THE Quad, consisting of four countries, the United States, Japan, Australia and India is gradually taking the shape of a security alliance which was the intent of the original name of the grouping – the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue.The security angle was highlighted by the recent meeting of the military chiefs of the four Quad members held in Sunnylands in California on May 15-17, the Indian Chief of Defence Staff Anil Chauhan attended the meeting.

A MEETING in memory of late Comrades Madan Ghosh and Mridul De, both former members of CPI(M) Central Committee and state secretariat, was held at Pramod Dasgupta Bhavan in Kolkata on May 10.At the beginning of the meeting floral tributes were paid to the portraits of Comrades Madan Ghosh and Mridul De by CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury, senior leader of CPI(M) Biman Basu, state secretary of the Party Mohammad Salim, Polit Bureau members Surya Mishra and Ramchandra Dom,    Soma Ghosh, wife of Comrade Madan Ghosh, Swapna De, wife of Comrade Mridul De, CPI state secretary Swapan Bane

THE Joint Platform of Central Trade Unions, in a statement issued on May 8, has expressed its whole hearted support to the justified demand of young women wrestlers for stringent action against Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, BJP MP and the chairperson of the Wrestlers Federation of India, who, as per two FIRs registered against him, harassed them sexually.

THE Shimla Municipal Corporation election results suggest that the citizens have expressed their discontent and unhappiness with the policies that were implemented by the BJP government and the municipal corporation over the last five years. The BJP faced a significant setback in these elections, securing less than half of the wards they previously held. Conversely, the Congress party won a decisive majority, while the CPI(M) succeeded in maintaining its hold on the Summerhill ward, with Virendra Thakur emerging as the winner.

A New York Times News Service report reproduced in The Telegraph of Kolkata (May 7), discusses the findings of a global public opinion survey carried out by the Bennett Institute of Public Policy of Cambridge University. These show that the Ukraine conflict had shifted public sentiment “in developed democracies in East Asia and Europe as well as the United States of America, uniting their citizens against both Russia and China and shifting mass opinion in a more pro-American direction”; by contrast “outside this democratic bloc, the trends were very different”.