The Age of the Everyday Billionaire
By P. Sainath, Counterpunch. June 24, 2009.
Another 29 members of the cabinet fall into the Rs. 5 million to Rs.50 million category. If you’re in this bracket, your chances of winning aren’t as great as the 50 million plus, or Platinum Tier, elite. However, you are still 43 times more likely to win than those with less than Rs. 1 million in assets (i.e. almost the whole of India’s population). The remaining ministers, in case you were losing sleep over their condition, fall into the Rs. 1 million to Rs. 5 million club, the cabinet equivalent of BPL (Below Poverty Line). However, there are five years in which to remedy this situation and alleviate the misery of this group.
Venezuela: “A process of nationalisations” after the referendum
By Federico Fuentes, GreenLeft. May 30, 2009.
Addressing the 400-strong May 21 workshop with workers from the industrial heartland of Guayana, dedicated to the “socialist transformation of basic industry”, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez noted with satisfaction the outcomes of discussions: “I can see, sense and feel the roar of the working class.”
Brazil’s economy and the end of the decoupling myth
By Renaud Lambert, Counterpunch. June 14, 2009
In May 2008 the US economy had begun its decline, but in Brazil things still looked fine. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva reckoned that his country was experiencing a “magic moment”: after a 5.67 per cent rise in GDP in 2007, government morale was high. What was going on elsewhere didn’t matter; growth would continue “at its present rate for the next 15 to 20 years”.
Economic Recovery: Is It Time For a Mid-Course Correction? - New School Lectures
On Tuesday, May 19, 2009, The Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis (SCEPA) at The New School for Social Research, held a half-day conference to critically evaluate the Obama administration’s current economic recovery plan. The question that was the focus of the conference was: is it time for a mid-course policy correction of serious magnitude, relating mainly to fiscal policy and bank regulation? Critical perspectives on the economic recovery plan also included discussions on (1) active labor market policies and what else policy makers can do to lessen the impact of the recession on the severity of joblessness, (2) the undue focus among policy makers and the media on GDP and bank health as a marker for a healthy economy.
Peru: Blood Flows in the Amazon
By James Petras. June 10, 2009.
In early June, Peruvian President Alan García, an ally of US President Barack Obama, ordered armored personnel carriers, helicopter gun-ships and hundreds of heavily armed troops to assault and disperse a peaceful, legal protest organized by members of Peru’s Amazonian indigenous communities protesting the entry of foreign multinational mining companies on their traditional homelands. Dozens of Indians were killed or are missing, scores have been injured and arrested and a number of Peruvian police, held hostage by the indigenous protestors were killed in the assault. President García declared martial law in the region in order to enforce his unilateral and unconstitutional fiat granting of mining exploitation rights to foreign companies, which infringed on the integrity of traditional Amazonian indigenous communal lands.
An interview with Christophe Jaffrelot on Indian politics, communalism and Dalit movement
Interviewed by Anoop Kumar, Insight Young Voices magazine. June 15, 2009.
You have been consistently writing on the rise of Hindu nationalism in the country. Recently, we all saw Tehelka’s expose´ of the involvement of the State in the Gujarat pogrom. The whole country felt the shock. However, the Congress government did not respond at all. Even the Left gave a much muted response. Most of us have been outraged. We knew everything; nothing new came out in this expose´ and yet, it was shocking for us.
Security-centric approach cannot resolve Lalgarh conflict
By Sujato Bhadro. June 28, 2009, The Times of India. This page is a part of Sanhati’s Lalgarh reporting.
Unlike Singur-Nandigram, the initial social resistance movement in Lalgarh revolved around police atrocities; with tribal people raising their voice against law enforcing agencies breaking the law of the land. So, this movement is political in nature; a story of demand for the restoration of civil liberties since November 2008. The people of Lalgarh are not concerned about problems of land acquisition, issue of development and displacement; the sole issue is fundamental: the right to life. If we focus on the historical, and oppose the fictional sense of the reality in which the people of Lalgarh live, we will be able to get a proper understanding of the problem.
Interim Report of Fact-finding Team on Demolition of VCA in Chhattisgarh
An all-India fact-finding team visited Chhattisgarh from May 29 to June 1, 2009 in the wake of certain disturbing developments in the State plagued by Maoist violence, state terror, the Salwa Judum campaign and attacks on voluntary organisations (even Gandhian bodies) by the powers that be. The team visited the site of the demolished Vanvasi Chetna Ashram (VCA) at Kanwalnar near Dantewada and run by Himanshu Kumar, a noted Gandhian social activist working among the tribals in Dantewada and Bijapur districts of Bastar region. The demolition of the ashram took place on May 17, 2009. After the visit, the team met with the state Governor, E.S. Narasimhan, and the Superintendent of Police, Dantewada, Rahul Sharma, and submitted a Memorandum to them.
The West’s fantasies of a free-market “New India”
By Pankaj Mishra, The National
Last month India held its 15th general elections. Those who recall some of the previous 14 could only marvel at the great interest the recent round of voting aroused in the western media. Less than a decade ago India was typically depicted in the international press as a poor, backward and often violent nation. Its experiments with democracy may have been unprecedented for a large poor country – but in the West they usually appeared solely in the guise of photographs of peasant women in colorful saris lining up to vote (this ageless staple popped up again in recent weeks). India’s image received a dramatic makeover only in the early years of this century, when the country’s protectionist economy, which was first liberalised in 1991, opened up further to foreign trade and investment.
Global Recession News
June 13, 2009
Both the unemployment rate and the capacity utilization rate (roughly the proportion of total non-labour capacity for production that is being used) are good measures of the level of economic activity in a capitalist economy. Both these indicators show that the US economy is in the deepest recession since the Great Depression.
Monthly Review Editorial, June 2009
The Real Unemployment Rate Hits a 68-Year High - John Miller, Dollars and Sense
Euro unemployment at decade high
EU elections: The decline of social democracy
By Peter Schwarz, World Socialist Website. June 10, 2009.
The most notable result of the European elections held last weekend is the dramatic decline of social democracy.
On average across Europe, social democratic parties received only 22 percent of the vote, six percent less than in the previous European election in 2004. With a turnout of just 43 percent, this means that less than one in ten of the electorate voted for these parties.
Blood at the Blockade: Peru’s Indigenous Uprising
June 13, 2009
Dozens of people are estimated to have been killed in clashes between police and indigenous activists protesting oil and mining projects in the northern Peruvian Amazonian province of Bagua. Peruvian authorities have declared a military curfew, and troops are patrolling towns in the Amazon jungle. Authorities say up to twenty-two policemen have been killed, and two remain missing. The indigenous community says at least forty people, including three children, were killed by the police this weekend.
Price of rice, price of power
By P Sainath. The Hindu, June 10 2009
Now that we have a Cabinet whose assets total close to Rs. 5 billion on its own declaration, with Ministers worth over Rs. 75 million each on average, it will be worth watching how it rises to the challenge of identifying with the poor and the hungry. That Rs. 5- billion figure, painstakingly compiled by the National Election Watch, a coalition of over 1200 civil society organisations working across India, covers 64 of the 79 Ministers. The other 15 are Rajya Sabha members whose updated assets are yet to be computed. True, these figures are skewed by the fact that the top five Ministers alone are worth Rs. 2 billion. However, as the NEW points out, the rest are not destitute. In all, 47 of the 64 are crorepatis. And the remaining 15 won’t harm the score too much when their totals come in.
The Social Meaning of Pensions
By Michael Perelman, MRZine. This article appeared first in 2005.
Pensions offer a wonderful example of the perverse phenomenon of the corporate sector winning support by taking actions that harm individuals. Between 1979 and 1997, the share of employees with defined benefit plans — i.e., plans that promise a specific level of support — fell from 87 percent to 50 percent (Mishel, Bernstein, and Boushey 2003, p. 247). Under defined benefit plans, employers bear the responsibility to provide the promised pensions — a responsibility that they were more than happy to shed.
Financialisation and the Tendency to Stagnation
By Bernard D’mello, EPW. May 9 2009
This is review of the book - The Great Financial Crisis: Causes and Consequences by John Bellamy Foster and Fred Magdoff (New York: Monthly Review Press; published in India by Cornerstone Publications, Kharagpur), 2009.
Click here to read the review by Bernard De Mello [PDF, English] »
Social Security Benefits and the New Pension Scheme
The central and many state government employees joining after 1st Janurary, 2004, would not get the benefits of the pay-as-you-go pension scheme. The employees themselves would have to contribute for their own pension fund, matched by equal contributions by the government. This fund might be utilised to invest in financial markets through fund managers, presumably private. In a single swoop the idea of pensions being rights of workers, has been thrown into the neo-liberal dustbin. One reason offered for this is the high return which could be earned in financial markets – a dangerous point needing scant elaboration in view of the recent worldwide turmoil. There has been little resistance from political parties. The Left parties demand for a guaranteed minimum pension income and keeping the fund out of speculation; this does not address the fundamental issue of stripping of citizens’ right to a life of dignity. The article, though a little dated (September 2007), sums up many aspects of the new pension scheme. - Editors, Sanhati. May 31, 2009.
Javed Iqbal’s open letter to the police after the destruction of Vanvasi Chetna Ashram
Javed Iqbal recently wrote 2 stories with photos on binayaksen.net. The First one is about the Anatomy of an encounter in South Bastar and second one is about an Attack On The Village Of Badepalli by the Security Forces. He was roughed up by the police during the demolition of VCA for exposing police brutality, police encounters, and Salwa Judum through these stories. Continue reading his Open Letter to Police - Editors, binyaksen.net
A human rights checklist for India
By K.S. Jacob. The Hindu, May 20 2009
Many of the current policies and practices “authorised” by the Indian state require careful review from a human rights perspective.
The latest general elections and the ongoing process of forming a Central government provide an opportunity for introspection regarding India’s human rights record. The policies and practices “authorised” by the Indian state require reflection and reappraisal. The context of India, its framework and policies, shore up and determine many of its practices. The capitalistic model with its success in the West, until the recent collapse, was adopted by India w ith dramatic impact on its economic growth. However, the average improvement in the Indian economy actually increased the income inequality for the majority of those living in Bharat. While poverty based on headcounts has reduced, deprivation, defined as the disparity between base and mean consumption, has increased. The non-inclusive nature of India’s recent growth has resulted in development without social and distributive justice for the majority of Indians.
The Nano and its Discontents
By Venu Madhav Govindu & Deepak Malghan, Tehelka
As the Nano is launched to the accompaniment of thunderous acclaim in the national and trade press, Venu Madhav Govindu and Deepak Malghan - academics from the Indian Institute of Science and the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore - raise several searching questions on the appropriateness of the Nano model of industrialisation.
India, Suddenly Starved for Investment
This article makes the point that since a large part of the recent investment boom, which drove the growth of the Indian economy, was based on foreign funds the global slowdown down not augur well for India. It originally appeared in The New York Times, May 4 2009.
Gurgaon, May 4 2009: Sumit Sapra is a member of that ambitious, impatient generation of young Indians who rode the crest of the global economy. In five years, he changed jobs three times, quadrupling his salary along the way. Even when satisfied with his position, he kept his résumé posted on job sites, in case better offers came along. And he splurged. In three years, he bought three cars, moving up a notch in luxury each time. For weekend jaunts, he bought a motorcycle.
No country for the brave - The dark heart within the glory of Indian democracy
By Bhaswati Chakravorty. May 16, 2009
There is almost a mythic power in the spectacle of India going to the polls. Just the number of people going to the booths in every corner of the country, the gigantic scale of the organization, the numerous political parties — all add up to a fascinating and undoubtedly significant exercise in democracy. Especially now, with the civilian governments in countries around India gasping for life, or turning into ruthless victory-mongers at the expense of minority populations. Within India, too, tragedies stalk the exercise of the people’s franchise. In the mythic perspective, these endow India’s general elections with something akin to a noble aura.
Defamed in death - the scurrilous implications of the CD on Tapasi Malik
By Shamita Basu. May 7, 2009. The Statesman
Recently, a propaganda film was made on Tapasi Malik’s death, based essentially on the premise that her murder was not political, but the result of a family feud stemming from an abortion, an affair, and an irate father. The film was written by Mandakranta Sen, and propagated a myth created by the CPIM within minutes of the discovery of Malik’s body in December 2006 - ed.
Singur update: Life under a brand new Trinamul panchayat
May 2009. A report from The Citizens Initiative
A large majority of the people of Singur in no way condones the Left Front government’s recent policies of industrialisation, development and land acquisition yet they are wary of the new TMC-led panchayat in Singur. For instance, some villagers in Dobandi, an SC village of landless farm labourers (and owing to existing caste discriminations and economic conditions this village has been the hardest hit ever since the land was taken away for the Tata project), received the rare subsidy from the government for making brick houses under the Indira Abasan Yojana (Indira Housing Scheme). Yet, this sum of about Rs. 35,000 came with several riders.
Children Against Dow/Carbide: Sarita Malviya spreads the word on Bhopal
By Rick Steelhammer, Commondreams. May 4, 2009
Sarita Malviya wasn’t born when an explosion at a Union Carbide chemical plant in Bhopal, India, on Dec. 3, 1984, sent a cloud of deadly gas containing the compound methyl isocyanate into the old section of the city, searing the lungs and causing the deaths of at least 4,000 people.
McCarthyism on US campuses
By Dana Cloud, MRZine. April 2009
The noxious weeds of the new McCarthyism have begun to bear bitter fruit around the country. Reports are coming in, not just about the better-known cases of harassment and firing of Norman Finkelstein (denied tenure at DePaul and banned from a speaking engagement at Clark College) or Joel Kovel (recently fired from his position as the Alger Hiss Chair of Social Studies at Bard College). Many readers will know the horrific case of Sami al-Arian, the University of South Florida professor jailed for five years without basis or charges for the suspicion of ties to terrorism.
Understanding the Nano: small car, big responsibilites
By Dipankar Dey
On the 23rd March 2009, the Tata Motors Company (TMC) launched its much publicized small car ‘Nano’ at Mumbai. As the Sanand plant at Gujarat is at its inception now, a makeshift arrangement has been made to produce 50,000 units at their Pantnagar plant. Limited numbers of prospective buyers will receive their cars after three months, in June 2009. It is reported that the basic model priced at Rs one lakh (ex-factory without transportation cost) without air conditioning will contribute only 20 per cent of the Nano sales and rest 80 per cent will be contributed by the premium models priced at around Rs1.6 lakh.
Bibhash Chakraborty’s open letter to intellectuals
In an article published in the Dainik Statesman (Mukto koro, mukto koro andhakarer ei dwar, April 24 2009), Bibhash Chakraborty lays out the reasons behind his open endorsement of Kabir Suman’s candidacy in the Lok Sabha elections. Along the way, he clarifies his views on the relationship between the intellectual and the State, asking fellow intellectuals “who are writing essays in magazines, acting out roles in films from scripts prepared by the powers that be, bringing out CDs with political pornography - how long can you keep repeating that nothing has happened, that it’s all lies, that nothing can ever happen”!
Click here to read part 1 [PDF, Bengali]
Click here to read part 2 [PDF, Bengali]
The Art of Not Writing
How does the media in Chhattisgarh report the conflict between the Naxalites and the Salwa Judum, or the conflict between local communities and corporations? Quite simply, it doesn’t. The pressures on journalists in Chhattisgarh are unique. They are paid not to report stories that are critical of the powers-that-be, whether they are industrial lobbies or state authorities.
Did Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee personally order police to fire on March 14?
Dropping a virtual bombshell in the run-up to the second phase of Lok Sabha polls, Forward Bloc state general secretary Mr Ashoke Ghosh, today disclosed that it was chief minister Mr Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee who had ordered police to fire on Nandigram villagers on 14 March, 2007 that killed at least 14 persons and triggered an unprecedented political turmoil in the state.
Unfair Wealth and Fair Elections
By Mukul Sharma, Kafila
In the first phase of elections, data (affidavits) available of 1440 candidates out of a total of 1715, compiled and analysed by the National Election Watch, is revealing: There are 193 crorepatis contesting elections in this phase; they have increased from 9 percent in 2004 to 14 percent in 2009. Congress has 45, followed by BJP and BSP, with 30 and 22 respectively. All parties, including independents, share this burden. Andhra Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Bihar, Jharkhand and Chhatisgarh have a majority of them. Their total assets go as high as 173, 125, 89, 72, 56, 45, 30 crores. Neither the earth, nor the sky is the limit. And the declared assets may just reveal a partial picture, considering the fact that most of them (979 candidates) do not even bother to have a permanent account number (PAN), which is necessary for filing annual income tax returns.
HDI Oscars: slumdogs versus millionaires
By P. Sainath. March 21, 2009
What does it mean to rank much better on GDP per capita than in the HDI, as we do? It means we have been less successful in converting income into human development.
“Only the idiots are committing suicide”
By Shubhranshu Choudhary. 31 Mar 2009, Indiatogether.
In Chhatisgarh’s Durg district, there is no shortage of farmers who have taken their lives - the district ranks second in the state on this count. But equally, there is no shortage of those who don’t see these suicides.
Nawagarh, in Durg district of Chhatisgarh, is a very small place by any standard. Everyone knows everyone else here, and so it was not difficult to find a local journalist as soon as we reached Nawagarh. We were looking for help to investigate stories of farmers’ suicides in the area. A simple enquiry at a local paan shop on the road side got us the address and directions to the most famous journalist in town.
A photo essay on the de-industrialization of Bengal: Real estate SEZs over the ruins of factories
The real story behind the much-hyped industrialization of West Bengal is one of continuous de-industrialization, land grab and conversion to real estate. This essay captures the emerging Shriram Hitec city in Hind Motors. Included is an article on industries in the Barackpur-Kanchrapara belt.
A psychological study of India’s Partition, and some surprising results
A sketch of Ashis Nandy’s recent lecture at UC Berkeley. March 13, 2009
It was not hatred, but a strong undercurrent of humanity, that was the surprising finding of research on the traumatic bloodbath of the Partition, iconoclastic Indian researcher Ashis Nandy told an audience March 3 at the University of California.
Nandy made some unconventional points: Even in the terrible bloodbath that claimed the lives of millions, as many as one in four people among survivors said they were saved by the other community, and their fondest memories were still of the days when they lived with the ostensibly enemy community. He added that while those who engaged in the killings virtually got off scot-free, they paid a price in terms of mental and physical health and some even accepted culpability in their later age.
Reaching out to the back rows: questions on primary education
In spite of increased enrolment, why are children in state-funded schools not getting quality education?
By Parimal Bhattacharya
In Satyajit Ray’s film, Aparajito, an inspector comes on a visit to a village school and asks a class the meaning of a Bengali word. The incident turns out to be serendipitous for young Apu: not only does he give the correct answer, but his moving rendition from a primer also pleases the headmaster.
Capitalism Beyond the Crisis - Amartya Sen’s article, and a critique
Unnayan - A discussion on the concept of Development with Dignity
By Atanu Midya
This article is based on Professor Amit Bhaduri’s recent work, Development with Dignity, and related discussions with Meher Engineer, Dipanjan Rai Chaudhuri, and others. It addresses the twin issues of mass employment generation on the one hand, and social and political empowerment of the rural population on the other.
Click here to read Unnayan, a discussion on Development with Dignity [PDF, Bengali] »
Poverty behind the tiger
By Chris Harman. Socialist Review, February 2009
November’s deadly attacks in Mumbai had one peculiar side-effect on the British media. Journalists were forced out into the streets and discovered that the vast majority of the city’s population are still poor.
Sri Lanka: A Besieged Society
By S Sivasegaram. RadicalNotes, 24 February 2009
Sri Lanka is in deep crisis on many fronts, and its politics is almost a total mess. Yet, its President, Mahinda Rajapaksa, elected by a whisker in November 2005, thanks to the boycott of the election by the Tamils in the North-East, after a last-minute call by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), is the only Sri Lankan head of government to have grown in popularity since election. He owes this immense popularity among the majority Sinhalese to his rejection of the peace process and the success of the armed forces in regaining, at a very high but unknown cost in men and material, all but 200 sq. km of the vast territory held by the LTTE.
India makes a place for Dirty Harry
By Daniel Pepper. The New York Times, March 1 2009.
Madkam Deva walks about 20 paces off a dirt footpath in a verdant forest, finds the place where large, orange ants crawl over a dark maroon stain, then points to another bloodstain a few yards away. This, he says, is where he saw one villager cut down by police bullets, and then a second. “I’m scared they’ll come after me now,” says Deva, who is about 20. He says a bullet grazed his right forearm while he fled the barrage. His account of what happened in this remote and undeveloped corner of eastern India on Jan. 8 boils down to this: the police rounded up 24 tribal villagers, told them they were going to a station for questioning, then lined them up for execution en route. Five, including Deva, escaped.
Working Paper: Current crisis regime and impact on class struggle in India
This paper has been produced by Gurgaon Workers News, February 2009.
1. The character of the Shining India after the crash 1991
2. Landmarks of the current crisis in India. a) The Crisis Blow b) The state’s reaction
3. Margins of the crisis regime in India a) The Social Unrest of the Rural World b) The Energy Crunch c) The Industrial Impasse d) The political consequences for the crisis regime
4. New frame-work and potentials for proletarian unrest
Inflexibility and falsifiability in economics, and the failure of rigid worldviews
By Amit Bhaduri. EPW, January 2009
It is remarkable that despite the inexactitude of economics as a body of knowledge, which should have left enough space for some if not several contesting economic ideologies, over the last 20 years or so all the major political parties in India cutting across the spectrum from the Left to the Right largely converged to a very similar point of view on economic management. Would the current global financial and economic crisis give us the courage necessary to re-educate ourselves to view the “logic of the market” more logically?
NREGA implementation countrywide: the first two years
By Jean Dreze and Christian Oldgies. Frontline, February 2009.
In an article in the July 27, 2007 issue of Frontline we presented and discussed data relating to the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) for 2006-07, extracted from the official website of the Ministry of Rural Development ( www.nrega.nic.in). This follow-up note is essentially an “update” along the same lines, including a brief comparison of 2006-07 and 2007-08 figures.
Few jobs for Muslims in Bengal; housing and banking discrimination
No jobs, Muslims only fobbed off in Bengal
Stink of prejudice at every step
Sorry, you’re Muslim : Visually impaired techie’s house hunt horror
Clash in Midnapore town after Muharram procession stopped
Europe’s growing swing to the Left
By Neil Clark, New Statesman. December 2008.
If socialism signifies a political and economic system in which the government controls a large part of the economy and redistributes wealth to produce social equality, then I think it is safe to say the likelihood of its making a comeback any time in the next generation is close to zero - Francis Fukuyama, author of The End of History, in Time magazine in 2000.
He should take a trip around Europe today. Make no mistake, socialism - pure, unadulterated socialism, an ideology that was taken for dead by liberal capitalists - is making a strong comeback. Across the continent, there is a definite trend in which long-established parties of the centre left that bought in to globalisation and neoliberalism are seeing their electoral dominance challenged by unequivocally socialist parties which have not.
21st century land grab - rich countries snap up land in Africa and elsewhere
By Debora Mackenzie, Newscientist. Dec 2008.
History may be repeating itself. Until the mid-20th century, many European countries grew rich on the resources of their colonies. Now, countries including China, Kuwait and Sweden are snapping up vast tracts of agricultural land in poorer nations, especially in Africa, to grow biofuels and food for themselves.
Do rural poor support land acquisition? - A survey by the Indian Statistical Institute
Dec 22, 2008: This survey by the premier statistical institution of the country produced interesting results. Rural poor in most states in India, including a majority in Bengal, oppose land acquisition. Fault-lines exist along the poverty line: people above are less opposed than those below. A small minority of states produced results in the affirmative. Interestingly, these states included ones with higher as well as lower per capita SDP than Bengal, pointing out the complex dynamics at play in these states.
30 years of destitution: India’s largest energy hub and the people of Singrauli, U.P.
“Singrauli will turn into Singapore,” - Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, 2008
Across the nation, up to 60,000,000 people are estimated to have been displaced by power, irrigation, mining and other development projects since independence.
Stalin, the Kolkata Film Festival, and Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee
By Sankar Ray. Dec 2008
Many old guard - especially fellow-travellers of CPI(M or CPI prior to the victory of Left Front in the Ninth elections to the West Bengal State Assembly - who saw the film Szabadság, szerelem (Children of Glory) depicting the turmoil in Hungary in 1956, a few months after the historic and controversial secret speech of Nikita Sergeyvich Khruschev on the last day of the 20th Congress of now-defunct Communist Party of Soviet Union in the fag end of February, at the 14th West Bengal Film Festival (14th FF)at Nandan Auditorium - looked pensive.
While walking out of auditorium, some were heard admitting that they were misinformed and misled by party leaders.
Return of the terror law: Implications for peoples movements and a petition
Sign petition to demand repeal of draconian laws
Implications for peoples movements
Press Release from Kolkata activists: deep anguish over laws - Dec 24, 2008
Acts of Terror and Terrorising Act – Unfolding Indian Tragedy - Dec 19, 2008
Double-barrel strike on terror - Dec 16, 2008
Airport cities: The new paradigm
One of the aspects of neoliberal accumulation in India and Bengal has been the steady creation of real estate enclaves, hubs, and gated cities. A new chapter in this process is the impending concept of airport cities, with the usual promises of job creation, downstream employment, and development. An idea imported from highly developed nations, the aerotropolis, as it is called, will demand the creation of attendent SEZs and the provision of infrastructure like water and electricity by local taxpayers. A land acquisition notice for an airport city in Andal (Burdwan, West Bengal) was served in December 2008.
Notes from a ghost town: a day in the Naihati industrial region, Bengal
By Parimal Bhattacharya, Dec 2008
Every night, at 11 pm, Moumita Pan waits in the dark with her schoolbooks for the electric light to come on. A student of Class XI, she has to race through her studies before the light goes out again at two in the morning. Moumita is the only girl in the workers’ quarters of the Jenson and Nicholson plant at Naihati, closed since 2004, who has cleared the Madhyamik and has not dropped out yet.
Climate change and India: ominous reports from UN convention (UNFCC 2008)
The United Nations Climate Change Conference was held in Poznań, Poland, between 1-12 December 2008. Over a decade ago, most countries joined an international treaty - the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) - to begin to consider what can be done to reduce global warming. This Conference of the Parties (COP) is the “supreme body” of the Convention; it is the highest decision-making authority. The COP meets every year.
Several ominous reports on India and the subcontinent emerged from the COP this year.
(1) India loses more people to climate change than any other country
(2) Farm output may drop 30pc in S Asia by 2050, effects already on display in Bangladesh?
Space relations of capital and Significance of New economic enclaves: SeZs in india
By Swapna Banerjee-Guha. This article was published in EPW.
“Space is political. It is a product literally filled with ideologies.” - Lefebvre 1991: 101
This paper examines the evolution of the new development enclaves - special economic zones - in India in the light of the space relations of capital. The process of establishing sezs in India is essentially a classic unfolding of the process of “accumulation by dispossession” which is part of the recent strategy of global capital to overcome the chronic problem of over-accumulation. The paper throws light on the ongoing reorganisation of the space relations of capital in India.
Click here to read article [PDF, English] »
Indian Tribes after Sixty Years - A Study
By Walter Fernandes. This paper first apeared in Counterviews Webzine, Feb 2008.
(1) Tribals and Land - Basic Statistics (2) Tribal displacement due to refugee rehabilitation (3) Displacement in Tripura due to refugee rehabilitation (4) Development-Induced Displacement (5) Ensuring Availability without Access (6) The Development Paradigm (7) Attack on Tribal Culture (8) Tribal Reaction (9) Conclusion
Where is red in your sky, comrade? - revolutionary posturing on the eve of the Calcutta Film Festival
Rosso come il Cielo (Red Like The Sky), to be shown at the inaugural ceremony of the 14th Kolkata Festival has a piece of significant dialogue:
“You’ll grow up, and by that time you’ll have outgrown everything about this place.”
Anti-mining and anti-SEZ struggles in Salem, Tamil Nadu: A summary
Salem, in Tamil Nadu, South India, is the scene of mining operations and an impending SEZ site. Various players, from SAIL to the Jindals to the infamous Vedanta corporation, are vying for mining rights in the area. An IT SEZ is on the cards. Local struggle is developing.
Dispossession of weavers in Varanasi and the need for an artisans movement
Varanasi in North India, which employed 700,000 people in handloom a decade back, now employs only 250,000, with 47 reported cases of suicide. In the face of liberalization, silk cloth imports, indiscriminate mechanization, loose control over cheap imitations, rising price of silk, etc. weavers, like other artisans, are being dispossessed. This article discusses the inefficacy of existing government schemes, and suggests ways forward, stressing the need for an artisans’ movement in the country.
Class analysis of Indian agriculture: from Towards a New Dawn Newsletter
By Abhijnan Sarkar, Towards a New Dawn, September 2008.
Click here to read article [English, PDF, 2.4 MB] »
Gated communities in urban enclaves: stories of internal colonization
With the increasing spatial concentration of wealth and misery, of upward opportunities and downward spirals, those who feel privileged tend to feel threatened. In that way Gurgaon, the new IT hub of northen India, is a landscape of mass-psychosis.
The US financial crisis: locating the real locus of the debate with Rick Wolff
By Rick Wolff
In US capitalism’s greatest financial crisis since the 1930s Depression, status-quo ideology swirls. The goal is to keep this crisis under control, to prevent it from challenging capitalism itself. One method is to keep public debate from raising the issue of whether and how class changes — basic economic system changes — might be the best “solution.” Right, center, and even most left commentators exert that ideological control, some consciously and some not. Hence the debates where those demanding “more or better government regulation” of financial markets shout down those who still “have more confidence in private enterprise and free markets.” Both sides limit the public discussion to more vs less state intervention to “save the economy.” Then too we have quarrels over details of state intervention: politicians “want to help foreclosure victims too” or “want to limit financiers’ pay packages” or want to “weed out bad apples in the finance industry” while spokespersons of various financial enterprises struggle to shape the details to their particular interests.
Kashmir and the liberals: a massacre justified by philanthropy?
By Pankaj Mishra
For decades now, Kashmir has hosted a bloody stalemate, in which a powerful nation-state repeatedly tries, and fails, to impose its will on a small unyielding population. The Indian state uses political means (elections, special privileges) and financial inducements as well as military force to convince Kashmiris that they should not dream of self-determination. Still, Kashmiri defiance and harsh Indian retaliation exact a terrible human toll: tens of thousands killed, innumerable many disabled, tortured, orphaned and widowed. There is hardly a family in the Valley left untouched by the biggest military occupation in the world.
SEZs in India: current lists and statistics
Click here for list of notified SEZs in India as of August 11, 2008 »
Click here for list of approved SEZs in India as of August 1, 2008 »
Click here for list of SEZs in India set up before SEZ Act of 2005 »
Click here for sectorwise distribution of SEZs in India »
Click here for statewise distribution of SEZs in India »
A conversation with Amit Bhaduri: alternatives in development
A few of us had a discussion with Professor Amit Bhaduri on his concept of “Development with Dignity”. In the struggle of ordinary people against the aggression of big capital in our country, this concept provides a vibrant locus of activity and future direction. It may also be important in the broader aim of social change. We present a draft of our conversation, both in Bengali and in English.
Perspectives on the U.S. financial crisis
The U.S. financial crisis: some views from Monthly Review
The Greed Fallacy: By Arthur MacEwan, Dollars and Sense
Hard Truths About the Bailout
Free market ideology is far from finished: By Naomi Klein
Crisis of Capitalism and the Left: By Emir Sader
A Big Devil in the Jondolos: The Politics of Shack Fires
This report from South Africa was prepared at the request of Abahlali BaseMonjo over July and August 2008. It looks at the problem of fire for people living in shacks. Shack fires are not acts of God. They are the result of political choices, often at municipal level. There is not enough affordable housing for everyone and low cost housing is rarely built close to the city centre. For this reason transport costs make even low-cost housing unaffordable for many people. Growing shack settlements are the result.
Click here to read the report [.doc, English] »
Dynamics of rural proletariat: labour shortage in agriculture, NREGA, aspirations, and the nouveau riche
Introduction: rural proletariat in Haryana and Punjab
Aspirations within misery: labour shortage in agriculture
The NREGA and the control of rural proletariat
The teenage guns of the nouveau riche
Is tenant eviction at the heart of the Bengal government’s new agrarian thinking?
By Shubhendu Dasgupta. Translated by Debarshi Das, Sanhati
One of the many aspects of the land reform programme was security for tenants. Those land owners who would not cultivate the land themselves, would lease out the same to the tenants. This is called tenancy cultivation – or “barga” cultivation in Bengal. Those who would lease in the land on barga cultivation would be called “bargadars”.
Aspects of Nuclear Power
1. Nuclear Reactor Hazards : Ongoing dangers of operating nuclear technology in the 21st century
2. Nuclear Power: no solution to climate change
3. Pros and cons of nuclear power
4. The nuclear ’solution’ to climate change
5. The Nuclear crisis in France
Politics at stake: reflections on civil society; a note on stakeholder analysis
By Mark Butler and David Ntseng, South Africa. Guest contribution, July 2008.
In South Africa one of the biggest barriers to the ability of grassroots political society to contest directly with state and capital is the spongy wall of civil society around both. This is very seldom recognised by the middle class left, most of whom are located in that civil society in NGOs or the academy. In that context this article by Mark Butler and David Ntseng is quite important as there are very few critiques of civil society around in South Africa. - Contextual introduction by Richard Pithouse
Inflation and the Spectre of World Revolution
By James Petras, Guest Contributor.
Inflation and all of its repercussions for wage and salaried workers, fixed income middle classes, as well as manufacturers and transport industries is splashed all over the financial pages of the major newspapers throughout the world. Inflation is the great solvent that dissolves paternalistic ties between employers and workers, landowners and peasants, clientele-patronage regimes and the urban poor and sets in motion violent protests against private property and previously popularly elected regimes. Historical religious, clan, party, ethnic, tribal, caste and other differences are temporarily suspended, as Hindus and Moslems in India, Communists and Christians in the Philippines, peasants and workers in China, industrial workers and public employees in Egypt, blacks and mulattos in Haiti…join together in sustained mass protests against inflation which profoundly and visibly erodes their living standards from week to week, in some cases from one day to another.
NREGA Scams in Orissa and Madhya Pradesh - two reports
These reports from the Centre for Environment and Food Security (CEFS) published in July 2008, give an outline of NREGA scams in Orissa and Madhya Pradesh. The full reports, as well as their executive summaries, are given.
Stiglitz and Sen, Food and Morals
By Aseem Srivastava
This article examines a recent piece by Joseph Stiglitz that appeared in The Guardian, called Scarcity in an age of plenty.
Click here to read this article [PDF, English] »
India’s Runaway ‘Growth’: Distortion, Disarticulation, and Exclusion
Introduction I. Economics as Mechanics II. How Capitalism Emerged in Europe III. Colonial Rule: Setting the Pattern IV. India’s Runaway ‘Growth’ IV 1. Missing Links IV 2. The External Stimulus and Its Implications IV 3. Private Corporate Sector-Led Growth and Exclusion IV 4. The Condition of the People IV 5. The Agrarian Impasse and Its Implications V. Unlocking the Productive Potential of the Entire Labour Force
Behind (or ahead of) the India-US nuclear deal: India Inc bets big on N-power
Indian capital is quick to take cue from the government’s move and has already started planning its investments in the nuclear sector. Whose interest will the nuclear deal serve? (1) US strategic interests, and (2) Indian corporate interest. The CPI(M) is and probably will remain silent about the second. One might even go a little further and see the haste in the government’s move resulting from pressures emanating from these two quarters: (1) US administration, and (2) Indian big capital. Thus, it seems that a nice alliance is in operation here, the alliance between multinational capital (represented by the US State) and national capital (represented by the Indian State). Analyzing the changing nature of this alliance over time might offer insights into the evolution of contemporary imperialism. - Dipankar Basu, Sanhati.
Behind the IAEA Safeguards Agreement: What the Nuclear Deal Entails
By M.V. Ramana, Guest Contributor.
With the submission of the safeguards agreement to the IAEA and the challenge to the government from the left parties, there is now renewed widespread debate about the nuclear agreement with United States. Much of the debate on the deal has been between what can be broadly called the nuclear hawks and the nuclear nationalists. The nuclear hawks believe India’s nuclear programme is a great success and more than able to take care of itself. They see the deal as imposing unnecessary constraints on the programme and making more difficult the creation of the large nuclear arsenal, including thermonuclear weapons (hydrogen bombs), that they believe is essential for India to be a ‘great power.’
Class Struggle and Resistance in Zimbabwe
1. Revolutionaries, resistance and crisis in Zimbabwe – Munyaradzi Gwisai
2. His Excellency Comrade Robert: How Mugabe’s ZANU clique rose to power – Stephen O’Brien
3. No to a government of national unity! Only united mass action will defeat Mugabe! – International Socialist Organisation of Zimbabwe
Click here to read Class Struggle & Resistance in Zimbabwe [PDF, 400 KB] »
The May 2008 Pogroms: xenophobia, evictions, liberalism, and democratic grassroots militancy in South Africa
By Richard Pithouse, Guest Contributor. Durban, 16 June 2008.
This essay examines the issues of xenophobia in present-day South Africa, in the light of the riots of May 2008. It starts by looking at eviction in the Harry Gwala settlement and the role of various poor people’s movements like Abahlali baseMjondolo, Anti-Eviction Campaign, and the Landless People’s Movement. It then looks at the riots, making the point that most areas under the control of militant organisations of the poor that have been in serious conflict with the state had no violence. The essay evaluates the ideas of Michael Neocosmos in theorizing xenophobia, coming to the conclusion that “For Neocosmos xenophobia and authoritarianism are a continuation of apartheid oppression that are, in the end, a product of liberalism. He proposes, against the state centric politics of liberalism, a recovery of popular emancipatory politics…[it] is the practical politics that was able to defend and shelter people targeted in the May pogroms, and has previously, although covertly, offered the same protection from the state…”
A man-made famine - India and the world in the Great Hunger of 2008
1. India’s Emerging Food Security Crisis: The Consequences of the Neoliberal Assault on the Public Distribution System - Analytical Monthly Review
2. A man-made famine - Raj Patel, The Guardian
3. The World Food Crisis: Sources and Solutions - Fred Magdoff, Monthly Review
4. Manufacturing a Food Crisis - Walden Bellow, The Nation
5. Global food crisis: ‘The greatest demonstration of the historical failure of the capitalist model’ - Ian Angus, Socialist Voice
6. Soaring prices are causing hunger around the world - Washington Post Editorial
7. The World’s Growing Food-Price Crisis - Time magazine
Talk To Naxals; Focus On Development, Land Reform
By Suhit Sen, The Statesman
A team of experts constituted by the Planning Commission has cottoned on to something the Prime Minister doesn’t seem to comprehend. It has pointed out that Left-wing extremism is not just - we could go further and say not at all - a law-and-order problem. It is a phenomenon that arises from a complete lack of development, desperate poverty and the dehumanisation that arises from it, and injustice and inequality. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh does not agree, of course - not long ago he had characterised extremism as the most virulent disease that afflicted India’s body politic and Naxals as the Public Enemy Number 1. He should take time off his admittedly onerous duties to pore over the report.
On the Naxalite Movement: A Report with a Difference
An EPW commentary by Sumanta Banerjee on the recent Planning Commission Report, “which while meticulously arranging the latest facts and figures, rigorously examines the causes of the continuing economic exploitation and social discrimination in the adivasi and dalit-inhabited areas even after 60 years of independence. It is significant that this particular expert group was set up by the government in May 2006, in the background of increasing Naxalite activities in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Jharkhand and Orissa.”
Enemies of the State - Women and men who choose the margins
Enemies of the State: Women and men who choose the margins - By Ashok Mitra
Mumbai’s Rebels: Those Who Couldn’t Remain Unmoved. Profiles of Anuradha Ghandy, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves, Shridhar Shrinivasan - By Bernard D’Mello
They insist your show must be cancelled! - cultural coercion in a post-Nandigram Bengal
By Tapas Sinha. Translated by Suvarup Saha, Sanhati
The phonecall came on the 10th of April. One of the organizers of the Champdanga Theatre Festival was on the line. On the receiving end was thespian Koushik Sen, who has been active in the civil society movement of Nandigram.
From Chhattisgargh to Manipur: The many faces of Salwa Judum
Manipur will arm its civilians to fight militants: A Salwa Judum in the making? - May 3, 2008
Chhattisgargh’s purification hunt - By Shubhranshu Choudhary
4 farmers commit suicide everyday in Chhattisgarh - the highest in the country - By Shubhranshu Choudhary
Venezuela: Democracy, Socialism and Imperialism
By James Petras
An analysis of Venezuela’s political scenario, covering the following points: (1) The advances and limitations of economic policy (2) Politics: the chavistas strike back (3) Social and cultural advances and contradictions (4) Cultural contradictions and challenges (5) The struggle of popular social movements versus the reactionary middle class movements (6) US-Venezuelan relations (7) Imperial-Vassal Three Part ‘Soft Power’: Drugs, Human Rights and Terrorism (8) The Hard Power Campaign - Three Part Strategy: Economic Boycotts, Low Intensity Warfare and the Colombia Card (9) Diplomatic and Economic Confrontation: Chavez Versus Bush (10) Vulnerability, Opportunities and Challenges (11) The National Security Threats (12) Conclusion: Advantages and Opportunities for Socialist Transformation
Let them eat biscuits! - Or how the market seeks new vistas
By Jean Drèze and Reetika Khera. An editorial in The Hindustan Times
Anyone who has illusions about the influence of corporate interests on public policy in India, or about the priorities of elected representatives, would do well to read the recent correspondence among the Biscuit Manufacturers Association (BMA), Members of Parliament and various ministries. The main issue in this correspondence is a proposal to replace cooked mid-day meals in primary schools with biscuits.
Looking back at Khejuri: Our men, their men – the straw men
This eyewitness account appeared in November 2007, and presents an alternative first-hand view of the highly publicised Khejuri camps. It has been translated by Atreyi Dasgupta, Sanhati.
…One of the little ones, when asked his name, immediately parroted, “We need industry, or else how can we have development”. He was ten years old. His sister was just beside him, and she said, “We don’t know how long we have to stay in this condition. If we ask these people, they say, everything will go back to normal in a few days. But where is that happening? You know didi, our friends in Nandigram told us that they have resumed their studies. What will we do?”
Does Land Still Matter?
By D. Bandyopadhyay
The national economy is growing at double digit rates but neither industry nor non-agricultural activities in rural India provide livelihood for millions of rural workers. The annual growth of agricultural output decelerated from 3.08 per cent pa during 1980-81 to 1991-92 to 2.38 per cent pa during 1992-93 to 2003-04. It is this failure that underlies the spurt in rural violence that has highlighted once again the issue of the poors’ access to land, water, and forests. It is gradually being recognised that further deterioration of economic, social, and political conditions of the rural poor can neither be arrested nor reversed without a significant policy shift towards a comprehensive land reform program.
Predatory Growth
By Amit Bhaduri
Over the last two decades or so, the two most populous, large countries in the world, China and India, have been growing at rates considerably higher than the world average. In recent years the growth rate of national product of China has been about three times, and that of India approximately two times that of the world average. This has led to a clever defence of globalisation by a former chief economist of IMF (Fisher, 2003). Although China and India feature as only two among some 150 countries for which data are available, he reminded us that together they account for the majority of the poor in the world. This means that, even if the rich and the poor countries of the world are not converging in terms of per capita income, the well above the average world rate of growth rate of these two large countries implies that the current phase of globalisation is reducing global inequality and poverty at a rate as never before.
Chemical Hub at Nayachar: Citizens’ Expert Committee Report
In view of the appalling lack of transparency pertaining to various aspects of the West Bengal Government’s proposal for, and efforts towards, setting up a Chemical / Petrochemical Hub at Nayachar and the numerous urgent issues of public interest thrown up by such a project, a Citizens’ Expert Committee was constituted to look into the desirability and viability of the said project. The Committee comprises of eminent specialists drawn from various disciplines – geology, chemistry, physics, river science, medicine, economics and fisheries. Presented below are the preliminary observations of the Committee, covering environmental, geological, and economic aspects.
You see, we do back calculations here - Rural employment and Panchayet realities in Bengal
By Swati Bhattacharya. Translated by Debarshi Das, Sanhati
We want work, work, work, work and work. - Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, Chief Minister, West Bengal
Anukul Das was from Sonaga village, Gosaba Gram Panchayat (South 24 Parganas District, the Sunderban region). He demanded the right to work for minimum hundred days from Panchayat. Presently he is in the Andamans seeking work. His wife Shikha Das says, he got only nine days of work in two years. So, he went to submit the application for unemployment dole with some other villagers. Panchayat did not want to accept to application, hence they forcibly submitted it. A few days later, works started in the area, and they did not find any. They were allotted works in Rangabelia, about four kilometres away. Cost of travelling to and fro is twenty two rupees per day. One hour by boat, one more on foot. It was absurd to accept such a proposal. Panchayat members had told them openly: you complained about us, we will provide no work to you.
On the CPIM’s draft political resolution
Capitalistic socialism: New Oxymoron - By Sankar Ray
Irony of recent history - A critique of the CPIM’s draft political resolution - By Sankar Ray
Singur brutalizer gets medal, cadres get Nandigram land, cash incentives for officials: Laissez-faire in action
Friedmanite neo-liberalism advocates minimization of the involvement of the state. In reality, neo-liberal policies are imposed and facilitated by the state - from nepotism and incentives to disappearances and massacres.
1. Singur: IPS officer accused of torture awarded Seva medal by Chief Minister - March 3, 2008
2. Bengal govt to distribute vested Nandigram land to party supporters - February 27, 2008
3. Cash Incentives for Officials Who Take Initiative for Land Acquisition - February 2, 2008
Economic Growth: A Meaningless Obsession?
By Amit Bhaduri, B.N. Ganguly Memorial Lecture; CSDS, Delhi, November 2006.
We are living in India at a time when the media is continuously transmitting confusing, even conflicting, economic signals. If we restrict ourselves to the English language print as well as electronic media, our comfort level is likely to be high. The economy is growing at a high rate, the stock market is booming, our foreign reserve is at a comfortably high level, and freer trade is bringing to our doors a variety of goods and services simply unimaginable even a couple of decades ago as a mark of the benefits of globalization. What is more, we are daily reminded that India is poised economically and politically as an emergent world power.
Tall Claims: Employment generated by Haldia Petrochemicals
By Dipanjan Rai Chaudhuri and Purnendu Chakraborty
These articles calculate the actual employment figure in downstream units of HPL for 2005 to be less than 19,301. We are being asked to believe that, in 2 years, the figure has increased from less than 19,301 to 50,000+89,900, an increase of more than 7-fold. The figure of 89,900 is also suspiciously close to 89,895, which is the employment figure for ALL new projects implemented in the state between 1991-2002 (Source: Frontline). It seems that either 89,000 is a favourite number, or that all employment in the state has come from HPL.
Neoliberalism, the U.S. economic crisis, and the phases of capitalism
Neoliberal Globalization Is Not the Problem - By Rick Wolff
2008: The Demise of Neoliberal Globalization - By Immanuel Wallerstein
Putting the U.S. Economic Crisis in Perspective - By Leo Panitch
Growth of a Wasteland
By Amit Bhaduri
Economic growth tends to be sustained over a period of time by mutually reinforcing tendencies. This process has appeared in different guises in various fields of enquiry to describe essentially similar phenomena. Biologists have long known it as symbiosis or mutualism between two species; they appear as autocatalysis in chemical reactions, and engineers dealing with electrical circuits call similar mechanisms systems of positive mutual feedbacks. Economists Myrdal and Kaldor tried to capture this phenomenon occurring during the process of economic growth as the mechanism of ‘cumulative causation’, and ‘dynamic increasing returns’ respectively. While most processes of economic growth sustained over a period of time might be characterized by this somewhat abstract notion of mutually reinforcing tendencies, each historical process is also different in so far as it generates it own specific tendencies. It is the specificity of these reinforcing tendencies that determine to a large extent the developmental politics underlying this growth process. The growing despair and anger in large part of Indian countryside about India’s recent and unprecedented high growth has to be placed in this context.
Some critiques of CPI(M)’s 19th Congress and stance on capitalism
On Jyoti Basu’s Embrace of Capitalism as the Only Road to Industrialisation - By P.J. James
CPI(M)’s 19th Congress: The Social Democrats Stand Further Exposed - By K.N. Ramachandran
Buddha Weeps in Jadugoda
Click here to watch documentary: Buddha weeps in Jadugoda [Youtube video, six parts]
Click here for photos of affected children
Ragi Kana Ko Bonga Buru (Buddha weeps in Jadugoda) documents the devastating effects of uranium mining by Uranium Corporation of India Limited at Jadugoda, in Jharkhand. For the last thirty years, radioactive waste has been dumped into the rice fields of Adivasis. The complete disregard of the authorities to radioactive waste management rules wreaks havoc on the daily lives of villagers and children, with genetic deformities becoming quite common.
About director Shriprakash Prakash: Shriprakash has directed and produced many documentary films during the last 15 years. He is also the chief co-ordinator of Kritika, a group working in the Jharkhand region since 1990 in the areas of culture and communication. With his films he has attempted to capture the struggles and aspirations of indigenous local communities in Bihar and Jharkhand, and to give them a voice.
NREGA - Employment guarantee: beyond propaganda
By Jean Drèze
The extension of the NREGA to the whole country is an unprecedented opportunity to build the foundations of a social security system in rural India, revive village economies, promote social equity, and empower rural labour.
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