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Vinod Mishra:
Selected Writings
Thirty Years of Naxalbari
 
 

 

October 2005

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Editorial

Appeal

Commentary

Feature

Fact Finding

Article

Activities

Labour

Reports

International

Obituary

 
 
  Editorial
 

Delhi-Washington, Delhi-Patna-Kolkata: The Congress Flights of 'Strategic Partnership'

Manmohan Singh's recent weeklong visit to France and the US once again underscored the growing militarisation and Americanisation of India's foreign policy. India already has a strategic partnership with France , and Singh's visit to France sought to expand the ties with greater purchases of weaponry from France ....Full text

  Appeal

Let us Stand by the Fighting People of Bihar in the Ensuing Elections to the State Assembly

Bihar is going to the polls again. Successive previous governments, both central as well as state, have treated the state and its people with such utter contempt and systematic neglect that the rulers are now finding it increasingly difficult to manufacture a majority. The rulers in Delhi and Patna have condemned the state to acute economic backwardness ....Full text

  Commentary
 

Bihar Polls: Towards a Powerful Left Assertion

As we go to press, the Supreme Court has cast a certain uncertainty on the Bihar polls. Following the earlier verdict of a hung assembly ... Full text

UTTAR PRADESH: Epidemics and their Implications

The dreaded Japanese encephalitis now has the whole of eastern UP in its grip. Thousands of children have fallen victim to it – most are dying, while survivors suffer severe retardation. Meanwhile, Mulayam Singh’s State Government was busy entertaining Bill Clinton in Lucknow and trumpeting the claims of having made Uttar Pradesh an ‘Uttam Pradesh’ – ‘ Ideal State ’! ....Full text

Reverse Reform in Buddha's Bengal

"The need of a constantly expanding market for its products", wrote Marx and Engels nearly 160 years ago, "chases the bourgeoisie over the whole surface of the globe. It must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connections everywhere." And cultivate their own people in the left parties everywhere....Full text

 
 
    Feature
 
 

World Bank And Water

International organisations like the World Bank and even the UN have been pushing hard for sweeping changes in the way the world uses water. In order to do so, they have concluded at high-level international meets, that water is a human need, not a universal human right. This distinction is not cosmetic, but is rather crucial. By arguing that water is a ‘need’, these bodies claim that the market should be given the right and responsibility to meet this need on a profit basis. Whereas if water were recognised as a right, the State would be deemed responsible for ensuring equal access to all on a non-profit basis. . Full text

The Blueprint for Water Privatisation in Delhi

The Chief minister of Delhi has been behaving like the CEO of a company implementing World Bank programmes. After power privatisation at the behest of World Bank, project 'water reforms' in Delhi is being carried out through a dismantling of water distribution by the Delhi Jal Board, a nodal agency of the government for water treatment and distribution in the city. If successful, the Congress government in alliance with World Bank would starve the poor of water. . Full text

.Environmental Devastation in Uttaranchal

For the past several months, Utaranchal has been witnessing a movement against the Hydro Electric Power Project at Joshimath – one of the 93 projects planned by the State Government to tap the State’s rivers for power. We carry an interview with Atul Sati, Convenor of the Citizens’ Struggle Committee of Joshimath town, on the implications of the Uttaranchal Government’s policies on the State’s environment and people.. . Full text

  Fact Finding
 

Gohana Atrocity

Caste Terror in Haryana

[A fact-finding team of the Forum for Democratic Initiatives* visited Gohana on 4th September 2005 to enquire into the gruesome torching of houses belonging to the Balmiki community on the day of 1st September 2005. The team met the victims and their relatives; local college lecturers and primary school teachers who were conducting a survey to assess the amount of loss; shopkeepers close to the site of the incident and other citizens of the town.] . . Full text

  Article
 

Indian Communists in Freedom Movement: Yesterday and Today

(Talk given by Arindam Sen at Bhilai on 7 August 05)

Yes friends, I do believe our struggle for independence is far from over. In what sense, I'll tell you towards the end of the discussion. For now, I'll dwell on the role of communists in our freedom movement up to 1947. Let us first confront and settle a couple of questions our adversaries often level against us. Were the first Indian communists Russian agents out to disrupt the national movement? And is communism an alien and imported ideology that never struck roots in the soil of Hindustan - and never will?

These questions bring us to an examination of the genesis of communism in India .. . . Full text

On the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act

- Srilata Swaminathan

The Domestic Violence Bill which had been pending before the Lok Sabha for many years has finally been passed this monsoon session. There have been a number of changes made to it and serious lacunae that existed at the time the NDA government drafted it have been suitably amended. Bill No. 116 of 2005 has now officially become The Protection of Women From Domestic Violence Act, 2005. While the UPA government has shown its total lack of political will and has been as impotent as the NDA in passing the 33% women's reservation bill they have been able to push through this - maybe as the lesser evil!. . . Full text

   

Activities

 

Students Protest Against Change of Criteria for IIT Entrance

The move by the Directors of the IITs, endorsed by the Union HRD Ministry, to upgrade the eligibility criteria for appearing in the IIT entrance exams met with widespread protests all over the country. Students held massive protests at the gates of the IITs in Delhi , Kanpur and other centers, and everywhere there faced police lathicharges.

AISA too organized protests at various centers in UP and Bihar....Full text

   

labour

 

Challenges Facing the Bank Employees' Movement

-Dipankar Bhattacharya

[This write-up was originally written for a souvenir of the Punjab National Bank Employees Association]

Bank employees constitute a key contingent of the modern Indian working class. Historically this contingent has played a major role in the movement for bank nationalization and in resisting the onslaught of neo-liberal reforms since the advent of the New Economic Policies in 1991. The fighting solidarity of bank workers and their comrades in the insurance industry has been significant in putting up a powerful resistance to the assaults of global capital on the strategic financial sector of the Indian economy. . . Full text

   

Reports

 

Jharkhand Bandh by CPI(ML)

Protesting against the cancellation of panchayat elections and demanding that they be held immediately, CPI(ML) called for a Jharkhand bandh on Sept. 7. The militant assertion of the protesters and the masses made this call a success. Through this bandh the Party registered a strong protest against the Munda govt., especially its anti-tribal policies, and conspiratorial designs for fomenting communal tension between tribal and non-tribal people in the state....Full text

Chilika Fisherfolk Block the Chilika Bill

Do or die – that was the slogan of the Chilika traditional fisherfolk while marching for the State Assembly gherao on August 9, 2005 , to save their fishing rights over the Chilika lake. They were more than ten thousand in number. Their mood was militant. Their main demand was the withdrawal of the anti-fisherfolk ‘Black Chilika Bill’ which was going to be introduced in the Orissa State Assembly on that day. The Bill was not being introduced for the first time....Full text

   

International

 


Hurricane Katrina: A Natural Disaster or a Disaster that is the Capitalist State

Hurricane Katrina struck USA 's Gulf coast on August 29 flooding and decimating houses and destroying infrastructure in the states of Louisiana , Mississippi and Alabama. The city of New Orleans was deluged. The death toll is estimated to be in tens of thousands and 25, 000 body bags have been ordered. Approximately, 140,000-160,000 houses have been submerged or ruined [1] and initial loss estimates could reach $125 billion, with insured losses of between $40 billion and $60 billion Full text

   

Obituary

 

OBITUARY

Comrade Jhanjhan Lal (born December 14 1923 ) died on the night of 21 August at the age of 82 at Puranpur of Pilibhit district. He had started his political journey at a very young age and always remained at the forefront of struggles which led him to go to jail for many a time. As a member of the undivided CPI, he always adhered to and advocated the revolutionary line as against revisionist thoughts, and in ’70s joined the communist revolutionary upsurge of Naxalbari. Since then he remained a member of the CPI(ML) till his last – a committed and disciplined soldier of the Party..Full text