IN early January, most of the major military forces of Iran participated in a large military exercise called Payambar-e Azam (Great Prophet), which started as an annual exercise nineteen years ago. These forces included the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) and the Basij Force, and took place in the air, on land, and in the sea. The exercises began in Iran’s western Kermanshah province, with the Mirza Kuchak Khan Brigade in the lead. The name of this Brigade is interesting.

ON January 1, 2024, Harkishen Singh Surjeet Bhavan was the venue for the 36th Safdar Hashmi Memorial Trust’s annual celebrations. Organised every year to mark the life, the works and the ideals of Safdar Hashmi who was attacked on this day while performing a street play with his troupe, Jan Natya Manch, SAHMAT has become a cultural artefact in its own right. This year was a somber occasion as SAHMAT lost one of its most beloved and avid supporter in Comrade Sitaram Yechury, General Secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist).

THE 12th Andaman and Nicobar State Conference of the CPI(M) was held in Port Blair on December 28-29, 2024, with a resolution to strengthen the Party and its mass organisations in the islands. The conference began on December 28 with a big procession, followed by a public meeting at Tiranga Park.

THE Electricity Employees’ Federation of India (EEFI), in a statement issued on January 3, has congratulated its Kerala constituents for achieving a significant victory following a prolonged and united struggle.

LIBERAL opinion is invariably opposed to “nationalism”. It treats “nationalism” as a homogeneous term that necessarily entails a non-friendly, non-accommodative and rivalrous attitude towards other countries. This view however is completely erroneous; anti-colonial third world nationalism is entirely different from the nationalism that developed in Europe in the seventeenth century following the Westphalian Peace Treaties.