2022

Her Excellency the 15th President of the sovereign, socialist, secular and democratic republic of India, sworn in by Justice N. V. Ramana, the Chief Justice of India holds promise for an extraordinary era. Her swearing ceremony was adorned by dignitaries who included, beside others, the outgoing President of India, Ramnath Kovind, the Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu, the Prime Minister and the members of his Council of Ministers, Governors and Chief Ministers of various states, etc.
A (…)

On the occasion of 80th anniversary of Quit India Movement
(This is the English translation of my article in Hindi written in 2012 to mark the 70th anniversary of Quit India Movement or August Revolution. The article was published in ‘Yuva Samvad’ and ‘Hastakshep.com’. In it an attempt was made to delineate the inspiration and facts behind the movement, and the sentiments of the Indian people and leaders who participated in it.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his ’Mann Ki Baat’ program (…)

Odisha celebrated 75th anniversary of India’s independence from 13th August 2022 onwards in a tuneful manner by playing Mahatma Gandhi’s Ram Dhun - Raghu Pati Raghav Raja Ram, Patitapavan Sita Ram, Iswar Allaha Tero Nam, Sab ko Sanmati De Bhagvan - across the city of Bhubaneswar. As the famous hymn of Gandhiji was played in all the traffic points of the capital city of Odisha right from the dawn of 13th August and continued till the day of independence on 15th August, the whole atmosphere of (…)

Latest developments in the media galore have raised serious concerns of media credibility and future of civil liberties in India. Two recent cases unequivocally demonstrate how the Indian media has waged a protracted battle to maintain its autonomy, truthfulness, and journalistic freedom. Since the media is a significant component in civil liberties, it is in the best interests of democracy, the rule of law, and nation-building to have an independent and fearless media. The significance of (…)

During the prolonged agitation of farmers which continued for almost a year in 2020-21, the adverse impact of big business houses on farmers and marketing of farm produce had emerged as perhaps the biggest issue. Now this issue is making waves in Himachal Pradesh in the context of its apple economy.
Himachal Pradesh has a border with all the three foremost states/regions of the farmers’ movement—Punjab, Haryana and Western UP. So some impact of the movement had also reached this Himalayan (…)

by Arun Srivastava
The compulsion of political survival has turned Narendra Modi so desperate that he has embarked on the mission to completely weed out his adversaries, even belonging to his own party and also to finish the leaders of the opposition parties.
From the day Bihar formed the Mahagathbandhan government, all the senior BJP leaders and even ministers have been instructed to launch a vicious tirade against him and his government. Two main allegations have been levelled against (…)

From the very beginning of the ISRO spy case in October 1994, I considered it as rubbish. But when I read recently Nambi Narayanan’s autobiography Ready to Fire: How India and I Survived the ISRO Spy Case which details the trajectory of both the space experiments of India and the scientist’s traumatic experience of being arrested, terming him as spy, and tortured by the Kerala Police and the IB officials, who knew nothing about rocketry, I was aghast to see the stupidity and criminality of (…)

by Murzban Jal
Such dangers constitute the real spice of the trade; the greater the insecurity, the more the conspirator hastens to seize the pleasures of the moment. —Karl Marx, ‘Les Conspirateurs, Par A. Chenu, Ex-capitaine des Gardes Du Citoyen Caussidière. Les Sociétés’
It is impossible completely to understand Marx’s Capital, and especially the first chapter, without having thoroughly studied and understood the whole of Hegel’s Logic. Consequently half a century later none of the (…)

[The below article by Anarchist Federation of Rio de Janeiro (FARJ) first appeared in 2014 in Libera newspaper, No 163 (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) as “Sectarismo e vanguardismo: debatendo um problema na esquerda”. It was translated into English by Enrique Guerrero-López]
by Anarchist Federation of Rio de Janeiro, FARJ
Sectarianism is intolerance towards the positions, opinions, ideologies or practices that are different from one’s own or those of the movement, organization or group to which (…)

PEOPLE’S UNION FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES (PUCL) 322. Patpar Gang Opposite Anand Lok Apartments, Mayur Vihar, Delhi 110091 Founder: Jayaprakash Narayan Founding President: VM Tarkunde President: Ravi Kiran Jain General Secretary: V. Suresh Email puclnat[at]gmail.com pucl.natgensec[at]gmail.com
18 August, 2022
PUCL condemns the remission of the sentence of the 11 convicts in the Bilkis case as arbitrary, unfair and dangerous for Indian democracy
Peoples Union for Civil Liberties condemns the (…)