media, journalists and even the prime minister have spread them.
In their new book "Love Jihad and Other Fictions", authors Sreenivasan Jain, Mariyam Alavi and Supriya Sharma apply the rules of journalism to bust some of the most damaging falsehoods.
On Scroll Ideas, Shoaib Daniyal speaks to Jain and Alavi to unpack the danger this poses to Indian democracy.
Producer: Karnika Kohli and Avinash Kumar
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
How secure is India's election process? [Hindi]
On this episode of Scroll Ideas, we discuss the vulnerabilities of the election process in India with Kannan Gopinathan.
Kannan Gopinathan was a member of the IAS between 2012 and 2019 and is now an activist. He has earlier studied and worked as an electronics engineer with a background in Very Large-Scale Integration design of integrated circuits.
Further reading: https://www.theindiaforum.in/article/...https://www.thehinducentre.com/the-ar... Host: Shoaib Daniyal Producer: Karnika Kohli
Decoding internet culture in India with Anurag Minus Verma
Anurag is a writer, filmmaker, satirist and the host of the Anurag Minus Verma Podcast.
As a content creator, Anurag has a ringside view of the internet in India.
He has also written and thought deeply about what this medium means for Indian culture and politics.
And he shares all of that on this episode of Scroll Ideas.
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
What is it like being a Muslim in India today?
With 200 million Muslims, India has the third largest population of Muslims of any country on the planet. For nearly a millennium now, Muslims have been a part of India’s mainstream, contributing to its art, culture, politics and economy.
However, of late, many Muslims feel a sense of alienation – even of siege – as a new majoritarianism grips India.
In this new book, “Being Muslim in Hindu India”, veteran journalist and commentator, Ziya Us Salam details instances of Muslim marginalisation in India.
Scroll Ideas speaks to Salam, currently an Associate Editor with the Hindu in Delhi, to understand how things got to such a stage and what young Muslims should do to navigate the current circumstances.
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
Producer: Avinash Kumar
Title: Why have Indian liberals failed to build a powerful political party (and can the Congress be that)?
This week on Scroll Ideas we have with us Ruchi Gupta. Ruchi is a former joint secretary of the Congress and national in-charge of its student wing.
She is also a columnist and a deep thinker on the nuts and bolts of Indian politics.
In this 70-minute episode we discuss why politics is so important for any country, why liberals have failed to make a mass impact and what ails the Congress.
In case you want to read more of her, her substack: https://rgupta.substack.com/
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
Producer: Avinash Kumar
What does Hindutva popular culture look like?
Hindutva is India's most powerful and popular political ideology. Yet, there seems to be little study of how it works on the ground.
Kunal Purohit's new book "H-Pop: The Secretive World of Hindutva Pop Stars" fills that gap by looking at the popular culture of Hindu nationalism.
We talk to Kunal to explore his research and understand how Hindutva became as widespread as it did.
This is a special episode of "Scroll Ideas" recorded in The Bookshop in Delhi in front of a live audience.
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
Producer: Karnika Kohli
Assistant Producer: Avinash Kumar
Why Palestine wants India to be a mediator in the Gaza conflict
Forty one days into Israel’s attack on the Gaza Strip has seen the Israeli Defence Forces inflict immense damage on Palestinian civilians. The death toll now stands at 14,000, meaning a staggering 1 out of 200 people in Gaza are now dead.
For Scroll Ideas, Shoaib Daniyal spoke to the Palestinian ambassador to India, Adnan Abu Alhaijaa, at the Palestinian Embassy in Delhi to understand the scale of the destruction as well as the part he wanted India to play.
The ambassador highlighted India’s historic role as a friend of Palestine. He also urged the Indian government to be a mediator between Israel and Palestine and put pressure on the Israeli government to declare a ceasefire.
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
Producer: Avinash Kumar
How the BJP 'pappufied' Rahul Gandhi
On this episode of Scroll Ideas, we are joined by journalist and author, Sugata Srinivasaraju, to discuss his latest book "Strange Burdens, The Politics and Predicaments of Rahul Gandhi".
We unpack the persona and politics of Rahul Gandhi and ask: can the Congress leader take on Modi?
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
Producer: Karnika Kohli
How do we fix the Supreme Court of India?
It is a truth almost universally acknowledged that India's Supreme Court is in crisis. Immense backlogs plague the apex court, approaching it is too expensive for most Indians, judge appointments are shrouded in controversy and even something as simple as which judge hears which cases has been the subject of intense and often ugly debate.
While anecdotal fixes to the problem are almost as numerous as the problems, for maybe the first time, a new book "Court on Trial" by Aparna Chandra, Sital Kalantry and William Hubbard trawls through large amounts of data to present policy solutions to the court's issues.
On this episode of Scroll Ideas, Aparna and Willian join us to discuss their book.
Host: Shoaib Daniyal
Producer: Karnika Kohli
Can a Muslim or Christian be a Dalit?
On Scroll Ideas, we’ll take an idea, chew it up, break it down and explore it from every angle possible. It could be anything: #politics, #history, #finance, #art, #food, #drink. This week we have Khalid Anis Ansari, a sociologist and public intellectual whose work has engaged deeply with the idea of #caste among Indian #Muslims. We explore a heated #debate that is ongoing at the moment: Can Muslims and #Christians also be Dalits?
Or does conversion to these so-called egalitarian faiths wipe away caste backwardness?
Why has India's powerful judiciary failed to check Modi?
Since 2014, multiple experts have identified that Indian democracy is backsliding. Examples include the clampdown on Jammu and Kashmir, arrest of journalists and activists as well as the attack on the Opposition using draconian instruments such as the Enforcement Directorate.
The one obvious institution that could have checked this slide are the courts. However, in spite of often being called the most powerful judiciary in the world, India's courts have done no such thing.
On episode #7 of Scroll Ideas, we are joined by legal scholar Anuj Bhuwania who has studied the post-independence history of India's higher judiciary. He argues that it was, in many ways, naive to expect the judiciary to act as a check on the executive given their post Emergency history as a populist organ.
Writer and host: Shoaib Daniyal
Producer: Karnika Kohli
Graphics designer: Shruti Rego, Rubin D’Souza
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Is the BJP now a backward caste 'bahujan' party?
On the sixth episode of Scroll Ideas, we are joined by political scientist, journalist and writer Nalin Mehta to talk about his latest book "The New BJP".
How did the saffron party become the central pole of Indian politics?
Why are so many backward castes and Dalits voting for the BJP?
And is state identity the party's kryptonite?
The BJP is the central pole of Indian politics and will probably be so at least till the near future. Understanding how it works is key – and for that we have this deep-dive podcast.
Writer and host: Shoaib Daniyal | Producer: Karnika Kohli | Graphics design: Shruti Rego, Rubin D’Souza
What the Chinese really think about India
On episode #5 of Scroll Ideas, we are joined by India's former Foreign Secretary and China expert, Shyam Saran to discuss how China sees India.
We talk about the Chinese perception of India, from ancient history right down to the Galwan clash of 2020.
Our chat covers Buddhism, Mao and even how the British used Indian troops to attack China in the colonial age.
Saran busts multiple myths about China, arguing that the country was not central to the world or even Asia, throughout history. In fact, India has a better claim to those achievements.
Writer and host: Shoaib Daniyal | Producer: Karnika Kohli | Graphics design: Shruti Rego, Rubin D’Souza
Is the Indian media broken?
In the fourth episode of #ScrollIdeas, we take a deep dive into the dysfunctional state of Indian media with Ruben Banerjee, former editor-in-chief of the Outlook Group.
Everyone seems to agree the Indian media is broken. TV news is now theatre. Print media rarely holds the government to account. And while everyone complains about it, subscribers seem reluctant to pay up for good journalism, incentivising media houses to curry favour with powerful politicians and industrialists.
Writer and host: Shoaib Daniyal | Producer: Karnika Kohli | Graphics designer: Shruti Rego, Rubin D'Souza
What really is Indian food?
On the third episode of Scroll Ideas, Shoaib Daniyal talks to author Krish Ashok on what exactly is Indian food.
Why does it have so many masalas?
Why are Indians so dramatic about veg and "non-veg"?
And which is the best cuisine in India?
[Link to paper mentioned in episode:https://www.researchgate.net/publication/275974858_Analysis_of_Food_Pairing_in_Regional_Cuisines_of_India]
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Writer and host: Shoaib Daniyal | Producer: Karnika Kohli | Art design: Shruti Rego, Rubin D’Souza
Why did Nehru choose centralised planning over the free market?
On Episode #2 of #ScrollIdeas, Shoaib Daniyal talks to historian Nikhil Menon on the history of central planning in India.
Why was Nehru so taken up by planning, was the Planning Commission unconstitutional and what did the tension between democracy and technocracy look like at the time?
Writer and host: Shoaib Daniyal | Producer: Karnika Kohli | Art design: Shruti Rego, Rubin D'Souza
Has South India been ignored in Indian History?
On the very first episode of Scroll Ideas, Shoaib Daniyal talks to author and historian Anirudh Kanisetti.
Kanisetti's new book Lords of the Deccan is a fascinating look at the history of early medieval South India. He charts the rise of the Chalukyas, the South's first empire and ends with the incredible powerhouse that the Cholas from Tamilakam were.
In this discussion, Shoaib and Anirudh discuss why elephants were weapons of mass destruction in medieval Deccani warfare, what happened to the Jains of South India and why India's incredible diversity in history is ignored for a one-size-fits all, Delhi-centric approach.
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Writer and host: Shoaib Daniyal | Producer: Karnika Kohli | Art design: Shruti Rego, Rubin D'Souza