Kisan Mukti March: Farmers Pledge to Oust ‘Kisan Virodhi’ Modi Government

SABRANG| December 01, 2018

Congregating in Delhi, thousands of farmers and tribals from 26 states of India, marched from Ramlila Maidan to Parliament Street to make their voices heard at the gates of India’s Parliament. Holding red, yellow and green flags, singing songs and shouting slogans, the historic farmers’ march pledged to intensify their struggle against the ‘kisan virodhi’ policies of the Narendra Modi government that had added to their distress, and oust it in the next general elections.

Life of Labour: Voices from Farmers’ March in Delhi; BSNL Workers Allege Favouritism

The Wire | December 02, 2018

Farmers at Ramlila Maidan.

“Over the last 10 years, I know of some 40 to 50 farmers who have died by suicide because of increasing loans. I have come to Delhi to speak for my people and demand some relief,” said Apparao, an Adivasi farmer from Andhra Pradesh to The Hindu .

Shanti Devi, 72, from Gaya in Bihar told NewsLaundry: “If the women farmers go and meet the government, wouldn’t they listen to us?” She believes women leaders in the government will listen to women farmers because “gents log toh thagta hain (The men always con us).” She adds: “Aaj pet bhunka hain toh yeha tak aaya na. Agar pet bhara rehta toh itni door aata kya (Had it not been for the empty stomach, would we have come this far)?”

To Reverse Decline of Women in Labour Force, India Must Make Its Working Spaces Safe

by Nishtha Satyam and Francine Pickup

The Wire | December 02, 2018

At 27%, India has one of the lowest female labour force participation rates in the world. Credit: Reuters

One in three women today – irrespective of social status, class, race, country or age group – continue to experience violence and abuse. Tragically, the perpetrators are most often someone they know – partners, family members, teachers or colleagues. According to UNODC’s latest reporttitled ‘Global Study on Homicide: Gender-related killing of women and girls’, around 87,000 women were killed around the world last year, some 50,000 – or 58% – at the hands of intimate partners or family members.

Debt-Ridden Farmer Falls to His Death After Protest in Delhi

The Wire | December 02, 2018

All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee members and farmers at the rally at Ramlila Maidan on November 29, 2018. Credit: PTI/Ravi Choudhary

New Delhi: Fifty-two-year-old Kiran Shantappa Ghorwade died after falling from the third floor of Ambedkar Bhawan in Jhandewalan on Saturday, Indian Express reported. Ghorwade, a resident of Kolhapur district in Maharashtra, had travelled to Delhi to take part in the farmers protest on November 29 and November 30.

U.S: With Workers Under Attack, Labor Leaders Say Only ‘Full-Throated Economic Populism’ Can Defeat Corporate Elites

by Jake Johnson, staff writer

Common Dreams | December 01, 2018

Labor leader Roseann DeMoro, former executive director of National Nurses United, during a panel discussion titled, “The Labor Movement: Essential to Democracy” at The Sanders Institute Gathering on Saturday. (Photo: Screengrab/The Sanders Institute Gathering)

BURLINGTON, VT – With the American labor movement under relentless assault by the right-wing Supreme Court, the Republican Party at both the state and federal level, and President Donald Trump‘s plutocratic administration, prominent union leaders convened during the final day of The Sanders Institute Gathering on Saturday to confront the existential threat facing the working class and emphasize the urgency of organizing at the grassroots level to fight back and build political power.

Our Elites Refuse to Accept Responsibility for Leaving Behind the Left Behind

by Dean Baker

“It is amazing how so many highly intelligent and well-meaning policy types can keep up this charade that the upward redistribution of income over the last four decades was somehow a natural development as opposed to being policy driven,” the author writes.  (Photo: Jobs with Justice/flickr/cc)

There have been several analyses of the 2018 election results showing that the Republican regions are disproportionately areas that lag in income and growth. In response, we are seeing a minor industry develop on what we can do to help the left behinds.

The assumption in this analysis is that being left behind is the result of the natural workings of the market — developments in technology and trade — not any conscious policy decisions implemented in Washington. This is quite obviously not true and it is remarkable how this assumption can go unchallenged in policy circles.

Free the Free Press From Wall Street Plunder

by Jim Hightower

A St. Paul Pioneer Press for sale in 2006. (Photo: mwms1916/flickr/cc)

A two-panel cartoon I recently saw showed a character with a sign saying: “First they came for the reporters.” In the next panel, his sign says: “We don’t know what happened after that.”

It was, of course, a retort to Donald Trump’s campaign to demonize the news media as “the enemy of the people.” But when it comes to America’s once-proud newspapers, their worst enemy isn’t Trump — nor is it the rising cost of newsprint or the “free” digital news on websites.

US Housing Crisis Inexcusable, Says Bernie Sanders, When Wall Street Bailed Out After Financial Crisis

Common Dreams| December 01, 2018

Labor leader Roseann DeMoro, former executive director of National Nurses United, during a panel discussion titled, “The Labor Movement: Essential to Democracy” at The Sanders Institute Gathering on Saturday. (Photo: Screengrab/The Sanders Institute Gathering)

BURLINGTON, VT – With the American labor movement under relentless assault by the right-wing Supreme Court, the Republican Party at both the state and federal level, and President Donald Trump‘s plutocratic administration, prominent union leaders convened during the final day of The Sanders Institute Gathering on Saturday to confront the existential threat facing the working class and emphasize the urgency of organizing at the grassroots level to fight back and build political power.

How Colonialism Actually Worked

by Ramachandra Guha

The Wire | December 02, 2018

Representative image of Indian peasants

In recent years, our understanding of what the British did (or did not do) in this country has been shaped by ideologues rather than scholars. Born-again patriots produce the Jallianwala Bagh massacre and the Bengal famine as final and conclusive proof that colonialism damaged and deeply degraded India. Latter-day nostalgists answer by holding up the railways as Exhibit A, and the universities as Exhibit B, of how the ruler from afar elevated and educated India. Both sides assemble their arguments mostly from scraps of evidence available online; neither seeks to nuance or complicate their black or white picture with any sort of original research.

‘India after Naxalbari’

by Harsh Thakor

Frontier | Vol. 51, No.22, Dec 2 – 8, 2018

The book ‘India after  Naxalbari, unfinished History’ written by Bernard D’Mellow and published by Aakar Books [28E Pocket IV, Maryu Vihar Phase I, Delhi-110091, Price : Rs 995] is a classic.

The book is divided into 10 chapters like an epic novel with each chapter a logical sequel to the previous one. Chapter—1 on ‘Naxalite Spring Thunder phase’ where he recounts the history of the naxalbari uprising. In Chapter—2 ‘1968 India as history’ he recounts the brutal state repression unleashed. Chapter 3—’Unequal Development and evolution of the ruling bloc’ describes the principal undeveloped capitalism highlighting the state-corporate nexus. Chapter 4—’Naxalite Spring thunder phase narrating the events from 1978-2003 and describing the mass movements of the Maoists in light of worker-peasant alliance and women liberation. Chapter—5 ‘India 1989’ which sums up the financial autocracy and phenomenal disparity prevailing in total contrast to progressive capitalism. Chapter—6 ‘The far and near’—India’s rotten liberal democracy narrates how fundamental rights are violated and how it is an integral part of the bourgeois Indian state and how parliamentary democracy only protected the vested interests. Chapter—7 ‘Maoist Spring Thunder phase 3’ studies the movement after the formation of the CPI (Maoist) throwing light on the guerrilla army. Chapter—8 ‘Rotten at the heart-Secular state’ vividly describes how essentially the state violates the rights of minorities being responsible for some of the bloodiest communal riots ever perpetrating violence on Sikhs and Muslims. Chapter 9—’Little man, What now’ sums up the semi-fascist nature of the Modi regime and the aspect of sub-imperialism. Here he draws an analogy of the Nazi regime of 1930’s with the Hindu fascist agenda. Chapter—10 In ‘History memory and dreams’ he elaborates the concept of New Democracy in term of it’s workability.