FD Correspondent

Politics is not the same as ideology. Politics operates by managing or exploiting ideological fantasies. We see politics through the lens of ideology. So, ideology is omnipresent, like time, like ether. There is nothing outside ideology. Being apolitical or seeing the world objectively also amounts to being ideological.

The centenaries of the organised Indian Left and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh are not parallel anniversaries. They mark the point at which one idea of India was defeated, and another became dominant. Modern India is not a compromise between these traditions. It is the outcome of their conflict.

The Epstein files—flight logs, photographs, depositions, calendars, settlements—do not merely document a sex-trafficking network. They map a system of elite impunity, sustained by familiarity, money, and institutional deference.