Seminar Abstract:

This seminar will focus on the management of intelligence, which is crucial for the maintenance of law and order and one of the main responsibilities of the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in India. Management of intelligence – precise and reliable information of value to political, military or civil decisions – is a comprehensive term that includes the collection, processing and implementation of intelligence. The seminar will touch upon the following questions: Why does intelligence matter? Who collects intelligence in India? How does intelligence make its way into policy and why does this occasionally fail? The speaker will compare the contemporary, colonial and pre-modern forms of intelligence gathering, processing and implementation in India. He will also discuss what holds India together, despite intelligence lapses and lacunae in intelligence management, and whether there exists a serious and urgent need for reform.

About the Speaker:

Subrata K. Mitra, Ph.D. (Rochester) is Director, Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), and Visiting Research Professor, NUS, Singapore, and, Emeritus Professor Heidelberg University, in Germany. The dynamic interaction of culture and rationality has deeply influenced his research profile, which focuses on governance and administration, citizenship, hybridity and re-use, the evolution of the Indian state from classical to modern times, the transition to democracy and its consolidation, and security and foreign affairs of South Asia. He has published widely, with numerous books, journal articles and chapter contributions in each of these areas, contributing both to the theory of political science as well as comparative politics and South Asian area studies.  Culture and Rationality (Sage 1999), The Puzzle of India’s Governance (Routledge 2005), Re-use: the Art and Politics of Integration and Anxiety (Sage 2008), Politics in India (Routledge 2017), Kautilya’s Arthashastra: Classical Roots of Modern Politics in India (jointly authored with Michael Liebig, published by Nomos 2016, and Rupa, 2017) represent different facets of his oeuvre.