“HELL is a city much like London…….”, wrote P B Shelly exactly two centuries back, defining life in the British capital. After 75 years of independence when we are celebrating our freedom and the developmental trajectory that we trudged, our cities are no better than what Shelly defined for his own city a long time back.

THE observance of the historic 75th anniversary of India’s freedom struggle is an occasion to remember the martyrs, the struggles and sacrifices of millions who fought the British colonialists so that India could be free. Among them are the adivasis, the tribals of India.(adivasi/tribal used interchangeably in this text). History books refer to the 1857 armed uprising as the First War of Independence.

OUR country is now commemorating 75 years of independence. At this time, it is our misfortune that the BJP, which was never part of the struggle for independence is heading the government that called for the observation of Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav, all the while working overtime to undermine the noble values of our freedom struggle – democracy, secularism, social justice and federalism.

AFTER 75 years of independence, there is perhaps no other sector in India which is in greater crisis than the agrarian sector. As per the data of the NCRB, over four lakh farmers and agricultural workers have been forced to commit distress suicide in the 25 years from 1995 and 2020, a direct result of neo-liberal policies. Of these peasants, over one lakh have ended their lives in the last eight years of the Modi-led BJP government alone.

THE post-colonial state in India had two primary tasks before it: one was to overcome the hegemony of metropolitan capital, so that a development strategy in relative autonomy from imperialism could be pursued; the second was to attack landlordism both to free the agrarian population from its clutches, and to increase agricultural output for rapid industrialisation based on a growing home market.