Peoples Democracy newsletter

Peoples Democracy newsletter

Bangla Bachao Yatra: Practising Alternatives across Bengal

The Save Bengal Journey, which began on November 29 from the Char of Raidak (the Dol Mela ground in Tufanganj), witnessed 19 sunrises and traversed 11 districts before concluding at BT Road in Belgharia. Even before independence, Belgharia witnessed the labour movement of 1938 and saw the red flag at the gates of the jute mills. The struggle to save Bengal today is the inheritor of that flowing stream of the communist movement. Now the industrial belt has been fragmented into pieces.

An Outrageous Assault On The Indian Constitution

SEVERAL employment schemes, each limited in scope and constrained by the availability of fiscal resources, had existed in different states of the country earlier; what the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme enacted in 2005 did was to introduce a uniform, nation-wide, essentially centrally-funded, demand-driven scheme: one person per rural household could get up to a hundred days of employment on demand, failing which the person demanding work would have t

Kochi Holds the First Indian Cultural Congress

“IN Kerala, I can breathe,” said Seema Chishti, senior journalist and editor of The Wire. She was talking not only about the contrast between the toxic air in Delhi and the fresh breeze from the Arabian Sea that was wafting across the open-air stage she was on in Kochi as she spoke in a session as part of the first Indian Cultural Congress (ICC). Chishti was also talking about the toxicity of the politics and culture being propagated by those in power in Delhi.

Kishore Theckedath: A Remarkable Marxist Intellectual, Organiser, and Leader

Dr. Kishore Kumar Theckedath, a rare and remarkable combination of a Marxist intellectual, organiser, and leader, passed away in Mumbai on the night of December 20, 2025 at the age of 89. He was a former member of the CPI(M) Maharashtra State Secretariat; a pioneer of the militant movement and organisation of college and university teachers in Mumbai and Maharashtra; a detenu for 15 months during the Emergency from 1975-77; and a renowned Marxist thinker, writer, and teacher.

Vande Mataram – BJP/RSS Ploy to Befool People

AN ironic but unsurprising coincidence marked the beginning of the winter session of Parliament. The Modi government decided to have a long discussion on ‘Vande Mataram’, which PM Modi, Amit Shah and others from the government side used to sing paeans of fulsome praise for the nationalism and sacrifice of freedom fighters inspired by the National Song, A few days later, the Modi Cabinet announced that 100 per cent Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) would be allowed in the insurance sector, up from the current 74 per cent.

The Week in Parliament

IN the second week of the Winter Session of Parliament, Prime Minister Narendra Modi kicked off a debate on the 150th anniversary of Vande Mataram. Taking part in the debate in the Rajya Sabha, V Sivadasan said the occasion reminds us of the history of the great national movement. The stanza of the poem is not only to salute the soil of the nation but also to salute the fighting spirit of the masses.

Higher Education: NEP 2020 to Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill

PROJECTED as a reform to enhance quality and governance, the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhishthan Bill, 2025 is the legislative culmination of the NEP 2020 project. It centralises control over higher education, erodes federalism and institutional autonomy, facilitates corporatisation and commercialisation, and embeds a Hindutva-driven ideological agenda under the guise of Indian Knowledge Systems.

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