Best of Times, Worst of Times....

‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...It was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair’. These immortal lines from Charles Dickens capture the zeitgeist of our times. In this issue, we have striven to make sense of this zeitgeist for our readers. Last time, we made sense of Trump’s rise; little did we know that in this issue we would be analyzing another unforeseeable result - BJP’s earth shattering mandate in Uttar Pradesh (U.P.) and Yogi Adityanath’s appointment as the Chief Minister (C.M.) of U.P. The gravity of Yogi’s appointment couldn’t be understated. It is a seminal moment in Indian politics, reverberations of which are being felt across the political landscape. Further, the blowback from last year’s Kanhaiya episode in JNU hasn’t lost fire; the protests at Ramjas College against an invitation to Umar Khalid brought to the fore issues that still remain unresolved. Needless to say, the Hindutva brand of politics is here to stay. After all, people have spoken and in people’s voice there is God’s voice. Can God be wrong? As Trump’s promise of bringing jobs back gathers steam, he has set the ball rolling to crackdown on the current system of H-1B visas. Needless to say, Indians would be greatly affected by this. But then again, there is no surprise as Trump ran his campaign with a very protectionist bent.Indians working in the U.S., on an H-1B visa, are a significant source of remittances; a protectionist H-1B regime not only would have an adverse effect on the forex reserves of India, but also deplete the bottom line of companies who employ relatively cheap high skilled Indian labor. Our cover story explains the emerging power structures in cyberspace. Given the alleged Russian interference in the U.S. presidential elections in favor of a particular candidate, it has become more important than ever to understand the nuances of cyber power, as it becomes a powerful tool used by nation states to further their objectives. These are indeed interesting times, from the rise of the right to the new weapons of state influence. These will be years that would test the post World War II consensus on multiculturalism, free trade, and democracy. Let’s hope something worthwhile comes out from this churn.