INDEPENDENT India is a young country, which is 70 years old. Demographically too, ours is a young country, boasting of an average age of just 28 years. The youth of our country have many dreams about their future. Today, the generation that had fought for our independence is slowly disappearing. As a result, many among the youth do not have the direct experience of interacting with those who had fought against the British colonial rulers. With BJP government’s efforts to distort history, there is every chance that they might be forced to be ignorant of facts.

IN a concerted attempt against Kerala, senior BJP leader and finance minister Arun Jaitley visited the state capital Thiruvananthapuram on August 6, and spread out falsehoods against the Kerala government and the CPI(M). In order to malign Kerala and its achievements for many decades, the BJP rallied RSS affiliated journalists from national media to Kerala to cover the minister’s programme. He visited the relatives of an RSS activist who was killed in a gang attack at Srikaryam in Thiruvananthapuram. BJP politicised this killing and tried to attack the CPI(M) workers during the last week.

AUGUST 9 this year marks 75 years of the Quit India movement and August 15 marks 70 years of Indian Independence. Recently a nostalgic and inspiring function that revived the glorious memories of the Satara parallel government during the freedom struggle was held at Shenoli village in Satara district and at Kundal village in Sangli district of Maharashtra.  In a programme that was full of symbolism and emotion, the few remaining valiant freedom fighters of the Satara parallel government were warmly felicitated by Mahatma Gandhi’s grandson Gopalkrishna Gandhi.

THE Delhi state committee of the CPI(M), in a statement issued on August 7, has expressed shock and outrage at the death of three workers due to suffocation while manually cleaning a sewer in Jal Vihar, Lajpat Nagar. It expressed its condolence to the families of the deceased.This is the second such instance in less than a month. Earlier four workers had died in similar circumstances in Ghitorni. Both these horrifying instances have taken place in areas that fall under the South Delhi Municipal Corporation.

THE joint national convention of central trade unions and independent industrial federations held in Talkatora Stadium in the national capital on August 8, chalked out a programme of joint campaign and struggles against the anti-worker and anti-people policies and the growing authoritarian tendencies of the Modi led BJP government at the centre.The national convention unanimously decided to organsie a massive three days’ ‘padav’ near parliament from November 9-11. It called upon the working class of the country to prepare itself for country wide indefinite general strike in the future.