THE belated release of census data on religion has been followed by predictable reactions from sections with a motivated interest in promoting sectarian divisions on religious lines. Judicious interpretation of census data can be a powerful tool for planning as demographic trends are good indicators of underlying socio-cultural and economic factors that determine changes in the trajectory of populations. India is perhaps the most culturally diverse country in the world and disaggregated census data provides information about social, cultural and economic trends in different communities.

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has issued the following statement on September 2, 2015.

THE Polit Bureau congratulates the working class of India for the magnificent strike they organised today (September 2, 2015). The CPI(M) had extended full support to the strike and the joint demand charter of the ten central trade unions and national and state federations.

THE year-long birth centenary celebration of Comrade Harkishan Singh Surjeet was inaugurated on August 31 at the Michael John Auditorium in Jamshedpur. The CITU district committee of Kolhan division and the AIDWA committee have initiated the formation of a broad based organising committee to observe the centenary.

THE countrywide general strike on September 2 called by the Central Trade Unions and independent national federations received massive response from the workers all over the country. Crores of workers employed in almost all the sectors of the economy participated in this strike. Police was used on the workers in several states. The Trinamool government in West Bengal used the brutal force of its police as well as its goons to physically attack the workers on strike. The workers bravely fought back this terror and participated in the strike.

HISTORY has not been written by capital alone. The dynamics of capitalism is an expression of unplanned antagonism between labour and capital. The neo-liberal milieu sometimes make us believe that it is the whims and fancies of the capitalist class that go unchallenged and hence capital can make the world of its own image. It had never been so and would not be in the future as well. Discourses that perceive capitalist logic as identical to that of human civilization are ideologically loaded.