RSS-BJP rulers of India have suddenly developed immense love for the Indian national flag. According to press reports under “Har Ghar Tiranga” [Tricolour at every home] campaign Centre facilitated hoisting of the Tricolour at 24 crore homes across the country from August 13 to 15 as part of the celebration of the 75th year of India’s independence. Even PM Modi[Read More…]
The Muslim religious practice of Bakrid – being observed in July this year – is in commemoration of an event in past history that is shared by both Islam and Christianity. Members of both the communities assert their devotion to a preacher known as Abraham among Jews and Ibrahim among Muslims. Note the similarities in the phonetic pronunciations. According to [Read More…]
The OverSeas Friends of the Bharatiya Janata Party, or; OF-BJP, is fairly big in the United Kingdom, and more so in the United States of America. It surprisingly even has a huge number of followers in the United Arab Emirates. You can visit them at their official online information portal at http://ofbjp.bjp.org/ and read up all about their plans and[Read More…]
It was late July this year when some Sikh kids came out with their parents in Surrey, to register their protest against the unjust farm laws passed by the world’s so-called largest democracy without due consultations. Implemented by the ruling right wing Hindu nationalist BJP government in New Delhi, these laws threaten the livelihood of the peasantry, which has taken[Read More…]
The block pramukh elections in the three-tier panchayati raj (rural decentralization) system of Uttar Pradesh, India’s largest state, took place on July 10 Saturday. The block pramukh is elected at the second tier. Many members are elected at the block level directly by people and these in turn elect the block pramukh. Hence direct voting by people is not involved[Read More…]
For the past six years, we have been told that India has got a strong government with a strong leader. The measurements of the Prime Minister’s chest became the centre of a political strategy that emphasised, what some saw as, his political strength and to resolve issues with an iron-fist approach. The onslaught of the pandemic and its consistent mismanagement[Read More…]
The BJP has recently suffered serious reverses in state assembly elections in W.Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, and what may even more worrying for its leadership, even in critical segments of the rural decentralization or panchayati elections in its strongholds of Uttar Pradesh. This is further confirmation, if such confirmation was needed, that several recent decisions of the government have[Read More…]
Soon after the reverses the BJP suffered in State Assembly elections in W.Bengal, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, it has suffered humiliation in some of its strongest households in Ayodhya, Varanasi and Mathura in a phase of the rural decentralization( panchayati) elections in the electoral heartland of Uttar Pradesh. Ayodhya has been the biggest centre of narrow religion-centered political mobilization of[Read More…]
During his speech in the Indian Parliament’s Lok Sabha, or Lower House, on Feb 9, Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi spoke about ‘Foreign Destructive Ideology’ plaguing the country, and the need to protect ourselves from it. This seems to be in reference to the expression of support for the farmers protesting around Delhi for the last two and a half[Read More…]
The Sangh was founded in 1925 with the declared aim of opposing the ‘yavan-snakes’ (i.e the Muslims) who ‘were spreading riots in the country.’ It declared with equal determination that it was not concerned with the independence movement. The Sangh kept its word and opposed the freedom struggle with determination. When independence appeared a possibility, Golwarkar dreamt of India as[Read More…]
Along with broader movement against the authoritarian project of RSS and BJP, emphasis must be laid on politicisation of society and balance of social forces must be changed Recently, senior journalist Santosh Bhartiya interviewed me on the contradictions of left movement. Responding to his question, I said that for me left movement in India is a democratic movement which stands[Read More…]
It would be interesting to recall in the context of the current India China relations that Liu Shaoqi’s book How to be a Good Communist was translated into Gujarati in the 1940s by Chandrakant Parikh, a full time CPI worker, in Mumbai. How much history has changed. Gujarat has come to this sad pass politically today. But it had a[Read More…]
When BJP national president Amit Shah descended on northern Kerala recently as part of his ‘save Kerala mission’, he brought along with him a gaggle of journalists to gauge the menace of “Red-Jihadi terror” in the state. The embedded journalists looked around with rubbernecking curiosity for mass graves of RSS men killed by CPM cadres. They, however, could not[Read More…]
My take on the situation in our country today is that the BJP must decide what it is – bird or beast. It must decide what its core ideology is. I am happy to do a Core Ideology Workshop for them and the RSS if they want. The problem is that they seem to be confused in this respect and[Read More…]
As was expected PM Narendra Modi shifted HRD minister Smriti Zubin Irani to less consequential position, the textile ministry, in the recent reshuffle of the council of minister. To have a particular minister in a particular position is the well established convention and the prerogative of PM in a parliamentary democratic system, on this ground the shifting is natural but[Read More…]
Paradigm for peace applied to Russia, Ukraine, and the US – Finale Part 4 
Protests in Italy against stripping of rights to Abortion 
Meloni’s “Neo-Fascist” Image & Political Hold! 
In memory of the ‘Young Guard’ on 80th Anniversary 
Waging peace/Making war: Curious case of another extension to AFSPA 
Global Democracy and Peace 
12th Congress of CPI (ML) Red Star Calls for All Out Offensive Against RSS Fascism 
Neo-Realist Films on the Lingering Impact of War Devastation 
UAPA: Criminalising Dissent and State Terror – Study of UAPA Abuse in India, 2009 – 2022 
Sea Level Acceleration 
Sabotage of Nord Stream Pipe Lines: A new phase of hybrid war 
Ukraine’s European Lives Matter! Iraqi Vietnamese Asian MidEast African Latin Lives Didn’t! An Element of Racism? 
As US Foreign Policy Turns More Aggressive, Much Stronger Peace Movement Needed in West 
High Inflation: Germany And Eurozone Face Difficulty 
Tech Billionaires Are Actually Dumber Than You Think 
To Youth of the World – Activists, Global Citizens, Earth Keepers, Red Road Walkers 
Pan-Turkism’s Aggressive Dreams of Empire –Yesterday and Today 
We Need a New Society, Not More Psychiatric Diagnoses 
Shaheed Bhagat Singh was without doubt our greatest anti-colonial Revolutionary who is relevant even today 
Accepting Failures in Life 
Who Sabotaged Nord Stream Gas Pipelines? 
Can The Ukraine Conflict Become Much Wider? 
Hasty launch of 5G mobile services without a matching preparation to indigenise mobile devices has strategic implications 
The World Is Sliding Into Recession, Warns WTO Chief Paradigm for peace applied to Russia, Ukraine, and the US – Finale Part 3 
The only option for Iran is to end the Hijab mandate 
Hindutva in East Leicester and its implications for UK 
Corporate entities’ excessive dependence on PSU banks- Financial stability implications 
Under-cover hobnobbing of 5 Muslim intellectuals with RSS chief is both anti-national & anti-Muslim 
RSS leader’s outreach to Muslims: Reconciliation or cooption? 
Opportunistic Interests: The US-Pacific Island Declaration 
PBS Spurious Narrative of America and the Holocaust 
Naujwan Bharat Sabha and Stree Mukti League commemorate 115th birthday of Shaheed Bhagat Singh in Mumbai 
“End War in Ukraine” Say 66 Nations at UN General Assembly Paradigm for peace applied to Russia, Ukraine, and the US – Finale Part 2 
Maharashtra’s progressive tradition 
RSS: Breadth and Depth – A review of Devanur Mahadeva’s book 
PUCL condemns the Mass Raids, the Arrests of PFI leadership and cadre and the Ban on the PFI 
Unprecedented Melt Of Swiss Glaciers, Finds Study 
BKU (Ugrahan) stage conference in Barnala commemorating 115th birth anniversary of Shaheed Bhagat Singh 
Havoc and misery caused by recent floods in Bengaluru, Pakistan and Assam are not only natural disasters but are man made and due to climate change. Over exploitation of urban land and water resources by greedy private real estate developers perhaps the chief cause of floods. Media relentlessly focused on flooded upscale villas, their swanky automobiles of super rich in[Read More…]
