YEMEN has been experiencing political turmoil for many years now. The problems in the country have been exacerbated after the ouster of the long ruling president, Ali Abdullah Saleh from power in 2012. An interim government was formed under the leadership of Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi following Saleh's departure. Hadi was Saleh's deputy but he did not have the kind of support his predecessor had. Under his watch, the country had to function without a representative government.

THE NDA government, after assuming office, has been constantly trying to bypass well-established parliamentary procedures. To push through crucial legislations without proper scrutiny, the government’s approach is to firstly use its “brute majority” in the Lok Sabha to bulldoze all oppositions to anti-people laws, and secondly, to pass off any legislation that deals with or relates to finance as a ‘Money Bill’, which under our Constitution, does not required approval by the Rajya Sabha, where the ruling dispensation is in minority.

TRIPURA Chief Minister Manik Sarkar has written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi opposing the central government's move to virtually abolish the special category status that has traditionally been granted to all the North Eastern states.

On the North East Region

The 21st Congress of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) expresses its deep concern over the continuing state of underdevelopment and backwardness in the North-Eastern region of the country.

A VERY simple calculation is enough to illuminate what has been happening in the Indian economy over the last few decades. In July 1973, I know from personal knowledge, the starting basic salary of an Associate Professor in a central university was Rs 700 per month. Nowadays the starting basic salary of an Associate Professor in a central university is about Rs 47,000 per month (which is the sum of Rs 39,000 and Rs 8,000 shown under two separate heads).