THE annual campaign successfully merging the festive spirit of Durga Puja with ideological outreach has once again affirmed its status as a highly anticipated feature of Bengal’s cultural calendar. Spearheaded by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and its mass organisations, this massive and widespread initiative saw the establishment of numerous Marxist and progressive book stalls across West Bengal.

NOBODY thought that after Sri Lanka and Bangladesh it would be the turn of Nepal to go through mob violence and arson leading to the downfall of KP Sharma Oli's Government. Even those who were waiting for people's backlash against the political arrogance of successive ruling alliances did not think that it could happen so soon and in the way that it happened.The immediate cause of the Gen-Z protest was the Oli Government's announcement of its intention to ban social media apps in case they fail to register themselves under regulations within the stipulated time frame.

MASSIVE protests in Leh over statehood, legislature and Sixth Schedule left some dead, dozens injured and number of people arrested including widely known environmentalist, Sonam Wangchuk The reorganization of the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019 was pushed forward as a move, ‘to strengthen integration, elimination of terrorism, and ushering in development’.  Five years on, however, the discontent that began in Kashmir has spread to Jammu and lately to Ladakh, raising uncomfortable questions about the path chosen by New Delhi.

IN Kerala, there are no ‘migrant workers’ in the conventional sense; they are instead known as ’guest workers’. This framing itself reflects how the state perceives them. Nearly 35 lakh such workers are employed across Kerala, making the state their preferred destination. On the one hand, relatively high wages, steady demand for labour and safer working conditions attract them; on the other hand, unemployment, low wages and infrastructural deficits in their home states push them outward.

IN his memoir Memory of Forgetfulness, Mahmoud Darwish, the distinguished Palestinian communist poet, recounts a profound conversation with his friend, Faiz Ahmad Faiz, a revolutionary poet of renown.