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Thursday, December 11, 2025
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PastForward

PastForward is a deep research offering from ThePrint on issues from India’s modern history that continue to guide the present and determine the future. As William Faulkner famously said, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” Indians are now hungrier and curiouser to know what brought us to key issues of the day. 
For now, this is available immediately to all ThePrint readers. Very soon PastForward will be among the premium offerings that go behind a paywall, only available to subscribers.

India’s beef with tallow is older than Tirupati scandal. Jain Shudh Vanaspati shocked Hindus

+TFP Antara Baruah -
Beef panic reached Hindu kitchens in 1983. The upholders of purity, Jains, were accused of selling animal fat in 'shudh' ghee. Lok Sabha rocked. VP Singh was on the defensive.
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Gun-toting IAS trainee vs academy director. 1981 scandal shaped dissent in civil services

+TFP Vandana Menon -
In 1981, a drunk IAS probationer terrorised peers with a gun during a Himalayan trek. When Home Ministry didn’t act, academy head PS Appu quit in protest, setting off storm in Parliament.
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1800s Kolkata is key to Modi’s Act East policy. It needs imagination, not just bureaucracy

+TFP Praveen Swami -
A globalised India is a project of imagination. It must model itself after 19th century Kolkata, as it seeks to integrate with the economic powerhouses to its East.
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George Mallory’s Everest climb was no macho heroism—It was rooted in racism, war, tragedy

+TFP Praveen Swami -
In 1999, Mallory’s mummified body was retrieved from the ice, with signs of injuries suggesting he was killed in a fall. The body of his climbing partner Sandy Irvine was never found.
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The spy who sold out Subhas Chandra Bose—he worked with Britain, Germany, USSR, Japan, Italy

Praveen Swami -
The collapse of the Japanese in Burma and the death of Bose, brought the curtain down on Talwar’s incredible career—one that had seen him work for 3 Axis intelligence services & 2 Allied ones.
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This is why Nehru-Liaquat Pact failed. Its ghost haunted Indian politics for decades

+TFP Apoorva Mandhani -
It was either war or exchange of population—and Nehru wanted neither. So he devised a third option.
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Indian politicians hit the jackpot with 1957 TISCO case. It set the tone for political funding

+TFP Apoorva Mandhani -
Electoral bonds have done what past innovations in party funding couldn’t — they have sprung the issue of party funding onto the national stage.
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Rabinder Singh spy scandal exposed R&AW’s ugly sides. But India hasn’t learned from its mistakes

+TFP Praveen Swami -
Vishal Bhardwaj's Khufiya touches on the penetration of R&AW. The reel-world denouement, though, was quite different from the real-world ending.
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1967 was the year politics changed. Modi wants to go back to the simpler times before that

Vandana Menon -
Apart from One Nation, One Election, there is a strong similarity between 1967 and 2023—a dominant party at the helm, and a politics that’s bringing oddballs of opposition together.
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Duties, duties, duties. Modi is going back to the Indira Gandhi Emergency era

+TFP Vandana Menon -
Speaking in the Old Parliament for the last time, PM Modi said the Central Hall of Parliament inspires us to fulfil our duties. Earlier, he had changed Amrit Kaal to Kartavya Kaal.
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On Camera

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Opinion

India’s long war with Maoists has a huge void — no number of dead bodies can fill it

+TFP Praveen Swami -
Weak governance, corruption and poverty continue to define tribal life in India. The introduction of industrial and mining projects has benefited contractors, politicians and officials more than Adivasis.

Kashmir tourist’s smog-fog confusion is natural. We’ve forgotten what clean air looks like

What a deep dive taught me about discipline and teamwork in Indian Navy: Lt Cdr Hardeep Singh

Economy

Niti Aayog CEO has a message for power stakeholders. Buckle up for surge to feed EVs, data centres

Udit Bubna -
Clean energy is “no longer the sideshow, it is the show”, BVR Subrahmanyam told the Odisha summit, warning India to lead the global shift or risk others’ tech dominance.

Defence

Dubai Tejas crash revives focus on advanced, fully automated safety systems

Tejas Bhatotia -
Dubai airshow crash & pilot death have rekindled concerns over pilot safety, and need for smarter automated systems that can step in when G-forces, temporary loss of consciousness hit the pilot.

National Interest

Asim Munir & Pakistan’s Failed Marshal Doctrine

Shekhar Gupta -
None of Pakistan’s PMs has lasted 5 years. That the current PM has given Asim Munir 5 years shows that of all military dictatorships history has seen, Pakistan’s is most creative.

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