Delhi State Conference of SFI Concludes Successfully

THE 19th Delhi state conference of SFI was concluded successfully on January 15-16 in Comrade Vijendra Sharma Manch and Martyr Comrade Shakeel Ahmad Baksh Hall. The hall of the conference was named after Shakeel Ahmad Baksh who was killed when he intervened in a case of eve teasing in Jamia in 1996. Comrade Vijendra’s name needs no introduction for anyone in students’ and teachers’ movement.A rally and public meeting was organised on January 15, in North Campus, Delhi University. This rally was also joined by the flag march of 15th all India conference that has started from Shimla.

Drought in Marathwada: Causes, Consequences and Remedies

MARATHWADA region has been reeling under drought condition since 2013. It is in a part of the scanty rainfall area of Central Maharashtra. The region coincides with the Aurangabad Division of Maharashtra. It includes districts of Aurangabad, Jalna, Beed, Osmanabad, Nanded, Latur, Parbhani and Hingoli. Out of these eight districts, five are the worst affected, namely Beed, Jalna, Parbhani, Nanded and Osmanabad. Marathwada region has a population of about 1.87 crore and geographical area of 64.5 thousand sq.km.

Tripura CM Expresses Solidarity with HCU students

MANIK Sarkar, chief minister of Tripura and the Polit Bureau member of the CPI(M) visited Hyderabad on January 22 and expressed solidarity with the students protesting against the institutional murder of research scholar Rohith Vemula.

Tens of Thousands Gather in Sikar on the Occasion of SFI’s All India Conference

SIKAR, in Sekhawati region of Rajasthan has been witness to many a historic struggles, ever since the pre-independence days. Peasant leaders like Trilok Singh and student leaders like Kana Ram have become part of the popular consciousness of the region. The mammoth public meeting on January 22 in the Ramleela Ground of Sikar on the occasion of the 15th all India conference of SFI saw that popular consciousness transforming into a material force full of zeal and energy.

MAHARASHTRA: One Lakh Court Arrest on Burning Issues at Joint CITU-AIKS-AIAWU Call

ON January 19, 2016, over one lakh workers, peasants and agricultural labourers courted arrest at 73 district and tehsil centres in 28 districts of Maharashtra, in response to the joint call given by the CITU, AIKS and AIAWU at a state-level convention at Parbhani on October 31, 2015 (See report in People’s Democracy/Loklahar, November 16-22, 2015).As per information gathered from all the districts, a total of 1,33,127 working people participated in the state-wide action on January 19. Of these, over one lakh courted arrest.

CRISPR: Good Science or Evil Science?

A THREE-YEAR old technology of gene editing called CRISPR is now the focus of two major disputes. The disputes are: who (or which team) will get the Nobel Prize for this discovery, and the other, the patent rights over the technology coming out of this discovery. One is the holy grail of science; not the discovery itself, but the public accolade that goes with it.

For a Financial Transactions Tax

SENATOR Bernie Sanders who is a “socialist” by his own admission and is campaigning with some success for nomination as the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate in the coming elections in the United States, has come out with a proposal for a Financial Transactions Tax, whose proceeds are to be used for making college education free for all students in public institutions.

NPRD Opposes the term ‘Divyaang’ for the Disabled

THE National Platform for the Rights of the Disabled (NPRD) in a letter addressed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on January 22, 2016, noted that on December 27, 2015 during the course of his ‘Mann Ki Baat’, the prime minister had referred to persons with disabilities thus: “Those in whom Paramatma has created a deficiency in the body, those for whom some part of the body does not work properly, we call them ‘viklaang’…….……..‘Why don’t we, in our country, replace the word ‘viklaang’ with the word ‘divyaang’?’ These are those people who possess divinity – divyata – in one or more parts of th

CITU Denounces Govt Decision to Exempt Start-Up Companies from Labour Laws

THE Centre of Indian Trade Unions in a statement issued on January 27 has denounced the brazen anti-worker designs of the government of India to grant virtual exemption to the start-up companies, including five year old registered establishments with an annual turnover of not more than Rs 25 crore, from the obligations under nine basic labour laws. It has done this on the plea of “handholding and nurturing” the so-called start-up companies, announced by the prime minister only recently.

Thinking Together

Q. What was the role of the Portuguese Communist Party in the formation of a new government after the elections to the National Assembly? S Prasanth, Chennai ELECTIONS to the national assembly of Portugal were held on October 4, 2015, which threw a fractured mandate. The ruling right-wing coalition of the conservatives consisting of the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the Peoples' Party (PP) lost 12 percent of the vote and the majority they had enjoyed in the assembly.

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