By Krishna Jha

The entire origin and development of living world has led to the emergence of complicated natural environment of which human beings are part and parcel. Environment and society are inter-related and inter-dependent. Society has come to rely on the natural environment for its existence. Any destruction of environment is sure to pose a threat to the society.

The case of Aravalli is one example of it. It has deep connections with those living around it, and faces a major threat from human kind, though the role it has played in shaping their lives is simply great. The Range has provided for meeting all their basic needs. The stability in their lives, with livelihood, space to live, and also clothes are all the gifts of the same. It is simply immeasurable. So far as the controversies that are raised around it, Supreme Court has sought a review of the existing one. For those who have realized the immense value of the range in their lives, it is beyond physical dimension. There has been hardly any reply, as even the definition provided by the Supreme Court, has been branded as too narrow in scope.

Amidst all these controversies, the question is raised about what Aravallis are. The apex court has sought a new evaluation and a yardstick for defining the Range. It may be added here that the Range stretches over 600 km across four states and, it is 2 billion years old. The Range represents India’s oldest fold mountains.

The Supreme Court’s recent decision to stay its past judgment accepting the controversial 100 metre-elevation definition for Aravali hills has brought the controversy to the fore again. On May 15, the Supreme Court said not an inch of Aravali would be allowed to be used for mining till an expert committee, to be constituted by the apex court, redefined what constitutes Aravali hills and ranges. As lawyers appearing for mining lease holders and those aspiring to get mining leases said the process for renewal and grant of leases could proceed without their finalisation, a bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi said, “We will not pass any order to allow resumption of mining activities in Aravallis.”…“We will not allow an inch of Aravali to be used for any purpose unless we are satisfied with the new definition that will be proposed by the expert committee to be constituted by us, taking into account the names suggested by amicus curiae K Parameshwar, Union government and parties,” CJI said.

People living in Aravallis do not agree with the definition given by the Apex Court in the past. It commands a larger influence area. The controversial definition provided by the Apex Court had previously been stayed in December last year.

Rajasthan, which accounts for a significant part of the Aravallis, is populated with those who feel one with the Range itself, synonymous with the Aravallis. Aravallis are not so much in heights as in depth, that is, in the lives of people for whom the entire area is home. There have been attempts to define the Range, but all such documents have been shelved. In one of the shelved definitions, involving a 100m elevation, cutoff and proximity of 500m between hills for demarcating the ranges, has made people scared as it can be defined as significant portion of the Aravallis that would be stripped of environmental protections. For those living in its folds, the stakes are high and to be implemented without losing time.

If the map shrinks, so do forests, grazing commons, water systems, and also the sacred groves. These sacred groves are forest patches protected by local communities due to deep religious, cultural or spiritual significance. These sacred groves are also hot spots for biodiversity, serve as sanctuaries for rare flora and fauna and often dedicated in the name of deities worshipped by locals.

In fact in our country there are an estimated number of 100,000 to 150,000 such groves. These areas are preserves for rare endangered plants and animal species, holding rich biodiversity. Slowly they are threatened by emerging checks that stand between community life and mining, fragmentation and forced migration. For those living in the Range, shelter and sustenance come from these mountains. It is not a modern phenomenon, the mountains have been providing for people since centuries. They have a bond with Aravallis, almost their identity.

The mountains shaped the warfare also. In the past, the Aravallis enabled guerrilla tactics and underground movement based on local knowledge of forests, mountain passes and water sources. If the hills protect, they also sustain. The Aravallis are Rajasthan’s ecological spine. It regulates climate, arrests desertification, feed rivers like the Banas, Luni and Sabarmati, and helps forests survive in a largely arid landscape. It is also a cultural watershed, separating not just river systems flowing towards the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal, but also shaping traditions, languages and ways of life.

Among the communities that have made a home here like Bhil, Meena, Garasia, Saharia, Raika, Rewari, Mogia, Nath, and Gurjar, for them the mountains are not a resource, but a living presence. Temples, sacred groves, hilltop shrines, and forest deities dot the landscape and the mountains are treated as a sacred geography. Communities collect food, fuelwood, medicinal herbs, bamboo, tendu leaves and wild fruits from the forest. Rain-fed terraced farming supports hardy crops such as millets and pulses, while hill slopes provide grazing areas for cattle, sheep, goats and camels.

Forest produce are the lifeline for those living in the Aravallis, with their livestock and water. Traditional water systems are central to survival. ‘Johads ’, stepwells, nadis and baoris, are built and maintained collectively. The rainwater is harvested and groundwater is recharged. The water structures are their lifeline. They are protected not by law but by community ethics. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

In India today, the number of unemployed especially in the working age has gone up to more than forty crore out of the population of one billion. The demon of deprivation stares at every unit of families. With occasional employment, life is barely sustained. The ruling circle never gets tired of claiming that unemployment rate has been falling. Even the government’s Periodic Labour Force Survey data showed unemployment rate had fallen to 3.1 per cent during 2022-23. However, the real time private data of CMIE shows unemployment has been hovering around 7-8 per cent.

However, at the launch of the “India Employment Report 2024: Youth Employment, Education and Skills”, a joint publication of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and the Institute for Human Development (IHD), in New Delhi, it was pointed out that it was incorrect to expect that all the issues can be resolved by the state, especially something like unemployment.

Unemployment has gripped the labour power of entire working age people. Significantly, approach of the Modi government on employment generation was quite revealing. It clearly shows that resolving the unprecedented unemployment crisis was not a priority for Modi government. During the campaign for the Lok Sabha Election 2024, when the unemployment became a key issue among the electorate, a statement came from the Secretary of the Union Ministry of Labour and Employment that said that as many as 30 million jobs had been generated in 2022-2023 and more than 110 million jobs were added in the last five years. It meant that Modi government had already solved the unemployment crisis of the country, since only about 20 million people enter Indian Labour Market every year. It also implied that the Modi government did more than required by generating 30 million jobs in one year.

The statement had cited the provision figures from the Reserve Bank of India’s KLEMS database for 2022-23, that tracks employment generation and productivity levels in capital, labour, energy, material and services sectors. It should be noted that the official claim was not supported by even the yearly PLFS data of the Union Ministry of Labour and Employment. It may be relevant to mention here that Narendra Modi had promised 20 million jobs a year during his election campaigns in 2014, but never even tried to meet the promise.

During the election campaign, PM Narendra Modi said in one of the meetings in New Delhi that India’s “youth have opted to become job creators more than job seekers”. The sarcasm was not lost. It was like rubbing salt on live wounds. The lack of employment is a debilitating fact in the life of not only those of working age but all ages. Even children start toiling since they are four or five and reach the mature age of eighty or even above. What Dr Kaushik Basu has said recently has to be noted here now. Pointing out that India’s youth unemployment rate is among the highest in the world at 45.4 per cent, he urged the government to take corrective measures to deal with this grave issue.

By 2017-18, India’s unemployment had risen to a level that was highest in last 45 years. Now India Employment Report 2024 has portrayed a grave picture on the job front especially for Indian Youth. With this publication the country knows that millions of youths could never find jobs at all, many of them have become overage during the last 10 years of Modi rule, and even 90 per cent of those who somehow managed to find a job are informally employed, with 82 per cent in the informal sector. Self-employment remained the primary source of employment for 55.8 per cent in 2022, while casual employment was at 22.7 per cent and regular employment at 21.5 per cent.

Unemployment crisis has remained frightening both in the urban and rural areas of the country, a proof of a jobless growth model Modi government has been pursuing since 2014. Election results denying Modi a majority in the Lok Sabha should serve a lesson to him, and also NDA allies in the government. Unemployment is likely to remain a key problem for the government.

In this context, it is revealing to see what the Annual Survey of Unincorporated Enterprises (ASUSE) has discovered. It was found that the number of employed workers in the informal sector in 2023 dropped by 16.45 lakh or about 1.5 percent to 10.96 crore compared to 11.13 crore in 2015-16.What is more, the data available for the first time since 2015-16, provides an understanding of the impact of the three major exogenous shocks, that was demonetisation in November 2016, roll out of goods and services tax in July 2017, and the Covid-19 Pandemic in March 2020, on the growth of unincorporated enterprises and employment in these enterprises.

Much of the brunt of the three shocks of demonetisation, which were sudden withdrawal of cash from the system, GST that involved regulatory compliances and inclusion in the tax net, and Covid-19 that prompted the government to impose a national lockdown, all these catastrophes were born by the informal sector.

Among the top ten states that account for nearly three quarters of the informal sector labour employed in India, five states, Maharashtra, Bihar, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha recorded only marginal increase in the informal employment in the period between 2015-16 and 2022-23. The data for these non-agrarian sector enterprises present an indicator of jobs since the informal sector is closely watched for its capacity for job generation. And absorption of Labour force. (IPA Service)

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By Arun Srivastava

Narendra Modi’s lurid boast on the floor of Parliament that he would be the prime minister for the third time and his party would alone win 370 seats deserves attention. The question is why is he so confident? Are RSS and BJP leaders busy hacking the Lok Sabha elections? Does democracy mean nothing anymore?

Gradually, the Indian masses are turning averse to Modi, losing trust in his leadership, and the prime minister’s image has been taking a beating in recent times. Moreover, the saffron ecosystem is failing to exploit Hindutva slogans of ‘Jai Shri Ram’ and ‘Jai Bajrang Bali’ to lure people in as was seen in recent assembly elections. In addition, Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra, which is incidentally attracting massive support from the people throughout the journey, has been exposing the ominous designs and patently discriminatory policies of the Modi administration. Hence, to claim that Modi would definitively win the Lok Sabha election this year is a bit of a gamble. Odds are against him. Election strategists and psephologists are not convinced of his victory. In this backdrop, the PM’s bombastic boast does give rise to skepticism over his intentions.

Modi claimed: “My third term is not very far away. It is just 100-125 days away and this time the entire country is saying 400-plus. I don’t usually get into numbers, but given the mood of the country, the NDA will surely cross 400 seats and the BJP will definitely get 370 seats.” His emphatic assertion nonetheless raises fears of massive manipulation, as was witnessed in the alleged 2Gscam case or the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. Or, is he resorting to this strategy to fool and dishearten the opposition rank and file and confuse people?

While Modi was boasting of his future win in the Lok Sabha election in parliament, in the assembly of Jharkhand, the former chief minister of the state, Hemant Soren openly accused the Modi government of framing him in a false case. Soren was arrested by the ED only four days back from the Raj Bhawan, while he had gone to meet the Governor, C.P. Radhakrishnan, participating in the confidence seeking motion in the assembly. Soren exposed how Modi plans to secure electoral majority for his government.

Soren laid bare Modi’s nefarious plot to denigrate adivasis for electoral gains. Soren implied that Modi was planning to put the non-adivasis, precisely the Hindu settlers, against adivasis, adding that the Modi-led centre despised Adivasis and Dalits. “The system they created doesn’t hesitate to say that they (Adivasis) come from the jungle and should remain there,” Soren said in the assembly. This was probably for the first time that the issue of non-adivasis exploiting and despising adivasis has featured in public domain. And this was being engineered by none else but Modi.

Soren said: “Where does so much malice come from? This is beyond my understanding…. We came out of the forest and sat next to them. They want us to remain in the jungle as their clothes started getting stained when we sat next to them.” He added, “If our opponents have their way, we will have to go back to the forest and live the life lived by our ancestors.”

Soren continued: “A black night and a black chapter were added to the democracy of the country on the night of January 31. I think this is the first time in the country’s history that a chief minister was arrested inside the Raj Bhavan. I don’t remember if this has happened before. I feel the Raj Bhavan was also involved in this episode.” He pointed to a nasty conspiracy: “They had been planning this January 31 episode for a long time, since 2022. They were cooking this on a low flame. This dish was not ready… but they served the half-cooked dish and arrested me.”

He emphasised: “They think that by putting me behind bars, they will succeed in their plans. But this is Jharkhand. This is a state where, in every corner, an Adivasi, Dalit and backward class (person) gave up their lives to save those of other Adivasis and Dalits.” He added: “I have not accepted defeat and will give a fitting reply to such feudal forces at the right time.”

Soren threw a challenge to Modi: “Today, I have been arrested on the charge of usurping an 8.5-acre plot. If they (the BJP) have the courage, let them furnish documents showing the land registered in my name. If it’s proved, I shall quit politics and leave Jharkhand. Agar hai himmat to dikhaaye (If you have courage then show it, prove it. We have not yet accepted defeat. If they think they can succeed by putting me behind bars, this is Jharkhand where many people have laid down their lives.”

He went on to claim that the ‘conspiracy’ to arrest him was hatched because he comes from a tribal community. “Why so much hate against me? No CM or any other leader of such stature has ever been arrested inside the Raj Bhavan. This happened because I come from the Tribal community. I won’t shed my tears, for you the tears of Adivasis don’t matter.”

Articulating the tribal anger against the BJP, RSS and the central investigative agencies, Soren alleged: “These people (BJP) have been torturing tribals, Dalits and minorities for many years and my arrest on January 31 is also part of such oppression. These people want the tribal community to live in forests like they used to live 50 to 100 years ago. These people (BJP) may put me behind bars, but my party JMM is not going to accept defeat. They do not know that this is Jharkhand and countless tribals here have always fought against exploitation and atrocities. These are the people who are conspiring against us and have not worn the Gandhi cap till date.”

“I will not shed tears, because tears have no value for you. When the time comes, I will give a befitting reply to each of their questions and conspiracies. They never want anyone from the tribal community to complete his five-year term as Chief Minister of Jharkhand. Forget me, even in their own party these people did not allow any tribal Chief Minister to complete his five-year term,” he said.

Soren has thoroughly exposed the façade of RSS and Modi’s so-called sympathy for the tribals. Modi must not have dreamt that his boast would receive such a severe shock within minutes of his assertion. Since Soren has emerged as the tribal face across the country, this humiliation meted out to him is being perceived as revenge by Modi. Soren said on the floor of the assembly: “The BJP doesn’t want a tribal chief minister to complete five years in Jharkhand, they did not allow this in its regimes.”

He went on to accuse the BJP of mistreating all Adivasi and Dalit communities, of denying them of their dignity. “They are not ashamed to say things like, ‘These people came from the jungle and should stay in the jungle.’ We have come out of the jungle and reached their level, but they look at us as untouchables. I was working to break these perceptions. My government was working to uplift the very communities they are looking down upon. I have not given up. They think that by putting me in jail, they will win. But this is Jharkhand. This is state where from every corner, our Adivasi, Dalit, backward community fighters have laid down their lives for their communities,” Soren said.

Soren added: “We were told on January 22 that ‘Ram Rajya’ has come. The first step of that was in Bihar. The second step was in Jharkhand, when an Adivasi chief minister was arrested. …I have no regrets whatsoever. Maybe now they will say I cannot fight elections. But Jharkhand Mukti Morcha has always fought for the state’s dignity, rights, and more, and it will continue to do that, whether the fight is electoral, legal or on any other standard. We have never stepped back, and we won’t step back now.”

Soren’s aggressive posture makes it amply clear that Modi lives in his make-believe world, far from the simmering discontent in the ground. His insinuation against Congress and opposition parties would not bestow upon him with the rose petals of a smooth victory. He also must not nurse the view that opposition and Congress have been politically finished. Had the Congress been indeed written off, then what is the rationale of Modi consistently harping and naming Congress? His portraying Rahul Gandhi as a “Pappu” and incessant misguided attempts to belittle Congress have only lowered his image in the eyes of the people, who have come to nurse the feeling that Modi has one point agenda, abuse Congress, and is not concerned of the welfare and development of the poor. (IPA Service)

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By Kalyani Shankar

The convincing victory of the JMM-Congress coalition in Jharkhand assembly on February 5 amidst allegations about BJP’s poaching reports, is a big boost to the INDIA bloc in the present political atmosphere in the country. Chief Minister Champai Soren has now the tough task to run a government for the welfare of the people, especially tribals while doing away with corruption in administration.

Jharkhand has been going through political unrest since its establishment in 2000. Therefore, it is no surprise that it is faced another crisis and political turmoil in the past few days.

The State had a tumultuous political history. It has witnessed eleven chief ministers in the last two decades, with the twelfth appointment being Champai Soren; on Friday, Hemant Soren, the previous chief minister, was interrogated for seven hours at his official residence and was subsequently forced to resign, resulting in a crisis.

Corruption and defection have led to instability in the State. In the past, several former Chief Ministers resigned due to corruption. It was not surprising when Hemant Soren was arrested, as he knew it was coming sooner or later.

Unfortunately, the crisis occurred at a crucial time, raising several issues. These include the uncertainty surrounding the newly formed Opposition Forum I.N.D.I.A. It could hurt adversely the outcome of the 2024 elections, which are scheduled for April-May. Additionally, why small states are experiencing political instability should also be investigated.

Jharkhand has had political instability and Maoist violence since it was formed. In contrast, Chattisgarh, created simultaneously, has been relatively politically stable. Jharkhand is blessed with plenty of natural resources. Still, its people have been struggling with poverty and underdevelopment due to frequent changes in government. This has caused problems for the State’s development over time.

Jharkhand has had 11 Chief Ministers since 2000, with most having brief tenures. Only Raghubir Das, a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party (B.J.P.), completed a full five-year term from 2014 to 2019.

After Hemant Soren resigned, Governor C.P. Radhakrishnan delayed Champai Soren’s swearing-in ceremony, causing tensions in Jharkhand. The State was left without a Chief Minister for more than 48 hours. However, Champai Soren, a committed Jharkhand Mukti Morcha party member and the former State Transport Minister, was finally sworn in as the new Chief Minister on Friday. Champai Soren is one of the founding members of the party, along with Hemant Soren’s father, Shibu Soren. Hemant chose Champai Soren as his successor not only for his loyalty but also for his competence and dedication to the party.

Just forming smaller states is no guarantee for better lives, as evidenced by Uttarakhand, Chhattisgarh, and Jharkhand, all created in 2000.

The Jharkhand Assembly has 81 members. A government can form with 41 members. The JMM-Congress-RJD alliance has 47 members, B.J.P. has 25, and A.J.S.U. has three members. The remaining seats are shared by the NCP, a Left party, and three independent members.

The JMM-led alliance was concerned about the Bharatiya Janata Party destabilizing their government by luring their members away. As a precaution, the M.L.A.s were taken to a safe place until the new chief minister took the oath. Defection problems have plagued the political system; resort politics is another issue that needs attention.

The opposition coalition I.N.D.I.A has faced a setback after instability in Jharkhand. The cracks in the alliance have become more evident due to a lack of unity within the I.N.D.I.A. group. Nitish Kumar’s departure from the party, followed by Mamata Banerjee’s announcement that her T.M.C. party will contest in all seats in West Bengal, and A.A.P.’s decision to run independently in Punjab, has posed a severe threat to the unity of the group. The strained relationship between the Congress and Akhilesh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh has further worsened the situation.

The Opposition accuses the Modi government of investigating several leaders from the Opposition. These include Delhi’s CM Arvind Kejriwal, Kerala’s Pinarayi Vijayan, NCP’s Sharad Pawar, Hemant Soren, D.M.K.’s Stalin and the Congress.

Former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee established three smaller states by dividing larger ones: Chhattisgarh from Madhya Pradesh, Jharkhand from Bihar, and Uttarakhand from Uttar Pradesh. The main goal was to promote development in these regions. However, two decades later, these states are still experiencing instability and a lack of development. The mere creation of a smaller state is no guarantee for better lives.

The time has come to assess whether smaller states have achieved their intended purpose. There may be better options for the people. Smaller assemblies can cause instability as M.L.A.s switch sides. In smaller states, elections often prioritize local issues, dividing representation among smaller parties and regional leaders who act independently. It can have unintended consequences that negatively affect people’s lives.

The stability of smaller states depends on various factors. In Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand, direct contests occur between B.J.P. and Congress. But, in Jharkhand, the multi-party system with national parties relying on regional parties can lead to instability and defections.

In elections, when no political party wins a clear majority, it can cause political instability in small and large states. To prevent lawmakers from switching parties, the Anti-Defection Law was created. However, this law often fails as some legislators are tempted by money and muscle power.

Comprehensive electoral reforms should be implemented, and state funding must be provided for elections. Political parties must find practical solutions to ensure the system’s fairness and transparency. (IPA Service)

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The Champai Soren government in Jharkhand — formed last week after a massive political crisis following the arrest of its Chief Minister — will take a floor test to prove its majority today. The majority mark in the 81-member assembly is 41.

The ruling alliance of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, Congress and Lalu Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal had sent off their MLAs to Congress-ruled Telangana to prevent any poaching by the BJP.

There have been allegations that some of the MLAs were approached by the BJP, in an attempt at what the Opposition calls Operation Lotus.

The ruling alliance has 47 MLAs in the 81-member house, where the majority mark is 41. Currently 43 MLAs are backing Champai Soren.

The BJP has 25 MLAs and the AJSU, or All Jharkhand Students Union, has three. The NCP and a Left party have one each and there are three independent MLAs.

Arrested former Chief Minister Hemant Soren, who claimed he is the target of a huge conspiracy, has been allowed to participate in the trust vote. A special court in Ranchi has allowed it despite vehement objections by the Enforcement Directorate..

The ruling MLAs were shipped off to Hyderabad to protect the government ahead of the coming general election. “Our MLAs are united… We have the support of 48 to 50 legislators,” state minister Alamgir Alam told reporters on their return from Hyderabad this evening.

JMM lawmaker Mithilesh Thakur asserted that the party-led coalition will sail through the trust vote, reported news agency Press Trust of India. “Many BJP legislators are also in support of the alliance in the state,” he claimed.

Biranchi Narain, Chief Whip of the BJP in the state, said the coalition was set to lose the vote of confidence.

Champai Soren — along with ministers Alamgir Alam of the Congress and Satyanand Bhokta of the RJD — was administered the oath of office by Governor CP Radhakrishnan on February 2,over 24 hours after Hemant Soren stepped down from the top post.

Shortly after, he was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in an alleged money laundering case connected to a land scam. The former Chief Minister — who was questioned on Wednesday morning — was being evasive, the Central agency had said, and pointed to the seven summons he had evaded.

With inputs from NDTV

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The Enforcement Directorate (ED) seized the vehicle of Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren, who is “untraceable” allegedly due to the federal agency’s action in connection with a money laundering investigation in an alleged land fraud case.

According to top sources in the ED, the car is an asset from the proceeds of crime. Soren uses this BMW in the national capital. The vehicle was searched by ED officials at approximately 8 pm.

Sources said the last known location of Soren is the premises of a senior advocate. Private charter is still at Delhi airport and agencies believe that he is still in the national capital.

The scheduled raids and questioning by the Enforcement Directorate of Hemant Soren, the chief minister of Jharkhand, unfolded in a dramatic manner from the early hours of Monday with the CM now “untraceable”, News18 has learnt from sources.

Soren left his residence around 2.30 am along with one of his security personnel, while another senior police officer who is part of his protective detail took a flight back to Ranchi. Mobile phones of the chief minister and his security personnel were switched off, while his family members, the CM’s office, and his colleagues in the cabinet and party expressed “ignorance” about his whereabouts to the ED.

The central agency is now looking for the chief minister and his aide, while BJP leaders in Ranchi are mulling a habeas corpus petition before the High Court, said sources in the party. Even though the investigation by the ED in Jharkhand has now taken a sensational turn with the chief minister “missing”, this is not the only drama that happened during the investigation.

The ED summoned the CM seven times in connection with stone mining and land scam cases. Soren appeared earlier this month, while he was scheduled to appear before the agency again on January 31. However, his party workers have been protesting across the state since Sunday against the ED action.

The JMM issued a statement saying ED officers had reached Hemant Soren’s residence in Delhi in the early hours of January 29 with several armed personnel, “which did not seem as per the law”.

“What was the hurry that ED’s officers could not even wait for two days? Isn’t this an insult of a democratically-elected CM? Can the Centre do anything with chief ministers of states when they are in Delhi? ” the JMM asked in a statement, citing Soren’s earlier letter to the ED that he would appear before it on January 31.

But the Jharkhand unit of the BJP claimed that the chief minister has been “absconding” for the last 18 hours, fearing action of the ED, and urged Governor C P Radhakrishnan to take cognisance of the matter as the “credibility and reputation of Jharkhand are at stake”.

The ED had questioned Soren at his official residence in Ranchi on January 20 in the case and had issued a fresh summons to him asking him to confirm his availability for questioning on either January 29 or January 31, the official sources said, adding Soren had sent a communication to the agency but had not confirmed the date and time for questioning.

In an email to the federal agency on Sunday, the 48-year-old JMM executive president alleged that the ED actions were “motivated by political agenda” to disrupt the state government’s functioning and claimed that its insistence to record his statement again on or before January 31 reeked of malice.

With inputs from News18

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The Jharkhand unit of the BJP on Monday claimed that Chief Minister Hemant Soren has been absconding since the last 18 hours, fearing action of the Enforcement Directorate. Urging Governor CP Radhakrishnan to take cognisance of the matter, Marandi said the credibility and reputation of Jharkhand are at stake.

According to media sources, late at night Hemant ji, wearing slippers and covering his face with a sheet, ran away from his Delhi residence on foot. Ajay Singh, the security personnel of special branch who went with him to Delhi, is also missing, Jharkhand BJP president Babulal Marandi said in a post on X.

The mobile phones of both of them have also been switched off. Since then, the ED and Delhi Police are searching for them. There cannot be any other example of such gross negligence regarding the security of the chief minister, the former CM said.

If there is truth in this news, then it is a situation of constitutional crisis for Jharkhand, Marandi said. The governor is requested to take cognisance of the matter…, he added. An Enforcement Directorate team on Monday visited the Delhi residence of Soren to question him in connection with a money laundering investigation in an alleged land fraud case.

The federal agency had questioned Soren at his official residence in Ranchi on January 20 in the case, and issued fresh summons to him asking him to confirm his availability for questioning on either January 29 or January 31.

Official sources claimed he was ”missing” and could not be contacted by the agency. The Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) leader, who had left for Delhi from Ranchi on January 27 night, has sent an email to the agency in which he has agreed to a fresh round of questioning by the ED investigators on January 31 at his Ranchi residence around 1 pm, they said.

Meanwhile, the JMM said the ED’s action against Soren is unconstitutional. The CM went to Delhi for some personal work and he will be back. But, the ED action is uncalled for and unconstitutional. It seems that the move is politically motivated, alleged JMM general secretary and spokesperson Supriyo Bhattacharya.

Soren has nothing to do with the case, he claimed. While the chief minister’s office was tightlipped on the development, Jharkhand Governor C P Radhakrishnan said he was keeping a watch on the situation in the state in the wake of the ED summons to Soren.

Jharkhand Congress president Rajesh Thakur alleged that confusion was being created surrounding Sorens’s location under a well-designed conspiracy. Attempts are being made to create a perception that President’s rule will be imposed in the state. People are spreading rumours that the CM is missing, Thakur said.

The Congress is a part of the JMM-led ruling alliance in Jharkhand. Is the ED really not able to trace the CM? This is nothing but a conspiracy to disturb the state government so that it could be prevented from carrying out welfare work, he asserted.

With inputs from News18

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By Krishna Jha

“The people of India, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a sovereign Democratic republic and to secure to all its citizens Justice, social, economic and political, Liberty of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship, Equality of status and opportunity, and to Promote among them all, Fraternity assuring the this twenty sixth day of November, 1949, do hereby adopt, enact, and give ourselves this Constitution.”

With these solemn words the Constitution was adopted on November 26, 1949, and came into force on January 26, 1950. It provides for a parliamentary form of government which is federal in structure with certain unitary features.

This Constitution was the result of constant struggle among those engaged in the freedom movement and then those that represented colonial domination on the other. In course of the movement, the realization emerged and got concretised that the British colonial forces subjugated the Indian people and exploited them to wrench out the fruits of their labour to shape their own economy. Those engaged in the efforts to liberate the country also realized that due to hardships under which people were forced to live slowed the development of the country itself. As Karl Marx had written that with the steam and science, the British colonial rulers had brought industrialization in India followed by all swallowing famine. Those plundering the country also imposed heavy taxation, free and unequal trade. The entire process was based on ‘drain of wealth’ from India to Britain. As the character of the modern imperialism was getting exposed, especially since 1918, after the October revolution, the Marxist ideas also started spreading fast and helped to fight colonialism in a scientific way.

Almost in the same way, days are back, though on a higher plain. Today, our Constitution, which is the lifeline of our Democracy, and promises a republic for us with freedom, justice, fraternity, sovereignty, democracy, socialism and equality, stands wounded. We are under the rule of such forces that make every attempt to crush and curtail freedoms enshrined in the Constitution. The systematic and strident attack on the Constitution by the ruling right is visible in the undeserved sharp criticism of the democratic forces. Parliament stands nullified with expulsion of members. Our composite culture is getting fragmented. It is a reminder that in the era of colonial rule, communal ideology was used as an instrument to promote any initiation based on a politics of divide and rule.

In the first quarter of the new century, there is a blatant effort to distort the history of the country, surprisingly, without any historicity. The latest indicator is the call to rewrite the Constitution. Implicit in this call is the BJP government’s bid to make people remember only what V D Savarkar wrote in his monograph as early as in 1923, “…The whole of India is for Hindus by virtue of the fact that they alone, and not Muslims or Christians, considered its territory sacred.” He wrote further, “All Hindus claim to have in their veins the blood of the mighty race incorporated with and descended from the Vedic fathers, the Sindhus.” Summing it up, he wrote, “We [Hindus] are one because we are a nation, a race and own a common Sanskriti (culture).” He never mentions our most beautiful cultural heritage of unity in multiplicity.

The concept of separate Hindu nationality emerged for the first time in the monograph which tended to replace the anger against the injustices committed by the British colonialists with negativity against the Muslim community with the same intensity. In a way therefore it was offering a handle to British authorities to follow its divisive policy. It was the emphasis on the concept of Hindutva that added to its exclusivity and all others, especially Muslims, remained the ‘other’ against whom the negativity was to be directed. To Savarkar, the term Hindutva represented the politically conscious Hinduism that sought to organise Hindus as a nationality. India’s Muslims and Christians did not constitute a part of this vision of the nation. The book did not only define what he considered Hindu nationalism, it also echoed his call for actions against Muslims because he specified that “a conflict of life and death” began “after Mohammad of Gazni crossed the Indus”. The text therefore tended to place Hindus against Muslims.

There is another dimension of the issue. Constitution promotes the principles of secularism, fraternity, freedom of expression, equality, composite culture, socialist values and many other such concepts that are to be included in our nation building process, as these are in the ethos of our country’s life. These ingredients face direct attack in scheme of things that is planned out for revision of the Constitution that was adopted by our constituent assembly.

On our Republic Day, January 26, we observe and celebrate our democracy and pay homage to its makers as they guaranteed the social, economic and political rights of every Indian.

As a nation state, we have arrived at the edge where social justice and harmony are becoming casualty and the rights of the weaker sections are gradually seized. The labour time of the workers that was regularized at eight hours a day after struggle launched in almost every country of the world and ended in victory after great sacrifices one and half century back. Today all these gains are bulldozed and working hours are gone up to twelve hours. Labour laws, gained after much struggle, have been revised and confined into mere four codes. The farmers are denied minimum support price despite struggles launched umpteen times and every time hundreds have lost life. In the famous Kisan Dharna on Delhi borders, more than seven hundred were martyred. (IPA Service)

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By Dr. Gyan Pathak

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s controversial inauguration of Ram Temple in Ayodhya on January 22 will also mark the beginning of BJP’s campaign for Lok Sabah General Election 2024. Religious events, including fetching large number of Hindu devotees to Ayodhya Ramlala Darshan free of cost for the next two months, will be organized as a special feature of this year’s election campaign outside the purview of the Election Commission of India in which large number of RSS-BJP-VHP activists under the garb of Sadhus overtly and covertly will do the work of BJP and PM Narendra Modi who will be seeking for their third term. However, the ultimate political impact will be uncertain, because after showing initial panic, the opposition seems to be firmly opposed the design, as the four Shankaracharyas declared the consecration violation of shastras of Sanatan Dharma.

Opposition is bent upon to expose RSS-BJP clans political design and as political parties many of them will not be participation the consecration ceremony as the four Shankaracharyas and may apolitical Hindu saints along with the four Shankaracharyas. It is another matter that many of the political leaders of various opposition parties will be seen visiting Ayodhya, since religion is person matter, and no opposition party is imposing on their any individual leader or activist not to observe religious events on January 22.

Many opposition political parties have planned to organize their own religious events in their states or areas to mark the occasion only to frustrate the RSS-BJP’s design to label them as anti-Hindu. Such as, West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC leader Mamata Banerjee would be leading a religious event in Kali Mandir at Kolkata, and AAP leaders would be organizing Sunderkand paths in Delhi. Many interpret these events as panic reactions on anticipation of political damage that BJP’s Ram Temple politics may inflict them in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections.

Nevertheless, the country will soon be witnessing two sets of religious congregations throughout the country before and during general election campaigns. Vishwa Hindu Parishad has already trained hundreds of RSS-BJP activists to impersonate themselves as Hindu Sadhus and do the political work under the garb.

Many of the RSS-BJP activists have been deployed as Kathavachakas, who visit throughout the country emotionally and politically targeting their audience during their Ramkatha or Krishnakathayagyas. It has been seen in the past during Vishva Hindu Parishad’s campaigns, and many such events will be organized in the near future.

They have also deployed mobile vehicles with Hindu deities that go from one place to the other in the name of religious teaching to the common masses. However, what they do is to prepare them for a Hindu Rashtra.

During their every religious congregation they talk about Hindu Rashtra, and to support them who are working for this ultimate aim. All their efforts, even when they do anything in any other field such as education, are targeted towards achieving their end. Ekal Prayas is one of them, and in 2019 election, it was reported in the media, how their teachers helped BJP candidates in Assam.

Several wings of RSS, has trained thousands of volunteers directly in over one lakh villages of the country and indirectly influencing about 4 lakh villages, through their education, rural and agriculture training, and several other social programmes.

January 22 would be the occasion when through lakhs of religious events, RSS-BJP activists would be activating all their wings and associates and put them in the election work in favour of establishing Hindu Rashtra under PM Narendra Modi.

Given the huge RSS-BJP network across the country, not only the BJP but also several political analysts have already declared that it is a sure win for Narendra Modi in Lok Sabha election 2024.

The certainly with which they talk is just misplaced. There cannot be pan-India political impact of Ram Temple inauguration, since Ram is not the most popular deity across the country. Hindus have many popular deities, and there are many sects, who would not like to overshadow their own deity by Ram, even if Prime Minister inaugurates it.

Perhaps, even PM Modi knows it, that is why he recently organized Tamil Sangam in Varanasi, the abode of Shiva, just only to link shaivaites of southern India. He has been seen travelling to South Indian religious places dedicated to other deities. Ram Temple politics has almost no political impact on South India.

From West Bengal to north east, the popular deities are Kali, Durga, Kamakhya and other female deities, worshiped as supreme deities of Hindus. In old Darbhanga, that is Mithila, the ‘dvar banga’ Shiva is the chief deity, and they grudge that their daughter Sita, was not well treated by Rama in Ayodhya. There is no great political impact of Rama in that region.

Lord Krishna is popular in Odisha, and Navin Patnaik is seen busy in organizing events for Jagannath puri corridor even currently when Ram Temple consecration ceremony is being held at Ayodhya.

Ram could be politically impact in Jharkhand and certain part of Bihar, central Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Chhattisgarh. Krishna is popular deity in Mathura and surrounding. In the upper reaches of the Himalayas, Shiva and Shakti are chief deities. Haryana has two popular deities named shyam – the one Mathura-Vrindavan Wale and the other Khatu wale. Maharashtra has their own Ganpati Bappa.

It should therefore be noted that RSS-BJP clan has limited power to impose Ram on everyone else in the Hindu pantheon. Therefore, the real issue is not Ram Temple, but the RSS-BJP-VHP network that needs to be taken on seriously by the opposition political parties. They must not panic, and they must expose how RSS-BJP-VHP activists under the garb of Sadhus (bhagvadharis) are trying to cleverly drive electorates to vote for BJP. (IPA Service)

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Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Tuesday hit out at the Centre for denying the state an opportunity to take part in the tableau presentation during the Republic Day parade. The Chief Minister said the Centre denied Karnataka a tableau because there is a Congress government in the state.

According to him, the proposals for tableaux included showcasing the life of Mysuru ruler Nalvadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar, Kittur Rani Chennamma who fought against the British like Jhansi Rani Lakshmi Bai and Bengaluru founder Nadaprabhu Kempegowda. ”The central government has insulted the seven crore Kannadigas by denying the opportunity for the state’s tableau at the Republic Day parade to be held in New Delhi on January 26,” Siddaramaiah said on social media platform X.

The chief minister recalled that Karnataka faced a similar situation last year as well, when the state’s tableau was initially rejected but later permitted keeping Karnataka elections in mind. ”This time, the central government has again continued its trend of insulting Kannadigas,” he charged.

Several tableau proposals were sent from Karnataka, but unfortunately the central government has rejected all these proposals, Siddaramaiah rued. ”We had conceptualised the tableau of Nalvadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar to depict his immense contributions to democracy and development of our state. We had also sent proposals to depict the contributions of Kittur Rani Chennamma and Nadaprabhu Kempegowda too along with the proposals to showcase Karnataka’s rich heritage and Brand Bengaluru,” the chief minister explained.

”However, the central committee rejected our request, depriving us of the opportunity to introduce the nation to our state’s immense achievements and exemplary figures,” he alleged. The fact that the Congress government is in power in the state seems to be a factor of concern for the BJP-led central government, the chief minister said adding that, from devolution of tax to the injustice in drought relief, to the sale of banks, ports, and airports built by Kannadigas, the Centre is constantly attacking the people of the state with political malice.

”Now, by denying the state the opportunity in the tableau presentation, it has attacked our identity again,” Siddaramaiah alleged. ”It is unfortunate that the MPs of @BJP4Karnataka are not questioning this injustice. They have become puppets of Narendra Modi. To whom are they loyal? Kannadigas or Narendra Modi?” he asked on ’X’.

With inputs from News18

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By Rahil Nora Chopra

Since Chief Minister Nitish Kumar took over the reins of the party, the Mahagathbandhan alliance partners are wondering whether the decision was deliberately engineered to create a conducive atmosphere for Kumar to switch over, once again to the NDA, or put pressure on the INDIA bloc, or just to hog the limelight on the national stage. However, Nitish taking the command of JD(U) would ensure that he would have a major say in the operation of INDIA bloc, influencing and guiding the activities of the opposition camp. Lalan has not been a heavyweight politician. He does not command the respect, which Nitish enjoys. Political resolution adopted at the JDU national executive described Nitish as the architect of the INDIA bloc, highlighted his leadership abilities and went ahead to urge the “bigger parties in the alliance have more responsibility”. It even hailed Nitish as “the hope of the backwards, extremely backwards, deprived sections, minorities and crores of unemployed youths”. Upset on being ignored, Nitish appeared to have decided to hit the road on his own to assert his leadership of the Opposition bloc. KC Tyagi said that the national executive decided that Nitish and the party will undertake a countrywide campaign, starting mid-January (around the time that Rahul Gandhi begins his Bharat Nyay Yatra), to press for a caste-based census across the country.“In mid-January, Nitishji will start a countrywide campaign from Jharkhand to demand a caste-based census like Bihar to be undertaken nationally,” Tyagi said. At the meeting, the party also decided to contest some seats outside Bihar — in Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and some other yet-unspecified states. A resolution terming the Bihar caste-based survey as a “historic initiative” was also passed. Nitish getting direct control of his party affairs was seen a move aimed at keeping the JDU flock intact amid fears that both current ally RJD and friend-turned-foe BJP could be attempt poaching Nitish’s ranks.

CONGRESS FOR BSP’S ENTRY INTO INDIA BLOC, SP AGAINST FOR NOW

The debate within the INDIA bloc over the BSP simmers still, with the Congress reportedly keen on it, but the Samajwadi Party (SP) stalling the same. According to sources, both sides are in connection once again even though Mayawati who had announced that her party would go it alone in the upcoming LS polls. While the Congress carries the opinion that aligning with the BSP would help the two consolidate the Dalit vote behind them, as well as ensure that the Muslim vote is not fragmented multiple ways. Political analysts believe that ‘any possible ties between BSP and Congress is most probably expected to throw up new political permutations ahead of the parliamentary elections’. On the other hand, the SP wants 65 out of the total 80 seats for itself, leaving 10 for the Congress and 5 for the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD). A major number of seats from Uttar Pradesh would put the SP in a commanding position.

ALLIANCE BETWEEN AAP AND CONGRESS LOOKS PRECARIOUS IN PUNJAB, DELHI

The tussle between AAP and Congress has immensely increased over seat-sharing, as Congress demanded 8 seats in Punjab and 3 seats in Delhi. In this context, the Congress high command is learnt to have held a meeting with the Punjab CLP leaders, Partap Singh Bajwa and the Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee (PPCC), Amarinder Singh Raja Warring to have a discussion on the possibility of alliance with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls. On the contrary, the Punjab unit of the Congress has been opposing the proposal of an alliance with the AAP vehemently. Leader of Opposition Partap Singh Bajwa has maintained that the party rank and file was not ready to accept a tie-up with the AAP in the state, pointing out that the cadre fight the elections. Some of the party leaders are demanding at least eight of the total 13 seats that include the seats of six sitting MPs – Manish Tewari from Anandpur Sahib, GS Aujla from Amritsar, Dr Amar Singh from Fatehgarh Sahib, Mohammed Sadiq from Faridkot, JS Gill from Khadoor Sahib and Ravneet Singh Bittu from Ludhiana

RAHUL GANDHI’S BHARAT JODO NYAY YATRA TO COMMENCE ON JANUARY 14

Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra will commence on January 14 from Manipur, mostly via buses besides stretches of walking, and is subsequently scheduled to end in Mumbai on March 20. In total, it will crisscross through 15 states, 110 districts and 100 Lok Sabha seats, covering 6,713 km in 66 days. Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said that “the idea of Rahul Gandhi’s Yatra is justice. The aim is to ensure political, economic and social justice for people of India,” The Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra will begin from violence-hit Manipur’s capital Imphal at 12pm, will cover en route the states of Manipur, Nagaland, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and went West Bengal, before reaching central India. All Chief Ministers belonging to the opposition bloc will be present at Imphal to flag off the yatra. According to the route released by the party, the yatra would stay the longest period in Uttar Pradesh, covering a distance approximately 1,074 km in 11 days. It would pass through the politically-vital areas of Varanasi, Prayagraj, Amethi, Rae Bareli, and Lucknow According to the route map, the yatra in West Bengal will be for five days, covering 523 km and seven districts, and in Bihar for four days, covering 425 km and seven districts. In Madhya Pradesh, the yatra will cover 698 km and nine districts in seven days and two districts in Rajasthan for a single day. The yatra will cover five days each in Gujarat and Maharashtra, traversing 445 km and 479 km respectively. The Congress hopes that the yatra will lead in bringing people together and at the same time will promote justice and unity all over the country.

CONGRESS READY WITH SEAT-SHARING PLANS IN BIHAR, UTTAR PRADESH

The Congress is actively engaged in discussions for seat-sharing arrangements in both Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. In Uttar Pradesh, the Congress has geared up for a robust electoral strategy by pitching for 21 of 80 Lok Sabha seats. In Bihar, Congress is all set for an ambitious goal of contesting 10 to 12 seats, in a state with 40 Lok Sabha constituencies. The Congress aims to leverage its presence in constituencies with a significant minority voter base, which also happen to be favourable areas for the Samajwadi Party. Congress  keen on contesting the UP Lok Sabha seats are Raebareli, Amethi, Sultanpur, Lucknow, Moradabad, Bijnor, Pratapgarh, Kanpur, Aligarh, Farrukhabad, Jhansi, Barabanki, Gonda, Dhaurahra, Kheri, Saharanpur, Bahraich etc. However, UP Congress leaders expressed their apprehension about the party getting a decent share of seats out of its expected alliance with the Samajwadi Party (SP) in the state, anticipating hard bargaining with SP chief Akhilesh Yadav in the wake of the Congress’s recent debacle in three Hindi heartland states. Meanwhile According to sources, SP was not ready to leave more than 12 constituencies for the Congress in the state but Congress, on the other hand, wanted 2009 as the basis of seat sharing. In the 2009 LS polls, Congress had won 21 seats in the state on its own. However SP leaders asserted that the party would also have to leave some seats for the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD), Bhim Army leader Chandrashekhar and Apna Dal (Krishna Patel). (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Forensic investigations by Amnesty International’s Security Lab have come out with surprising revelations about continued and increasing use of Pegasus, a type of highly invasive spyware, developed by Israeli surveillance firm NSO Group. It has come amid an unprecedented crackdown by the Indian authorities on freedom of peaceful expression and assembly, which has had a chilling impact on civil society organizations, journalists, and activists.

“Journalists in India face the threat of unlawful surveillance simply for doing their jobs, alongside other tools of repression including imprisonment under draconian laws, smear campaigns, harassment, and intimidation,” said Donncha Ó Cearbhaill, Head of Amnesty International’s Security Lab. Amnesty International, in partnership with The Washington Post, has unearthed shocking new details about the continued use of NSO Group’s highly invasive spyware Pegasus to target prominent journalists in India, including one who had previously been a victim of an attack using the same spyware.

Siddharth Varadarajan, Founding Editor of The Wire, was one who was among the journalists recently targeted with Pegasus spyware on their iPhones. Then there is Anand Mangnale, the South Asia Editor at The Organised Crime and Corruption Report Project (OCCRP), was also named in the Amnesty International’s report that dealt with the latest identified cases occurring in October 2023.

The use of Pegasus comes amid an unprecedented crackdown by the Indian authorities on freedom of peaceful expression and assembly, which has had a chilling impact on civil society organizations, journalists, and activists.

There is complete silence and no explanations despite repeated revelations. There has also been a lack of accountability about the use of Pegasus spyware in the country which only intensifies the sense of impunity over these human rights violations.

It is again Pegasus spyware activity on devices of Indian journalists reported by Apple in a  notification globally to I-Phone users, a possible target for “state sponsored attackers”. In India, at least 20 journalists and opposition leaders have reportedly been cautioned about the threat.

It is the Amnesty International’s Security Lab that has undertaken a forensic analysis on the phones of individuals targeted all over the world. This lab has also identified an attacker-controlled email address used as part of the Pegasus attack on his device. The recovered samples are consistent with the NSO Group’s BLASTPASS exploit, publicly identified by Citizen Lab in September 2023.

In October, 2023, Apple issued a new round of threat notifications globally to iPhone users who may have been targeted by “state-sponsored attackers”. More than 20 journalists, and opposition politicians in India are reported to have received the notifications.

Amnesty International previously also documented how Siddharth Varadarajan had been targeted and infected with Pegasus spyware in 2018. His devices were later forensically analysed by a technical committee established by the Supreme Court of India in 2021 in the wake of the Pegasus Project revelations.

In 2022, the committee concluded its investigation, but the Supreme Court has not made the findings of the technical report public. The court noted, however, that the Indian authorities “did not cooperate” with the technical committee’s investigations.

The Modi government has never confirmed or denied using spyware, and it has refused to cooperate with a committee appointed by India’s Supreme Court to investigate whether it had. But two years ago, the Forbidden Stories journalism consortium, which included The Post and OCCRP, found that phones belonging to Indian journalists and political figures were infected with Pegasus, which grants attackers access to a device’s encrypted messages, camera and microphone.

In recent weeks, The Post, in collaboration with Amnesty, found fresh cases of infections among Indian journalists. Additional work by The Post and New York security firm iVerify found that opposition politicians had been targeted, adding to the evidence suggesting the Indian government’s use of powerful surveillance tools.

In addition, Amnesty showed The Post evidence it found in June that suggested a Pegasus customer was preparing to hack people in India. Amnesty asked that the evidence not be detailed to avoid teaching Pegasus users how to cover their tracks.

Siddharth Varadarajan was targeted again with Pegasus on October 16, 2023. The same attacker-controlled email address used in the Pegasus attack against Anand Mangnale was also identified on Siddharth Varadarajan’s phone, confirming that both journalists were targeted by the same Pegasus customer.

There are no indications that the Pegasus attack was successful in this case.

A day after Apple warned independent Indian journalists and opposition party politicians in October that government hackers may have tried to break into their iPhones, officials under Prime Minister Narendra Modi promptly took action — against Apple.

Reporters at The Washington Post reached out to NSO Group for their response to these latest findings.

The company said, “While NSO cannot comment on specific customers, we stress again that all of them are vetted law enforcement and intelligence agencies that license our technologies for the sole purpose of fighting terror and major crime. The company’s policies and contracts provide mechanisms to avoid targeting of journalists, lawyers and human rights defenders or political dissidents that are not involved in terror or serious crimes. The company has no visibility to the targets, nor to the collected intelligence.”

NSO Group states that it sells its products only to government intelligence and law enforcement agencies. Indian authorities have until today provided no clarity or transparency on whether they have procured or used the Pegasus spyware in India. (IPA Service)

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Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren on Tuesday dismissed speculations of his wife Kalpana Soren contesting from Gandey assembly constituency in the state and termed it as a ”complete imagination” of the BJP. There is not an iota of truth in the speculations, said Soren who is the executive president of the JMM. ”Possibility of my wife contesting in the near future is a complete imagination of the BJP… The speculation about handing over reins to her is a fabric woven by the BJP to build a false narrative,” the chief minister told PTI.

The speculations were triggered by the Enforcement Directorate’s recent summons to the chief minister coupled with the sudden resignation by the ruling JMM’s Gandey MLA Sarfaraz Ahmad on Monday. The opposition BJP has claimed that Ahmad was made to quit so that the chief minister’s wife Kalpana Soren could contest from the Gandey seat in case of any eventuality in connection with the ED summonses.

Soren has been in the eye of a political storm after the ED summonses in an alleged corruption case involving an office of profit case. Besides, the Election Commission had sent a letter to the then governor of Jharkhand Ramesh Bais in August 2022 which is believed to have recommended his disqualification as an MLA as a mining lease given to him was renewed during his tenure as the state’s chief minister. However, neither Bais nor his successor CP Radhakrishnan opened that letter.

According to a close aide of the chief minister, making the Gandey seat vacant is a masterstroke. Elaborating, he said that there are chances that the governor would open the letter during the ED’s questioning of Soren and give the mandatory permission to the agency to act against the chief minister. If Soren has to relinquish his membership in the assembly, he can continue as the CM for six months without being elected. After that period is over, the provision for holding a by-election will not exist as Assembly polls are due in November-December. So, effectively Soren will continue as the chief minister till the next assembly elections, he said.

In case Soren decides to contest the by-poll, he would do it from Gandey and not his present constituency Barhati as that would send a wrong signal to the people, he said. ”Without any armour, he (Soren) would have been trapped. The CM wants to give a message that you (central agencies) do whatever you want to do but I am ready,” Soren’s close associate said. Meanwhile, sources in the Chief Minister’s Office told .

With inputs from News18

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By Krishna Jha

The Communist Party of India will be a century old in another year. The party was formed on December 26, 1925. In 1920, the All India Trade Union Congress was formed with strikes and struggles of working masses, in the textile mills in Bombay, jute mills in Kolkata, and many other places. Emancipation from the shackles of an exploitative system became a goal. India was at the time, a colony of British imperialism.

Those early years the trends that could be identified among the Indian revolutionaries were classified in four groups. First were those active from abroad during the war and post war years – in the United States, Germany, Afghanistan and Turkey. A “provisional government of independent India” was formed in Kabul. Prominent among those active were Raja Mahendra Pratap, Virendranath Chattopadhyay, M Barakatullah, MPBT Acharya, M N Roy and Abani Mukherji, earlier functioning from Berlin.

The second group was those from the Pan-Islamic Khilafat movement, who went abroad during the war itself (1914-16). There were also those coming from the great Hijarat Movement in the War days and later were influenced by the October Revolution. Among them were Mohammad Ali Sepassy, Rahmat Ali Khan, Ferozuddin Mansoor, Abdul Majid, and Shaukat Usmani.

A third group of national revolutionaries as they were all categorised by Dr G Adhikari, were from the Ghadar party organised among the Sikhs and Punjabi emigrant labour in the US before the war. They had intended to stage a revolution in 1915, but the attempt failed.

The last group belonged to those who were in the left wing of the National Congress, Khilafat movement, the underground national revolutionary organisations and parties, the Akali movement especially from among the Babbar Akali left group linked with the Ghadar Party, active within the country itself. There were many from these groups disillusioned after the withdrawal of the non-cooperation movement in 1921-22, who came in the folds of those who believed in scientific socialism, and joined the class organisations of workers and peasants.

It was also a period when the great October revolution was accomplished and the new Soviet government had a deep impact on the freedom and revolutionary movements all over the world, including anti-colonial national liberation movements in Asia and elsewhere. The British colonialists were witnessing the rise of the Indian revolution as dangerous and desperate as that of 1857.

The very foundation of the Communist Party in the early twenties of twentieth century was the opening of the flood gates for the search for ever new programmes and ways for more effective methods and programmes of struggles for freedom. It also brought together all those who were from different trends and found a scientific way to move further towards freedom. It was a dialectical unity of proletarian internationalism as well as the patriotism that led to the foundation of CPI.

Both of these streams kept evolving along with the party itself. The anti-imperialist stream was as much the part of the CPI as was the struggle against exploitation, which led to organising the working class and the peasantry both.

Early communist groups were formed in various parts of the country. Among them were S A Dange in Bombay who brought out the Socialist, wrote a book called Gandhi Vs Lenin and both were seen and read by Com Lenin. Singaravelu in Madras was a popular trade union leader, and established the Peasants and Workers Party.

The events that helped form a context for the formation of the party could be identified among those taking place in 1922-25. The first ones were the conspiracy cases held at Peshawar in the 1922-24 period. These were followed by strengthening of ideas to form a legal and open party for open activities for the communists and organise the masses. It had impacted the British rulers strongly.

As a way out they planned the separation of leadership and the masses. The first step in this regard was the Kanpur Bolshevik conspiracy case in 1924. Soon the executive committee of the Communist International adopted a resolution on India in March-April, 1925.  Soon after was the Foundation Conference organised on December 26, 1925. The British rulers had realised that the evolution of ideas that led to October Revolution was now irresistible in India also and that “nascent communist activities were the real danger in the coming years”.

Lenin was concerned about forming the strategy for continuing struggle on the anti-colonial front. He had been keen about the necessity of broader support to that section of the bourgeoisie which was involved in the national movement in colonies and semi colonies. The issue was to remain alive even long after independence.

The characterisation of the national bourgeoisie and their role in the national mainstream was imperative for the formation of a united front. The debate was also raised about the varied class interests and making compromises on causes and interests while aligning with the commitment towards nationalism.

Later, in 1925, when the party conference took place in Kanpur, the basics of a brief programme were presented along with the party constitution. The brightest point of the conference was that the party could assemble all the comrades representing communist groups active since the early days from Kolkata, Bombay, Madras, Punjab and several other places.

The conference elected a central executive committee. With certain changes introduced, it worked as the guiding force from 1926- 29, when almost all leaders were arrested in 1929 in the Meerut conspiracy case. Just before the arrests, a new phase was ushered in when the party unleashed a two pronged attack, fighting against imperialism, and also organising the working class and the peasantry.

Large scale mass movements, strike struggles and peasant morchas helped people to become politically aware. It was an open politico- economic struggle, a struggle between the classes, openly initiating movements led by workers and peasants parties almost all over the country. Communists were working in Indian National Congress also, urging broad left wing support for the national revolutionary programme and also building an independent mass base among workers and peasants to work as class organisations and play the role of a mass force leading the country’s struggle for independence towards a national revolutionary direction.

It was this clarity about the direction that helped the leadership to decide on August 18, 1959, the Kanpur conference of 1925 as the foundation day of the party. But it did not mean that it was done at the cost of importance and significance of the Tashkent date.

Foundation conference also asserted that the Communist Party would strive to liberate the country from colonial rule and move towards socialist path. Journey continues keeping pace with the changes, but the goal remains the same. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Our democracy has lost each of its basics. From the recent crisis that proved to be an assault on not only federalism, but also its most relevant constitutional principles. The Supreme Court judgment on the abrogation of Article 370 of the Constitution and the dismantling of the state of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories was itself a case of a  constitutional court condoning the misuse of powers by the executive. Four years after the event, the three concurrent judgments of the five-judge Constitution bench, headed by the Chief Justice of India, have larger and long-lasting implications that strike at the roots of federalism and states’ rights.

The very fact that the Presidential order abrogated Article 370 when judiciary, deeply respected until now as the guardian of democracy, has been giving verdicts eroding the existing federal structure.  was under President’s rule, which means that the Supreme Court had given its clearance to this betrayal of the commitment made to the people of J&K at the time of accession to the Indian Union. By upholding the ruling that Article 370 was a temporary measure and there was no ‘internal sovereignty’ for the state of J&K, the court has taken a turn away from the question of why special status was accorded to J&K and how such a status was not temporary, but part of a solemn commitment made to the people of Kashmir by the constitutional authorities. Article 370 represented a constitutional guarantee that this status would be defined and evolved with the concurrence of the representatives of the people of J&K.

The judgment delivered by the CJI, on behalf of three members of the bench, makes the claim that Article 370 was intended to “enhance Constitutional integration between the Union and the State of Jammu and Kashmir” rather than as a provision for special status of J&K. It further claims that the continuous exercise of power under Article 370 (1) by the President indicates that the gradual process of constitutional integration was ongoing.

The history of Article 370 shows that it was constantly misused to deny autonomy and encroach on the states’ powers over the years by the president exercising this power. How was that done?  “Concurrence” was given under various spells of President’s rule by the centre’s own-appointed governor.

However, as per the peculiar logic of the verdict, “The declaration issued by the President under Article 370 (3) was a culmination of the process of integration and as such is a valid exercise of power”.

By this reasoning of the learned justices, J&K does not deserve even the special features or rights given to some of the north-eastern and other states in Article 371.  There can be no better legal justification for the decades of denial of democracy and autonomy to J&K.

The Constitution, that always provided a step sheet for the ‘dos and don’ts’  has been pushed aside as the judiciary, deeply respected until now as the guardian of democracy, has been giving verdicts eroding the existing federal structure. The secular, ethno-federal democratic principles have been thrown into hungry hands and are torn into pieces.

The Constitution stands amended. The decision was taken by the Judiciary. The decision of the Supreme Court upholding abrogation of the special status of Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 on August 5, 2019, stands intact. It is an act that does not have the honour of judicial acceptance, it also takes a position that goes against its own grain. It is not attempting to protect federalism, nor it stands for democratic values; all it does is promote a politically supportive pat on the back. The Supreme Court has released the government from the need of getting a hitherto imperative assent with two-third majority from both the houses. It is not the much needed assent to the act with two third majority, it destroys the very spirit of demos with kratos, as it becomes a rule of few on the majority destroying the first premise of democracy. The mechanism is not complicated. Only attempts are to be made to create a situation where law and order situation becomes vulnerable, and the pretext is ready to impose President’s Rule, under Art 356.

The step is also an indicator of the subversion of our unity in diversity, the historicity in which the composite culture. It had been a deadly attack on federalism coming from the court directly as it said that when the state is under President’s rule, it can opt to take any decision, either legislative or otherwise, leading to any act which can be of even irreversible consequences, on behalf of the state legislature.

The decisions have been taken. It is extremely unfortunate that the decisions had the court’s sanctions. How long do they think it will be before Modi begins to use the freedom their verdict has given him, to start overturning opposition governments in order to bend the whole of India to his and his Hindutva colleagues’ will?

To justify its decision, the bench has put forward two other supporting arguments. The first is that Article 370 was placed in part 21 of the Constitution titled “Temporary, Transitional and Special Provisions”. Thus it was never meant to be permanent. So all that the Modi government has done is to close the chapter on Kashmir.

The second is that over the decades since the accession, Kashmir’s laws have in any case been brought in line progressively with those of the rest of India. So as the government has argued, the autonomy shielded by Article 370 had been ‘gradually eroded’. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

November 3 this year marked the centenary of the great trade union leader in banking, H L Parwana. On this day we recall him and his contributions to the history of banking industry in our country. For the cause of banking he sacrificed his life, and toiled to emancipate the bank employees who were suffering from exploitations, denials, deprivations and humiliations. It was the drawing force for him that brought him to the trade union movement since he was inspired by the great history of the struggle of working class movement in our country. His vision and unusual leadership qualities will always inspire the bank employees and thousands among them are carrying out the heritage he has left behind.

To celebrate the occasion, Communist Party general secretary D Raja inaugurated the function at Parwana Bhawan in Nagpur on the occasion of marking the centenary of H L Parwana.

Parwana was born in a poor middle class family in Punjab. He was a bright student and always secured first rank in exams from early days. His school was ten kilometres away and everyday he used to walk up and down. He was highly inspired by the freedom struggle, and its leaders like Lala Lajpat Rai and Bhagat Singh. Jallianwalla Bagh massacre had a very deep impression on him. Despite his longing to study more, he had to leave and opt for a job. In Punjab National Bank, he got a job of daftary, though he had first rank in matriculation. Later he managed to graduate in Urdu. His brother was a trade Union worker and Parwana, encouraged by him, organized a union in the bank. That was the beginning which saw no end till he passed away.

He had realized early in his career while organizing the working class in the banking industry that the potential to develop in a country largely depends on the strength and expansion of the banking sector with people’s orientation. To create such a system, the steps towards nationalisation of banks became imperative. One of the major initiatives in the process of bank nationalisation was visualized as involving more people to ensure financial inclusion. It was formulated as our goal in our Constitution to build our nation as a democratic socialist republic, for which the prospect of progress depended on financial facilities made available by the banking institutions.

After independence, for progress and development, people oriented path was opted as seen in the first five year plan of 1951 in which the support of banking system was required.

After a series of efforts, fourteen banks were nationalized on July 19, 1969 by the government. These were the 14 largest private commercial banks of the country. The nationalization was completed through the Banking Companies (Acquisition and Transfer of Undertakings) Ordinance, 1969, and decided to hold more than 50 per cent stake. Soon after, in the second phase, on April 15, 1980, the then government nationalised six more private banks with a capital of Rs 200 crore.

It was hardly three decades ago, before the banks were nationalized that in the Second World War the entire financial sector of most of the countries was drowned in losses. As a result, it was the capitalist countries that initiated the process of nationalisation in their own countries. India was no exception. But the step was taken here to restrain the monopolization of economy also, which was not without deterrents. There were wars that came as economic and political upheavals. The years of 1962 and 1965 had witnessed the immense pressure on public finances.

It was also a fact that banks needed to spread out to the rural regions as well. It was only limited to great cities. The banks were all private till 1968, monopolised by industrialists, with the share of industry in the credit disbursed by private banks doubling between 1951 and 1968 from 34 per cent to 68 per cent, while agriculture was receiving less than two per cent of the total credit. People’s confidence was very low in banking, which was a major obstacle in the expansion of banking in India.

Nationalisation of banks changed the fate of rural areas. Banks started coming out of cities and opening in villages and towns. The nationalisation itself transformed the whole sector on a priority basis.

To make the country self-reliant in food security, steps were taken towards Green Revolution too and nationalisation was one factor that also strengthened the process. Gross domestic savings almost doubled as a percentage of the national income in the 1970s.

At the same time, there was an increase of nearly 800 per cent in deposits in India’s public sector bank branches, and a massive 11,000 per cent jump in advances (loans). The share of small-scale industrial units in total bank credit increased from 6 per cent in June 1968 to 12 per cent in June 1973. Steady increases were recorded in the share of rural areas in aggregate credit and deposits.

Yet, the process was not all that smooth. In its course, bank nationalisation also had its share of criticism from time to time, and it is said that the then government had taken this step for political gains. A battery of bank union leaders like H L Parwana with Naresh Pal, Prabhat Kar, Sudhin Biswas, Tarakeswar Chakravorty and many others , stood up to secure the nationalization process. Our 25 members in Parliament also formed a formidable force for protecting the people’s cause.

But today the scenario stands changed. As in March, 2023, the public sector banks have a total gross operating profit as 2,28,414crores.Net profit after provisions stands at 1,00, 814 crores. Thus the bulk of the profits, that is 56 per cent of it, goes for provisions of bank loans or writing them off. Thus the people’s money is looted by the corporate houses. Just as we fought for the nationalisation of banks, we have to stand for public sector banks now, and struggle to defeat the steps towards privatization. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

It was the largest mass involvement in the world that was engaged in Freedom struggle in our country, except the rightist forces. They had no share in it. Nor did they have any share in strengthening the secular democracy borne out of the freedom struggle or in the national reconstruction. And yet, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat in his speech on October 24, once again evaded all the vital questions that his organisation faces – Why did RSS always keep away from the national movement? What role did it play in the Partition of India and in the communal violence that ensued? And why did it play a divisive politics all through its existence?

Instead of answering these questions, Bhagwat uttered something that he and his organisation know the best – to follow western fascist ideas. In his speech he mentioned communists and progressives as “cultural Marxists” and held them responsible for creating “discrimination in society” and for making “attempt to break the constructive collectivity, create separation and conflict”. He further said: “Their modus operandi involves taking control of the media and academia and plunging education, culture, politics and social environment into confusion, chaos and corruption.”

In fact these comments do not deserve any attention, since truth speaks for itself. They have used an expression like ‘cultural Marxists’, something which is used by the far-right and neo-fascist circles in Europe and other countries. For them, ‘cultural Marxism’ is conspiracy to destroy western morality and civilisation and to impose an elite concept of political correctness. Here they have attributed this role to communists. They have used the term to attack all those who stand against the homogenization of our society, culture and history.

It may also be mentioned here that the most important organisations of Hindu nationalism not only adopted fascist ideas in a conscious and deliberate way, but this happened also because of the existence of direct contacts between the representatives of the main Hindu organisations and fascist Italy. Mussolini had himself said, “Fascism believes neither in the possibility nor in the utility of perpetual peace”. And it is peace for which we always strived.

Seventy five years back, we attained freedom. The fragrance of the memories still unfading, men and women moved as one towards a new horizon. It was the road to freedom. It was with a promise of victory. Victory it was, the victory of vision, perspective, human values. All they yearned for was a humane socio- economic structure, egalitarian society and democratic values. All this got expression when in the first general election itself, the rightists lost heavily, communists became the main opposition party, and first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru declared that it was not the victory of any party, it was the victory of secularism and humanity.

The election results had been declared in 1952. Before that in August, 1947, India was partitioned and also set free. After three hundred years of colonial rule, India became a free nation, but knifed into two. One based on religion, the other on democracy. The communal frenzy that followed, intensely brutalised our country. In all this, no less important was the role played by organisations that saw in the immediate aftermath of the partition an opportunity to derail the secular project of independent India. The conspirators associated with these Rightist organisations and the conspiracies they hatched had resulted already in major national tragedies. One such was gruesome murder of Mahatma Gandhi on January 30, 1948. Assassination was part of a conspiracy hatched by top Hindu Mahasabha leaders whose prime objective was to   destabilize all efforts to uphold secularism in India.

Hell was let lose. There were riots, killings, and people uprooted from homes, moving towards a world they never expected to see.  They had lost their sense of belonging. And yet they loved their people, with a keen sense of oneness. Communists were everywhere, helping those lakhs of migrants. It was awakening to this unity and faith in it, that made them vote for secularism and build the new Republic. But there were the rightists, who never had anything to do with either the freedom struggle or the new republic emerging with the new democratic system and its Constitution.

Secularism was not something unknown to us. We had been living together for centuries as one. Wedge came only when some of us started talking about majoritarianism. That was not our culture. All of us had fought together, shed our blood and sacrificed lives for the freedom that was our goal.  We had our Constitution that had in its preamble characterised our state as Sovereign, Socialist, Secular Republic, the very ingredients on which we built our nation. We believe in change, not stagnation. Our infrastructure was changing.

Industrialisation was in process. Five year plans were prepared to move ahead. All the time, those who believed in Marxism, planned, slogged and celebrated the achievements. The socio-economic progress, perusal of peace were the driving forces. Communists always stood by the people whenever there was injustice. Entire toiling masses have been represented by the communists in pre and post independence period. We had invented the word called bandh, a complete strike. It was us who fought for the freedom of Goa. The first martyr was a communist.

We had fought along with the people of Puducherry against French colonialists and gained freedom. We had launched the struggle for Samyukta Maharashtra, and succeeded. We had our government in Kerala, the first in the country and second in the world. It was us who had organised first All India rally in Delhi joined by all the states and their people for the first time. In fact the very expressions evolved in the process like anti-colonialism, anti fascism, national independence and peace came as the leading concepts of the national liberation struggle. But the rightists always kept away from these. History is witness to it.  (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

As the summer with its heat is receding and winter, with its horror of ice cold nights shivers even in these warm days, India’s majority population, jobless, hungry, goes to bed to spend a night of miseries. It is October again, and on its second day was born the father of our nation, Mahatma Gandhi. Bapu, as he was called, is a presence that has always been there. For more than a century, it was always like in any crisis, we were confident of his protective aura. We earned our independence, we built our political system that was democratic, secular and socialist, we had our education system, health care, nationalization to slowly get rid of private ownership, and finally our composite culture that got evolved, and nurtured by the Constitution. And yet, there was the right, growing stronger all the time.

But when the BJP formed the government in 2014, a fault line started emerging. We had been the world’s largest democracy and once again there are serious attempts to put a wedge in our composite culture. We are a collective and also have individual identity, both alive and closely woven in the multiplicity that has been part of our culture since centuries. But today it is threatened, confronting a political project that seeks to promote Hindu authoritarianism along the lines of Nazi anti-Semitism. The project is premised on the same old idea that India is a Hindu state and minorities must subscribe to Hindu primacy – a position that threatens the very foundation of its democracy in which all citizens of every faith and all Hindus of every caste have equal standing.

As in the past, Hindu supremacists today belong to RSS and its large family of affiliates as well as organizations, that have mushroomed in the last couple of years under the rightist ideological umbrella, are full of contempt for minority communities. They look to Narendra Modi, a long-time member of the RSS who now heads the government, as the deliverer of Hindu Rashtra.

There are all out efforts to organize discourse in which Muslims would be treated as second class citizens. Government has been pursuing Hindutva majoritarian attacks. The most evident of them has been the Citizenship Amendment Act that came as a blow on our basic planks of democracy. Secularism has been stretched over to extreme negativism. It has been replaced by bare and barbaric Citizenship Amendment Act. For the first time, while defining and granting citizenship, religion has been made a criteria. It is almost the basic factor to spell out who is Indian citizen. It was an attack on our vision of India, and also on our Bapu, everything that he stood for, and along with him, on us all. The attacks are aimed at wiping out whatever we held with our entire democratic ethos, actually the reflection of the power Gandhiji held over the masses.

The Citizenship Amendment Act fast-tracks Indian citizenships to non-Muslim immigrants from three neighbouring countries. The bill provides citizenship to religious minorities from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan. The government of Hindu nationalist forces led by BJP says this will give sanctuary to people fleeing religious persecution. Critics say the bill is part of BJP agenda to marginalise Muslims. It has been also called anti-Muslim law, which is open only to Hindu, Christian, Sikh, Buddhist, Parsi and Jain.

The act prompted widespread protests in the country especially in north eastern region which borders Bangladesh. The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) revises the 64 years of Indian citizenship law which prohibited illegal migrants from becoming Indian citizens. It defined illegal immigrants as foreigners who entered India without a valid passport or valid documents, or stayed beyond the permitted time. Illegal immigrants could be deported or jailed. The new Act also amends the provision which says a person must have worked for the federal government for at least 11 years, before one can apply for citizenship. Now there will be an exception for members of six religious minority communities if they can prove that they are from Pakistan, Afghanistan or Bangladesh. They will only have to live and work in India for six years to be eligible for citizenship or nationality of the country.

Efforts continue to make Muslims in the country the “other”. So are the attacks on them. The moment has come when the country feels the imperative need to rediscover Gandhi. Bapu could never be reined in because in his life time itself, he had comprehensively countered the project of Hindu Rashtra forcing its advocates, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Hindu Mahasabha, to the margins of Indian politics.

It was only Gandhi who could do it with his immense moral power and his all-out efforts as the supreme leader of the anti-British struggle that in a short span after Independence, the validity of the vision of a secular and democratic nation seemed beyond question. It rose above the turmoil of the time and became the unifying principle of the post-Independence India. It was this secular project of Independent India that was sought to be derailed by the assassination of Gandhi. Though the battle-lines are emerging again, Gandhi lives. So does our composite culture. (IPA Service)

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By Nantoo Banerjee

The growing power tussle between the Centre and opposition-ruled states over the management control of the University Grants Commission-funded universities in states threatens to ruin the sanctity of the country’s higher education system. Chief ministers of a number of opposition states and centrally-appointed governors there are at loggerheads with each other over appointment of university vice-chancellors (VCs). Both sides want political appointees of their choice. Recently, Tamil Nadu’s state assembly passed two bills seeking to transfer the governor’s power in appointing VCs of 13 state universities to the state government. Last year, West Bengal’s state legislative assembly passed a bill to make the chief minister the chancellor of all state-run universities, replacing the governor. The bill is yet to get the governor’s consent.  The states of Maharashtra, Karnataka, Jharkhand and Rajasthan have laws that underline the need for concurrence between the state and the governor on the appointment of university VCs.

Lately, the issue has come to a head between West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Governor C. V. Ananda Bose, a former bureaucrat turned Bharatiya Janata Party member in 2019, over the appointment of several senior professors as interim vice-chancellors of state-run universities. West Bengal Education Minister Bratya Basu urged the professors to turn down the governor’s appointments while the state is seeking legal opinion. The latest appointment of Professor Buddhadeb Sau, a BJP follower, as prestigious Jadavpur University’s interim vice-chancellor has taken the rift between the governor and the state government to a new high as Basu accused Ananda Bose of repeatedly flouting the UGC’s vice-chancellor appointment guidelines that require a minimum 10-year academic experience as a professor. Reportedly, Prof. Sau does not fully meet the criteria. Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has ordered that an exercise be immediately instituted to appoint permanent VCs in the universities in West Bengal.

The Jadavpur University has been running headless since June 1 after the term of Prof. Suranjan Das, an eminent historian, ended. The state’s higher education department is yet to form a search committee for his successor. Notably, the university is listed among the world’s top institutes. Jadavpur University ranked 701-750 by the QS World University Rankings in 2023, and 182 in Asia. In normal circumstances, few could blame Governor Ananda Bose for appointing an interim VC at the university provided that it was in consultation with the state government and the selected candidate met the UGC criteria.

Last year, in November, a Supreme Court judgement said that university VCs must have served 10 years as university professor and his or her name should be recommended by a search-cum-selection committee. The apex court said a VC’s appointment has to be made from the names recommended by the search-cum-selection committee. The bench of Justices M.R. Shah and M.M. Sundresh referred to Section 10(3) of the University Act, 2019 which provided that the committee should prepare a list of three persons for appointment as VC based on their qualification and eligibility. The judgment dealt with a challenge by Professor Narendra Singh Bhandari, whose appointment as VC of Soban Singh Jeena University was earlier set aside by the Uttarakhand High Court. The contention against Bhandari’s appointment was that he did not have the requisite 10-year teaching experience as professor of the varsity. He had only 8.5 years’ experience as professor until he was appointed as member of the Uttarakhand Public Service Commission in 2017. However, he made the case that while serving the Commission he was on long leave and his lien continued on the post of professor. He was appointed VC in 2020.

“Merely because his lien was continued on the post of a professor, it cannot be said that he continued to teach and/or he was having the teaching experience during the period of lien. Even considering Article 319 of the Constitution, while working as a member of the Public Service Commission, he could not have rendered any other work on any other post,” Justice Shah, who wrote the judgment, held. The court also rejected his argument that he was supervising Ph.D scholars while serving as a member of the Public Service Commission, and this ought to be considered as part of his teaching experience. “Supervising Ph.D scholars cannot be said to be having teaching experience as a professor in the university,” the court said, upholding the High Court verdict. In a somewhat similar case, the apex court had earlier set aside the appointment of Dr. Rajasree M.S. as the VC of the APJ Abdul Kalam Technological University, Thiruvananthapuram, in Kerala. The Supreme Court had underscored the importance of a VC’s selection from a panel of names recommended by a search committee of academically eminent persons.

Those who spent their working life in academia are concerned about the quality of functional heads of universities. In recent years, several vice-chancellors have been in the news though mostly for wrong reasons. Chandra Krishnamurthy, erstwhile VC of Pondicherry University, had to ingloriously quit in 2016. Her forced resignation was not purely a result of an agitation by students and faculty. Rather, the tipping point followed from the findings of a high-level probe, which found her guilty of academic fraud: involving claims about books she had not written and for listing a fictitious D. Lit degree in her CV.

Earlier, in Bengal, Abhijit Chakrabarti, vice-chancellor of Jadavpur University, was compelled to exit office. While his failure to meaningfully respond to a molestation case sparked a loud and energetic student agitation, he added fuel to the fire by getting students beaten up by the local police using his political clout. Last January, in an act of foresight or pre-emption, Rajasthan University vice-chancellor J. P. Singhal tendered his resignation a day before the High Court was to decide his fate over a petition filed by two Jaipur-based activists. The petitioners were questioning the academic worth of the VC, who had barely completed seven months in office.

Political intrusion in universities is nothing new in India. It began in the 1960s when Left parties and their student unions started   vigorous campaigns to control educational institutions at all levels — from schools to universities. At that time, the fight was mostly between the Left and traditional Congress party affiliated student bodies. The situation changed in the 1990s after BJP started testing political power in states as well as at the Centre. The right-wing Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP), affiliated to Hindu nationalist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), came in the fore to control academic institutions through its followers among the students, teachers and employees. In fact, almost all state and central educational institutions are now under the influence of ruling political parties. Political parties and leaders are becoming uncomfortable with, if not insecure about, critical evaluation and independent voices that could come from universities and higher educational institutions. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

As the masses in the country are suffering from extreme deprivation, under the dark shadows of unemployment and no earnings even to meet the basic needs, there comes the horrific revelation that under Ayushman Bharat, 7.5 lakh beneficiaries were registered with a single mobile phone number. According to the CAG report tabled in the Parliament, insurance claims for fresh treatment were paid against 88,670 already dead persons. There is no exposure on who has been paid the money as it has not gone to the beneficiaries.

In fact from Ayushman Bharat to Dwarka Expressway, there have been seven scams that have been brought to light by the CAG. In reply, there is nothing but silence. The money that belongs to people, returns of their toil, which they pay as taxes, has been squandered, reports CAG.

There have been serious irregularities spotted in the audit of the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY) health insurance scheme. The Comptroller and Auditor General of India has revealed that Rs 6.97 crore was paid for the treatment of 3446 patients. All these patients receiving the care and getting treated are actually non-existent, since in the database, they all have been long dead.

The scheme was started in 2018. It was meant to give succour to poor and helpless in rural and urban areas for gaining their health back. During the performance audit, the heading carries the information, “Treatment of beneficiary shown as ‘died’ during earlier claim/treatment, the CAG identified that patients earlier shown as ‘died’ in TMS (the transaction management section of the scheme) continued to avail treatment under the scheme”. The audit noted that there were 3,903 such claims. Madhya Pradesh had 403 such patients for whom Rs 260,09,723 were paid for their treatment. Such reports have been available from other states as well.

According to the guidelines, if a death is there after admission in the hospital, and that too before discharge, payment to the hospital is made only after audit. “During the desk audit (in July 2020), audit had reported to National Health Authority (NHA) that the IT system (TMS) was allowing pre- authorisation request of the same patient who was earlier declared dead under the same system availed under the scheme. NHA while acknowledging the audit comment, stated in July, 2020, that necessary check(s) have been put in place on April 22, 2020 to ensure that PM–JAY ID of any patient who has been shown as ‘died’ in TMS is disabled for availing further benefit under the scheme,” said CAG report.

The report states that when the CAG flagged that the necessary checks were not followed, the NHA stated in August 2022 that “back date of admission is allowed in the system for various operational reasons”. The reply of the CAG over the explanation was that “the reply was not tenable, as pre-authorization initiation, claim submission and final claim approval by the State Health Authority for ‘beneficiaries already shown as died during treatment earlier, indicate flaws in application and make it susceptible to misuse at user level.” The faults in the database of AB-PMJAY include invalid names, unrealistic dates of birth, duplicate health IDs and unrealistic family sizes, the government’s auditor said in a report tabled in Parliament.

Amidst the saga of plunder pours out, another one comes tumbling down. According to the CAG report, it has been revealed that the money meant for the pensions was spent on the publicity campaign of the Swachh Bharat Fortnight in 19 states.

Even the old age people, the widows and the physically challenged people who were entitled to pensions from the rural development ministry were not spared as the money meant for them was diverted and spent on the publicity of some other schemes of some other department.

According to reports released by the government’s auditor earlier this month titled ‘Toll Operations of National Highways Authority of India in Southern India’, toll collection at five toll plazas led to an “undue burden” of Rs 132.05 crore on commuters. For this report, the CAG conducted an audit of 41 randomly selected toll plazas in five southern Indian states.

Among the other findings are the allegations revolving around the Dwarka Expressway and Ayodhya development project, besides the Bharatmala Pariyojana. The Centre’s flagship road development scheme, Bharatmala Pariyojana and the cost of its construction has doubled to over Rs 32 crore per km from Rs 15.37 crore per km, according to the CAG report on ‘Implementation of Phase-1 of Bharatmala Pariyojana’ released last month.

About the flaws in process of tender, no detailed project report was submitted. Rs 3,500 crore was diverted from the Escrow accounts. There were no safety consultants appointed. In its audit of the tourism ministry’s Swadesh Darshan scheme, the CAG pointed out irregularities in the ‘Ayodhya Development project’, which the Opposition cited to allege that the project is “riddled with scams”.

Money has been issued to contractors who are not even registered. GST payments are coming their way. Who are these people? What are they doing? How come the tendering process is so flawed? These were the revelations made by the CAG based on audits and tabled in the Parliament, not any random allegations. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

The BJP-RSS government is moving aggressively with its privatization policy. Prime Minister Narendra Modi made it explicit in one of his remarks when he said recently in one of his meetings: ‘Hamare Desh me public sector ka marne ke liye Janma hota hai’ (In our country, public sector is born to perish). It stands in clear contrast to the ideals our Parliament has stood for. Our Constitution is committed towards building a society with socialist principles. Public ownership and the control of commanding heights of the national economy with its strategic sectors were considered imperative to the system we aspired for.

Long years of colonized economy had destroyed the basics and the prime need was to make the recovery fast. It meant that each one of our people was to have access to every opportunity, free from individual domination. It could be possible only in a democracy with social justice. For these endeavours, availability of adequate finance was needed. First to be nationalized was Life Insurance, and then the Imperial Bank of India. Soon were built up other institutions in public sector and major banks were also nationalized. The step was taken to promote the mobility of public money, create an infrastructure in the fields of production, not only for the basic essentials but also those for export.

It was the year of 1969, when the most significant shift came. Fourteen large commercial banks, owned by the monopoly houses, were nationalized. It was also stressed by the government that even after nationalization, the credit needs of the private industry and trade would be met. The unrolling of the nationalization process was to meet the needs of productive sector, especially those in agriculture, in small scale industries, and also for those that were self employed. The nationalized banks were also to sustain the new and growing initiatives, and in the backward and neglected areas in the country. The public ownership was also to help decline the process of spending in the direction of speculative and unproductive areas.

The aim was to remove control of few, extension of credit to priority sectors, giving a professional bent to bank management and encouragement to new classes of such producers and traders. The objective was to blend the capital and people’s skills. It was to help society in its advances. Justice Krishna Iyer had said that the nationalization was aimed at collecting the savings of people and investing it in agrarian sector along with other sections that are in need of support. The purpose was to take each one together and with their skill and capital gathered to move forward. To aid these development projects banks were aimed at higher growth rate and bringing down of the rate of impoverishment.

There was massive expansion in branches, the volume of deposits was also growing, especially in rural areas. Just in two years, growing bank credit was diverted to priority sectors from 14 percent to 41 percent. There was also significant success in removing inequalities. Banking policy was extended to secure progressive reduction in income inequalities. All these policies protected not only the nationalized banking but the entire economy from the Melt Down effects.

Despite these achievements, challenges waited at doorstep through the years. Capitalist system was maturing and giving way to finance capital. Corporate sector was promoted by the system. Welfare of people was no more the task of the government. Various regimes came to power including BJP itself in the beginning of the century. But it was only in 2014, when BJP-RSS government came to rule, the major steps for disinvestment were taken.The government at the Centre managed raise over Rs 4.04 lakh crore through disinvestment and strategic sale of public sector enterprises, according to finance ministry.There were sales in 10 companies, including Air India, that had yielded Rs 69,412 crore to the exchequer in the last eight years. Share buyback in 45 cases fetched Rs 45,104 crore. Dismantling of PSUs has been going on.

When the prime minister spoke about the demise of PSUs, he also meant the crumbling of democratic process in the country, the reason being large scale privatization, a task taken up by the government at the Centre. Public sector is the backbone of the Indian economy and it plays a pivotal role in its development. Its final aim is to socialize the means of production. Striving to achieve certain socio-economic objectives, the primary concern of public sector is to protect the economy which is owned and controlled by the government.

Efforts are also made to provide basic goods and services to the citizens, promote economic development, and protect the interests of weaker sections of society.It has always tried to provide the basic essential services to the citizens. When the nationalization had been initiated, it helped to resolve the issue of unemployment also. It brought in opportunities for employment. Finally, the means for infrastructure is also provided by PSUs to strengthen democracy.

Along with Public Sector, our composite culture, Constitution, and the democratic ethos are also under threat. One example is Manipur, where humanity itself is in flames. Never had India witnessed such barbarity. It is not the issue of SC status, nor is it the tribal conflict. It is only an attempt to side line the major problems, the issues of employment, education, health, finally resources. Also it is an effort to fragment them to keep alive the discontent.(IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

On June 1, there had been reports that the law panel backed the penal provision for the offence of sedition, saying repealing it altogether could have adverse ramifications for the security and integrity of the country. The offence of sedition has been stretched up to even “…mere inclination to incite violence or cause public disorder rather than proof of actual violence or imminent threat to violence” and would be sufficient ground for punishment.

The government has sought time to submit its response to petition challenging the constitutional validity of section 124 A of the Indian Penal code dealing with the offence of sedition. In the light of rising number of cases under sedition law, which has gone up to 28 percent, adding 559 cases, a rapid increase in the years of 2014-2020, the apex court had intervened in 2021.

The CJI has questioned why a colonial law used against Mahatma Gandhi and Bal Gangadhar Tilak continues to survive in law book even after 75 years of independence. The CJI said that sedition or section 124 A of the IPC was prone to the misuse by the government. Sedition law were enacted in 17th century England when lawmakers believed that only good opinions about the government should survive, as all bad observations were detrimental to the government. The law was originally drafted in 1837 by Thomas Macaulay, the British historian politician, but was inexplicably omitted when the IPC was enacted in 1860. Section 124 A was inserted in 1870 by an amendment introduced by Sir James Stephen when it felt the need for a specific section to deal with the offence. Today Sedition is a crime under section 124 A of the IPC, defined as an offence committed against the ruling regime.

The Law Commission of India has recommended enhancing the jail term in sedition cases from a minimum of three years to seven years, contending that it would allow courts greater room to award punishment in accordance with the scale and gravity of the act committed. In a report on the ‘Usage of the Law of Sedition’, the Commission said its earlier report had termed the punishment for Section 124A (law of sedition) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) “very odd” as it has provisions for either life imprisonment or a three-year jail term, but nothing in between.

The minimum punishment under the sedition law is paying fine.

“A comparison of the sentences as provided for offences in Chapter VI of the IPC suggests that there is a glaring disparity in the punishment prescribed for Section 124A,” the Commission said.

Chapter VI of the IPC deals with offences against the state.

“It is, therefore, suggested that the provision be revised to bring it in consonance with the scheme of punishment provided for other offences under Chapter VI. This would allow the courts greater room to award punishment for a case of sedition in accordance with the scale and gravity of the act committed,” the report said.

The Commission also suggested changes to the phrasing of Section 124A and added words “a tendency to incite violence or cause public disorder”.

The current Section 124A of IPC reads as follows: “Sedition-Whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards, the Government established by law in lndia, shall be punished with imprisonment for life, to which fine may be added, or with imprisonment which may extend to three years, to which fine may be added.”

However, the law commission has now recommended to alter the Section as: “Whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards, the Government established by law in lndia, with a tendency to incite violence or cause public disorder shall be punished with imprisonment for life, to which fine may be added, or with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to seven years, to which fine may be added, or with fine.”

The Commission said the expression ‘tendency’ would mean mere inclination to incite violence or cause public disorder rather than proof of actual violence or imminent threat to violence. The report of the Law Commission has been completed and submitted to the concerned minister.

In fact Law Commission’s backing of Section 124 A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC ), pertaining to sedition, in itself shows that the BJP government has been planning to make the law more “draconian”. The government is keen to convey the hard message before the next general election. There is allegation that the BJP would be using the sedition law as a tool of “subversing, subjugating, and silencing dissent”. There is also the question raised why the government has gone on to make the law more stringent when the Supreme Court has been rendering it inoperative. Law commission has under lined that there will be a distance between the ruler and the ruled, and through this law, the foundations of the republic will be uprooted. (IPA Service)

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By Rahil Nora Chopra

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) supremo and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has been in touch with various leaders of non-BJP parties to gain support in the fight against the Centre’s latest ordinance to clip the wings of Delhi’s elected government, despite a Supreme Court order in its favour. Kejriwal’s hectic meets with fellow opposition leaders are to ensure that the Centre’s bid to replace the draconian ordinance with a bill is defeated when it is brought into Parliament. The Centre had on May 19 promulgated the ordinance to create an authority for the transfer and posting of Group-A officers in Delhi, which the AAP government had called “deception”, especially in the wake of the Supreme Court verdict on control of services.CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury, Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao, Shiv Sena (UBT) chief leader Uddhav Thackeray, NCP chief Sharad Pawar, and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee have so far extended their support to the AAP. Bihar Chief Minister and JD(U) leader Nitish Kumar as well as his deputy Tejashwi Yadav and RJD leader have also supported Kejriwal in the matter. Meanwhile, the AAP national convener has requested for time to meet Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and Rahul Gandhi to seek their support against the ordinance. Congress had discussed the issue with the party leaders, and although the Punjab and Delhi regional leaders were against the idea of supporting AAP, but they authorised the Congress high command to take the final decision in this matter. In any case, it is nearly impossible for the Congress to support the ordinance in the Parliament.

12 JUNE PATNA CONCLAVE LED BY NITISH KEY TO CEMENTING OPPOSITION UNITY

In an amicable step to unite the opposition parties on board against the incumbent BJP in the next year general elections, a conclave of like-minded political parties will be held on June 12 in Patna. Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is likely to preside over the meeting. The participants comprise of some 18 political parties of the secular opposition camp. According to sources, both Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and former president Rahul Gandhi might not attend the meeting citing scheduling problems. But the Congress has assured that it will definitely depute one of its top leaders to mark presence for the upcoming meeting. West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee, Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, Tamil Nadu CM M K Stalin, NCP Chief Sharad Pawar, SP Chief Akhilesh Yadav, CPIM leader Sitaram Yechury have already assured and confirmed their presence. While this is just a preliminary meeting, Nitish is strategically framing a platform wherein the BJP could be engaged in a one-on-one contest with the opposition. He has already recognised nearly 475 seats where the united opposition can enter into a direct fight with the BJP in the 2024 polls. However, the strategy of the opposition will come to light only after the June 12 conclave of the political parties.

POST KARNATAKA WIN, CONGRESS RETAINS KANUGOLU FOR MADHYA PRADESH

BJP and Congress both have started preparations to return to power in Madhya Pradesh. Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra will kickstart the Assembly poll campaign for her party in the crucial central Indian state by going ahead on June 12 with a road show and rally in Jabalpur, which will start after offering prayers to the Narmada river. Jabalpur is the largest city of the state’s Mahakoshal region, where the Congress had won 11 out of the 13 Scheduled Tribe-reserved seats in the 2018 Assembly polls, leaving the BJP with paltry victories in just two constituencies. However, Congress is emphasizing more on Bundelkhand, Malwa and Vindhya region. The party is eyeing women voters and former CM Kamal Nath has announced that if his party forms the government again in Madhya Pradesh in the state assembly election scheduled later this year, a financial help of Rs. 18,000 per year would be given to women and it would be largest ‘women empowerment scheme of the world’. Moreover, Congress has roped in poll strategist Sunil Kanugolu, a former associate of Prashant Kishor, to aid and shape its campaign for the upcoming Assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh.

GEHLOT, PILOT MEET WITH KHARGE, RAHUL DEEMED PARTLY SUCCESSFUL

Although the Congress party showcased unity after a meeting with Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and his rival Sachin Pilot, the meet concluded with more questions unanswered, indicating that the party is yet to resolve the rift between the two, a situation that poses problems for its prospects in the upcoming state election. In a four-hour meeting between Ashok Gehlot, Sachin Pilot, Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge, and Rahul Gandhi, there was no agreement on power sharing. Senior Congress leaders claim, that there is no firm proposal on board but directions to both the warring leaders have been given to follow the Karnataka model, where bitter rivals Siddaramaiah and DK Shivakumar fought as a united front. Sources said the party’s central leadership has made it clear that it would decide on the role of Pilot at a later stage. He would be given a prominent role ahead of the elections, but he should promise that he would not precipitate a crisis in the party, as he did with his earlier comments. Rahul himself has assured Pilot that his concerns would be addressed. On the other hand, Pilot would not back down on his demands, including a probe against former CM Vasundhara Raje. However, Rajasthan CM Gehlot expressed the hope that he and his bête noire Pilot would work together and win the assembly polls in the state later this year, and called upon Congress workers and leaders to exercise “patience” and wait for their opportunity to serve in some capacity.

MAURYA ASKS WHY ONLY SOUTHERN BRAHMINS INAUGURATED NEW PARLIAMENT?

Senior Samajwadi Party leader and MLC Swami Prasad Maurya has posed questions over why only south Indian Brahmin seers were given invitation for the programme on the occasion of the inauguration of the new Parliament building on 28 May. Swami had bluntly opposed the government’s decision in the matter as according to his views when India gives equal importance to all religions, then why were religious leaders from one varna (sect) from south only were invited. Meanwhile Chief of the Ram Janmabhoomi Nyas and also the head of the Shri Krishna Janmasthan Seva Sansthan. Mahant Nritya Gopal Das, Former MP and member of Ram Janmabhoomi trust Dr Ram Vilas Vedanti and Hindu spiritual leader and founder of Handicapped University Tulsi Peeth Jagadguru Rambhadracharya and many other seers were not invited in the inauguration ceremony of India’s new Parliament building. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has installed the historic ‘Sengol’ near the Lok Sabha’s speaker’s chair. Amid Vedic chants by priests from Karnataka’s Shringeri Math, the prime minister performed “Ganapati Homam” to invoke Gods to bless the inauguration of the new Parliament building. Modi prostrated before the Sengol and sought blessings from high priests of various adheenams in Tamil Nadu with the holy sceptre in hand. The Golden Sengol has a Nandi on top, which signifies power and justice. Historically, Tamil Nadu has been the bastion of Shiva worship, on the other hand Uttar Pradesh has been the bastion of Lord Ram and Krishna worship. While differences between Vaishnavites and Shaiva has been cropped up and the Sadhus and Sant have not been paced and are to an extent annoyed that they were not invited in the inauguration ceremony of India’s new Parliament building and political parties are trying to exploit the situation. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

We are a multi-religious country. For each community, there is a spiritual path to arrive at the basics, the most sacred that we hold to ourselves. Our culture is composite, multi- dimensional, and each according to its own context. There are those that are based on natural specifics influencing the practices in everyday lives. Then there are those from not only lower income groups but also from the lowest strata who serve and have to stand and wait patiently to get something in return. It is not for them to ask for their rights. Obviously the relationships were basically evolved to formulate the categorization in the society to keep alive the disparity in the socio- economic formations. It is to serve the interest of one at the peril of the other.

Hence the prevailing sense of alienation, and also despair, with an eroding crisis of identity. Caste division reigns supreme in all this injustice and deters any step towards reversal of this practice. To understand the level of backwardness, and determining its extent, caste census is an imperative need. It would help to know the level for reservation in education, jobs, health facilities and in other basic essentials while moving towards egalitarianism in society.

The last caste census was conducted in 1931. All caste data are projected on its basis. It became the basis for quota caps under the Mandal formula.  Caste data were collected for the 2011 census but the data were never made public. Such a diligent exercise would also serve a legal imperative allowing the government to answer the Supreme Court’s call for quantifiable data.

This, however, is not the only anomaly that the present census exercise is facing. The other problem has to do with the growing demand for a separate column for the religion of tribal communities in Census enumeration.

Among the six existing religions mentioned in the Census form are Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism.  Adivasis in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, West Bengal among others call their faith Sarna which has not been included as a separate religion.  In Karnataka, Lingayats, though a prominent religious group, are not mentioned. On the form, the respondents have the liberty to write the name of any community they belong to, but except those in the list, no other would be recognized.

The issue of Sarna code started building up after the Jharkhand Assembly, in a special session on 11 November 2020, passed a resolution asking the Union government to introduce a separate religion code for the tribal population in the upcoming Census exercise. The resolution termed it “Sarna Adivasi Dharma” – a generic name for tribal nature worshippers. Under the present circumstances, tribal people have no option but to identify themselves as one of these or as “Other Religions & Persuasions (ORPs)”, or are forced to tick “Hinduism” or fall in the category of ORPs.

The demand to get Sarna religion included in the Census enumeration has put the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh in a fix. For decades, the RSS and its affiliates – the Sangh Parivar – have tried to convince tribals that they are essentially Hindus living in forests rather than being independent religious communities. But now, as the demand for Sarna code has started making waves in Jharkhand as well as in neighbouring states, the RSS seems to be petrified. On the ground, it is maintaining a studied silence trying not to say anything that would annoy tribals even in the slightest way, while, at the same time, hoping that the BJP-led government at Centre would do the needful – find a way out to politely reject the demand of Sarna code’s inclusion as a separate religion in the Census enumeration.

The RSS claims that the Adivasis are Hindus. But Adivasis constitute an independent identity. The bases of their cultural and religious beliefs are completely different from those of the Hindu belief system. For example, varna system is integral to the Hindu social structure. Adivasis have actually stayed out of it. Moreover, the cultural and religious practices of various Adivasi groups in India are always linked with jal, jangal and jameen (water, forest and land), the same that forms the basis of what is being described as Sarna religion. The Adivasis, therefore, believe that their demand of Sarna code is an issue of their cultural identity.

In the Census of 2011, about 50 lakh people of Sarna religion – more than the total population of Jains – opted for the ‘others’ category.

The pride of being the original settlers as the word Adivasi connotes, was taken  away from them as their identity, and were given the status of “Vanavasis” or forest dwellers by the RSS. The term original settlers could be used only for descendants of Vedic people, a critical component of “Hindu Rashtra”. Hence the “Adivasis”, as original dwellers, challenge the Sangh’s project, whereas in the concept of “vanavasis”, there is only ‘submission’, preferred by Hindu construct.  However, the reality is that there is simmering discontent among Adivasis against the Sangh in most of Jharkhand’s tribal areas and may create similar fissures in neighbouring tribal dominated states. For, Adivasis have started looking at the activities of the Sangh Parivar as an attempt to subsume their cultural identity.

At the moment, there is complete confusion as to when the next Census exercise would take place. It was to be held in 2021 but had to be postponed owing to the Covid pandemic. Now it is likely only in 2024. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

There is a chink opening up in the claim that India has been ushered in the group of five most developed nations in the world. With consistent fall in the GDP, even an indication towards upward move gets clapping, a myth that is carried forward since last almost a decade. It is a myth since it does not have roots in the reality. Since 2011-12, the statistical agencies in the country have been silenced by the government that came to power in 2014. The World Bank had earlier clarified drawing a line to define extreme poverty according to data collected in a survey, and stated that it is 1.5 dollar per day, per person. In India, shockingly, 23 percent of population live with even less than it. It has been the only available data since 2011-12.

The absolute lack of official data on poverty has led to imaginative poverty line, now branded as hypothetical, drawn from various sources, calculations and assumptions. There is absolute lack of confirmation on any available data. The national survey results, when compared with the present unconfirmed sources working discreetly, come out with huge differences making any convergence of observations impossible. The finality keeps eluding. The issue has been that official data has not been allowed to see the light. The government has stopped publication of the results of National Sample Survey or Consumer Expenditure Survey since 2017-18. The unofficial sources have presented an extremely grim status report and that could be assumed as the cause behind the absence of any debate on poverty data especially when the 2024 elections are at the door step.

It is time to assess the rate of Government performance especially at the level of economy. Since concerned data is not available through approved sources, and economic indicators lack clarity, there is possibility of getting the estimation through headcount as well as about the rate of spending by people. The World Bank has come out with its own indications based on the cut off line to decide the extreme poverty, but the fact is that it varies among nations. So far as the government of India is concerned, it favours the Tendulkar committee report which says that poverty was a fact of life for 22 per cent people living in 2011-12.  In fact the great Indian poverty debate 2.0 was initiated at the very assumption that consumption at the rate of per person went up with the last available data that came out in 2011-12. It was assessed on the basis of national accounts consumption rate.

The data was attacked all over the world since no one believed it. Estimate India had ‘eliminated’ extreme poverty line of 1.90 dollar and it was even before pandemic started. The World Bank had used the data from the Consumer Pyramid Household Survey (CPHS). It was from Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy. The representation of the poor that it gave had been questioned several times. Then there was the assumption that poverty had gone down in 2011-2012 and again in 2019-20, which was assessed at the rate of 10 percent. It was never taken seriously.

In fact the World Bank had taken the data from private sources, one among them was New Poverty Web Site. In fact a paper was presented at Columbia University which is yet to arrive in the public domain that said that even Pandemic did not arrest the decline. It was in contradiction even to the findings of CPHS. The paper was written with the help of a different set of data, from India’s periodic Labour Force Survey, published by India’s National Statistics office. It had no link with either the World Bank poverty data or the International Monetary Fund. However the conclusions of the paper are not connected with the decline of poverty in the country. Usually the decline in poverty is linked with either the poverty headcounts or the other pointers like better wages or growth in the productivity

Both are unlikely to take place. The other aspect is agriculture, and its share has been falling with the growth of industrialisation. Its contribution to GDP remained the same from 1990s to 2004, at 16 to 17 percent. The total agricultural force has also declined from 50 percent to 43 percent. The contribution to GDP has been highest among the South Asian countries like Bangladesh, China etc. It may be taken up here that while maintaining the decline issue of poverty, there is also the other narrative about systemic growth of poverty which is based on official and national estimates.

While the source of data on reduction of poverty is always operating from back stage, the steps to improve the living standards are also taken more as an imposition than relief. It explicitly came to the fore when the collection of Hunger data was taken up. The source had to face retribution when India was placed even below Afghanistan. Despite the rancour about the ranking, there was no flaw so far as data collection was concerned. It was collected from Food and Agricultural Organisations (FAO) that provided headcount. According to available data, since 2019-21, there was no visible improvement reported. It stuck to 16 percent all the while. The great poverty debate about our country was started with calculations that in fact were coming to light since last year.  The formulation tried to say that India had got rid of poverty even before Pandemic. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

At a time when we celebrate birth anniversary of our guide and philosopher Comrade V I Lenin on April 22, we are passing through a phase called as rule of finance capital. It is defined by Lenin as the higher stage of capitalism that takes away our democratic rights, our Constitution, right to elect our own government, and freedom to live and think in our own varied ways. It refuses to give us food instead offers a well organised famine. It refuses to give us jobs because its prime interest is not investment. Health and education are not in its priority list. Despite killing negligence of public welfare, it is also true that it is scared of people and their strength. And it is at this point we find a similar situation when Lenin stressed on alliance of all democratic forces that includes bourgeoisie too which is also facing a crisis and joins the struggle for a democratic state.

The government at the centre today realises the need for at least a semblance of democracy, through elections “without freedom to conduct agitation and on the basis of a restricted qualification,” but at the same time they refuse to allow the opposition to play its democratic role and become effective in the parliamentary democracy. These were the words of Lenin while defining the rule of finance capital. He said wherever there is finance capital with a significant presence, one element is common and that is national chauvinism. As if to prove it, in our country, V D Savarkar, an exponent of blind nationalism, had said in his book in 1923, “All Hindus claim to have in their veins the blood of the mighty race incorporated with and descended from the Vedic fathers, the Sindhus”. Summing it up, he wrote, “We [Hindus] are one because we are a nation, a race and own a common Sanskriti (culture).”

Hence all available opportunities must be used to further the cause of launching a united struggle for democratic rights, elections and parliamentary democracy. Lenin said communists must take part in elections like in any other country and insisted on getting together all democratic forces in action. There must be regular mass movements and a united front has to be formed to further the cause.

It is beyond doubt that any national movement has to be bourgeois democratic movement, said Lenin articulating the significance of united front that has become the need of the time. Communist Party of India has been coming to terms with the decision that has been truly Leninist. The stance to have a united front along with bourgeoisie has been prophetic and their significance stands valid. It was Georgi Dimitrov who helped the idea to evolve ideologically and also taking in the new turn the imperialism was taking as an objective force.

It was 1935, and anti imperialist front was emerging as the primary need. He said while speaking to the seventh World Congress of the Comintern, “…While maintaining their political and organisational independence, they must carry on the active work inside the organisations that are part of the Indian National Congress, facilitating the process of crystallisation of a national revolutionary wing among them for the purpose of further developing the national revolutionary movement of the entire people against British imperialism.”

Much before Dimitrov concretised the idea of united front, Lenin had visualised it especially in the era of imperialism. He saw it as a broad based stage in the process of transition towards socialism. In course of shaping it, he developed the concept and said that working class would be more interested in the transition. All the demands, even today, raised in the phase of bourgeois democracy are to support their cause only. The slogan for more employment opportunities strengthens the cause of maturity of capitalism only. Even in the agrarian sector, the demand for MSP is to further their cause only.

Democracy and parliamentary institutions have expanded as never before. For capitalism, establishment of democracy is an existential issue. Therefore there is greater need for broad based anti-imperialist struggle. In our country, our struggle is in defence of our Constitution that furthers the cause of a democratic set up. Hence, Lenin’s approach has become more relevant. Any democratic revolution is bourgeois democratic revolution in content. The very demands that are raised now in the process of moving towards democratic revolution, they are in reality bourgeois democratic.

It is because when monopoly capitalism develops it destroys non-monopoly sections of capitalism. The medium and the small scale industries too get crushed. Thus it is the class demand of the non- monopoly sections to oppose monopolisation of capital.  Thus the very content of the democratic revolution is anti-imperialist. Here comes the dialectics, when the interest of the working class is aligned with that of the capitalist class. Historical development has taken a way when the working class has become the greatest defender of democratic rights, and thus of the bourgeoisie itself.

Following the path that Lenin had directed towards, Georgi Dimitrov had stressed that in India the communists must support, extend, and participate in all anti imperialist activities, not excluding those which are under national reformist leadership. While maintaining their political and organisational independence, they must carry on their active work inside the organisations of Indian national Congress, facilitating the process of crystallisation of a national revolutionary wing among them, for the purpose of further developing national revolutionary movement of the Indian people. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

In 1938, there were public bonfires of forbidden books in Italy. Militia was always present in such events to help keeping alive the flames and restrain any interruption. In fact, Mussolini had contended that “fascism requires military journalism”. In fascist Italy, the role of Mussolini as the prime censor was visible quite openly. Usually whenever there was the order to impose total blackout on a topic, or to pull out a story from the press, it was immediately organized and it happened almost every day.

Today, with digital revolution, there is the ever increasing speed through which the information is catered, and through social media, communication has become much easier and less time consuming. However, despite the speed, the sense of urgency intends to make it not only faster, but also to the liking of the ruling regime. For example there is the new education policy, which rarely leaves any space for sincere attempt to decipher objectively the historical process. It has to be written and understood according to the wishes of the state. It hardly matters if centuries of evolution are thrown into garbage despite the fact that they are all inalienable parts of life itself. It reminds one of the Italian fascist regime ruling over the country led by Mussolini when the social control was exercised by disinformation and also surveillance.

To decipher the theme of communication, especially with the social media gaining popularity and a vast space, it is getting difficult to get into the issue of disinformation. The Union government or its divisions have been working like the regulating entity. In the IT (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendments Rules, 2023, the Union government has added a provision of a fact check unit to identify fake or false or misleading online content related to the government. Against such content identified by this unit, intermediaries, such as social media companies or net service providers, will have to take action or risk losing their protective measures in Section 79 of the IT Act, which allows intermediaries to avoid liabilities for what third parties post on their websites. This is unacceptable and problematic. Also, Section 69A of the IT Act, 2000 elucidates the procedure to issue takedown orders, which these notified amendments could bypass.

Without a right to appeal or the allowance for judicial oversight, the government cannot sit on judgment on whether any information is “fake” or “false” as the power to do so can be misused to prevent questioning or scrutiny by media organisations. Takedown notices have been issued by the government for critical opinion or commentary on social media platforms, with several having to comply with them and only a few such as Twitter contesting them in courts. By threatening to remove a platform’s immunity for content that is flagged by a government unit, it is clear that the Union government intends to create a “chilling effect” on the right to speech and expression on online platforms.

To keep the establishment — which includes the executive government of the day — on its toes and to speak truth to power is a non-negotiable and salient role of journalism in a democracy. In India, freedom of the press is guaranteed through Article 19 of the Constitution, with media rights and public right to free speech derived from this Article. It stands to reason that any relationship between the government and the media should be one kept at arm’s length, with the media having sufficient freedom. The government being the arbiter on what constitutes “false” or “fake” news and having the power to act upon platforms for publishing these will amount to draconian censorship. This power of censorship became a reality with a gazette notification.

The Ministry of Electronics and IT (MEITY) that had created the Information Technology (Intermediary Guidelines and Digital Media Ethics Code) Amendment Rules, 2023 [IT Rules, 2023] authorised a fact check unit of the Central government in respect of, “any business of the central government”. This department is to scrutinise any online comments, news reports or opinions about government officials and ministries and then notify online intermediaries for its censorship. To promise accuracy, only facts will be stated, and the decision on citizen interest is to be left to the reader.

Also the power is meant to fill in details within the legislative intent and directions of the Supreme Court. There has been the Shreya Singhal judgment of the Supreme Court that had established that Section 79 and the IT Rules require intermediaries to have actual knowledge from a court order or be notified by the appropriate government in relation to the unlawful acts — these are reasonable restrictions under Article 19(2) of the Constitution. The Article 19(2) has no mention of the phrases “fake or false or misleading The IT Rules may be read under broader classifications such as public order, security of the state, and morality. Also the incorrect or inaccurate statement will not automatically become “fake or false or misleading.” The terms like “Fake or false or misleading” do not always come within reasonable restrictions, creating an unconstitutional power for government censorship. Even the IT Rules, 2023 do not define what constitutes “fake or false or misleading” information, nor do they specify the qualifications or hearing processes for a “fact check unit”. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

India has entered one of its darkest phases of deprivation when the annual income of the poorest 20 percent has fallen by 53 percent and still continues to fall from the level of 2015-16. Since last three decades, economy was evolving at the rate of seven percent a year and was going up constantly till the advent of the pandemic years. Per capita income before the Pandemic days had arrived at 2100 dollars a year. It was in the same years that the richest twenty percent were reaping an income growth of 39 percent. It was the result of the Covid days that had impacted the economy splitting the population in a perfect contrast of Haves and Have Nots.

The survey conducted by People’s Research on India’s Consumer Economy, between April and October 2021, had taken up 200,000 households in the first round and 42,000 households in the second round, spreading it over 120 towns and 800 villages across 100 districts.

As the economic activity has been declining to almost zero level, especially in the months of 2020-2021, and caused GDP to contract up to 7.3 percent, the urban poor was also affected hugely as their household income was receding steeply.

With erosion, there was also the sharp categorisation, though with very little difference among them except with the top twenty percent. Among the poorest 20 percent, it was the most brutal erosion of 53 percent, for the second lowest, usually called lower middle category, the decline in their household income came down to 32percent.

In the middle income category, the decline was found to be of nine percent, while for the upper middle category, it was a rise of seven percent. It also faced decline but it was only nine percent, and then the rise. It was the richest twenty percent that registered the highest rise among the entire population. It rose to 39 percent, when the famine and joblessness had caused big masses to migrate towards their roots.

The survey also brought out the fact that the richest twenty percent had earned more in the post liberalisation years including the days of pandemic. In contrast to it, for the most impoverished twenty percent households, especially during and after 2021, their income saw a sharp fall of more than half of what they were getting in 2016.

In the last eleven years before pre Covid days, between 2005- 2016, the household income for the top rich went up from 20 percent to 34 percent, for the poorest 20 percent, it also saw a hike in the average income growth rate of 9.9 percent. Now in 2021, the share of the poorest 20 percent has dropped to 3.3 percent in the same period.

The survey showed that in contrast to those poorest, the richest 20 percent accounted for a jump of 56.3 percent in 2021.

As with pandemic, economy was getting more formalised, and big companies in the top twenty percent benefitted at the cost of smaller ones. The survey brought in the light the fact that while job losses were almost all pervading among small and medium enterprises in the casual labour segment, large companies did not suffer much on this account.

It is also noted that there has been a difference in impact between urban and rural regions. Those poorest 20 per cent in urban areas got more impacted than their rural counterparts since Covid and the lockdown. They have been facing a worsening curb in economic activities in urban areas. This resulted in job losses and loss of income for the casual labour, petty traders and household workers.

The miseries of people in the country caused by the economic policies that have been supportive to the highest twenty, were not thought of worthy to be taken into account. The ruling regime, joining hands with the rule of finance capital, has been reluctant to even list the disastrous consequences of such policies that have brought decline in per capita income of the major section of people, who already suffer from rise in malnutrition, that causes stunting and wasting among children, slipping down to the rank of 94 out of 116countries in the Global Hunger Index.

In addition, demonetisation has pushed the country to the brinks. Millions of people have been pushed into a state of acute impoverishment. Then there are the MSME who have hardly any support from the system. With chaotic management of the pandemic, there is also refusal to transfer cash to the poor. Then there is growing unemployment, coming down to 7.2 percent, with urban 8.4 and rural 6.4 percent. Also high inflation rate, CPI 5.6 percent, high indirect taxes, indulgent direct taxes; poorly designed GST; profiteering in sale of petrol, diesel and LPG; return of the licence-permit regime; concentration of capital and wealth and finally strengthening of the monopolies; crony capitalism.

In these grim days, masses are going through little less than famine times. They are paying back the prices for all decisions that the system is taking. But soon it would be the system that would be made to bear the prices for everything. (IPA Service)

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By Prakash Karat

The recent appointment of six new governors by the president of India has revealed a lot about how the post of governor is viewed and cynically misused by the Modi government.

The appointment of Justice S Abdul Nazeer, who had retired from the Supreme Court just two months ago, as the governor of Andhra Pradesh is an egregious example of how the Modi government distributes this sinecure post. It may be recalled that Justice Nazeer was part of the five-member bench which gave a unanimous verdict in the Ayodhya dispute case in 2019.  As such, this appointment is being widely seen as a quid pro quo.

The Modi government has the dubious record of having appointed Justice P Sathasivam as governor of Kerala in 2014 – the first instance of a retired chief justice of India becoming a governor. This step had drawn widespread criticism from retired judges and jurists who saw in this move a threat to judicial independence.

Four of the other appointees belong to the RSS-BJP pedigree.  They are mostly second rank leaders of the BJP, whose only qualification presumably is their loyalty to the ruling party and the RSS.  How they perform their duties as governor is going to be determined by their fealty to the ruling party.  This is evident in how one of the appointees has expressed slavish gratitude to the ruling party leaders.  CP Radhakrishnan, a former BJP member of parliament from Tamil Nadu, has tweeted his heartfelt thanks not only to the Rashtrapathiji but also to “our beloved most respected honourable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modiji and our beloved most respected honourable Home Minister Shri Amit Shahji” on being appointed as the governor of Jharkhand.  Displaying such slavish gratitude upon being rewarded, his behaviour as a governor can also be predicted.

For Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, the choice of governors is from a pool of loyal party functionaries, RSS swayamsewaks and pliable retired bureaucrats and generals. The governors appointed to the non-BJP ruled states in the past few years have shown them to be  agents of the ruling party, or, worse  political henchmen.

These governors have trampled upon constitutional norms and arrogated to themselves the task of supervising and interfering in matters which concern the elected state governments.  A latest example of such an overbearing attitude is the letter sent by the Punjab governor, Banwarilal Purohit to Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann questioning the selection process of principals of schools who were sent abroad for training and other similar decisions of the state government.

From refusing to read out parts of the governor’s address to the state legislature, summoning senior officers and giving directions to them, public criticism of the political positions of the ruling party of the state and refusal to give assent to pending legislations – BJP-appointed governors are constantly misusing the ornamental post of governor.

All the non-BJP run state governments must come together to demand an end to the unconstitutional acts of the governors which are encouraged and abetted by the central government.  Public campaigns should be launched in these states to mobilise the people to defend the federal principle and to check the arbitrary actions of governors.  (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

It was the continuing process of instability in the economy that was more obvious with CMIE data showing the country’s unemployment rate touching a four month high, at 7.9 percent in December, 2021, the urban employment rate rose from 8.21 in November 2021, to 9.3 percent in December 2021.  In December, 2022, it was 8.30 per cent, the highest in the current months as indicated by CMIE. The numbers show a significant uncertainty in economic activity that started even before restrictions were imposed when Covid onset became explicit and economic activities faced disaster.

State wise also steady decline was observed so far as economic upward data is concerned. Urban unemployment rate had gone upwards every week to a double digit rate. About those that are employed, among the informal workers, that constitutes 90 percent of the total labour force, they are producing about half of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Despite their significant contribution in the GDP, one third of them do not get even the minimum wages which is identified as wages for unskilled labour. Among the total number of the employed, ten percent are working but still destitute, since the earnings are not even sufficient to meet the basics.

Twenty seven percent among the rest of them are not very sure of their jobs which offer them insufficient returns, and hence they have been termed as vulnerable. In final calculations, thirty nine millions are either destitute workers despite the fact that they earn wages, and then there are those who always live under the clouds of uncertainty and hence ‘vulnerable’. There is no minimum wages for both the sections. The biggest share for the migrating workers going back in reverse belongs to Dalits, Adivasis and other backward castes, driven by hunger, a force that cannot be staved off.

The reverse process starts surprisingly from the rich states where the workers come from the poorer ones like Bihar, Odisha, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh and many other states looking for respite from agrarian distress, caste and communal discrimination, acute lack of jobs at the source. It was a process seen for the first time in the decades of post independence years. Those were the times when country was going through the Covid days and the workers, after the work places were shut down, started moving in reverse.

It could be explained in terms of search for homely warmth in the days of insufferable anguish, uncertainty of any opening for livelihood, absence of support system, and then always in an anxiety about getting extension of the contract, which anyway was over. About 7.3 lakh workers who returned to Madhya Pradesh, especially in the lockdown period, 60 percent belonged to SC/ST group. The precarious situation continues even after Covid. There are new contracts, but insecurity remains because there is the issue of retrenchment as the small and medium level concerns that hire them, keep facing the brunt. It is not unknown to them that home also is no more the all giving solace, but there is that feeling of inclusivity that gives them rootedness. The fabric of urbanised society of developed states offers them only a temporary status.

According to recent Periodic Labour Force (PLF) survey estimates, among the 15-59 years of age group, which is almost 52 percent of adult population, constitutes the population of toilers that number around 104 millions. Among them 82.7 million are male and 21.7 are female.  Across social categories, around 3.2 million (3.07 percent) are those that belong to Scheduled Tribes. Among the Scheduled Castes, there are 15.2 million workers, that are 14. 57 percent of total.  In the OBC category, there are 44. 7 million workers that constitute 42.81 percent of those engaged.  In the ‘other’ category (OC), there are 41.3 million that is 39.56 percent engaged in the work force. It is significant that only half of the scheduled tribe population is engaged as workers in urban areas. In the formal and informal categories, about 23 percent of urban workers are employed in formal sector and rest of the 77 percent are in the informal sector. In the formal employment, from among the tribal population, only 766.3 thousand or 3.21 percent are engaged while those from scheduled castes, only 12.66 percent, which is 3.02 million are employed in the formal sector.

It is obvious that ST and SC categories are employed in bigger numbers in informal sector. In the case of those working as sweepers, helpers, there is significant concentration of Adivasis and Dalits, who still suffer from the historical segregation, a conservative tradition still occupying a prime space in our society. It is also significant how the employment of urban informal workers is organised across the industrial units. It is usually found that priority list is prepared keeping in view the caste and religion. In agriculture and allied activity, from STs, the involvement is 3.65 percent, for SCs, 14.3 percent, for OBCs,  53.34 percent, for other, 28.71 percent, and then on community based lines, while for Hindus, 79.69 percent, and for Muslims, it is 14.6 percent. Most of the Muslim workers opt for manufacturing and 19.69 percent are engaged in such sectors, while Hindus have a share in the same sector of 75.9 percent. So far as the menial jobs like sanitation and hygiene is concerned, those that mostly shoulder the burden that nobody offers to take up, do not get even the minimum wages.

The data available shows that the lowest rank in the society has been at the receiving end of the lowest wages, far below the minimum wages, of which they have to spend almost 53 percent on food alone, while those with better resources, spend only almost 12 percent. No wonder that for those ‘not haves’, life offers almost nothing to live for.   (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has blocked the demand raised by the Opposition in the Parliament for an enquiry to be monitored by the Supreme Court or to set up Joint Parliamentary Committee to investigate the Adani group’s manipulations of the stock market and fraud and into the allegations levelled against the industrialist Gautam Adani himself and his company by Hindenburg Research. The step reconfirms the Centre’s patronage for the Adani group.  Adani’s own response to Hindenburg’s allegations which runs in 413 pages is a blatant attempt to deflect the serious charges of fraud against the group. The company called the allegations “calculated attack on India, its independence, integrity, and quality of Indian institutions, and also the growth story and ambition of India.”

Gautam Adani, founder and chairman of Adani group, has acquired a net worth of roughly 120 billion dollars, adding over hundred billion over past three years largely through stock price appreciation in the group’s seven key listed companies which have spiked an average of 819 percent in that period.

The Hindenburg Research has claimed to investigate how the world’s once third richest man is pulling the largest con in corporate history, by speaking to people, including former senior executives of Adani group and taking up many other authentic sources. Its key listed companies have also taken substantial debts, including pledging shares of their inflated stock of loans, putting the entire group on precarious financial footing. The documents studied were in thousands, and conducting diligence site visits in almost half a dozen countries. Even if the findings of Hindenburg Research are not considered, and one takes up the financials of Adani group at face value, its seven key listed companies have 85 percent downside purely on a fundamental basis owing to high valuation.

The groups very top ranks and eight of twenty two key leaders are Adani family members, and places control of the groups financials in only the hands of few. Hence it is called ‘a family business’. Gautam Adani’s elder brother, called an ‘elusive figure’, has been always found at the centre of the investigations conducted by any government into Adani group for his alleged role in managing a network of offshore shell entities used to facilitate fraud, the research said. In fact Vinod Adani, through various associates, manages a vast labyrinth of offshore shell entities.

In fact it has been reported that the valuations of Adani’s companies flew to the highest skies in the past three years, between April 2020 and August 2022. The value of its stocks rose nearly four thousand percent. After the fall in the stocks, the rating of these companies are facing a decline.

A section of the securities of the group that Credit Suisse had assigned a lending value of 75 percent, are now rated zero. The conglomerate finds it impossible to raise money. The American investment bank Citigroup has refused to give loan to the group against securities. The share sale also has been facing the brunt, causing heightened scrutiny. According to reports that at least two more companies said to be from the Adani Group underwrote and likely bought in the share sale. Hindenburg Research says they have been helping the Adani Group engage in corporate malfeasance. The conglomerate denied the links.

The Adani share sale was oversubscribed by rich Indian individuals at the last minute, after retail investors or non-professional investors stayed away.

It is in the common knowledge that Adani and Modi both hail from the western state of Gujarat. As Modi climbed through the political ranks, he also openly displayed a close friendship with Adani: he flew in Adani’s private jets during his election campaign, and again when he travelled from Gujarat to New Delhi to take office as Prime Minister. In those days, Adani became richer by nearly 230 percent. Much of it has been credited to the Indian government’s mass privatization drive and business-friendly policies, which saw Adani winning several government tenders and infrastructure projects in ports, airports, roads, rail, fossil fuels, and green energy across the country. It was a process of building nation, as Modi called it.

This ‘nation building’ has encroached in the Budget too, offering mega profits to the rich while taking away the means of livelihoods from the common masses. The protests have been raised demanding job-inclusive investments as well as hikes in social security spending.

There is visible fall in the allocations in real terms for MNREGA, social security, pensions, child nutrition programmes and maternity benefits. The budget fails to take notice of how people are left starving as they have almost nothing to purchase even food. In the budget there should have been provisions for funds to increase people’s purchasing power with job generation and boosting the growth of domestic demand. This budget fails to meet this situation. The Fiscal federalism has been aggressively attacked as fund transfers to states have been restrained.

With the raising of curtain from almost the greatest con of the decade, it is the finance capital that emerges as the one that rules over the phase, matured and irresistible, serving the few at the cost of the rest, vast and starving. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

“Today, when there is so much talk about revising of the Constitution or even writing a new Constitution, we have to consider whether it is the Constitution that has failed us or whether it is we who have failed the Constitution,” said the then President K R Narayanan while speaking in the Central Hall of the Parliament on the occasion of the celebrations of completion of fifty years of our Constitution on January 27, 2000.

The fear has raised its head again. Dr B R Ambedkar while writing the guiding principles, had prepared the foundations for a secular democratic republic, which is facing continual erosion since last several years. In fact the achievements for which we had toiled and suffered for all the decades past, are today getting demolished. The scientific temper that we had nurtured among ourselves to build a secular state faces the deadly attack from the obscurant, communal absurdities. It is done through banning books, pushing scientific research organisations to the edge, in an attempt to replace them with irrationalism, destroying the cultural, literary ethos. Nothing more harmful can be done than enslaving the mass consciousness which is the first priority for the autocrat in the making. The fourth estate for democracy, the media, today stands shackled by the corporate forces. The print and electronic both are facing the brunt.

While elaborating on the making of the Constitution that took almost three years, Dr Ambedkar had said that the “…policy of the state, and how the society should be organised in its social and economic side are matters which must be decided by the people themselves according to time and circumstances,” since “…it cannot be laid down by the Constitution itself, …because that is destroying democracy itself.”

Dr Ambedkar thus stressed on people’s will. This ‘will’ is not the will of the majoritarian forces. It was the constituent assembly under whose guidance the Constitution was prepared that had added many points to protect the rights of the minorities.

It was on November 26, 1949 that the Constitution was adopted and came into force on January 26, 1950. It signified the victory of democratic forces, with secularism implicit in it, in the post independence India. Despite the challenges from the Hindutva forces, especially in the conditions of partition in the country, the Constitution guaranteed in its article 25 “Freedom of conscience and right to freely profess, practice and propagate religion equably.”

The making of Constitution was taken up by a team led by Dr Ambedkar in a meeting of the Constituent Assembly on December 9, 1946. It was also a time when in the process of partition, eight to ten million people were displaced, five to ten million dead and 70,000 women raped and destroyed. An entire civilisation remained blood soaked. The refugees poured in from newly formed borders of the two countries that were till then one, from the northwest and the east. The Constitution was conceived in such a way as to bring to the newly formed country a sense of oneness, filling the gap that history had left between the past and the transformed present of the Independent India. Secularism and federalism are non-negotiable – one of the central messages the Constitution succeeded in delivering.

It is also important to point out that in the making of the Constitution, the developments like independence, partition and the resultant blood bath were not overlooked and were taken with precision, depth, and farsightedness. The criticism made by certain sections about the constituent assembly remaining silent on some prime issues like the partition stands corrected in the making of the text of the Constitution itself. In the debates of the constituent assembly that formed the foundational document, it could be seen in the debate over Indian citizenship, especially with the millions of migrants settling in the country after partition. Then there was the claim from the minorities for political electoral reservation which was outrightly opposed by Hasrat Mohani as that was taken as coming from earlier strains of separatism which was responsible for partition.

The Constitution, with its declared features of welfare state, was an achievement.  In the process of characterising the Indian state, later terms like ‘secular’ and ‘socialist’ were added to the Preamble that were in built in the Constitution. In this struggle one of the prime points was Hindu Code Bill which was presented in the constituent assembly and faced grim controversy. The bill had to be divided in parts like Hindu Marriage Act, that outlawed polygamy, had provisions for inter caste marriage and divorce procedure, the Hindu adoption and maintenance Bill  and lastly the Hindu succession Bill that brought widows and daughters at par with sons in matters of property inheritance.

The Hindutva forces opposed it in the name of Hindu family norms, but the prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru remained unruffled and got it passed. He also refused to make any alteration in Muslim Personal Law as his contention was that majority Hindus need not force any change on the minorities. Any change would be introduced only if the suggestion came from them, especially the Muslims. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

In 1947, when we attained freedom, our dream was to build a country for ourselves without any inequality. There was to be fundamental rights ensured in the Constitution. Directive principles of the state policy in the Constitution promised us all that only a socialist democracy offers. Our preamble says that we, the people of India having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a sovereign democratic republic and to secure to all its citizens, justice, social, economic and political, liberty, of thought, expression, belief, faith, and worship, equality of status and of opportunity, and to promote them all, fraternity ensuring the dignity of the individual and the unity of the nation. “…In our Constituent Assembly, this twenty-sixth day of November, 1949, do hereby adopt, enact, and give ourselves this Constitution.”Constitution came into force on January 26, 1950.Later in 1970s,two more words were added, and that were “Socialist” and “Secular’. We had felt the need to pronounce these two words that we had earlier found in built. When the first election (1952) results were declared, our first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru had sent letters to all chief ministers saying that it was not the victory of any party, it was the victory of secularism.

Perhaps we should take stock of things now, after so many decades.

We had promised equality for ourselves in the Constitution, but the resources had all dried up. The country had been ‘bleached white’ by the British imperialism. Draining our economy to enrich their own, “British steam and science had uprooted the whole surface of Hindustan” (Karl Marx). We had to start rebuilding from the scratches. Our polity strengthened with constitutional commitments, greater share of infrastructural blueprint for foundation of heavy industries was prepared under the authority of state, not any individual. In super structure, education, science, health, progress and peace were all the pillars that stood to guard our democracy and freedom.

It was also true that state was dominated by entire capitalist class, and monopolies also had their own way, but the communists kept up their fight against every conservative step. We had liberated Pondicherry and Goa despite resistance. We had been instrumental in nationalising banks, mines and fought and gained rights for working class. All India Kisan Sabha had also its achievements.

But for every such move, within Parliament and without, there were the challenges from the forces of right, eroding the system. Their assertions are seen in the rise of finance capital, a new stage that capitalism has evolved into. Power in hand, they are busy in privatising every sector.

With prices hiking, essentials have gone beyond common citizen’s reach. We stand in front of a wall, the wall of depravity, and deprivation. According to Global Hunger Index (GHI), the score shows consistent fall since 2015. The data comes only from either the GHI or the government itself. The ruling regime has not accepted the charge since its own data shows otherwise. Government has even questioned the reliability of the survey.

GHI has shown a regular fall in figures, especially in urban areas. Hunger is generally characterised with quantity and the quality consumed. The government also has argued that three out of every four respondents are children, hence it cannot represent the entire population. But if the children are hungry, the country loses its human capital, the real treasure of a society. If the issue is not taken into account, the undernourishment may cause the growth in mortality rate. In fact children are the future and hope, for us, for the country, to keep alive the optimism.

The other face of the right reaction is seen in eco-politics flows. There is loss of investment, as the industrial capital has been merging with the banking capital. Last month unemployment rate surged to 8.3 percent as employment sequentially fell by two million to 394.6 million. The government at the Centre is not concerned about either the jobless growth from 2014 to 2022or the great employment crisis in the informal sector. There is no attempt made to recover from the fall.

But workers want results. They need jobs, and hence, there is simmering opposition to it. AITUC has been taking steps to organise agitations and movements against such injustices. In the rural sector too, agrarian labour and the farmers are launching movements. It is people’s unity getting organised for agitation.

Against this unity, Hindutva has been used to play the divisive role. Its communal fascist role comes alive in the book ‘Hindutva, Who is a Hindu’ by VD Savarkar, where he defines it, “…for though Hindusthan to them is Fatherland as to any other Hindu, yet it is not to them a Holyland too. Their Holyland is far off in Arabia or Palestine. Their mythology and Godmen are not the children of this soil.” The formulation seems familiar when we go through the role of fascists in Germany. Savarkar had praised the role of Hitler for his barbaric act of elimination of Jews. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Communist Party of India was formed on December 26, 1925. It has been a day that makes us remember how the suffering Indian masses were united against the forces of British imperialism. The commitment to fight to end the class divided society, to end exploitation, and to create a society for people has been kept alive through all these decades. We pay homage to all those who lived and died for the cause.

In the years gone, through theory and practice, with the changes and shifts, the stages of the struggle have been concretised. In every congress since then the imperative need for unity as well as struggle was underlined.

As for the stages, Lenin had defined the national movement, including ours, as a broad front of anti-imperialist forces. It was when he was speaking in the second congress of the Comintern articulating the tasks of the communists in the colonial countries. CPI assimilated the significance of united front that was the need of the time and was coming to terms with the decision that was truly Leninist. Facing colonial onslaught, Indian masses were in the midst of struggle for freedom, that promised parliamentary and constitutional system as against colonial rule.

Georgi Dimitrov said while speaking to the seventh World Congress about the tasks of communists in Indian situation, “…While maintaining their political and organisational independence, they must carry on to work actively inside {the trends within} the Indian National Congress, facilitating the process of crystallisation of a national revolutionary wing among them’’… for the purpose of developing the national revolutionary movement of the entire people against British imperialism.

In the run up to Second World War, in 1935, general secretary of the Communist International Georgi Dimitrov came with his famous thesis on United Front, in the context of the new turn imperialism was taking as an objective force, and that was fascism itself.  Anti fascist front was emerging as the answer to the primary need to rein in the rising fascist forces that was posing challenge to every democratic system in the world. Soon only after three years in 1939, second world war started.

It also goes to the credit of CPI that the first anti- fascist march in the world was organised on the streets of Mumbai in 1939 by the seventy thousand workers of Girni Kamgar Union along with the citizens of the city.

It was clear that under the leadership of CPI, guided by what Dimitrov had spoken from the rostrum of the Comintern, the concept of National Front emerged along with the progressive forces uniting in the national scene. The writers and students were organised along with the cultural workers. CPI had moved into a phase of cultural Renaissance when during the first congress of the Communist Party of India in 1943, Indian People’s Theatre Association was born. It was an act of invincible optimism and did not stop there. All India Kisan Sabha launched peasant agitation in West Bengal in 1946-47. There was also the continued historic land struggle in Telangana (1946-51) led by the CPI.

It was the national stream for freedom that kept up its united struggle in the face of horrors of famine in Bengal, war and rising atrocities of colonialism against the rebelling masses.  They had known that it was the moment to realise their dream for complete freedom, and had started closing in.

The country got national independence on August 15, 1947. There had been the first election in 1952. CPI had emerged as the main opposition force in the Parliament.  There were significant changes in the national context.  Class relations had changed to new levels. There was the need to prepare the blue print for analysis and action. The economy had gone sluggish, almost at the lowest levels, and dependent on agriculture which itself made the contribution in country’s economy of only 48.1 per cent. Factory production was only three percent.  It was the national bourgeoisie as a whole that was in power at the centre. Big bourgeoisie had strong feudal connections and   had a share in governance.

The search for a new path was initiated hurriedly. The capitalist path was failing to bring fast economic recovery, slipping into a phase of stagnation. Right reaction had started attacking everything that was progressive. But it was also true that there were many patriotic elements among the national bourgeoisie that were part of the power sharing and were moving in support of the progressive goals. They had antagonistic relations with the imperialist forces, the Indian monopolies and the landlords and thus creating a possibility to forge unity among anti monopoly, anti feudal and anti imperialist forces against the right. The journey of the Indian masses moving towards democratic revolution had begun.

There were gains also. Democratic institutions were built. Research organisations contributed to the traditions of scientific knowledge. The state sector moved ahead with production of steel, fertilizer, medicines, textiles, cement etc to meet the basic needs, and the factories producing them were addressed by then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru as the Modern Temples of India. He never knew that the same temples would be put in the market for sale. For last several years, our country has been facing the ruling forces compromising with imperialism.

The 24th congress of our party held in Vijayawada from October 14 to 18, 2022 has dealt with these questions in detail and concluded that our struggles for democratic rights are not separate from democratic revolution, instead it is part and parcel of the broad democratic revolution which will create conditions for strengthening democratic institutions. In the deliberations of the congress, Imperialism and its ominous role has been properly highlighted. Communal fascism and its right wing regime also have been spelt out clearly. In these difficult days, broadest possible united front has to be formed and in all this the CPI will have an independent role on principled basis. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

In almost every act of development, there keeps flowing an undercurrent of loss. Every beginning is based on the negation of its preceding one. One glaring example is that of global warming. There is smog, wide spread and dense, erosion destroying the course of streams and rivers that had sheltered the human settlements for centuries, leading to ecological migration, ozone destruction, the clearing of tropical forest for timber and arable land to meet the demands of time, including that of Amazon, the collapse of ocean fisheries and other common-access resources, and heightened extinction rates. Here comes the relevance of what Frederick Engels had said, in his Dialectics of Nature elaborating on the human-nature antagonism, “…Men destroy it (the nature) in order to sow crops on the soil thus released, or to plant trees or vines.”

All the steps that humans take are almost all planned, while the animals never plan. Engels said, “…animal merely uses the environment and brings about changes in it simply by its presence; man by his changes makes it serve his ends, masters it. This is the final essential distinction between man and other animals, and once again it is the labour that brings about this distinction.”  Engels does not stop here and goes on, “Let us not, however, flatter ourselves over much on account of our human victories over nature. For each such victory, nature takes its revenge on us. Each victory, it is true, in the first place, brings about results we expected, but in the second and third places, it has quite different and unforeseen effects which only too often cancel the first.”

Engels points out further that with better understanding of the laws of nature, society was having a better view of immediate and long term effects of our actions in nature. He also discussed the complexities in the interaction of the natural and social factors and great importance of the latter. It is also significant how he deals with the question at classical political economic level. He says that in capitalism and in all other socio-economic formations preceding capitalism, one had been concerned only or mainly with the immediate and direct results of labour and production without bothering about the long term ecological effects. Classical political economy, he said, examines only the social effects of human actions in the fields of production and exchange that are only intended towards about immediate production and sale of these commodities. Citing the example of Spanish planters in Cuba that were concerned only with burning down the fields to the extent that only bare rocks were left, he said, “In the present mode of production, only concern has been about the immediate and most tangible results.”

Marx had also brought out details about environmental loopholes in the British capitalist society. He wrote interesting details about pollution and argued along with Engels that it was essential to have a strong link between industrial and agricultural production.  In fact Marx and Engels were the philosophers and scientists who analysed the society and repeatedly held responsible the capitalist society for the worrisome situation. It was the duo of Marx and Engels who had prepared the blue print of scientifically organising the downtrodden for demanding change in the exploitative socio-economic system.

They analysed the ecological dangers of the industrial society scientifically and all their prophecies have come true. Tsunami, earthquakes, droughts and massive floods are now common, every minute are burning long stretches of forests, toxic gases spreading their infections and making the atmosphere poisonous, promoting pandemics. All these devastations point towards the fact that repercussions of anarchic ‘development’ are let lose. It is time to take up ecological issues with primary concern. The threat to nature has become threat to life on earth. Perhaps it would need a total revision of earth’s atmosphere, biosphere, noosphere among so many other dimensions. But as we enter the end of modernity and reach out to the post modern days, collective thinking slowly has been pushed into the past.

It is the singularity of the regime that takes the final call. Entire approach has been shifted towards ways that serve the vested interests. The recent sale of the forest land is here that unveil the obvious. Incidents are there when the deal is cleared and price is collected without taking into confidence the provincial governments, despite the fact that the issue is under concurrent list. Approval of the victims, the forest inhabitants, is of no concern. Not even the legal side of it.

Instead of bringing back the balance that the criticality of the moment needs imperatively, the law has been revised to allow for de- reservation of forest land and use of it for non-forest purposes. Noose has started tightening fast. The changes to be brought in the Forest (Conservation) Rules, 2022 are meant to push the dwellers of the forest to the end, and the effects it would have are not just for the people living in the forests but for ecology itself. Nature stands almost bereft of its gifts. It is not only forests, rivers and mountains, but the entire human habitat that is facing the challenge — singular and almost invincible. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Driven by good performance compared to other sectors during the pandemic, agriculture has absorbed an additional 11 million workers over the last three years while the rest of the economy lost 15 million jobs, said the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE). Jobs apart, the question remains where does the surplus from the bumper crops gets accommodated.

According to CMIE’s Consumer Pyramids Household Survey, agriculture saw an estimated 4.5 million increase in employment during fiscal 2021-22. While total employment fell by 21.7 million in the pandemic year of 2020-21, agriculture provided employment to a substantial 3.4 million. In 2019-20 as well agriculture saw an addition of 3.1 million to its count of employed.

This has been possible because of good monsoon, bumper production and higher prices, the CMIE said. It is a fact that even though there was a hike in prices in agricultural production, that hardly helped the rural producers. Life remained as hard as ever. With the bumper crops, difficulties for the farmers were not resolved as the market forces were not in their side. Situation remained grim and the migration rate was huge. There were the adversities, in 2019-20, and yet agriculture grew by 5.5 percent, while the non-agricultural sectors grew by a lower 3.5 percent. In 2020-21, agriculture grew by 3.3 per cent, though the rest of the economy shrunk by 6.3 per cent. In 2021-22, while economy was recovering from its deep fall, agriculture continued to grow by 3.3 per cent.

The industry and services sector, that constitutes more than 80 percent of the gross value added (GVA) in the country, provides employment to 54.4 percent of work force, and so far as agriculture is concerned that accounted for 18.19 percent of GVA in 2019-20, and retained 45.6 percent of the workforce.

Agriculture is one sector that has the highest number of people employed as agricultural workers, as high as 151 million in the financial year of 2021, despite the epidemic and lock down that had the extreme negative impact on the country’s GDP ratio. Agrarian sector was the only one that saw an increasing employment trend. With a year-on-year growth rate of 4.1 percent, the sector accounted for almost 40.9 percent of employment growth. Number of people employed in this sector, in millions in the financial year of 2021, was 151.79, for 2020, it was 145.88, for 2019, 143, for 2018, 143.83, and for 2017, it stood at 145.66.

As per census, 2011, conducted by the registrar general of India, the total number of agricultural workers in the country went up from 234.1 million, among them were included 127.3 million cultivators and 106.8 million agricultural workers. In recent years the share of agricultural workers has come down to 58.2 percent in 2000 and by 2011, it was 54.6 percent. Migration of rural to urban areas by the agricultural workers was one factor that took its toll in this shift. It was in fact a general phenomenon and natural in the development process. The reason for this shift was lure for better wages, employment opportunities, in industries and services as the graph of urbanisation was going up.  In a market economy like India has, the movement of people for better opportunities is inevitable. The food grain production kept up its high levels. During 2018-19, the production was estimated as 284.95 million tonnes (As per fourth advance estimates, 2018-19).

As per the seventh schedule of our Constitution, land comes under the purview of state government, and therefore it is on the state governments, to make efforts to increase cultivable land, and the Centre has to help the states through supplementing in crop development programmes. But in reality, the Centre is busy in acquiring land for its own vested interests. The purpose has been to serve the service and construction sector, and such non-productive areas that help the corporate sector to evolve. It is not the food grains they are interested in, the land in their hands turns into capital.

Despite the fact that India has further fallen in the Hunger Index to 107th position out of 121 countries, the government of India, instead of finding ways to resolve the ultimate, that concerns life, is busy criticising the agencies like Welthungerhilife or Concern Worldwide that calculate the index. When the country is facing the grim scenario, the latest India Wealth Report 2021, the number of dollar-millionaire households in India is increased by 11 per cent to 4,58,000 households in 2021, as compared to 2020. A household having a net worth of at least INR 7 crore (1 million dollar), is referred to as a dollar-millionaire household. The report has estimated that the number of dollar-millionaire households in the country shall increase by 30 percent over the next five years to reach 6,00,000 households in 2026.

The contrast is obvious. There is the growth, even though restricted, there are haunting shadows too. The basics are kept intact. The surplus from the bumper production does not feed the hunger of those living at the bottom, their wages are still not even the minimum, while MSP remains a far cry.  (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

The 30th anniversary of Babri Masjid demolition is December 6. The wound is still livid. Razing down of Babri Masjid was a major step towards destroying our composite culture. It was also a part of the Ayodhya strategy of Hindutva forces that awaits its completion. To remove the hurdles from the path towards autocratic rule, they had managed to remove Bapu, and later, they destroyed the 16th century structure of Babri Masjid illegally, gleefully on December 6, 1992.  They had realised that the challenge posed by Bapu could never be reined in because in his life time itself, he had comprehensively countered the project of Hindu Rashtra forcing its advocates, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Hindu Mahasabha, to the margins of Indian politics.

It was only Gandhi who could do it with his immense moral power and his all-out efforts as the supreme leader of the anti-British struggle that in a short span after Independence, the validity of the vision of a secular and democratic nation seemed beyond question. It rose above the turmoil of the time and became the unifying principle of the post-Independence India. It was this secular project of Independent India that was sought to be derailed by the assassination of Gandhi.

Babri Masjid, in its quiet presence, symbolized the secular and democratic ethos that we inherited from Gandhi. By demolishing it, they sought to revive communal-fascist strategy that had been thrown to the margin by popular anger generated in the wake of the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi. The demolition of Babri Masjid thirty years ago shook the very core of the nation and furthered the Ayodhya strategy which had started on the night of December 22, 1949, a little less than two years after Gandhi’s assassination. Late that night, a little known sadhu, Abhiram Das, with his followers entered Babri mosque, and planted an idol of Ram inside it.

The act created ripples, seen in the Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s letter on March 5, 1950 to K G Mashruwala, editor of Harijan, the journal founded by Mahatma Gandhi, “You refer to Ayodhya Mosque. The event occurred two or three months ago, and I have been very gravely perturbed over this.” Jawaharlal Nehru could visualize the coming danger in the garb of majoritarianism, that was to crush the minorities and destroy the cultural ethos. Secularism was their main enemy. With rabid communalism as their leading light, they tried to consolidate the gains they had made in the temple town.  But success remained as elusive as always to them.

The turmoil created by the planting of the idol of Ram in the Babri Masjid gave way to legal battles. It was sacrilege, yet permission for carrying on the rituals for the idol was given by the court.

The issue remained politically dormant for over three and a half decades when it was revived by the RSS. It got the national attention which quickly turned it into the focal point of religious tensions between the two communities. To make the Ayodhya strategy more effective, the RSS conceived an elaborate plan to communalise the body politic.

Keeping Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), its electoral outfit, and Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), its affiliate responsible for mobilizing sadhus, in the front, the RSS set out to win the support of Hindus and Hindu religious groups through a series of mass ritual actions, use of religious imageries and conclaves of Hindu religious leaders for the campaign. The BJP president at the time, LK Advani, went on to start a Rath Yatra – a Toyota truck modified into a chariot – around the country to rally Hindus to the cause. His journey – yatra – began on  September 25, 1990 at Somnath in Gujarat, where a temple had been destroyed by a Central Asian Muslim invader, Mahmud Ghazni, in the eleventh century. The yatra was planned to go through hundreds of villages and cities in the states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh before reaching Ayodhya. Though Advani was arrested before he could enter Uttar Pradesh, his yatra, by bringing militant Hindu sentiments to the fore and provoking communal riots along its route, transformed the BJP into a major political force in the country.

A series of events thereafter, carried out by the RSS and its affiliates, culminated in the demolition of Babri Masjid on December 6, 1992.

The demolition was a stunning shock. It shook the inner core of the nation and revealed how the communal-fascist forces had made yet another bid to force India away from the secular-democratic path. By assassinating Gandhi in 1948, they had thought they would succeed. But the path that nation opted was not what they were keen about, it was robustly secular and democratic, the inheritance of Bapu. The attempts to push the country into chaos, fragmenting its identity, by demolition of Babri Mosque would never claim success. The offering of a ready-made and prefabricated Hindu majoritarian identity for the nation, the one that India had wrestled against in the past and which Gandhi had fought relentlessly and died for, would never succeed and be rejected lock, stock and barrel. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

That Savarkar had appealed to the British colonialists several times to get released and spared after he was sent for life transportation has been proved true through all the Maafinamas that are now in public domain, but that was not all. In these letters, he had not only pleaded for mercy, but clearly stated that if released, he would be loyal to the British government, which he did, all his life. The carpet had been full of skeletons underneath as was reflected in the letter Linlithgow, the longest serving viceroy (1936-1943), had written to the secretary of state for India.

The letter is dated October 7, 1939, two days before viceroy met Savarkar. The report of the meeting with Savarkar was placed in the postscript on October 9, immediately after the meeting which obviously viceroy considered significant from the point of view of the British vested interest in India. According to the letter, Savarkar had said, “Our interests were now the same, we must therefore work together.” As if that was not enough, the letter reveals further, “The Hindu Mahasabha,” he (Savarkar) went on to say, “favoured an unambiguous undertaking of dominion status at the end of the war.” (India Office (IO), MS EUR F 125/8 1939, Letters to the Secretary of State for India).

It was exactly the moment when the rest of the country, including the Left and the Congress demanded complete freedom from the British colonialists. They argued that if the country was set free, it could strive more to halt the Fascist forces, and this would be a great help to the Allied forces. In contrast to it, among the many mercy petitions Savarkar wrote, (the first one had come on August 30, 1911, which was less than two months when he was taken to Cellular jail), in one of them, he had written, “I am ready to serve the government in any capacity they like, for as my conversion is conscientious so I hope my future conduct would be. By keeping me in jail, nothing can be got in what would be otherwise. The mighty alone can afford to be merciful and therefore where else the prodigal son can return but to the parental door of the government?”

This promise was never violated, either in spirit or in practice. For his book, “Hindutva, Who is a Hindu”, was written just when the British government had witnessed the first great countrywide upsurge at the call of non-cooperation movement and was getting desperate to divide the Indians. Savarkar’s theory of Hindutva against the so called enemies, the Muslims, did not only promise to hold back a section of Hindus from joining the anti-colonial nationalist struggle, but it also promised to help the British in promoting its “divide and rule” policy in India. The promise of togetherness with colonial interest was not only kept alive but it blossomed further when the restrictions on his movements outside Ratnagiri were removed.

Savarkar started constantly moving towards shaping a battlefield so strategically that it could easily host a war between the two communities of Hindus and Muslims. Soon after becoming Hindu Mahasabha president in December 1937, he opted for the horrid political line that led to further fall in the earlier pervading sense of love and brotherhood. “There are two antagonistic nations living side by side in India,” he said at the nineteenth annual session of Hindu Mahasabha in Ahmedabad. “Several infantile politicians commit the serious mistake in supposing that India is already welded into a harmonious nation or that it could be welded thus for the mere wish to do so. […] India cannot be assumed today to be a Unitarian and homogenous nation. On the contrary, there are two nations in the main: the Hindus and the Muslims, in India.”

The threat was ominous and the path that Savarkar had undertaken was to be soaked in blood and death. Muslim League also followed the suit in early 1940, only months after Savarkar met the viceroy.

The demand of partition at the most crucial juncture in the history of Indian national movement signified a complete success of British government’s divide and rule policy. At the time, nationalists were in the mode of complete boycott of the British government ever since Linlithgow declared India’s participation in the Second World War on September 3, 1939, without even consulting them. In protest the Congress ministries resigned within a month. In October, 1940, Gandhi and Congress, in order to counter the British propaganda that India was supporting the war of its own free will, launched individual Satyagraha campaign. The nationalists pointed out the hypocrisy in Britain’s decision – to support the democratic forces in the war that were fighting against the Fascist forces, while still keeping India under their rule.

By contrast, Savarkar not only agreed for a promise of dominion status after war, but also declared his intention to take part in viceroy’s executive council and the war office in 1940. When the nationalists launched Quit India movement in 1942, Savarkar and all the Hindutva outfits stood with the imperialists. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Three coal mining workers died on September 18, 2022, due to suspected inhalation of poisonous gas while working in a rat hole coal mining at Tikok Malu hills in Ledo area under Margherita subdivision of Tinsukia district. Saidul Islam, Hussain Ali and Asmat Ali, all under thirty, died since it was suspected that there were no preventive steps taken against the deadly impact of environmental hazards, and here it was the poisonous gas emitting in the mine.  According to reports in the national dailies, illegal mining is continuing under the knowledge of district authorities, but   they are compelled to keep quiet because of the involvement of several ruling party leaders,

It is a common phenomenon. The hapless workers, in search of employment which has become a rare commodity, accept the mining jobs in these rat holes that have turned into death traps in the absence of inadequate security measures. Apart from gas, there are accidental deaths too as the mines are left without any measures of renovation. Human lives are considered cheaper than the coal they bring from the mines. The accident is not without context, though media is not allowed to cover them.

First time it was in Jogigopa, 900 km from the recent spot. This rat hole is not the only one, there are at least one thousand such mines in this district alone. The voices against the hazards are not allowed to be raised. Rat hole mining is not the only threat to life, whether it is the human life, wild life or the green life of nature itself. But in each of these cases, the responsibility falls on the greed to exploit the nature. Dehing Patkai Park is spread out in an area of 89.44 km of rainforest, declared a wild life sanctuary, on June 13, 2004.

On December 13, 2020, state government of Assam declared it a national park. On June 9, 2021 Forest Department of Assam officially notified it as a national park. The national park is spread over the largest stretch of lowland rainforests in India. Despite its mesmerising natural beauty, the National Board for Wild Life has accepted a proposal recommending the usage of 98.59 hectares of land belonging to the Dehing-Patkai Wild life reserve, for extraction of coal by Coal India ltd. Dehing is a river flowing through the forest while Patkai is a mountain, and no one is sure what future has in store for them.

The NBWL discussed Saleki also, a proposed reserve forest land, for a coal mining project by North Eastern Coal Field. Saleki is a part of Dehing-Patkai Elephant Reserve forest, covering 111.19 square km of rain forest and several reserve forests spread out to Dibrugarh, Tinsukia and Sibsagar districts. The scientists have also realised that there is a steep rise in zoonotic diseases directly linked with biodiversity and forest destruction. Zoonoses have opened the gates for Bird Flu, Ebola, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), Nipah Virus, Zika Virus and finally Corona Virus

It will not be surprising that the tsunami of all these deadly ailments are found to have the only source, and that is human interference. During Pandemic, Union ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) planned out industrial and infrastructural projects detrimental to environment security. In fact a new set of rules have been introduced, which is draft Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) Notification, 2020, and would replace EIA Notification of 2006 with, and that would be totally contrary to principles of environmental protection. The approval granted by NBWL proves violation of forest conservation Act, 1080.

North Eastern Coalfields is subsidiary of Coal India Limited which was granted a 30 year mining lease of this region in 1973. Since then North Eastern Coalfields have continued mining in the area. The lease expired long back in 2003, but it has continued mining illegally. Dehing-Patkai wild life area and its elephant reserve are in the same danger that our miners face in the rat hole mining in Dibrugarh. These are all the tips of an iceberg. The reality is even more grim and worrisome.

Climate change report has pointed out that India is one of the 197 countries that had made a promise of not letting the Green House effect to cross 1.5 C by 2030. The Climate Action Tracker, an independent analysis that tracks government climate action classifies India’s action as “highly insufficient”. It also says India’s continued support to the coal industry undermines a green recovery. The UN Climate Change report says the world is failing to act with urgency to curb greenhouse gas emissions despite the planet witnessing climate-enhanced heatwaves, storms and floods after just 1.2°C of warming.

Even if the countries meet their pledges, we are on track for around 2.5°C of warming, which will be disastrous. The findings are based on an analysis of the latest Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), or country-specific action plans to cut emissions and adapt to climate impacts. The report adds that emissions compared to 2010 levels need to fall 45 per cent by 2030 to meet the Paris deal’s goal! In fact, earth itself is rejecting the life that it once celebrated. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

October 31 was the day of ‘March on Rome’, when Mussolini proceeded towards the capital of Italy hundred years back, with his black shirt clad young boys with arms. Even before that on October 28, 1922, the king in Italy was forced to accept Mussolini as his prime minister. But that was not all. Mussolini, with the sole aim of destruction of democracy, organised a brutal massacre in 1925.

The barbaric killings helped him to establish his rule of terror. Despite the fact that he had woven terror at the roots of the autocracy he was moving towards, he had named it ‘a totalitarian state’. The year of 1925 was significant for us Indians as well. It was in the same year that Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh was born on September 27, though not without its nemesis, that is the Communist Party of India, founded on December 26, 1925.

In 1925, Mussolini declared October 28 as the “Day of Fascist Revolution”. But the revolution never came to its completion. Even before that, on April 6, PCI, or the Communist Party of Italy took part in elections and despite fascist attacks and endless interruptions, managed to get 2,68,000 votes and several seats. Among those who came victorious, Antonio Gramsci was one of the most popular leader.  The decade of 1920s presented quite a few difficulties for the party when the Mattiotti crisis burst out. Mattiotti was a socialist parliamentarian brutally killed by fascists.

Italy was torn in sharp and strong contradictions. Anti fascist forces started raising their heads and communist leaders like Togliatti and Gramsci started writing in support of united front against the fascist rule. In 1931, in the fourth congress of the PCI organised in Germany, Italian leader Togliatti brought in the slogan of United Front, and at his initiative, radicals, Trotskites, socialists and the communists came together and had an agreement on August 17, 1934. Soon after in 1935, in the seventh congress of the Communist International, Georgi Dimitrov stressed on the unity of countries and classes to defeat fascism.

It was in these days that PCI leader Togliatti, in his article, ‘From where does fascism gains its strength,’ wrote that fascism must be recognised in its true colours. He warns against repeating the meaningless statements and dogmas and cautioned that the example of fascism in Italy should not be used mechanically in the context of other countries. He said that whatever is true about Italy could be so in other countries too but not always.  In his lectures, he analysed the emergence, its structure and its class character as well as differences between Nazism in Germany and Fascism in Italy. Fascism must be seen in its real colours, which is not at all another form of capitalist democracy.  Despite the limitations, democracy is never another form of fascism.  Also fascism is not the same as the democratic rule with its oppressive character and being without people’s support.

Togliatti defined fascism as the terrorist dictatorship of chauvinist elements, that are imperialist, reactionary features of finance capital. Fascism prepares popular ground for the growth of monopoly capital. Togliatti and the other communists stressed in the thirteenth plenum that fascism also prepares its widely popular foundation even among petty office workers, civil servants who have been disconnected from their own identity. During the first world war itself, Lenin had seen that imperialists and monopoly capitalists were shirking away from those features of democracy that got developed during the beginning of fascist evolution and in return, try to attack them.

In fact this new economy has a feature which is monopoly capitalism and develops from political democratic system to political reaction. This is according to the competition free from democracy, and follows political reactionary monopoly economy. Lenin had observed that here is a natural trend in monopoly capital to attack democracy and to establish an open autocratic rule. He always criticised the limited role of democracy and stressed on socialist democracy. But it was also true that he always stood for defending democracy in capitalism and how in capitalism democracy must be protected.

Even after so many decades, these facts remain unchanged. One example is India itself. There is the finance capital ruling over the economic scene. The level of exploitation has arrived at unprecedented levels. Fascism has offered the concept of corporate state, but corporatisation itself has proved to be source of contradictions. Parliament used to be one space where people’s representation was visible. Fascism made it its one of the first targets. The masses, burdened with laws, find it impossible to carry further. But their optimism is still alive since even Mussolini was not spared. He had to face the masses and pay in the same coin he had treated others with. (IPA Service)

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By Sushil Kutty

Most times we forget there is also Himachal Pradesh in the Union. Tucked between Punjab and the high Himalayas, largely Hindu–dominated with a burgeoning Muslim-led demographic change. This is a state nestling in the lower reaches of the Himalayas, a paradise on earth largely gone unnoticed because the pure-driven snow hasn’t so far been shaken and stirred by the rip-roar of too many contentious issues.

Or, are we wrong? Himachal Pradesh these days is preparing for another assembly election. And November 12 is the Election Commission-set date for a good day of voting. Right now, sturdy men of the hills are lugging electronic voting machines to nooks and crannies of Himachal Pradesh in preparation of November 12 and what the day holds for the idyllic state with a rugged exterior.

And, unlike the multi-polar of most plains-states, Himachal Pradesh, as usual, will witness a bipolar contest between the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress, though for several tantalizing days, it did look like the broom-wielding Aam Aadmi Party would make it three-cornered fight with a potential Punjab-like sweep with the “jhaadu”.

But only witches hitchhike by broom! And, with apologies to AAP convener Arvind Kehriwal, Himachal Pradesh is the land of “devis” and “devtas”. The Delhi Chief Minister had recently let it out that he shares ‘Janmashtami’ with Lord Krishna and had been sent to rid Modi’s home-state Gujarat of the ‘Kans’ who have been depriving Gujarat of state of the art Delhi-model government schools.

Himachal Pradesh has no such schooling problems and, therefore, can do without a Manish Sisodia! But the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress aren’t sitting idle because there is no AAP in the fray to fray nerves. AAP or no AAP, nothing will dent the three-decade old Congress-BJP electoral rivalry with both parties forming governments every consecutive five years.

However, like happened in Kerala, where the CPM-led LDF found favour with the electorate for a second straight term, surprising the Congress-led UDF, Himachal Pradesh too could reward the BJP with another five years in office. That said, the electorate cannot be trifled with. Electoral democracy quite often does let one slip through. The hilly terrain is natural for bouncers. And AAP can come from behind to hit both the contenders.

So, every passing night is bringing Himachal closer to D-day. At least one Opinion Poll has predicted a winning lead for the BJP with the AAP dredging the bottom, and the Congress sandwiched. AAP’s promised freebies may or may not find traction, but that is conjecture. What runs through the heads of the electorate is hard to pinpoint in a fluid state.

That being said, the bitter cold months in the hill-state could do with an excise minister of the right proof. AAP’s Manish Sisodia has the gift to set the bar high. Sisodia is New York Times-endorsed set against the perennially-trolled in bold letters Modi. AAP, if it does a ‘Punjab’ in Himachal, will be the toast of more than half of India, and feted in columns and pictures by the Western media. Kejriwal will join Sisodia in the ‘NYT Hall of Fame’.

Meanwhile, the BJP is flaunting the past five years’ development works and the Congress has picked corruption, price rise and unemployment to pummel the BJP with. An old pension scheme for government employees has been pulled down from the rafters for trading recriminations. Health is another election issue along with education.

Under the circumstances, the BJP is doing what it can do—stressing that “double-engine ka Sarkar” was best for Himachal Pradesh. Also, urging stop thinking anti-incumbency when pro-incumbency was so much more rewarding. The Centre and state can together take Himachal to further heights.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has found time to visit the state with his regular spiel told in the fashion he has perfected in the series of elections that has taken place since May 26, 2014, the date that separates after Modi from before Modi. The Washington Post carried an article on October 17 talking of the wedge between Hindus and Muslims under Modi, and how Modi has to go, no matter what, doesn’t matter how.

Fortunately, unlike during the UP elections earlier this year, Hindu-Muslim hasn’t vitiated the atmosphere in Himachal Pradesh. The BJP is betraying nervousness linked to anti-incumbency. The trio of Modi-Shah-Nadda campaigned in Himachal. The Congress on the other hand is anchored by its state leadership, which is hamstrung by lack of talent. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra addressed a rally, but neither Sonia Gandhi nor Rahul Gandhi have cast a sideways glance.  The Congress has still three weeks left before the polls for bridging its gap with the BJP. Can the GoP get back the hilly state from the BJP buoyed by Bharat Jodo Yatra’s big success in southern parts of the country? (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

October 2 is here again. The day Bapu was born. The unforgettable message Bapu conveyed to us was about change, its being eternal. He told us it is the way life is. Even the truth for which he laid his life. His last words, when the bullet pierced him, were “Hey Ram”! He was not unprepared. Not surprised. He knew his people only too well and the ‘other’ too. They had no roots among us. Us includes not only India, but beyond too. Bapu took us all in his thin bony arms. As he slowly crumbled, he knew it was not defeat. Only Godse and his mentors started shrinking. For them, Hindu Rashtra, the aim itself, got demolished after Bapu was killed.

In the aftermath, RSS was banned. Its leaders were all incarcerated. Even after the ban was lifted one and a half year later, RSS was not accepted by people; they remained sceptical.

Worldwide, October 2 is celebrated as International Day of Non-Violence, the day when we all redeem our pledge to resist peacefully any attack on civil liberties.

Non-Violence, for Bapu, was not within the limits of negation or assertion of it, it was absence of even the awareness of violence. He wanted us to understand it, which was not only fearlessness. Hence when the gunman was facing him with pistol to shoot for the third time, because first two shots were totally unexpected, Bapu simply glanced at him for a moment, and collapsed.

It was intimately within our cultural ethos. There was no complain in his last glance at Godse.  And thus he took his own murderer within, making him as his own. The cultural multiplicity arrived at new levels, levels of humanity, humaneness. And here we can experience that Hindu nationalism, a communal identity of our people, is left far behind, shrinking and cruel. That was a great victory against Hindu nationalism.

Nationalism as such, that was fighting against colonial forces, for freedom, democracy and secularism had a much wider canvas, covering all the communities, tribes, the entire people. The source of its inner strength was maintenance of civil liberties and their extension. In fact the press was the only organ to play the role of opposition. There was no democracy. But there was press. When the first political strike of workers erupted, in 1908, spontaneously, almost unorganised, was against sentencing Tilak for six years as he was writing profusely against the colonial government. The series was called

The Arrival of Bomb and he was not so much going by the events but was constantly trying to probe the reasons behind these. He said the government was not allowing dissent, not giving freedom to think and act, youth are groping to find answers in these acts of violence.  Tilak condemned violence, and yet he was charged with sedition. When someone tried to warn him of possible incarceration, his reply was the colonial government had turned the entire country into a big jail, and going to prison was like moving into a smaller cell from a bigger one. The reaction to his prosecution was unprecedented. Textile workers of Bombay came out on streets, and continued to be there six days — exactly for as many days as the number of years Tilak was to spend in jail, 1908 to 1914. Years later, Com Lenin, after coming to know about the workers’ strike, hailed them at ‘their entry in the political stage of India’. He also called Tilak ‘a revolutionary’.

Years later, in 1922, Gandhiji was also charged with the same sedition. It was surprising that there were millions who were on streets following Bapu, lacs in jail, in course of Non –Cooperation movement, but the colonial government did not pin any charges against these. Gandhiji was charged with sedition for writing articles in his paper ‘Young India.’ Gandhiji had said one should defend the civil liberties even with life. He said it was the breath of social and political life.  For him it was the foundation of freedom. Freedom was imperative, and civil liberties had no limits. It was the water for life, he said. To keep the water pure, he could even go up to accommodating differences, since water is the life line for human kind, and so are civil liberties.

It was not only the question of civil liberties, but also the struggle for it. And in this struggle, to strengthen it further, there was acute need to unite. The Meerut conspiracy case against the communists was one example when all the anti British forces got united and became formidable. Our thirty two leaders were arrested whom the government thought extremists. The effort was made to create a rift, but they failed. It was because steps were taken to keep opposition alive. It is the heritage of our national movement, where nationalism was blossoming. The British had been keen to suppress the communists, but contrary to that, even the common masses became acquainted with the communist ideology. Meerut was a small town in United Provinces, where the prisoners were kept, and yet every bit of news was reaching public domain in no time. Credit goes to our nationalist press that was splashing them every day.

Lest we forget, it was an example of united struggle of our people against the common enemy. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Telangana Armed struggle was a Communist led rebellion of peasants against princely state of Hyderabad in the region of Telangana.  Basically the struggle was to liberate the peasants from unjustified exploitation and merge Hyderabad in the Indian Union when it attains freedom.  The book of Com Rajbahadur Gaur, published by the Communist Party of India (CPI) in September 1947, soon after India got independence, had been titled correctly as it said Tricolour Shall Fly Over Hyderabad. Dr Rajbahadur Gaur was a renowned communist leader of the peasant rebellion that had started in 1944-46 and was  involved in insurrection in 1946-51.

In Hyderabad, with a feudal monarchy, most of the land concentrated in the hands of landed aristocrats known as doras, exploitation was extremely severe. It was a system of agrarian slavery, with doras wielding complete power over the peasants. Conditions worsened during 1930s and a transition was there towards commercial crops.  In the forties, the peasants started turning towards communism, organised themselves through Andhra Mahasabha and began a rights movements.

Catalyzed by a food scarcity that affected the region, following the end of the second world war the movement escalated into a rebellion after the administration and the doras attempted to suppress it. The revolt began on July 4, 1946, when a local peasant leader was killed in the village of Kadavadi in Warangal by the agents of a dora. Beginning in the district of Nalgonda and Warangal, the rebellion evolved into a revolution across Telangana in response to continued repression by the Nizam Mir Osman Ali Khan and later Kasim Razvi.

The Hyderabad state forces and the police, combined with the paramilitary Razakars, were unable to suppress it and were routed, while the rebel forces went on a successful guerrilla offensive. Rebels established a parallel system of government composed of gram rajyams and village communes, which caused a social revolution where caste and gender distinctions reduced. Women participation increased, including in their armed squads. Conditions of the peasants also improved with land distribution.  At its peak in 1948, the rebellion covered nearly all of Telangana with at least 4,000 villages directly administered under their control.

Communists had been active in the Telugu speaking Godavari-Krishna delta region of the neighbouring regions since 1934 and largely organised through peasants’ organisations such as the Andhra Mahasabha (Madras), and the All India Kisan Sabha. The first incursion of the communist movement in Telangana occurred in the Madhira-Khammam area of Warangal district, through peasants who had settled down at the Wyra and Paleru irrigation projects, and had relatives in Coastal Andhra.

The first communist organisations were established in Warangal and Nalgonda districts through the efforts of Chandra Rajeswar Rao, renowned communist leader working in Mungala. The Regional Committee of the Communist Party of India in Telangana was established under the leadership of Pervaelli Venkataramanaiah in 1941.

The students’ movement contributed significantly to the growth of the communist movement. Having gained experience through the Vandemataram protests, a number of radical progressive students organizations were established which eventually merged to form the All Hyderabad Students Union in January 1942. Devulapalli Venkateswara Rao, a former student agitator during the Vandemataram protests, was instrumental in building up the Communist Party in the districts of Warangal and Nalgonda. The nationalist, progressive and secular intelligentsia in the city of Hyderabad turned towards political radicalism as well, influenced by Naya Adab publicizing communist literature, and through the Comrades’ Association initially formed in reaction to the growth of communal sectarian organisations. The association became communist under the leadership of Raj Bahadur Gaur and Makhdoom Mohiuddin.

In February 1947, the British administration announced the transfer of power to the Indian leadership and gave the princely states the option of either joining India or Pakistan or becoming independent. The Nizam of Hyderabad, the Muslim aristocrats and the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Musalmeen wanted Hyderabad to become an independent state but the vast majority of people wanted the state to merge with India in the hope of political freedom and participation in self-government.

The Communist Party added merger with India into its list of demands and aligned itself with the progressive left section of Indian National Congress which had started pressing Nizam to accede. In March 1947, when the division in the Congress became too sharp, the working committee of the State Congress was restored and Swami Ramananda Tirtha was re-elected with a wide margin of 751 to 498 votes against B.G. Rao, enabling him to completely exclude the moderates within the Congress. He praised the communists for their revolt and suggested the incorporation of a more revolutionary policy for the State Congress.

The Congress went on satyagraha seeking the merger of Hyderabad with India and the State Congress under Swami Ramananda Tirtha launched a civil disobedience campaign. The communists joined up with Congress workers in their agitation although they held reservations over the effectiveness of their methods. Soon most of the agitations in Telangana especially in the rural areas was carried out by communists, the police were unable to differentiate between the two and assumed that they had entered into a league. The general understanding among the communists was that the “rightist congressmen” were backed by the doras and opposed to any form of alliance with them while the “leftist Congressmen” wanted unification with the Communist Party but were unable to carry it forward.

The Andhra Conference, previously seen as a dora organisation, grew in popularity among the peasants and started being referred to as the Andhra Mahasabha (AMS) in Telangana. Venkateshwara Rao directly recruited disillusioned Congress members and sympathisers into the Communist Party during the same period. Initially faced with opposition from the moderate leadership, landlord organisations such as the Agriculturalists Association and through heavy political repression from the government, the AMS was slowly transformed into a militant mass organization opposed to the Nizamate with a coalition of peasants, the working class, the middle class and youths as its members. The process was completed in the 1944 Bhongir session of the AMS when two young communists, Ravi Narayan Reddy and Baddam Yella Reddy were elected as the president and secretary. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Covid was a reality all over the world in the years of 2020-2021.The epidemic was not alone, it was followed by devastation. The victim countries were dragged down from the development level they had been. India was no exception. But for other countries, their agenda never allowed any compromise with progress and hence, they arrived soon where they were. India was one country that remained unconcerned about the key indicators. Result was reflected in no uncertain terms in the ranking for the United Nations’ development index or HDI.

As was expected, India’s ranking was quite below the mark.  Decline had been there for last two years (2020 and 2021), lagging behind what all had been achieved before. Earlier, the country had been always at par with the world average. Today India has been ranked at 132 (2021), slipping from 130 in 2020, according to the Human Development Report 2021-22 released on September 8, 2022. The report, released by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), says India’s HDI value stood at 0.633 during 2021, which was lower than the world average of 0.732. In 2020, too, India recorded a decline in its HDI value (0.642) in comparison to the pre-Covid level of 2019 (0.645).

The lag is the crude reality today with people dying at much younger age. The factors that lead to this gloom are all thrown into one basket making Covid responsible for all the suffering. Till 2019, the average age in the country was 67.2 years but now, to be alive even after the average of 67.2 years is a boon.  In education too we lag behind, registering poor schooling and the resultant damage for the young ones. In the 11.9 years of schooling in the country, today in reality, it is available for hardly 6.7 years.

At the root of the tragedy is the unprecedented shrinking of income. The Gross National Income per capita level has slipped down to 6,590 dollar, labelling India as a lower middle-income country.  Jobs are like catching moon in your palm, that you would never wish to let go, at any cost, even life. Long hours of slogging, in extremely unhealthy conditions, and then at the end, promises drown in falsehood and you get underpaid. Still you continue putting at stake your conscience, your rights, and continue toiling at your peril.

It is here that country’s progress gets locked. Any kind of welfare steps are denied to those who produce the wealth, on which the life of a nation is kept flowing. It is in other words, demographic dividend. The report has come out pointing at the pitfalls in the handling of the employment scenario and the resultant suffering of our working class. It is the failure of the system that forces people from the lower depths to shoulder the responsibility of development and progress, and yet they are themselves kept with bottom level affordability. According to the report, a reduction has been registered in their Human Development Index value in 2020-2021, reversing much of the progress. It is the Sustainable Development Goals that are facing the brunt.

In the grim scenario, it is the MSME that has kept offering respite to the common masses. Compared to other sectors, availability of employment is greater here, whatever be the wages and the timings. But the skeletons started rolling out when emergency credit line guarantee scheme was introduced. The credit to MSMEs was for a maximum of 20 per cent of their outstanding debt. As per data, when the loans have been disbursed under this scheme to one crore accounts, 16.4 per cent of these accounts have turned non-performing due to financial stress the borrowers were going through. It was clear that Covid was not the only factor to keep economy suffering. It continued even after Covid days were over.

The data from the National Credit Guarantee Trustee Company reveals that 16.22 lakh loans have turned bad. In value terms, this works out to Rs 11,893 crore. This implies that it was the relatively smaller firms that have been under stress and have not been able to meet their obligations. The fact that in the first tranche itself of the scheme, most of the loans turned bad was a signal that it was only a tip of an iceberg, more tragedies were yet to roll out. MSMEs, both formal and informal, give jobs to the major section of labour force, and it is mostly this section that is victim of continuing financial stress.

While these numbers do reflect the extent of financial stress among the MSMEs, it is also relevant to point out that these are formal MSMEs. Formal sources are applicable only for them. Informal MSMEs are much larger in numbers and financial crisis is greater for them, since they are denied any access to formal sources.  With no access to credit and formal funding, their plight is much worse. Labour force getting visibly affected, their continuing financial stress points to the simmering distress in the labour market. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

Our economy is in shambles as growth without jobs goes up to 8.3 percent. Unemployment has been rated at 394.6 million, a fall in the employment availability by two million as the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) reports have revealed. In July, the unemployment rate was 6.8 percent while employment was 397 millions, reported CMIE. The urban unemployment, which is usually higher, was at about 8 per cent than the rural employment rate which is usually around 7 percent. In August Urban unemployment went up to 9.6 percent while rural unemployment was at 7.7 percent.

Unemployment left entire families without food. At least two hundred million people have no food security. In the countries where this basic essential to keep alive is scarce, India has the honour to have the largest number of people going hungry for days or surviving in famine conditions. In the ranking of global hunger index, 2017, it covers position 100out of 119 ranked countries with 31.4 percent food security situations which had been really grave. The problem has many serious dimensions.

Major among them is high prevalence of underweight children under five, a result of low nutrition and poverty among families. Despite the fact that National Statistical Office pointed out in its data released recently that our economy grew at 13.5 percent in the first quarter of the current financial year, the growth was studied taking a comfortable base line where there was a sharp fall in the economic growth due to pandemic in the first quarter of the last financial year. The Reserve Bank of India had also taken the same base line and came out showing the growth at 16.2 percent, over estimating without taking the context of the base line.

This also shows that despite a double digit growth, gross value added (which strips away indirect taxes and subsidies), has come out with a growth of mere 4.7 percent from first financial quarter of its pre-pandemic level, 2019-20. In agrarian sector, the value added in disaggregated data was 4.5 per cent in the first quarter of the financial year. The fall in GDP growth, falling number of opening in employment opportunities has brought the common masses to the brink. Among them are those that are either daily wagers or the self employed.

There is sharp rise among those who opt for ending life. Since 2014,  the number of these daily wagers who slog to get an under paid job with long stretched working hours to keep the family at least alive, losing a job itself is falling in an abyss. Life gets doomed and gloom swallows everything that could be spelt as bliss. They enter a world of eternal darkness, without any other option except to end one’s life. Share of daily wagers among those who die by suicide in the country has crossed the quarter mark for the first time, according to the latest report of the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) — one in four of the recorded 1,64,033 suicide victims during 2021 was a daily wage earner.

In the report, “Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India”, it has been recorded that the daily wage earners remained the largest profession-wise group among suicide victims in 2021, accounting for 42,004 suicides (25.6 per cent).

There is a separate list for the daily wage earners, from those called Khet Majdoor, slogging in the fields, and have been grouped in a sub-category under the head “Persons engaged in farming sector”.

In 2020, too, daily wage earners accounted for the highest share, with 37,666 (24.6 per cent) of the 1,53,052 recorded suicides in the country. In 2019, before the Covid outbreak, the share of daily wage earners was 23.4 per cent (32,563) of the recorded 1,39,123 suicides.

The latest report shows that not only did the share of daily wage earners among suicide victims go up during 2021, the number increased faster than the national average.

In the suicide data the categories taken by the NCRB are under nine profession-wise groups: students, professional/salaried persons, daily wage earner, retired persons, unemployed persons, self-employed persons, house wife, persons engaged in farming sector and other persons. Among these groups, the highest increase of 16.73 per cent was recorded by “self-employed persons”:

While the number of suicides committed by “farmer/cultivator” has dipped, 5,579 in 2020 from 5,957 in 2019, those by “agriculture labourers” have risen sharply in 2020 to 5,098 from 4,324 in 2019.The overall share of “Persons engaged in farming sector” among the total recorded suicides stood at 6.6 per cent during 2021.

The “House wife” category accounted for 14.1 per cent of the total suicides during 2021, their number too increased by 3.6 per cent from 22,374 in 2020 to 23,179 in 2021.The report shows that the number of student suicides stood at 13,089 in 2021, up from 12,526in 2020. In 2021, the number of suicides by “retired persons” stood at 1,518 while 23,547suicides were recorded in the “other persons” category. (IPA Service)

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By Nitya Chakraborty

Quoting from our great epic Mahabharata on Sunday at an interaction with the law students, Chief Justice of India U U Lalit said “ Our motto in Supreme Court is ”Yato Dharmastato Jayah” meaning whatever is right shall prevail. Gandhari said this to Duryodhan while giving her blessings.CJI said “That’s the kind of ethos this country stands for. The judiciary is no exception.

Justice U U Lalit took over as the CJI on August 27 this year and he will be retiring on November 8 this year enjoying a tenure of only 74 days in this highest judicial position in the country. But for this new CJI, the short or long term of a tenure does not matter. From day one, he started shaking up the procedures of the apex court by speeding up the process of disposal. In first four working days, the Supreme Court disposed of 1293 miscellaneous cases and 106 regular hearing matters.

The most important is that the bench under the CJI ordered bail for the rights activist Teesta Setalvad which was denied by the Gujarat High Court and the observations made by the bench on the handling of the Teesta bail by Gujarat High Court, is a big step in ensuring that the High Courts and the lower courts do not deny or delay the granting of the bail to those eligible. The order in Teesta case holds the promise of the emergence of a vigilant court at lower level wedded to the principle of justice.

CJI said that the country stands for the ethos in favour of right. Our Constitution is the guarantor for that. But in the last eight years, that spirit of the Constitution and the Indian ethos which the CJI talked, is being violated by the ruling government at the centre led by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The right is being wronged, the level playing field in democracy for the political parties is being dismantled. The country has entered a period where the basic rights of the citizens are being denied as has been alleged by the former Supreme Court Justice B. N. Srikrishna in a recent interview.

The Supreme Court has kept pending many crucial petitions in the recent months, but two petitions concerning the Prevention of Money Laundering Act(PMLA) and the electoral bonds are still to get the final consideration of the apex court. As regards the PMLA, the apex court recently endorsed the PMLA as such and recommended review of two provisions. These two are of crucial importance since these provisions are being exploited by the central agencies, especially the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to pounce on the rivals of the present ruling elite. The Indian people who cherish democracy wish that the CJI does immediate follow up on the PMLA provisions review to ensure that the right will prevail over wrong as he wanted.

The PMLA had been enacted first by the Atal Behari Vajpayee government in 2002 in its first full time tenure and subsequently amended by the UPA government in 2012, but both the regimes launched investigations with great caution. Between 2002 and 2014, the Enforcement Directorate lodged only 112 cases in all and made an equal number of searches. There were few searches with political motives in both the regimes but there was no widespread impact.

But things took a bizarre turn after 2014 when Narendra Modi became the Prime Minister. In less than eight years between June 2014 and the end of March 2022, the Enforcement Directorate launched 5,310 cases, conducted 3086 searches, attached Rs 104,702 crore (1.4 trillion) worth of assets (calling these the “proceeds of crime”) and filed 880 charge sheets. But the net result was that it secured only 23 convictions. The Modi government brought about few more amendments to give extraordinary powers to the ED officials.

What was significant during this eight years of Modi period was that the PMLA was used with a deliberate purpose of weakening the political opponents on the one hand and impart fright among the industrialists on the other so that they only donated to the ruling party coffers avoiding any contributions to the political rivals like the Congress Party. A sort of ED terror was in force in the corporate world during this period so that only the BJP got all the high finances from the big and medium corporates to enable the party to steam roll the opposition parties in both assemblies and parliamentary elections.

In the past three years since 2019 Lok Sabha poll, the BJP government has relied more heavily on the PMLA and the ED to break the opposition alliance governments The ED has been used indiscriminately against the opposition leaders, in West Bengal, Assam, Bihar, Karnataka, Maharashtra and Jharkhand. No BJP leader has been investigated in the recent period though money is flowing with many of them and crores are being spent by the BJP leaders to buy the opposition legislators to destabilize the opposition governments.

Under the PMLA, the Enforcement Directorate can call anyone from anywhere in the country for interrogation without having to give a reason, record everything they say without a defence lawyer present, and use even minor discrepancies in their statements as grounds for arresting them. These enormous powers given to ED under PMLS are being used by the Narendra Modi government to destroy level playing field in the elections and cornering the opposition based on the misuse of the central agencies of the government.

Apart from the review of the provisions of extraordinary powers given to ED under PMLA, the pending petition challenging the Electoral Bonds Act, 2018 needs immediate hearing by the Supreme Court. Earlier Justice N V Ramana during his tenure expressed concerns about the misuse of electoral bonds but dismissed the petition to stay the fresh sale of the bonds which only fattened the coffers of the BJP. The state assembly elections are due by 2022 end and also in 2023. The next Lok Sabha elections are scheduled for March/April 2024. The BJP is taking full advantage of the sale of the bonds and this will totally dismantle the level playing field in the coming elections.

The functioning of democracy in the states in India as also at centre is under threat due to this money power. The level playing field has been lost for the non-BJP parties and all these have been possible due to the huge resources mobilised by the BJP through corporate donations, active support of the big traders and the big funds supply by the overseas Indians close to BJP as also the VHP dominated overseas religious bodies. The massive funds through the electoral bonds will only give a big boost to the financial power of the BJP before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. It now depends on the CJI to ensure his dictum “’whatever is right, shall prevail”” by giving urgent attention to both issues and set the wrongs into right. (IPA Service)

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By Krishna Jha

When in 2016, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) was targeted by the new regime, the students and teachers refused to submit. Classes continued under the open skies since authorities had locked the class rooms. Teachers kept their promise. Students debated the concepts that were posed as challenges to them. The undeterred steps showed that those attending the classes had realised the enormity of the crisis. In fact entire country was in the grip of it. Someone had pointed out that in independent India, whenever we had faced the polarising attack on our fabric, it had been only from those who believed in the supremacy of the majority over the minority. In fact, it had been Hindutva, keen to establish its exclusivity, ideologically and politically, that wanted to reconstruct India as a whole with absolute state power.

Earlier it had happened at the time of partition. Lakhs of people lost their lives. Families lost their dear ones. Women were violated with unimaginable brutality. A dividing line was stabbed and the country was cut into two.  It was the same in 1992, December 6, when Babri Mosque was demolished. One of the most sacred spaces for the minorities was violated. The ground where the mosque stood, there remained only a moist patch.

It has been said that what we are dragged through now is the same as it was in previous instances. But what we are engaged in is nation building, where there is no singularity. People are from multiple streams that reflect their literature, culture, way of living, all of which together construct their world view, which has to be respected. And yet there is the mainstream of national liberation struggle in the pre-independence days and now in post, when nationalism has kept evolving, unity in multiplicity.

It is that ‘revolutionary nationalism’ as it is called by Prof Mridula Mukherjee which has brought the blessings of Constitution, teaching us to respect those that are different, and yet they are us only. We live for the humanity, and if need be, we die for it. Our national liberation struggle, in its dirt and blood, starvation and epidemics, brings out the common masses, the people that we all are, and makes visible their multiplicity and the oneness. This is how we are all created, with our humane traditions of secularism, our democratic principles and the oneness, that brings fraternity, liberty and equality

It is the contribution of the days of post feudalism, when caste is no bar, opportunities and resources or gender cannot inhibit anyone for not taking part. When Tilak brought the Constitution of India Bill in 1895, and asked for voting rights, the adult suffrage was universal, for both men and women. The Constitution that was formally adopted in 1950, had its genesis fifty years back. For the ‘Father of modern India’, Raja Ram Mohan Roy, civil liberties were imperative, and the battle still goes on.

In contrast to it, for those who are trying to find the roots for the Hindu nationalism, the cadres are fed on the poison of communalism. There are efforts to engrave in them that any other community is inferior that is not Hindu. There is absolutely no tolerance for any other views and it was in this spirit that in those three weeks and several time there after that students and teachers were brutally attacked, mostly in the presence of police that mostly kept quiet.

The teachers and students were assaulted while keeping ‘nationalism’ as theme on which instead of debate or lectures, they preferred physical attack. But one fact glared out from the entire murky goings on. The Hindu nationalism believes in its singularity and hence the issue is not minorities submitting, instead it strives to take the command of entire consciousness of the people in the country. The RSS is different from fascism in Italy and Nazism in Germany. Its nationalism is based on reorganising whole of the society as a means to produce new kind of people, as Hindu. There would not be any other community at par with it, they all have to submit to Hindutva. Hindus would be made to believe that all the ‘others’ are racially inferior to them. They are aliens, invaders. Their identities are to be merged within Hindu culture and they must opt for conversion.

RSS believes in reinterpreting traditional cultural features, preserving them and also attributing new meaning to the symbols and practices, apparently in reaction to the disorienting influence of the western culture. It is to have a spread all over the society in which ideology plays only a subservient part. To substantiate his reasoning, VD Savarkar introduced traditions often alien to Hinduism. He tried to redefine Hindu identity to fight what was essentially the imaginary threat and introduced the concept of ‘Vedic Golden age’ to make his followers deflect from anti-British agitations and enter into anti-minority actions. The imaginary ‘Golden Age’ that had no real existence in history was turned as the corner stone of ethnic or communal Hindu nationalism. It was turned into a reference point, an imagined tradition, based on western examples and presented as revival of a lost tradition. It was plain and simple revivalism, a necessary component of fascism.  (IPA Service)

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