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April 28, 2024
 

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Gautaman Bhaskaran
For Gautaman Bhaskaran's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 9, 2001
Cultural 'cleansing' exposes outrageous methods of Taliban
NEW DELHI -- History is replete with cultural savagery.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 23, 2001
India's census will only confirm the obvious: the nation is overpopulated
The ongoing census in India, the sixth since its independence in 1947, is bound to unfold an ocean of data, perhaps bewildering to an outsider given the country's complex social and caste divisions.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 21, 2001
India's barbaric idea of school discipline
Corporal punishment has no place in a civilized society. Yet a recent High Court judgment in the southern Indian state of Kerala recently upheld the legitimacy of this method of punishing a child.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 9, 2001
Musharraf blows chance to end impasse
NEW DELHI -- For a while, it almost seemed that the recent Gujarat earthquake would help advance the peace process for Kashmir, when Pakistan's military ruler, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, not only sent relief goods to the victims but also telephoned the Indian prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, to convey Islamabad's condolences.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 4, 2001
Quake made worse by greed and ineptness
NEW DELHI -- The earthquake that devastated many parts of India's western state of Gujarat opened a Pandora's Box, out of which tumbled a shocking spectacle of ignorance and mismanagement driven by greed and callousness.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 12, 2001
India paying dearly for its bully image
NEW DELHI -- Although world attention is invariably riveted on India-Pakistan hostility, New Delhi's ties with its other neighbors have been uneasy in the best of times.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 29, 2000
Rare rumblings of dissent ruffle Dalai Lama's agenda
NEW DELHI -- Even as the Dalai Lama has softened his attitude toward China -- which annexed Tibet in 1950 and drove him to an Indian exile nine years later -- the spiritual leader of his people, who was honored with a Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, now finds himself facing dissent within his own community.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 8, 2000
Flood of goods from China an eye-opener for Indians
NEW DELHI -- China's invasion of India in 1962 was perhaps less of a humiliation for India than Beijing's latest attempt at capturing its market.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 1, 2000
Wooing rebels may calm Paradise Lost
NEW DELHI -- This year, there was an added significance in the sighting of the Ramadan moon, the new moon that marks the start of the holiest month on the Islamic calendar.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 24, 2000
To flourish, Sonia needs Indira's cunning
NEW DELHI -- Sonia Gandhi once hated politics, certainly the intrigues of Indian affairs.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 3, 2000
Furor over Hindu die-hards
NEW DELHI -- It may not be an exaggeration to say that India's Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS, or National Volunteers Corps) has a certain religious doggedness which is uncomfortably similar to the rabid Taliban in Afghanistan.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 20, 2000
Peace far away under fragile coalition
NEW DELHI -- Peace seems to be eluding Sri Lanka. The latest parliamentary elections there has caused disquiet and confusion after the electorate failed to give a clear mandate to either Chandrika Kumaratunga's People's Alliance (PA) or Ranil Wickremesinghe's United National Party (UNP).
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 29, 2000
Warmer ties do not signal U.S. tilt toward India
NEW DELHI -- It may be still too early to conclude that there is a definite American tilt toward India, but there are strong signs that Washington is fed up with Islamabad's obsession with Kashmir that has has forced Pakistan to throw logic and caution to the wind.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 1, 2000
Prospects bleak for Sharif, but may be bleaker still for Musharraf
NEW DELHI -- Pakistan's two most important political figures are facing bleak times.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 11, 2000
Time for Delhi to show trust in Kashmiris
NEW DELHI -- The Kashmir problem defies solution. Three recent developments have even compounded the impasse.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 4, 2000
A faltering lama, and the boy who is Tibet's new hope
NEW DELHI -- Will the Tibet problem ever be solved? The last several months have seen sheer despondency among the people of the plateau. With little sign of China granting them even a small degree of autonomy, let alone freeing them from its decades-old subjugation, Tibetans are now beginning to have serious doubts about a political settlement.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 30, 2000
Radical Hindus wrecking India's tolerant secularism
NEW DELHI -- The new millennium has been terribly cruel to Christians in India. Fanatical Hindu organizations -- which are wings of the country's ruling party, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) -- have unleashed a reign of terror on the second-largest minority group after the Muslims. Murder and mayhem and desecration of churches are no longer confined to remote forests or nameless villages, where modern communication has not yet reached. They now occur in well populated and policed areas.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 16, 2000
Pakistan gains clear edge over India in race for nuclear prowess
NEW DELHI -- It seems sad rather than tragic that warring India and Pakistan have not learned lessons that history taught us after such pain and suffering. In the summer of 1998, India exploded nuclear bombs. Pakistan did the same within days to begin what is clearly a disturbing sign in the subcontinent: a destructive arms race.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 14, 2000
Sharif's fate sets stage for odd political realignments
NEW DELHI -- Pakistan's ousted prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, is now perhaps both happy and unhappy. Happy that his country's military dictator, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, has spared his life. Yet unhappy, because the 25-year imprisonment handed him -- for trying to prevent Musharraf's plane from landing in Pakistan on Oct. 12, among other charges -- can in many ways be worse than the noose.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 7, 2000
India still hurts from Nehru's blunders
NEW DELHI -- It seems absurd that almost 53 years after India became a free country that it should remain without recognized borders with its most powerful neighbor, China.
Town to block view of Mount Fuji in response to overtourism
The town government of Fujikawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, decided to set up a 2.5-meter-high screen to prevent tourists from taking pictures of Mount Fuji looming behind a convenience store.
In Japan, regional revitalization fails to halt population decline
Sakiyama elementary school in Tamba, Hyogo Prefecture, in March .Over the past decade, the government has directed efforts toward policies designed to give young people incentives to base themselves in rural areas.
Number of homeless in Japan hits record low
Homeless people sleep on the street in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward in August 2021.
Ukraine is far from doomed
When comparing Ukraine’s military situation in 2024 to Europe’s in 1941, Russia’s defeat seems entirely possible.
Japan wants you to spend more with ‘luxury tourism’
Performers play a traditional drum unique to Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the prefectural capital of Kanazawa on March 16 to mark the extension of the Hokuriku Shinkansen line to Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture.
Tokyo's Koto Ward by-election a race unlike any other
Natsumi Sakai, the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan’s candidate and one of four female candidates running in the by-election, touts her experience as a cancer survivor and midwife as having prepared her to tackle issues that women currently face.
Japan wants you to spend more with ‘luxury tourism’
Performers play a traditional drum unique to Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the prefectural capital of Kanazawa on March 16 to mark the extension of the Hokuriku Shinkansen line to Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture.
Casa del Cibo: A thriving jewel born from Tohoku’s harsh past
When chef Ryohei Ikemi moved to Hachinohe, Aomori Prefecture, and opened Casa del Cibo in 2011, it was the first proper Italian restaurant in the city.
Town to block view of Mount Fuji in response to overtourism
The town government of Fujikawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, decided to set up a 2.5-meter-high screen to prevent tourists from taking pictures of Mount Fuji looming behind a convenience store.

Podcast

From easily navigable train stations to the helpfulness of its municipal staff, Tokyo has earned high praise for its commitment to accessibility for disabled travelers.
[Rebroadcast] Japan is doing better on accessibility than you may think

Longform

Later this month, author Shogo Imamura will open Honmaru, a bookstore that allows other businesses to rent its shelves. It's part of a wave of ideas Japanese booksellers are trying to compete with online spaces.
The story isn't over for Japan's bookstores
By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Prize winner Maki Imoto catches light with glass
Prize winner Maki Imoto catches light with glass

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