THE death of an African student from Congo, Masonda Kitanda Olivier, after being brutally assaulted on May 21 in South Delhi has brought to the fore the deep-seated racism which exists in India. There are thousands of students from Africa studying in various educational institutions in the country. It is a shameful fact that these black students are often subject to racial discrimination and attacks.

MODI government’s single biggest failure – betrayal is a better word for it – is on the jobs front. Two years ago Modi was voted to power because he promised again and again in his campaign speeches that the days of joblessness are going to be over soon, “achche din” (good times) are coming. In a country which has been reeling under ‘jobless growth’ for the past several years, and ever increasing number of people, especially youth were severely under-employed, Modi’s words were welcomed by many.

THE vote in the lower house of the Brazilian parliament (the Chamber of Deputies) on April 18 to forward the case for the impeachment of the president, Dilma Rousseff, to the upper house (senate), was the first big step taken by the coup plotters in ousting the popularly elected president of the Republic. Dilma, Brazil's first female president, had won reelection only eighteen months ago for a second four year term in office.

NARENDRA Modi, the chief executive of Indian democracy has been riding on the back of three horses’ – the globalised monopoly capitalist classes of India, the transnational monopoly capitalism and the Hindu Sangh Parivar of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and every important agenda of the Modi government is guided and determined by the interests and goals of these three driving forces which have guided prime minister Modi in decisions from 2014 to 2016.If on one hand, every basic economic policy followed by the Modi government during its two years of rule has been openly supportive of monop

IN elections held last month to a limited number of gram panchayats (GPs) whose five-year term of office were to mature in the month of June 2016, the CPI(M) won over 100 gram panchayats in its two main adivasi bastions of Nashik and Thane-Palghar districts with a clear majority. It also won four GPs in Nanded district in the two tehsils of Kinwat and Mahur, and one GP in the Taloda tehsil of Nandurbar district.In these contests, the Party trounced the BJP, Shiv Sena, Congress, NCP and MNS, who fought either separately or in bizarrely opportunistic alliances.