THE 17th Lok Sabha election, the notification for which has been issued, is going to be the most consequential election in the history of independent India. Much is at stake. This election will have a bearing on the future of the secular-democratic Republic as enshrined in the Constitution.
THE Indian economy in the 70s and 80s were marked with moderate growth rates of 3 to 4 per cent and registered up to 2 per cent growth in employment (SWI-2018). But markedly the post reform period of the 90s and 2000s clocked less than even 1 per cent of growth in employment corresponding to an economic growth of 7-8 per cent. This was also a period of a structural transformation with a reduced workforce in agriculture with...
MAINSTREAM bourgeois economics which is what occupies a hegemonic position in the academic world today is often criticized for being “unreal”, for proceeding on the basis of assumptions that obviously do not correspond to reality. This criticism however, though valid, does not capture its real intent, which is to serve as a means of camouflaging imperialism.
THE air strikes by India across the Line of Control (LoC) have been accompanied by much chest-thumping by the prime minister, by government and ruling party spokespersons, and camp-follower TV and other media personalities. This despite India’s reluctance or inability to release convincing evidence such as imagery of damage caused to and inside the targeted structures in Jaba Top, or evidence of a Pakistani F-16 fighter brought down during the Pakistani...
On March 8, thousands of women took to the streets of Delhi marching from Mandi House to Parliament Street in solidarity with the International Day of the Women, which witnesses’ global participation. In the spirit of fighting back, thousands of women thronged the streets of Delhi, with a spectrum of demands, from safety and the right to live with dignity to minimum wages and fair compensation of their work.
ON the very first day of the two-day countrywide general strike by workers on January 8-9, police in the Congress-ruled Rajasthan lathi-charged, used teargas and fired on the peaceful assembly of the workers in front of Japanese company Daikin Airconditioning Private Limited in the so-called ‘Japanese Zone’ in the Neemrana industrial...
OVER 300 participants including intellectuals, university professors, college students, scientists, bankers, lawyers, labour unions, women’s organizations, social activists, media-persons and others, deliberated on the continuing agrarian crisis over three days on March 01–03 at the national conference of the ‘Nation for Farmers Forum’ in the India International Centre, New Delhi.
ON March 9, the BJP-IPFT coalition government in Tripura started its second year in office. The government led by Biplab Kumar Deb and 8 of his colleagues in the cabinet had taken oath of office and secrecy in presence of PM Modi. As is the political practice in our country the first six months of a newly elected government is the honeymoon period when the new political executives remain busy in receiving congratulations and felicitations and getting adapted to the nuances of running...
WAR can only aggravate, it cannot solve problems, observed the noted economist and public intellectual Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus of Economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University while delivering the inaugural lecture of the Haryana unit of AIPSO at Karnal. The focal theme of his lecture was "War Versus Peace".
THE CPI(M) Telangana state committee has condemned the recent lathicharge on turmeric and red jowar farmers of Armoor and Nizamabad. The farmers were headed towards the state capital to protest against lack of minimum support price (MSP) as per the norms. Stating that violence could not solve any problem, CPI(M) demanded support price for red jowar and turmeric in addition to establishing a Turmeric...
