IN the morning on October 16, a Sunday, young women from different parts of Delhi arrived at the premises of the state office of Janwadi Mahila Samiti to take part in a workshop organised by its state committee. JMS in its state conference earlier this year had vowed to take up the task of building organisation amongst young women on an urgent basis. It was noted that to overcome the lack of our presence amongst young women in any significant way, the state committee will undertake systematic steps to approach young women and organise them around their demands.

Jharna Das Baidya, CPI(M) MP from Tripura raised a Special mention in the Rajya Sabha on August 3, on the issue of recent cases of trafficking of 31 young tribal girls from Assam. She expressed shock at the trafficking of 31 young tribal girls from Assam to Punjab and Gujarat, in the name of education, to indoctrinate them in Hindutva at the RSS camps. This violates the national and international laws on child trafficking. The victim girls belong to Bodo and Santhal communities in Assam’s Kokrajhar district. They were all aged between 8 to 14 years.

THE crisis of neoliberal globalisation has manifested itself in the resurgence of right wing politics throughout the world which is now signified by the vicious campaign of Trump in America. Despite the obvious signifiers in the last few years, it is also well acknowledged that the impending crisis is not new and has had a cascading impact on the life of the working classes of the world.

The All India Democratic Women’s Association(AIDWA) in a statement issued on June 3 has expressed solidarity with Pakistan’s women who reacted strongly to the statement made by Pakistan clergy “Beat wives lightly” as a violation of fundamental rights of women. AIDWA also condemned similar derogatory remarks by people holding public offices in India. AIDWA protested when the WCD minister made such remark in the context of marital rape not being applied to Indian families. It also protested against attack on Section 498A which criminalises domestic violence.

AS a part of the BJP government’s crackdown on the autonomy of educational institutes across the country, the organisers of a discussion in BPS Mahila Vishwavidyalaya in Khanpur Kalan, Haryana, were at the last minute asked to withdraw their invitation to AIDWA general secretary and Bhim Sports Awardee, Jagmati Sangwan, who was one of the main speakers in the discussion.