ONE of the puzzling phenomena in world capitalism today is the bellicosity displayed by Europe vis-à-vis Russia. The claim that Russia has imperialist designs towards Europe, which the European ruling circles keep repeating, is clearly absurd. It is NATO that moved eastwards, in violation of a promise made by the US administration to Gorbachov, and provoked Russia; and it is NATO members, notably US and UK, that torpedoed the Minsk agreement reached between Russia and Ukraine which would have prevented the war.

Below we publish the speech delivered by Manik Sarkar, CPI(M) Polit Bureau member and President of the Inaugural Session of the 24th Congress of CPI(M) Coordinator of the Polit Bureau, Prakash KaratChairman of the Reception Committee, K BalakrishnanLeaders of the Left Parties on the dais Delegates, Distinguished Guests and Friends, Vanakkam.WE are assembled here in Madurai for the 24th Congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist).

SPEAKING on the Manipur Appropriation Bill 2025 in the Rajya Sabha, Bikas Ranjan Bhattacharyya asked what prompted the Manipur Budget to be placed in Parliament? We talk about being the ‘mother of democracy’, but democracy has been shattered when you find that the Indian Parliament has to take up the Appropriation Bill for Manipur. Our prime minister has given a new theory, that of ‘double-engine sarkar’. Are we going on reverse gear? Manipur was the first place where Netaji  Subhash Chandra Bose came with INA for India’s Independence and that was really a historical event.

ONE of the arguments in favour of a divine power – or god – is that life could not have arisen naturally and needed a touch of the divine to come into being. While Oparin, Haldane and Bernal had argued how organic life forms can arise naturally, experimental proof that this is indeed the case was lacking, though the Urey-Miller experiments in 1953 came quite close to it.

COMMUNAL forces have hatched a well-planned conspiracy to cover up the state government’s failure to solve people’s livelihood issues and also to further its communal agenda in Maharashtra.