Archive for August, 2019

Books About Wars in Your Country

Books About Wars in Your Country

A brief history of books, resistance, the police and politicians. It is humanly impossible for even the most learned judge to have read every book referred to in their court. For a brief while this week, the judge conducting the trial of activist Vernon Gonsalves, an accused in the Bhima Koregaon incident of 2018, became an example of this. That[Read More…]

by 31/08/2019 1 comment India
Kashmir – The Invisible and the Damned

Kashmir – The Invisible and the Damned

You can look away now The Vale of tears has dried up And a deathly silence stalks the Dal Deserted towns, burnt orchards and shadows everywhere. Paradise will ne’er be the same again Nothing will ever be the same again We, the invisible and the damned, the rejected and the reviled, have long ceased to exist for a world gone[Read More…]

by 31/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Hindu Villagers Protects Mosque in Bihar

Hindu Villagers Protects Mosque in Bihar

In a heartwarming instance of communal harmony, the Hindu residents of Mari village, in Nalanda district of Bihar have given their heart and soul to take care of an old mosque left abandon by the Muslims in their village. According to media report, in Mari village, due to scourge of unemployment Muslim population has slowly eased themselves out of the[Read More…]

by 31/08/2019 2 comments Communal Harmony
India Should Not Go The Nazi Way But Give Citizenship To 1.9 Million People Left Out Of The Assam NRC List

India Should Not Go The Nazi Way But Give Citizenship To 1.9 Million People Left Out Of The Assam NRC List

Over 1.9 million people have been left out of the final National Register of Citizens or NRC – a list intended to identify legal residents and weed out illegal immigrants from Assam. Those left out of the NRC can appeal to the Foreigners Tribunal within 120 days. After that those left out will be sent to Detention Centers! Are we[Read More…]

Egypt’s security forces execute 17 persons in extrajudicial killing

Egypt’s security forces execute 17 persons in extrajudicial killing

Egyptian President Field Marshall Abdel Fattah al-Sisi’s security forces have killed 17 pro Muslim Brotherhood persons in the latest incident of extra judicial killing. The security forces claimed that the people killed were involved in a car bomb near the National Cancer Institute (NCI) that killed more than 20 people in Cairo on August 4. However, how the way the[Read More…]

by 31/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
On the Day of my Birth: Witnessing Desperation, Celebrating Triumph

On the Day of my Birth: Witnessing Desperation, Celebrating Triumph

It was my birthday and I was both sad and glad for myself. I had lived a long life, filled with difficulties of every kind one can imagine. I had spent a good portion of it struggling to survive in the face of poverty and want. I had struggled to raise three children, mostly alone, in the midst of that[Read More…]

by 31/08/2019 1 comment Life/Philosophy
First ‘green village’ and its struggles

First ‘green village’ and its struggles

‘The soul of India lives in its villages’ Mahatma Gandhi While cosmopolitan cities and even many villages are being polluted increasingly, there are some villages which are resisting environmental pollution by the people living there. One such village is Khonoma in the North East of India. History Khonoma is Asia’s first green village in the hills of Nagaland. The village[Read More…]

by 31/08/2019 1 comment Environmental Protection
Abrogation of Article 370 An Act of Terror: Prelude to Dispossession, Displacement and Accumulation

Abrogation of Article 370 An Act of Terror: Prelude to Dispossession, Displacement and Accumulation

“…always was, always will be, the land of Kashmiris” Conquest by Abrogation: The acts of the Indian government in flooding Kashmir with its troops is a coercive measure meant to control, manipulate and subjugate the terrified people of Kashmir. In the days leading up to the abrogation of Article 370, the Indian government transformed Kashmir into a landscape of fear.[Read More…]

by 31/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Some Thoughts on Extinction Rebellion – and the Future of the Climate Movement

Some Thoughts on Extinction Rebellion – and the Future of the Climate Movement

The rise of ‘Extinction Rebellion’ signals that climate activism is moving up a gear. Further radicalisation is probably inevitable. Extinction Rebellion (or XR) is climate activism’s new face. One of its new faces at least, together with the youth climate strikers. The XR movement was created in 2018 in the UK with the stated aim of using civil disobedience and nonviolent[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 5 comments Climate Change
Search for Answers

Search for Answers

With those thousands and millions of pieces you have been broken into How long can you keep on fixing them to get through one more day? And with a cracked heart and crushed soul How long till u count yourself among the living fray? With this unthinking unfeeling existence of yours How long till u tire and call it a[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 1 comment Arts/Literature
A dock sits damaged near the Statue of Liberty, which remained closed to the public six weeks after Hurricane Sandy on December 13, 2012 in New York City. (Photo: John Moore/Getty Images)

Leaked UN Draft Report Warns Rising, Warming Oceans ‘Poised to Unleash Misery’ Worldwide

A draft United Nations report warns “the same oceans that nourished human evolution are poised to unleash misery on a global scale unless the carbon pollution destabilizing Earth’s marine environment is brought to heel,” according to Agence France-Presse, which exclusively reported on the 900-page scientific assessment Thursday. The forthcoming report from a U.N. body that assesses science related to the human-caused planetary emergency is[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Indian media’s sellout on Kashmir

Indian media’s sellout on Kashmir

Recalling the stellar role of the Indian media during the infamous internal Emergency imposed by the late Indira Gandhi, Lal Krishna Advani, the BJP patriarch now forcibly retired, famously noted: “You were asked to bend but you began to crawl.” Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, well known for his love of the fourth estate right from his Gujarat days, the[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 1 comment India
G7 – The Cost of Uselessness

G7 – The Cost of Uselessness

The G7 Summit is an obsolete, useless talking shop, as Finnian Cunningham so adroitly says. RT calls it The Unbearable Pointlessness of G7. Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, UK, and the United States constitute the G7 gang. It should strike any logical thinker as extremely odd that the world’s largest economy (by purchasing parity-based GDP), China, is not part of[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
What lies behind Mohan Bhagwat’s call for debate around reservation 

What lies behind Mohan Bhagwat’s call for debate around reservation 

What is the similarity between reservation and the special status granted to Kashmir ? The issue is of relevance since Mohan Bhagwat raked up the issue of reservation within a fortnight after Article 370 providing special status to Kashmir was abrogated. Mohan Bhagwat speaking at Gyan Utsav event at IGNOU in New Delhi on August 18 called for a discussion[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 1 comment India
Nature And Human Beings

Nature And Human Beings

 “Capitalism tends to destroy its two sources of wealth: nature and human beings” – Karl Marx  “Man lives on nature — means that nature is his body, with which he must remain in continuous interchange if he is not to die. That man’s physical and spiritual life is linked to nature means simply that nature is linked to itself, for[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 3 comments Climate Change
Unhinged before the Fall: Boris Johnson, Parliament and Brexit

Unhinged before the Fall: Boris Johnson, Parliament and Brexit

The Brexit no deal prospect is engendering an element of lunacy fast seeping into every pore of the British political establishment.  As with all steeped in such thinking, some of it made sense.  Prime Minister Boris Johnson had been inspired by a mild dictatorial urge, seeking to suspend the UK parliament five weeks out from October 31.  This has been[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Iran – Is a Rouhani – Trump Meeting Imminent?

Iran – Is a Rouhani – Trump Meeting Imminent?

PressTV Interview Transcript https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qsp1UcXqEo Background Tehran and Washington have been locked in a dispute since last year when the US unilaterally pulled out of the nuclear agreement and re-imposed crippling sanctions on Iran. On Monday, President Donald Trump said he is ready to meet his Iranian counterpart, Hassan Rouhani within weeks after a G-7 leaders’ summit. The idea was proposed[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Protest: The King is dead, long live the king

Protest: The King is dead, long live the king

  Protest is back on the front burner. Protesters occupy streets in cities ranging from Hong Kong and Moscow to Khartoum and Algiers. They would likely do so in Srinagar, the capital of Indian-controlled Kashmir, were it not for unprecedented pre-emptive security measures. When protest is not on the streets, it is embedded in culture wars wracking countries like the[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Pakistan successfully tests night launch of surface to surface ballistic missile

Pakistan successfully tests night launch of surface to surface ballistic missile

Amid mounting tension over India’s annexation of Kashmir, Pakistan has successfully carried out the night training launch of a surface to surface ballistic missile. The missile “is capable of delivering multiple types of warheads up to 290 kilometres”, said military media spokesperson Major General Asif Ghafoor via a tweet, which also included a video of the launch. The missile is[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 Comments are Disabled South Asia
Jharkhand Government responds to Pathalgadi with violence instead of honouring Constitutional rights of Adivasis

Jharkhand Government responds to Pathalgadi with violence instead of honouring Constitutional rights of Adivasis

On 6-7 August 2019, a fact-finding team comprising activists, academics, researchers and lawyers visited a few Pathalgadi villages in Khunti district (Ghaghara, Bhandra and Habuidih in Khunti block and Kochang and Birbanki in Arki block) to understand the Adivasis’ motivation for doing Pathalgadi and the response of the administration. The team met several residents of these and neighbouring villages and[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Human Rights
Medha Patkar On Indefinite Hunger Strike

Medha Patkar On Indefinite Hunger Strike

Chhota Badda (Barwani) | The fast of Ms. Medha Patkar under the “Narmada Challan Satyagraha” continued for the sixth day today. The Chief Minister of the State urged Ms. Patkar to end the fast, which was rejected in the absence of a concrete plan to rehabilitate the affected. Today, 10 affected people of Bhavati, Bijasan, Ganpur, Chhota Badda, Rajghat and[Read More…]

by 30/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Johnson to suspend UK parliament to push through Brexit in a major assault on democratic rule

Johnson to suspend UK parliament to push through Brexit in a major assault on democratic rule

Elizabeth II, Queen of the United Kingdom, yesterday signed off on Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s request to suspend parliament. Known as proroguing, the move followed a visit by three Privy Council members, led by arch Brexiteer Jacob Rees-Mogg. It means that parliament will stop meeting no earlier than Monday September 9 and no later than Thursday September 12, until Monday[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
The Saudi Axis and Israel’s Drone War on the Shiite Crescent

The Saudi Axis and Israel’s Drone War on the Shiite Crescent

In the past week, Linah al-Saafin at Al Jazeera English points out, an Israeli drone hit a Hizbullah target in Lebanon, Israeli fighter jets bombed a base in Syria with Iranian personnel, and Israel somehow hit bases of a Shiite militia in Iraq, including one on the Syria-Iraq border, killing a militiaman. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu claimed that the Iraqi[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 1 comment World
Surge in Misogyny and Objectification of Kashmiri Women

Surge in Misogyny and Objectification of Kashmiri Women

Kashmiri women community have been a victim of the reinforced rape culture since 1947. With the recent abrogation of Article 370 by the Modi government, the fear of violence among Kashmiri women have increased. As witnessed in the past, Kashmiri women have been a victim of gang rapes, killing and torture by the Indian armed forces. Now, with the recent[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
COPYRIGHT THE BRITISH LIBRARY BOARD A photograph of the Babri Masjid from the early 1900s

Babri Masjid – Ram Janmabhoomi: Contextualising The Historical Content

History is to be interrogated. Subjected to scanners, sieved and then made to make a standpoint. Eye witnesses accounts or contemporary or near contemporary sources are to be thoroughly probed, as only then, it would become a delving point to pronounce the veritable conclusion-elusive of its biasness or with any pre-judicial pretence. Obviously, the same criteria would have to be[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
The politics of revivalism: Intersection of caste and Hindutva

The politics of revivalism: Intersection of caste and Hindutva

The nation does not mean number all the time. However, the assimilation of number with the Hindutva self has created a situation of the legitimacy of the Hindu nation. The current results of the 2019 election stamped the majoritarian mindset in India. The great victory of the rightwing protagonists’ party Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP)[1] challenged the minority mindset that India[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
India And ‘Crony Capitalism’

India And ‘Crony Capitalism’

In 2012, Daren Acemoglu & James A. Robinson wrote a book, Why Nations Fail, in which they point out that when political power is captured by elites, all the wealth taken by few, and opportunities and prosperity apparently disappeared for the masses at one hand. And the public insititutions operate under highly influenced and show disparity in the treatment of[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Gandhian Model of Economy And Industry And The Post Globalisation Scenario

Gandhian Model of Economy And Industry And The Post Globalisation Scenario

On 20th August, 2019 Indian Express e-paper carried an unusual advertisement by the Northern India Textiles Mills Association about Indian Spinning Industry facing a huge crisis. The spinning mills are incurring huge loses, they are not in a position to buy Indian cotton, livelihood of 10 crores people, directly or indirectly, dependent on textile industry and a larger number of[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Globalisation
Climate Change Facts – from Climate Change to Runaway Global Heating

Climate Change Facts – from Climate Change to Runaway Global Heating

In the light of the recent IPCC special report on climate change, desertification, land degradation, sustainable land management, food security, and greenhouse gas fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems, (Ref 1), it is interesting to recap some of the salient features of the runaway global heating emergency that we humans find ourselves in. Slow changes of carbon dioxide, methane, and oxygen concentrations[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 1 comment Climate Change
facing Israel

‘We are waiting for war’: Lebanese say Israel has gone too far

Text and Photos: Andre Vltchek After the recent Israeli attacks against Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq, the Middle East has found itself in the midst of undeclared war. Almost everyone in Lebanon appears to agree. “This time Israel went too far. In just two days, it bombed three countries,” I am told by a local UN staffer based in Beirut. The[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Labor Day 2019

Labor Day 2019

   We celebrate Labor Day by honoring workers — especially the forgotten workers. Stay-at-home mothers who home school their children are often forgotten. Others who are forgotten are those who work in school cafeterias, those who empty bedpans in nursing homes, and ordinary local guys, like my plumber. He is smart, honest and he never overcharges. These are just ordinary[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Humanity Denied: What Is Missing from the Omar, Tlaib Story

Humanity Denied: What Is Missing from the Omar, Tlaib Story

Israel’s decision to bar two United States Democratic Representatives, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib, from entering Israel and visiting Palestine has further exposed the belligerent, racist nature of the Israeli government. But our understanding of the Israeli decision, and the massive controversy and discussion it generated, should not stop there. Palestinians, who have been at the receiving end of racist[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Changing politics over Indian Muslim Women

Changing politics over Indian Muslim Women

Recently enacted Triple Talaq Bill is a piecemeal legislation to safeguard Muslim women’s rights regarding un-Islamic practice of marriage dissolution. While discussions are still raging over the legal propriety of rendering a civil offence to cognizable criminal one and what is the raison detre of government pushing a bill that may affect only microscopic population of Muslim community at the[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Can Press Council defend media blackout?

Can Press Council defend media blackout?

If there is any weapon that protects democracy, it is freedom to express a critical opinion. Every democratic Constitution must facilitate, declare and protect the people’s right to tell, write, represent, petition and challenge constitutionality of a policy that curbs expression en bloc. The fundamental right under Article 19(1)(a) is not only exercised by journalists and TV anchors. En mass[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Dear Kannan Gopinathan, I quit Zoho for the same reason. Where do we go from here?

Dear Kannan Gopinathan, I quit Zoho for the same reason. Where do we go from here?

Put me back in the middle of the sea, Let me struggle, learn & find a new shore. Dear Kannan Gopinathan Couple of days ago, I stumbled upon a news article that spoke about you resigning from the service. The reason for your resignation is something Bhakts and to-be-Bhakts might find really hard to digest. As you say in an interview, “If you ask me[Read More…]

by 29/08/2019 2 comments India
Iran Nuclear Accord: The Third Act is Now Starting

Iran Nuclear Accord: The Third Act is Now Starting

            The first act of the Iran Nuclear Accord took eight years. The backdrop kept changing from Geneva to Vienna but the actors were nearly all the same.  Except for the representative of the European Union it was an all male, middle-age cast with little comic relief, at least on stage.  The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, to give the[Read More…]

by 28/08/2019 1 comment World
The Faces of Communism in Russia Today

The Faces of Communism in Russia Today

I am taking a long Sunday walk when I come upon them handing out leaflets in front of Kentucky Fried Chicken, in Perovo, the region of Moscow in which I reside. There are four or five of them altogether: young teenagers or those in their early twenties – handing out leaflets. They try to hand me one, and I, assuming[Read More…]

by 28/08/2019 1 comment Life/Philosophy
Kashmir – and the strange paralysis of the Indian civil society

Kashmir – and the strange paralysis of the Indian civil society

There were no black-bordered newspaper announcements of either the abrogation of the Articles 370 and 35A or the immediate clampdown imposed on Kashmir, effected as they were by devious and totalitarian, unconstitutional means. There was no broadcast-in-the-dark by any TV broadcaster. And, in the days following there was no running count of the days of incarceration for the entire valley,[Read More…]

by 28/08/2019 1 comment India
Indo-Pak People-to-People Peace Efforts need a Close Look

Indo-Pak People-to-People Peace Efforts need a Close Look

Indo-Pakistan relations have almost never been all-smooth, least of all since the 1990s if not earlier, post the worsening of the situation in Jammu and Kashmir. This was also the decade when collective efforts for people-to-people contact gained pace, with peace activists on both sides of the border coming together at forums like the Pakistan India People’s Forum for Peace[Read More…]

by 28/08/2019 Comments are Disabled South Asia
A Requiem for Amazonia

A Requiem for Amazonia

Amazon burns Each flame licks a life Each ember leads to strife How will man survive? From the meat roasted by the flames That rise as if from Earth’s insides? The birds that no longer fly Lie roasted, toasted, drained of colour. The brilliant macaw with its plumes of blue and yellow, The golden monkey that leaps from tree to[Read More…]

by 28/08/2019 3 comments Arts/Literature
Polishing Turds: Lord Bell’s Public Relations Revolution

Polishing Turds: Lord Bell’s Public Relations Revolution

“Morality is a job for priests.  Not P.R. men.” Tim Bell, New York Times, Feb 4, 2018 Lord Bell is dead, but his public relations tinkering, with all its gloss gilding and deception, remains.  It was Tim Bell who cut his teeth in this dubious field, assisting Margaret Thatcher win the 1979 UK election through a mix of emotive tugging[Read More…]

by 28/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Hollywood reboots Russophobia for the New Cold War

Hollywood reboots Russophobia for the New Cold War

It is an age-old question as to the extent art reflects the world we live in. Bertolt Brecht allegedly said to the contrary that art was “not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it.” The Marxist German playwright devised theatrical methods designed to distance the audience from the staged drama while drawing self-reflexive[Read More…]

by 28/08/2019 1 comment Arts/Literature
Kashmir: The Worst Conflict Area In The World

Kashmir: The Worst Conflict Area In The World

It won’t be an exaggeration to say Kashmir is the worst conflict area in the world. Look anywhere else in the world where there are conflicts, there is no communication crack down. From Gaza to West Papua, from Hong Kong to the Yellow Vests in France….. the world knows what’s happening there. However in Jammu and Kashmir of India, we[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 4 comments India, Editor's Picks
Colombian natives and activists protested against the government of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro over the fires in the Amazon rainforest, in front of the Brazilian consulate in Bogota, Colombia, on August 23, 2019.(Raul Arboleda/AFP/Getty Images)

The Amazon Is on Fire—Indigenous Rights Can Help Put It Out

Colonialism is setting the world on fire. Taking leadership from the people who have been resisting its violence for centuries, while protecting non-extractive ways of life, is our best hope of putting out the flames. It was an epic case of projection. Lashing out at the attacks on his Amazon-incinerating policies, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro accused French President Emmanuel Macron of having[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
The New Trail of Tears

The New Trail of Tears

 How climate change is forcing the relocation of species, including our own In 1830 Congress passed the Indian Removal Act, designed to appropriate to the United States lands occupied by aboriginal Americans. The Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional, but the army under Commander in Chief Andrew Jackson acted anyway. Now a lightning rod for condemnation of the expropriation of indigenous[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Tinderbox Earth: The significance of the Amazon and Siberian fires

Tinderbox Earth: The significance of the Amazon and Siberian fires

As fires rage across tens of thousands square km the Amazon forest, dubbed the Planet’s lungs, producing some 20 percent of the oxygen in the atmosphere, with some 72,843 fires in Brazil this year, where fires on such a scale are uncommon, as well as through Siberia, Alaska, Greenland,  southern Europe and elsewhere,they herald a world where increasing temperatures and[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 2 comments Climate Change
Amazonia in Flames – Brazil’s Bolsonaro is a World Criminal – Encouraging Jungle Burning for Private Exploitation of Freed Land

Amazonia in Flames – Brazil’s Bolsonaro is a World Criminal – Encouraging Jungle Burning for Private Exploitation of Freed Land

On 28 October 2018, Jair Bolsonaro was elected President of Brazil with 55.1% of the vote – and with a gigantic help from Cambridge Analytica. At the World Economic Forum (WEF) in January 2019 in Davos Switzerland, Bolsonaro made a sumptuous presentation, “We Are Building a New Brazil”. He outlined a program that put literally Brazil up for sale, and especially[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Israel Has Attacked Lebanon And Syria – So What?

Israel Has Attacked Lebanon And Syria – So What?

  On August 25th, 2019, Israel attacked Lebanon. It has done it again. Just as it attacked Syria, the same night. RT reported the same day: “Israeli drone flights were “an open attack on Lebanese sovereignty” and an assault on UN Resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 Israel-Lebanon war, Hariri said on Sunday, just hours after reports of two Israeli UAV incidents[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Changing Israel

Changing Israel

Part1-BDS Defeating Israel does not sit well with the American public. Although defeat does not seem possible, the word intimates the destruction of all Israelis. Changing Israel into a nation that preserves some of the characteristics that guided many to embrace an earlier expressed vision — creation of a nation that is a light upon all nations — albeit a[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Justifications for Inequality: The Neuroses of Kochland

Justifications for Inequality: The Neuroses of Kochland

One of the brothers Koch, David, has shuffled off this mortal coil, and the pious few looking at his passing may well think he is making it tough for camels passing through needles.  As part of the Brothers Koch, he presided over a corporate empire that did its pinching best to wrest control from the purses of public accountability in[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Hong Kong and the Audacity of the United States

Hong Kong and the Audacity of the United States

People often ask and hint at the similarities between the Hong Kong protests and the French Yellow Vests. The former started on 31 March and are approaching their 19th week – the Yellow Vests (YV) have celebrated last weekend their 40th week of protests. As of recently some voices of Macron-infiltrates into the YV movement – or Fifth Columnists –[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Are Sanders and Warren Throwing a Lifeline to the Military-Industrial Complex?

Are Sanders and Warren Throwing a Lifeline to the Military-Industrial Complex?

Co-Written by Medea Benjamin & Nicolas J S Davies   Among the frontrunners in the Democratic Party presidential primary, Senators Warren and Sanders not only have the most progressive domestic agenda, but also the most anti-war, pro-diplomacy foreign policy agenda. The sharpest distinction between them is that Sanders has voted against over 80% of recent record military spending bills in the Senate, while[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Sufi

Sufi

Each expression of beauty is an act of love.  Every manifestation of love is an act of beauty. To make a warrior’s choice in the clarity of human evolution is to invite the flowering of beauty.  To make a warrior’s choice within the possibilities of wisdom is to work intimately in the garden of love. A person does not need[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Uncategorized
Stratfor: Kashmir may provide spark for Pakistan-India nuclear war

Stratfor: Kashmir may provide spark for Pakistan-India nuclear war

The specter of nuclear war haunts tensions between India and Pakistan, and the disputed territory of Kashmir could provide the spark that lights South Asia’s nuclear fuse, warns Strafor, a geopolitical intelligence think tank that provides strategic analysis and forecasting to individuals and organizations around the world. With passions again running high in Kashmir, the stakes for the region and[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled South Asia
Love For My Country Transcends Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nay The Whole world!

Love For My Country Transcends Bangladesh, Pakistan, Nay The Whole world!

Tsunami of aggressive nationalism Across USA, Europe and beyond Internationalism is my creed; patriotism acceptable But not the sedition law   My ancestors born in Pakistan Part of undivided India Communal partitioning in 1947 Affected lives   My mother born in 1921 At Suri Mohalla, Rawalpindi Completed her studies At middle school, Rawalpindi   At school she learnt needle work[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Questioning Democracy

Questioning Democracy

Equality. Freedom. Justice. Secularity. Rights. Federalism. People’s government. That’s the general view of democracy we have in our minds. Democracy promises to incorporate all these values while administrating the institutions of society, economy and polity. To be specific, what democracy is to people is what a sickle is to a farmer- a tool to bring good days. But, despite all[Read More…]

by 27/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
As New Fires Rage in Amazon, Global Calls for Urgent Action to Avert ‘Astronomical’ Impacts to ‘Life on Earth’

As New Fires Rage in Amazon, Global Calls for Urgent Action to Avert ‘Astronomical’ Impacts to ‘Life on Earth’

Pope Francis urges protection of “that lung of forests” and French President Macron says G7 nations pledged help at summit Brazil’s army on Sunday deployed aircraft to battle the raging fires in the Amazon as global concern and outrage over the potential consequences—and the destructive causes—of the disaster grow. The military operations involving C-130 aircraft to put out fires came after Brazil’s far-right President Jair Bolsonaro triggered global[Read More…]

"Politicians have responded with indifference to our crippling summer of record heat, bushfires, and floods. It's no wonder so many came out in support today," Nosrat Fareha a 16-year-old climate activist from Western Sydney, said as more than 150,000 students and adult supporters poured into the streets across Australia on Friday. (Photo: School Strike/Flickr/cc)

Global Climate Movement: Darkest Before the Dawn

“Locally, city-wide, state-wide, nationally, internationally we must join the fight as if our lives depends upon it, because they do. Now’s the time to join the movement for stopping global climate change and for climate justice.” Wildfires burning  in the Amazon and Siberia, unrelenting heat waves, 100-year floods happening yearly are signs of our times—the worst of times. A global[Read More…]

by 26/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
A sign for Transition Linlithgow in Scotland, part of the Transition Towns initiative. (Photo: John Lord/flickr/cc)

Two Arguments for Localism

Argument 1: Localism is inevitable. Globalization was made possible by long-distance transport, communications, and capital flows. It fits with widespread assumptions about progress and economic growth leading to a better future. But there are good reasons to think that our current bout of globalization is actually a brief, fragile, and highly problematic phase of human history. Societies seem to pass[Read More…]

by 26/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Counter Solutions
The Naming Industrial Complex:  The Stupidity of Smart Devices and Smart Cities

The Naming Industrial Complex:  The Stupidity of Smart Devices and Smart Cities

Insentience cannot have intelligence, but the modern public relations revolution would have you think otherwise.  Smart phones, smart bombs, and, it follows, Smart Cities (capitalising such terms implies false authority), do not exist in that sense, whatever their cheer squad emissaries in High Tech land claim.  They are merely a masterfully daft celebration of tactically deployed cults: there is a[Read More…]

by 26/08/2019 2 comments World
Aramco’s IPO: A bell weather of Saudi balancing between East and West

Aramco’s IPO: A bell weather of Saudi balancing between East and West

  Saudi Arabia’s planned awarding of mandates for the management of an initial public offering (IPO) by its national oil company Aramco is likely to serve as a bell weather for how Riyadh balances its relations with the United States and China. In an early indication that Western financial institutions like Goldman Sachs may be losing their near monopoly, Saudi[Read More…]

by 26/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Hindutva – A Mirror Image of Zionism

Hindutva – A Mirror Image of Zionism

On 26th August 2019 The Consulate General of Israel in Mumbai, along with one Indo-Israel Friendship Association, is organising a public discussion on “Leaders’ Idea of Nations in the Context of Zionism and Hindutva” at the Convocation Hall of University of Mumbai. The poster of the event displays images of Theodor Herzl and V.D. Savarkar. This is only an expression[Read More…]

by 26/08/2019 2 comments India
The Press Council of India Must Protect Press Freedom

The Press Council of India Must Protect Press Freedom

Statement by concerned mediapersons on the Press Council’s intervention application in the petition filed by Ms Anuradha Bhasin We, the undersigned individual journalists and media organisations, express our grave concern at the decision of the Press Council of India to intervene in the petition filed by Kashmir Times Executive Editor Anuradha Bhasin. The Press Council of India’s petition has sought[Read More…]

by 26/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
A Short History of Untouchables in Indian Army and Role of Dr. Ambedkar

A Short History of Untouchables in Indian Army and Role of Dr. Ambedkar

(Note: This essay was written by Bhagwan Das in 2005 on my request. Actually Bhagwan Das proposed to write a book on Untouchables role in Indian Army and he had collected some material also but he could not. It was because Bhagwan Das himself had served in Royal Air Force as Radar Operator and was deployed on Burma border to[Read More…]

by 26/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
India’s Media Watch Dog Supports News Blockade In Kashmir

India’s Media Watch Dog Supports News Blockade In Kashmir

In a shocking development India’s Media watch dog, The Press Council of India (PCI) has moved the Supreme Court supporting the Centre and Jammu and Kashmir government’s decision to impose restrictions on communication in the state following the abrogation of Article 370. The council, a statutory body led by a former Supreme Court judge and meant to preserve freedom of[Read More…]

by 25/08/2019 3 comments India
Ravidas as portrayed in the painting commissioned by Dara Shikoh

Brahmanical Reporting of History of Ravidas Mandir in Tuglaqabad

In an article by Shoaib Daniyal, published in www.scroll.in under the title Why are angry Dalits recalling a Delhi sultan to protest the demolition of a bhakti saint’s temple? It is stated “They claim that the plot on which the shrine stood was gifted to the sect by Sikandar Lodi six centuries ago”. https://scroll.in/article/934967/why-are-angry-dalits-recalling-a-delhi-sultan-to-protest-the-demolition-of-a-bhakti-saints-temple I would like to put in[Read More…]

by 25/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
We Are Not Fooled By The Hong Kong Protests

We Are Not Fooled By The Hong Kong Protests

Co-Written by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers Update: Protests continued in Hong Kong this weekend. The protesters returned to the use of violence and the police responded. The South China Morning Post reported: “In a now familiar pattern, the protesters threw bricks, petrol bombs, corrosive liquid and other projectiles at the police, who responded with tear gas, pepper balls and sponge[Read More…]

by 25/08/2019 2 comments World
How Modi, Shah Brought Kashmir to Global Centre-Stage

How Modi, Shah Brought Kashmir to Global Centre-Stage

Kudos to Narendra Modi and his hefty henchman, Amit Shah. They have managed to transform India’s image overnight from that of being the world’s largest democracy into a highhanded occupation power. Something that Pakistan couldn’t quite accomplish over the past 73 years despite its best efforts. The much feted democracy is today being compared to the Apartheid states of Israel[Read More…]

by 25/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
We are in the Silence

We are in the Silence

In what feels like a parallel life devoid of the ugliness of the present, I enjoy watching the Doctor Who series. It’s just a fun wholesome sci-fi show, where an alien who just goes by ‘Doctor’ travels through time and space in a machine which from the outside looks like an old British police box. The Doctor dashes through time[Read More…]

by 25/08/2019 1 comment India
AAP, Article 370 and a Blind Alley

AAP, Article 370 and a Blind Alley

“He came, he saw and he concurred“ – Caption of a RK Laxman cartoon in early 90 s AAP’s stand on article 370 has confused and disheartened many. For its workers the party has opened itself to attacks by its adversaries because of its support to stripping of statehood for Jammu and Kashmir and thus weakening its own plank for[Read More…]

by 25/08/2019 2 comments India
How many more arrests and how many deaths of dalits and adivasis to take place in Niyamgiri region?

How many more arrests and how many deaths of dalits and adivasis to take place in Niyamgiri region?

CDRO severely condemns the death of Patnaik Harijan – a 45-year-old undertrial in Kalahandi district of Odisha on August 23, 2019.  The deceased, a daily wage labourer from Rengapalli village of Lanjigarh block, was declared dead at VIMSAR, Burla where he was admitted by the Bhawanipatna jail authorities in critical condition.  He had been in prison since four months. He[Read More…]

by 25/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Human Rights
The Carpenter Friend

The Carpenter Friend

I do not wish the sun to rise And I do not wish the moon to disappear The carpenter who made this bed Has done more than he could dream for Saving me from the nightmare of getting up To see what I do not wish to see And to hear what I do not wish to hear If ever[Read More…]

by 25/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
A Dialectical Materialist Response to “The Metaphysics of Revolution”

A Dialectical Materialist Response to “The Metaphysics of Revolution”

I use a simple formula, perhaps too simple, to teach my students the different categories of philosophical thinking. It is difficult to explain without a visual, but I will try. To begin with there are the two polar opposite ways of thinking, the Metaphysical and the Materialist, or, if one prefers, the Religious and the Scientific. The Metaphysical seeks explanations[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 1 comment Life/Philosophy
“We are all equal!” Captain who saved refugees refuses award from Paris mayor

“We are all equal!” Captain who saved refugees refuses award from Paris mayor

Pia Klemp, the former captain of the refugee rescue ship Juventa, who together with her crew saved thousands of refugees in the Mediterranean Sea, is refusing to accept an honorary prize bestowed by the Socialist Party mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo. The 36-year-old from Germany announced her decision in a post on her personal Facebook page on Tuesday. She states:[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 4 comments World
Photo by George M. Groutas

Resist Locally, Renew Globally

Resistance to corporate rule at the policy level will need to be coupled with the generation of alternatives from below, to fill the gaps left by the departing old system. The Promise and Pitfalls of Localism The fact that the language of localism is being increasingly co-opted by authoritarians around the world is itself a sign of localism’s appeal. Left[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Counter Solutions
Earth 4C Hotter

Earth 4C Hotter

A decade ago several prominent climate scientists discussed the prospects of a 4C Earth. Their concern was qualified “… if greenhouse gases do not slow down, then expect a 4C Earth by 2055.”Of course, that would be catastrophic, and one can only assume those scientists must have recognized real risks. Otherwise, why address the issue of 4C by 2055 in[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Climate Criminal Australia Sabotages Pacific Islands Forum & Threatens All Island Nations

Climate Criminal Australia Sabotages Pacific Islands Forum & Threatens All Island Nations

The 18 nations of the Pacific Islands Forum recently held their 50th meeting. US lackey and climate criminal Australia brought an anti-China  American agenda, offered a $500 million dollar bribe (stolen and rebranded from its  miniscule Aid budget), and sabotaged  the consensus Forum statement on action over the worsening climate change threat to Island Nations. Humanity is existentially threatened  by[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Diverging Gulf responses to Kashmir and Xinjiang ripple across Asia

Diverging Gulf responses to Kashmir and Xinjiang ripple across Asia

Recent diametrically opposed responses to repression of Muslims by China, India and other Asian countries highlight deep differences among Gulf states that ripple across Asia. The different responses were evident in Gulf reactions to India’s unilateral withdrawal of Kashmir’s autonomy and Qatar’s reversal of its support of China’s brutal clampdown on Turkic Muslims in its troubled, north-western province of Xinjiang.[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Jeff Bezos’s Politics

Jeff Bezos’s Politics

Jeff Bezos is the owner of the daily newspaper in Washington DC, the Washington Post, which leads America’s news-media and their almost 100% support of (and promotions for) neoconservatism — American imperialism, or wars. This includes sanctions, coups, and military invasions, against countries that America’s billionaires want to control but don’t yet control — such as Venezuela, Syria, Iran, Russia,[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 1 comment World
Boris Johnson, GMOs and Glyphosate: Irresponsible, Negligent and Criminal?

Boris Johnson, GMOs and Glyphosate: Irresponsible, Negligent and Criminal?

  In his first speech to parliament as British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson said: “Let’s start now to liberate the UK’s extraordinary bioscience sector from anti-genetic modification rules and let’s develop the blight-resistant crops that will feed the world.” Johnson reads from a well-rehearsed script. The ‘GM will feed the world mantra’ is pure industry spin. There is already enough[Read More…]

The Forthcoming Presidential, Parliamentary Elections: The Urgent Need For The Unity Of All Tamil Political Parties

The Forthcoming Presidential, Parliamentary Elections: The Urgent Need For The Unity Of All Tamil Political Parties

As far as Tamils are concerned the forthcoming elections [Presidential and Parliamentary] is not going to solve any of the burning problems faced by the Tamils since independence, in 1948. Since independence Tamils and Tamil leaders were betrayed, cheated by the two major political parties United National Party UNP and Sri Lanka Freedom Party [SLFP] As far as Tamils are[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 Comments are Disabled South Asia
The Demolition of Sant Guru Ravidass Temple And The Way Forward For Dalits

The Demolition of Sant Guru Ravidass Temple And The Way Forward For Dalits

                    Tughlabad is a town situated in Delhi National Capital Regions. This area is not fully developed as compared to other posh localities of Delhi. Several big or small forts were built in this area during the reign of Sultan Ibrahm Lodi(1517-1526). Tughlabad is politically hot area due to the presence[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Condemn the Tragic Death of Pattnaik Harijan of Rengapalli Village in Jail Custody

Condemn the Tragic Death of Pattnaik Harijan of Rengapalli Village in Jail Custody

We, concerned citizens and organizations in Odisha, are shocked and outraged at the death of Pattnaik Harijan, a resident of Rengapalli village, Lanjigarh block, Kalahandi district at the Burla Medical College Hospital while in the custody of Kalahandi jail authorities and administration.  He died yesterday, Friday, August 23 when he was brought from Bhawanipatna Jail with high fever. We are[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Human Rights
Effective climate mitigation – What we aren’t talking about in Canada’s election

Effective climate mitigation – What we aren’t talking about in Canada’s election

Energy transitions have historically taken many decades, half centuries. But now, to stay under even a 2C (and not the much safer 1.5C) global rise in temperature, greenhouse gas emissions must be halved in each of the upcoming decades. Climate change is now a sprint with heavy emission reduction needed as quickly as possible. A carbon pricing aided decarbonization where[Read More…]

by 24/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Wildfires rage throughout the Amazon rainforest

Wildfires rage throughout the Amazon rainforest

Satellite imagery reveals that at least a quarter of the Amazon rainforest is on fire or covered in soot and ash across the four Brazilian Amazonian states: Amazonas, Rondônia, Mato Grosso and Pará. A combination of dry summer heat exacerbated by climate change, planned burnings and expanded deforestation of the Amazon rainforest has sparked at least 9,507 new wildfires in[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Planet images showing Nova Bandeirantes in Mato Grosso, Brazil after a fire on Aug. 21, 2019. (Photo: courtesy of Planet Labs Inc.)

Views of Destruction: Satellite Images Reveal Devastating Amazon Fires in Almost Real-Time

High-resolution images from satellite company Planet are revealing glimpses of some of the fires currently devastating the Amazon rainforest. While many of the images currently being shared on social media and by news outlets are from past fires — some from as long as 15 years ago — satellites can provide a near real-time view of what’s unfolding in the Amazon. With[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Our Vanishing World: Glaciers

Our Vanishing World: Glaciers

Something is causing the worlds glaciers and mountain ice fields to melt. And, despite your first thought, it is not the ongoing climate catastrophe. It does not matter where on Earth the glaciers and mountain ice fields are located, they are all melting. Moreover, the projected timeframe for some of them to disappear altogether is ‘imminently’; that is, within years.[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 1 comment Climate Change
Climate Crisis: Panic as 74,000 Amazon Wildfires Plunge Sao Paulo into Darkness, Can be Seen from Space

Climate Crisis: Panic as 74,000 Amazon Wildfires Plunge Sao Paulo into Darkness, Can be Seen from Space

Brazil’s big commercial hub, Sao Paulo, went dark on Wednesday afternoon. I’ve been to Sao Paulo in late August. It is bright. Accu-Weather quoted Brazilian meteorologist Josélia Pegorim from an O Globo interview: “The smoke didn’t come from fires in the state of Sao Paulo, but from very dense wildfires that have been happening for several days in Rondônia and Bolivia.” That[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 1 comment Environmental Protection
Leaked Documents Show Brazil’s Bolsonaro Has Grave Plans for Amazon Rainforest

Leaked Documents Show Brazil’s Bolsonaro Has Grave Plans for Amazon Rainforest

DemocraciaAbierta had access to PowerPoints from a meeting between members of the Bolsonaro government. The slides show that the current government intends to use the president’s hate speech to diminish the power of minorities living in the region and to implement predatory projects that could have a devastating environmental impact for the Amazon.  Leaked documents show that Jair Bolsonaro’s government[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Bolsonaro’s ‘Disastrous’ Policies on Amazon Led to Fires, Say Observers

Bolsonaro’s ‘Disastrous’ Policies on Amazon Led to Fires, Say Observers

The Amazon is burning and Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is to blame. That’s the general consensus from observers and green groups who say the right-wing firebrand’s anti-environmental policies shoulder the lion’s share of the responsibility for thousands of fires across the rainforest, known as the world’s lungs The fires, as writer Wendi Muse pointed out on Twitter, aren’t spontaneous, but[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Most Major Opposition Parties Demonstrate At New Delhi In Support of Kashmiris; Protest Reminiscent of J.P.’s 25 June, 1975 Rally

Most Major Opposition Parties Demonstrate At New Delhi In Support of Kashmiris; Protest Reminiscent of J.P.’s 25 June, 1975 Rally

Co-Written by Dr. P. S. Sahni & Shobha Aggarwal   On 22 August, 2019 leaders of most major opposition parties demonstrated at the national protest site, JantarMantar, New Delhi, India from 11 a.m. to 1.15 p.m. The all party demonstration was organized to urge immediate release of leaders detained in J & K; to save democracy and to protect human[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 2 comments India
Imperial Sentiments: Donald Trump, Greenland and Colonial Real Estate

Imperial Sentiments: Donald Trump, Greenland and Colonial Real Estate

Haven’t the critics worked it out yet?  US President Donald Trump chugs to the coal of nonsense that may come in the wrapping of some sense. Initial mad-cat comments, when cobbled together, might reveal some pattern in time. Take, for instance, the recent offer to purchase Greenland.  Considered laughable, purchasing territories has notable, historical precedent in US foreign policy.  Territorial[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Imperialism
Debunking ‘Lower Oil Supply Will Raise Prices’

Debunking ‘Lower Oil Supply Will Raise Prices’

We often hear the statement, “When oil supply is lower, oil prices will rise because of scarcity.” Now, we are getting to see firsthand whether oil prices really do rise, as oil supplies become more scarce. Figure 1. Figure from the OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report for August 2019 showing world and OPEC oil production by month. Figure 1 shows that world[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Resource Crisis
Suddenly West Is Failing To Overthrow “Regimes”

Suddenly West Is Failing To Overthrow “Regimes”

It used to be done regularly and it worked: The West identified a country as its enemy, unleashed its professional propaganda against it, then administered a series of sanctions, starving and murdering children, the elderly and other vulnerable groups. If the country did not collapse within months or just couple of years, the bombing would begin. And the nation, totally[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 1 comment Imperialism
Fighting democracy’s crisis and the capitalist state. A Manifesto

Fighting democracy’s crisis and the capitalist state. A Manifesto

Co-Written by Bhabani Shankar Nayak & Ernesto Gallo What is happening to democracies across the globe? Neoliberalism and the rise of authoritarianism are moving together and, by dismantling social harmonies and states, are threatening democracy’s very existence. In fact they are combining and consolidating in different forms, of which three look more remarkable. First, there is the rise of nationalist[Read More…]

by 23/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Youth to Adults—Join Us in the Climate Fight

Youth to Adults—Join Us in the Climate Fight

So far it’s been the hottest summer ever recorded — June was the hottest June, and July was the hottest month ever. France, Germany, Britain, Belgium, and the Netherlands had their hottest days of all time, joining countries from Cuba to Vietnam and Togo to the Reunion Islands. This is dangerous for two reasons. One, it’s destroying the planet. And[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Holier Than Thou:  A Response to Dan Corjescu’s “On the Persistence of Religion”

Holier Than Thou:  A Response to Dan Corjescu’s “On the Persistence of Religion”

I have yet to find the time to sit down and write a thorough response to Dan Corjescu’s last piece “On the Metaphysics of Revolution”, which was, to my mind, a gross misinterpretation of Socrates in particular,  and on the evolution of revolutionary thought in philosophy in general.  However, on the appearance of this, his second piece, I promised myself[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 6 comments Life/Philosophy
In Kashmir Health Professionals Speak Truth to Power

In Kashmir Health Professionals Speak Truth to Power

These are strange times. A state can just get ‘obliterated’ from the map of the nation. Constitutional propriety is set aside to deprive millions of citizens of their basic human rights while a significant section of the rest of the country ‘rejoices’ over it all. A large section of the media has abandoned its role as watchdog of democracy but[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Dalit Bahujan Solidarity With Kashmir

Dalit Bahujan Solidarity With Kashmir

We, the undersigned — Dalit, Bahujan, Adivasi, members of all marginalised communities and anti-caste allies of India — condemn the support shown by certain Dalit–Bahujan political party leaders to the Bharatiya Janata Party government’s decision of diluting Article 370 of Constitution of India through fraudulent means. Our heart goes out to the people of Kashmir who are in a confused[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 2 comments India
On Day One, the Next President Should Declare A Climate Emergency

On Day One, the Next President Should Declare A Climate Emergency

The next president should declare a Climate Emergency, which will give the president powers to act rapidly and decisively to confront the climate crisis. The president should also create a cabinet-level Office of Climate Mobilization for the coordination of all federal agencies in mobilizing the nation’s resources to achieve zero greenhouse gas emissions and 100% clean renewable energy by 2030.[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Jeffrey Epstein and the Spectacle of Secrecy

Jeffrey Epstein and the Spectacle of Secrecy

When phrases such as “the deep state” and “conspiracy theory” become staples of both the corporate mainstream media and the alternative press, we know the realities behind these phrases have outlasted their usefulness for the ruling elites that control the United States and for their critics,each of whom uses them refutably or corrobatively. These phrases are bandied about so often[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Gandhi’s Contribution To Communal Harmony

Gandhi’s Contribution To Communal Harmony

It is well known that Mahatma Gandhi began his meetings with a all faith prayer – reciting portions from various religious texts. Gandhi was a firm believer in the idea of communal harmony. From his childhood as he used to nurse his father, he got an opportunity to listen to his father’s friends, belonging to different religions including Islam and[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Communal Harmony
Beyond Kashmir – some thoughts

Beyond Kashmir – some thoughts

‘ Extreme violence has a way of preventing us from seeing the interests it serves’ Naomi Klein from ‘The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism’ Many analysts have presented critique of the Abrogation of Article 370 and its impact on the political and social conditions but not much has been expressed about the causes of such hasty policy decisions.[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
The Dead Flower

The Dead Flower

Sometimes I do not like meeting people Whenever I do not like meeting myself Meaningless actions and meaningless words Among the multitude of meaningless people Make me feel the need to enjoy the absurdity To understand that a word in need Is just a word indeed. And when the heaven fell on earth I thought it was a dead flower[Read More…]

by 22/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Jewish Settlers Rule the Roost in Israel, But at What Price? 

Jewish Settlers Rule the Roost in Israel, But at What Price? 

Israeli Jewish settlers are on a rampage in the occupied Palestinian West Bank. While settler violence is part of everyday routine in Palestine, the violence of recent weeks is directly linked to the general elections in Israel, scheduled to be held on September 17. The previous elections, on April 9, failed to bring about political stability. Although Israeli leader Benjamin[Read More…]

by 21/08/2019 1 comment Palestine
 Can Modi save India from a looming disaster?

 Can Modi save India from a looming disaster?

          The early warning signals are blaring, and a disaster is in the making. It will tear the nation apart severely impairing the economic prosperity gained in the last twenty years. Terrorism in the likes of Afghanistan was never a part of India, but the conditions are ripe to give birth to it. The United States has much to lose, first[Read More…]

by 21/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
The ‘Ayurvedic’ Supervisor: Remembering Biswamoy Pati

The ‘Ayurvedic’ Supervisor: Remembering Biswamoy Pati

My candid association with Dr. Biswamoy Pati began somewhere around 2012 when I eventually settled down for social history of health and medicine as my research theme for MPhil/PhD which was met by an equally enthusiastic and generous response by Dr. Pati. Although he had taught us earlier the paper on Social History of Modern India during post-graduation, the deplorable[Read More…]

by 21/08/2019 1 comment Life/Philosophy
Political Economy of SEZ in India

Political Economy of SEZ in India

The contradiction of praxis is the eternal contradiction of Capitalism with its innate attribute of unceasing accumulation. It means opposite to what it says. It appropriated political power and established itself with the slogans of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity but its very existence depends on the contrary principles, as its prominent organic intellectual Adam Smith has aptly defined the historical progress (of[Read More…]

by 21/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Global collapse has begun, but this doesn’t mean we have to give up hope

Global collapse has begun, but this doesn’t mean we have to give up hope

David B. Lauterwasser writes: Very few people today think that our global civilization is on the brink of collapse. Most of the news consist of disturbing stories on increasingly overwhelming issues that, plainly spoken, seem impossible to solve. And yet, no one even recognizes that it is collapse that’s started to unfold all around us. Only the fewest today think that[Read More…]

On the Persistence of Religion

On the Persistence of Religion

We feel that even if all possible sci entific questions be answered, the problems of life have still not been touched at all —Ludwig Wittgenstein Tractatus Recently I received an angry note about the persistence of religion in the modern world as proof of the world’s ongoing irrationality in response to some of my comments in my lately published article[Read More…]

by 21/08/2019 1 comment Life/Philosophy
Sick of being a guinea pig

Sick of being a guinea pig

Some corporations and governments have used the US public as guinea pigs in uncontrolled experiments conducted without the public’s approval. They were often gambling with our well being when they introduced new products or conducted risky tests. In contrast, there were usually few risks for the CEOs or government officials in charge of these unacknowledged experiments. If serious harm occurred,[Read More…]

by 21/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
An Axis of Hope, Dignity and Defiance stands up to the Triumvirate of Evil

An Axis of Hope, Dignity and Defiance stands up to the Triumvirate of Evil

We will never accept the Mark of the Beast In these times, many in the Americas and the Caribbean are giving in to geo-political fatalism. Their argument is that because we are locatedin the so-called “backyard” of the Empire, we must inevitably accept the mark of the beast.  We have survived centuries of enslavement and colonialism no thanks to such[Read More…]

by 21/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Character of our nation is on test

Character of our nation is on test

Co-Written by Aruna Roy and Nachiket Udupa Those of us who care for integrity, principle and constitutional values as citizens of India have a huge task ahead. When Independence was dreamt of, it must have seemed impossible “Being part of a democratic government is hard. Being a citizen is hard. It is a challenge. It’s supposed to be. There’s no[Read More…]

by 21/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Coporate Loot And People’s Resistance In Niyamgiri

Coporate Loot And People’s Resistance In Niyamgiri

By CDRO AND GASS On August 18, a report titled “Corporate Loot and People’s Resistance in Niyamgiri” was released at the CDRO Convention on UAPA and other Draconian Law held in Jalandhar, Punjab. The report is an outcome of a joint fact-finding visit by a 16-member team from April 26-28, 2019 from All India Coordination of Democratic Rights Organization (CDRO)[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Israel pushing Palestinians to leave Gaza

Israel pushing Palestinians to leave Gaza

Israel is actively encouraging and ready to facilitate mass emigration of Palestinians from Gaza, according to a senior government official. “Israel is ready to carry the costs of helping Gazans emigrate,” and would potentially use air force bases in Israel for that purpose, The Times of Israel reported on Monday. The unnamed official, in Kyiv as part of Benjamin Netanyahu’s delegation to Ukraine,[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 1 comment Palestine
Fascism Then And Now: A New Book

Fascism Then And Now: A New Book

I would like to announce the publication of a new book, entitled “Fascism, Then and Now”. It  can be freely downloaded from the following link: http://eacpe.org/app/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Fascism-then-and-now-John-Scales-Avery.pdf Please circulate the link to your friends who might be interested. Parallels between fascism of the 1930’w and neo-fascism today There  are many extremely worrying similarities between fascism in Europe in the 1930’s and[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 1 comment Book Review
Abrogation of Article 370: A Legal Fiction

Abrogation of Article 370: A Legal Fiction

It is not just Article 370, the President’s Order has also amended Article 367, changing the substantive character of an important provision besides abolishing the entire Constitution of Jammu & Kashmir. Article 370 is meant for preserving autonomy for Jammu & Kashmir, leaving decision-making power regarding relationship with the Centre to the State’s Constituent Assembly. It is a serious limitation[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Normalization of Hindutva politics and Saffron modernity in India

Normalization of Hindutva politics and Saffron modernity in India

Right-wing extremists’ politics in India has now stamped absolutely as an authentic politics in the majority expectation. Now the question is about its future concerning India as a nation laden in the cultural foundation of conservatism and purity. Does India, as a society, will be moulded through the power of right-wing politics into a single cultural system?  The recent rise[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 1 comment India
“Unify Behind The Science” of Impending Abrupt Climate Disruption

“Unify Behind The Science” of Impending Abrupt Climate Disruption

Perhaps the immutable forces of Nature are beginning to take charge of the total food supply for human consumption. That is to say, Nature is taking control of the human food supply out of human hands where that control has resided for the past 10,000 years. There is something terrible and tragic in the course of human events that is[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 2 comments Climate Change
BREXIT – or Not? Masters of Manipulating Public Opinion

BREXIT – or Not? Masters of Manipulating Public Opinion

BREXIT deadline is 31 October 2019. On 23 June 2016, the British people voted 52% against 48% to leave the European Union. In England alone, the margin was somewhat higher, 53.4% for leaving the EU, against 46.6% for staying. In the meantime we know, that this result was influenced by Cambridge Analytica, the same as the Trump Presidency was apparently[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 1 comment World
Israel’s Secret

Israel’s Secret

It is an established, and a very well-known fact that Israel is a genocidal, terrorist, ethnic-cleansing colonial state. Backed by a genocidal blood-thirsty real estate elitist god (read the Old Testament/the Torah) with a racist enslaving anti-goyim supremacist and vengeful religion, similar to ISIS terrorists of today, Zionist Jewish terrorist gangs such as the Stern, the Irgun, the Palmach and[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 1 comment World
The Metaphysics of Revolution

The Metaphysics of Revolution

Socrates was the first revolutionary. He opened up with a legendary oracular search the inner space from which the individual, as we understand him today, would eventually emerge. His “daemon” was that which spoke the necessary freedom and autonomy to become what we are. His was the first lesson. His student, Plato, brought on the second movement. He postulated the[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
The Quest For an Ideal Teacher

The Quest For an Ideal Teacher

The best teacher is the one who suggests rather than dogmatizes, and inspires his listener with the wish to teach himself. ~ Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton Ideal teacher could be somebody who has empathy, understanding, patience and the ability to provide the knowledge of what student seeks in a comprehensive manner by helping him to liberate his mind. Unfortunately not many[Read More…]

by 20/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Press Conference in Ayodhya Banned

Press Conference in Ayodhya Banned

Today when we tried to hold a Press Conference at the Ram Janki temple in Saryu Kunj, Vasishtha Kund, Ayodhya at 11 am at the venue of the two days meeting on communal harmony on 17-18 August, 2019, which was to be addressed by Professor Ram Puniyani, and which was not allowed to be held, to explain the purpose of[Read More…]

by 19/08/2019 2 comments Communal Harmony
Hong Kong In The Crosshairs of Global Power And Ideological Struggle

Hong Kong In The Crosshairs of Global Power And Ideological Struggle

Co-Written by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers Hong Kong is one of the most extreme examples of big finance, neoliberal capitalism in the world. As a result, many people in Hong Kong are suffering from great economic insecurity in a city with 93 billionaires, second-most of any city. Hong Kong is suffering the effects of being colonized by Britain for more than[Read More…]

by 19/08/2019 2 comments World
No Deal Chaos: The Brexit Cliff Face and Operation Yellowhammer

No Deal Chaos: The Brexit Cliff Face and Operation Yellowhammer

Britain’s Boris Johnson is driving his country to the cliff face, along the way mouthing and spouting all manner of populist reassurances.  Still fresh in the job, he declared that UK preparations for a no-deal Brexit on October 31, when Britain would leave the European Union, would receive a boost – a “turbocharge”, no less.  Michael Gove, now chancellor of[Read More…]

by 19/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Orwell Revisited in the Age of Trump

Orwell Revisited in the Age of Trump

I, Winston Smith… I mean, Tom Engelhardt… have not just been reading a dystopian novel, but, it seems, living one — and I suspect I’ve been living one all my life. Yes, I recently reread George Orwell’s classic 1949 novel, 1984. In it, Winston Smith, a secret opponent of the totalitarian world of Oceania, one of three great imperial superpowers left[Read More…]

by 19/08/2019 1 comment World
Offering Choice but Delivering Tyranny: The Corporate Capture of Agriculture

Offering Choice but Delivering Tyranny: The Corporate Capture of Agriculture

Many lobbyists talk a lot about critics of genetic engineering technology denying choice to farmers. They say that farmers should have access to a range of tools and technologies to maximise choice and options. At the same time, somewhat ironically, they decry organic agriculture and proven agroecological approaches, presumably because these practices have no need for the proprietary inputs of the[Read More…]

Revocation of Kashmir’s Article 370 and a Prognosis

Revocation of Kashmir’s Article 370 and a Prognosis

  On Monday August 5, 2019, Modi government abrogated Article 370 of the Indian Constitution that gave special autonomy status to Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) and bifurcated the state into two Union Territories – Jammu and Kashmir; and Ladakh. The move has led to mixed reactions in India though buoyed by the Hindutva ideology the majority who no doubt sees[Read More…]

by 19/08/2019 2 comments India
Cruelty by the Indian State…Kashmir caged

Cruelty by the Indian State…Kashmir caged

Since the arrival Modi in our political scenario in 2002, India has steadily drifted into world of “pseudo-reality”. By 2019, India has fallen deep into “the abyss of a totalitarian society”. Yet another “master-stroke” hurtling India towards disaster. The problem here is that since 1947 the UN has regarded the whole of Kashmir (held by India and Pakistan) as “disputed[Read More…]

by 19/08/2019 1 comment India
The Threat To Life From Ocean Microplastics

The Threat To Life From Ocean Microplastics

Co-Written by Meena Miriam Yust and Arshad Khan When Chelsea Rochman at the University of Toronto and colleagues began their study on medakas (small Japanese rice paddy fish), they did not expect to find what they did. They first soaked ground-up polyethylene in San Diego Bay for three months and then fed it to these fish along with a laboratory diet.  They[Read More…]

by 18/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Now Ram Puniyani Prevented From Going To Ayodhya

Now Ram Puniyani Prevented From Going To Ayodhya

We condemn the house arrest of Advocate Mohammd Shoaib, Sandeep Pandey and other friends on 11th and 16th August, 2019 on the issue of staging one hour candle light demonstration in support of people of Jammu and Kashmir and for preventing Professor Ram Puniyani, Sandeep Panday, Rajeev Yadav, Hafeez Kidwai and others from reaching Ayodhya on 17th August, 2019 for[Read More…]

by 18/08/2019 1 comment Communal Harmony
This picture taken on September 5, 2018 shows flags from the Pacific Islands countries being displayed in Yaren on the last day of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF). - PIF members on September 5 signed a security agreement promoting cooperation on issues such as trans-national crime, illegal fishing and cyber-crime.The agreement, called the Boe Declaration, also recognised the need for joint action on "non-traditional" threats, primarily climate change. (Photo by Mike LEYRAL / AFP)        (Photo credit should read MIKE LEYRAL/AFP/Getty Images)

Condescension and Climate Change: Australia and the Failure of the Pacific Islands Forum

It was predictably ugly: in tone, in regret, and, in some ways, disgust.  Australia emerged from the Pacific Islands Forum Leaders Meeting isolated, the true spoiler of the party which saw 17 states facing the obstinacy of one.  It had taken place on Tuvalu, some two hours flight north of Fiji.  The capital Funafuti is located on vanishing land; the[Read More…]

by 18/08/2019 1 comment Climate Change
Divestiture of BJP`s Delhi Unit Politics  

Divestiture of BJP`s Delhi Unit Politics  

The Delhi unit of Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP), no doubt, is making all cunning efforts to win the forthcoming Municipal Corporation Delhi(MCD) elections in Delhi. The BJP Delhi unit chief, Manoj Tiwari, a popular Bhojpuri singer, is inviting & cajoling all disgruntled, tired, hopeless, disloyal and corrupt Congress and Aam Aadmi Party(AAP) party erstwhile leaders in the hope to strengthen the[Read More…]

by 18/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Why Palestine?

Why Palestine?

Is it because when ‘God’ created this land, with its sweeping landscapes, its proud hills, its sweet streams, its succulent figs, its crunchy grapes, its juicy oranges and its mighty olive trees he was overwhelmed with its beauty? Maybe because of all this he decided to call this land his own and, as such, plagued it or blessed it from[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Palestine
India may use nuclear option first to pre-empt attack of Pakistan

India may use nuclear option first to pre-empt attack of Pakistan

In an apparent shift in its ‘no first use of nuclear option’ doctrine, Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh said Friday (August 16) that while India has strictly adhered to Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s doctrine of ‘No First Use’ (NFU) of nuclear weapons, “what happens in future depends on the circumstances”. In a visit to Pokhran in western India, the site of[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 2 comments India
God, Guns and Video Games

God, Guns and Video Games

The din struck by videos of the gaming variety; its forced causal link (always alleged, never proved) to altering conduct, continues its relentless march across the discussion forums in the United States and beyond.  The almost casual butcheries – actual, not as opposed to digital – have gone on unabated, the next extremist taking a murderous shot at his role[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
A Crime of ‘Pure’ Indifference

A Crime of ‘Pure’ Indifference

The ethic that dehumanises dalits continues 72 years after the country’s Independence. ‘What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty,[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Business and boxing: two sides of the same coin

Business and boxing: two sides of the same coin

What do a planned US$15 billion Saudi investment in petroleum-related Indian businesses and a controversial boxing championship have in common? Both reflect a world in which power and economics drive policy, politics and business at the expense of fundamental rights. And both underscore an emerging new world order in which might is right, a jungle in which dissenters, minorities and[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
The Sell-Off Government

The Sell-Off Government

The Standing Committee on Defence, 2017-18 of the Sixteenth Lok Sabha highlights the idea of Buy Indian-IDDM (Indigenously Designed Developed and Manufactured). The Committee expressed concern over the import content of equipments produced and developed by Defence Research and Development Organisation, Ordnance Factories and Defence Public Sector Undertakings because of the dependence it creates for military hardware on foreign suppliers.[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Kashmir`s Faux Pas

Kashmir`s Faux Pas

Kashmir`s antiquity dates back to about 3000 BC, to make it contemporaneous to the Indus valley civilization. Kashmir has been a great seat of learning during the Vedic period, a part of the Maurya Empire in the 3rd century BC under Asoka, who founded the city of Srinagar. Srinagar is also known as ‘Paradise on Earth’. I shall not go[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
UAPA Bill 2019, Was It Required?

UAPA Bill 2019, Was It Required?

The Unlawful Activities Prevention Amendment Bill 2019 has been passed after days of deadlock between the government and the opposition parties in Rajya Sabha. The bill gives Central government the POWER to designate/tag/label individuals as terrorists on the basis of suspicion without following any formal judicial process. When designated as terrorists an individual can appeal to Union home secretary, who[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Kashmir

Kashmir

A soul without a body was walking Wondering how much time was left in his life The corpses on the side of the road Seemed to be breathing A man with a chopped hand Was struggling to ride a bicycle Women hid their faces For the shame others have done to them The past was best to be forgotten The[Read More…]

by 17/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
NOAA revealed Thursday that July 2019 was the hottest month on record since the U.S. government began recording temperature date in the lat 19th century. (Photo: Lukas Schulze/Getty Images)

July 2019 Was Hottest Month Since Records Began in 1880

As climate scientists raise alarm over hotter and hotter global temperatures, a top U.S. weather agency reported on Thursday that July 2019 was the hottest month the planet has ever experienced since the government began recording global temperatures nearly 140 years ago. NOAA’s monthly Global Climate Report revealed that last month the average worldwide temperature was 1.71 degrees Fahrenheit above the average[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 1 comment Climate Change
Financial turbulence continues as major economies move towards recession

Financial turbulence continues as major economies move towards recession

Markets around the world fell yesterday in response to the biggest fall on Wall Street for the year on Wednesday, amid further indications from bond markets and production data that the global economy is moving into recession. In response to the Wall Street decline, markets in Asia fell with Japan’s Topix index down 1 percent while the Australian market dropped[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
The Chief of Defence Staff appointment: An inauspicious beginning

The Chief of Defence Staff appointment: An inauspicious beginning

Since several committees have recommended the creation of the appointment of the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) or equivalent position, here issue is not taken with the government finally getting round to creating the post. The problem is the maneuvering – amounting to musical chairs – attending the naming of its first incumbent. That the creation of the position has[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Article 370: Magsaysay Awardee Sandeep Pandey Put Under House Arrest Again

Article 370: Magsaysay Awardee Sandeep Pandey Put Under House Arrest Again

Social activist and Magsaysay Award winner Sandeep Pandey was put under house arrest again. In a brief mail he said, ” The police arrived again today at my and advocate Mohammad Shoaib’s place to house arrest us and other activists an hour and a half before candle light demonstration at Gandhi statue, Hazratganj, Lucknow scheduled at 6 pm.” On August[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
The Life and Legacy of Samir Amin

The Life and Legacy of Samir Amin

August 12th 2018 marks the first anniversary of the death of Samir Amin, a man who, in my view, was the first, and perhaps the most prolific, global organic intellectual in history. He quite literally traversed the seven continents, meeting with local lefts wherever he could find landfall, participating in their discussions, and building from them some of the most[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Tlaib And Omar’s Denial Of Entry Is Not A “Freedom Of Speech” Issue 

Tlaib And Omar’s Denial Of Entry Is Not A “Freedom Of Speech” Issue 

For how long will discourse on the plight of the Palestinian people be hostage to the notion that “impartial observers”, i.e., the silent majority on Israel, must be addressed in a manner that accounts for “where they are, not where we’d like them to be”? And who defines where these people are in the first place? According to Robert Cohen,[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 3 comments Palestine
Was it a Thumbs Up Sign or a Finger Gun Pointing at Us?

Was it a Thumbs Up Sign or a Finger Gun Pointing at Us?

I have to say it doesn’t take very long for Kansas’ 1st district Rep. Roger Marshall and his staff to feel like as though they are the victims of their constituents’ concerns and not the other way around. This time it started on Sunday, August 4 with some singing and chalking on Rep. Marshall’s sidewalk. The chalking included images as[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Remembering the late historian Prof. Mushirul Hasan’s ‘Secular Legacy’ on the special occasion of his 70th birth anniversary

Remembering the late historian Prof. Mushirul Hasan’s ‘Secular Legacy’ on the special occasion of his 70th birth anniversary

         It is to be remembered that the late Prof. Mushirul Hasan who was born on 15th August 1949 and passed away -after four years of his serious accident- on 10th December 2018 at Delhi.  At the outset, let me admit that Prof. Hasan had cherished and epitomized the rich heritage of India’s secular and plural legacy. Prof Hasan’s academic[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Disabled in a capitalist society

Disabled in a capitalist society

Since the major aim of capitalists is to see that maximum production can be extracted from labor, exploitation of workers becomes a key factor. Ordinary workers, thus, face constant harassment, humiliation, misery and burden of work. Disabled, in addition, face alienation and abuse both from the employers as well as society. The Merriam Webster Dictionary offers two definitions of disability.[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Pellet gun victim

Punjab of 1984 and Present Kashmir Bears Similarities

The manner and intent of Indian Establishment in sending of the Indian army to the Golden Temple in Amritsar on 3 June 1984 and degradation in special constitutional status of Jammu and Kashmir on 5 August (2019) bear a lot of similarities. Both actions were sudden and unexpected carried with excessive use of the armed forces. These two events were[Read More…]

by 16/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Indian Subcontinent Independence And Economies Lagging Counterparts

Indian Subcontinent Independence And Economies Lagging Counterparts

Mid-August is when the subcontinent celebrates independence from Britain.  Born in a cauldron of hate 72 years ago, India today is again filling it to the brim. In one fell swoop, Mr. Modi has denuded Kashmir of the flimsy shroud purporting to preserve its cultural and territorial integrity through articles 370 and 35A in the constitution — the latter empowering[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 2 comments India
How the U.S. Created the Central American Immigration Crisis

How the U.S. Created the Central American Immigration Crisis

 It’s hard to believe that more than four years have passed since the police shot Amílcar Pérez-López a few blocks from my house in San Francisco’s Mission District. He was an immigrant, 20 years old, and his remittances were the sole support for his mother and siblings in Guatemala. On February 26, 2015, two undercover police officers shot him six times[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 1 comment Human Rights
Inside India’s Dollar City

Inside India’s Dollar City

Co-Written by Kamalesh Roy  & Anuja Dutta For three decades now, Tirupur – a town in Tamil Nadu – has been engaged in the production of fabric and garment export business. This initiative – established as a coalition of few cotton mills – has emerged as the economic backbone of nearly four lakh workers depending on a mechanized mode of[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Night of the broken glass for Huzaifa Pandit

Night of the broken glass for Huzaifa Pandit

On the night of broken glass he reads a poem by Faiz. Outside, someone drives under influence down a frail bridge across the river, after the rains. jo toot gaya, so toot gaya ‘Khuda Hafiz. Khuda Hafiz, Would there be salvage after the wreck?’ asks the squeaky wiper blades to the tune of filmy rain dance that fogs the pane.[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
India at 72

India at 72

Caste system not only intact but strengthened. People facing untouchability still a reality. Manual scavenging still prevalent despite tall claims of swachh bharat People dying of hunger Children and girls still being trafficked. Violence against women one of the dirtiest realities of our society Honor killings are nothing but preservation of caste supremacy and to terrorise the lower castes Superstition[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 1 comment India
The Antarctic ice sheet is melting and, yeah, it’s probably our fault

The Antarctic ice sheet is melting and, yeah, it’s probably our fault

Glaciers in West Antarctica have thinned and accelerated in the last few decades.  A new paper provides some of the first evidence that this is due to human activities. It’s been some time since I wrote anything for RealClimate. In the interim there’s been a lot of important new work in the area of my primary research interest – Antarctica. Much[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
The fading home of Homo ‘sapiens’

The fading home of Homo ‘sapiens’

In front of our eyes green forests are blackened by fire, draughts turn grassy planes to brown semi-deserts,fertile  fields are flooded by muddy water,white snow and ice  melt to pale blue water and clear blue skies turn grey with aerosols. Preamble The inhabitants of planet Earth are in the process of destroying the habitability of their world through the perpetration[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
From Planetary Community to Universal Community

From Planetary Community to Universal Community

Socialist Freedom The workers of the world are yet to unite to accomplish their over-a-century-long pending task of overcoming what Thorstein Veblen called “the predatory phase” of human development. They have yet to move on to the phase of “an association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all” (Karl Marx and[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Questioning the Extremely Online

Questioning the Extremely Online

This essay is in regard to a crime that too often goes unmentioned when the conversations turn towards political analysis, the contemporary journalistic scene, and broader social critique: the crime of being extremely online. What does it mean to be extremely online? It mostly is as straightforward as it sounds. Generally, activities such as spending too much time on the[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Shanti Rides a Green Horse

Shanti Rides a Green Horse

(Wisdom-King Achala: The Unshakeable) Presented here are some tales and some verses by Bhusukupa, mystic, poet, who lived in the eastern parts of the Indian subcontinent around a millennium ago. Lovers of Bangla literature remember him as the poet who wrote seven and a half poems of the Chawrjyapawd collection that contains verses that speak of the Tantric SahajaYana or[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Freedom must speak itself

Freedom must speak itself

The word freedom has never fully revealed itself to me. When we were kids, the day off from school, or a my dad having time to take us kids for a round around the city, or my mother looking happy about not having to cook a meal because we were invited elsewhere seemed akin to what might be freedom. Before[Read More…]

by 15/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Pellet gun victim

Shocking! Press Club of India Refuses To Show Film And Photographs On Kashmir

I was present at this amazing, historical Press Conference at Press Club of India today afternoon, by a team just back from its Kashmir visit from August 9 to 13 with its Report on Kashmir after abrogation of Art. 370. Team consisted of Jean Dreze, economist, Maimoona Mollah, AIWDA, Kavita Krishnan, CPI- ML (Maale) and Vimal Bhai, NAPM. What was[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 2 comments India
Kashmir Caged: Fact Finding Report

Kashmir Caged: Fact Finding Report

We spent five days (9-13 August 2019) traveling extensively in Kashmir. Our visit began on 9 August 2019 – four days after the Indian government abrogated Articles 370 and 35A, dissolved the state of Jammu and Kashmir, and bifurcated it into two Union Territories. When we arrived in Srinagar on 9 August, we found the city silenced and desolated by curfew, and[Read More…]

Manifestos of Hate: What White Terrorists Have in Common

Manifestos of Hate: What White Terrorists Have in Common

Writing under the title of “If the El Paso shooter had been Muslim”, Moustafa Bayoumi stated the obvious. “If the El Paso shooter had been a Muslim,” Bayoumi wrote in the British Guardian newspaper on August 6, US President Donald Trump “would be lobbing accusations such as ‘Islam hates us’ in the direction of Muslims and not lecturing the public[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Sea Level Rise!

Sea Level Rise!

Sea level has been stable, at current levels, throughout recorded history for 5,000 years. That’s about to change. Still, it’s very difficult for people to imagine a change in sea level after 5,000 years of rock solid stability. Nevertheless, assuming sea levels do rise markedly, one of the biggest questions of the century is whether the world is prepared for[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Our climate crisis is dire, but our priority on war is sadly still higher

Our climate crisis is dire, but our priority on war is sadly still higher

Choosing up teams of nations to make military alliances to wage war….we have to stop doing that.  We now need one alliance, of all nations, to wage the real war against the real existential threat.  Climate heating.  Our global annual military spending of $2,000,000,000,000 ($2 trillion) should not be wasted on war. Climate heating is the enemy we created and[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 1 comment Climate Change
Australia’s Pacific Play: Denying Climate Change and Boosting China’s Threat

Australia’s Pacific Play: Denying Climate Change and Boosting China’s Threat

Australia has always nursed a contradictory, repressive relationship with its Pacific neighbours.  Being a satrap of great powers, it has performed the role of gate keeper and monitor of regional instability, a condescending, often paternalistic agent. At stages, it has also entertained more direct colonial interests.  For almost seven decades, Australia controlled Papua New Guinea, assuming power over the former[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Apartheid Israel Bombing Syria & Iraq – Hotting Up Deadly 4-Decade US War On Iran

Apartheid Israel Bombing Syria & Iraq – Hotting Up Deadly 4-Decade US War On Iran

Since the removal of the US-backed Shah in the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the US has enacted 4 decades of deadly hostility to Iran  through sanctions and violence that can be described as  a 4-decade US War on Iran. 1 million Iranians  died in the 1980-1988 US-backed Iran-Iraq War and 3 million Iranians died avoidably from deprivation in 4 decades of[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Paul Findley: A Man of Courage

Paul Findley: A Man of Courage

Paul Findley one of the most remarkable Congressmen that the US House of Representatives had produced since the Second World War passed away on the 9th of August 2019. He was 98 years old. He was first elected to Congress in 1960 from a district in Illinois once represented by Abraham Lincoln, his immortal hero.  Findley was elected 11 times[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Unmasking the elitist interest of UBI

Unmasking the elitist interest of UBI

Basic income, also called Universal basic income (UBI), Citizen’s income (CI), Citizen basic income, Basic income guarantee, or Universal Demogrant in different countries or regions is a capitalist reform project, a proposed periodic cash payment delivered to all on an individual basis, without means test or work requirement. The income will be (i) unconditional (ii) periodical (iii) non withdrawable i.e.[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Why do we treat science as a joke in Pakistan?

Why do we treat science as a joke in Pakistan?

The scene begins with a man theatrically putting on a white lab coat,matching mask and transparent protective glasses before adjusting his left glove with a dramatic snap while an array of beakers bubble in the background. The viewer then encounters an anonymous man in a white lab coat who carefully (and rather pointlessly) transfers non-descript pink liquid from one beaker[Read More…]

by 14/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Concerns grow over global financial stability

Concerns grow over global financial stability

The current turmoil in financial markets was set off by the Trump administration’s threat to impose tariffs on an additional $300 billion worth of Chinese goods and its decision to label China a “currency manipulator,” following Beijing’s move to allow the renminbi to fall. The extreme volatility has prompted questions about the stability of the global financial system. But the[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Hong Kong  airport resumes operations with over 200 flights still cancelled amidst violence

Hong Kong airport resumes operations with over 200 flights still cancelled amidst violence

The Hong Kong International Airport resumed operations on Tuesday, a day after all flights were cancelled due to violent acts by protesters. Media reports said: Despite resumption of activities of the HK international airport, still over 200 flights in and out of China’s Hong Kong Special Administrative Region have been cancelled on Tuesday. Thousands of protesters rallied at the airport,[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 1 comment World
Military Strength Is Our National Religion

Military Strength Is Our National Religion

  When I was a teenager in the 1970s, I looked to the heavens: to God and Christianity (as arbitrated by the Catholic Church) and to the soaring warbirds of the U.S. military, which I believed kept us safe. To my mind then, they were classic manifestations of American technological superiority over the godless Communists. With all its scandals, especially[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Imperialism
FILE PHOTO: Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) officers from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) look on after executing search warrants and making arrests at an agricultural processing facility in Canton, Mississippi, U.S. in this August 7, 2019 handout photo.    Immigration and Customs Enforcement/Handout via REUTERS  ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY./File Photo

Visions of Class Struggle:  The U.S.  Immigration and Customs Enforcement Raids in Mississippi

Karl Marx’s words are resilient – history is indeed “the history of class struggles.”  Not solely, because history has also been marked by gender, race, and religious struggles; but class struggles have and do shape the world we live in today.  Not to see the events occurring in the world through the lens of historical class conflict between the bourgeoisie[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 2 comments World
Indian State post-1947 Served Imperialists and Strengthened Landlord Base

Indian State post-1947 Served Imperialists and Strengthened Landlord Base

Distortion of Com.T Nagi Reddy’s views is not the way to pay real homage to him How fragile is India’s Constitution, and how illusory are its claims of sovereignty, independence, democracy, secularism and socialism has been noticed repeatedly over the last 70 plus years after 1947 August. RTI and Article 370 were the most recent shocks to some people who[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
PADS Condemns Modi Government’s Conspiracy Against People of Jammu and Kashmir

PADS Condemns Modi Government’s Conspiracy Against People of Jammu and Kashmir

The parliament of India on 6th August put its stamp of approval on bills abrogating article 370 and downgrading the state of Jammu and Kashmir to two union territories. When the representatives of the people of India were deciding the fate of the state, the people of J&K were forced into collective house arrests. Armed forces imposed curfew like restrictions[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
69 human rights activists and organizations sign letter to Prime Minister Modi on situation in Jammu & Kashmir

69 human rights activists and organizations sign letter to Prime Minister Modi on situation in Jammu & Kashmir

Dear Prime Minister Modi, We, the undersigned civil society activists and organizations, human rights defenders, lawyers, journalists, and academics from around the globe, write to express our deep concern regarding the recent actions your government has taken over the past week in the State of Jammu & Kashmir. The state’s unilateral repeal of the special status of Jammu & Kashmir,[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Official Myths on J&K Busted

Official Myths on J&K Busted

Economist and activist Jean Dreze, who has co-authored books with Nobel laureates, such as Amartya Sen and Angus Deaton, was in the headlines for a placard he carried to a protest rally in Delhi earlier this week. His placard challenged the government’s most critical justification for its controversial move to scrap Article 35A and read down Article 370 in Jammu[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 1 comment India
Obama’s Unending Wars

Obama’s Unending Wars

Obama’s Unending Wars – Fronting the Foreign Policy of the Permanent Warfare State. Jeremy Kuzmarov. Clarity Press, Atlanta, GA, USA, 2019. Obama is a shining light in comparison to his two bookends, George Bush and Donald Trump. His manner is calm and focussed as he presents his ideas with well mannered rhetorical flourishes, speaking in terms of hope, peace, change,[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Book Review
Reality-Denial Among America’s Democratic Party Faithful

Reality-Denial Among America’s Democratic Party Faithful

I used to be a Democrat, until the majority of Democrats in the U.S. Senate voted in 2002 for George W. Bush’s 2003 catastrophic invasion of Iraq, even though everything that Bush and his Administration were alleging the invasion to be based on were mere lies, by him and his Administration. A Senator or Representative is supposed to represent the[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Reflections on Trump’s “mental illness”

Reflections on Trump’s “mental illness”

I thought I knew what it meant, but I looked up the definition of insanity anyway: mentally deranged, not of sound mind; irrational [Concise Oxford Dictionary]. That is a rather broad spectrum and on more reflection includes not only Trump and his minions, but everyone else of us at least one time or another – including myself. Irrational How often[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 1 comment World
The Kashmir crisis spotlights what a civilizational world looks like

The Kashmir crisis spotlights what a civilizational world looks like

India’s decision to deprive Kashmir of its autonomy, alongside a clampdown in the troubled north-western Chinese province of Xinjiang and US-backed Israeli annexation of Arab land, is the latest indication of what a new world order led by civilizational leaders may look like. In dealing with recent conflicts, US President Donald J. Trump, Israeli and Indian prime ministers Benyamin Netanyahu[Read More…]

by 13/08/2019 1 comment India
Motor car crashes and a faltering economy

Motor car crashes and a faltering economy

It is not just the arrogant, rich and drunken drivers who cause road crashes . Even professors in IITs, the prestigious Indian Institute of Technology, tend to drive or tended to drive rashly within the campus injuring students. Dinesh Mohan, professor from IIT Delhi and the country’s foremost expert on road crashes, points out that when speed breakers were put[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Floods hit Indian states of Kerala, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu: Toll at least 150

Floods hit Indian states of Kerala, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu: Toll at least 150

Kerala flood 2019: A view of a flood-affected region in Malappuram district on Sunday. (PTI Photo) Monsoon fury has gripped central and southern Indian States. The floods have crippled life in vast areas, affecting millions. The death toll from floods in the Indian states of Karnataka, Kerala Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu rose to at least 150 on Sunday,[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Typhoon in eastern China takes 44 lives and wreaks havoc, billions of dollars in economic losses

Typhoon in eastern China takes 44 lives and wreaks havoc, billions of dollars in economic losses

Rescue workers help residents after Typhoon Lekima hit the city of Linhai The death toll from typhoon Lekima in eastern China rose to 44 people on Monday morning, according to official data, as the storm continued up the coast, racking up billions of dollars in economic losses and widely disrupting travel. This is the third-largest typhoon in China’s history. Typhoon[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Floods and landslide in Myanmar: At least 52 dead

Floods and landslide in Myanmar: At least 52 dead

Rescue workers search for bodies under debris and mud after a landslide in Mon state, Myanmar, August 10. © Thomson Reuters Foods and rain-pressed landslide   are taking a heavy toll in Myanmar. Troops have been deployed to flood-hit parts of Myanmar on Sunday to help with relief efforts after rising waters left thousands stranded and the death toll from a[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Climate Change
Holy Cow: Indian Political Chessboard

Holy Cow: Indian Political Chessboard

Lynching alone has not been the only fallout of making Holy cow as central to the agenda of Hindu nationalist BJP and its co travelers towards Hindu Rashtra. In the dreaded phenomenon of lynching the major victims have been the religious minorities and dalits as highlighted by in the letter of 49 eminent film and other personalities. This is just[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 2 comments India
Back-stabbing of Kashmiris & Dismembering of Jammu and Kashmir Into Tukde-Tukde By The Government of India

Back-stabbing of Kashmiris & Dismembering of Jammu and Kashmir Into Tukde-Tukde By The Government of India

From PIL Watch Group archives  The PIL Watch Group strongly condemns the reprehensible act of the Indian Govt. in relation to Jammu and Kashmir set in motion on 5 August, 2019. All assurances given to the people of Kashmir by the Indian Govt. since 1947 stand withdrawn through a sleight of hand by a brute majority in Parliament; as also[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 1 comment India
From the Royal to the Prophetic to the Apocalyptic: The Case for a Saving Remnant

From the Royal to the Prophetic to the Apocalyptic: The Case for a Saving Remnant

A version of this essay was presented at the “Is the Future of Agriculture Perennial?” conference, Lund University, Sweden, May 8, 2019. The royal, prophetic, and apocalyptic traditions in the Hebrew and Christian bibles provide a compelling framework for understanding progressive intellectual and political work today, as we face the task not only of struggling to create a just and sustainable world[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Counter Solutions
The World Is Uniting For International Law, Against US Empire

The World Is Uniting For International Law, Against US Empire

Co-Written by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flower “We oppose the extraterritorial application of unilateral measures.“ That is not Cuba, Nicaragua, Iran, Russia, or China talking about the most recent unilateral coercive measures imposed by the United States against Venezuela, i.e. economic sanctions that have become an economic blockade, but the European Union. Even allies who have embarrassed themselves by recognizing the[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 3 comments Imperialism
Epstein, Faction, and Neopatrimonialism

Epstein, Faction, and Neopatrimonialism

Faction: a number of citizens, whether amounting to a minority or majority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community. James Madison Never has the word “conspiracy” been spoken so easily. Never has the[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 1 comment World
Conspiracy, Death and Jeffrey Epstein

Conspiracy, Death and Jeffrey Epstein

Within minutes of news about his death in a Manhattan jail cell Saturday morning, theories spread with pestilential vigour.  Was Jeffrey Epstein murdered?  Accepting the premise without qualification, the next question followed: Who did it?  MSNBC host Joe Scarborough was not giving anyone time to wonder.  “A guy who had information that would have destroyed rich and powerful men’s lives[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Ambush at Kamikaze Pass

Ambush at Kamikaze Pass

Call it a summer whim or something about this grim moment of ours, but I had an urge to post at TomDispatch my very first piece of published writing. It appeared 48 years ago in what was, at the time, one of the more obscure journals on the face of the Earth, one I helped found as a then-antiwar-China-scholar-to-be: the Bulletin of Concerned Asian[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 2 comments Arts/Literature
Sacred Games In The Name of Babri Masjid

Sacred Games In The Name of Babri Masjid

Sacred Games-2 is slated to begin from August 15 on Netflix Cinema is the worst form of expression, and particularly more so, when we are bombarded with over 400 hours of news, real news, enacted news in our 24 hours, round the year, which has rendered an ordinary citizen gasping. Even real time wars, street to street battles and massacres[Read More…]

by 12/08/2019 1 comment Arts/Literature
They Fill the Land – What Filth!

They Fill the Land – What Filth!

The poem is based on a brief observational study done by my team and I on the Pirana landfill site in Ahmedabad. The poem is meant as a satirical take on the social and environmental repercussions of landfill sites, and our attempts to not acknowledge the same. It is intended not to preach, but provoke individuals to take cognizance of[Read More…]

Article 370: Magsaysay awardee Sandeep Pandey put under house arrest in UP

Article 370: Magsaysay awardee Sandeep Pandey put under house arrest in UP

Social activist and Magsaysay Award winner Sandeep Pandey and his activist wife Arundhati Dhuru were put under house arrest in Lucknow on Sunday to prevent them from holding a protest dharna against the revocation of article 370 and communication blockade in Jammu and Kashmir. The proposed protest ‘Stand for Kashmir’ was to be held on Sunday evening at the GPO[Read More…]

by 11/08/2019 1 comment India
Photo: “The Joy of Peace”. By Pilar Viviente, Venice 2019.

LIVING ON BRIDGES: Dialoguing on Peace, Cultural Violence, Education, Art

With Pilar Viviente, Gary Corseri and some esteemed friends Photo: “A Tower of Understanding”.  By Pilar Viviente, Venice, 2019 “Life can certainly throw us some hardballs, that’s for sure!  But that is the thing about life—unfathomable, mysterious, beautiful and ugly all on one plate, one sitting, one incarnation.” — Antonio C. S. Rosa “Nous sommecomme des nainsjuche sur des epaules[Read More…]

by 11/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Kashmir: Struggle towards Gender Justice Means End to foreign Rule

Kashmir: Struggle towards Gender Justice Means End to foreign Rule

A friend had asked– What about gender discrimination in the valley? Can you guarantee that after Kashmiris are given Azaadi, violence against women would stop in the region?” The questions presume that Indians troops are occupying Kashmir because of Kashmiri-driven discrimination against women. Those new in the feminist theory would fall in the trap set by the Indian state and[Read More…]

by 11/08/2019 2 comments Patriarchy
“UrfeAalo” – Theatre driving social transformation for manual scavengers

“UrfeAalo” – Theatre driving social transformation for manual scavengers

 “UrfeAalo” a play by Whistle Blower Theatre group, forces its audience to confront the harsh reality of manual scavenging – an occupation which is no less oppressive than bonded labor. It talks about Nilesh, a Valmiki trying to get out of the caste imposed occupation. Nilesh while in school was associated with a theatre group for social awareness, and he[Read More…]

by 11/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Our Vanishing World: Rainforests

Our Vanishing World: Rainforests

Rainforests are a crucial feature of Earth’s biosphere. Apart from being critical to Earth’s climate and vital carbon sinks, the major player in Earth’s hydrological (water) cycle, a massive producer of oxygen and home to most of the world’s species, rainforests are the home of a large indigenous human population. They are also the source of many vital resources, including[Read More…]

Bangkok - 6 star hotel and a slum

China’s BRI Could Save Destroyed South East Asia

Text and Photos by Andre Vltchek Most of the people in the West or in North Asia usually never think about it, but Southeast Asia is one of the most depressed and depressing parts of the world. It has been through genocides, wars and atrocious military regimes. Then, those monstrous income disparities. According to The Bangkok Post, in 2018,“the 10%[Read More…]

by 11/08/2019 1 comment World
 Venezuela and Iran in the Crosshairs of Murderers Inc – Who is Next?

 Venezuela and Iran in the Crosshairs of Murderers Inc – Who is Next?

Imagine just for a moment, the World would stand up in unison, sick and tired of the aggressive killer arrogance of the United States and her vassals – and their joint war-force called NATO – and this World, our World, what’s left of it when you deduct Washington and its Brussels allies, would at once block every shipment of everything[Read More…]

by 11/08/2019 1 comment World
Again

Again

 A ghazal for all Kashmiris and In Memoriam Agha Shahid Ali     Soldiers have died in vain and will again. Lovers have kissed in rain and will again.   Neighbors dispute, tragically lose all calm. Nations have split in twain and will again.   Beauty gives power to hurt or heal with balm. Passion brings exquisite pain and will[Read More…]

by 11/08/2019 2 comments Arts/Literature
Kashmir: Abolition of Article 370: Implications

Kashmir: Abolition of Article 370: Implications

Currently there are celebrations in sections of Indian society and there is a pall of gloom in Kashmir. On Tuesday 5th August (2019), by a Presidential order Article 370 has been revoked along with article 35 A. Interestingly the citizens of Kashmir, the traders  of Kashmir scattered in different parts of the country are under immense tension about the well[Read More…]

by 11/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Indianising Kashmir, at Gunpoint

Indianising Kashmir, at Gunpoint

“Maine aisa Hindustan kabhi nahin dekha!” In six words, Farooq Abdullah may have captured the trauma and acute sense of betrayal of his people. The three-time chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir broke down like a child during a media interaction at his Srinagar residence. The National Conference leader and son of the late Sheikh Abdullah, the Lion of Kashmir,[Read More…]

by 10/08/2019 2 comments India
Sabarmati: An effluent river

Sabarmati: An effluent river

Sabarmati is reminiscent of the times of Mahatma Gandhi who set up his Ashram on its banks. Today, the Sabarmati river reminds us of the ambitious riverfront project taken up by our Prime Minister, which resulted in a stretch of glistening yet stagnant water. The lesser noticed river stretch downstream is no more than a channel that carries sewage from[Read More…]

Press Freedom In Kashmir:Petition Filed In Supreme Court

Press Freedom In Kashmir:Petition Filed In Supreme Court

NEW DELHI, August 10: Today, Ms. Anuradha Bhasin, the Executive Editor of Kashmir Times, has filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court of India seeking directions to ensure that the State creates an enabling environment for journalists and all other media personnel in all parts of Jammu and Kashmir to practise their profession, and that the debilitating restrictions imposed[Read More…]

by 10/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
What’s your Worth?

What’s your Worth?

Many years ago, in the 1970’s I remember seeing a Russian tractor. India used to have a bilateral trade agreement with the USSR by which we bought all kinds of goods from Russia and paid for them in Indian Rupees, whereby we were able to conserve our meagre foreign exchange. You can read more about that agreement here http://www.commonlii.org/in/other/treaties/INTSer/1953/16.html Russia bought[Read More…]

by 10/08/2019 2 comments Life/Philosophy
Kashmir and Palestine share the struggle for self determination against colonial occupation

Kashmir and Palestine share the struggle for self determination against colonial occupation

Mondoweiss, a progressive Jewish media, Friday published a researched article by Zainab Ramahi, a graduate of UC Berkeley School of Law, comparing the struggle of the people of Kashmir and Palestine. Zainab Ramahi argues that reviewing the literature on the Indian Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), and its origins, it is not hard to draw the connection to Israel’s[Read More…]

by 10/08/2019 2 comments World
US-imposed Opiate Holocaust –  US Protection Of  Afghan Opiates Has Killed 5.2 Million People Since 9-11

US-imposed Opiate Holocaust –  US Protection Of  Afghan Opiates Has Killed 5.2 Million People Since 9-11

Numerous science, engineering, architecture, aviation, military and intelligence experts conclude that the US Government was responsible for the 9-11 atrocity (3,000 people killed) with some asserting Israeli and Saudi involvement, but US-beholden Western Mainstream media are united in  blind belief in the official version of  mendacious George Bush. However resolutely ignored is the UNODC report that 0.6 million people die[Read More…]

by 10/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Disturbed Areas Act in Gujarat: A tool to fuel the communal divide

Disturbed Areas Act in Gujarat: A tool to fuel the communal divide

The Gujarat Prohibition of Transfer of Immovable Property and Provision for Protection of Tenants from Eviction from Premises in Disturbed Areas Act, 1986 (Government would have passed another bill in Lok sabha while you read the names) or in short, Disturbed Areas Act 1986, was meant to arrest the distress sale of assets in the areas frequently affected by communal[Read More…]

by 10/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Communal Harmony
Kashmir Fallout: Foreign Policy Front Going Awry

Kashmir Fallout: Foreign Policy Front Going Awry

The step of Narendra Modi government on August 5, abrogating the Article 370 of Jammu and Kashmir, is going to alter the internal and external politics of the country for at least the next fifty years. Congress, PDP, NC, JKPC and the entire opposition was caught unawares, but perhaps, the Modi government started to prepare for it, as it took[Read More…]

by 10/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
In the Name of Family

In the Name of Family

In the name of family We destroy the same In the name of peace We build wastelands Imagine, please, imagine please do A little girl at your bosom Imagine, please, imagine please do A young boy laughing loud The warmth of embrace The exuberance of dawn The deep love and grace Forever now gone Joy knows no home Absolute and[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Chelsea Manning faces $441,000 in fines and another year in jail for refusing to testify against WikiLeaks

Chelsea Manning faces $441,000 in fines and another year in jail for refusing to testify against WikiLeaks

Federal District Judge Anthony Trenga rejected a motion Monday from imprisoned whistleblower Chelsea Manning to reconsider the imposition of daily fines for her principled refusal to testify before a grand jury impaneled to bring frame-up charges against WikiLeaks founder and publisher Julian Assange. Manning has been held in contempt of court for 149 days in the Alexandria City Jail. She[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Terror Grips Kashmir

Terror Grips Kashmir

Terror grips the most militarized zone in the world after India’s Central Government terminated Jammu and Kashmir’s 70-year-old “special status” as the first step towards stripping the disputed region of statehood entirely. Internationally infamous as the world’s hottest potential nuclear flashpoint, J&K originally acceded to India in 1947 only on the condition that the newly-formed country be restricted from interfering[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Uncategorized
Hong Kong protest and photo of U.S diplomats with protest leaders emerge

Hong Kong protest and photo of U.S diplomats with protest leaders emerge

Hong Kong is hot with protests, and with a photo of foreign diplomats and protest leaders. Media reports said: Hong Kong’s Airport Authority said on Friday only departing passengers with travel documents will be allowed to enter the terminal as anti-government activists gear up for a three-day rally to raise awareness among tourists entering the city. The move comes as[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
When Comedian Dick Gregory Tried to Bust the Word 

When Comedian Dick Gregory Tried to Bust the Word 

One afternoon in New York City in the spring of 1964, I marched at the head of a small civil rights demonstration, one of the few white people in the group. I was carrying a watermelon. It was a Dick Gregory joke. To say the least, not everyone liked that joke, but I thought it was hilarious, a jab by[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 1 comment Life/Philosophy
Why Civilians Need Militarized Rifles

Why Civilians Need Militarized Rifles

By A Proud Member of the NRA Ever notice how people who don’t own guns never shoot anyone? You have to wonder about people like that. I mean, they don’t feel the need for even a little girly handgun to defend themselves and their wives and sweet innocent children from criminals and riff raff, and Mexican rapists sneaking over the[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Will India’s move on Kashmir derail ties with China?

Will India’s move on Kashmir derail ties with China?

Shi Jiangtao, a former diplomat writing in the South China Morning Post, says a fresh row between Beijing and New Delhi over India’s decision to split the hotly contested region of Kashmir into two territories could cast fresh uncertainty over bilateral ties amid signs of growing strategic competition. Parts of Kashmir are claimed by the two regional giants as well[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Scrutinizing The Legal Challenges To Abrogation Of J & K’s Special Status

Scrutinizing The Legal Challenges To Abrogation Of J & K’s Special Status

In an unprecedented move to fulfill its manifestoed promises, the Central Government has, through a Presidential Order, rendered Article 370 of the Indian Constitution inoperative ipso facto. While the frenzy of netizens has hailed it as a firm footing towards full integration of the state of Jammu & Kashmir into the Union of India, certain legal infirmities could pose a[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
The Growing Phenomenon of Demonising Muslims

The Growing Phenomenon of Demonising Muslims

The majority-minority cleavages seem to be sharper in democracies than in other systems. Ever since the Al-Qaeda terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001 (9/11), Muslims all over the world are ‘under siege’. That’s how the Pakistani-American sociologist Akbar Ahmed titled his book Islam Under Siege (2003).  He could see how the tide[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Communal Harmony
Uniting the identity of Pastorals through first ever National Pastoral Parliament

Uniting the identity of Pastorals through first ever National Pastoral Parliament

Pastorals from across the country meeting in Gujarat GOPNAAD, ‘Mera’ village, Becharaji, Mehsana, Gujarat: ‘It is the high time to reestablish the contribution of pastorals for sustainability of the environment, in the context where humanity has reached a verge of crisis’. With this as the central objective, pastorals from 15states in India are meeting to mobilize themselves on 10-11 August[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
The Spirit of Quit India Movement: Lohia’s Perception

The Spirit of Quit India Movement: Lohia’s Perception

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 9 August 2017. On[Read More…]

by 09/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
‘Imagination Unlimited’: Countercurrents.org Initiates A New Book Publication Venture

‘Imagination Unlimited’: Countercurrents.org Initiates A New Book Publication Venture

The dedicated journal Countercurrents.org has sustained for almost two decades. Writers and readers from all parts of the world have appreciated the relevance of this crucial effort. After an experience of two decades of social journalism, Countercurrents.org has decided to get involved in the production of books with a difference, through a venture titled ‘Imagination Unlimited’. The rationale for this[Read More…]

Mass Shootings: Amnesty International Issues Historic U.S Travel Warning

Mass Shootings: Amnesty International Issues Historic U.S Travel Warning

Amnesty International (AI) has urged travelers to be cautious amid a “human rights crisis” which it blames on “ubiquity of firearms” and U.S. government reluctance to confiscate them. It is a historic development regarding the U.S., because it was the U.S., which regularly issue travel warnings to its citizens visiting other countries. The AI aims to hold up a mirror[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 1 comment World
Government’s Decision on Jammu and Kashmir: A Long Leap into Unconstitutionality  

Government’s Decision on Jammu and Kashmir: A Long Leap into Unconstitutionality  

As per the decision the present day government took in the Parliament on 5 August 2019 the special status of the state of Jammu and Kashmir accorded under Article 370 of the Constitution of India has ended. The Article 35A also has ceased to exist. Consequently Jammu and Kashmir will no longer be even a full-fledged state. The entire area[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 1 comment India
SRINAGAR, FEB 27 (UNI) Troops on a security vehicle entering the 13 Rashitriya Rifles camp in the central Kashmir district of Ganderbal where a soldier shot dead his five colleagues and injured another before committing suicide on Thursday. UNI PHOTO -114U

Euphoria Over Kashmir: Pointer To The Diabolical Nature of Our Species?

The euphoria in the country over the Kashmir situation is just another pointer of the diabolic nature of our species. The population is rejoicing over the revoking of Article 370 and Article 35a, calling it a much awaited move and appreciating the gutsy attitude of this Government. The covert and horrendous means used to achieve this end are termed as[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
A Betrayal of People

A Betrayal of People

Co-Written by Rahul Pandey and Sandeep Pandey In a single stroke of decisions, the Indian government has revoked Articles 370 and 35A, bifurcated J&K into J&K and Ladakh, and reduced their status to Union Territories. While there are questions about the legal soundness of these decisions, their moral illegitimacy lies in the fact that none of the stakeholders in J&K[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 1 comment India
The War on Innocence: Palestinian Children in Israeli Military Court

The War on Innocence: Palestinian Children in Israeli Military Court

On July 29, 4-year-old Muhammad Rabi’ Elayyan was reportedly summoned for interrogation by the Israeli police in occupied Jerusalem. The news, originally reported by the Palestinian News Agency (WAFA), was later denied by the Israeli police, likely to lessen the impact of the PR disaster that followed. The Israelis are not denying the story in its entirety, but are rather arguing that it was[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 1 comment Palestine
“Culture of Violence?” You Betcha Mr. Trump, But it’s Not the Video Games

“Culture of Violence?” You Betcha Mr. Trump, But it’s Not the Video Games

On the day after America’s weekend shooting rampage that killed 31 people and wounded dozens more in El Paso and Dayton, president Trump told the nation in a 10-minute address, what he sees as the causes of and cures for gun violence in the U.S. As causes, he mentioned: “Racism, bigotry and white supremacy” adding, “These sinister ideologies must be[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Howie Hawkins: ‘The US Culture Of Violence Is Reaping What It Has Sown’

Howie Hawkins: ‘The US Culture Of Violence Is Reaping What It Has Sown’

The US is in the midst of an epidemic of mass killings. In the 215 days so far this year, the US has seen 252 mass shootings – an average of more than one a day. The reasons why this is happening are pretty obvious: too many guns, inadequate gun laws, a culture of militarism that glorifies violence, misogyny, and[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Uyghur asylum seeker puts international community on the spot

Uyghur asylum seeker puts international community on the spot

Ablikim Yusuf, a 53-year old Uyghur Muslim seeking a safe haven from potential Chinese persecution, landed this week in the United States, his new home. But Mr. Yusuf’s perilous search that took him from Pakistan to Qatar to Bosnia Herzegovina where was refused entry and back to Qatar highlighted China’s inability to enforce its depiction of the brutal clampdown on[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 1 comment Human Rights
Caste bias in institutions of Excellence

Caste bias in institutions of Excellence

Flaws in Indian education system have been discussed at length by various analysts and root causes have also been pointed out. Still, the situation has not improved. Marginalised sections find difficult to pursue higher study even though some of them successfully clear entrance exam and enter reputed institutes like IITs and IIMs. Drop- outs The surge in enrollment of dalits[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Some incoherent thoughts on abolition of Article 370

Some incoherent thoughts on abolition of Article 370

The abrogation of Article 370 that binds India to Jammu and Kashmir by the current BJP government has come as a rude shock to those who believed in the famous slogan “Kashmiriyat, Jamhooriyat, Insaniyat” as a road map to tackle the problems of alienation in the restive state north of India. The BJP government with a sledge hammer of brute[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Gujarat Text Book Tweaks Ambedkar’s Iconic Slogan — Educate, Organise, Agitate

Gujarat Text Book Tweaks Ambedkar’s Iconic Slogan — Educate, Organise, Agitate

Is tweaking of Babasaheb’s iconic slogan — Educate, Organise, Agitate — by the Gujarat government part of a pan-India phenomenon in the saffron camp? Does anyone still remember the ‘re-editing’ of Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi during National Democratic Alliance (NDA)-I period when demands were raised that it should to be scrapped and the original collected works should to be reinstated so that readers/scholars[Read More…]

by 08/08/2019 1 comment India
Pounding Heat Clobbers Greenland

Pounding Heat Clobbers Greenland

Greenland is one of the biggest targets for global warming, in part, because it’s so big it’s hard to miss.And sure enough, only recently crazy halting weather with inordinate hot temperature hit Greenland bull’s-eye, dead-on with one helluva meltdown. That’s bad news for pretty much everybody on the planet. On the hottest days, the melt-off could fill 3 million Olympic-sized[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 1 comment Climate Change
Dear Ilhan

Dear Ilhan

Dear oh dear Ilhan We see you in our sleep We see you when awake We hear you in all of our being There is nothing like a voice That wavers never at all There is nothing like the strength Of dignity withal Please don’t ever tire Your energies should never wane Stay vigilant dear Ilhan You bless us with[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 1 comment Arts/Literature
Jobs, the Environment, and a Planet in Crisis 

Jobs, the Environment, and a Planet in Crisis 

When it comes to heat, extreme weather, wildfires, and melting glaciers, the planet is now in what the media increasingly refers to as “record” territory, as climate change’s momentum outpaces predictions. In such a situation, in a country whose president and administration seem hell-bent on doing everything they conceivably can to make matters worse, the Green New Deal (GND) seems to offer at[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 1 comment Counter Solutions
India’s Tryst with Destiny: Freedom Struggle from Exploitation and Degradation Is Global

India’s Tryst with Destiny: Freedom Struggle from Exploitation and Degradation Is Global

Today, we are in the grip of a globalised system of capitalism which drives narcissism, domination, ego, anthropocentrism, speciesism and plunder. A system that is using up oil, water and other resources much faster than they can ever be regenerated. We have poisoned the rivers and oceans, destroyed natural habitats, driven wildlife species to (the edge of) extinction and have altered[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Looming Water Crisis: But there is a way out

Looming Water Crisis: But there is a way out

Every year there is shortfall of rain in South India, Karnataka & Tamil Nadu which share Cauvery river water, go into crisis mode. The dispute is primarily because the total water demand exceeds the total water available in the Cauvery basin. Each year, with less water available and increasing demand, the demand-driven dispute becomes more fierce. Beyond Cauvery India, with[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
The Russian Revolution in Retrospect

The Russian Revolution in Retrospect

One may ask why we still think it important to understand the theories and practices of those who came to power in Russia in 1917 and those who have governed for some three quarters of a century with falsehood marking the entire course of the regime’s rise and demise – November 7, 1917 to December 26, 1990.  It matters vitally[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 1 comment Life/Philosophy
The Hindus of Babri Masjid

The Hindus of Babri Masjid

The final battle to the nation’s most vexed problem Ramjanambhumi/Babri Masjid title suit, which has bogged the country from the past seven decades, has started from onwards to August 6th, on the basis of a day-to-day hearing, which means i.e. every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday,  in a constitution bench at the Supreme Court of India headed by Chief Justice of[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Developments around Gulf: U.S. finds friends and reluctant-friends

Developments around Gulf: U.S. finds friends and reluctant-friends

The United States is trying to build up coalition for its Gulf expedition. The world power is finding a few friends while a few of its friends are not feeling easy with joining the war-coalition and the world power is facing problems in building up the war axis. Media reports said: U.S. allies feel ‘ashamed’, say Zarif The U.S. is[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Caught in the Strait

Caught in the Strait

It is clear that the United Kingdom could not have thought this through.  Was it a touch of the Suez jitters, the haunting syndrome of 1956 leaving a false impression that the Old Empire still had it?  To taunt a power already under the watchful and punitive eye of the United States was never a recipe for equanimity and calm[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Fire and smoke billowing from Norwegian-owned Front Altair tanker said to have been attacked in the waters of the Sea of Oman on June 13, 2019 [Credit: ISNA]

Whose Gulf is it anyway?

The Persian Gulf with its Strait of Hormuz is considered the vital area for the global economy because it is the main marine corridor for oil tankers. Free and safe navigation for oil tankers are of utmost importance and are guaranteed by international laws. Throughout history of the Gulf its navigation was threatened only twice; once during the late 1980s[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Security architecture in the Gulf: Troubled prospects

Security architecture in the Gulf: Troubled prospects

Russia, backed by China, hoping to exploit mounting doubts in the Gulf about the reliability of the United States as the region’s sole security guarantor, is proposing a radical overhaul of the security architecture in an area that is home to massive oil and gas reserves and some of the world’s most strategic waterways. Chinese backing for Russia’s proposed collective[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 1 comment World
India’s Solid Waste Management System

India’s Solid Waste Management System

A case in the backyard The city of Ahmedabad has grown to become one of the finest in country. The economic progress of the state has often been publicized across the country as something that other states should strive for. And it often feels so. The state has a remarkable growth strategy to boast of. It ranks high in terms[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Kashmir: A Coup Against the Constitution and the Kashmiris

Kashmir: A Coup Against the Constitution and the Kashmiris

The PUCL condemns the abrogation of key portions of Article 370 of the Indian Constitution and the bifurcation of the State of Jammu and Kashmir and taking away its statehood. While the deed by itself is deceitful, the manner in which it was done is even more so. All the constitutional provisions, procedures, safeguards and values have been disregarded. What[Read More…]

Global Peace and Human Security:  India and Pakistan Itching for Showdown on Kashmir

Global Peace and Human Security:  India and Pakistan Itching for Showdown on Kashmir

Has civilization taught us to be more friendly towards one another? Asked Bertrand Russell, the British philosopher and intellectual and explains further:  …Within the herd we are more friendly to each other than are many species of animals, but in our attitude towards those outside the herd, in spite of all that has been done by moralists and religious teachers,[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled South Asia
Woodrow Wilson Center expert says: India’s sudden Kashmir move could backfire badly

Woodrow Wilson Center expert says: India’s sudden Kashmir move could backfire badly

Michael Kugelman of the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson International Center, has warned that Indian Prime Minister Narenra Modi’s sudden move in Kashmir could backfire badly. “Sure enough, on Aug. 5, India announced that it plans to revoke Article 370, a constitutional clause dating back to 1949 that gives Jammu and Kashmir its special autonomous status. The scale of this move cannot[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Listen to People of Jammu & Kashmir: End ‘Reign of Occupation and Terror’

Listen to People of Jammu & Kashmir: End ‘Reign of Occupation and Terror’

 National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) unequivocally condemns the indefensible and totalitarian move of the BJP-led NDA Govt. to repeal Article 370 of the Constitution by way of a Presidential Order and introduce a Bill for bifurcation of the state of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories, not only without but seemingly in violation of the consent of the[Read More…]

by 07/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Animal World – Kashmir

Animal World – Kashmir

K.P Sasi is a cartoonist, film maker and writer. SIGN UP FOR COUNTERCURRENTS DAILY NEWS LETTER  

by 07/08/2019 1 comment India
Kashmir: Modi’s  ‘Bangladesh Moment’?

Kashmir: Modi’s  ‘Bangladesh Moment’?

If any confirmation was needed Narendra Modi is determined to cast himself as a carbon copy of Indira Gandhi-  albeit one with a venomous, communal edge – you need not look further than his latest Kashmir gamble. There is true ‘Indira-style’ audacity written all over his regime’s decision to scrap the special status given to the Himalayan state under the[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 4 comments India
Remembering the veteran communist leader Tarimala Nagi Reddy on his death anniversary!

Remembering the veteran communist leader Tarimala Nagi Reddy on his death anniversary!

July 28 is the death anniversary of the of veteran communist leader Tarimala Nagi Reddy, known and called by comrades as com. TN. He was a lifelong fighter for the revolutionary program he has committed and dreamed of. In the state of Andhra Pradesh, he attracted hundreds of cadres towards the Communist movement in the process of carrying out his[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
U.S. plans to deploy missiles in Asia and eyes competition with China

U.S. plans to deploy missiles in Asia and eyes competition with China

The U.S. is planning escalation of its war program in Asia. There is news on its plan to deploy missile in Asia. The move will increase tension in the continent amid threat of new arms race. The U.S. is hoping to deploy new ground-based intermediate-range missiles to Asia “sooner rather than later,” U.S. defense chief Mark Esper said of a[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Women We Are Fighting For

Women We Are Fighting For

 There are stories that are unrelated to the news, but can explain much better than many combat reports, why people like meare fighting against the Empire and imperialism, with such determination and vehemence. Not all stories are ‘big’ or ‘heroic’; not all include famous people or iconic struggles. Not all take place onbattlefields. But they ‘humanize’ the struggle. Once in[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Trump’s White nationalist  (Supremacy)  Agenda

Trump’s White nationalist  (Supremacy)  Agenda

The president of US has shown the world how racist he and his great nation have fallen from grace. He attacked four progressive congresswomen of color from the Democratic Party whom he directed his ugly, vicious, and vile vitriol at: Alexandria Ocassio-Cortez (D-NY), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), Rashida Talaib (D-MI), and Ayanna Pressley (D-MAS). “On Sunday evening, he initiated an attack[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
A couple of facts and legal queries about Constitutional Amendments

A couple of facts and legal queries about Constitutional Amendments

Article 368 of the Constitution of India is titled ‘Power of Parliament to amend the Constitution and procedure thereof’. Clauses 1 and 2 of the same state: “Notwithstanding anything in this Constitution, Parliament may in exercise of its constituent power amend by way of addition, variation or repeal any provision of this Constitution in accordance with the procedure laid down[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 1 comment India
The Terrible Truth of Climate Change

The Terrible Truth of Climate Change

In June, I delivered a keynote presentation on Australia’s vulnerability to climate change and our policy challenges at the annual meeting of the Australian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society, the main conference for those working in the climate science community. I saw it as an opportunity to summarise the post-election political and scientific reality we now face. As one of the[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 2 comments Climate Change
August 6, 1945 – For our children

August 6, 1945 – For our children

                       I An anniversary falls today, Which most of us ignore, Though thousands were just burned away: Birth of atomic war.   In summer, 1945, Near end of WWII, When most of us were not alive, A nightmare became true.   On Monday morning, August 6, At 8:15 a.m. Enola Gay performed some tricks Of nuclear mayhem.   A monster[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
White Supremacy

White Supremacy

A number of commentators have linked the killing of 20 people at a Walmart store in El Paso in the United States of America on Saturday 3rd August 2019 to the rising tide of White Supremacism. White Supremacism is a belief that whites are superior to others and therefore have a right to dominate them. There were elements of such[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Discrimination against the disabled

Discrimination against the disabled

Recently, I was browsing through a bunch of articles when one headline in the New York Times caught my attention. It read “How to disclose a disability to your employer (and whether you should?)”. My first response was to ignore it on the grounds of being ignorant and inconsiderate. A closer introspection, though, led me to the conclusion that the report[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Human Rights
Children Should Work On Dreams And Not On Fields

Children Should Work On Dreams And Not On Fields

“There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul than the way in which it treats its children.” -Nelson Mandela On 12th June 2019, ILO celebrated 100 years of promoting help and social justice to labor and their family. On this day, ILO defined one of their sustainable development goals as global commitment to eradicate child labor aligning with[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Human Rights
The Walls that Spoke

The Walls that Spoke

In times when the nation treats the public universities as liabilities, we should be crystal clear in demarcating: what is a university and what it is not? A university is not a factory that processes raw materials and brings out finished products. It cannot be reduced into a laboratory that conducts experiments to come up with the desired result. It[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Scream!

Scream!

Celebrate, Celebrate the Independence Day While Munch-like screams explode Like fireworks lighting the night sky Silent, vociferous, full of angst Unable to speak Bleak, bleak, bleak. Oh, the cruelty of life! The anger and strife Guernica revisited each time. This is not just about soldiers who die. But about all those who silently cry For a dozen different whys? A[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 1 comment Arts/Literature
The Long Dark Night In Kashmir

The Long Dark Night In Kashmir

At the stroke of the midnight hour on 5 August 2019, Jammu and Kashmir was blanketed in a state of siege. 35,000 fresh troops in addition to the existing 6.5 lakhs were present with orders to shoot, curfew, internet and phone shut down, media black out, and all major elected leaders under house arrest. Already, there was escalated aggression over[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
What Is The Agenda On Kashmir?

What Is The Agenda On Kashmir?

The agenda is clear. Whip up frenzy and sentiments outside Kashmir for the ‘bold’ decision on it. The celebrations on the street look as if you have ‘occupied’ a territory and the way responses are coming they reflect how much divisions we have created in this country. Right and wrongs are now clearly based on your religious identity. The decision[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
India revokes Kashmir’s special status as a prelude to change demography

India revokes Kashmir’s special status as a prelude to change demography

Apparently taking que from Israeli policy to implant Jewish settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government Monday (August 5) revoked the special status of Jammu Kashmir under articles 35A and 370 of the constitution which forbid Indians from outside the region from buying land or permanently settling in the Muslim-majority territory.By repealing Article 370 of[Read More…]

by 06/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
The Article 370 Amendments: Key Legal Issues

The Article 370 Amendments: Key Legal Issues

In this post, I will attempt to break down the constitutional changes to Article 370, and highlight some key legal issues surrounding them. In essence, to understand what has happened today, there are three important documents. At the heart of everything is Presidential Order C.O. 272, which constitutes the basis for everything that follows. The second is a Statutory Resolutionintroduced in the[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 2 comments India, Editor's Picks
People in Venezuela are prepared for battle to defend the Bolivarian Revolution

People in Venezuela are prepared for battle to defend the Bolivarian Revolution

People in Venezuela shall defend the Bolivarian Revolution. To defend the land, the people are prepared for battle. This is the promise by the people in the land the revolution is moving forward with its transforming process. Therefore, Nicolas Maduro, the president of Venezuela, has said: Venezuela is “prepared for battle” if the US imposes quarantine. “We are all prepared[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 1 comment World
El Paso shooting: Hundreds of mothers and students demanding gun control march on White House and the Capitol

El Paso shooting: Hundreds of mothers and students demanding gun control march on White House and the Capitol

Hundreds of mothers, students and other volunteers demanding action on gun control marched on the White House and the Capitol on the heels of the deadly shooting in El Paso, Texas on Saturday. Several other similar protest demonstrations were also held across the U.S. Members of activists group Moms Demand Action and Students Demand Action organized the march. The protesters[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Jammu And Kashmir Loses Its Special Status, To Be A Union Territory

Jammu And Kashmir Loses Its Special Status, To Be A Union Territory

The government of India has abolished the special status given through the constitution to Kashmir through a presidential order. Home Minister Amit Shah informed parliament that Article 370 has been abolished with the President signing an order that comes into effect “at once.” The government has also said it wants parliament to clear a proposal that bifurcates the state of[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 1 comment India
Cheering a New Arms Race: The End of the INF

Cheering a New Arms Race: The End of the INF

US President Donald Trump is a master of the withdrawal method.  That said, it is often forgotten that the United States remains that most fickle of creatures, joining, or abandoning international regimes that might be seen to jar with the national interest.  Initial preparations for such global arrangements tend to be initially optimistic, even rosy.  Eager to draft a suitable[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
The Stubborn Truth About Employment and the Defense Industry

The Stubborn Truth About Employment and the Defense Industry

Co-Written by Nia Harris, Cassandra Stimpson, and Ben Freeman A Marilyn has once again seduced a president. This time, though, it’s not a movie star; it’s Marillyn Hewson, the head of Lockheed Martin, the nation’s top defense contractor and the largest weapons producer in the world. In the last month, Donald Trump and Hewson have seemed inseparable. They “saved” jobs at a helicopter plant.[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Magsaysay Award for Ravish Kumar Is A Victory for Truth

Magsaysay Award for Ravish Kumar Is A Victory for Truth

There could not have been a better choice than Ravish Kumar for this year’s Magsaysay Award. Ravish has demonstrated exemplary courage in questioning the sectarian, communal, jingoistic and irrational politics which has dominated the narrative in this country over the last five years when one by one most of the saner voices were made to disappear, some made compromises or[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 1 comment India
History of Street Plays in India – An Ongoing Social Movement

History of Street Plays in India – An Ongoing Social Movement

Theatre and India share a long relationship dating 5000 years ago. The earliest form of theatre was Sanskrit theatre. Bharata’s ‘Natya Shastra’ was the one of the earliest play enacted in India. Indian theatre was heavily influenced by the people who ruled over the country. During the Islamic rule in the country, theatre was mostly forbidden throughout the nation. However,[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Try

Try

Judgement by Anonymous Before God’s footstool to confess A poor soul knelt, and bowed his head; “I failed,” he cried. The Master said, “Thou didst thy best—that is success!” It was December 1980. I was sitting on the veranda of my house in Guyana. It was about 9.00 pm, dark, balmy evening in the tropics. As usual on most days in[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Post Truth

Post Truth

I cannot speak anymore the language of my oppressors. My memory gradually corroded by a billion ants folds into itself. I cannot think anymore, my eyes are vacant, perpetually wandering. I’m defenceless as ever, I put my papers in place and patiently await my turn at the guillotine for them to press the button, for them to cut off my[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
TB is preventable & curable: Zero new infection & zero deaths must become a reality

TB is preventable & curable: Zero new infection & zero deaths must become a reality

TB is preventable, treatable and curable. Science shows how can we effectively prevent, accurately diagnose, treat with effective regimen, and eventually cure TB. But are not we failing to translate scientific wisdom in public health gains? How can we explain over 10 million new cases of TB and 1.6 million TB deaths (including 300,000 TB deaths among people living with[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
China’s Social Credit Check System: A move towards Orwellian Dystopia

China’s Social Credit Check System: A move towards Orwellian Dystopia

“ Keeping trust is glorious, and breaking trust is disgraceful..” In a move straight out of George Orwell’s famous 1984, China is in the process of implementing a nationwide “Social Credit Check System.” It is a national reputation system aimed towards standardizing China’s citizens’ and businesses’ reputation or ‘Social Credit”. This system will be implemented by gathering information through mass[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Tribal rights movements in India

Tribal rights movements in India

The number of tribal movements across the country has surgedand the tribal people are starting to gain the confidence to raise their voice against getting exploited. The landmark judgments like Vedanta-Dongria Kondh verdict has given them this confidence. The tribal communities are strongly associated with their land, culture and ethnicity and most of their struggles happen against institutions which try[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Higher Secondary Education in Malabar Districts of Kerala to Suffer

Higher Secondary Education in Malabar Districts of Kerala to Suffer

Academic year of 2019 – 20  begun in June – July. Multiple educational reforms are implemented by state and central governments in India. Kerala is inter alia a topper state in India in respect of literacy having 96 percentage in 2018. It has been striving for achieving sheer and comprehensive literacy rate in coming years. However higher educational achievements of[Read More…]

by 05/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Can Recycling Really Solve The Plastic Problem?

Can Recycling Really Solve The Plastic Problem?

Co-Written by Meena Miriam Yust and Arshad M. Khan The practice of recycling has everything to commend it:  On a finite planet, it conserves resources; it is meretricious allowing us, as it does, to pin a mental merit badge on our chests as we ready the assigned recycling bin once a week; and it is an activity that is all[Read More…]

Neoliberalism, Neofascism  & Trumpism – Racist Alliance Of Mob & Capital

Neoliberalism, Neofascism  & Trumpism – Racist Alliance Of Mob & Capital

Philosopher Hannah Arendt found common causes of  genocidal Western European imperialism on 5 continents and genocidal 20th century fascism as an alliance between the mob and capital, with a commonality in this union of extreme nationalism, lying, rapacity, atrocity-justifying racism and anti-humanism.  Today American Trumpism is ferociously anti-intellectual, anti-humanist, nationalist  and racist, with genocidal Trump threats to “totally destroy” or[Read More…]

by 04/08/2019 1 comment World
Today, Freedom From Fear Is Freedom From Mainstream Media

Today, Freedom From Fear Is Freedom From Mainstream Media

 (This  is originally a speech by journalist Ravish Kumar , winner of  the 2019 Ramon Magsaysay Award.) What was once considered unacceptable and unethical in the public domain has been made entirely acceptable and ethical by the mainstream media in the last five years. Not only is the media celebrating existing immoralities, it is also scaling new heights of impropriety. Crudity[Read More…]

by 04/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
When RSS To Start Sainik School

When RSS To Start Sainik School

Rare are the occasions when the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) — which could be said to be the biggest organisation of Hindu men — moves beyond its founder member Dr Hedgewar to build memorials. Whatever might be the consideration behind it, but it came as a little surprise that the RSS has decided to start a school in the memory[Read More…]

by 04/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
They are Chharas- Not “Criminals”

They are Chharas- Not “Criminals”

I want to share one of the incidents that I encountered recently. But before that, I would like to set the context. I am a student at IIM Ahmedabad (PGP 2). As a part of my curriculum, I have taken a course called TSM (Transformational Social Movement) where we have been taught about many social movements by our professor, Dr.[Read More…]

by 04/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Sex Workers in India – Life in a “Gutter”

Sex Workers in India – Life in a “Gutter”

[Source: gaylaxymag.com] Last month, while researching on Sex Worker’s rights movements in India for an academic project, I came across some extremely disturbing incidents mentioned by VAMP (Veshya Anyay Mukti Parishad) and other online articles describing the plight of Sex Worker’s in our country. One of the most glaring incidents mentioned by them was of a sex worker with speech[Read More…]

by 04/08/2019 2 comments Patriarchy
A cry for help from the womb

A cry for help from the womb

At a very young age, I learned about gender inequality that pervades our society. I was just six when my sister was born and my elation knew no bounds. However, I was bewildered that my sister was not welcomed with excitement and enthusiasm by some. Back then, I wasn’t able to comprehend the mocking gibes made by the conservative sundry[Read More…]

by 04/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Patriarchy
Evaluation of Right to Education (RTE) Act

Evaluation of Right to Education (RTE) Act

Education is often used as a parameter to measure the development of a country. It is the fundamental right of every human that makes them empowered, assists in growth and enables better decision making for them individually as well as for the nation as a whole.However, these benefits presumethe existence of a sound education system. Since children represent that segment[Read More…]

by 04/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Clothing a Naked Emperor: The BJP’s Attacks on Gandhi and Nehru

Clothing a Naked Emperor: The BJP’s Attacks on Gandhi and Nehru

It is a measure of the greatness of Mahatma Gandhi and Pandit Nehru that the BJP ideologues and their followers can’t stop referring to them, no matter how idiotically and venally they do so. To blame Nehru for everything – as is the wont if these demagogues – is to imbue him with the absolute power that indeed he never[Read More…]

by 04/08/2019 1 comment India
US scrapping of INF treaty heightens threat of nuclear war

US scrapping of INF treaty heightens threat of nuclear war

Washington formally scrapped the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty Friday, bringing the world a major step closer to nuclear war. The treaty, signed over 30 years ago by US President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, banned a whole class of weapons that had placed the world on a hair trigger for a nuclear conflict. Both countries agreed to[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 2 comments World
Khushwant Singh’s Foresight on Hindutva Fascism

Khushwant Singh’s Foresight on Hindutva Fascism

There was something or everything so very extraordinarily different to Khushwant Singh that even after five years of his passing away he holds sway. At the recently concluded Khushwant Singh Literary Festival at King’s College, London, it got more than apparent that the man’s views and viewpoints were of great significance. Perhaps it wouldn’t be amiss to state that he[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Palestine: Is history repeating itself?

Palestine: Is history repeating itself?

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/nelson-mandela/10139739/Nelson-Mandela-the-orator-his-most-powerful-speeches.html “We know too well that our freedom is incomplete without the freedom of the Palestinians” These are one of the most famous words of a leader who is looked up everywhere with the highest of regards- NELSON MANDELA. How his solidarity with the Palestinian struggle is related to his own legacy of struggling against Apartheid is a little tricky[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 4 comments Palestine
Right to Education- Just a phrase for textbooks?

Right to Education- Just a phrase for textbooks?

  “Knowledge is power. Information is liberating. Education is the premise of progress, in every society, in every family.” – Kofi Annan According to the Right to Education act, “Every child within the age group of 6 to 14 must be provided with free and compulsory education.” The act came into the referendum in the year 2001 to increase the[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
UAPA: A Call to Mob Lynching

UAPA: A Call to Mob Lynching

The UAPA bill has been ultimately passed by the Rajya Sabha yesterday. UAPA refer to Unlawful Activities Prevention Act under which the Central government has got a right to ‘designate’ an individual as a terrorist. While there is no immediate threat to arrest, the person will have to appeal to the government with in forty days of his/her name appearing[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Preventing TB is rooted in medical ethics and human rights

Preventing TB is rooted in medical ethics and human rights

With quarter of world’s population infected with latent TB (not active TB disease), and in the light of scientific fact that every new case of active TB disease comes from this pool of population infected with latent TB, the writing on the wall is clear: we cannot put TB prevention on the blindspot anymore if we are to eliminate TB[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Critique of Paresh Chattopadhyay’s “Twentieth Century Socialism”

Critique of Paresh Chattopadhyay’s “Twentieth Century Socialism”

Paresh Chattopadhyay once visited me at my rented residence after we launched our party, the World Socialist Party (India) here in Calcutta (now Kolkata), 1-3 March 1995. He listened to my long speech via audio cassette of Bishnupur public meeting and highly appreciated it. After a detailed discussion he agreed to send articles in the event we published a journal[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Vow In The Name of The Soil of This Country Not to Let It Down

Vow In The Name of The Soil of This Country Not to Let It Down

Co-Written by Sandeep Pandey and Sanjay Singh A fact to which the press, and by extension the public, did not pay much attention was when Narendra Modi, serving Chief Minister of Gujarat, came to New Delhi in 2014 to take oath as Prime Minister, he used Adani’s aircraft. The implication of it only now dawns on us as Adani emerges[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 1 comment India
Towards A Better Democracy

Towards A Better Democracy

Towards a better democracy that can overcome unethical polity brewing in Karnataka that is ready to submerge the rest of India Some times good things come out in crisis situations. Won’t it be great if a way towards better and more democratic governance could bloom out of the current constitutional crisis in Karnataka. We need not go into the crisis[Read More…]

by 03/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Climate is warming faster than it has in the last 2,000 years

Climate is warming faster than it has in the last 2,000 years

Global mean warming / cooling rates over the last 2,000 years. In red are the periods (each across 51 years) in which the reconstructed temperatures increased. Global temperatures decreased in the periods in blue. The green line shows that the maximum expected warming rate without anthropogenic influence is just under 0.6 degrees per century. Climate models (dashed orange line) are[Read More…]

 Climate Change and the Upcoming Federal Election – Managed Decline

 Climate Change and the Upcoming Federal Election – Managed Decline

There is a Canadian federal election on the horizon. The campaigning has already begun. I’m a long time climate activist who thinks that you should know a very important perspective on climate change and, in particular, mitigation strategies in Canada (election issue).   But what I have to tell you is out of the box, outside the Overton Window, heretical;[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 4 comments Climate Change
Lives In Economics

Lives In Economics

Their lives can help us today I would like to announce the publication of a book describing the lives of some of the people who have contributed importantly to economic thought. Their lives can help us today, as the world faces a crisis that has both economic dimensions. The book can be freely downloaded from the following link: http://eacpe.org/app/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/Lives-in-economics-by-John-Scales-Avery.pdf The[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Killing Amazon And The Indigenous Tribes

Killing Amazon And The Indigenous Tribes

On July 23, Emyra Wajapi, a leader of Wajapi indigenous tribe, was allegedly killed by the garmipeiros or the gold miners in Northern Brazil in the Amazon Forest. Three days later, around 50 garmipeiros invaded the 600,000-hectare Wajapi indigenous reserve in the state of Amapa. The garmipeiros were armed with automatic rifles and shotguns and they threatened the villagers. The[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
Elementary school kids sitting around teacher in a lesson

Sporadic Notes: Teachers in an empire

Facts force out myths. The following facts narrate condition of a part of teachers, students and an education system in a society that overflows with resources. A survey of teachers, 1,038 in total, from 45 US states, conducted in July 6-10, 2019, found: Ninety-six percent of teachers surveyed pay for school supplies for their students. (Fishbowl, “96 percent of teachers[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 1 comment World
Sheikh Ibrahim El-Zakzaky and the persecution of his followers

Sheikh Ibrahim El-Zakzaky and the persecution of his followers

The government of Muhammadu Buhari in Nigeria is accused of violence, brutality and gross violation of Human Rights. Since he grabbed power in 1983 through a military coup, imprisonment, torture and kidnappings have become the tools to silence his critics. His main targets of political imprisonments have been students, journalists, human rights activists and clerics alike. While he continues to[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
The Retainer Solution: The European Union, Libya and Irregular Migration

The Retainer Solution: The European Union, Libya and Irregular Migration

There is a venom in international refugee policy that refuses to go away: officials charged with their tasks, passing on their labours to those who might see the UN Refugee Convention as empty wording, rather than strict injunction carved upon stone.  They have all become manifest in the policy of deferral: humanitarian problems are for others to solve.  We will[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
The Western Alliance is Falling Apart

The Western Alliance is Falling Apart

Ever since Imran Khan became the 22nd Prime Minister of Pakistan in August 2018, the winds have changed. While his predecessors, though generally leaning eastwards, have often wavered between the US and the China orbit, Khan is in the process of clearly defining his alliances with the east, in particular China. This is for the good of his country, for[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
What I Am Fighting For?

What I Am Fighting For?

  PREFACE TO MY RUSSIAN BOOK I am Russian. That’s how I feel and therefore, that’s what I am. I was born in Russia, in the Soviet Union – in what was and still is a stunningly beautiful city on the Neva River called Leningrad. For some reason, out of the almost 20 books that I have written, only 2[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 1 comment World
Slaughter of Tamil Prisoners Inside High Security Jail And Genocide of Tamils in July 1983

Slaughter of Tamil Prisoners Inside High Security Jail And Genocide of Tamils in July 1983

Post independence Sri Lanka brought in several official dispositions that gave preference to the Sinhalese majority. The Sinhala Only Act introduced by the Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) government of S. W. R. D. Bandaranaike in 1956, for example, recognized Sinhalese as the only official language of the country. The 1950s also saw the launching of several development projects by[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled South Asia
Trump’s Venom Against the Media, Immigrants, “Traitors,” and More Is Nothing New 

Trump’s Venom Against the Media, Immigrants, “Traitors,” and More Is Nothing New 

Along rivers prone to overflowing, people sometimes talk of preparing for a 100-year flood — a dangerous surge of muddy, debris-filled water so overwhelming it appears only once a century. In our political world, we are now seeing a 100-year flood of toxic debris. The sludge washing ashore includes President Trump’s continuing cries of “fake news!” and “traitors”; his rage[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Oh, Baltimore

Oh, Baltimore

Baltimore, Oh Baltimore You have things on your mind You have children to feed and trees to tend You have ties that strongly bind No fool, no demagogue, no trickster Could ever fool you deep No hateful and crude cad Should make you cringe or weep You rise when hate is strong Your daughters and sons see clear Baltimore, Oh[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
Why did three Chief Ministers support the RTI killer Bill?

Why did three Chief Ministers support the RTI killer Bill?

Why three Chief Ministers- Biju Patnaik (Odisha), K Chandrasekhar Rao (Telangana) and Y S Jaganmohan Reddy (Andhra Pradesh) have shown greater loyalty to NDA than the NDA Chief Ministers in helping the BJP to push through the controversial RTI Amendments Bill 2019, is a big political question. (See open Letter to  three CMs below.) Why three Chief Ministers- Biju Patnaik[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Denotified Tribes And Their Rights

Denotified Tribes And Their Rights

Denotified Tribes: Denotified Tribes (DNTs) are the tribes which were listed by British under the Criminal Tribes Act of 1871 which notified certain tribes as “criminals,” regardless of the activities of individual members. The DNTs being a nomadic group have remained outside the Indian constitution and have not received any constitution rights and welfare activities. The Criminals Tribe Act was revoked, and Habitual offenders[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Human Identities and Liberation

Human Identities and Liberation

The liberation of humanity is dependent on raising above immediate ‘identities’. The identities may be that of caste, class, religion, region, race, gender, ethnicity, language etc. However, it becomes a challenge in a society where differences and unequal relationship based on these factors already exist in society. Those subjected to oppression on the basis of caste, class, religion, region, race,[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Communal Harmony
Abode of the Gods

Abode of the Gods

(Himalaya is called the Abode of the Gods due to its serenity and spiritual ambiance. We should always make it a point to preserve the serenity of these mountains by keeping these clean) Himalaya has been popularly called the “Abode of the Gods”. Not only have the holy men been meditating in these cool and serene heights but there are[Read More…]

by 02/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Environmental Protection
US federal court exposes Democratic Party conspiracy against Assange and WikiLeaks

US federal court exposes Democratic Party conspiracy against Assange and WikiLeaks

In a ruling published late Tuesday, Judge John Koeltl of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, delivered a devastating blow to the US-led conspiracy against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. In his ruling, Judge Koeltl, a Bill Clinton nominee and former Assistant Special Prosecutor for the Watergate Special Prosecution Force, dismissed “with prejudice” a civil lawsuit[Read More…]

by 01/08/2019 2 comments World
Modinama: Issues That Did Not Matter

Modinama: Issues That Did Not Matter

Preface: Modi 2. The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born; in this interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms appear (Antonio Gramsci, Prison Notebooks, 1930). Narendra Damodardas Modi, the man who began his political journey as a Pracharak of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), has been re-elected Prime Minister[Read More…]

by 01/08/2019 1 comment India
Germany won’t take part in U.S.’ Strait of Hormuz initiative

Germany won’t take part in U.S.’ Strait of Hormuz initiative

United States’ Iran-show is not moving smoothly. It is not always getting wholehearted support from all of its friends. The Strait of Hormuz initiative by the U.S. is part of the show, and it is facing the same problem. An example is Germany. Germany will refuse to take part in a U.S.-led maritime mission in the Strait of Hormuz, German[Read More…]

by 01/08/2019 1 comment World
The state vs. the citizen

The state vs. the citizen

Patriotism, respect for law, and allegiance are demands placed upon the citizen by the state. Such awesome authority, being capable of misuse, should always have to justify itself. Does the state accept this small burden? The responsibility of the citizen is to insist upon it. But how? And through what medium? It is commonly suggested that power ultimately lies with[Read More…]

by 01/08/2019 1 comment World
Saudi Iranian rivalry polarises Nigerian Muslims

Saudi Iranian rivalry polarises Nigerian Muslims

A recent ban on a militant, Iranian-backed Shiite group raised the spectre of the Saudi Iranian rivalry spilling onto Nigerian streets as security forces launched a manhunt to find the alleged Boko Haram operatives who killed 65 people attending a funeral. Nigeria, Africa’s foremost oil producer, banned the Iranian-backed Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) this weekend after demonstrations in the[Read More…]

by 01/08/2019 Comments are Disabled World
Remembering Asma Jahangir : A Legacy to Cherish

Remembering Asma Jahangir : A Legacy to Cherish

It is now more than a year since Asma Jahangir left us. As August 14-15 approaches, one cannot but recall her, for she was someone who worked tirelessly for human rights as well as better and smoother, peaceful Indo-Pakistan relations. People like her (characterised as an icon and a crusader) and the work they do retain their relevance for not[Read More…]

by 01/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
New Education Policy and Disabled

New Education Policy and Disabled

There has been a lot of debate on the draft of new policy on education. Many analysts have exposed loopholes and contradictions in the policy. Inaccessibility Though the government has eloquently spoken of ‘Divyang’ – disabled persons possessing ‘divine limbs’ and powers,even the ‘ access’ contents, considered as ‘a key guiding principle’ by the Draft has not been made available[Read More…]

by 01/08/2019 1 comment India
In Kashmir: Love and respect thy patient

In Kashmir: Love and respect thy patient

                    Today, the world over, a number of issues confronting the societies are discussed day in and day out and intellectual analysis and outpourings start to emanate once the issue at stake draws the attention of masses in the society, Healthcare is one such issue which holds a tremendous significance in[Read More…]

by 01/08/2019 Comments are Disabled Kashmir
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