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Vinod Mishra:
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Thirty Years of Naxalbari
 
 

 

January

2005
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HOMAGE
 
REMEMBERING COMRADE V M

The heroes have finally arrived on the stage!

If a colossal miscarriage allowed social democracy to blow in full bloom in the Indian Communist movement, to be sure, social democrats too had to pay a heavy penalty for their victory: doomed as an essentially regional force, they could never really make any dent in the Hindi heartland. What else can one infer from the CPI(M)’s total failure to make any headway in Bihar despite presiding over a full fledged model of social democracy in neighbouring West Bengal for no less than nine years in succession ? ... Full text
 
  Editorial
 

Welcome 2005!

Like the last few years, 2004 too would be remembered worldwide as a year of growing popular resistance to American imperialism. If Iraq remained the hottest theatre of protracted armed confrontation between a freedom-seeking people and the nexus of a US-imposed puppet regime and Anglo-American occupation forces, capital after capital and city after city continued to witness huge mass protests around the world against imperialist globalization and the US-led global war ..Full text

  Commentary
 

Ram and Roti

When the BJP’s trouble-shooting President L K Advani called the first meeting of the newly elected Office-Bearers, even he could not have had an idea of the toll that the Party’s publicity-hunger would take... Full text

 

India in the Eyes of Time

Did you know?
That India is producing millionaires at a record rate?
That in 2003, 11,000 Indians became millionaires?
That the richest five in India are richer (worth $ 24.8 billion) than the richest five in Britain (24.2 billion)?
BUT
That India accounts for one quarter of the world’s poorest?
That 300 million in India subsist on less than $ 1 a day?
... Full text

 

Modify the Patents Bill to Oppose Generic Patenting

As January 1, 2005 the WTO deadline for amending the Indian Patents Act to make it compliant with Trade-Related Intellectual Property (TRIPs) regime is approaching, the UPA government is hurrying to rush through an amendment to the Patents Act, popularly known as the Third Amendment, in the Winter Session of the parliament ... Full text

 

From Land Reform to Land Scams

Land reforms is gone, land scam is on. Land has always been one of the core agenda for the left parties. But this time it is the other way round in the Left Front, ruled West Bengal. It is not the ‘Rural land for the poor’, but the ‘urban land for the elite’.

... Full text

  Articles
 

Post-MFA regime:

Textile Restructuring and The Impending Turbulence

The Indian textile industry is at a crossroads. Jan. 1, 2005 will mark a watershed for the Indian textile industry. The Indian markets will be opened without any hindrance to the foreign textile goods. The US and EU markets will do away with the textile ‘Quota Raj’ that protected Indian textile industry since the day the Agreement on Textile and Clothing (ATC) . ....Full text

 

Bangalore’s IT Boom and the Grim Reality of Globalisation in Karnataka

It is no irony that under the overriding logic of globalisation, the clamour for ‘social clause’ and ‘labour standards’ in the West has given way to Business Process Outsourcing (BPO). Bangalore has emerged as the major destination for IT sector capital export ....Full text

  Investigation
 

Land Question and Land Struggle in Orissa

(An abridged version of a discussion paper presented by comrade DP Buxi in a workshop held on 9-10 October 2004, at Gunupur, Orissa) ... Full text

 
Reports
 

Jan Sankalp Rally in Patna:

People Pledged to give a decisive blow to the forces of crime, repression, plunder and communalism

The people of Bihar made Nov 30 a historic and memorable day when they thronged the huge grounds of Gandhi Maidan in Patna leaving no space empty and took a pledge to overthrow the crime-rule of Laloo-Rabri government whose criminal insensitivity has left thousands of poor to starve in a situation of acute famine while criminals are moving freely under government protection. People from every corner of Bihar, especially rural poor, agrarian labourers, dalits and other oppressed and marginalised sections of ...Full text
 

Statewide “Chakka-jam” in Bihar

Responding to the call of state-wide ‘Chakka Jam’ issued by CPI(ML), the people of Bihar expressed their anger on December 7 against the spree of kidnapping and murders which continue unabated under the Laloo-Rabri regime, and the mounting number of starvation deaths and the famine-like situation that has arisen due to the drought and floods. ...Full text
 

CPI(ML) Victories in Panchayat By-elections in Bihar.
Employees on Strike in Bihar .
Crackdown on Students’ Protest in Patna University. ... Full Reports
 

Vikalp Rally in Jharkhand

Addressing the ‘Vikalp Rally’ in Jharkhand, held by CPI(ML) in Ranchi on 2 December, Party General Secretary Comrade Dipankar Bhattacharya called upon the people to wipe out BJP from Jharkhand and put up a tough challenge before the UPA which has betrayed with the 2004 mandat ..Full text
 

McCarthyism in Uttar Pradesh:

Anti-Communist Witch-hunt in Mulayam’s ‘Samajwadi’ Regime

Mulayam Singh Yadav never misses an opportunity to invite the Left to join forces with his party and launch a third front. Last week while he was once again busy renewing his call for a third front, the UP Police were busy carrying out a systematic witch-hunt against communist revolutionaries and their rural poor supporters in the state ...Full text
 

Human Rights Day 2004:

When Famine Stalks the Land and Farmers Are Treated as ‘Threat to National Security’

ON December 10, 2004 the world observed the fifty-sixth anniversary of the International Human Rights Day. India is a signatory to the Universal Human Rights Charter and there was no dearth of official celebration on that day. Since the passage of Human Rights Act and formation of Human Rights Commissions, the phrase ‘human rights’ has become a customary component of India’s official discourse...Full text
 

7 th State Conference of CPI(ML) in West Bengal

The 7 th State Conference of West Bengal unit of CPI(ML) was held on 10-12 December 2004 at Arijit Mitra Nagar (Salt Lake Stadium) Kolkata. The hall and the dais of conference were named after the two departed leaders, Comrades Shankar Das and Tapan Chakraborty respectively. The open session was held on 10 December 2004 at...Full text
  Aadhi Zameen
 

4th AIPWA National Conference

The 4th National Conference of the AIPWA was held on 24-25 November at the Shaheed Manju Devi Hall (Gaur Bhavan) in Delhi. The Conference began with hoisting of the AIPWA flag Full text

Women Activists Speak Of Their Lives and Struggles

Within the four walls of the houses, in collieries in Jharkhand, in power looms and match factories of Tamil Nadu, the tea gardens of Assam , the fields of Bihar , Andhra Pradesh, Eastern UP... generations of women have toiled day in and day out without uttering a complaint and without being heard. Full text

  Homage
 

Red Salute to Comrade Shankar Das

Liberation mourns the untimely demise of Comrade Shankar Das who passed away in the evening of November 22 after a severe heart attack at Jalpaiguri. Full text

    Special Report
 

“We do not want economic packages.
We want AFSPA to be repealed”

-- Images from the Ongoing Struggle in Manipur

A team organized by the Campaign Committee Against AFSPA visited Manipur in December. The team comprised of several human rights activists, as well as activists of students’ and women’s groups. Mona Das, President, JNUSU, Manisha Sethi from the Forum For Democratic Initiatives as well as Malay, Bilash and Sumit from AISA, Jadavpur University, joined the team. On December 9, CPI(ML) PB Member Rubul Sharma as well as Lokenath Goswami, a cultural activist from the Assam Jan Sanskritik Parishad, attended and addressed a Convention against AFSPA in Imphal. Manisha Sethi reports some impressions from the visit. Full text

 
   

Film Review
 

A Letter From A Father to A Daughter:

State Repression and Resistance in Manipur

In another time, a father wrote from the confines of the jail, letters to his daughter- letters giving glimpses of world history. The writer of those letters became India’s first Prime Minister and in his tenure – in the year 1958 – was introduced an Act called the Armed Forces Special Power Act.  Full text