Constitution Amendment Bill, Not GST

CONSIDERABLE confusion has been spread by the corporate media that the Rajya Sabha approved the GST Bill on August 3. In this context, it must be understood that, as the Indian constitution stands at present, a Central Tax on Goods and Services cannot be imposed by the central government. The constitution needs to be amended to allow the legislation of a centralised Goods and Services Tax. What the Rajya Sabha did on August 3 was to approve such a constitutional amendment which enables the central government to bring a GST legislation.

Public Health Must Prevail Over Corporate Profits

The following is the statement issued by Jan Swasthya Abhiyan on March 19.

THE Jan Swasthya Abhiyan compliments the government for notifying a list of over 300 drug formulations, available as fixed‐dose combinations (FDCs) of two or more drugs, which are to be banned with immediate effect on the grounds of “lack of therapeutic justification”. This is a long pending measure and needs to be followed up by further action to weed out a huge number of formulations, that should not have received marketing approval in the first place.

Aadhaar Bill: An Unconstitutional Legislation

IT is often said that “privacy is not something that people feel, except in its absence”. Arun Jaitley realised it the hard way in 2013 when his telephone records where illegally obtained by the government. In an article titled “My call detail records and a citizen’s right to privacy”, Jaitley wrote: “every citizen in India has a right to privacy. His right to privacy is an inherent aspect of his personal liberty. Interference in the right to privacy is an interference in his personal liberty by a process which is not fair, just or reasonable. Every person has 'a right to be left alone'.

Development for Divide and Disrupt

NARENDRA Modi was nominated by Mohan Bhagwat, the RSS Supremo, as prime ministerial candidate for the Lok Sabha elections of 2014 and Modi launched his election campaign on the political platform of his Gujarat model of Development and during every election meeting, he promised his audience that vote for BJP under the leadership of Modi will lead to economic growth for entire India.

An Exclusionary Judgment

THE recent judgment of Supreme Court (Rajbala & Ors. Vs. State of Haryana & Ors) upholding the amendments to the Haryana Panchayati Raj Act has been widely perceived as unjust, anti people, and exclusionary. In effect, it disqualifies a majority of persons including the most poor and marginalised sections of Haryana from contesting elections.

TRIPURA CM AT THE NITI AAYOG MEETING

At the second meeting of the governing council of NITI Aayog held on July 15, Manik Sarkar, chief minister of Tripura made the following observations in his speech on the amendments proposed in the Second Ordinance, 2015 to The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013 (LARR 2013).

Debroy Takes the Hatchet to Railways

THE Report of the Bibek Debroy Committee for restructuring of Indian Railways (IR) has predictably recommended dismembering of IR and its privatisation in all but name, preferring to call it “liberalisation” instead. No doubt critiques of these recommendations will be dismissed by the BJP government and its corporate and other cheerleaders as knee-jerk reactions by the Left or from antiquated ideas of the Nehruvian-socialist era. The shoe is actually on the other foot.

Pachhwara Coal Mines: A Tale of Disguised Privatisation,Corporate Malpractice and Exploitation of Adivasi Peasants

IN line with the policies of liberalisation adopted in 1991, successive governments since the early 1990s have sought to subvert nationalisation of coal through disguised privatisation. This has been done in many ways. The mining capacity of public sector coal companies has been severely reduced through retrenchment, incentivising early retirements and imposing controls on recruitment. Consequently, public sector coal companies have been forced to increasingly carry out mining by sub-contracting operations to private contractors.

Massive Demonstration against Coal Mines Bill

HUNDREDS of coal workers staged a demonstration in New Delhi on March 18 to oppose the government’s move for denationalisation of the coal sector. The demonstrators urged the parliamentarians not to pass the Coal Mines (Special Provisions) Bill, 2014 as it is likely to doom the economy of a vast Indian society, push the miners into slavery and pave the way for insecure mining.

Anti-People Coal Mines Bill

THE Coal Mines (Special Provisions) Bill, 2014 is aimed at de-nationalising the entire coal sector and doing away with the historic Coal Mines (Nationalisation) Act, 1973. The Bill is not in the interest of the national economy, but in the interest of private corporate entities, both domestic and foreign, as it allows them to play with the most crucial natural resource owned by the people of India for their private gains.

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