Monthly Archives: June 2025

Debates, Democracy, Empire/ Imperialism, Identities, Islamophobia, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Conversations on Palestine: Teredide Mane O Baa Athithi

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Conversations on Palestine with an activist, a poet, a scholar

Teredide Mane O Baa Athithi (Come in, I have opened my doors dear guest) is an offshoot of Mere Ghar Aakar Toh Dekho, a national campaign in India, in Karnataka. It aims to counter the forces of hate, bigotry and polarization that have gained ground in the country by redrawing boundaries and expanding notions of trust and community. The campaign involves participants from diverse backgrounds opening their own homes and hearts to guests from equally varied locations. Teredide Mane has grown as a community, learning and unlearning through practice the concepts of guest and host, home and house, consent and comfort, celebration and sharing, listening and observing—both commonalities and diversity. [Content and editing by Madhu Bhushan, Winnu and Anita Cheria. Illustrations and design by Winnu]

We invite you into this moving and powerful conversation that has been reproduced largely in the speakers’ own words, and hope that you will add to it and take it forward. Read the whole conversation here (https://shorturl.at/JzvI5). Or a shorter note on the conversation here (https://shorturl.at/NkLHz).

Over the past months, the genocide in Palestine has come up multiple times in our meetings. Apart from engaging in acts of protest and solidarity, there was a need to go beyond ‘news noise’, and meet people engaged with and from Palestine. We decided to create a virtual space, one that was safe and intimate, to be able listen deeply to friends we had connected with in the course of our work and life journeys. This conversation, with Lisa Suhair Majaj, Smadar Lavie and Issa Samander in October, 2024, came about as a result of this intention.

Lisa Suhair Majaj is a passionate Palestinian American poet whose writings and poetry echo with the spirit of the land and people that she was herself exiled and alienated from.

Continue reading Conversations on Palestine: Teredide Mane O Baa Athithi →
Debates, Democracy, Government, Identities, Law, Politics, Refugee crisis

Assam: Arms Licenses to ‘Vulnerable Citizens’

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How saffrons are engaged in militarising Indian society not so surreptitiously.

Representational Image. Image Courtesy: Flickr

“…though this be madness, yet there is method in it“?

-Polonious, in ‘Hamlet’ by William Shakespeare

Pushback of ‘alleged foreigners’ It was May end, when the Assam government led by Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Himanta Biswa Sarma, was in the news for its policy of pushback where it was found literally pushing what it termed as ‘illegal foreigners’ into Bangladesh.

What was noticeable was that when its controversial pushback policy came under the scanner of national and international human rights organisations, the Assam government approved another scheme that has raised new questions?

This was a ‘special’ scheme to make the border areas, especially those inhabited by indigenous people living in “vulnerable and remote areas”, safe. ..

.. ..it was basically to give arms licenses to people and those along the border with Bangladesh to “help them protect themselves.” [ Read the full article here : https://www.newsclick.in/assam-arms-licenses-vulnerable-citizens]

Capitalism, Culture, Debates, Democracy, Law, Movements, Politics

Review : ’And Quietly Comes the Dawn’

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The ‘Other Haryana’ Which Rarely Gets Discussed

BOOK REVIEW

And Quietly Comes the Dawn:
Haryana —Its Identity Issues, Grassroots Movements and Alternative Endeavours
by Tarun Kanti Bose

Kamgar Prakashan | https://kamgarprakashan.com

What image does one conjure up when Haryana finds mention anywhere !
It is the image of the millenium city Gurgaon – with offices of leading MNCs or neighbouring Nuh – the Muslim majority district with one of the lowest literacy rates in India or the dominant Jat peasantry, the growing gender imbalance in the society which even gets reflected in the phenomenon of purchasing of brides from Bihar or other areas, etc

Various cases of dalit oppression add another gloomy layer to the not so bright picture.

Rarely does one find voices of the ’other Haryana’ getting reflected in the public discourse.

….Writer, journalist, left activist Tarun Kanti Bose’s new book, ’ And Quietly Flows the Dawn : Haryana— Its Identity Issues, Grassroots Movements and Alternative Endeavours breaks a new ground in this dominant discourse and brings before us many such unheard voices.

( Read the full review here : https://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article15848.html )

Culture, Debates, Democracy, Education, Government, Right watch

बच्चों के लिए सैनिक प्रशिक्षण : आखिर महाराष्ट्र सरकार की यह नई योजना क्यों एक चिन्तित करने वाली पहल है ?

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‘मैंने जापान में जनता को अपनी स्वतंत्रता की सीमाएं अपनी सरकार द्वारा स्वेच्छा से स्वीकार करते हुए देखा है…लोग इस सर्वव्यापी मानसिक दासता को प्रसन्नता और गर्व के साथ स्वीकार करते हैं क्योंकि वे अपने आपको शक्ति की एक मशीन, जिसे राष्ट्र कहा जाता है, में बदलने की तीव्र इच्छा रखते हैं…’ 

-रवीन्द्रनाथ ठाकुर, ‘नेशनलिज्म’  

बच्चों के लिए फौजी तालीम !

भारतीय संघ के सबसे समृद्ध सूबा कहलाने वाले महाराष्ट्र ने स्कूली शिक्षा के क्षेत्र में एक नयी पहल हाथ में ली है। वह स्कूली छात्रों के लिए कक्षा 1 से ही बुनियादी फौजी प्रशिक्षण देना शुरू करेगा ताकि बच्चों में ‘देशभक्ति, अनुशासन और बेहतर शारीरिक स्वास्थ्य की नींव डाली जा सके।’ एक स्थूल अनुमान के हिसाब से चरणबद्ध तरीके से लागू की जाने वाली इस योजना में लगभग ढाई लाख सेवानिवृत्त  सैनिकों को तैनात किया जाएगा। …..

यह प्रस्ताव कई स्तरों पर चिन्तित करने वाला है:
 
एक, जैसा कि जानकारों एवं शिक्षा शास्त्रियों ने बताया है कि राज्य का शिक्षा जगत एक जटिल संकट से गुजर रहा है, जिसका प्रतिबिम्बन कमजोर होती अवरचना / इन्फ्रास्टक्चर /infrastructure, अध्यापकों की कमी और नीतियों को लागू करने के रास्ते में आने वाली प्रचंड बाधाओं में उजागर होता है। ..अगर सरकार की तरफ से कक्षा एक से आगे फौजी प्रशिक्षण प्रदान करने की योजना को लागू किया गया तो उसका असर स्कूली शिक्षा के लिए आवंटित किए जा रहे संसाधनों में अधिक कटौती में दिखाई देगा।

[ Read the full article here :https://janchowk.com/military-training-for-children-why-is-this-new-scheme-of-maharashtra-government-a-worrying-initiative/]

Capitalism, Countryside, Democracy, Development, Ecology/Environment, Violence/Conflict

The Everyday Ecological Justice Struggles Across India to save Commons, Humans & All Species: NACEJ

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[We are publishing below a report of a press conference by the NATIONAL ALLIANCE FOR CLIMATE AND ECOLOGICAL JUSTICE that details the status of struggles for ecological justice from across the country. Lifting the mask off ritualistic official observances of the World Environment Day, while the government continues to wreak havoc on the ecology and the commons, this report gives a sense of the struggles in different parts of the country. At the end of this report is the link to its full online recording.]

As the world marked yet another Environment Day on 5th June, the National Alliance for Climate and Ecological Justice (NACEJ), a pan Indian forum of NAPM, brought together voices from different parts of the country in an online press conference on 6th June, to share the current status of ecological justice struggles. Speakers from Kashmir, Sikkim, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telangana, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Haryana, Odisha, and other states addressed the Press Conference. These voices reinforced the reality that both the Central Govt and different states governments are majorly complicit in environmental violations, enabling large profiteering, extractive agendas of mega-corporations, unleashing repression on democratic movements. Moderated by well-known environmental activist Soumya Dutta, the meeting saw good participation from both media and movements.

Continue reading The Everyday Ecological Justice Struggles Across India to save Commons, Humans & All Species: NACEJ →
Culture, Debates, Democracy, Education, Government, Language, Politics

Maharashtra: Military Training for School Children!

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Why this latest move by the state government is a worrying development.

“I have seen in Japan the voluntary submission of the whole people to the trimming of their minds and clipping of their freedom by their government, which through various educational agencies regulates their thoughts, manufactures their feelings, becomes suspiciously watchful when they show signs of inclining toward the spiritual, leading them through a narrow path not toward what is true but what is necessary for the complete welding of them into one uniform mass according to its own recipe. The people accept this all-pervading mental slavery with cheerfulness and pride because of their nervous desire to turn themselves into a machine of power, called the Nation, and emulate other machines in their collective worldliness.”

-Rabindranath Tagore, Nationalism

The richest state in the Indian union, Maharashtra, has embarked on a new initiative in the field of school education. It would provide basic military training to school students starting from Class 1, to promote  “patriotism, discipline, and physical fitness among young learners from an early age”. Around 2.5 lakh ex-servicemen would be involved to deliver this training which will be introduced in a phased manner.

Undoubtedly, in the aftermath of Operation Sindoor, this proposal will be able to gather enough eyeballs in the rest of the country and it would not be surprise that few other Bharatiya Janata Party-ruled states would implement similar schemes in education.

This proposal is worrying at many levels. ( Read the full article here :https://www.newsclick.in/maharashtra-military-training-school-children)

Capitalism, Left watch, Movements, Politics

Marxist Coordination Committee and Lal Nishan Party Merge with CPI(ML) Liberation: Dipankar Bhattacharya

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[In two very significant developments in the non-mainstream Left, the Marxist Coordination Committee (MCC) of the Dhanbad-Jharkhand region and the Lal Nishan Party (LNP) of Maharashtra merged with the CPI(ML) Liberation. While the merger with the took place in September 2024, the one with the LNP happened on 31 May 2025. What is really significant about these two developments is that both the MCC and the LNP, in different ways moved away from orthodox thinking from the beginning. It is not surprising then that they decided to merge with the CPI(ML) Liberation, which in my reckoning, has made some very significant departures from orthodoxy on a range of issues concerning the Indian social and political scene (as also on matters such as democracy and climate change). It is no wonder then that while the MCC, founded by the legendary AK Roy, had developed strong ties of the trade unions in the colliery with the larger adivasi Jharkhandi society, the LNP in its time, distinguished itself by standing by and campaigning for Ambedkar in the early 1950s.

Here we reproduce two pieces by CPI(ML) General Secretary DIPANKAR BHATTACHARYA published in their journal Liberation. The pieces separately discuss the two mergers. – AN]

Lal Nishan Party’s Unification with CPI(ML): Towards a Stronger Communist Movement to Defeat the Fascist Offensive

To defeat the growing fascist offensive, India today urgently needs a stronger presence and role of the Left. The merger of the Lal Nishan Party of Maharashtra with the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist), announced at a unity conference in Shrirampur on 31 May, marks an encouraging step in this direction. This unification brings together two great legacies of India’s communist movement in a state which has historically been the cradle of the quest for social equality. Maharashtra also happens to be the ideological fountainhead of Indian fascism and every advance of the communist movement in Maharashtra today has great value. The unification of LNP and CPI(ML) therefore evokes a lot of hope in the centenary year of India’s organised communist movement.

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Culture, Debates, Democracy, Everyday Life, Identities, Islamophobia, Politics

Will Asjad Babu Get Justice in Today’s India

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“Our dead are never dead to us until we have forgotten them”

– George Elliot (English Novelist and Poet, 1819-1880)

Firdaus Alam alias Asjad Babu – age 24 years – is dead.

Details of this cold blooded killing have appeared in a section of the media and make chilling reading. (1)

Asjad – a native of a village in Kishenganj district of Bihar, married hardly 7 months back, worked as a tailor in Panipat, Haryana.That tragic evening, he was sitting with his friends including his brother Asad Raza in a playground when the accused approached him and started mocking him for wearing a skullcap.

None of the friends had any personal enmity with the accused Narendra alias “Susu Lala”.When confronted, he felt further agitated and attacked Asjad with a knife, inflicting serious fatal injuries.

Death of Asjad is no ordinary death.

It appears to be a hate crime.

Hate crime is a special crime where a person is targeted just because of hostility or prejudice towards that person’s colour, look, dress, which reveals the person’s community, religion or belief etc. One does not know whether the police or the law-and-order machinery would be ready to acknowledge this brutal murder as a hate crime (2) because that would entail stricter charges, which may be followed by stricter punishment.

What is even more disturbing, is to note that killings, like that of Asjad have become commonplace. ( Read the full article here : https://countercurrents.org/2025/06/will-asjad-babu-get-justice-in-todays-india/)

Countryside, Democracy, Development, Ecology/Environment

Stop Forcible Dam Activity and Militarization in Siang Valley – Safeguard Ecology & Uphold Indigenous People’s Rights: Solidarity with Arunachal’s Indigenous Farmers

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Following is a statement of All India Solidarity with Siang Indigenous Farmers’ Forum, endorsed by 43 organizations and fifty individuals.

The Siang river in Upper Siang district, Arunachal Pradesh. Photo courtesy Anupam Chakravartty, Down to Earth

We, the undersigned, express our solidarity with the Siang Indigenous Farmers’ Forum (SIFF), which has been spearheading the people’s protest against the proposed 11,500 MW Siang Upper Multipurpose Project (SUMP) of the National Hydro-electric Power Corporation (NHPC) in Arunachal Pradesh, which will be disastrous for this whole area. We support the demands of SIFF for withdrawal of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) deployed in Beging village for doing the Pre-Feasibility Report (PFR) of the project.

Continue reading Stop Forcible Dam Activity and Militarization in Siang Valley – Safeguard Ecology & Uphold Indigenous People’s Rights: Solidarity with Arunachal’s Indigenous Farmers →