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Uphold the Glorious Legacy of International Women’s Day 8 March 2010 marks the centenary of International Women’s Day – a hundred years from the time when the working class women’s movement first thought to observe ‘Women’s Day’ to celebrate their day-to-day struggles and assert the goal of women’s liberation....Full text
Price-rise: Assault on Food and Livelihood of Aam Aadmi Amidst record-breaking rise in food prices, the UPA government continues to shed crocodile tears. Worse, in the name of tackling prices, the government is trying to use rising prices as a pretext to shower more concessions on big capital. At the beginning of the Budget session of Parliament, President Pratibha Patil in her inaugural address held price rise to be “inevitable.” Earlier, in the meeting of Chief Ministers in Delhi on February 6, the Prime Minister called for advancing retail sector reforms to tackle the surge in retail prices – a clear hint to push for greater and faster corporatization of the retail sector.....Full text he Return of Rajapakse in War-Torn Sri Lanka DB Sri Lanka’s incumbent President Mahinda Rajapaksa won an emphatic victory over his former Army chief General Sarath Fonseka in the January 26 Presidential election. In 2005, Rajapaksa had won by a very narrow margin, primarily because an LTTE-enforced boycott in the Tamil areas had adversely affected the prospects of his rival, Ranil Wickremasinghe of the UNP. This time around, there was no LTTE to influence the poll; it was rather the total defeat and decimation of the LTTE which was the key issue of the Presidential election. In fact, even though the election was constitutionally due only in November 2011, Rajapaksa had advanced the elections by two years precisely to cash in on the post-LTTE dominant national mood in Sri Lanka ranging from chauvinistic triumphalism to a widespread sense of relief and respite after more than two decades of intense civil war.....Full text Bihar ‘Growth Miracle’: Myth and Reality Observer There has of late been a lot of media hype about the recent ‘CSO’ (Central Statistical Organisation) data on Bihar’s ‘growth miracle’ in the last 5 years. At a five-yearly average of 11.03 per cent, Bihar under Nitish Kumar has apparently been next only to Gujarat which clocked a growth rate of 11.07%, only marginally higher. The CSO has of course been quick to distance itself from this statistical miracle, attributing the figures to data supplied by the Bihar government.....Full text Nitish Mission of Mahadalit Mockery With Assembly elections round the corner, Nitish Kumar has pulled out all stops to play his social engineering cards. Just a day before the inauguration of the budget session of the Assembly, Kumar accompanied by his deputy from the BJP, Sushil Modi, addressed a Mahadalit unity rally in Patna. The rally was convened and conducted by none other than the Speaker of Bihar Assembly, Uday Narain Chaudhary, who is projected by Nitish Kumar as a Mahadalit leader. Chaudhary, on his part, thanked Kumar for making a Mahadalit the Speaker of the Assembly and for ‘looking after’ the Mahadalits in the state.....Full text Digvijay Singh’s Azamgarh Visit: Manisha Sethi Senior Congress leader Digvijay Singh’s visit to Azamgarh is being touted as the party’s reaching out to a community and town that have been reeling under a spate of arrests of alleged terror accused and battling the tag of ‘epicenter of terror’. ....Full text Bt Brinjal :
Corporate Control in Scientific Research Radhika Krishnan The highly controversial issue of genetically modified (GM) crops has once more catapulted into national limelight. For the past few years, public opinion against GM has been building up, owing to a nationwide campaign. Finally, in February this year, Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh announced an indefinite moratorium on the introduction of Bt Brinjal and its commercial production in India in the face of massive public opposition. In doing so, Ramesh overruled the recommendations of the Genetic Engineering Approvals Committee (GEAC) which sanctioned the introduction of Bt Brinjal in October last year.....Full text
8 March 2010: Women's Day Centenary The Slogans of Hundred Years of Women’s Liberation Struggles Resonate Even Today Who deserves the credit for the legacy of ‘International Women’s Day'? Governments or the United Nations may try to turn it into a day for official (sarkari) pronouncements and promises of 'women's empowerment.' They try to hide the real legacy of Women's Day, because they are deeply uncomfortable with the fact that it was communist women workers protesting on the streets a century ago, who started International Women's Day.....Full text
‘Maoism’, State and the Communist Movement in India Arindam Sen Part IV The fourth and concluding part of our discussion is followed by an account of our experience of engaging with the Maoists in various states. The UPA government is clearly preparing the ground for a full-scale intensification of Operation Green Hunt. To begin with, the government has embarked on a massive propagation of its new found doctrine of security which singles out Maoism as the biggest threat to national security. The government is also busy cobbling a grand political consensus around this doctrine and it has already achieved a good deal of success in this regard. If Narendra Modi is effusive in praising Chidambaram’s clarity and firmness, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee too clearly speaks the same language as Chidambaram. For the sake of political convenience, Shibu Soren and Nitish Kumar may have skipped the February 9 meeting in Kolkata with Chidambaram and Buddhadeb, but the governments of Jharkhand and Bihar are very much part of the growing centre-state coordination on this issue....Full text Experiences of Engaging with the Maoists [Our assessment of the CPI(Maoist) is based not just on a macro level theoretical study; it is informed by decades of practical experience of engagement with them since the MCC-PU-PWG days. We bring you glimpses from this practical experience. Ed/-] Isolation and Decline of Semi-Anarchism in Bihar In the course of the rise and spread of our movement and organization in Bihar, we have historically had to face hostilities from different quarters – the feudal forces, the state as well as the ‘Maoists’. In the Magadh region of central Bihar (especially in the districts of Patna, Jahanabad-Arwal, Gaya and Aurangabad), where the predecessors of today’s Maoists too had pockets of operation and influence, we had to withstand a spate of attacks and killings unleashed by both the MCC and the Party Unity group (CPI(ML) Central Organising Committee) which had merged with the PWG before the latter combined with the MCC to form the CPI(Maoist)....Full text
Notes on Some Sectors of the Working Class [AICCTU in Tamilnadu has held a series of workshops to study the salient features of various sectors and the living conditions of workers in these sectors in preparation for a mass membership campaign. Below are excerpts from some of the papers presented at the workshops in Chennai and Thanjavur. Ed/-]....Full text Contract workers’ Struggle at Military Stations in Assam Subhas Sen The All Assam Contractor Workers’ Union affiliated to AICCTU has begun to organize contract workers of military and air force stations in the two upper Assam districts of Dibrugarh and Tinsukia....Full text
Fact-finding report on Atrocities against Dalits in Karnataka [A team of various human rights groups, dalit groups and women’s organizations visited Chitradurga to investigate reports of atrocities on dalits in three villages. The team included members of PUCL-K, AIPWA, PDF, HRFDL-K, and Janapara Vedike. HRFDL-K activists at Chitradurga facilitated the team’s visit. The team was in Chitradurga on the 8 Feb 2010 and visited the villages of Budihalli, Renukapura and Lakshmisagara. Below are excerpts from the report prepared by Dr V Lakshminarayana of PUCL-K and Dr E Rati Rao of AIPWA, both of whom were part of the team.]...Full text
AISA's 7th National Conference Abhyuday AISA's 7th National Conference was held in Kolkata from 8-10 February. On 8 February, AISA activists from 18 states marched through the streets of central Kolkata and assembled at College Street for a public meeting. The meeting started with the rendition of popular songs by Com. Sanjay Tiwari and a dance performance by AISA activists from Karbi Anglong. Com Ravi Rai, National Secretary, AISA, addressed the gathering from 'Bharat-Selim-Tapashi' manch and called for a student movement to resist state repression and Operation Green Hunt and struggling for the right to education and employment....Full text
6th Conference of the Paschim Banga Krishak Samiti Held The Paschim Banga Krishak Samiti (West Bengal Peasant Association) held its 6th Conference with an open session in Bardhaman followed by a two-day delegate session on 15-16 February. The conference took note of the acute agrarian crisis and resolved to impart a fresh impetus to the peasant movement in the State. Comrade Dipankar addressed the open session while Comrade Rajaram Singh, convenor of AIKSS (All India Peasant Coordination Committee) inaugurated the conference. Comrade Kartick Pal, PBM and several other leaders of the Party’s West Bengal State Committee also attended and addressed the conference....Full text Struggles against Land Mafia and Police Repression in UP In Ghazipur district of UP, struggles to free land from land mafia and ensure the grant of pattas to landless poor have been ongoing since November 2009. On November 5, protests were held at different blocks demanding work and wages under MNREGA. In retaliation, the AIALA District Secretary and another activist were booked by police on false charges. Next day, when the District Secretary of the party Comrade Ram Pyare Ram went to the SP’s office to lodge a protest against the police action, he was told by the SP himself to refrain from “Dharna-Pradarshan” (demonstrations or protests) or be ready to face dire consequences....Full text
Autism and Religious Stereotypes Jawed Naqvi [The writer is Dawn’s correspondent in Delhi. The article (slightly abridged and edited below) appeared originally in the Dawn on 18 February 2010.] We all know that the most patriotic Indian Muslim according to the Hindu nationalist pantheon was the kohl-eyed Company Quarter Master Havildar Abdul Hameed. Legend has it that he died blowing up US- made Patton tanks with hand grenades in the 1965 war with Pakistan.
The Legacy of Howard Zinn There is a constrained jubilation in the right wing intelligentsia at the passing of the legendary historian and activist, playwright and an iconic leftist intellectual Howard Zinn. A perpetual source of trouble for the right, Howard Zinn rallied against the conservative agenda in the US all through his life. Even at the age of 87, when he died, he was constantly traveling, speaking and inspiring people (with his remarkable humor) to organize and be agents of change.....Full text
When the Wolf Masquerades as the Sheep Kavita Krishnan “I suffer from multiple handicaps… I'm a double Shudra…An allegation against a Shudra needn't be proved; it's the Shudra who must prove his innocence…”
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