Heads of state, government ministers and thousands of other delegates from all corners of the globe are converging on Glasgow, Scotland for two weeks of climate change talks beginning this weekend. This year marks the 26th round of negotiations following the ratification by more than 190 countries of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, which was agreed to[Read More…]
An Open Letter to the Global Media by Greta Thunberg and Vanessa Nakate Dear media editors around the world, Melting glaciers, wildfires, droughts, deadly heatwaves, floods, hurricanes, loss of biodiversity. These are all symptoms of a destabilizing planet, which are happening around us all the time. Those are the kind of things you report about. Sometimes. The climate crisis, however, is much more[Read More…]
In September 2019, a month after the Abrogation of article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir, Bashir Yatoo , reached out to children stuck at home in the midst of a curfew and communication blockade. Bashir, who works as transport in-charge at the Dolphin International School in Pulwama, in south Kashmir, went around with a couple of local teachers to check[Read More…]
The consumption and possession of narcotic drugs has been under public lens in India in the wake of high-profile arrests in recent times. It has once again brought into the limelight an issue often buried 6 feet under. Measures to legalise drugs that have been traditionally consumed in India for centuries , sometimes and are largely acceptable in moderation have[Read More…]
The United States’ chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan has dented the credibility of the trans-Atlantic relationship and dealt a body blow to the NATO. These developments add to the already existing frustration in Washington that the European allies disfavour its confrontational Indo-Pacific Strategy. Europe regards China as an economic competitor and ‘systemic rival’, but prefers the path of engagement and dialogue. [Read More…]
There is increasing need for all the countries of the Global South to respond with growing unity on several important issues of common interest. One of these important issues relates to justice in climate funding. As the Glasgow Climate Summit—the Convention on Climate Change 26th Conference of Parties (COP26)– starts today ( October 31) an important concern will be to[Read More…]
Image; Masar Badil, Conference of the Alternative Palestinian Path: Towards a new revolutionary commitment, in Madrid, Oct. 30, 2021 October 30, 2021 marks a pivotal moment in the course of Palestinian history. It’s been clear for thirty years now that strategy, not disastrous Oslo-like compromise, is what Palestinians must do, and that is exactly the call that rang out at Masar[Read More…]
S N Subbarao is no more, born in Karnataka, he breathed his last in Jaipur (Rajasthan), Jaura (Madhya Pradesh) became the spectator of his last rites and then his ashes were flown into the river at Prayagraj (Uttar Pradesh). The passing away of this soldier of peace and goodwill, popularly known as Bhaiji, at the age of 92, was like[Read More…]
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people … The General Assembly, Proclaims this Universal[Read More…]
On 29/10/2021, a massive congregation of around 4000 dalit agricultural workers belonging to the joint front of the rural and farm labour organizations flooded city of Morinda to besiege the house of Chief Minister Charanjit Channi in a huge rally. It was part and parcel of a protracted campaign initiated in a 3 day dharna in Patiala in early[Read More…]
Figures on suicides released by the National Crime Records Bureau on October 28, 2021 show that 10,677 people related to agricultural sector committed suicide in the country during 2020. Among those who committed suicide were 5,579 farmers and 5,098 agricultural labourers. During 2019, 5957 farmers committed suicide, which is 5579 during 2020. These figures show a 6.35 per cent reduction[Read More…]
The world’s largest economies will suffer severe human and economic consequences of climate change, especially if no action is taken to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, according to a new study (G20 Climate Risk Atlas, Impacts, Policy, Economics, https://files.cmcc.it/g20climaterisks/G20_all.pdf) from the Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change (CMCC), an Italian research center. “From droughts, heatwaves and sea level rise, to dwindling food supplies[Read More…]
The forthcoming Glasgow COP26 climate change conference is increasingly seen as a near-last ditch attempt to prevent massive and deadly harm to Humanity and the Biosphere. However a resolutely mendacious, dishonestly anti-science, anti-environment, pro-fossil fuels, egregiously corrupt, genocidally racist, and remorselessly climate criminal Australia is set to sabotage COP26 as it has sabotaged all its predecessors. Australia’s allies in the[Read More…]
We landed in a messy Halloween today after curious turns of events in October. There were eruptions of anti-Hindu barbarism in Bangladesh during mid-October, during Bengali Hindu religious festival centring Durga Puja. And after that we got a week when news of vandalism against Muslim community came from Tripura. The Bengali-Hindu community in eastern India including West Bengal, Assam, Tripura[Read More…]
PUCL strongly condemns the indiscriminate and unabated killing of civilians by militants in the Kashmir Valley. This year over 31 civilian, non-combatants have been killed which include 11 civilians killed in October alone. Out of the 11 civilians killed, seven belong to the minority communities (Hindus and Sikhs). Very clearly these killings are meant to create a fear psychosis and[Read More…]
The 3-day virtual Parliament of the World’s religions concluded in a spirit of fervent bonding and camaraderie connecting thousands around the world. From 16th through 18th October thousands participated to partake of the hundreds of inspiring and riveting presentations, prayers, music and dance, exhibitions and displays, workshops and many other unique features all echoing again and again the call to[Read More…]
Is it not a paradox if a preventable, diagnosable, treatable, and curable disease becomes a top killer? Till Covid-19 struck our world, Tuberculosis (TB) – a disease that can be prevented, diagnosed and treated – was the most deadly infectious disease worldwide. Covid-19 pandemic has also adversely impacted the fight against TB, as well as other diseases. Not surprisingly, the[Read More…]
Human history as cultural history We need to reform our teaching of history so that the emphasis will be placed on the gradual growth of human culture and knowledge, a growth to which all nations and ethnic groups have contributed. A new freely downloadable book I would like to announce the publication of a book which presents many aspects of[Read More…]
The piggy bank was rattled again. In September 2021, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) gave $6,669,000 in grants for projects aimed at “regime change” in Cuba, a euphemism to avoid saying “direct intervention by a foreign power.” The United States’ current Democratic administration has especially favored the International Republican Institute (IRI) with a bipartisan generosity that Donald Trump never[Read More…]
The question of whether or not Russia is fascist rarely if ever gets asked nowadays because it seems so obvious: Why waste the time it takes to even ask the question? International relations scholars; major media organizations; non-scholarly yet high-profile shapers of the prevailing wisdom; and politicians on both sides of the aisle seem almost unanimous in their response to[Read More…]
You’ve either seen the Netflix show Squid Game, considered watching the South Korean series before giving it a pass because of its violence, or read about it and wondered what all the fuss is about. You know, therefore, that this global hit is about hundreds of indebted Koreans competing against one another for a huge jackpot. The competitions are children’s games[Read More…]
For the past two days, I have been watching the extradition hearing for Julian Assange via video link from London. The United States is appealing a lower court ruling that denied the US request to extradite Assange not, unfortunately, because in the eyes of the court he is innocent of a crime, but because, as Judge Vanessa Baraitser in January[Read More…]
As the new government led by Prime-Minister Ahmed Abiy takes office for their second term, the West’s relentless propaganda campaign against Ethiopia continues. Since the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) attacked the Ethiopian State on 4 November 2020 (the day after President Biden was elected coincidentally), the US and allies, factions within UN agencies and human rights organizations have worked[Read More…]
Understanding that the only recourse for Palestinians is continued revolt Image: Rima Najjar in Madrid blogging on Masar Badil, Conference of the Alternative Palestinian Path: Towards a new revolutionary commitment Stand strong, not only with Palestinian civil society, but with all forms of legitimate resistance to Israel’s domination, control and oppression in Palestine from the river to the sea. That’s[Read More…]
Riverine nostalgia in post-partition Bengali music Since river valleys and riverbanks have perennially been the life-giving source of all flourishing human civilizations around the earth throughout history (Indus-Ganges, Nile, Tigris-Euphrates, Mississippi, Amazon and a great many more), it is quite natural that when politically and colonially engineered partitions of the homelands of people residing generationally on those riverbanks occur, beyond[Read More…]
As sectarian nationalism is becoming more assertive and strong, the religious minorities are being subjected to intimidation and violence on regular basis. As such there is an increase the frequency of this phenomenon during last decade in an alarming way. The anti-Muslim violence is noticed and partly reported but the anti-Christian violence, for various reasons is not brought to fore[Read More…]
On October 28th Three women protesters — Sukhvinder Kaur (60), Amarjit Kaur (58) and Gurmail Kaur (60) of Khiwa Daluwala village in Punjab’s Mansa district — were run over by a speeding truck carrying construction material near the Tikri-Bahadurgarh border here on Thursday morning. Two others sustained injuries. The incident of Laxmpur Kheri literally repeated itself. They were cremated today[Read More…]
The second day of appellate proceedings by the United States against Julian Assange saw the defence make their case against the overturning of District Court Judge Vanessa Baraitser’s January ruling. Any extradition to the US, she concluded, would be so oppressive to the publisher as to render it unjust under UK extradition law. Before the UK High Court, both Edward[Read More…]
To Shri Bhupender Yadav Minister Ministry of Environment, Forests & Climate Change (MEFCC) Govt of India Dear Shri Yadav, I refer to your Ministry’s recent decision (https://moef.gov.in/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/scan_1_20211021165307682.pdf) to exempt mine expansion projects from the mandatory requirement of public hearing as a condition precedent to granting statutory environment clearance. In my view, your Ministry’s decision is highly imprudent, as it violates the letter and the[Read More…]
Weather extremes can cause economic ripples along supply chains. If they occur at roughly the same time, the ripples start interacting and can amplify, even if they occur at completely different places around the world, a new study – “Ripple Resonance Amplifies Economic Welfare Loss from Weather Extremes” – by Kilian Kuhla, Sven Norman Willner, Christian Otto, Tobias Geiger and Anders Levermann (published on 27[Read More…]
The co-chairs of the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics of the U.S. House of Representatives Science, Space & Technology Committee were cheerleaders for the use of nuclear power in space at a hearing at which they presided over last week titled “Accelerating Deep Space Travel with Space Nuclear Propulsion.” The advocacy of Representatives Don Beyer and Eddie Bernice Johnson for nukes in[Read More…]
The US has been targeting China by expressing a concern that China does not or will not act according to a ‘rules-based’ order. This column examines how well the US follows the rules, especially international laws, it played a key role in developing. For example, two key articles in the United Nations Charter stress the importance of non-intervention. UN Charter[Read More…]
by Thomas Klikauer and Meg Young Bushfire smoke over the Sydney Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge on 29 December. Photograph Source: Nick-D – CC BY-SA 4.0 Perhaps democratic eco-socialism starts with a need to solve the climate crisis and related crises. This requires a radical socio-ecological revolution that transcends capitalism through the non-violent dismantling of capitalism. It replaces capitalism with an alternative system based[Read More…]
How a human rights activist could be a challenge to the jail authority? On what way could solitary confinement of undertrial prisoner help him/her to avail justice? From various press releases, letters and media reports, Ganatantrik Adhikar Surakhya Sangathan, Odisha (GASS) got information that the some of the human rights activists, arrested on Elgar Parishad – Bhima Koregaon case, have[Read More…]
In an interview sometime back, Chandrashekhar Azad alias Ravan had said that the present is the golden period of Dalit politics. By the way, if the condition and direction of Dalit politics is seen today, then it is not visible from anywhere its golden period, but it is its downfall. On one hand, while Dalit leaders have taken refuge in[Read More…]
The recent in the face bluster of the Centre that it need not always obey the verdict of the SC carried a disturbing undertone of menace.As if it will be infra dig for the SC to compel the Centre to comply with its orders.Treason,to put it starkly. But in democracy such obedience to constituted authority is the rule,as in its[Read More…]
Eminent Gandhian S.N.Subba Rao is no more. He breathed his last at the age of 92 in Jaipur on October 27. He will be remembered by countless people for spreading the message of justice, peace and non-violence for over seven decades, but above all he will be remembered by those who had the cherished the experience of attending his youth[Read More…]
The Tamils in Sri Lanka, victims of genocides, the worst during the war between 2006-2009 including structural genocide since 1948 [immediately after the independence from the British] which is still being actively executed by the Sri Lankan Governments have left the Tamils with scars of war, traumatized with heavy feelings of a defeated nation and wounded pride. From the ashes[Read More…]
Robin Rue Simmons had been very curious about the truth of American life as a young person. But it was only after she finished high school, left her native Evanston, Illinois, and returned as an adult — ready to buy a house in the historically Black neighborhood in which she grew up — that she delved deep into her city’s[Read More…]
President Gotabaya Rajapakshe in his speech in the United Nations General Assembly in his ambitious statement said “Fostering greater accountability, restorative justice and meaningful reconciliation through domestic institutions is essential to achieve lasting peace. So too is ensuring more equitable participation in the fruits of economic development. It is my Government’s firm intention to build a prosperous, stable and secure[Read More…]
The attempted US extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange resumed yesterday with the opening of a hearing into a US government appeal. It is a legal abomination in pursuit of a heinous crime. Assange is being targeted for his and WikiLeaks’s exposure of war crimes, torture and other human rights abuses, mass surveillance, coup plots, and state corruption. The architects[Read More…]
The Association for Protection of Democratic Right, better known as APDR was going to hold its belated (due to pandemic related restrictions) 28th biannual State Convention (রাজ্য সম্মেলন / राज्य सम्मेलन) at Surendranath Vidya Niketan at Sheoraphuli on 23rd & 24th October, 2021. They were forced to suspend the meet under extreme pressure and intimidation by Administration at the last[Read More…]
It’s time to ready yourself for ghoulishly bad behaviour. Shred your bill of rights or whatever charter of liberties you have handy. Flatulent, dangerous and fatuous, the US prosecution of Julian Assange took to the UK High Court on October 27, opening its effort to overturn the January ruling by District Judge Vanessa Baraitser. In a judgment poor on press[Read More…]
Ecuador’s President Guillermo Lasso on Wednesday called for dialogue following a second day of demonstrations by indigenous and social groups against gasoline price rises. The President said his government would keep security forces on highways to maintain order. Media reports said: Thousands of demonstrators marched on Tuesday in rejection of Lasso’s increase of the price of gasoline extra, a cheaper[Read More…]
In June 2021, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) India released an appraisal report on the Aspirational Districts Programme (henceforth ADP). ADP is a flagship programme by the Government of India which is dedicated to the development of 115 aspirational districts (a new nomenclature used for most backward districts) across 28 states in India. In its 65 pages long report, the[Read More…]
When Joe Biden was declared the winner in the US elections last November, expectations in Ramallah were high. A Biden Administration, compared to the brazenly pro-Israel Trump Administration, would surely be much fairer to Palestinians, was the conventional wisdom at the time. Hence, unsurprisingly, Palestinian Authority President, Mahmoud Abbas, was among the first world leaders to most enthusiastically[Read More…]
“The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force.” –Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The German Ideology “If you stick a knife in my back nine inches and pull it out six inches, there’s no progress.[Read More…]
The Arab word’s a veritable mess. The cosmic leadership deficit, the absence of legitimate institutions, the lack of transparency, disrespect for human rights, abysmal regard for gender equality, and too much conspiratorial thinking make it impossible to come to terms with the magnitude of the problems. In short, this region will remain broken, angry, and dysfunctional until the leaders who[Read More…]
After making losses on their vegetable crops throughout the Covid period farmers in Madhya Pradesh are making big losses due to falling prices of cotton. Vegetable crops have been destroyed for two years in a row due to Covid, because the market was closed. Prices had fallen so low that paying for wages and freight charges to the mandis was[Read More…]
The seasonal stream rolling down along the north-western boundary of our over a century old house in the small hill town of Bhimtal, suddenly became turbulent following the continuous down pour since the early morning of October18. Our house is situated in the lowermost terrace of an orchard that surrounds it. By 10 pm it had rained enough for the[Read More…]
When world leaders gather in Scotland next week for the COP26 climate change conference, activists will be pushing for drastic action to end the world’s catastrophic reliance on fossil fuels. Consciousness about the climate emergency has skyrocketed in recent years, while government responses remain meager. But one aspect of extreme climate jeopardy—“nuclear winter”—has hardly reached the stage of dim awareness Wishful[Read More…]
Today the UK High Court begins a two-day hearing of a United States government appeal aimed at securing WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange’s extradition to the US. The hearing is the culmination of a campaign of rampant criminality by American imperialism and its allies, stretching over a decade. Its character is summed up in revelations during the last two years that[Read More…]
Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok has returned home with his wife under tight security, the prime minister’s office said on its Facebook account on Tuesday. Some ministers remain in detention and may be facing a trial. Since early Monday, Hamdok and some of his ministers were arrested with civilian members in the Sovereign Council. Earlier on Tuesday, General Commander of[Read More…]
All indications are that the regional states are preparing to accord recognition to the Taliban government. The meeting of regional states and Taliban officials in the so-called Moscow Format last Wednesday signalled that the Taliban government is a compelling reality and constructive engagement is needed. read more A week is a long time in politics. The foreign-minister level conference in Tehran[Read More…]
Is the imperium showing suspicions about its intended quarry? It is hard to believe it, but the US House Intelligence Committee is on a mission of discovery. Its subject: a Yahoo News report disclosing much material that was already in the public domain on the plot to kidnap or, failing that, poison Julian Assange. Given that such ideas were aired[Read More…]
by Manolo De Los Santos and Vijay Prashad U.S. Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) appears to be obsessed with Cuba. Every few days he takes to social media or makes remarks to the press about his desire to overthrow the Cuban Revolution. In recent months, Rubio has played a key role in drumming up support for anti-government protests in Cuba. On September 23, 2021, for[Read More…]
ExxonMobil has spent more than $39 million to manufacture doubt about climate science. In a secret video recording made public in late June, a top ExxonMobil lobbyist—Keith McCoy, who was fired soon afterward—not only conceded that the oil giant’s support for a carbon tax is a sham, but he also admitted that the company quietly financed climate science denier groups to stave[Read More…]
As the British before them, US imperial propaganda treats itself as the victim and those they invaded and occupied as the criminal On August 18th, shortly after the Taliban took Kabul, former British Prime Minister Theresa May stood up in the British House of Commons and asked: “Where is global Britain on the streets of Kabul?” The rhetorical question, as well[Read More…]
Preparations for nuclear war have been in the news, even mainstream news, more than just occasionally: NATO unveils master plan to defeat Russia in nuclear war, Voice of London, UK., October 23, 2021 [1] America’s failed weapons test shows Washington is currently hopelessly outgunned by Beijing in the race for hypersonic supremacy International Journal, Oct. 22, 2021 [2] China says[Read More…]
Canada was born of empire and still thrives within that milieu. It is the progeny of French and British imperial quests in the ‘New’ World and is accompanied by its siblings within the Five Eyes, the most influential being the United States. Canada’s creation out of mostly British imperial interests carried all the factors of imperialism internally as it developed[Read More…]
Thank you Vidya Bhushan Rawat for mincing no words in your piece “Sacrilege or blasphemy: The dirty attempt to cover up the caste prejudices against Dalits.” The underbelly of a progressive community stands exposed. It is a wake-up call for the Sikh community. The deathly silence of the Sikh leadership in not unequivocally condemning the ghastly murder is reminiscent of[Read More…]
As an eyewitness, I can recall the events of January 6th in Washington as if they were yesterday. The crowds of angry loyalists storming the building while overwhelmed security guards gave way. The slavishly loyal vice-president who would, the president hoped, restore him to power. The crush of media that seemed confused, almost overwhelmed, by the crowd’s fury. The waiter[Read More…]
Section 4(1)(b) of the RTI Act made it an inescapable duty of every public authority to furnish 17 categories of information on their own, without anybody seeking it. The illegal circular of Telangana govt that no information could be given without permission of principal secretary is illegal; it needs to be withdrawn immediately, as it seriously undermines the transparency and[Read More…]
On Friday, Israel’s Defence Minister Benny Gantz signed a military order declaring six of the most prominent Palestinian non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the occupied Palestinian territories “terrorist organizations.” The decree is an attack on Palestinian human rights activists and the communities they represent, and on the local and international public’s right to information about the situation in the occupied territories.[Read More…]
The high handedness of the Taloja Central Jail administration was evident in the events leading to the death of the octogenarian Bhima Koregaon undertrail, Stan Swamy on July 5, 2021. Almost immediately, the remaining BK undertrials protested the arbitrary jail conditions imposed by the then Superintendent, Kaustabh Kurlekar by observing a one-day hunger strike. However, far from bringing such persecution[Read More…]
Madhushree is a comics-maker
The former chairperson of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Justice H. L. Dattu, during his tenure there (February 2016 – December 2020 ), described it as a `toothless tiger’, while giving vent to his frustration at his inability to deliver justice to victims of human rights violation. He blamed the built-in regulations that were imposed on the NHRC by[Read More…]
The practice of temple demolition/ appropriation of images of gods and goddess was in vogue in ancient India and Kashmir much before the arrival of the Muslims. In ancient times the achievements of Hindu Kings were measured not only by the number of temples they built in their realms during peace times but also of those they appropriated/demolished in the[Read More…]
A military coup in Sudan has dealt a sharp reversal to one of Africa’s most heralded and closely watched democratic transitions, igniting street protests by thousands of pro-democracy supporters and triggering a harsh crackdown that left scores of people dead or injured from military gunfire. Early on Monday, the military dissolved Sudan’s transitional government and the Sovereign Council, a joint[Read More…]
The probability is that the US President Joe Biden committed yet another diplomatic gaffe at a CNN town hall last Thursday that Washington had a commitment to come to Taiwan’s defence if it were attacked by China. Yet, like Biden’s gaffes usually, this one too was not without an element of deliberateness. Biden was even insistent. Indeed, there is an[Read More…]
On January 7, 2015, the staff of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo found themselves facing a form of cancel culture before it became fashionable in the Twaddle sphere. It was of the most severe, lethal sort. Twelve people were butchered and the fanatic’s credo asserted. The assailants Chérif and Saïd Kouachi had been offended by the magazine’s cartoon depictions[Read More…]
When the COVID-19 lockdown began in West Bengal in 2020, a number of students from Jadavpur University of Kolkata came together to stand up with the people in the face of the grave crisis. The lockdown was a threat to the employment of many belonging to the underprivileged sections of society. The slum dwellers, daily wage laborers, domestic workers faced[Read More…]
India’s rankings in religious freedom and human rights have been on a slippery slope since the ascension of the Hindu ‘nationalist’ regime of Narendra Modi in 2014. The country’s pride has fallen from 0.58 in 2014 to a pitiable 0.31in 2019, and currently shares the spot with a war-torn South Sudan in the World Bank’s Freedom of Religion index. The[Read More…]
by Noam Chomsky and Stan Cox This month will mark a critical juncture in the struggle to avoid climate catastrophe. At the COP26 global climate summit kicking off next week in Glasgow, Scotland, negotiators will be faced with the urgent need to get the world economy off the business-as-usual track that will take the Earth up to and beyond 3 degrees[Read More…]
When the news circulated that Morocco’s leading political group, the Development and Justice Party (PJD), has been trounced in the latest elections, held in September, official media mouthpieces in Egypt celebrated the news as if the PJD’s defeat was, in itself, a blow to the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood movement. Regionally, political commentators who dedicated much of their time to discredit[Read More…]
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Tuesday downgraded its 2021 economic growth forecast for Asia after the Covid-19 delta variant caused a spike in cases in parts of the region. The IMF said it expects Asia’s economy to grow by 6.5% in 2021, compared with its April forecast for a 7.6% expansion. “The global COVID-19 pandemic is still ravaging the region,”[Read More…]
Although critics of the Biden administration’s Build Back Better plan to increase funding for U.S. education, healthcare, and action against climate catastrophe say the United States can’t afford it, there are no such qualms about ramping up funding for the U.S. military. This May, the Pentagon asked Congress to fund a $715 billion budget for Fiscal 2022—an increase of $10[Read More…]
The aim of consumerism, which the rulers of these [socialist] economies had promoted, when they aspired to surpass the United States in the standard of life, conceived in terms of capitalist West, forced them to abandon their socialist objective. The consumerist standards of the Western world could be achieved only by providing very high incomes to a few in highly[Read More…]
The Ken-Betwa River Link Project (KBRLP) is one of the most disputed river projects of India. Involving two states of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, this Rs. 35000 crore ( Rs. 3500 billion) project involves the construction of a dam and a 230 km canal, largely ( but not entirely) in Bundelkhand region of these two states, to take the[Read More…]
Shimla: The lockdown reached the remote Lahaul-Spiti district of Himachal Pradesh before the Covid pandemic did. Farmers, who suddenly had no way to send their produce outside their region, found a simple solution. They began to host farmers markets called Apni Mandi (Our Market) across the valley. When the initiative earned them profits, farmers were inspired to grow food[Read More…]
The Basor community of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh are still reeling with the losses of the pandemic as it brought their business – making household items of bamboo – to a screeching halt. Depending upon benevolent supporters and NGOs for ration, the members of the Basor community, today have no alternative livelihood. The popularity of plastic in the last[Read More…]
Whatever has happened to Pegasus,the winged horse? The SC had put a simple question to the government’s counsel if it used it on certain citizens who can by no means be considered security threats.The government just refused to respond any way,leaving everybody on tenterhooks. Nothing has since been heard about it. Meanwhile reports say the Israeli government is in secret[Read More…]
A coalition of over two dozen press freedom and human rights organisations has called on the Biden administration to drop all charges against Julian Assange. This is ahead of a US appeal that will be heard next week, challenging a British court decision that blocked the WikiLeaks publisher’s extradition. The statement, delivered last week to Biden’s Attorney General Merrick Garland,[Read More…]
Looking back on 30 years of climate conferences, Geoffrey Lean recalls the many missed opportunities for change that led us to this boiling point. Peering back through the tunnel of three frustrating decades, it’s hard to believe that, as the 1990s opened, the world expected to quickly agree on effective action to tackle climate change. Back then, the stars did seem[Read More…]
Since its origin in the early 19th century by followers of Robert Owen, the term “socialism” has evolved to mean many different things to many different people and has been misused by dictatorships to describe their draconian management of capitalism. At the present time “socialism” is an unpopular word. Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot have poisoned our understanding by applying the word “socialism” to[Read More…]
“It’s like putting a Band-Aid over a gaping hole,” said Andrea Taylor of Duke University, discussing the rich countries of North America and Europe giving their own citizens Covid-19 vaccine boosters before the rest of the world gets their first shot. Covid-19 is a global pandemic. It respects no national boundaries and will continue to spread and mutate if it[Read More…]
We are not afraid, but clearly they are! Image: Aljazeera [2011] “The resistance movement has been growing steadily in Palestine since the Second Intifada — especially in West Bank villages affected by the Separation Wall and illegal settlements” [GALLO/GETTY] There is no escape for Israel from growing Palestinian power. If nothing else, the upcoming Conference of the Alternative Palestinian Path in Madrid[Read More…]
I have transcribed much words spoken by the survivors of holocaust before writing this. I did this exercise not to gather information but to recognise in my flesh that I am incapable of speaking about what has happened at Auschwitz, the largest concentration and extermination camp. The place of “Final Solution to the Jewish Question”. ‘Where inmates were killed in[Read More…]
The upcoming CoP26 is not without its own set of apprehensions and mired more in doubts than expectations with unrealistic ‘net-zero’ rhetoric and big consultancies like Boston Consultancy Group[i] managing the event, along with the latest rumours that one of the most notorious businessmen of the world, Adani[ii], trying to pitch for a presence in this global summit. Climate change[Read More…]
There is no doubt in the fact that Sikhism actually was a revolt against the Brahmanical system and superstition. Guru Granth Saheb is perhaps the only holy book which contains matters from different religions as well as those of various Sufi Saints including Kabir, Ravidas, Baba Farid and others. The aim of Sikhism was to create an egalitarian society and[Read More…]
In a democratic country like India, custodial death, being a regular occurrence, raises question of our system. Custodial Violence is never acceptable in our civilized society. But it is a matter of regret that our educated and civilised masses are not concerned about it in any way. Further, while the allegations of custodial death are rising in the state day[Read More…]
Joint Fact-Finding Report by: Association for Protection of CivilRights|United Christian Forum | United Against Hate Series Of Attack On Christians The violence against Muslims in India which has now become pan Indian needs to be seen with the violence and vendetta against Christians. Unfortunately the media tends to ignore the violence against Christian. Human rights groups which monitor atrocities against[Read More…]
It was Tuesday, August 4, 2009 in the Europe Tour. Before that I only knew a little about Monet, Leonardo Da Vinci, Vincent van Gogh, Rembrandt, Pablo Picasso, but I was very happy today because we went to see the world-famous Vincent van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. We got there in the morning. As usual, there were crowds of tourists[Read More…]
The Moscow meeting of ten regional states and the Taliban officials on Wednesday has produced an outcome that by far exceeds expectations. The salience of the consensus opinion is four-fold, as reflected in the joint statement issued after the event: regional recognition that Taliban government is a compelling “reality”; it is through constructive engagement that regional states should endeavour to influence Taliban; a[Read More…]
[Rima Najjar: Packing my bags to travel to Madrid, Spain: The Alternative Palestinian Path Conference (Towards a new revolutionary commitment) October-November 2021 Although the world has stood up for Palestine repeatedly through widespread global demonstrations against Israel’s crimes (see The Electronic Intifada’s video clip of May 2021), it still takes a lot of courage for Palestinians to stand up for[Read More…]
Back in the 60s and 70s the drugs of choice were marijuana, LSD and heroin. Though the Beatles may have actually never wrote in I am the Walrus, but the refrain was popular as hell: ” Everybody smokes pot”. For most of my peers, the ones who learned to grow their hair a bit longer, male or female, marijuana was[Read More…]
The term ‘ethnicity’ carries a broad range of connotations. It is highly subjective and typically self-reported, and different organisations use different terms to describe ethnicity. I self-identify as a British Bangladeshi and a Catholic Christian. I’ve had the opportunity to observe how ethnic minorities are represented politically inside the York Labour Party. York Labour has a considerable and growing ethnic[Read More…]
The situation in Afghanistan is yet to calm down. Women are facing hard time and threats. The Taliban are also wearing down with problems of governance. Internal Divisions, Even Resentment A Christian Science Monitor report, ‘Why did we fight?’ Challenge of governing is wearing down Taliban, by Scott Peterson on October 21, 2021 said: “The veteran Taliban fighter once strove[Read More…]
Moscow has butted the grand old transatlantic alliance in the chest on Monday with the foreign ministry announcing that it will suspend the NATO military liaison mission with effect from November 1 and recall the accreditation of its staff in response to the NATO decision to withdraw the accreditation of eight Russian diplomats. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov curtly added, “if NATO has[Read More…]
Overpaid breakfast hosts on an Australian network sniggered, wondered and pondered. Why is that top throbbed Blue Origin capsule heading to space shaped that way? Is Jeff Bezos’s effort nothing more than a phallic spurt into the heavens? The implications are flowing: Can he hold it? Will he come in the appropriate atmospheric strata? Giggles aside, the scandalous venture that[Read More…]
The former African-American military commander Colin Powell has just died from COVID-19 complications, and mendacious and pro-war Western Mainstream media and politicians have been fulsome in their praise for the first Black American Secretary of State while conceding his error at the UN over non-existent Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD). Missing has been mention of the millions dying in the[Read More…]
They are called ‘chitmahals’ or ‘paper palaces’. For decades, the people living in these twilight zones on the border between India and Bangladesh have been searching for citizenship, constitutional rights and a national identity. Over 15,000 people live in these enclaves on the Indian side of the border and in make-shift camps which have come up in recent times near[Read More…]
Within just a few days, the United States will once again make its case in a UK court that it has a right to extradite WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to be tried under the Espionage Act, in what remains this century’s most dangerous attack on global press freedom. These hearings, taking place on October 27 and 28, are an attempt[Read More…]
It is time to take action against corporate methods of agriculture which poison the food our families eat, threaten the survival of soil ecosystems, destroy the livelihood of farmers, crush farmworker organizing efforts and subjugate entire countries. Here are a few of the many ways that people are challenging capitalist agriculture, from the very theoretical to the very concrete. The[Read More…]
As Israel intensified its killing campaign in the Gaza Strip in May, people across the globe took to the streets in solidarity with Palestinians. Others used social media to document, condemn and raise awareness of Israel’s crimes. But Facebook and Instagram users soon noticed their posts being taken down, their accounts suspended and their content receiving reduced visibility. A new report by Human Rights Watch confirms that the[Read More…]
Why is the world’s most powerful democracy absent from the 12 million pages of leaked documents on global tax dodging and hidden wealth schemes? Where are the US billionaires, Wall Street banks and financiers, the Big Four tax firms Deloitte, EY, KPMG, PwC? In this first of a two-part series, Michael West asks if the Pandora Papers the world’s biggest[Read More…]
Two of India’s most beautiful regions where thousands of people go to watch and feel the wonders of nature are suffering because of the extremely disastrous rains and floods subsequently. Well, the pain that the rains brought to Kerala and now in Uttarakhand is warning to all of us. It’s nature’s warning to us to mend our ways. Nobody would[Read More…]
In recent years leaders of Green political parties have served in coalition governments of several countries. They could do this generally because they had done well in elections and so when coalition governments were formed they could enter the government in important positions and could influence government decisions,of course in favor of environment protection but often also in favor of[Read More…]
Before it’s too late, we need to ask ourselves a crucial question: Do we really — I mean truly — want a new Cold War with China? Because that’s just where the Biden administration is clearly taking us. If you need proof, check out last month’s announcement of an “AUKUS” (Australia, United Kingdom, U.S.) military alliance in Asia. Believe me, it’s far[Read More…]
On 21 October 2021, India crossed its milestone of administering over 1 billion (100 crores) doses within 278 days since it began the vaccination rollout (on 16th January 2021). The World Health Organization (WHO) calls upon all countries to ensure that at least 70% of their population must be fully vaccinated by June 2022. India aims to cross 70% goalpost[Read More…]
Africa’s 1.3 billion people remain “extremely vulnerable” as the continent warms more, and at a faster rate, than the global average, warns the UN. Yet Africa’s 54 countries are responsible for less than 4% of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In State of the Climate in Africa 2020 (https://library.wmo.int/doc_num.php?explnum_id=10833), a new report from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and other[Read More…]
As a city, Melbourne previously prided itself with the air of a prim and proper heiress, one without peer in Australia: a gastronomic wonder, a sporting goddess, and a place of orderly public transport. The Economist Intelligence Unit glowed with praise, designating the city the world’s “most liveable” for seven years running. There were few law and order issues; nothing[Read More…]
The United States regretted its inability to take part in the talks on Afghanistan in Moscow this week. The Russian side was pinning hopes on a meeting of the exclusive Troika Plus (US, China, Russia and Pakistan) followed by a gathering in an expanded format known as the ‘Moscow format’ on Wednesday. The US State Department spokesman Ned Price said during a[Read More…]
When Occupy Wall Street was evicted from its home base in New York City’s Zuccotti Park on Nov. 15, 2011, by the NYPD in a paramilitary-style operation under cover of the night with a press blackout, the obituaries were being written. The day before, Occupy Oakland, which vied with New York as the leader of the leaderless movement, was evicted for the second and final time. A convergence[Read More…]
“It feels like we are at the end of an era,” Bárbara Sepúlveda tells me on October 12, 2021. Sepúlveda is a member of Chile’s Constitutional Convention and of the Communist Party of Chile. The era to which Sepúlveda refers is that of General Augusto Pinochet, who led the U.S.-backed coup in 1973 that overthrew the popularly elected government of[Read More…]
In August 2019, in the middle of heavy monsoon rain and floods, my sister Sudakshina Sen (an avid wildlife photographer) and I arrived at the Western Ghats in southwest India, a global biodiversity hotspot. One day, we got stuck on the sinuous state highway SH-78, due to fallen trees on the road from the storm. Parked by the roadside was[Read More…]
The pro-Israel crowd on social media was quick to pounce on award-winning Irish novelist, Sally Rooney, as soon as she declared that she had “chosen not to sell … translation rights of her best-selling novel, ‘Beautiful World, Where Are You’ to an Israeli-based publishing house”. Expectedly, the accusations centered on the standard smearing used by Israel and its supporters against[Read More…]
US-based sociologist Ashutosh Varshney, an expert on BJP politics has coined the term Jim Crow Hindutva to describe the current wave of Hindu nationalism fang in the country. The author compares the current brand of BJP politics with the American politics of the late 19th century with regard to race that was called ‘Jim Crow’ south syndrome. Ashutosh Varshney is[Read More…]
This week many parts of Uttrakhand have again faced disaster like conditions of very heavy and concentrated rain, landslides, heavier then expected water flows and floods. At the time of writing on Wednesday evening ( October 20), 46 deaths have been reported and 11 are reported missing. Rescues by National Disaster Response Team and others resulted in timely rescue of[Read More…]
With 22 million passengers every day the Indian railways is second only to China globally in terms of the number of people transported. Since the onset of the Covid pandemic in early 2020 however, hundreds of train services have been shut down and traffic plummeted with big revenue losses. While this has not made much difference to the India’s urban[Read More…]
by Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies In country after country around the world, people are rising up to challenge entrenched, failing neoliberal political and economic systems, with mixed but sometimes promising results. Progressive leaders in the U.S. Congress are refusing to back down on the Democrats’ promises to American voters to reduce poverty, expand rights to healthcare, education[Read More…]
The wealth of US billionaires has increased by a massive $2.1 trillion, or 70 percent, since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, while tens of millions of working people have faced unemployment and illness, and 724,000 have died from COVID-19. Additionally, the list of American billionaires grew by 131 individuals—going from 614 to 745—during the same period. According to an[Read More…]
(Note: Although Bhagwan Das wrote this article in 2001, but in this he had identified the shortcomings and weaknesses of Dalits and predicted a bleak future of Dalits, it is proving to be completely correct today. Therefore, Dalits should learn from this article and fight for their rights by adopting Buddhism and forming a strong organization to secure their future.[Read More…]
Climate change has been identified as the “defining issue of our time” by many of the world’s leading experts and the diagnosis of planetary health is dire. The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services has concluded that goals for achieving sustainability “cannot be met by current trajectories” and UN secretary-general António Guterres has referred to humanity’s “war on nature” as “senseless and suicidal”. The[Read More…]
Youth-led mass mobilisations in recent years have challenged the argument that young people have no interest in politics or democratic processes. Young people displayed a commitment to change and modelled an inclusive approach to participatory democracy through street actions, events, and debates as seen in the climate movement. Jasmine Lorenzini explains how young people challenge the norms of participation today,[Read More…]
The La Niña, a natural cycle marked by cooler-than-average ocean water in the central Pacific Ocean, is back, U.S. federal forecasters announced Thursday. It is happening for the second straight year. The La Niña (Spanish for “little girl”) climate pattern is one of the main drivers of weather around the world, especially during the late fall, winter and early spring. It is[Read More…]
If controlled by corporations, digital farming initiatives create new poverty traps for small food producers while promoting environmental-destructive intensive agricultural practices. Smartphones have revolutionised our way of living. No need to visit a library when looking for information—we just go online. Convenience is convincing. But can digital technology solve all the problems in the world? The idea of going high-tech in[Read More…]
I read a stimulating essay recently co-authored by Paul Dolan, professor at the London School of Economics, and his research assistant Amanda Hedwood analysing, against the backdrop of the uncertainties of the Covid-19 pandemic, how dominant narratives powerfully influence decisions and create the ‘narrative trap’ in decision-making. The LSE academics wrote: “We contend that the failure to step back and consider[Read More…]
History is strewn with the broken branches of twisted irony. An individual who found himself entangled in it was the late Colin Powell, who, as a military man, gave a doctrine his name only to forgo it as a diplomat. The Powell Doctrine was one of certitude and caution: do not engage in conflict except in conditions whereby you could[Read More…]
“General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized that education is the foundation of a century-old plan. It is hoped that the People’s Education Press will focus on the fundamental task of fostering morality, adhere to the correct political direction, carry forward the fine traditions, promote reforms and innovations, and create excellent teaching materials with Bacon casting soul, enlightening wisdom, and making new[Read More…]
Safety should always get importance in coal mining operations but in addition special conditions have emerged now in which it is even more important to emphasize safety of coal mining and coal miners in India. This is particularly true of the most extensive coal mining belt in the state of Jharkhand and neighboring areas. As is well-known, electricity generation in[Read More…]
Can you see it, right here, inside swaying the tusks dripping blood? Do you see it, drunk in adulation the peak of its head held high still climbing with every cheer from the boisterous crowd? Are you seeing it- the large microphonic ears flapping on himself like a decorated fan? Those distrusting eyes penetrating through you in quiet[Read More…]
Thirteen thousand feet high on the far side of the Himalaya mountains, we have entered the past and the future at the same time. We are a medical expedition and also a pilgrimage, consisting of doctors, nurses, Buddhist clerics, supernumeraries like me, and a large staff of guides, muleteers, and camp tenders. We are bound for the isolated villages of[Read More…]
The plight of the undertrials in the jails: The majority of the undertrials in India belong to the disadvantaged sections of the society. The offences alleged to have been committed by them may be minor ones but they are forced to languish in jails without a trial for years, as the criminal justice system in the country is a slow-moving[Read More…]
The global (and largest) lung health conference opened with not one but at least three major scientific announcements. The 52nd Union World Conference on Lung Health was marked with the announcement of three major scientific developments that can potentially impact the global response to tuberculosis (TB), the world’s second deadliest infectious disease after Covid-19. Researchers from the University of Cape[Read More…]
If people in India are told that the Ganga and Jamuna meet in Bangladesh then they will not believe this easily as they know very well that the Ganga and the Yamuna/Jamuna meet at the famous sangam (confluence) near Prayagraj, or near the city of Allahabad, a very famous place of pilgrimage as well as tourist interest. However the fact[Read More…]
Colin Powell, the first black secretary of state who saw his legacy tarnished when he made the case for war in Iraq in 2003, died on Monday from complications from COVID-19. News of his death elicited strong reaction in Iraq, which has paid the price of what they call “never-ending wars”. Many of them wish he had been tried of[Read More…]
Commemorations were held on Oct 17 to mark the 60th anniversary of a bloody Paris police crackdown on a demonstration by Algerians that occurred during the final year of the struggle for independence from the colonial power France. Human rights and anti-racism groups as well as Algerian associations staged a tribute march in Paris on Sunday and called on authorities[Read More…]
No one can stop him. He can barely stop himself. The former Australian prime minister, Tony Abbott, seems to be everywhere, fighting the poor cause. At the very least, he is everywhere with the press cameras, the niggling concerns, the irritations that make it into the twenty-four-hour news cycle before sinking with toxic charm. He is the perfect ingredient in[Read More…]
I was 5 years old when I first got involved with environmental activism. For me, it started with caring about whales and the ocean, and that morphed into climate action. From handing out pamphlets at the local farmers market and being on a local radio station when I was 6, to speaking with the Connecticut governor and organizing a rally[Read More…]
“Vexilla regis prodeunt Inferni” – Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: The Inferno Try to look ahead and see if you can see what’s been coming for decades. Try to climb higher and see the beautiful things that Heaven bears, where we came forth, and once more see the stars and raise a banner of resistance to the King of Hell and[Read More…]
During the autumn of 2020, the United States lost one of its most brilliant, incisive, yet unheralded thinkers in Sherle R. Schwenninger. One of Schwenninger’s many gifts was his ability to anticipate far in advance trends that would shape U.S. foreign policy and the global political economy. He was also one of the first thinkers to promote an alternative to[Read More…]
The fact that Tanzanian novelist Abdulrazak Gurnah has won the 2021 Nobel Prize in Literature is welcome news, especially as the Swedish Academy is historically known for lacking in diversity, as if intellectual creativity is largely confined to Western intellectual circles. It is premature to suggest that the Academy has finally decided to break away from its ethnocentric past and[Read More…]
With the advent of the Black Lives Matter movement, together with the emergence of Critical Race Theory, the spotlight has once again been shone on the heinous institution that was slavery and its aftermath, racial discrimination. Could anything be worse than a system in which a human being becomes the property of another, to do with as the slave owner[Read More…]
To: Shri A.K. Jain, Chairperson, Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee, Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change, Indira Paryavaran Bhavan, Jor Bagh, New Delhi. Date – 19th October 2021 Dear Sir, Its with great shock and concern that we learn about the recent discovery of Genetically modified rice in a consignment that we had exported to EU countries. Rice being one[Read More…]
The Jewish Chronicle warns that the dismissal of Prof David Miller is ‘just the beginning’ The Israel lobby appears to be readying for a campaign to root out leftwing academics in the UK critical of Israel’s continuing oppression of the Palestinian people – echoing its efforts against the previous leader of Britain’s Labour party, Jeremy Corbyn. As with the attacks[Read More…]
Islam’s diffusion towards India occurred due to Arab Traders rather than Invaders as imagined by the RSS ideologue, Mohan Baghwat in his latest statement. This is substantially substantiated by the building up of the first mosque by these Arabs in Kodungallur (modern Kerala which had nothing in common with what came to be called India after the British arrival) in[Read More…]
The global debt has jumped to a new high of $226 trillion, said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on October 13, 2021. As reason of this leap in global debt, the IMF has cited the Covid-19 and policies put in place to respond to it. Global debt in 2020, including public and private borrowing, “jumped by 14 percent to a record high $226 trillion,”[Read More…]
At a conference I attended some time ago, during cocktails, I observed a few delegates from Gujarat sipping their drinks from steel glasses. When I asked them out of curiosity the reason, one of them cryptically replied that if one lived in Gujarat, one too learned to do things this way. What they were trying to say was that when[Read More…]
Food Sovereignty is a philosophy of life. It offers a vision for our collective future, and defines the principles around which we organize our daily living and co-exist with Mother Earth. It is a celebration of life and all the diversity around us. It embraces every element of our cosmos; the sky above our heads, the land beneath our feet, the[Read More…]
In 1871 photographer William Henry Jackson and painter Thomas Moran joined an expedition to the Yellowstone region of the United States, which they documented in a series of powerful and moving creative works. Soon after, Jackson’s and Moran’s images became the catalysts for Congress to designate the very first national park at Yellowstone. This little-known detail, that artists played a major[Read More…]
For decades, I kept a poster on my wall that I’d saved from the year I turned 16. In its upper left-hand corner was a black-and-white photo of a white man in a grey suit. Before him spread a cobblestone plaza. All you could see were the man and the stones. Its caption read, “He stood up alone and something[Read More…]
Celebrating the path of resistance for the Palestinian people Image: Poster behind writer and activist Khaled Barakat says: “Vietnam — Palestine.” [courtesy of Khaled Barakat] In the interview below, Palestinian writer, researcher and activist Khaled Barakat, co-organizer of Masar Badil (The Alternative Palestinian Path Conference: Towards a new revolutionary commitment, Madrid, Spain, October-November 2021), says: We are confident that the decisions, actions and[Read More…]
The Prime Minister of the country Narendra Modi has given the slogan ‘Small farmers, the glory of the nation’. His slogan is quite accurate, as evidenced by a report by the United Nations. The report highlights the fact that family farming is the only way to ensure food security for the whole world and save the environment from pollution. The[Read More…]
Nutritious food is considered essential for a healthy life, but 300 million people, or 40 percent of the world’s population, do not have enough money to eat nutritious food. This is stated in a report released at the United Nations Food Systems Summit 2021 held in Rome from 26 to 28 July. The report was jointly released by Food Price[Read More…]
In recent decades one of the greatest losses that India has suffered has been in the form of loss of the biodiversity of its crops. The 55 years of 1965-2020, the so-called green revolution years, can be described as the years of gratest loss of farm biodiversity in the country as traditional seeds of great diversity and immense value were[Read More…]
To celebrate the 204th birth anniversary of Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, the AMU Old Boys Association of Ghazipur chapter (located in eastern UP) has organized a programme in the S.K.B.M Intercollege Dildar Nagar. In this programme, literary figures, local leaders of various political parties (especially from the Congress and BSP) teachers and the large number of Alig biradary both males[Read More…]
Amid ongoing outrage over global vaccine inequity, Pope Francis on Saturday urged pharmaceutical companies to “make a gesture of humanity” by lifting intellectual property protections and sharing Covid-19 vaccine technology with the world. The pope’s remarks came during a video address to the World Meeting of Popular Movements, a collection of grassroots groups, in which he expressed his belief “that we are not condemned[Read More…]
On 27th September we commemorated the 10th death anniversary of the late playwright Gursharan Singh.Punjab has never witnessed a revolutionary theatre activist who has penetrated the soul of the Punjabi masses in such depth Be it in the era of the Naxalbari uprising, the Emergency, the Khalistani movement or period of Globalization, he kept the flag of revolutionary resistance afloat[Read More…]
Terror, terrorism, terrorists Terror is the emotion of “extreme fear” caused by the threat or use of violence. Terror is also an instrument to cause fear, “a weapon of the impotent, the disenfranchised and the unorganized in the face of profound grievance“. Causing extreme fear using the instrument of terror are both age-old. However, only in recent times has terrorism[Read More…]
Hunger and poverty are so intertwined that reports concerning one have implications for the other, and a palpable common factor is food security. The release of the Global Hunger Index (GHI) for 2021, on the eve of the observance of World Food Day (16 October), and the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty (17 October) has naturally generated both[Read More…]
Dwight D. Eisenhower had the special distinction of being a very highly decorated and senior five-star military general in-charge of some of the most crucial battles of the second world war who went on to become two-term President of the USA in the important post war phase ( 1953 -1961). When his maximum allowed 8 years of two terms were[Read More…]
The last 12 years have affirmed a dark history where Sri Lanka is unlikely to offer a just resolution to the Tamil national question. It continues with its long history [73 years – since independence from the British in 1948] of deception in formulating a just and reasonable solution to the conflict. Since 1948, Tamils underwent continuous genocides involving pogroms, economic[Read More…]
Well now you know how time flies, Like a bird caught in a whirlwind, Like a serpent shedding skins, Like a roadside bench being abandoned again and again. And it has been said before And maybe even before that, That these are worlds of our own making, A translucent lucid facade of falsifications Of hopes and of dreams and of[Read More…]
World Food Day ( October 16 ) may be just the right time to reconsider several highly controversial decisions taken in recent times which will create several avoidable problems in food and farming sectors. The Union Food and Public Distribution Minister Sh. Piyush Goyal said whle addressing a press conference in Shimla ( lead news in Amar Ujala dated 26[Read More…]
On September 26th, we commemorated the 35th martyrdom anniversary of Comrade Baldev Singh Mann, who succumbed after waging a valiant battle against the Khalistani terrorism. On the night of 26th September he fell to the bullets of the Khalistani Commando force. He was the Amritsar district secretary of the C.P.I. (M.L) Chandra Pulla Reddy group. and editor of party magazine[Read More…]
It was not for everybody, but the shock advertising tactics of the Australian comedian Dan Ilic made an appropriate point. Australia’s Prime Minister Scott Morrison, a famed coal hugger, has vacillated about whether to even go to the climate conference in Glasgow. Having himself turned the country’s prime ministerial office into an extended advertising agency, Ilic was speaking his language.[Read More…]
Come 16 October – and the world once again is together as one, to focus on the most basic need for a person’s survival: food! The first ‘World Food Day’ was observed in 194, to mark the launch of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations. Ever since, the day is marked to highlight the need and[Read More…]
On Sept. 28, Greta Thunberg mocked world leaders when she reiterated their promises to an audience of young activists at the Youth4Climate event in Milan, Italy, saying: “Build back better, blah blah blah, green economy, blah blah blah, net zero by 2050, blah blah blah, climate neutral, blah blah blah… This is all we hear from our so-called leaders. Words. Words[Read More…]
Monday, October 11, marked the official closure of the U.N. Group of Eminent Experts on Yemen (also known as the Group of Experts or GEE). For nearly four years, this investigative group examined alleged human rights abuses suffered by Yemenis whose basic rights to food, shelter, safety, health care and education were horribly violated, all while they were bludgeoned by Saudi and[Read More…]
Through his administration’s recent policies towards Haiti and Haitian migrants, President Joe Biden is carrying out a crime against humanity. Unfortunately, this represents continuity in a decades-long, bi-partisan policy toward Haiti. Biden recently ordered the breakup of a camp of 15,000 mainly Black Haitian migrants under a border bridge in Del Rio, Texas. The migrants—many of whom had traveled thousands[Read More…]
A new freely downloadable book I would like to announce the publication of a book which presents the reasons why we urgently need immediate and drastic climate action The book may be freely downloaded and circulated from the following link: http://www.fredsakademiet.dk/library/action.pdf Use of fossil fuels must stop! The IPCC Report The 4,000-page report by the International Panel on Climate Change[Read More…]
Facebook has been in the limelight for two issues of late—both damaging from the company’s perspective, but in terms of public interest, each has its own level of usefulness. The news item with less long-term significance but more sensational media appeal is that what was supposed to be a small configuration change took Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp down for a few hours[Read More…]
Speech against Irving Police Department’s honoring of RSS’s international wing After the City of Irving, Texas’s Police Department welcomed and honored a local branch of the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh, the international wing of India’s Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) paramilitary, on 21 September, I attended the very next city council meeting to explain how and why that sent a chilling message[Read More…]
Squid Game, a Korean survival drama series written and directed by Hwang Dong-hyuk, has become an international phenomenon. On Tuesday, Netflix reported that it had officially become the most widely viewed series ever for the platform, with more than 111 million viewers worldwide. It is currently the top show on Netflix in at least 90 countries, from Argentina and Australia,[Read More…]
All parts and aspects of life have been occupied by capitals. This is the broader picture. This is one of the facts from reality that composes context of life of people in almost all lands. This is one of the brutal facts that dominate people in exploitative societies. The dominance is so much powerful and so much shrewd that the[Read More…]
At least six people were killed and over 60 people were injured in the most violent street fighting in the Lebanese capital Beirut in years Thursday. According to the medics, all victims were shot in the head and the chest. Heavy gunfire broke out during a protest organized by the Iran-backed Hezbollah and its Shiite allies from the Amal Movement[Read More…]
After celebrating virtually a festival of the masses on 114th birth anniversary of Shaheed Bhagat Singh the Bharatiya Kisan Union (Ugrahan) has left no stone unturned in tackling the burning issues of the peasantry like damages to crops or organising solidarity protest campaigns against the brutal murder of farmers by son of Ashis Mishra. The spirit of struggle is intensifying[Read More…]
With the arrival of the European colonizers in India through the Indian Ocean world, the country emerged as a powerful space for several social, cultural, political, and economic exchanges with countries in Africa and other parts of the world. Historical records reveal that Africans arrived in India mostly from Ethiopia and other parts of eastern Africa over two phases (https://indianexpress.com/article/research/african-rulers-of-india-that-part-of-our-history-we-choose-to-forget/).[Read More…]
The situation is complex and so feminists should not take the simplistic view that a policy of non-cooperation with the Taliban is the way to support women. Since the Taliban took control of Kabul and the central government on August 15, efforts to support Afghan women have become extremely challenging. According to some prominent U.S. feminists with strong ties to Afghan women, the[Read More…]
A cultural transmission or meme is an element of culture (e.g., a perception, value or belief) that is copied and spread virally from one individual to another among people who find favor in their contents. Cultures generate memes. Thanks to science, a culture presents us with many memes that are reality oriented or based upon objective, compelling evidence. But other memes that are deluded are also promulgated. From a[Read More…]
by Thomas Klikauer & Meg Young In Germany’s 2021 federal election (26th September 2021), Germany’s Neo-Nazi – some say right-wing populist – party, the AfD stabilized its 2017 result losing slightly. Still, about five million Germans voted for the AfD in 2021. The AfD remains part of Germany’s Radical Right Populism in Germany. The party – the Alternative für Deutschland[Read More…]
In July 2018 the attention of The New York Times and then Esquire magazine was somehow drawn to a mountain town in southern Mexico and the truly remarkable amount of Coca-Cola drunk by its residents. The British Broadcasting Corporation has produced a documentary on the same topic. The town is San Cristobal, in the Central Highlands of Chiapas, Mexico’s poorest[Read More…]
This summer we witnessed, with brutal clarity, the Beginning of the End: the end of Earth as we know it — a world of lush forests, bountiful croplands, livable cities, and survivable coastlines. In its place, we saw the early manifestations of a climate-damaged planet, with scorched forests, parched fields, scalding cities, and storm-wracked coastlines. In a desperate bid to[Read More…]
Recent weeks have seen mounting conflicts between Washington and the European imperialist powers over China. Last month, Australia suddenly repudiated a €56 billion French submarine contract to sign instead the Australia-UK-US (AUKUS) alliance targeting China, and European countries this month successfully overrode US accusations that IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva improperly promoted China in official reports. When French Finance Minister Bruno[Read More…]
Carbon emissions are rebounding strongly and are rising across the world’s 20 richest nations, according to a new study. The Climate Transparency Report, Comparing G20 Climate Action and Responses to the Covid-19 Crisis (https://www.climate-transparency.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Climate-Transparency-Report-2020.pdf) says that CO2 will go up by 4% across the G20 group this year, having dropped 6% in 2020 due to the pandemic. The 2020 edition of[Read More…]
The police launched an unscathed attack on the Zameen Prapt Sangharsh Committee activists who have being waging a grim battle for their rights. Thousands of dalits were victims of brutal lathi charge.in Morinda, in front of the Chief minister’s house,Charnjit Singh Channi. It illustrated the true anti-people colours of the ruling classes and how pretentious they were. It testifies how[Read More…]
The area under snow cover in Himachal Pradesh has declined by 18.5% according to a recent report published by State Centre on Climate Change (SCCC) and Space Application Center (ISRO) Ahmedabad. The report revealed this decreasing trend for the five major river basins in the State. As the report points out, the high altitude regions of Himachal Pradesh receive precipitation[Read More…]
Artist’s note A chilling question entered my mind one cold morning in October 2011 and it shook me to the core. I was standing in the attic of the house in which Anne Frank had lived in hiding. Ever since I had read her book, I had wanted to see for myself, the place where she lived and wrote her[Read More…]
From Yeola in 1935, when Dr. Ambedkar announced that he would not die a Hindu, to Nagpur in 1956 when he converted to Buddhism, is a considerable distance in time. But, there was in him a need to make a public announcement in 1935 about moving away from Hinduism. It was a testament to the depth of his feelings of the futility of[Read More…]
Farmers across a vast cotton growing area of Punjab and some parts of neighboring Haryana are today extremely bitter about the extensive damage caused by pink bollworm pest, while memories of other serious pest attacks also continue to trouble them. Neel Kamal reported in The Times of India ( Chandigarh edition, 28 September, 2021), “ The pink bollworm attack[Read More…]
These so-called ‘solutions’ are, overwhelmingly, empty promises that will lead to massive violations of Indigenous rights, while failing to solve the climate crisis. Imagine you’re a Baka, a hunter gatherer in the Congo Basin forest. That land has been your home for generations. You know every stone and every tree there. Your grandparents are buried on that land. You and your[Read More…]
Moscow has categorically stated that it will not accept a US military presence in the Central Asian region. This reiteration has come at the level of Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov who told Tass that Afghanistan had been discussed at a meeting with Victoria Nuland, the visiting US Undersecretary of State in Moscow on Tuesday. Ryabkov added, “We emphasised[Read More…]
A wrongly targeted Afghan aid worker and his family are among the latest casualties. On August 29, in the final days of our 20-year occupation of Afghanistan, the United States launched a drone strike, firing a 20-pound Hellfire missile at an aid worker named Zemari Ahmadi as he parked his car outside his home in a residential neighborhood of Kabul.[Read More…]
On no subject is the bipartisan consensus more unshakable than on the Russian threat. In his latest book, The Stupidity of War: American Foreign Policy and the Case for Complacency, American political scientist John Mueller demonstrates that since the end of World War II, American policymakers have developed a kind of addiction to threat inflation by “routinely elevating the problematic to[Read More…]
Despite claiming to endorse a carbon tax, ExxonMobil has funneled millions of dollars to lawmakers who oppose the idea. When then-ExxonMobil lobbyist Keith McCoy conceded in a secretly recorded video in May that the oil giant voiced support for a carbon tax only because it assumed it would never happen, ExxonMobil CEO Darren Woods said the company was “shocked by these interviews” and stood by its “commitments[Read More…]
As the war on terror stands struck in the ruins of Afghanistan, more attention will be given hopefully to repairing the fault lines which caused the debacle. Ominously , however, many factors which led to terrible mistakes in the war on terror continue to retain a scary presence. US authorities must realize that their discourse on this and related issues[Read More…]
A picture containing text, person, person, suit Description automatically generatedOne year and 10 months ago when first case of corona virus was reported in Wuhan, China, entire world was terrified because no one knew if we have any medicine that will work against it. Possibly our worst fears came true and we witnessed the horrendous impact of the pandemic. One[Read More…]
The European Union is currently reviewing the suspension of GSP+ granted to Sri Lanka in 2017. In this respect, one has to consider the unacceptable state of accountability, justice and rule of law in Sri Lanka and how far they have been respected and observed by Sri Lanka as a member of HRC and UN. In this respect, the following[Read More…]
Recently during a book-launch RSS supremo Mohan Bagavat is reported to have regretted that Savarkar has been the victim of an historical conspiracy of sorts.He warned that next,Swami Vivekananda may come in for similar villification.Apparently both are in the same league in his opinion.’Guruji’ Golwalkar had also written in his WE OR OUR NATIONHOOD DEFINED about the exceptional logical clarity[Read More…]
The number of migrant children who cross the Darien Gap on foot has hit an all-time high, UNICEF warned today. The Darien Gap is an extensive and inhospitable strip of tropical forest that divides Panama and Colombia, considered one of the most dangerous places for migrants attempting to reach North America. On their trek north towards the U.S., some 19,000[Read More…]
NAPM extends its full solidarity and support to the crucial 10-day long foot march undertaken by hundreds of adivasis from the Hasdeo region of Chhattisgarh to protect their forests and home lands from destructive coal mining. Starting from 4th October 2021, more than 250 Adivasi residents from 30 villages of the Hasdeo Aranya region of Surguja are currently marching[Read More…]
Although the pandemic problems were strictly in force, the Toronto International Film Festival 2021 had brought in an exceptional selection of films that excited audiences around the world in a hybrid format of in-person as well as digital screening. The line-up showcased, as usual, the beloved auteurs along with a good number of fresh filmmakers including a greater women representation.[Read More…]
Vishwa Hindu Parishad General Secretary Milind Parande recently (Sept 2021, TOI) stated that “The very idea of Ganga Jamuni Tehjeeb (term used for confluence of Hindu and Muslim cultures in the country) is irrelevant, what exists is one culture, and the rest can simply merge into it. The Hindu cause has to be prime.” Many notions are being circulated that[Read More…]
The United Nations body responsible for monitoring and recording human rights abuses effectively abandoned the people of Yemen last week. In a 21-18 vote with seven abstentions, the U.N. Human Rights Council (UNHRC) refused to extend the mandate of an independent investigation into war crimes committed by all sides in Yemen. Since its establishment in 2017, the Group of Eminent Experts (GEE) had served as a[Read More…]
The Russian President Vladimir Putin will be delivering “an informative and very important speech and then take part in a plenary discussion” on Wednesday in Moscow at the Russian Energy Week, an international forum on the global energy sector. Expectations are running high in the energy circles in Europe and in America. Europe is experiencing an energy crisis with burgeoning[Read More…]
On October 8, a terrible blast struck the worshippers attending Friday noon prayers at the Gozar-e-Sayed Abad Mosque in the Khan Abad district of Bandar, the capital of Kunduz, one of Afghanistan’s largest cities in its northern belt. This is a mosque frequented by Shia Muslims, who were referred to as “our compatriots” by Taliban spokesperson Zabiullah Mujahid. Forty-six people died immediately in the blast, and[Read More…]
Telugu States lose Rivers Godavari and Krishna : The Centre has usurped all the powers of the State governments over all the irrigation projects (35 on Krishna basin and 71 on Godavari) with reference to all functions. People of Telangana agitated for more than half century against inequitable distribution of Krishna and Godavari river waters between the sub-regions of Andhra[Read More…]
Himachal Pradesh is a small state with a population of only about seven million people. Hence it should be particularly worrying that at the end of the monsoon season this year floods ( particularly flash floods), landslides and heavy rains are officially estimated to have led to a loss of as many as 461 lives, with 13 people missing. The[Read More…]
So, communal strategy is apparently being tried once again on the Kashmir-front. Kashmir is clearly viewed as one of those political cards which right-winged, extremist parties can bank upon to whip up communal frenzy particularly when the going seems fairly dismal in other areas. Recent developments, Covid-impact, farmers’ protest and Lakhimpur-case among several others have not helped the party heading[Read More…]
Language is politics and politics is power. This is why the misuse of language is particularly disturbing, especially when the innocent and vulnerable pay the price. The wars in Syria, Libya, Afghanistan and other Middle Eastern, Asian and African countries in recent years have resulted in one of the greatest humanitarian catastrophes, arguably unseen since World War II. Instead of[Read More…]
Snow geese, Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge, New Mexico. After spending the winter in New Mexico, the snow geese go to the Arctic (Alaska, Nunavut, Siberia) for nesting and rearing their young. (Photo: Subhankar Banerjee, 1998). After a long stretch of public inattention, biodiversity conservation is a hot topic again, as if we had suddenly been jolted into awareness[Read More…]
FacingFuture.TV recently hosted a preview of the upcoming IPCC 2021 UN climate report, which report guides the gathering of dignitaries from around the world meeting in Glasgow this November to discuss, analyze, and decide how to deal with global warming/climate change. View the interview here: According to the Code Red interview, the IPCC is taking off its ultra conservative[Read More…]
I know what it means to be watched all too carefully, a phenomenon that’s only grown worse in the war-on-terror years. I’m a strange combination, I suspect, being both a military spouse and an anti-war-on-terror activist. As I’ve discovered, the two sit uncomfortably in what still passes for one life. In this country in these years, having eyes on you[Read More…]
With most women not permitted to possess bank accounts in Afghanistan, cryptocurrency has become a critical lifeline for women fleeing the country. A media report said: The fall of Kabul has seen more than 600,000 people fleeing the Taliban regime and, without access to bank accounts, Afghan women were immediately put in a precarious position in their ability to help[Read More…]
“True religion is a revolutionary force: it is an inveterate enemy of oppression, privilege, and injustice.” Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan (Justice, Diversity, Enemy) Many philosophers, writers, thinkers and critics have, over the centuries, handed down a wealth of writings and speeches on life and its existence. From Democritus, Plato, Aristotle, etc., to modern thinkers like Marx, Engels, Lenin, Rosa Luxembourg, Mao, everyone[Read More…]
Recently the Chief Minister of West Bengal Mamata Banerjee has written a detailed letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi regarding the man-made floods created in her state due to excessive water discharge from Damodar Valley Corporation (DVC) Dams. In particular she has criticized the discharge of about 10 lakh acre-feet of water between September 30 and October 2 2021[Read More…]
Lakhimpur Kheri, situated in the northern Terai region of Uttar Pradesh and bordering Nepal, has all of a sudden caught the attention of national political parties and media – due to the violent clashes there on October 3 during the demonstration of farmers agitating against three unpopular farm laws of the Modi government. The clashes resulted in the killing of [Read More…]
Pankaj Pushkar in conversation with Pramod Ranjan Pankaj Pushar: What has been your relationship with languages during your educational journey? How do you relate to different languages? Which language(s) do you use in your different activities? Pramod Ranjan: I was born into a family which spoke the Magahi language. I spent my childhood at my maternal grandparents’ place. My Nana’s[Read More…]
Together the two, on both sides of the Himalayas, is a vast mass of land with almost half of the world population, huge resources, wide varieties of ecologies, agro-ecological and climate zones, and rich with by-gone civilizations fossilized in history. Mountain ranges stand high between them. But the uniformity that once put them on the same plane is exploitative systems[Read More…]
Much of infrastructure in the U.S. is already at risk of being shut down by flooding, and as the global warming continues, the threat is expected to grow. a new report finds One-in-four pieces of all critical infrastructures in the U.S. including police and fire stations, hospitals, airports and wastewater treatment facilities face substantial risk of being rendered inoperable by[Read More…]
At a time, when Afghanistan is in news everywhere and Taliban’s rule has been interpreted in different ways, the geo equation experiencing a shift from ‘western’ domination, there can be multiple ways of future actions at strategic and diplomatic levels of the region’s power, particularly by China, India, Pakistan, Russia, Iran and others. But irrespective of what is changing or[Read More…]
As Colorado and other states eliminate Columbus Day as a holiday, it might seem as if our society has begun to repudiate the legacy of a slave trader/explorer who fed Spain’s lust for gold by trafficking in, and annihilating, native peoples. In truth, we continue to celebrate it. We celebrate it every time the desires of the dominant culture override the concerns[Read More…]
When I was young, Helen was supposed to be a sex bomb in Hindi films. She played the role of vamp. But then, there were also others for the vamp roles. So, she stuck to her dancing roles. She was a good dancer. I still cannot understand why she was considered as a sex bomb. Perhaps, for the mainstream audience,[Read More…]
On September 10, 2021, during an important diplomatic meeting that occurred by telephone, U.S. President Joseph Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping affirmed the necessity of a better relationship between their two nations. According to the official Chinese summary, Xi said that “when China and the United States cooperate, the two countries and the world will benefit; when China and[Read More…]
Was watching the Alabama vs. Texas A& M football game last night. It was a home game for A& M and the natives were out there in full regalia… or should I say Brown shirts. A& M has this humungous ROTC program, and why not? It is the home of the Bush and son presidential libraries, where the war mongerers[Read More…]
Canada’s recent election proved mostly that Canadians are more or less set within their provincial agendas. The ruling Liberals gained three seats, the Conservatives stayed the same, the Bloc Québecois gained two, the Greens lost one, and the NDP gained one. (There were five independents before the vote). In sum, nothing changed, a lot of money was wasted – or[Read More…]
On 3rd October 2021 Mamata Banerjee, the incumbent chief minister of West Bengal – with a reputation as street-fighting politician, won a by-election at Bhabanipur, to secure her chief ministerial chair. Ironically, the very next day, the West Bengal police cracked down on students holding demonstrations demanding opening of the schools and colleges in the state. Discontent has been brewing[Read More…]
The Taliban’s cruelties are horrendous, but withholding international support and maintaining blanket sanctions will only hurt the long-suffering Afghan people. Afghanistan’s humanitarian situation is spiraling into catastrophe. Millions of Afghans are now facing severe economic stress and food insecurity in the wake of the Taliban’s August takeover, set off by widespread lost income, cash shortages, and rising food costs. Officials with the UN and several foreign[Read More…]
USA Congress plans to spend a $1.5 trillion on improved nuclear weapons! [1] “If We Don’t End War, War Will End US,” [2] Twenty years after the end of the Cold War there are at least 23,000 nuclear warheads still in existence, with a combined blast capacity equivalent to 150,000 Hiroshima bombs. The U.S. and Russia together have over 22,000,[Read More…]
A note on ‘Indian Muslims’ by Ms Humra Quraishi Farid, the earth questioned the sky, Where are the mighty captains gone ? In their grave they rot, was the reply And rebuked for tasks Not done Baba Farid Shakarganj ( 1173- 1265) A video of a photographer jumping on the dead body of a hapless ‘encroacher’ from Assam has gone[Read More…]
Feminists, jan sangathans, mass organizations, collectives, students, trade unionists, farm workers, fisher people, members of Adivasi, Dalit and Muslim communities, displaced persons, civil liberties activists, journalists, academics, youth, as well persons facing political persecution joined the events held across States and expressed their solidarity with Gulfisha Fatima. Numerous cities and towns across the country were part of this solidarity action,[Read More…]
Real life has a way of surprising theory. One of the most intensely discussed theoretical questions on the Left has been how to bring agricultural labourers and peasants, including well-to-do peasants, together in a common struggle against landlord domination in India’s countryside. Numerous Marxist gatherings have for years discussed the contradiction between peasants and labourers holding up a decisive resolution[Read More…]
Review of Amartya Sen’s Memoir “HOME IN THE WORLD”,Penguin Random House,2021 Amartya Sen is rightly regarded as the iconic liberal democrat of our time,combining as he does a deep-seated commitment to fundamental civil rights with an unwavering passion for social justice,advocated with serene rationality unfailingly courteous to people holding different views.The only condition he lays down is that such views[Read More…]
The Lakhimpur Kheri massacre will be remembered as a painful chapter in the history of the farm movement of India. The whole truth of this incident has been revealed to the country through all the videos that have become public so far. It is clear that this incident did not happen suddenly. Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Mishra[Read More…]
E A S Sarma, Former Secretary to Govt of India has raised serious concerns about the coal block auctions. He raised strong reservations about allocating coal blocks to Adani Power. In a series of letters, he questioned the rationale behind the allocation of coal blocks. To Shri A K Jain Union Coal Secretary Dear Shri Jain, Please refer to my[Read More…]
The Taliban is getting many suitors lately. It is far from the “pariah” that the Biden Administration thought it was destined to be. During the past month alone, the Taliban received six suitors from the region and beyond offering courtship — the foreign minister of Qatar; the special envoys of Russia, China and Pakistan; the High representative of UK Prime[Read More…]
In the face of climate change, children need positive stress as well as compassion to maintain mental health and inform their responses. Climate-related disasters are on the rise, and carbon emissions are soaring. Parents today face the unprecedented challenge of raising children somehow prepared for a planetary emergency that may last their lifetimes. Few guidebooks are on the shelves for this one, yet, but[Read More…]
The recent acquisition of the Newcastle United football club by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, along with financier Amanda Staveley and the billionaire Reuben brothers, was a source of much excitement for some former players. Old boy Alan Shearer did little to conceal it. “We can dare to hope again,” he rejoiced. In The Guardian, Barney Ronay was less enthusiastic,[Read More…]
US lackey Australia is second only to Zionist-subverted America as a fervent supporter of Apartheid Israel. The Australian Coalition Government and Labor Opposition support the all-European, genocide-complicit, mendacious, pro-Zionist and largely pro-nuclear terrorism International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) that through its malignant definition of anti-Semitism is itself egregiously anti-Arab anti-Semitic, anti- Jewish anti-Semitic, and holocaust denying. In short, the Coalition-[Read More…]
“And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.” (Howard Zinn, late American historian and distinguished[Read More…]
“My constituents have raised concerns about our country fostering a relationship with the RSS and its leaders given the group’s painful history of violence and destruction,” wrote US Congressman David Trone (Democrat-Maryland) to immediate-past Acting Ambassador to India Atul Keshap on 30 September. Trone’s letter follows weeks of swirling controversy provoked by Keshap’s 8 September meeting with the chief of the Rashtriya[Read More…]
The counter-public sphere is contrary to power, domination, and hierarchical structure. It has emerged with a task to develop a different mode of public discourse in a complex society. The counter-public sphere appears as a new and different space wherein the representation of the ‘self’ and re-presentation of new ‘world view’ or standpoint to ‘others’ perpetuates with self identity. Fraser[Read More…]
Between 2009 and 2018, the continuous rise in sea temperature cost the world 14 per cent of its coral reefs – that’s more than the size of Australia’s reefs combined – an UN-backed report revealed on Tuesday. In the Sixth Status of Corals of the World: 2020 Report, experts from the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network, funded by the UN Environment[Read More…]
The Samyukt Shetkari Kamgar Morcha (SSKM) endorses the “Maharashtra Bandh” on 11th October called by the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) in support of the Farmer Victims of Lakhimpur Kheri! The entire nation stands shocked at the brutal Lakhimpur Kheri murders. Despite the worst provocations, the Farmers protests have been overwhelmingly peaceful over the course of the last 10 months. The[Read More…]
It is indeed a breakthrough scientific achievement that we Diagram Description automatically generated with medium confidencenow have the first-ever and only malaria vaccine to prevent malaria in children. This is an important (and long-awaited) addition to existing range of scientifically proven effective methods to prevent malaria. While we celebrate this moment of yet another milestone scientific feat we must remind[Read More…]
The ongoing Covid pandemic has affected the Raika and Rebari community in Rajasthan, known to herd camels for a livelihood for centuries. The Raika community, who are pastoralists, have been facing hardships since 2015 with the decline in the camel population and its trade but the outbreak of Covid has put them on the brink of economic disaster. The community[Read More…]
With the BJP coming to power in 2014 and also in 2019 for the second time the Clash of Cultures in India is increasing day by day. After it came to power under the leadership of Narendra Modi, who is known for his political upbringing in the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh, which historically is known for upholding the anti-agrarian and artisanal productive[Read More…]
There is an unmistakable shift in American politics regarding Palestine and Israel, a change that is inspired by the way in which many Americans, especially the youth, view the Palestinian struggle and the Israeli occupation. While this shift is yet to translate into tangibly diminishing Israel’s stronghold over the US Congress, it promises to be of great consequence in the[Read More…]
“It’s like putting a Band-Aid over a gaping hole,” said Andrea Taylor of Duke University, discussing the rich countries of North America and Europe giving their own citizens Covid-19 vaccine boosters before the rest of the world gets their first shot. Covid-19 is a global pandemic. It respects no national boundaries and will continue to spread and mutate if it[Read More…]
“Communist Victory in Beijing, China “ (photo by Andre Vltchek) In this review article, we remember Andre Vltchek who passed away last year Sep 22, was a friend of all oppressed peoples, who travelled far and wide to scores of countries. And reflect on his views about China that recently (Oct 1) celebrated its revolution, significant in the context of[Read More…]
The anniversary of the 9/11 attacks was marked by days of remembrances — for the courageous rescue workers of that moment, for the thousands murdered as the Twin Towers collapsed, for those who died in the Pentagon, or in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, fighting off the hijackers of the commercial jet they were in, as well as for those who fought in[Read More…]
Air pollutants are responsible for 7 million premature deaths a year worldwide, says the World Health Organization (WHO). The WHO has called it “one of the greatest environmental risks to health.” On 22 September 2021, the WHO has issued strict new standards for air pollution levels. Data suggests that the air in many regions across the U.S. contains much higher[Read More…]
1.26 billion people at highest risk of conflict and displacement caused by environmental damage. A vicious cycle linking the depletion of natural resources with violent conflict may have gone past the point of no return in parts of the world and is likely to be exacerbated by climate change, said a report on Thursday. Food insecurity, lack of water and[Read More…]
Jallianwala Bagh the most iconic symbol of Indian freedom struggle is in news on its reopening in a renovated form, which started a few years ago. There are few internationally known iconic symbols of colonial and imperialist repression on the people during their colonial regime in Asian, African and some other victim countries of the world. The horror saga of[Read More…]
The Indian State never tires of pontificating and appealing to alleged Naxalites/ Maoists/ terrorists/ militants/ separatists/ freedom fighters to shun violence, come under the Indian Constitution and adopt parliamentary path. The LGBTQIA movement has been peaceful; legal & constitutional; and democratic. Why is Parliament then vary of discussing the Gay Manifesto? By way of partial repeal of Section 377 Indian[Read More…]
Indian society is deeply fissured. The fault lines lie along caste, sub caste, class, religion, region, language and several other overt and unstated domains. The linguistic division of states and thereby of Indian society has generated linguistic chauvinism. At the pan Indian level, we hear of Hindi chauvinism but there are regional chauvinisms originating from the four power centres of[Read More…]
It seems like just a few short years ago that the theoretical economists and the insatiable capitalists were head-over-heels in love with globalization. And why not? As a continuation of old-style colonialism wealthy nations go anywhere on the planet to find the cheapest resources with the least amount of pesky environmental or labor regulations and pocket enormous profits when they[Read More…]
The only surprise was that it did not come sooner. Big Tech whistleblowers are not exactly running out of the offices of Silicon Valley, so it was with some excitement that Facebook could produce a person willing enough to show us the laundry, with the dirt still caking the content. And the laundry in question proved to be bountiful, with[Read More…]
by Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies President Biden and the Democratic Congress are facing a crisis as the popular domestic agenda they ran on in the 2020 election is held hostage by two corporate Democratic Senators, fossil-fuel consigliere Joe Manchin and payday-lender favorite Kyrsten Sinema. But the very week before the Dems’ $350 billion-per-year domestic package hit this[Read More…]
The recent Quad leaders meeting in the White House on September 24 appears to have shifted focus away from its original framing as a security dialogue between four countries, the United States, India, Japan and Australia. Instead, the United States seems to be moving much closer to Australia as a strategic partner and providing it with nuclear submarines. Supplying Australia with U.S. nuclear submarines[Read More…]
We call Gandhi as Father of our nation, who preached non-violence, but police stations remain mothers of custodial violence throughout the country. *** During 17 years till 2018, 1727 persons died in custodial violence in India. Just they were killed. According to data released by National Crime Records Bureau NCRB, 26 policemen were convicted. Some critics described only 26 are[Read More…]
It was late July this year when some Sikh kids came out with their parents in Surrey, to register their protest against the unjust farm laws passed by the world’s so-called largest democracy without due consultations. Implemented by the ruling right wing Hindu nationalist BJP government in New Delhi, these laws threaten the livelihood of the peasantry, which has taken[Read More…]
About half of the world’s population will suffer from water insecurity by 2050, found The State of Climate Services 2021: Water , a new report from the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The report said: More than 2 billion people are living in countries under water stress and 3.6 billion people face inadequate access to water at least one month per[Read More…]
Finding soil’s soul and shadow is difficult, but not impossible. Science and farmer experience make it possible. The finding, found through science and labor, helps soil smile, and sustain life and economy. Building Soils for Better Crops discusses soil, solves that “riddle” that kills soil’s life, and finds that “magic” that brings on earth blooming crops in a sustainable manner.[Read More…]
As communal harmony has come under stress in recent years due to propagation of myths about excessive faith based hostility in historical times, it is important to get rid of these myths so that the foundation of social harmony and inter-faith harmony in our country can be strengthened. The long battle between Rana Pratap and Akbar is well[Read More…]
Independent film-maker Rajkumari Asthana has produced a documentary on the ongoing farmer’s struggle in India. It is the first episode of a series called Jab Tak Raat Baki Hai, planned as a people’s history of the farmer’s movement. Anand Patwardhan’s Vikalp@Prithvi showed the film last weekend. This is an independent, completely non-commercial effort.
Roadster Roadster is the standard or as in Bengal we call it the ‘Bangla’ cycle. Its design was perfected around 1890 and it has not changed significantly since then. Many people think it is old fashioned and they want to go for ‘fancy’ cycles. However the roadster has a great resilience and remains the choice for millions all over the[Read More…]
The two common utterances regularly heard in our public discourse are – (i) “The law will take its own course” (by the prosecution); and (ii) “We have faith in the judicial process” (by the prosecuted). But both these assertions need to be questioned, given the experiences of common Indian citizens in their sufferance from laws on the one hand, and[Read More…]
Dhanbad: Ray Talkies in Jharkhand’s Dhanbad has screened many a Bollywood blockbuster, seeing its packed audiences ride the emotions since 1952. Its filmy fever, however, was broken by the Covid pandemic, during which the government did not allow cinemas to function. Last month, the government reallowed cinemas to open with caution. “But, only five per cent of people returned to[Read More…]
A militarized rivalry between the US and China will be costly and dangerous for all concerned, but the people most likely to suffer from it will be found in the countries that the two major powers choose to turn into their battlefields. The Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union split Europe down the middle, but it[Read More…]
As the 20th anniversary of the attack on the World Trade Center approached, I wasn’t paying much attention. But then I received an email from my longtime colleague John Cavanagh, former director of the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C. It was a private message recalling the “Justice, Not Vengeance” initiative that the institute and YES! Magazine organized along with Harry Belafonte and[Read More…]
It was supposed to be the greatest transition of modern times. Practically overnight, a dirty, inefficient, and unjust system that encompassed 11 time zones was to undergo an extreme makeover. Billions of dollars were available to speed the process. A new crew of transition experts came up with the blueprint and the public was overwhelmingly on board. Best of all,[Read More…]
Pandora Papers is not the entire Pandora’s Box; but a part of it only. The full picture is yet to emerge, in one sense, and in another sense, the whole is already perceptible. The way the rich have their wealth, the way they accumulate, the way they hide, the way they deceive, the way they deprive, the way they lie[Read More…]
This October 2nd (2021) the Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday; the twitter was flooded with tweets, ‘Nathuram Godse Amar Rahen’ (Long live Nathuram Godse), Nathuram Godse Zindabad (Hail Godse). It was the top twitter trend for the day. It did come as a shock to many. Even to those who have been observing resurgence in praise of Godse, the murderer of Gandhi,[Read More…]
During the 1930s, MS Golwalkar, the main ideologue of RSS stated that `we have 3 enemies: Christians, Muslims and Communists’. The socialists, communists, Congress, Muslims, Dalits, Adivasis and even Christians were struggling against British colonialism at that time. But the ideology of RSS was very clear. The struggle was not against the British, but against the above three forces namely[Read More…]
There are increasingly worrying signs of the government becoming increasingly becoming more repressive towards farmers. On October 3, just a day after Gandhi Jayanti, four farmers and a journalist were killed at a protest site in Lakhimpur Khiri district (UP) when a car of a son of a union minister crashed into them. Just a little before this, the BJP[Read More…]
Former Facebook employee Frances Haugen claimed that the social media giant for prioritizing profits over public safety. Haugen, who worked on the company’s Civic Integrity team until it was dissolved shortly after the 2020 election, said that Facebook has been a major contributor to divisions in society. “Facebook has realized that if they change the algorithm to be safer, people[Read More…]
To Shri Sanjeeva Kumar Union Home Secretary Dear Shri Sanjeeva Kumar, I had earlier written to the Union Finance Minister in my letter dated 21-6-2021 on inaccuracies in the affidavit filed on behalf of the government before the apex court on the quantum of compensation payable to the victims of Covid virus. I forward here a copy of that letter[Read More…]
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the U.S. recently, attending the UN General Assembly session and meeting with President Biden. In spite of his government’s reign of terror against religious and ethnic minorities and dissidents in India, his U.S. hosts remained strangely silent. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government led by Modi has committed egregious human rights violations against wide swaths of the[Read More…]
The merits are hard to stomach for partisans long jaundiced by presumption and dislike, but the cheer at the deplatforming of Donald Trump by a range of social media platforms said as much about the nature of any sentiment about democracy as it did about those claiming to defend it. For one, it shut off a valve of fantastic, instant[Read More…]
While political changes have been in the forefront of most recent discussion on Afghanistan and Myanmar, a serious humanitarian crisis looms large for several million people. Over 50% of the nearly 88 million people living in these troubled lands are likely to face serious shortages of food, medicine and other essential needs. Invariably minorities identified on religious, ethnic, regional or[Read More…]
Afghanistan and Tajikistan share a 1,400-kilometer border. Recently, a war of words has erupted between Tajikistan’s President Emomali Rahmon and the Taliban government in Kabul. Rahmon censures the Taliban for the destabilization of Central Asia by the export of militant groups, while the Taliban leadership has accused Tajikistan’s government of interference. Earlier this summer, Rahmon mobilized 20,000 troops to the border, and held military[Read More…]
Image: Capture on the left is from a Zoom public grievance hearing at SFSU on Sept 30, 2021 over the university administration’s mishandling of Zoom’s cancellation a year ago of an open classroom webinar that included Palestinian feminist icon Leila Khaled on the guest panel. “You cannot pretend nothing has happened!” That was the rallying cry at the San Francisco State[Read More…]
Where so many mainstream writers miss the mark is that whereas dispossession was a zero-sum game, these would-be settlers, mostly peasants, were fleeing feudalism at home. “The discovery of gold and silver in America, the extirpation, enslavement and entombment in mines of the aboriginal population, the beginning of the conquest and looting of the East Indies, the turning of Africa[Read More…]
Global warming in Siberia is on a hot streak! It was +6°C last year. In like manner, if the entire planet hit +6°C above pre-industrial, it would be lights out, life snuffed out, sayonara. Meanwhile, the Siberian hot streak theoretically threatens the entire planet with methane induced runaway global warming, the dreaded monster of the North that takes no prisoners.[Read More…]
Today marks fifteen years since WikiLeaks was founded by Australian publisher Julian Assange on October 4, 2006. In the years since, the small media organisation, founded on a shoestring, has become synonymous with the courageous exposure of government and corporate crimes, as well as the ever-more ferocious attempts of state agencies and the ruling elites to censor the internet and[Read More…]
Pandora Papers – recently leaked papers – show how some of the world’s elites accumulate property empires while avoiding millions of dollars in taxes. More than 100 billionaires and others have been exposed by the Pandora Papers obtained from 14 offshore banking institutions and analyzed by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). The ICIJ obtained the trove of more[Read More…]
In a secret deal with the UK and the US for nuclear-powered submarines, Australia has stabbed France in the back, and torn up a huge, underway deal for conventional French submarines. The nuclear terrorist Australia, UK and US AUKUS Alliance threatens Australian security, sovereignty, coastal cities, and trade. It also threatens nuclear disarmament, the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear[Read More…]
Ashish Tripathi writing in DECCAN HERALD(October 4) has quoted an SC bench hearing a case against farmers’ protest objecting that it impedes the public’s freedom of movement by blocking roads.The bench made two observations.First since the laws have been stayed there was no reason for protests to continue. Secondly,the validity of the laws will be tested and decided at the[Read More…]
4th October 2021: The National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) vehemently condemns the murderous attack on protesting farmers at Lakhimpur Kheri which resulted in the death of 4 farmers – Shri Daljeet Singh (35), Shri Nachattar Singh (60), Shri Gurvinder Singh (19) and Shri Lovepreet Singh (20) – and serious injuries to several other farmers and protestors including Shri Tajinder[Read More…]
There was a time when time was time and space and speed had some human meaning, for people lived within the limits of the natural world of which they were a part. As Albert Camus said, “In our madness, we push back the eternal limits, and at once dark Furies swoop down upon us to destroy.” The destruction is now[Read More…]
To celebrate 152 Jayanti of Mahatma Gandhi, most of the political parties from the Left to Right (barring a section of Ambedkarites) including secular parties are busy in celebrating Gandhi’s Jayanti with much compassion and commitment. In this respect, civil society and public intellectuals have written several articles in the newspapers and posted messages on social media to express their[Read More…]
A whiff of fresh air caresses my cheekbones as I see the leaves sway periodically from right to left. My eyes search in both the direction of the road to look at the cycles pass by whilst absorbing the warmth of the sun for the first time in days. The scent of wildflowers fills the air as I walk my[Read More…]
In an urgent virtual press conference called by Samyukt Kisan Morcha, members of the 9-member coordination committee of SKM addressed the media with regard to the ghastly incidents in Lakhimpur Kheri of Uttar Pradesh. SKM’s Richa Singh and Guramneet Mangat who are in Lakhimpur Kheri (the former during the occupation of the helipad in Tikonia earlier in the day and[Read More…]
The spectacular failure of the strategy of setting such a great score by the tools of subjugation that are, for the most part, scarcely noticeable as such has never been hammered home with such punch and finality as in the spectacle involving the ignoble loss of face of the U.S in Afghanistan. These include such tools as of intimidation, immiseration[Read More…]
I usually use Uber Bikes, a bike-hailing service from Uber to get around short distances in my colony area… may be a maximum of 5 kilometers or so. Apart from Uber, I am aware of at least two other apps that provide such services Ola and Rapido, and have these on my phone too. If Uber isn’t available or the[Read More…]
Pushing people back across borders; turning asylum seekers away from shores. When such tactics were openly adopted and used with impunity by Australia’s navy and border force, it caused outrage and concern in the maritime community and pricked the interest of border protectionists the world over. Disgust and outrage have, in time, been replaced by admiration at the sheer chutzpah[Read More…]
ABSTRACT This is a response to the two sets of articles written by Sajai Jose on the Fourth Industrial Revolution and on the world’s and India’s hunger crisis. It is in two parts. In the first part it lays the historical background of the response of capital in the face of periodic crises it faces and people’s response to it.[Read More…]
One of the seven sins we should not commit as warned by Mahatma Gandhi, is “science without humanity”. But are we conscious enough to ensure that the global fight against Covid is mindful of Gandhi ji’s message? Right before Gandhi ji’s birth anniversary, government of India announced its reciprocal policy for UK nationals arriving in India to undergo mandatory quarantine[Read More…]
A prominent Rohingya Muslim leader has been shot dead in a refugee camp in southern Bangladesh. Mohibullah, who was in his late 40s, led one of the largest of several community groups to emerge since more than 730,000 Rohingya Muslims fled Myanmar after a military crackdown in August 2017, Al Jazeera reported. He was talking with other refugee leaders outside[Read More…]
73 years after his death, Mahatma Gandhi and his messages continue to be remembered in the context of many possible solutions for problems of a deeply troubled world. His birthday October 2 is a time for events in his memory in many parts of world, a time also for re-emphasizing his key precept of non-violence as a way of life.[Read More…]
North Korea fired a newly developed anti-aircraft missile on Thursday, North Korean state media KCNA reported, the latest in a recent series of weapons tests that has come as denuclearization talks with the U.S. have been in deadlock. It was North Korea’s second known weapons test this week after the launch of a previously unseen hypersonic missile on Tuesday. It[Read More…]
A Yahoo News’ investigation reveals that, through much of 2017, the CIA weighed up whether to use wholly extrajudicial means to deal with the supposed threat posed by Julian Assange and his whistleblowers’ platform Wikileaks. The agency plotted either to kidnap or assassinate him. Shocking as the revelations are – exposing the entirely lawless approach of the main US intelligence[Read More…]
On the occasion of 152nd Gandhi Jayanti, 2nd October 2021, in tandem with Azadi ka Amrut Maha Utsav launched on the 75th Independence Day what thoughts flood our hearts as we survey happenings and events in the country and the plight of humanity. On the one hand is the “India of My Dreams” that Mahatma Gandhi had expressed and[Read More…]
A memoir is a sort of autobiography. You record only those things that have affected you. You don’t do any research for it, except occasionally to check a date or fact. You write what you remember. Our Home I was born in Mysore in 1943 and we moved to Indore in 1945. I left Indore to study electronics at IIT[Read More…]
Economic ideas of Mahatma Gandhi are most remembered for his emphasis on village self-reliance, a far cry from globalization. Despite this, as his birth anniversary is observed on October 2, a world troubled by many discontents of globalization may find it useful to consult Gandhian ideas for reducing them and getting some clues to important reforms as well. Mahatma Gandhi[Read More…]
Human history as cultural history We need to reform our teaching of history so that the emphasis will be placed on the gradual growth of human culture and knowledge, a growth to which all nations and ethnic groups have contributed. A new freely downloadable book I would like to announce the publication of a book which presents many aspects of[Read More…]
With Indian Army recruitment exams halted for over a year and a half, several aspirants who had been preparing for years are faced with bitter disappointment at the lost opportunity to escape debt-induced poverty. Nashik: Clearing the General Duty Soldier Exam to join the Indian Army is considered an aspirational, life-changing opportunity for young men across rural Nashik. Many youngsters[Read More…]
“Modern perceptions of early modern slavery associate the institution almost solely with Africans and their descendants. Yet slavery was a ubiquitous institution in the early modern world…The story of European colonialism in the Americas and its victimization of Africans and Indians follows a central paradigm in most textbooks. The African “role” encompasses the transportation, exploitation, and suffering of many millions[Read More…]
“There is no spoon” happens to be one of my favourite quotes from a movie. The Matrix, a movie released in 1999, based on a future world of technology and its implication on human lives. One should also read ‘1984’ along with ‘Animal Farm’. Such literature has shown the world, and also come true, what a future can possibly be.[Read More…]
Global Leaders Plead for Peace in Ukraine at UN 
Ghosts of the Past: For Israel, War on UNESCO is an Existential Battle 
Keeping Cattle on Public Land Is Bad for People, Cows, Wildlife, and the Planet 
The United States in the World: Making Sense of the Past Forty Years (1981-2023) 
Canadian Youth At Risk and the Discrimination of Marginalized Demographics 
While Searching Worldwide for Terrorists, Uncle Sam Should Also Look in a Mirror 
American Abrams tanks roll into Ukraine 
An open letter to JNU VC – Your association with RSS defies humanism, anti-colonial struggle Indian democracy! 
From Education to Incarceration 
Tunakataa! Saying ‘No’ to Capitalism and Imperialism in Kenya 
Rising Islamophobia and Communal Discord: An Alarming Trend in BJP-Ruled States 
Speak Truth to Power and Pay the Price! 
USA’s Wars Took 12 Million Lives in The Last 25 Years 
US to send long-range ATACMS missile to Ukraine 
In Jawan, Shah Rukh Khan makes us an offer we can refuse 
Nijjar affair poses an existential dilemma 
On the Brink of Famine 
Appeal to withdraw the notification for the public hearing for the proposed Sijimali Bauxite Mining Project 
“Making a thriller from grain” 
Key Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) Likely To Collapse In 2025-2095 
Global Biofuel Alliance at G20: Land vs Water vs Food Security- Has the government addressed the trade-offs? 
The Nijjar Murder and Indian Government’s alleged “involvement”: Reactions and Reflections 
France Will Pull Out Its Diplomats And Military From Niger, Says Macron 
Imperial Footprints in Africa: The Dismal Role of AFRICOM 
Hunger in Africa has its roots in a History of Colonialism and Neo-colonialism 
The Climate March: Magnificent and Misdirected 
Imagining a Progressive Pentagon 
“Lost Voices of Fentanyl” Rally at the White House 
Indian Government Must First Evict Dalai Lama & his Followers before Admonishing Canada for Separatist Activities 
Peasant-rebels: lineages of insurgency 
Mission to Free Assange: Australian Parliamentarians in Washington 
Bayer-ICAR Collaboration Raises Serious Concerns Regarding Indian Farm Policy 
Place of Minorities as Allotted by Savarkar, Golwalkar and Upadhyaya 
What is in the name? Attempt to stop the usage of ‘India’ by the Government 
Poona Pact: A Reappraisal 
Hate Speech Inside Parliament: Reaching a New Low 
Criminal Justice And Freedom of Speech 
75,000 Climate Protesters Marched In New York With Demand To End Fossil Fuels 
On the Dark Side of the Moon.. 
Avoiding the War on Terror would have saved over 10 million lives at home and abroad 
My Amma (Malayalam word for Mother) passed away on August 22, 2023 at 3.10 AM. It is always difficult to deal with the passing of a parent, that too one’s mother. I thought the grief would go away. No it didn’t. All those bitter sweet memories won’t go away. At night I lie awake for hours. My friend, guide and[Read More…]
