2019

by Prem Singh
August 9, 2019 is the 77th anniversary of the ‘Quit India’ Movement, famously known as the August Revolution and an important milestone in the history of India’s freedom movement. The 75th anniversary of this movement, a movement which was fuelled by the intense desire for freedom of the Indian people, was celebrated two years ago on August 9, 2017. On that occasion, political parties across the spectrum had organised a number of programmes in memory of the martyrs of the (…)

From N.C.’s Writings
We reproduce N.C.’s following article on the 77th anniversary of the ‘Quit India’ struggle that began on August 9, 1942.
This was the week, fiftytwo years ago, that marked the parting of ways between the Communists and the Congress. It was the Communist opposition to the ‘Quit India’ resolution at the historic AICC session in August 1942 that ultimately led to the expulsion of the Communists from the Congress organisations in 1946. Incidentally, the eviction of the (…)

IMPRESSIONS
If God is love, why does he allow suffering? A timeless question. The answer provided by religion is that suffering leads to enlightenment. So a rishi would stand on one leg for years, another would do tapas inside a flaming fire. Jesus took whipping as he was taken to the cross for a slow death. The Buddha developed the Eightfold Path for release from suffering.
Shia Muslims stand out with their concept of suffering as a duty and an honour. Some carry out self-flagellation (…)

“Calcutta University worshipping the Chandal” was the vicious campaigns targeting Mukunda Behari Mallick, when he was appointed as a Pali teacher by Vice-Chancellor Sir Ashutosh Mukherjee in 1921.
The news of victimisation of a tribal lady, a university teacher in the faculty of Geography, targeting her birth, complexion and gender furnished the latest illustration of deep-rooted caste-based prejudice and discrimination prevalent in West Bengal. This one is inescapable because the ugly (…)

BOOK REVIEW
by Abid Ahmad Shah
Kashmir: Rage and Reason by Gowhar Geelani; Publisher: Rupa Publications, New Delhi; Price: Rs 395.
Kashmir is glorified the world over as paradise on the earth, second to Switzerland in terms of scenic beauty, serene valleys, calm and fresh waters and colourful flora and fauna. But, beyond the gaze of this whole matrix lies a narrative of pains, sufferings, broken promises and what not. Caught in the whirlpool of hypersensitive political environs, the (…)

EDITORIAL
The BJP’s role in the gory happenings around a case of rape in UP’s Unnao district has come out in bold relief placing the ruling party at the Centre and in the State in the dock. Two years ago a 17-year-old teenager was allegedly raped in a village in the district allegedly by a locally powerful BJP MLA, Kuldeep Singh Sengar. A year later she sought to draw public attention to the alleged crime by trying to immolate herself before the State Chief Minister’s residence in Lucknow. (…)

At a time when there is a countrywide demand that the modalities of the appointment of the Election Commissioners be amended to an independent collegium format in order to enhance the credibility of the Indian electoral system, guess what the government has done?
It has passed a Bill in the Lok Sabha seeking to take control over the tenure and salary structure of Information Commissioners without suggesting any persuasive rationale for so tightening the executive noose around citizens’ (…)

by Ram Puniyani
Narendra Modi has won the 2019 elections with a resounding mandate. Now his party has a simple majority in the Lok Sabha and his alliance NDA has a sizeable majority in the Lower House of Parliament. What does it mean for Indian democracy? Will democracy sustain, or will it get converted into some sort of an authoritarian rule? This is the question on the minds of many who have experienced diverse phenomena related to Modi first as the Gujarat Chief Minister and then as the (…)

IMPRESSIONS
Rahul Gandhi’s insistence on not continuing as the Congress President was the best thing that happened to the Congress in a long time. He must stick to it. Confusion and chaos, perhaps even cracks and crumbling may follow. That, too, would be good for the party which is 134 years old now. Everything needs renewal, rebirth and sometimes reincarnation. A new kind of Congress is what India needs. If it can emerge only from the ashes of the existing set-up, so be it. The exodus of (…)

The following is the lead article in CPI-ML’s weekly newsmagazine, ML Update, (Vol. 22, July 23-29, 219). It is being reproduced here with due acknowledgement.
On July 19, 2019, a village chief (gram pradhan) in Sonbhadra, Yagya Dutta Bhurtiya, eastern Uttar Pradesh, led several tractor-loads of gunmen into Umbha village, firing on Gond adivasis who were tilling their own land. Ten adivasis were killed in this massacre.
The Sonbhadra massacre underlines, once again, that Uttar Pradesh, (…)