ON July 5, 2024, a delegation of All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) and All India Agricultural Workers Union (AIAWU) visited the families of the three victims of the pre-planned killings of Muslim youth transporting cattle, on June 7 near the Mahanadi Bridge on the Mahasamund-Raipur border in Chhattisgarh by BJP-RSS criminals posing as cow vigilantes.
NEARLY two lakh anganwadi workers and helpers across 28 states participated in demonstrations on July 10, observing Demands Day at the call of the All India Federation of Anganwadi Workers and Helpers (AIFAWH). Every year, AIFAWH marks July 10 as All India Demands Day. This year, the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU) called for demonstrations at various levels on the same day to highlight the basic and immediate demands of the working class, including scheme workers. In many locations, anganwadi unions synchronised their demonstrations with the CITU programme.
IN his opus The Wealth of Nations published in 1776 Adam Smith drew a distinction between the progressive state, the stationary state and the declining state. The progressive state was one where capital accumulation would be occurring at a rate faster than the growth of population, because of which wages would be high and population growing; in a declining state by contrast the opposite happened, while in a stationary state the capital stock and the population, and hence the labour force, was constant and so were the wages, but at a level lower than in the progressive state.
IT is more than nine months since Israel launched its genocidal war on the Palestinians in Gaza. Till now, around 39,000 people have been killed, including a large number of women and children, in the brutal bombardment and air strikes. Hospitals, schools and residential buildings – nothing has been spared by the Israeli armed forces. In the occupied West Bank, the Israeli armed forces are conducting daily raids and over 550 Palestinians have been killed.
IT is the time when Instagram feeds will be flooded with photos and reels of the mega fortnight marriage event of the Ambanis and the eye balls of average Indians would be rolling to follow the spectacle of wealth, offering glaring evidence of the billionaire raj that India could produce at the end of three decades of neoliberal reforms. According to the latest study of the World Inequality Lab, India’s inequality levels have reached unprecedented levels, highest ever since 1922.
LAWYERS across the country are mobilising demanding the central NDA government to suspend the implementation of three new criminal laws. In Tamil Nadu, state-level Advocates Associations and the Bar Association have united to form a Joint Action Council. On July 8, they organised a rally and demonstration in Tiruchi, where leaders of several political parties voiced their support for the lawyers' cause.On July 10, advocates responded to the Joint Action Council's call by organising protests at railway stations and boycotted court until July 12.
THE coming to power of governments led by fascists is either a reality or a threat today over large parts of the world. In Europe at present there are several countries where fascists are leading governments; France was on the verge of being added to this list, in which case it would have been the second major European power, after Italy, to have a fascist government.
IT is impossible for a political party committed to policies of austerity to remain in office forever. Austerity policies cannibalise social life, cutting everything that makes it possible for humans to live in the modern world. When the Conservative Party’s David Cameron became the prime minister in 2010, after thirteen years of New Labour rule which had already pursued an austerity strategy, he pushed an ultra-austerity budget that cut investments in health and transportation, in education and community life.
In a joint statement, the Platform of Central Trade Unions said “now any gathering of people and the leaders of the gatherings can be declared terrorists.
PEOPLE of France have voted against the far-right in the parliamentary elections. Contrary to many opinion polls, the National Rally of Le Pen could win only 143 seats and stood third. The newly formed Left coalition, New Popular Front achieved a victory by emerging as the largest bloc with182 seats, while President Macron’s group Ensemble won 163 seats. As a result of this fractured mandate, no single party or Front secured an outright majority. For a majority, one needs to win 289 in the 577-seat National Assembly. The New Popular Front fell short of majority by over 100 seats.