2023

In August 2022, when the Indian subcontinent was celebrating seventy-five years of its freedom from colonial rule, the State of Gujarat freed on remission eleven men jailed in Panchmahal for life for the gang-rape of a pregnant woman during a religious pogrom in 2002. The men were convicted in early 2008. This was a religious conflict. In March 2022, a 22-year-old Dalit woman in Tamil Nadu’s Virudhunagar was subjected to sexual assault by eight people, including school students, who had (…)

Sitaram Yechury, general secretary of the CPI(M) at the 23rd Congress of the party held in Kerala in April 2022, had emphasised “isolate and defeat the BJP” as the central responsibility of the Marxists. He had also pointed out that BJP utilised its government to aggressively further the Hindutva communal agenda of the fascistic RSS and the Modi government has been imposing full-fledged authoritarianism trampling constitutionally guaranteed democratic rights and civil liberties of the (…)

Indian Doctors for Peace and Development (IDPD)
Date: 22.09.2023
PRESS RELEASE
Withdraw the order reducing cut off for NEET PG to Zero Percentile - IDPD This will benefit the affluent sections only, albeit lower the quality of medical education
The Indian Doctors for Peace and Development (IDPD) has taken serious note of the decision of the National Medical Commission (NMC) to bring down the cut-off percentile for the NEET for postgraduate admissions to Zero. It is reported that (…)

DBS Jeyaraj, like so many Sri Lankan Tamils, made Canada his home some years after the 1983 anti-Tamil riots swept Colombo, giving much needed oxygen to the nascent Tamil militancy. A journalist, Jeyaraj reported from Sri Lanka the deteriorating ethnic ties as the Tamil separatist campaign went from strength to strength before he quit his country and made Toronto his new home. Like many other Tamils, he too saw the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), initially, as the answer to (…)

September 13, 2023
A creeping authoritarianism now extends to the digital sphere in India.
India is often called the world’s largest democracy. While this brand had cache in the post-independence period, India’s status as a liberal democracy is losing its lustre.
Democracy indexes that have consistently downgraded India on their lists during the past decade have been dismissed as ’conspiracies’ by the government.
After India recently slumped 11 places on the Reporters Without Borders (…)

Press note
Massive rally at Attari border by Kirti Kisan Union Strong demand to open Indo-Pak trade through Attari and Hussainiwala road corridors. Demand to give freedom to farmers to sell their produce by abolishing visa conditions. Big gatherings will be held on September 20 in many districts including Hussainiwala. Demand for withdrawal of condition imposed on export of basmati at USD 1200 per tonne.
Attari, September 18, 2023
Kirti Kisan Union today held a massive rally at the (…)

by Bhagat Singh
October 5–6, 1930
It is a matter of debate whether my lack of belief in the existence of an Omnipresent, Omniscient God is due to my arrogant pride and vanity. It never occurred to me that sometime in the future I would be involved in polemics of this kind. As a result of some discussions with my friends, (if my claim to friendship is not uncalled for) I have realised that after having known me for a little time only, some of them have reached a kind of hasty conclusion (…)

September 18, 2023
When we think of the best ways to reduce stress, we might picture activities such as exercise or meditation. But while these pursuits certainly work for some people, they aren’t the only techniques you can use to reduce stress.
Over the past couple of years, adult colouring books have also become a popular hobby for people looking to relax. Although the activity might be simple, our research has shown colouring really can be an effective way of reducing stress and (…)

BOOK REVIEW
Reviewed by Hsunhui Tseng (National Cheng Kung University) __0__
Seeking Western Men: Email-Order Brides under China’s Global Rise by Monica Liu
Stanford University Press, 2022. xiii + 239 pp. (cloth), ISBN 978-1-5036-3247-9; $28.00 (paper), ISBN 978-1-5036-3373-5
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The phenomenon of the mail-order bride has been studied for a long time, with these studies often linking this form of commercialized marriage to women trafficking and the global sex trade. However, (…)

* Delhi University & the Rise of a Necropolis | B Madhavan
* Fading Trust in Teaching-learning Process | Indranil De
* ISRO Myth and Reality | Papri Sri Raman