Firstpost Editor's Picks: Mamata Banerjee's brazenness, ghost villages of Uttarakhand, Nandini Krishnan row; today's must-read stories

The constitution is in danger not because of CBI, but due to the brazenness of Mamata Banerjee and her cronies Switching loyalty is a very delicate and complex affair. Kolkata Police commissioner Rajeev Kumar could deceive himself that he is serving the Constitution, but things won’t be the same after a change of government either at the Centre or state. Kumar perhaps momentarily felt empowered as the chief minister not only drove to his residence during Sunday’s chaos, but also offered protection by launching a scathing attack against the Central government. It is certain that when Kumar joined the IPS cadre in 1989, he must have taken an oath of allegiance to the Constitution of India and not to Mamata. In his zest or nervousness, Kumar, it appears has shifted his loyalty to the chief minister. Plea for Sanskrit prayers at Kendriya Vidyalayas begs for honest judicial, political examination of nature of Indian secularism What the writ petition filed by advocate Veenayak Shah possibly calls for is an honest judicial and political examination of what is the nature of the Indian secularism. For one end of the political spectrum, it is a hateful word preventing, as they see it, the natural order of things: Hindu supremacy. For the other, it is a word that harks back to a certain Nehruvian aloofness from religion and embrace of atheism. At a time when the forces of Hindu supremacy are clearly on the ascendant, the constitutional position of secularism needs to be clearly and forcefully articulated. This is not just a matter of semantics or linguistic explanation - it is an articulation of what kind of India we want to live in. Migration in Uttarakhand: In need of better healthcare, other basic facilities, villagers abandon Baluni for urban centres According to a Migration Commission report, 734 revenue villages of Uttarakhand have no residents, putting a serious question mark on the relevance of the hilly state carved out of Uttar Pradesh. Baluni, around 160 kilometers from state capital Dehradun, is one such village on the list. “There were more than 15 to 20 families in the village about 10 years ago. But all of them shifted to urban areas one by one due to the lack of opportunities to earn a livelihood and public amenities, such as education and healthcare facilities,” says Shyam Prasad, the last inhabitant of the village of the Sainar Gram Panchayat, who recently moved out in to get better medical aid. Premier League: Sergio Aguero's adaptability and seemingly limitless bag of tricks make the Argentine impossible to replace Is he a fox or a grasshopper? Before Sergio Aguero turned into a silver fox, he was called the grasshopper in his younger days. The dyed hair may have triggered a decisive shift to his new name but Aguero has been a fox in the box for years. Yet, the Argentine striker still retains the slow-moving menace of a grasshopper. His game is arguably incomplete without either characterisation – Aguero remains the most accomplished finisher in the Premier League because he gradually positions himself in the right place and pounces on opportunities in a flash. This gift was exhibited once again on Sunday as he put Arsenal to the sword, reminding us why he is one of the very few fixture-proof footballers. Nandini Krishnan, Penguin Random House committed serious breach of trust, ethical lapses in publishing book on us, charge trans men At least 22 trans men featured in Nandini Krishnan’s recently released book, Invisible Men: Inside India’s Transmasculine Network, have accused the author of committing serious ethical transgressions and breach of trust in her portrayal of these individuals in particular, and the community in general. Their charges include the author’s use of conversations that were off the record, her failure to provide them with a translated version of their interviews in the language in which those exchanges took place – many of the trans men that appear in the book have little or no command over English; some of them are only lettered in their native tongue – that they have been misgendered, and referred to by dead-names despite their express instructions against such labelling, and that email communication with one of them has been tampered with to suit the author’s purpose.