WHEN questioned about Maratha reservations, Nitin Gadkari, cabinet minister in the present union government and also former president of the BJP, posed a counter question: “Where are the jobs”? Before posing this question, he actually started it by saying: “But there are no jobs. Because in banks, the jobs have shrunk because of IT. The government recruitment is frozen”. If the same words come out of our mouth’s, all of us would have been by now branded as ‘anti-nationals’ and what not. As the saying goes, the truth has come out of the ‘horse’s mouth’.

MERE SUSPICION IS ENOUGH  IN the changed Tripura, if one is a government employee and has attained the age of 50 or 55 years or completed 30 years of service, then the threat of voluntary retirement scheme (VRS) looms large on such category of government employees. The continuation of the services will depend upon periodical reviews of one’s fitness, service records etc. If the review finds the employee unfit, he/she would be shown the door.

HUGE protests erupted across the state of Kerala over the brutal murder of DYFI activist in Kasaragode, the north end district of the state. Abubacker Siddiq was stabbed to death at around 10 pm on August 5, by RSS criminals. A four member gang led by Ashwath and Karthik executed the murder in the darkness. Ashwat and Karthik both are history-sheeters and have been arrested by the police. Abubacker Siddiq was 23 years old and always stood in the forefront of DYFI's activities against the forces which spread communalism.

THE All India Co-ordination Committee of Road Transport Workers’ Organisations has called upon road transport workers and owners of the country to go on strike on August 7, demanding withdrawal of draconian MV Act (Amendment) Bill 2017 that paves way for corporates into the core transport sector. The call was given at the meeting of motor transport workers and vehicle owners held at Thiruvananthapuram on July 14.The MV Act bill was passed by Lok Sabha on April 10, 2017, overruling the objections raised by the Left and other opposition parties.

MORE than three crore road transport workers in state-transport, private passenger transport, goods transport and small passenger transport like auto, taxi etc., have staged a magnificent strike action throughout the country on August 7. This strike was to voice their protest against the draconian Motor Vehicle Amendment Bill (MVAB) which is still pending for enactment by parliament. The draconian bill presented by the Modi government is a design for paving the way for destruction of State-owned public transport corporations.