In a disgraceful act of political and artistic censorship, the Frankfurt municipal administration, known as the Magistrat, decided on Friday to ban Roger Waters’ concert scheduled for May 28. The Magistrat, led by a coalition of the Social Democrats, Greens, and Free Democrats, who are in a coalition at the federal level, and the pro-EU Volt party, instructed the Frankfurt[Read More…]
When the history of these times is written, the last 15 months or so from November 2021 to January 2023 will form a very tragic part of its pages. This has been the time of the most irresponsible abandonment of their most crucial responsibilities by world leadership, leading to a sharp, perhaps unprecedented, escalation of dangers and risks for the[Read More…]
Metro work causing havoc in Surat, in Mr Modi’s home state. In Mumbai bus transport is neglected. The prohibitively costly Metro rail project has caused disruption on a massive scale in different cities in India. But nowhere else more than in Surat in the Prime Minister’s home state of Gujarat. And also in Mumbai. Metro Mokan says today’s edition of[Read More…]
Wherever we live in this world, whatever business we are in, our first priority is to take care of our life-giving ecosystem and the biodiversity that sustains us. Nothing else on earth matters as much as taking care of our planet. We have been and are still causing, through our actions, acid rain, smog in our cities, environmental pollution and[Read More…]
The acclaimed Palestinian writers Susan Abulhawa and Mohammed El-Kurd were invited to the Adelaide Writers Festival but have encountered a storm of false defamation from Zionists, pro-Zionist Mainstream media and pro-Zionist politicians. Abulhawa has also been falsely defamed for her sensible views on the Ukraine War. The eminent anti-racist Jewish Australian Festival Director Louise Adler is standing firm against this[Read More…]
Over the last few weeks, February 24, 2023 was the most observed day on geopolitical stage. The famous, and posing as dignified, MSM ceaselessly predicted and propagated: Russia is going to begin a new offensive on February 24, 2023 in Ukraine. But there was nothing like that. A year has passed since Russia began its Special Military Operation in Ukraine.[Read More…]
Lot of discussion and writing is happening in India about anti-caste laws and rules getting framed in America, the dream land of Dwijas of India. Several Hindutva intellectuals are telling stories about their love for Dalits without telling anything about how their forefathers created this barbaric system, which is now getting globalized and how they want to participate in abolishing[Read More…]
The latest official statistics of ‘Youth Risk Behavior Survey’ (YRBS), USA, 2011-2021 released recently by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, (CDC), USA, have revealed truly alarming levels of distress among US youth. From a distance youth of other countries perceive life of youth in USA to be a life of joy and fun in a prosperous land free[Read More…]
Rallies against the U.S.-led NATO bloc, the EU, supply of weapons to Ukraine and anti-war have been held across France, and in Italy and Germany. At protest sites, demonstrators defaced and tore down NATO and EU flags. Berlin Tens of thousands of Germans braved the elements to attend the Uprising for Peace, a massive rally organized by Die Linke (Left[Read More…]
To residents of Memphis’s resource-poor, predominantly nonwhite neighborhoods, the Scorpions were easy to spot. The plainclothes patrols were known for driving their unmarked Dodge Chargers through the streets, often all too recklessly, sowing fear as they went, spitting venom from their windows, jumping out with guns drawn at the slightest sign of an infraction. On the night of January 7th, Tyre Nichols was two minutes from[Read More…]
On February 20, the United Nations Security Council approved a statement, described in the media as a ‘watered-down’ version of an earlier draft resolution which would have demanded that Israel “immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory.” The intrigues that led to the scrapping of what was meant to be a binding resolution will be the subject of a[Read More…]
Recognizing the historic move of banning caste-based discrimination by a Seattle City Councillor, Vancouver-based online magazine has decided to pick her as person of the year. Kshama Sawant, the lone Indian-American member of the Seattle City Council, has been known for her unwavering dedication to social justice. She has consistently stood up for the underdog, including the poor working class[Read More…]
To Smt Nirmala Sitharaman Union Finance Minister Dear Smt Sitharaman, From media reports, it appears that both DIPAM and the Ministry of Mines are in a hurry to divest the government’s equity share of 29.54% in Hindustan Zinc Ltd. (HZL), without appreciating the strategic and financial implications of the proposal. In this connection, I invite your attention to my letters[Read More…]
Promising to return once a month, the group “Mothers on the March,” who have actively engaged for the past decade through weekly vigils in protesting police killings and brutality of Black and Brown people by police, held their first demonstration February 24 outside of the Israeli Consulate, calling attention to the injustice for killings of Palestinians in Israel and the[Read More…]
Harry Haywood was for a prolonged period a member and leader of the Communist Party-USA and other communist organizations from the 1920’s until his death in 1985. On February 4th this month we commemorated his 125th birth anniversary. He championed the crystallisation of the concept that Blacks represented a separate “nation” inside the United States. Haywood’s theoretical writings probably contributed[Read More…]
Bengaluru: Names of 9,159 Muslim voters in the Shivajinagar constituency in Bengaluru have been removed from the voters’ list. This removal is done based on a complaint filed by a private agency named Chilume which has links to the BJP. The complaint was filed on November 16, 2022, and the action was taken by the Election commission in January 2023.[Read More…]
The really awful mistake is to treat the present as an oasis of peace and wish away all bad omens as temporary noise bound to get filtered out.Now in jitters thanks to stirring of conscience and resistance among broader sections of the people, the evil regime is desperate to encourage this illusion and gag any open sign of defiance.’I am[Read More…]
Climate Code Red, a very thorough and well-respected source on climate change/global warming, recently issued a three-part study on where things stand with the climate system via looking through the rearview mirror at 2022 and reflecting that charred image into the future: Faster, Higher, Hotter: What We Learned About the Climate System in 2022 by David Spratt, Research Director, Breakthrough[Read More…]
At the G20 meeting in Bengaluru, India, the United States arrived with a simple brief. U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said at the February 2023 summit that the G20 countries must condemn Russia for its invasion of Ukraine and they must adhere to U.S. sanctions against Russia. However, it became clear that India, the chair of the G20, was not willing to[Read More…]
In October 2022, about eight months after the war in Ukraine started, the University of Cambridge in the UK harmonized surveys conducted in 137 countries about their attitudes towards the West and towards Russia and China. The findings in the study, while not free of a margin of error, are robust enough to take seriously. These are: For the 6.3 billion[Read More…]
They have become the outsourcing mandarins, consultancy companies which have served to degrade expertise in the public sector while diminishing the quality of services. Along the way, they have charged astronomical fees in giving repeatedly flawed advice. Consultants, packaged as all wise gurus, have become the great confidence tricksters. Embracing the inner voodoo of consultancy had the effect of discouraging[Read More…]
‘Lenin’ by Rajani Palme Dutt ,published by Magpie publications,most classically dissects all aspects of the life and Contribution of Lenin. In a most lucid and congealed form it illustrates how Lenin’s ideology was relevant to the world and how Leninism shaped world history. Its aim was to project the significance and role of Lenin not primarily as a Russian leader,[Read More…]
Protests are continuing in Peru even 11 weeks after the ‘coup’ of December 7, 2022, dislodging President Pedro Castillo and putting him under arrest. Formally elected president Pedro Castillo was in office for a short period: 28 July 2021 – 7 December 2022. Newspaper La Republica, which belongs to one of the two biggest media houses, ran two headlines carried[Read More…]
In India, the cries for justice, are becoming louder and longer! They come from different segments of society and particularly from those who continue to be exploited and excluded! These cries are heart-rending: anyone with an iota of conscience will hear them! The sad and tragic reality is that these cries will remain unheard; those who need to hear these[Read More…]
To Shri Rajiv Gauba Cabinet Secretary Dear Shri Gauba, I refer to my earlier letter dated 7-2-2023 (https://countercurrents.org/2023/02/hindustan-zinc-ltd-hzl-proposed-acquisition-of-overseas-zinc-companies-in-namibia-and-s-africa-is-questionable/) raising serious concerns bout HZL’s proposal to buy THL, a Mauritius-based company of Vedanta, indirectly owning majority equity stakes in overseas zinc companies in S.Africa and Namibia. Belatedly, the Ministry of Mines has filed its opposition to the proposal (https://www.bseindia.com/xml-data/corpfiling/AttachLive/705CD9B9-44C1-403F-AEAA-F525481B0709-083834.pdf), stating that[Read More…]
Imperialism and colonialism One of the focal historical features of the western (West European) civilization was and is imperialistic colonization followed by the brutal social, economic, political, financial, etc. exploitation of the local peoples and their cultures. By some academic understanding and formal definition, imperialism is a process of extending a nation-state’s power by territorial occupation or by forming political,[Read More…]
As the war in Ukraine completes a year, different scenarios are being painted by different media. There can be no denial about the large-scale destruction of life, resources and environment, despite pacifist movements, despite the reality of climate change, despite the huge suffering of people. There were those who tried to continue in Ukraine, not just as soldiers but as[Read More…]
China’s foreign ministry has published its proposal for political settlement of the crisis in Ukraine on its website on Friday. Media reports said: China’s 12-point settlement plan includes a call for de-escalation and ceasefire. The document says: “All sides should show rationality and restraint, avoid fuelling tensions or taking steps to aggravate the conflict, avert further escalation and prevent the[Read More…]
The bicycle, invented two hundred years ago in 1817, was called an iron horse because like a horse it is an individual transport. However on occasions it can carry two persons and sometimes two adults and two children too. And like a horse it can also carry loads up to 250 Kg. easily. And it is cheaper too both as[Read More…]
It is 1963, I am recording live the last moments of Sylvia’s life. She invites me as she doesn’t understand livecast. “Have a cake” she says, “Baked in my own oven,” her eyes twinkle. She takes me to check on her kids. Frieda has her arms around Nicholas sleeping secure. I livecast the sleep. Returning to the warm[Read More…]
Though it has been argued that the so-called American dream is long dead, Nikki Haley is proof that the dream is still alive. Unfortunately, the ‘dream’ is hers alone. Until recently, a close confidante of former US President Donald Trump and his pro-Israel circle, Haley wants to be the next United States president. On February 14, she officially declared her[Read More…]
by Katrina vanden Heuvel and James W. Carden As 2023 unfolds, we fear that American policy will continue to be characterized by both mission creep and the absence of any sort of diplomatic engagement with Russia. Throughout the course of the war, the Biden administration has slowly, steadily, even stealthily increased America’s involvement. Calls from Kiev for more and more weapons[Read More…]
War of words and display of cosmetic diplomacy by either or both President Joe Biden and/or President Vladimir Putin is least likely to help either USA or Russia win the Ukraine-war which has formally lasted for around a year. Ukraine-war in the hope of ensuring surrender/defeat of Russia, at present, probably bears greater importance for Biden on his domestic turf.[Read More…]
During a Veterans Day celebration in my small Maryland community, a teacher clicked through a slideshow of smiling men and women in military uniforms. “Girls and boys, can anyone tell me what courage is?” she asked the crowd, mostly children from local elementary schools, including my two young kids. A boy raised his hand. “Not being scared?” he asked. The[Read More…]
1 18th February 1983 Thanks to God(?) History doesn’t stink. Or else it could have still stinking the flesh, dust and blood of that six hours – the insane hours of carnage in the village of Nellie. I wasn’t born then Or maybe I was born that day. Does it really matter? I am the name February had called in[Read More…]
The sacked workers of the Manesar plant of Maruti Suzuki, one of the country’s largest car manufacturers, have been relentlessly demanding reinstatement for the past 10 years. Even after continuous protests, the management refuses to discuss the issue of reinstatement of the workers. On February 15, the sacked workers of Maruti relentlessly waged a sit-in protest by taking out a[Read More…]
Sukhrani is a koladivasi woman in Sakrauhan village of Manikpur block in Chitrakut district (Uttar Pradesh). She toiled at a NREGA ( rural employment guarantee scheme)work site for 21 days. This was about six months back. However she has still not received her wages despite having made several pleas for this. ChotwaKol is an adivasi farmer of this village. He[Read More…]
High levels of global debt are likely to turn what could be a controllable shift from expansion to contraction into a blowout of unfulfilled expectations and obligations, leading to widespread suffering. An enormous debt bomb threatens the U.S. federal government and the nation’s financial system unless warring politicians can agree on a plan to defuse it. However, there are even[Read More…]
Why Norway? In Seymour Hersh’s account of the Biden Administration’s decision to destroy the Nord Stream pipelines, why did much of the secret planning and training for the operation take place in Norway? And why were highly skilled seamen and technicians from the Norwegian Navy involved? These questions have been put forward by Pulitzer winning journalist Seymour Hersh in his “From[Read More…]
Israeli forces killed 11 Palestinians, including a boy and at least two men over the age of 60, during a daytime raid in the northern West Bank city of Nablus on Wednesday. More than 100 others were injured, several of them critically, the vast majority by live ammunition, suggesting a further loosening of Israel’s already permissive open fire regulations. Events in #Nablus[Read More…]
Bioenergy is often seen as a more environmentally-friendly alternative to other forms of energy generation. But the truth is that it can actually be quite harmful to the environment. Bioenergy has a dark side: It contributes to air pollution. Biomass, or bioenergy, creates energy by burning living materials like plants and trees. The wood pellet industry uses trees to make[Read More…]
When the Earth is shaken to her utmost convulsion And the[Read More…]
Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Aero India 2023, the Runway to Billion Opportunities. It “is a wonderful platform to showcase the unlimited potential our country has in defence and aerospace sectors”. The country which was the biggest defence importer for decades now exports defence equipment to 75 countries, he said. “India has rejuvenated its defence sector in the last[Read More…]
Hundreds of workers engulfing vast areas of the country are valiantly protesting at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar against the establishment of digital presence to monitor MGNREGA workers. The workers state that due to technical defects in this new rule, they are being marked absent and their wages are also being deducted. Organizations are determined to prolong the protest for the next[Read More…]
To Respected Chief Ministers Sir, During the last few years, there has been a growing trend on the part of the Centre to diminish the role of the States under the Constitution in several ways, including by reducing the share of tax receipts to be devolved to the States on the basis of equitable allocations recommended by the Finance Commission[Read More…]
On September 23, 1973 Pablo Neruda, one of the greatest poets ever and a Nobel laureate, breathed his last. This was just 12 days after the US-assisted military coup in Chile on September 11 1973 which also resulted in the highly tragic and widely mourned death of one of the most sincere and democratic leaders of Latin America—President Salvador Allende—who[Read More…]
In an address to the Federal Assembly on February 21, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that Russia would suspend its participation in the 2011 New START nuclear arms controls treaty. The treaty, which provided for a 50 percent reduction of the number of strategic nuclear missile launchers and a bilateral inspections regime, was the last remaining arms control treaty that[Read More…]
The survey of Income tax on BBC offices in India, which were started on 14th February (2023) were stopped after three days. While IT department called it a ‘survey’, many columnists and agencies like Amnesty International called it a raid. The global media linked it to the release of BBC documentary, ‘India: The Modi question’. It was yet another attack[Read More…]
On February 9, 2023, around 100 armed men drove to Dembo, Burkina Faso, on motorcycles and in pickup trucks. They opened fire on a militia group called Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (VDP), which works with the Burkinabé military to protect the areas of northwest Burkina Faso near its border with Mali. These men killed seven members of the VDP. Three days[Read More…]
“The United States will provide Ukraine with a new $500 million infusion of aid to help the government in Kyiv continue paying salaries, pensions and providing services, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Thursday. Yellen detailed the assistance following her meeting Wednesday with Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal and Finance Minister Sergiy Marchenko, saying it was necessary to help their government[Read More…]
On February 7, a funeral was held in the northern Syrian town of Jinderis. It was one of numerous such funerals to be held on that day across Syria and Türkiye, following a devastating earthquake that killed and injured thousands. Each one of these funerals represented two seemingly opposite notions: collective grief and collective hope. The Jinderis funeral was a[Read More…]
When news first emerged over explosions endured by the Nord Stream pipelines, known collectively as Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2, an army of guessers was mobilised. The accusation that Russia had done it seemed counterintuitive, given that the Russian state company Gazprom is a majority shareholder of Nord Stream 1 and sole owner of Nord Stream 2. But[Read More…]
by Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies With the Ukraine war now reaching its one-year mark on February 24, the Russians have not achieved a military victory but neither has the West achieved its goals on the economic front. When Russia invaded Ukraine, the United States and its European allies vowed to impose crippling sanctions that would bring Russia[Read More…]
It is understood by all that at least two sides are required in a war scenario. One side must be waging war on another side. It is not required that the aggressed side fight back. To surrender to a warmaker, however, means coming under the suzerainty of the warmaker. That is almost always anathema to a people since people cherish[Read More…]
Can there be any question that we’re in a mad — and loud — new age of McCarthyism? Thank you, Kevin! And don’t forget the wildly over-the-top members of the so-called Freedom Caucus and their Republican associates, including that charmer, lyin’ George Santos, Jewish-space-laser-and-white-balloon-carrying Marjorie Taylor Greene, and — once again running for president — the man who never lost, Donald Trump-em-all. I’d like to say it[Read More…]
On the 18th of February 2023, Human Rights Lawyer Ansar Indori’s house was raided by NIA in Kota, Rajasthan. Ansar Indori has been targetted because he sought to provide legal defence and challenge an FIR (filed before the ban) against some former PFI members in Rajasthan High Court. Ansar has been working in civil rights field for a long time[Read More…]
On February 20th the Zameen Prapt Sangarsh committee staged a day long dharna outside the Sangrur district magistrate office, pleading for genuine demands promised to the dalit agricultural labourers. It was a culmination of meticulous preparations in past weeks. Villagers were mobilised from Bhawnigarg, Sherpur, Lehra,Dibba, In previous days meetings were organized in a cluster of villages, in preparation. Sukhwinder[Read More…]
Seattle, WA (February 21, 2023) – A coalition of Indian-American civil rights organizations today commended the Seattle City Council for its leadership in passing the historic legislation to ban caste-based discrimination in the city. Introduced by Council member Kshama Sawant (District 3, Central Seattle), the legislation passed on Tuesday with a 6-1 vote prohibits, “businesses from discriminating based on[Read More…]
The extremely cruel deaths of a mother and her daughter in the course of a demolition drive in Marauli village of Kanpur Dehat ( Uttar Pradesh) has disturbed the conscience of even those people who normally remain silent on such injustices against the poor, and condemnations have been coming in from far and wide. Reports have pointed out how demolitions[Read More…]
Work is easy. Work is difficult. Work shows a lot. Work hides a lot. Work creates. Work destroys. Work is painless. Work is dreadful. Work brings victory. Work is slavish. Work is like creating a poem or a picture with joy. Work is hellish. A poet or a philosopher may define work differently than a physicist’s definition. An economist or[Read More…]
On Monday, US President Joe Biden arrived in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine, pledging the United States’ commitment to the war with Russia for “as long as it takes.” The visit by the “commander in chief” to the front solidifies the conflict not only as an American war but as the defining and preeminent focus of the Biden administration. Coming[Read More…]
On February 19th in Allahabad Dastak journal conducted a meeting in commemoration of it’s 100th issue. The main theme was preserving the democratic rights of journalists ‘Dastak’ is manifestation of the anti-fascist and revolutionary democratic spirit. It has played an important role in shaping anti-feudal,anti-imperialist and secular consciousness, and given a prop to democratic and secular movements. This Hindi Magazine[Read More…]
First of all, I think we should not categorize tradition and modernity as exclusive or contradictory terms. We cannot call any tradition as only (or exclusively) a tradition, devoid of modernity. For example, when Islam emerged as a new religion in the world, it rejected most (if not all) the previous existing traditions and presented/evolved itself as a harbinger of[Read More…]
Connection to Baltistan This is a recall of June 1984, thirty-nine years ago. The formation cut of a motorable road from Leh over Khardungla on the Ladakh mountain range and into Baltistan along the Shyok river valley, was completed. (The Shyok river, with source at the Rimo glacier, is a major tributary of the Indus river). The story of overcoming[Read More…]
Marvin Gaye said it best in his hit song ( written by him) : Whoa, oh, mercy mercy me Oh, things ain’t what they used to be, no no Where did all the blue skies go? Poison is the wind that blows from the North and South and East Whoa mercy, mercy me Oh, things ain’t what they used to[Read More…]
The earlier article on ‘Citizen resistance in the age of Hindutva’ had mentioned different forms of resistance after 2014. These included resistance by writers & artists (Award Waapasi), Dalits (Una protest), Dalits & Student community (Rohit Vemula protests), Students & Teachers (JNU Nationalist debates), Muslims & others (Anti CAA protests), Muslim women (Anti hizab restriction protests), Journalists (Independent youtube media[Read More…]
An important aspect of fiscal policy relates to the extent to which the various welfare needs of people are being met. One important indicator of this are the allocations made for the social sector. The social sector in the context of the union government of India is generally identified in terms of the following ministries—Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare, Rural Development,[Read More…]
Hundreds of protesters gathered in Washington, DC Sunday for the ‘March Against the War Machine’ rally, with a number of prominent speakers from across the political spectrum of U.S. calling on the U.S. government to end its military support of Ukraine in favor of diplomacy, and slashing the Pentagon budget to address numerous domestic issues. The anti-war event held at[Read More…]
Bilkis Bano, then 19 years old and pregnant, was gangraped in the 2002 infamous communal violence of Gujarat. 14 of her family members were also killed including a 3 years old daughter. Case was registered after the intervention of National Human Rights Commission. In 2004 the trial was moved to Mumbai by Supreme Court. In 2008, 11 accused were convicted.[Read More…]
As the nuclear “Doomsday Clock” inches towards midnight, peace, anti-war and Climate Crisis activists took the streets today across the country to protest their “Rage against the War Machine” demanding substantive de-escalation of the Russian-Ukraine war and calling for “Not one penny for war in Ukraine” while emphatically calling for substantive changes to reverse the climate crisis. Participants in the[Read More…]
It is true that economic growth – meaning rising GDP – is one of the key indicators of rising prosperity in a society though as the Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz also reminds that “Maximising GDP is not same as maximising wellbeing” puts to question the merit of overemphasis that are often put to GDP as the marker of ‘development’ in[Read More…]
The predecessor of todays African Union, the Organization for African Unity, OAU, was launched in 1963 with the glorious goal of uniting Africans to help liberate the continent from colonialism. Unfortunately, despite the dreams of Kwame Nkrumah, Sekou Ture and others, reality quickly showed its face and the dream turned out to be a fantasy. Why do I say this?[Read More…]
The Common Agenda that stemmed from the commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations Organization identified the following 12 action goals: (1) Leave no one behind; (2) Protect our planet; (3) Promote peace and prevent conflicts; (4) Abide by international law and ensure justice; (5) Place women and girls at the centre; (6) Build trust; (7)[Read More…]
Incarceration of common people is becoming a routine affair. Activists and political opponents are being increasingly suppressed by the government with the goal of exercising political monopoly over the people. Concerns are being voiced by none other than the President of India and the chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Janhastakshep organized a well-attended, qualitative meeting at Delhi’s Gandhi peace[Read More…]
Some cow vigilante belonging to Bajrang Dal kidnapped Junaid (35) and Naasir (25) when they were traveling from Bharatpur Rajasthan to Bhiwani in neighboring Haryana and burnt them alive on suspicion of being cow smugglers. The charred remains of Junaid and Nassir were found in a Bolero in which they were traveling. “Eyewitnesses say the ‘gau rakshaks’ and the Crime[Read More…]
At a time when minority communities have been passing through difficult times and need reassurance and support, the union budget has come as a rude jolt for them with its big cuts in allocations for such obvious priorities as education and skills. What is more, as the now available data shows, there were very big cuts in the previous year[Read More…]
The BJP party and government(there is actually no difference.) has crossed all rational limits to crush the little but numerous vibrant signs of revolt under the steamroller of the state.Such responses are also absurd to the point of being ridiculous.The gagging of the BBC documentary and frantic persecution of some viewers and platforms betray the growing insecurity and apprehension of[Read More…]
The economic proxy war between the rising and fading Superpowers is escalating and expanding in the “Asian 21st Century.’ This was apparent in an (un)diplomatic exchange between Chinese and United States officials over the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) debt restructuring delays in Sri Lanka which was the venue of the recent CARAT/ MAREX war games. These happened in the run[Read More…]
To Shri G C Murmu C&AG Dear Shri Murmu, The AP State government sold its 10.4% equity share in Gangavaram Port to the Adani Group in mid-2021 for Rs 120 per share, at a total value of Rs 644 Crores, without going through any competitive bidding procedure, as required by the Centre’s disinvestment guidelines, thus deliberately allowing the transaction[Read More…]
In all societies and social groups, there are rules not only about what can be said but in fact what can be thought. In the West, this has strong tones in the professional world, in which some things are so sacrosanct as to be verboten. The more unsayable a thing is deemed to be, the more it needs to be[Read More…]
Australia’s Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) provides excellent globally-oriented TV and radio services to Australia, and particularly to exceptionally multicultural Australia. However SBS has succumbed to foreign and local Zionist pressure and suspended renowned Arab journalist Essam Al Ghalid for unexceptional tweets made 10 years ago which offended local Zionists and a foreign, pro-Israel, Israel-promoting and Zionist media monitoring website called[Read More…]
Perhaps the greatest crime that Julian Assange committed in the eyes of both Democratic and Republican governments was this: he dared to tell the American people some of the terrible things their government had done. The first time I was asked to comment publicly on Julian Assange and Wikileaks was on MSNBC in April 2010. Wikileaks had just released the Collateral Murder video. The[Read More…]
The union budget 2023-24 has failed to live up to the real needs and hopes of people living in villages, or to prioritize rural areas. A clear decline can be seen in the proportion of the budget going to rural development, agriculture and allied sectors. As the Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability has pointed out in its analysis of[Read More…]
Introduction Any budget is complex consisting of many things of varying importance. Often, people focus on things of their direct interest but miss the wider implications that affect them indirectly and may undo any benefit they may get directly. Thus, it is not only important to look at the trees but also the forest. So, it is important to analyse[Read More…]
In India maize or corn has been traditionally known as a nutritious and tasty food crop grown predominantly on small family farms. It is relished in the form of mainly home baked rotis. In addition corn on cob heated on simmering fire is also a highly enjoyable food, particularly during rainy season. Similarly maize has been cherished in many cultures[Read More…]
A recent report out of West Antarctica is rattling scientists. It’s all about heat, big-time heat, encroaching upon the world’s biggest chunk of ice that locks down a couple hundred feet of sea level rise. This kind of news is enough to raise the shackles of smart well-informed people, as excessive CO2 emissions spewing like crazy ever since the turn[Read More…]
There is reason to be alarmed by the recent China balloon. However, that reason is not the alleged China aggression but the very calculated aggression towards China by the Obama, Trump and Biden administrations. This hate and the manufactured reasons for it have been layering on for years. We’ve seen this playbook. It’s the same game plan that led[Read More…]
Inequitable family planning and illogical pro-growth policies are taking away every child’s right to a fair start in life. There is a conflict between ecocentric people struggling for freedom, and anthropocentric people threatening that freedom. This conflict, which happens beneath the surface of most media, constitutes a “secret war” for what the future of Earth will be. This secret war[Read More…]
My title comes from a 19th century author whose name does not matter nor would it mean much if I mentioned him. It’s an old truth that has not changed a bit over the centuries. I think, however, it would be more linguistically accurate to say that most people want to be deceived, for the world, the earth doesn’t give a[Read More…]
In India, which is said to be the world’s largest democracy, media and its freedom have been considered indispensable. But after income tax raids on several print and electronic media organizations in recent years, the Delhi-Mumbai offices of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) have now come under the income tax department’s radar. The opposition has alleged that central government agencies[Read More…]
How do donations via electoral bonds funded by legal or illegal money help curb undue influence on policy makers? Electoral bonds provide an additional of such funds. The Union Government initiated the Electoral Bonds scheme, which was announced in the Union Budget 2017–18, on January 2, 2018. The aim was “to cleanse the system of political funding in the country”. While many other issues are also germane,[Read More…]
The massacre at Laxmanpur-Bathe of Jehanabad in Bihar on the night of 1 December in 1997 was a landmark event with distinguishing features .The genocide rightly shook the conscience of the nation in the 50th year of Indian independence. The scale of the carnage was unparalleled in any caste massacre. It was a perfect manifestation of how in essence the[Read More…]
by Intizar Husain Trans. Ghazala Jamil and Faiz Ullah. Originally published 2003. Yoda Press. INTRODUCTION Dilli tha jis ka Naam is a historical account by Intizar Husain published originally in Urdu in 2003. The book at hand, Once there was a city named Dilli (2016), is its English translation by Ghazala Jamil and Faiz Ullah. In today’s time, when a[Read More…]
GANDHI AUR SARLA DEVI CHAUDHARANI: BARAHA ADHYAY (GANDHI AND SARLA DEVI CHAUDHARANI: TWELVE CHAPTERS) By Alka Saraogi 2023, New Delhi, Vani Prakashan, Pp. 216, Price Rs. 299/- Alka Saraogi (1960- ) is a well known modern Hindi author. She received the Sahitya Akademi award for her first novel, ‘Kalikatha via Bypass‘ in 2001. Since then it has been translated in[Read More…]
Seymour Hersh, the famous investigative journalist, has slammed U.S.’s alleged involvement in bombing the Nord Stream gas lines as one of the “dumbest” decisions taken in years, warning that the move will have “horrific” consequences for Europeans and further undercut the already “supremely useless” NATO alliance. Speaking to Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman for an interview on Wednesday, Hersh outlined his recent report on[Read More…]
A poet in Russia is more than a poet,” Yevgeny Yevtushenko, a leading author of his time, famously stated. He knew what he was talking about. During Nikita Khrushchev’s cultural years of Thaw, Soviet poets were public figures like rock stars. They performed to sell-out crowds, predicted the future and helped get over the past. Poetry, like any form of[Read More…]
To start with a few words about myself, I am a conservationist serving the rainforests of the Western Ghats in India. It has been my lifelong inquiry to look at how a biome can recover from assault—from colonial-neocolonial-capitalistic-civilizational assault. I know, and the biome knows, that it can heal from most travesties and injuries, and that it will do its[Read More…]
The cover-up by the U.S.-and-allied ‘news’-media of Seymour Hersh’s blockbuster self-published February 8th investigative-news report that Joe Biden himself had ordered the destruction of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, wasn’t only the virtually total blackout of it that was engaged in by almost all ‘news’-media in The West — their failing to report that Hersh had issued any such news-report[Read More…]
Being an early adopter of solar technology has given me personal insight into some of the practical limitations and difficulties of the energy transition. In 2022, I authored two articles expressing doubts about society’s transition from fossil fuels to renewable solar and wind power. In this final article in the series, I’ll explain why my conclusions are based on experience as well as[Read More…]
In January 2023, after five police officers killed Tyre Nichols, President Joe Biden quickly issued a statement calling on protesters to stay nonviolent. “As Americans grieve, the Department of Justice conducts its investigation, and state authorities continue their work, I join Tyre’s family in calling for peaceful protest,” said Biden. “Outrage is understandable, but violence is never acceptable. Violence is destructive and against[Read More…]
In May of this year, I will reach the ripe old age of 80. Through all the decades that I have been on this earth this question has been on my mind. When will it ever end? So far, a logical and fair answer eludes me. It’s not for lack of trying, it’s because every time we Palestinians, despite all[Read More…]
The protests of the Peruvian people staged against the dictatorial government of Dina Boluarte have been taking place for more than a month and, in recent days; have taken on more intensive and generalised form. Road blocks and important demonstrations in several regions of the country have been routine, like in Puno, Arequipa, Junín, Cusco and Apurímac. The unanimous cry[Read More…]
It is not farfetched to make the point that delivery systems capable of deploying nuclear weapons will lead to them carrying those very same weapons. Whatever the promises made by governments that such delivery systems will not carry such loads, stifling secrecy over such arrangements can only stir doubt. That is the problem facing the AUKUS alliance which makes Australia[Read More…]
There is increasing concern that the world is not on track to resolve climate change as well as about a dozen or so other serious, inter-related environmental problems that threaten to disrupt the life-nurturing conditions of our planet. Corrective actions should not be delayed much longer. Most environmental problems arise in the process of creating certain goods and services. In[Read More…]
Both the Congress and the RSS have one common trait: Indifference towards the Indian Muslims. The Kashmir Files In Jan 19, 1990, the Azaadi uprising in the Kashmir Valley led to the ethnic cleansing of an estimated 1,00,000 Kashmir Pandits. For some, this day heralded the rejection of Indian rule by protesting Kashmiris, followed by the bloody suppression of Kashmiri[Read More…]
India has witnessed growth and acceleration of Hindutva agenda from 2014 onwards. The growth of BJP, penetration of communal propaganda through social media, decline of independent media, decline of institutions, and emergence of autocrat leader who gets identified as liberator of majority has contributed to this trend. However, the acceleration of Hindutva agenda has also been equally accompanied by different[Read More…]
The Illegality of NATO: Violation of the UN Charter and the Nuremberg Principles In recent years, participation in NATO has made European countries accomplices in US efforts to achieve global hegemony by means of military force, in violation of international law, and especially in violation of the UN Charter, the Nuremberg Principles. Former UN Assistant Secretary General Hans Christof von[Read More…]
The leadership of the Marxist-Leninist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) launched an impressive rally in besieged Gaza resiliently protesting the Criminal “Caesar Law”. The Caesar Law refers to the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act (HR/31), which commands a hermetic siege on Syria disguising to protect the Syrian people and defending human rights in the war-striven country. Following[Read More…]
To Smt Alka Tiwari Secretary National Commission for the Scheduled Tribes (NCST) Dear Smt Tiwari, I understand from a news report (https://m.economictimes.com/industry/indl-goods/svs/metals-mining/vedanta-declared-preferred-bidder-for-bauxite-block-in-odisha/articleshow/97953706.cms) that the Odisha government has put the Sijimali bauxite mine located across Kalahandi and Rayagada districts to auction and that the Vedanta Group has been declared as a preferred bidder. Sijimali bauxite mine is located across Thuamul–Rampur tehsil of[Read More…]
A Fox News headline writer called it “Biden’s War on Your Kitchen.” Wall Street Journal columnist Kimberley Strassel wrote, “The reason gas stoves are in the news is simple: There is a coordinated, calculated—and well-funded—strategy to kill them off. It’s the joint enterprise of extremely powerful climate groups, working with Biden administration officials.” (“Extremely powerful climate groups”? Where can I[Read More…]
Our near term future: Over the next 50/100/200 years Biosphere temperatures will rise. This will lead to a rise in Ocean waters. Human survival will be limited to habitable planetary niche areas. Our long term future: Temperature rise in the Biosphere of Planet Earth will adversely effect much of Planetary life. Corrective actions by Homo sapiens will be inadequate. A repeat of a Methane Hydrate[Read More…]
For a whole year, Israel has struggled in its attempts to articulate a clear and decisive position regarding the Russia-Ukraine war. The reason behind the seemingly confused Israeli position is that it stands to lose, regardless of the outcome. But is Israel a neutral party? Israel is home to a population of almost one million Russian-speaking citizens, one-third of them[Read More…]
Sexual violence and rape have always been used as the tactical and instrumental weapon of war against women. Unfortunately, women have always been the worst victims of such horrendous crimes during the wars of all times. From the First World War till contemporary armed conflict in South Sudan, the women have always faced the crimes, torture, and brutality in the[Read More…]
The US is a far bigger threat to Canadian sovereignty and democracy than China but you’d never know it from following the dominant media. In recent days a CIA-linked firm got the federal government to stop research with a Chinese university, a State Department funded group convinced parliament to criticize China and the Pentagon’s panic over a balloon prompted Global[Read More…]
A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) D. Y. Chandrachud, on 10th February expressed concern over the acute downfall in share values of Adani Group and observed that “there is a need to protect Indian investors from[Read More…]
A flawed process led to erroneous policy which is counterproductive and which resulted in not only damage to democracy but to huge adverse impact on the public, especially the poor. The process by which a policy is arrived at, also determines the outcomes. Can it then be said that the process was legal, even if formally, so the achievement of[Read More…]
It’s clearly not a coincidence that at the recent 3 day convention organised by the Jamiat-i-Ulema-i-Hind at the Ramlila grounds in Delhi, has degenerated into another national round of competitive communalism & petty bickering. A convention where religious leaders from the Hindu, Sikh, Jain & Christian communities were invited by the Jamiat to further the cause of communal harmony, was[Read More…]
South Asian University is a university set up in Delhi by member countries of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation – India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Afghanistan and Maldives – which is open to students from all these countries. However, as SAARC is receiving little attention these days because of regional political dynamics, it appears as if SAU[Read More…]
Adequate investment in equality-based education is widely accepted as one of the key components as well as a strong base for the progress of developing countries. Despite this, educational progress in India has been impeded badly by low budgets as well as inequalities. There is near consensus, even at the official level, regarding the need to take government educational budget[Read More…]
by Jacopo DeMarinis and Drea Bergman When it comes to the climate crisis, we are running out of time. In 1994, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change established the Conference of the Parties (COP) to encourage UN member states to meet annually to discuss scientific data and technological advances related to climate change and implement international environmental agreements. Despite the global interest in[Read More…]
Most meat-eaters want to believe that the animals they eat don’t suffer, but time and again, federal records have shown that they do. It’s not unreasonable to assume otherwise; after all, most U.S. meat production is subject to the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act, which requires that animals be stunned (rapidly rendered insensible to pain) before they’re hoisted upside down and killed. But[Read More…]
Things are getting rather bizarre at the US Northern Command and the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD). Its increasingly prominent commanding chief, one General Glen VanHerck, has abandoned any initial sense of frankness in discussing the destruction of an alleged Chinese surveillance balloon on February 4. Since that disproportionately violent event, more public relations than sense, three other objects[Read More…]
The most common description of the union budget’s allocations for health sector has been that these have increased marginally. However it would be much more appropriate to say that the health allocations have been glaringly low compared to the officially recognized projections of what is needed. In 2017 the National Health Policy agreed that the health budget of the central[Read More…]
This marginalization of the rural economy is a result of the policymakers’ focus being on the organized part — the modern part of the economy. Modernization of the economy has been taken to be the copying of western modernity. India has not attempted its own modernity suited to the needs of the vast majority living in rural areas. No wonder[Read More…]
In the case of Jamia violence of 2019, 11 students were arrested. One of them was Sharjeel Imam, who was student of JNU. The others included likes of Safoora Zargar and Asif Iqbal Tanha. While discharging them Court comments, “police was unable to apprehend “actual perpetrators” and “surely managed to rope them (accused) as scapegoats” in the matter.” Court also[Read More…]
The discourse over the implementation of the Uniform Civil Code has often stirred up a whirlwind of uproar by political advocates and religious objectors. India follows a system of legal pluralism that allows different religious communities to be governed by their codes of personal law. This has been seen as a way of protecting distinct communal identities and safeguarding[Read More…]
In a recent commentary from Washington Post, there is description and analysis on the flood of illegal arms into Palestinian communities, including East Jerusalem, where local arms traffickers say “business has never been better”. This is also true of circumstances in Palestinian Israeli towns, where “a political and security vacuum has allowed criminal gangs to flourish, and spurred ordinary people[Read More…]
It is an open secret. There is no love lost between India’s religious minorities and the federal government. When Muslims, the most significant minority that makes up 14.2 per cent of the nation’s 1.4 billion people, needed a healing touch, they got a budgetary shock in the form of a significant cut to funds meant for their welfare. The presentation[Read More…]
So many serving and retired bureaucrats and politicians live and work in the vicinity of Y.B. Chavan Centre in Mumbai but few attend significant events there. Felt this particularly after watching the opening film at the Chavan international film festival last evening. The film Holy Spider directed by Iranian film maker Ali Abbasi is particularly relevant to our times since[Read More…]
Legendary investigative journalist Seymour Hersh claimed on Saturday that his latest exposure report that suggests the CIA was responsible for the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines in September, was not a hard story to find. It was obvious that there was more to the issue than was being reported by most media outlets, Hersh said. In his first interview, (Radio War[Read More…]
On the weekend encompassing Friday 14 February to Sunday 16 February 2003 in Australia, coordinated mass protests against the impending Iraq War occurred around the world in over 600 cities. This global mass protest was described as the largest protest event in human history. According to the BBC 6-10 million people protested in a total of about 60 countries. In[Read More…]
by Ankit Kumar and Komal Patel In February 2019, when about 116 people died from hooch in U.P. and Uttarakhand, the then Deputy CM of Bihar when asked if prohibition should be imposed in those states had said, “Prohibition may have worked in Bihar, but it cannot work everywhere. Different states have different circumstances, and it is up to their[Read More…]
by Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies Fresh graves at a cemetery near Bakhmut, December 2022. – Photo credit: Reuters In a recent column, military analyst William Astore wrote, “[Congressman] George Santos is a symptom of a much larger disease: a lack of honor, a lack of shame, in America. Honor, truth, integrity, simply don’t seem to matter, or[Read More…]
by Noam Chomsky and Vijay Prashad Cuba, a country of 11 million people, has been under an illegal embargo by the United States government for over six decades. Despite this embargo, Cuba’s people have been able to transcend the indignities of hunger, ill health, and illiteracy, all three being social plagues that continue to trouble much of the world. Due[Read More…]
Inside the beating heart of many students and a large number of learners lies an inner cheat. To get passing grades, every effort will be made to do the least to achieve the most. Efforts to subvert the central class examination are the stuff of legend: discreetly written notes on hands, palms and other body parts; secreted pieces of paper;[Read More…]
One definition of revelation is: A surprisingly and previously unknown fact, especially one that is made in a dramatic way. This is what many of my fellow working stiffs need to reach: A revelation on how screwed we all have been! Not since the ‘ Gilded Age’ ( 1870s – 1900 approximately) have we seen the Super Rich running roughshod[Read More…]
Child development is increasingly seen as the most important part of the development path. This is particularly true of a country like India where nearly a third of the children under 5 years of age are either stunted or underweight ( as per National Family Health Survey ) , or where nearly 32 million children are unable to complete school[Read More…]
In India, Valentine’s day is the time when patriarchal authorities can exercise the powers of moral policing that they have bestowed upon themselves. Acting under the banner of Indian civilization, which supposedly legitimizes their war against “Western” ideas of romantic love, vigilantes will subject young men and women to “head shavings, face blackening, public thrashings and forcibly solemnized marriages”. “Politically-connected[Read More…]
The 13th Amendment is the baby born from the Indo-Ceylon Accord of 1987, a brain child of India which is an international agreement as entered by two independent nations India and Sri Lanka. It is adopted in the Constitution of Sri Lanka and cannot be removed or repealed unless another new Constitution is adopted by Sri Lanka. This is not[Read More…]
To Shri Bhagwant Mann Chief Minister Punjab Dear Mann saheb, I have come across reports on the Centre asking Punjab power utilities to pay for transporting coal from the State’s coal mines in the eastern region via Adani Group’s port on the west coast (https://www.thestatesman.com/india/punjab-being-made-to-bear-high-expense-of-coal-to-benefit-adani-mann-1503154486.html). This is indeed paradoxical, to say the least! I had earlier written to you and[Read More…]
Over a Lakh Muslim Girls in Karnataka Pay for Anti-Muslim Agenda In the current session of parliament, CPI(M) leader John Brittas claimed that “more than a lakh Muslim girls backed out of government colleges in Karnataka alone” during a debate over a private member’s bill proposed by Abdul Wahab of the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) to implement the Sachar[Read More…]
The workers of Marshall Machine Limited, located at Focal Point, Ludhiana, secured success by persuading the management and labour department to concede to their demands. Around 150 workers of a company manufacturing ‘turning machines’ (i.e. computer-controlled lathe machines) waged a strike since last February 7 on issues related to wages and social security. The strike was being led by an[Read More…]
The cow is held as a sacred animal by a section of Hindus. But in the cases of lynching, it becomes a political animal with which to browbeat and even murder the minorities and the Dalits. Ziya Us Salam, Lynching Files (2019) The cow was never used for spiritual elevation. In the 20th century everybody used the cow[Read More…]
Hundreds of thousands of people joined in rallies in Spain and France on issues of healthcare and pension reform. Madrid Media reports said: Around 250,000 people marched through the streets of Madrid on Sunday demanding that the Spanish government increase the country’s health care budget, improve working conditions and expand the staff. “Today in Madrid we are standing up again[Read More…]
A quarter of a million people have signed an online petition urging German Chancellor Olaf Scholz to stop increasing the flow of weapons to Ukraine and to push for a peaceful resolution of the conflict instead. The petition, started on change.org by German politician Sahra Wagenknecht and journalist Alice Schwarzer, accrued over 250,000 signatures about two days since its creation. Ukraine Is[Read More…]
Though it was clear that Burkina Faso was eventually going to follow in the footsteps of Mali and the Central African Republic (CAR), Ouagadougou’s decision to break military ties with France was not as simple as media sound bites want us to believe. The conventional wisdom is that these countries are walking away from their former colonial master, France, to[Read More…]
2011-12 was a very sad year for Somalia. As hunger related to drought and other factors was worsening, a famine situation was not declared officially till very late and relief supplies were delayed. The result was that a large number of people perished in famine deaths even before famine was officially declared. A total of as many as 260,000 people[Read More…]
The International Movement for a Just World (JUST) urges the American, British, Australian, Canadian, Swiss and some European Union and Arab League governments to lift the unjust, immoral sanctions against Syria in order to lessen the immense sufferings of the people caused by the massive earthquake of 6th February 2023. A number of local groups including the Syrian Red Crescent[Read More…]
World Radio Day is a day that is celebrated annually on February 13th to recognize the role that radio plays in bringing people together, fostering communication and promoting a better understanding of different cultures, communities, and perspectives. The United Nations General Assembly declared World Radio Day as an official day of celebration in 2012 to pay tribute to the significant[Read More…]
Harbhajan Singh Atwal was presented with a Human Rights Defender certificate on Sunday, February 12, at Gurdwara Sukh Sagar Sahib, New Westminster, BC for his continued advocacy for the release of political prisoners. The certificate was given to Atwal by Gurpreet Singh, the cofounder of Radical Desi, an online magazine that covers alternative politics. While addressing the congregation, Singh raised[Read More…]
This year’s Indian Budget has allocated Rs 10 lakh crore (121.0 Billion US $) as capital expenditure for building huge infrastructure during 2023-24. Nearly one fourth of the capital outlay will be spent on constructing new roads and highways and another quarter to Indian Railways for running new high speed trains (like Vande Bharat), laying new rail tracks and 10[Read More…]
Winston Churchill is credited to have stated, ‘Politics is not a game. It is an earnest business’. The recent appointments to as many as 13 gubernatorial posts, when countdown for Loksabha elections 2024 has already begun, confirms Churchill’s aphorism. Perhaps the most significant story lurking behind the recent appointments is the increasing profile of northeastern states in the political arithmetic[Read More…]
The Prime Minister had announced in June 2017 that the income of the country’s farmers would double by 2022, and he further promised to double the farmer’s income in many places. It was reiterated in every annual budget of the central government till 2021. But he stopped mentioning it after the farmers’ agitation against the new agricultural laws and the[Read More…]
Recently, I received a video (YouTube shorts), on WhatsApp, of a comical portrayal of a scene where Rahul Gandhi is peeping from behind to see how Narendra Modi prepares tea. Rahul Gandhi is curious to know, in this video, what masala (spices) Modi adds to the tea that makes people consuming his tea come back again and again. Modi tells[Read More…]
Today on February 12th, we commemorate the 25th death anniversary of student leader and youth leader Anil Ojha, of Bihar. He fell in the early morning hours on February 12th, as a result of severe head injuries. He had been admitted to hospital a week previously. He languished in hospital without receiving any proper treatment. It was diagnosed that sheer[Read More…]
The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said on Friday that Washington owed the world an explanation, following the publication of journalist Seymour Hersh’s report, claiming the U.S. was behind the September 2022 attack on the Nord Stream gas pipelines. Media reports said: “We have noted the reports,” Mao Ning said, responding to a question from Dragon TV. She added that the[Read More…]
This is an ode to a film script/story/dialogue writer known for his films like ‘I am Kalam’ and ‘Paan Singh Tomar’- Sanjay Chauhan. He passed away recently and this write-up is an attempt to commemorate his connect with all those who met him I recall meeting you for the first time in that wooden cubicle which served as a sitting room[Read More…]
Anybody who closely follows global warming knows that the Arctic has been clobbered 2-3 times beyond the impact on the planet. And knowledgeable sources also know that what happens in the Arctic doesn’t stay in the Arctic. After all, for millennia Arctic ice steadfastly served as the planet’s numero uno biggest reflector of solar radiation by reflecting 80%-90% of sunlight[Read More…]
A PROPER DEGREE OF GRATITUDE & THANKS IS DUE SEYMOUR HERSH The recent revelations of investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, Pulitzer Prize Winner for his reportage on the infamous My Lai Massacre during the Vietnam War, has just broken the colossal true story of how America took out Russia’s Nord Stream I & II LNG Pipelines. Hersh’s account now affords all[Read More…]
The people of Ukraine have suffered enormous distress during the last one year. Clearly it is time to consider carefully the various options and select the safest one involving the least possibilities of further distress and risks. From all available evidence the safest possible path from the point of view of the people of Ukraine appears to be a three[Read More…]
Greater Than the Sum of Our Parts – Feminism Inter/Nationalism & Palestine. Nada Elia. Pluto Press, 2023. London. Interestingly this work by Nada Elia – Greater Than the Sum of Our Parts – takes off from what the last book I read on Palestine discussed as images of Palestine and the imagination arriving with that. The first image used here[Read More…]
The exposure has been denied by the Empire. But does anyone believe the denial? Not today, none. People across the world have come across such denials many times, and each time all the denials turned out as lies. The latest denial is related to the incident of explosion in the Nord Stream pipelines. Seymour Hersh, the famous journalist, found: The[Read More…]
The game has changed . A new narrative has begun. Now Adani Realty is in BKC’ says the slogan on the wall of the upcoming high rise Adani building. The irony is that it is right opposite the building of MHADA, Maharashtra housing and area development authority in Bandra east in Mumbai.It is an affront to the whole concept of[Read More…]
I would like to announce the publication of a new nook, entitled “Our Knowledge-Based Society”. The book may be downloaded and circulated, free of charge, from the following link: https://eacpe.org/content/uploads/2023/02/Our-Knowledge-Based-Society-by-John-Scales-Avery.pdf Below is some discussion of the content of the book: Cooperation in groups of animals and human groups The social behavior of groups of animals, flocks of birds and communities[Read More…]
A new-old ghost is hovering over Europe—war. The most violent continent in the world in terms of the number of deaths caused by warfare during the last 100 years (not to go back any further and include the deaths suffered by Europe during religious wars and the deaths inflicted by Europeans on peoples subjected to colonialism) is heading for a[Read More…]
A slice of president Joe Biden’s State of the Union address that calls for closer analysis: Putin’s invasion has been a test for the ages. A test for America. A test for the world. Would we stand for the most basic of principles? Would we stand for sovereignty? Would we stand for the right of people to live free from[Read More…]
There is nothing Gautam Adani will not do for money. In this sense, he is admirably dedicated to greed, so much so he has become its foremost caricature worthy of permanent enthronement. Mark this man’s name in the scriptures of eternity: There was nothing he did not do for the filthy lucre. For the unfamiliar reader, the $218 billion Adani[Read More…]
Bryan Pfaffenberger and his stock are continuing the Western traditions of confusing or at the least misunderstanding the life in South Asia, its various nations and cultures, as also the values, and make much ado about the ‘Fourth World Colonialism’.1 We are to encounter many apparitions which the myth-making of the Western scholarship has unleashed in the conceptual forms of[Read More…]
While most of the budget discussion is understandably concentrated on the financial year ahead of us, it is important to have an understanding also of the previous year’s experiences. An important aspect of this relates to significant cuts made in the allocations of various union ministries and departments of crucial importance during the previous financial year 2022-23, with hardly any[Read More…]
Today’s Google Doodle features an ode to PK Rosy, a long-forgotten first Malayalam cinema Dalit actress also known as ‘Rajamma’, ‘Rosamma’ and ‘Rajammal’. This is not only a great moment to see that her participation has been honoured; rather it is a moment to feel sorrow for the state of Indian cinema and academia, which has taken decades to at[Read More…]
* On the initiative of the Uttarakhand Mahila Manch, the National Fact Finding Team of women and human rights organizations has released a study on the Ankita Bhandari murder. * It demands registration of FIR against all guilty employees. * Implementation of law against sexual violence at workplace in the Uttarakhand tourism sector. * End of political protection to criminals[Read More…]
At this very moment a hideously frightening yet absurd antic is going on in Assam in the name of law.Of course we are getting blase about Hindutva forces in and out of government staging all kinds of ludicrous drama,like the RSS (in a recent issue of The ORGANISER,official organ of the RSS) coming out blazing all guns in support of[Read More…]
“Safe Food Week” being marked all over the country this week Delhi, February 9th 2023: National Safe Food Day was marked widely all over the country today, on the day when Bt brinjal was placed under an indefinite moratorium in 2010. Citizens were seeking to remind Government of India about this pro-people, pro-nature decision that was taken by the then[Read More…]
The lines between the public and private have slowly become more and more blurred, with the hope being from the side of Right-Wing Ground activists that eventually it will be erased completely. We must take the mob activity that took place on January 21st, 2023 with the utmost seriousness as it displays to us the direction in which the nation[Read More…]
Whether the proposed inauguration of Manusmriti at Telugu University, Hyderabad be stopped ? As per reports appearing in a section of the press, the The Veda Dharma Prachara Trust has translated and published Manusmriti from Hindi to Telugu which will be inaugurated in a mass programme to be held at Telugu University in Hyderabad on 11 th of Feb 2023.([Read More…]
Even before the terrible damage caused by earthquake in Syria and Turkey, there was a strong case for ending sanctions against Syria as the existing sanctions imposed by the USA and its close allies, continuing for several years, had already accentuated the humanitarian crisis greatly in Syria. Now in the post-earthquake situation, it would be nothing short of a crime[Read More…]
Though Israel’s past wars on Gaza have often been justified by Tel Aviv as a response to Palestinian rockets or, generally, as acts of self-defense, the truth is different. Historically, Israel’s relationship with Gaza has been defined by Tel Aviv’s need to create distractions from its own fractious politics, to flex its muscles against its regional enemies and to test[Read More…]
Antiwar and environmental activist Dr. Helen Caldicott warns that policymakers who understate the danger of nuclear weapons don’t have the public’s best interest at heart. Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for clarity and length. A video of the description of nuclear war from the interview can be viewed on Vimeo. Listen to the entire interview, available for streaming on Breaking Green’s[Read More…]
In Ecuador’s ’Referendum 2023’ on Sunday 5 February, citizens voted on eight government proposals for Constitutional reform, including one that affects the governance of Water Protection Areas (APH) and the National System of Protected Areas (SNAP). Just days earlier, however, the national Environment Ministry had annulled protected status for an APH on Indigenous lands in Cotopaxi province, undoing years[Read More…]
In India, the hegemonic discourse on girls’ engagement with social media has been fixed on the way they are using digital tools to express their sexuality and construct visual intimacies. Moral panic has been channeled towards the visibility of the female body, which is said to subvert frameworks of heteronormative marriage and civilizational grandeur. As a Muslim male, I witnessed[Read More…]
The plight of slum dwellers is aggravating day by day with the advent of Bulldozer Raj, with their lives literally placed at a razors edge. Without formulating any alternative arrangements for rehabilitation, notices are continuously being issued to demolish all the slums in Delhi. It has placed the poor labourer families in jeopardy, with a housing crisis. Path has been[Read More…]
An important aspect of health budget that we must keep in consideration while analyzing recent allocations relates to the fact that health budgeting in the present phase of India’s development is not about marginal increases. In fact marginal increases sometimes mean near stagnation after accounting for the inflationary factor. This apart, as India has one of the lowest public spending[Read More…]
This is the first part of a two-parts article on the issue of job insecurity of ad-hoc teachers in Delhi University. A little close to a decade ago, when I was working as an ad-hoc teacher, I recall a particular incident which left me extremely disturbed and sad. I was walking through my college car park and came across a[Read More…]
Hysteria over balloons is a strange thing. Hot air balloons made their appearance during the Napoleonic era, where they served as delivery weapons for bombs and undertook surveillance tasks. High altitude balloons were also used by, of all powers, the United States during the 1950s, for reasons of gathering intelligence, though these were shot down by the irritated Soviets. Somehow,[Read More…]
One day after a devastating 7.8 magnitude earthquake and its aftershocks struck the western border region of Turkey and Syria, the death toll has surpassed 7,700 and is expected to continue to rise as rescue and recovery efforts continue. The quake is one of the strongest ever recorded in the region and the deadliest in nearly 25 years. More than[Read More…]
One of the most successful plays in New York in the last few days is against the planner Robert Moses who destroyed so many poor neighbourhoods in the city, promoted the car lobby, worked against public transport. He was strongly opposed by Jane Jacobs, a pro people urban planner who fought automobile dominance. The play portrays the conflict between the[Read More…]
Christians are under frequent threat by the Chief Minister in Goa. Without any real evidence to corroborate false qualms, he has vowed to act with an unyielding hand to put down forced conversions that were taking place in remote corners. Pastor Dominic has been one of his targets and the government had even imposed Section 144 around his residence. Religion[Read More…]
Several governments or government entities play a double game of enforcing some drug laws while ignoring others. Their reasons vary, and history proves it will be difficult to stop. The modern globalized world has made it easier and far more lucrative to facilitate and enable international drug networks, and several governments, or elements within them, actively work with criminal groups to[Read More…]
A few weeks ago, the world’s power brokers — politicians, CEOs, millionaires, billionaires — met in Davos, the mountainous Swiss resort town, for the 2023 World Economic Forum. In an annual ritual that reads ever more like Orwellian farce, the global elite gathered — their private jets lined up like gleaming sardines at a nearby private airport — to discuss the[Read More…]
Barbara Anna Kistler was born in 1955 in Zurich, Switzerland. We just commemorated her 30th death anniversary, with her death in January, 1993. Barbara was a Swiss revolutionary, anti-imperialist, and guerrilla fighter. Kistler was a torch bearer in shaping the anti-fascist and anti-imperialist struggle in Switzerland. She also worked in various women’s groups, seeking to bring a Marxist-Leninist line to[Read More…]
“Empowering the minority communities and creating an enabling environment for strengthening the multi-racial, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural, multi-lingual and multi-religious character of our nation”. “To improve the socio-economic conditions of the minority communities through affirmative action and inclusive development so that every citizen has equal opportunity to participate actively in building a vibrant nation.[Read More…]
Why GM Crops and Foods Are Becoming the Core Issue of Food Safety February 9 2010 was an important day for food safety in India when after a very broad-based public consultation the Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh announced a moratorium on Bt brinjal and thereby the entry of GM food crops was prevented at that time despite a huge attempt[Read More…]
The Monroe Doctrine was first discussed under that name as justification for the U.S. war on Mexico that moved the western US border south, swallowing up the present-day states of California, Nevada, and Utah, most of New Mexico, Arizona and Colorado, and parts of Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Wyoming. By no means was that as far south as some would[Read More…]
To Shri Rajiv Gauba Cabinet Secretary Dear Shri Gauba, For the last several years, I have been questioning the Union Mines Ministry’s proposal to disinvest government’s residual equity share of 29.58% in Hindustan Zinc Ltd (HZL), keeping in view that zinc is a critical mineral on which public ownership and control would be necessary and also keeping in view the manner[Read More…]
Merrimack Station, the coal fired power plant on the banks of the Merrimack River in Bow New Hampshire, has recently passed its fiftieth anniversary. It’s New England’s last remaining coal plant. It’s also NH’s largest point source of carbon pollution. The plant owners, Granite Shore Power, proclaim that they scrupulously comply with EPA and state regulations. The plant uses the Merrimack River water[Read More…]
Workers on the picket line outside Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton during strike by nurses and ambulance staff. Photo: Morning Star Tens of thousands of British nurses and ambulance workers walked off the job on Monday, in what is the largest strike in the 75-year history of the National Health Service (NHS). While the government has offered a pay[Read More…]
As the prospects of world peace worsen and those of a war much beyond Ukraine increase, the role of Europe becomes increasingly important. Europe was at the center of the enormous destruction caused by both the world wars. As the possibilities of a third one increase, can Europe compensate by being the peacemaker this time? Certainly Europe, with all its[Read More…]
Since the ouster and imprisonment of democratically elected President Pedro Castillo in Peru political crisis is prolonging in the country as people’s revolt against the rightist government is spreading across the country, and the government is increasing repressive measures instead of taking measure for a democratic approach. Daily protesters around Peru have blocked highways with trees, boulders and tires, taken[Read More…]
The anti-Shudra, Dalit and women language of Tulsidas in his Ramcharitamanas engendered a major controversy in North India. Its impact could also be seen in the South, which already had a strong Shudra mobilization history. He equated them with animals and drums and wanted to keep punishing them forever. The new consciousness of the Shudras, Dalits and women is not going to accept[Read More…]
It was January 1983 and raining in San Francisco. The summer before, I’d moved here from Portland, Oregon, a city known for its perpetual gray drizzles and, on the 60-odd days a year when the sun deigns to shine, dazzling displays of greenery. My girlfriend had spent a year convincing me that San Francisco had much more to offer me[Read More…]
Every conflict, including this one in Ukraine, always leads to refugees. Considering the size of Ukraine, it is not surprising that a large number of Ukrainian refugees are in Russia and in Europe. Ukrainian refugees were the topic of an interesting online conference, where you could hear very interesting information from experts about Ukrainian refugees in the Baltics. The name[Read More…]
In the budget presented on February 1, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that this budget has ushered in an amrit kal period , but for Dalits, tribals and farmers, this budgetary amrit period is a mirage and there is no way to face the challenges like inflation and unemployment in the budget. This budget has once again confirmed that the[Read More…]
If a single aspect of the union budget 2023-24 is to be selected in the context of drawing the maximum criticism, then it is the very low allocation for NREGA. As a response to this widespread criticism, on February 3 the Rural Development Ministry issued a statement (see The Statesman, February 4), saying that there is no need for widely[Read More…]
The term Siddi refers to Afro-Indians – Africans who mixed with Indians through marriage and relationships. Africans crossed the Indian Ocean and arrived in India during the 1200s, 1300s and 1400s. They were transported by Islamic invaders and Portuguese colonisers as enslaved people, palace guards, army chiefs, harem keepers, spiritual leaders, Sufi singers, dancers and treasurers. Today, the majority of Siddis are found in the west[Read More…]
by Sanjana Sree Manusanipalli and Sandeep Pandey The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act was enacted by the Union Government in 2009 and implemented in 2010. As part of Section 12(1)(c) of this Act, at least 25% of children in the age group 6-14 years from the disadvantaged groups and weaker sections can be admitted to unaided[Read More…]
On the 26th of January, 2023, India reminded herself, yet again, that she is a Republic. As the winter sun rose in the east and gently waded across the smoggy skies of the National Capital Region, yet again, we witnessed shows of patriotism and love that we shower on ourselves in the form of tableaus and speeches. What remained understated,[Read More…]
In 2022 Melbourne University (MU), formerly Australia’s top university, succumbed to racist Zionist subversion by falsely defaming anti-racist Jewish and non-Jewish staff and students as anti-Semitic for criticism of Israeli Apartheid. MU has now adopted the false, racist and defamatory International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) Definition of anti-Semitism that is anti-Jewish anti-Semitic, anti-Arab anti-Semitic, and near-comprehensively genocide-ignoring and holocaust-ignoring. Not[Read More…]
They wanted love. The young. The desire was inside them. A candle in the night. A match in a bedroom of fireworks. They wanted to tumble in pairs into the prayers of another world – hot unions of bodies and souls. To smell, to taste, to touch, to feel, and to experience (as if dreaming together) the light of[Read More…]
Alpha generation is the one made of people who are born after 2010. They are tomorrow’s adults who will face the entire crisis that the world is going through and they will have the responsibility to face it and solve it! A big challenge! About the school Government Higher Primary School, Hengavalli, is located at a village named Hengavalli, in[Read More…]
Generation Z Generation Z are those who were born between 1997 and 2012. As the world is going through a catastrophic change, it is they who are going to face the music/the hardships and miseries. On the other hand it is they alone who can save the world. Here we are mainly referring to youths from the developed countries –[Read More…]
House Republicans, now being in the majority under the leadership of Speaker Kevin McCarthy (D-CA), having mounted a smear campaign against Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D-MN) for her antisemitic comments, which she later apologized for, removed her yesterday from the Foreign Affairs Committee. House Resolution 76 (H. RES.76) submitted by Rep. Max Miller (R-OH) calls for her removal because “Representative Omar[Read More…]
80 years ago, an event took place marking a turning point in shaping the course of the last century and literally saving the fate of mankind. February 2nd marked the 80th anniversary since the end of the Battle of Stalingrad with the complete victory accomplished of the forces of the Red Army and the crushing of the Nazi armies, something[Read More…]
On December 21, 2020, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution – co-sponsored by the United Arab Emirates and Egypt – proclaiming February 4 as the International Day of Human Fraternity, inviting all Member States and international organizations to observe the International Day of Human Fraternity annually. The International Day of Human Fraternity commemorates the historic signing of the[Read More…]
Forever Chemicals are found everywhere from the depths of the Mariana Trench to the mountaintop of Mt. Everest. Following 80 years of manufacturing various PFAS chemicals, the world is swimming in chemical permanence. And yes, it is a toxic price society pays for modern-day conveniences — made easy! But maybe it would be better if “products made easy by PFASs”[Read More…]
Post-Budget Statement by Peoples’ Action for Employment Guarantee (PAEG) and NREGA Sangharsh Morcha (NSM) The allocation for NREGA announced in the budget for FY 2023-24 is a travesty and is an assault on the peoples’ right to work as mandated under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. NREGA is a demand driven law and demand for work must be satisfied.[Read More…]
India is widely mentioned as the top milk producer in world and this achievement is frequently stated to have been achieved on the basis of its ‘white revolution’ which in turn is claimed to have been achieved on the basis of improved livelihoods of small dairy farmers. How real are these claims? This is not merely an academic question. If[Read More…]
To Smt Nirmala Sitharaman Union Finance Minister Dear Smt Sitharaman, You must have received my letter of 31st January, 2023 (https://countercurrents.org/2023/02/overseas-shell-companies-a-shadow-economy-a-threat-t-national) on the legal vacuum left unfilled over the years (“shell companies” not statutorily defined), deliberately or otherwise, by the Finance and Corporate Affairs Ministries, which has perhaps strengthened the unholy nexus that exists between domestic corporate entities and their overseas shell[Read More…]
Remnants of KPFM-1S-SK cassettes manufactured in 1988 that Human Rights Watch researchers found in Izium in October 2022. These cassettes are used for the delivery of PFM mines by the 9M27K3 Uragan mine-laying rocket. The cassette opens in flight using a small explosive charge to separate it from the rocket motor section of the weapon and scatters 312 PFM mines[Read More…]
It has been customary to discuss war in terms of victory or defeat of the two sides. So it is hardly surprising that the ongoing Ukraine war too has often been discussed in these terms. However there are important reasons why such discussion is increasingly irrelevant, the most important being that even a victory by any one side in the[Read More…]
Ennu Swantham Sreedharan (With Love, Sreedharan), a movie directed by Siddik Paravoor, is a true depiction of a real-life story of a family in Nilambur, Northern Kerala. It’s a must-watch movie in the present society where sectarian strife and conflict still exist. It’s a great movie-watching experience – the best movie I watched in the past 12 months. While drawing[Read More…]
Asian and North American super-grid interconnection can represent the capstone of global renewable energy development There is a path for renewable energy cooperation through the development and then interconnection of a North American and an Asian renewable super-grid. That’s in the mutual long-term interest of the United States and China. Solar energy alone can “lead to full power availability all[Read More…]
Nearly a year in, the war in Ukraine has cost hundreds of thousands of lives and brought the world to the brink of, in President Joe Biden’s own words, “Armageddon.” Alongside the literal battlefield, there has been a similarly bitter intellectual battle over the war’s causes. Commentators have rushed to declare the long-criticized policy of NATO expansion as irrelevant to the war’s[Read More…]
The fundamental right to vote has been a core value of Black politics since the colonial era — and so has the effort to suppress that vote right up to the present moment. In fact, the history of the suppression of Black voters is a first-rate horror story that as yet shows no sign of ending. While Democrats and progressives[Read More…]
Amílcar Lopes da Costa Cabral was born September 12, 1924 in Bafatá, Guinea-Bissau, one of Portugal’s African colonies. On January 20, 1973–50 years ago Cabral was murdered by fascist Portuguese assassins just months before the national liberation movement in which he played a central role won the independence of Guinea-Bissau. Cabral was amongst the most dialectical, critical and creative Marxist[Read More…]
Having gone through Hindenburg research report on Adani Group’s activities, there seems to be much more to it than that which meets the eye. While it is true that the valuations of the Group companies, which are generally reserved for hi tech companies, such as Amazon, Tesla, Google etc. are not justified in case of the companies that are engaged[Read More…]
The fog enveloping both the subjects discussed in my last article has not cleared thanks to the studied silence of the accused.If Hindenburgh Research is to be believed, Adani’s 413 page is not much of an answer as it allegedly fudges or skips over key issues.We are only spectators in the game but we are keen that things should be[Read More…]
Condemn the State’s undemocratic action of denying passage to CDRO Fact Finding Team for inquiry into Aerial Bombings in Chhattisgarh! Resist the attempt to create a war without witnesses in Chhattisgarh! Resist the attack on exercise of Democratic rights! A fact finding team of the Coordination of Democratic Rights Organisations (CDRO) comprising of 25 members from Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, West[Read More…]
After the blood bath in occupied Palestine in 2022, more than 230 Palestinians were killed. The Israeli Occupation Forces and the heavily armed Jewish illegal settlers in the West Bank continued their feral killing spree into 2023 unabated. In the first month of this year, Israel murdered 36 Palestinians. Ten of those murders took place in Jenin, my birthplace. This[Read More…]
The Right to Food Campaign is shocked to see that, at this time of deep crisis the Union Budget 2022-23 has continued to reduce the government spending on the social sector by a huge extent. The negative impact of the economic crisis that began even before the pandemic has fallen disproportionately on those at the bottom of the pyramid. Multiple[Read More…]
The North Korean government has pledged (Press Statement of Spokesperson for DPRK Foreign Ministry Issued, 02/02/2023, KCNA.kp (En) to respond with the “toughest possible” measures to any U.S. military provocation against the country, after the U.S. pledged to deploy more weapons to the Korean peninsula. After the U.S. Defense Secretary promised to beef up South Korean military capabilities, North Korean officials[Read More…]
As Bharat Jodo yatra, in its final phase is in Kashmir, there is an overwhelming response. At the same time some writers and commentators are using the occasion for Nehru bashing, blaming him for the difficult situation created there. Some are using this to create a binary between Nehru and Patel yet again, stating that had Patel handled the issue[Read More…]
Tributes to respected Shanti Bhushan-ji, a tall lawyer, great teacher and humble leader ! Instrumental in dethroning Indira Gandhi, gathering of forces for the post-Emergency Janata Party and bringing AAP and Kejriwal to the political forefront. I remember his surprise appearance for me in the Operation Bluestar Report – bail matter in the district Court of Tis Hazari, when I[Read More…]
Climate Stalemate: Uncle-Twinkle Dialogue on Planetary Politics – Part 6 Uncle: You know, Twinkle, it was Svante Arrhenius, a Swedish scientist, who pointed out more than a hundred years ago that the emission of carbon dioxide (CO2) from fossil fuel burning could result in global warming. But the issue remained academic until the middle of the 20th century. Only after[Read More…]
Decades ago, a German word entered the English language. The word was Schadenfreude. Schadenfreude is the experience of pleasure, joy, and self-satisfaction that comes from learning of or witnessing the troubles, failures, and humiliation of another. Yet, this German word has no direct translation. Some might argue that people might feel Schadenfreude about Brexit – when the UK left the[Read More…]
The latest Arab Opinion Index 2022 is yet more proof that Arab societies are diverse in every possible way, from their assessment of their economic situation and living conditions to their take on immigration, state institutions and democracy. With one single exception: Palestine. 76 percent of all respondents to the poll, which is carried out annually by the Arab Center[Read More…]
The National Press Club in Washington, DC today upped the public awareness campaign calling for the immediate release of war correspondent Austin Tice who was kidnapped on August 13, 2012, after being detained at a checkpoint near Damascus, Syria. The campaign is part of the Washington Post Press Freedom Partnership drive to #FreeAustinTice along with several partners involved in press[Read More…]
Let’s cut to the chase OK? All working stiff Americans are living within an empire. As the late President Eisenhower warned, and he should have known because he served it: A Military Industrial Complex. Look around you fellow Americans of most political leanings : the Super Rich control our corporate empire and thus our very lives. The anger we should[Read More…]
Right since the abrogation of article 370 on Aug.5th, 2019 which was ostensibly read down to herald a new beginning in the state of J&K that was tom-tommed as to usher in the much- needed peace, stability and economic wellbeing of the people of the erstwhile state, all that has remained elusive and nothing that would even remotely reek[Read More…]
A disturbing aspect of the union budget for the year 2023-24 relates to food and nutrition. In the case of most allocations there is a decline compared to the previous year or else there is near stagnation, which also means a decline in real terms after accounting for inflation. Although so many schemes and programs impact the food and nutrition[Read More…]
The union budget for the year has been presented at a time of growing concerns that expectations regarding an inclusive recovery from the COVID and lockdown related economic crisis have not been realized for millions of poor households, while inequalities have been increasing sharply. There were therefore strong reasons for using this budget as an instrument for providing immediate relief[Read More…]
Rajani, a 17-year-old girl, who is one amongst the 3309 child workers, recorded recently in Maharashtra, works at a garment shop in Nanded. Like several other workers in informal sector, she is also subjected to unacceptable long hours of work, unhygienic and unsafe conditions. With a monthly income in the range of Rs 3000 to 4500 and a long hour[Read More…]
Pakistan is facing a major economic crisis. News agency AFP headlined one of it reports as “Pakistan’s economy in ‘collapse’ as IMF visits” A report — Pakistan facing worst economic crisis; Pakistani rupee at Rs 250 against dollar: Report — said: Pakistan is facing the worst economic crisis since the nation formed with its currency falling to Rs 250 against[Read More…]
Forbes, world’s financial news daily declared (September, 2022), Gautam Adani as the second richest in global rich list, with a fortune estimated to be $155.5 billion on Forbe’s Real time billionaire rankings. Then during this week credible American financial investigating firm Hindenburg Research revealed a saga of stock manipulations and accounting frauds of Adani empire, India’s biggest crony capitalist. As[Read More…]
We strongly support the demand by the people of Ladakh, that the Government of India include Ladakh in the Sixth Schedule of the Indian Constitution and accord it statehood, so that the land, culture, environment and the economic interests of the Ladakhi people can be safeguarded for current and future generations. We also express deepest shock about the way in[Read More…]
Cutting the Pentagon Budget in Half Would Finally Force the Generals to Think My name is Bill Astore and I’m a card-carrying member of the military-industrial complex (MIC). Sure, I hung up my military uniform for the last time in 2005. Since 2007, I’ve been writing articles for TomDispatch focused largely on critiquing that same MIC and America’s permanent war economy. I’ve written against[Read More…]
Today marks two years since the attempted military coup in Burma. Over the last two years, the people of Burma have bravely resisted the junta’s violent attempt to take total control of the country. In the face of mass, unwavering public resistance, the junta continues to increase its campaign of brutality and savagery as it carries out killings, torture, forced disappearances, sexual[Read More…]
Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), a self-governing enclave in the South Caucasus, remains under total blockade by Azerbaijan. Over 120,000 Armenians—including 30,000 children—are on the brink of an unspeakable humanitarian catastrophe as food runs scarce, medicine cabinets fall bare, and children now suffer malnutrition. A single mountain road connects Artsakh to Armenia; it is the sole lifeline for the indigenous Armenians who live[Read More…]
To Smt Nirmala Sitharaman Union Minister for Finance & Corporate Affairs, Dear Smt Sitharaman, In recent times, there has been a proliferation of overseas shell companies, which have literally come to represent a shadow economy, posing a threat to the stability of the financial system and a serious affront to national security. Answering a Rajya Sabha Question on shell companies[Read More…]
February, the month of love, is now coloured by incarnadined cries from battlegrounds. Irrawaddy has turned red. Dneiper weeps ashes and blood. Yet, red roses will distribute love bought in supermarket splendour. Bombings in Beirut, Peshawar. Ring the bells for love till bombs are incapacitated to hate. This February, ring the bells. Lay red roses on graves[Read More…]
Avoiding the War on Terror would have saved over 10 million lives at home and abroad 
The Angertainer Steps Down: Rupert Murdoch’s Non-Retirement 
Climate Emergency Update, September 2023 
My appeal to Meta’s Oversight Board: Palestinian political and resistance organizations & individuals are not “terrorists” as classified by Israel 
Artificial Intelligence: Profit Versus Freedom 
How Can We Understand the Passage of Time? 
Pre- and Post-Soviet Language Policy in the East-Baltic States 
Breadcrumb 
Three Indian Movies win TIFF 2023 Awards 
Ukrainian president holds crisis talks in Washington amid failure of “spring offensive” 
Zelensky Faces Difficult Time In Washington D.C. 
Stumbling Towards Old Age And Looking for Someone to Lean On 
Tolstoy’s Dilemma 
Ukraine Peace Activists Protest During Zelensky White House Visit 
“Our world is becoming unhinged”: Antonio Guterres 
How Chances of Direct War between the USA and Russia Are Increasing 
G20 Biofuel Alliance threatens Food security 
Thousands Of Auto Workers Strike In Three U.S. Plants, Face Financial Hardship 
Submission To Australian National Anti-Corruption Commission, NACC: Mainstream Media Lying 
In The Name of Decolonization 
Is This the End of French Neo-Colonialism in Africa? 
Tel Aviv’s Losing Brands: Israeli ‘Coup’ and the Death of False Democracy 
Tackling Global Emergencies – UN International Day of Peace 
The Futility of Feudalistic Democracy 
Bayer over-riding Bhartiya Krishi 
Pulwama Bombing 14th February 2019: Unanswered Questions 
Himalayan Apple Growers Worried Over Increasing Threat from Imports 
After protests in flood-hit Derna, Libyan officials order journalists to leave 
International Day of Peace: Fostering Harmony and Unity in a World of Diversity 
More Butterflies, Fewer Billionaires — Unrigging the Global Economy 
Veganic Farming: How My Tiny Plot Produced 5,000 Pounds of Food Without Using Manure 
Fighting the Diaspora: India’s Campaign Against Khalistan 
CAIR Files Lawsuit to End Islamophobic No Fly List 
N.D.Mahanor, The Poet Who Taught Us to See Culture in Agriculture 
Dark and light streaks in India-China relations 
Why the Central Government Should Rush Special Aid Package for Himachal Pradesh 
Special Session: Another Image-Boosting Move? 
Eddelu ( Wake up) Karnataka: The Great Citizen’s Wall Against BJP 
Urgency of Improving Dam Safety Re-Emphasized in Libya and Ukraine 
Climate Crisis Threatens Largest U.S. Cities 
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…]
