ON December 9, 2023, the dharna movement at the foot of the Gandhi statue in Esplanade, Kolkata marked its 1000th day. This protest is held by the deserving candidates who had successfully cleared the West Bengal State Level Selection Test (SLST) for secondary and higher secondary school teaching positions. Nearly three years have transpired since the inception of this movement.Throughout these past three years, the lives of these aspiring teachers have been marked by hardship and deprivation.

IN 1948, the Lebanese historian Constantin Zurayak used the Arabic word Nakba (catastrophe) to refer to the forced removal of Palestinians from their lands and homes by the newly formed Israeli state (in his August 1948 book, Ma’na al-Nakba or The Meaning of the Nakba). A decade ago, in Beirut, I met with the Lebanese novelist Elias Khoury – then editor of the Arabic-language Journal of Palestinian Studies, who told me that the Nakba of 1948 was not an event but part of a process.

CPI(M) Polit Bureau has issued the following statement on December 11THE verdict of the Supreme Court dismissing the challenges to the abrogation of Article 370 and dissolution of the state of Jammu and Kashmir is disturbing and has serious consequences for the federal structure of our constitution which is one of its fundamental features.The verdict says that J&K does not retain any element of sovereignty after the Instrument of Accession was signed and hence rules that the constitution of J&K is redundant.

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) met in New Delhi on December 9, 2023. It has issued the following statement on December 10RECENT ASSEMBLY ELECTIONSThe BJP registered a clear victory in the three Hindi speaking states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh.Though the Congress Party could more or less retain its vote share of 2018, it lost its governments in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. The BJP increased its vote share in all three states.There is a consolidation of the core Hindutva vote in all three states.

THE euphoria on India becoming the third largest economy by 2030 or a 5 trillion-dollar economy soon backed by estimates by rating agencies assuming 7 per cent growth rate in 2026-27 and further, has been showcased as one of the great achievements of the current regime that seem to have exalted India’s position in the global scenario. To begin with some initial facts, India’s GDP in current prices is 3.39 trillion US dollars and in constant 2015 US dollar prices it is 2.95 trillion US dollars.