violence Against women: zero tolerence

Dismissal PPO

First Ever PPO Order for those Dismissed.. Gupta's Visionary Contribution to the Pensionary and TU Movement.. Thanks to CHQ and all who strived for realising the same

Madurai Conference Invitation

How Much You Pay for Prasar Bharati.! By:Joseph Martin CJ It is a fact that the tax payers money in a democratic country needs to be spend in responsible manner .There is nothing wrong if the government of a democratic country trying to control and reduce the government expenditure ,keeping in mind the genuine interest of its citizens and the nation ,( with out sacrificing its social responsibilities towards the citizens). Our concern here is restricted to Public Service broadcaster and National Broadcaster, Prasar Bharati. All over the world Pubic Broadcasters facing brutal axe on its funding by the governments, which became a serious threat to the quality of its services to their citizens and even a threat to their very existence itself.Prasar Bharati also going to face or facing the same scenario due to the government decision to fund only the fifty percentage of its operating expenses. In this scenario let us examine how much tax payers valuable money our nation and its citizens paying for Prasar Bharati's (AIR&DD's) various diversified services . On 09.03.2010, Hon’ble Minister of State for I&B Shri. Mohan Jatua, tabled in the Lok Sabha the following statement , regarding the details of income, expenditure and gap in income & expenditure of All India Radio & Doordarshan for the last four years as under: (STARRED QUESTION NO .166 ANSWERED ON 09.03.2010 in the LOK SABHA ,link to the statement http://164.100.47.132/LssNew/psearch/QResult15.aspx?qref=83283) . Financial Year Income Expenditure Gap Between Expenditure & Income 2006-07 983.05 1954.67 971.62 2007-08 1035.86 2057.92 1022.06 2008-09 1096.78 2518.88 1422.10 2009-10 1119.00 3098.00 1979.00 Amount in Crore of Rupees,For the year 2009-10 figures are provisional. If the income ,expenditure and gap between expenditure & income (Revenue deficit) of Prasar Bharati is calculated for the last four financial years it will be, Average income ..................=1058.7Crore Average expenditure ..........=2406.7Crore Average Revenue deficit...=1348.0Crore. Up to now this revenue deficit of Prasar Bharati was completely funded by the government and in effect this revenue deficit was the governments expenditure for Prasar Bharati.So the governments or tax payers average spending in the last four financial years for Prasar Bharati's services were 1348.00 Crore. India the largest democracy in the world with second largest population,with an estimated population of 1.13 billion, (as per 2008 survey).The average expense per citizens/year towards Prasar Bharati in the last for years was 1348.00 Crore/113 Crore= 11.9 rupees /citizen/year only . We want to ask the policy makers and the each citizen of this country to decide whether this just 11.9 rupees /citizen/year expenditure for Prasar Bharati and its services is justified or not?. It is certain that, even those opposed to the very concept of Public Service Broadcasting and National Broadcasting, will agree that this expenditure of just 11.9 rupees /citizen/year for the Public Service Broadcaster and National Broadcaster of the largest democracy in the world is absolutely justifiable.

Our nftetn.org Server is fault.. so we place this item in this blog Kindly Ignore A News has been spread throughout Tamilnadu that the Circle Secretary of Chennai has invoked the name of our Tamilnadu Circle Secretary in their meeting held on 6th July’12 questioning the placing of Com A B Bardhan’s TU Lecture Notes in TN website and abused our Circle Secretary by calling Caste aspersion as Parppann (a derogatory term for Brahmin). Comrades started enquiring the said / alleged affair. One of our Senior Comrade (Outside Chennai and Tamilnadu Circle), hearing the same verified the veracity of that affair. With great organizational interest, Our Senior Comrade voluntarily conveyed to Tamilnadu Circle Secretary that Chennai Circle secretary denied any such speech /such meeting. Moreover, whenever TN CS and Chennai CS share joint platform, no disrespect was shown by each other and even if any differences, both expressed the same in a dignified way only. As far as TN CS is concerned, he acts only on issue basis in TU related matters and never acts on the basis of whims and fancies or on the basis of fear or favour. No more enquiry on this matter is solicited. 11-7-12

Rashtrapati Election — CPI Stand

MAINSTREAM, VOL L, NO 29, JULY 7, 2012 Rashtrapati Election — CPI Stand by S. SUDHAKAR REDDY The election of the Rashtrapati, scheduled for July 19, has sparked intense debate in the media as well as in political circles as differences in major political groupings have come to the surface and there are speculations on possible political realignments. But most of the speculations seem to be out of context because any realignment has to materialise on the basis of concrete socio-economic policies. The National Executive of the Communist Party of India, keeping in view the political tactics adopted at its Patna Congress, resolved to abstain from the presidential poll voting as our Party cannot support the candidates of parties or groups of parties that are wedded to implementation of the disastrous economic course of neo-liberalism. The call of the Party Congress was for continuous struggle against neo-liberalism as well as mobilisation of the masses and political forces towards an alternative to these policies. The presidential election this time assumed significance for two reasons: One, in the electoral college for the presidential poll, neither any political party on its own nor any of the groupings of political parties on their own had a majority. Second, the present political situation is such that no political party or pre-poll alliance is expected to gain majority. This will create a very complex situation for the new incumbent of Rashtrapati Bhavan. In such a situation, the Left rightly called for a national consensus on the election of the President and hoped that the Congress as the biggest partner of the ruling alliance will take initiative towards it and consult all parties in that regard. The Congress miserably failed in this task. It floated several names but never consulted others. Even when one of the constituents of the UPA was talked to on the issue, not one but two names were suggested. Only after deciding on its candidate did the Prime Minister make phone calls to seek support of others for the Congress candidate. Much before the Congress announced the candidature of Pranab Mukherjee, the AIADMK leader and Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, J. Jayalalithaa, and the Chief Minister of Orissa, Naveen Patnaik, proposed the candidature of P.A. Sangma as the presidential candidate and requested the Left and other parties to support him. Sangma is one of the tall leaders of the tribals, but does not have much support from others. The Chief Minister of West Bengal and TMC leader, Mamata Benerjee, along with Mulayam Singh of the SP proposed the names of former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh and former Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee as their choices. The BJP tried to own Abdul Kalam but he withdrew from the contest as the numbers were not in his favour. Mulayam Singh too backed out within 24 hours. Like the Congress, the BJP too kept delaying for long to declare its choice. It finally opted to adopt Sangma, not for any love for the tribal leader but in the hope that the option could win over those who had initially proposed his name. The JD (U) differed with the BJP and decided to support Pranab. The oldest ally of the BJP, the Shiv Sena, too kept away from it and extended support to Pranab. The SP, BSP, Lok Janshakti Party, RJD, and National Conference decided to support Pranab. The CPI-M and Forward Block also decided to support Pranab. In the meeting of the Left Parties on June 21, the CPI made it clear that it cannot support a candidate of the Congress party, since we are fighting against the anti-people policies that are adopted by the Congress and UPA-II. The ideal situation would have been to project a Left-sponsored candidate and mobilise the secular, democratic forces to project our opposition to the anti-people economic and pro-imperialist foreign policies of the UPA-II Government. But it was too late. Hence we proposed abstaining from the voting that was later endorsed by the National Executive of our Party. Let there be no doubt that the Left has a common approach of opposing the neo-liberal economic policies of the UPA-II Government. These policies have resulted in the unprecedented rise in prices of almost all essential commodities (inflation is already in double digit), slowdown in the economic sphere (the GDP growth rate has slipped down to around five per cent), the manufacturing sector’s growth rate is negative, the rupee’s exchange value has touched a record low of Rs 58 per dollar, and the cleavage between the haves and have-nots keeps widening. The government is not ready to even ensure food security and refuses to rebuild the mechanism of the universal Public Distribution System (PDS). The Left has called for a joint mass campaign on these issues from July 1. Will it be appropriate to support the candidate of the dispensation that is bent upon pursuing this disastrous course? The Congress as the leader of the UPA is not ready for any introspection on economic and foreign policies. Rather, it intends to pursue these more ruthlessly. After the announcement of the candidature of Pranab Mukharjee as the presidential candidate, the Prime Minister thrice warned about hard decisions and pledged $ 10 billion to the IMF (equalling Rs 57,000 crores) while refusing to bring the Food Security Bill, Lok Pal Bill in Parliament. It seems Dr Manmohan Singh has fully swallowed the new mantra of bailout packages of the IMF that has brought a number of European countries to the brink of bankruptcy. This package, for which the Indian fund has been pledged, envisages nationalisation of private debt and cut in public spending in sectors like education, public health and slashing of pensions and wages. In foreign policy there is a change in favour of the USA, losing other friends and totally throwing out the nationally accepted non-aligned policy. The policies are generally pro-corporate and anti-people. Hence the CPI felt that we cannot vote for a Congress candidate in such circumstances. If we vote for the Congress and still call for struggles against the anti-people policies of the government, the credibility of the Party will be at a loss. We cannot support any NDA backed candidate. It is too late to put up a third candidate, as most of the parties have already made up their choices. Some quarters have raised the question that abstaining from voting is undemocratic. This is not true. As the provision for rejection is not there, abstaining is the only alternative though not much desirable. Similarly, a party-centric or state-centric position in a national poll will be amateurish to say the least. We cannot support the entry of FDI in multi-brand retail trade only because some other party inimical to us is opposing it. • IN spite of the differences between the Left parties on the issue of the presidential elections, Left Unity will continue. We agreed to disagree on this particular issue. Our joint struggles will continue. Actually, the National Executive of the Party has reiterated its commitment to make the food security campaign starting from July 1, 2012 a success. The CPI had differed on issues like Nandigram and Singur earlier but never treated them as matters leading to a breaking-point. Strengthe-ning the Left for greater Left and democratic unity is of key importance to implement the tactical line adopted at the Patna Congress of the Party. The RSP has also taken a similar stand along with the CPI to abstain from the election. The Congress and BJP both have lost credibility due to their shameless pursuance of neo-liberalism and their bid to impose a two-party system to continue the hegemony of the neo-liberalists in one form or the other has been totally exposed. It is time for the Left to unitedly work for a fresh re-alignment of forces on the basis of an alternative to neo-liberalism. Apart from their collaboration on implementation of the suicidal economic policies, both the parties are stinking with corruption. If the Congress has to send a few Ministers and MPs to jail, the BJP had to force two of its Chief Ministers to resign and sack all its three Ministers in Punjab due to corruption charges. In the recent elections, the rejection of the Congress in UP and Punjab and in by-elections in different States including in Andhra Pradesh shows the lack of support among the people for it. The BJP and NDA are equally discredited. The BJP lost power in Uttarakhand and its strength was reduced in UP and Punjab. People are on the move. Many struggles of peasants, workers, Adivasis, Dalits and other sections of people are taking place. The POSCO struggle has completed eight years but the fighting spirit continues. More struggles are coming up. There is uneasiness in the situation. There is a big churning in politics. It is a positive sign that the JD(U) is moving away from the BJP. They may go the way of the BJD of Orissa showing the BJP its place. So far as the mercurial temperament of Mamata Banerjee is concerned, nothing can be predicted. There is a necessity and possibility of realignment of political forces in the country. Secular parties should leave the NDA. Regional democratic parties should abandon the Congress and UPA, which is a sinking ship. Just regrouping of the non-Congress, non-BJP parties will not make a meaningful alternative. There should be clarity on the pro-people economic policies and commitment to control prices, inflation and corruption. The struggles of the Left Parties and masses on various basic issues will create a favourable atmosphere for a new alignment of political forces in the country. Our aim should be to bring the largest section of masses into struggles. Let us carry forward the call of the 21st Congress of the CPI for massive, militant struggles of the people, for a decisive turn of the nation towards the Left. The author is the General Secretary of the Communist Party of India.

An article from newyorker

Why Smart People Are Stupid Posted by Jonah Lehrer Editors’ Note: The introductory paragraphs of this post appeared in similar form in an October, 2011, column by Jonah Lehrer for the Wall Street Journal. We regret the duplication of material. Intelligence-Stvenson.jpg Here’s a simple arithmetic question: A bat and ball cost a dollar and ten cents. The bat costs a dollar more than the ball. How much does the ball cost? The vast majority of people respond quickly and confidently, insisting the ball costs ten cents. This answer is both obvious and wrong. (The correct answer is five cents for the ball and a dollar and five cents for the bat.) For more than five decades, Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Laureate and professor of psychology at Princeton, has been asking questions like this and analyzing our answers. His disarmingly simple experiments have profoundly changed the way we think about thinking. While philosophers, economists, and social scientists had assumed for centuries that human beings are rational agents—reason was our Promethean gift—Kahneman, the late Amos Tversky, and others, including Shane Frederick (who developed the bat-and-ball question), demonstrated that we’re not nearly as rational as we like to believe. When people face an uncertain situation, they don’t carefully evaluate the information or look up relevant statistics. Instead, their decisions depend on a long list of mental shortcuts, which often lead them to make foolish decisions. These shortcuts aren’t a faster way of doing the math; they’re a way of skipping the math altogether. Asked about the bat and the ball, we forget our arithmetic lessons and instead default to the answer that requires the least mental effort. Although Kahneman is now widely recognized as one of the most influential psychologists of the twentieth century, his work was dismissed for years. Kahneman recounts how one eminent American philosopher, after hearing about his research, quickly turned away, saying, “I am not interested in the psychology of stupidity.” The philosopher, it turns out, got it backward. A new study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology led by Richard West at James Madison University and Keith Stanovich at the University of Toronto suggests that, in many instances, smarter people are more vulnerable to these thinking errors. Although we assume that intelligence is a buffer against bias—that’s why those with higher S.A.T. scores think they are less prone to these universal thinking mistakes—it can actually be a subtle curse. West and his colleagues began by giving four hundred and eighty-two undergraduates a questionnaire featuring a variety of classic bias problems. Here’s a example: In a lake, there is a patch of lily pads. Every day, the patch doubles in size. If it takes 48 days for the patch to cover the entire lake, how long would it take for the patch to cover half of the lake? Your first response is probably to take a shortcut, and to divide the final answer by half. That leads you to twenty-four days. But that’s wrong. The correct solution is forty-seven days. West also gave a puzzle that measured subjects’ vulnerability to something called “anchoring bias,” which Kahneman and Tversky had demonstrated in the nineteen-seventies. Subjects were first asked if the tallest redwood tree in the world was more than X feet, with X ranging from eighty-five to a thousand feet. Then the students were asked to estimate the height of the tallest redwood tree in the world. Students exposed to a small “anchor”—like eighty-five feet—guessed, on average, that the tallest tree in the world was only a hundred and eighteen feet. Given an anchor of a thousand feet, their estimates increased seven-fold. But West and colleagues weren’t simply interested in reconfirming the known biases of the human mind. Rather, they wanted to understand how these biases correlated with human intelligence. As a result, they interspersed their tests of bias with various cognitive measurements, including the S.A.T. and the Need for Cognition Scale, which measures “the tendency for an individual to engage in and enjoy thinking.” The results were quite disturbing. For one thing, self-awareness was not particularly useful: as the scientists note, “people who were aware of their own biases were not better able to overcome them.” This finding wouldn’t surprise Kahneman, who admits in “Thinking, Fast and Slow” that his decades of groundbreaking research have failed to significantly improve his own mental performance. “My intuitive thinking is just as prone to overconfidence, extreme predictions, and the planning fallacy”—a tendency to underestimate how long it will take to complete a task—“as it was before I made a study of these issues,” he writes. Perhaps our most dangerous bias is that we naturally assume that everyone else is more susceptible to thinking errors, a tendency known as the “bias blind spot.” This “meta-bias” is rooted in our ability to spot systematic mistakes in the decisions of others—we excel at noticing the flaws of friends—and inability to spot those same mistakes in ourselves. Although the bias blind spot itself isn’t a new concept, West’s latest paper demonstrates that it applies to every single bias under consideration, from anchoring to so-called “framing effects.” In each instance, we readily forgive our own minds but look harshly upon the minds of other people. And here’s the upsetting punch line: intelligence seems to make things worse. The scientists gave the students four measures of “cognitive sophistication.” As they report in the paper, all four of the measures showed positive correlations, “indicating that more cognitively sophisticated participants showed larger bias blind spots.” This trend held for many of the specific biases, indicating that smarter people (at least as measured by S.A.T. scores) and those more likely to engage in deliberation were slightly more vulnerable to common mental mistakes. Education also isn’t a savior; as Kahneman and Shane Frederick first noted many years ago, more than fifty per cent of students at Harvard, Princeton, and M.I.T. gave the incorrect answer to the bat-and-ball question. What explains this result? One provocative hypothesis is that the bias blind spot arises because of a mismatch between how we evaluate others and how we evaluate ourselves. When considering the irrational choices of a stranger, for instance, we are forced to rely on behavioral information; we see their biases from the outside, which allows us to glimpse their systematic thinking errors. However, when assessing our own bad choices, we tend to engage in elaborate introspection. We scrutinize our motivations and search for relevant reasons; we lament our mistakes to therapists and ruminate on the beliefs that led us astray. The problem with this introspective approach is that the driving forces behind biases—the root causes of our irrationality—are largely unconscious, which means they remain invisible to self-analysis and impermeable to intelligence. In fact, introspection can actually compound the error, blinding us to those primal processes responsible for many of our everyday failings. We spin eloquent stories, but these stories miss the point. The more we attempt to know ourselves, the less we actually understand. Drawing by James Stevenson. Read more http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/frontal-cortex/2012/06/daniel-kahneman-bias-studies.html#ixzz1yiON8TRb

100 years in 10 mts

Samir Amin's Talk on Socialism

Tagore's 151st Birthday

where you walk in company with the world of men, I am united with you. Not in the forest retreat, nor in isolation, not even in the solitude of my inmost thoughts, but where the people have you for their own, I, too, have you for my own, my beloved. Where you greet every one with outstretched arms, my heart awakens in love for you. Love is not to be secreted away within the four walls, like sun, it spreads out everywhere. That you bring joy to one and all, is also that which brings me joy, my beloved! Rabindranath Tagore [Translated by Kshitis Roy from the original Bengali song, Viswa sathey yogey yethaye viharo]

Message of UN SG

UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon I welcome the focus on women and girls as the theme of this year’s World Telecommunication and Information Society Day. Information and communications technologies are already benefiting women and girls in numerous ways. E-commerce is expanding opportunities for entrepreneurship. Mobile telephones are enabling midwives to make childbirth safer. Electronic social networks are allowing women around the world to mobilize as never before for democracy, dignity and human rights. At the same time, we know that information and communications technology has the potential to cause harm. Cyberbullying, Internet-driven human trafficking and other abuses are often targeted at women and girls. We must do everything possible to stop these crimes and promote greater online security for all people. More broadly, we should work to optimize the power of information and communications technology to support sustainable development. By gathering, disseminating and analyzing information, we can accelerate action to protect natural resources, combat climate change and help vulnerable people, including women and girls. This is especially important in the context of the “Rio+20” United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, to be held next month in Brazil. In the final run-up to the Conference, and then especially afterwards as we implement the decisions taken there, information and communications technology can make possible new approaches and solutions for a sustainable future. On this World Telecommunication and Information Society Day, I call again for wide-ranging efforts to close both the digital divide and the gender gap. All people must be able to make the best use of information and communications technology to help create the future we want. Ban Ki-Moon UN Secretary-General

Message of ITU SG

Theme 2012: "Women and Girls in ICT"

Militant images of Mayday 2012

Voice of Reverred Paul Robeson Afro American

May Day Song 1947

Sam pitroda Interacts with SNEA leaders

Apr
6
Com Pramod Gogoi is No More
The Central Secretariat of the Communist Party of India announces with profound grief and sorrow the death of veteran CPI leader, former Assam minister and President of the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) at Guwahati this morning. (on April 6. at 9.35 a.m)
Comrade Pramode Gogoi who joined politics at an early age during the freedom struggle was one of the tallest leader of the Left movement in the entire North Eastern region. He championed the cause of working people and played an important role in organizing the trade unions of different segments of workers including oil employees. He was president of AITUC.
Comrade Gogoi was elected to the Assam Legislative Assembly more than half a dozen time and was minister of the cabinet rank twice in the coalition government.
Comrade Gogoi who attended the 21st Party Congress at Patna and was elected to the National Executive and had been Secretary of the National Council in the past returned to Assam capital day before. After some complain of shivering he was admitted to hospital where brain hammerage proved fatal.
The National Secretariat of the Party sends heartfelt condolences to the bereaved family and leadership and rank and file of the Assam unit and dip the Red Flag in memory of the veteran dear leader Comrade Pramode Gogoi.

Condolence

Mar
22
Com. C.K. Chandrappan is no more

The National Council of the Communist Party of India, with profound grief and sorrow announces the death of Com. C K Chandrappan, secretary, national council, as well as Kerala state council of the CPI at a Thiruvananthapuram hospital this forenoon.
Com. C. K. Chandrappan, son of a valiant fighter of the Punnapra-Vayalar mass revolt C. K. Kumara Panickar emerged as a stormy petrel of the youth movement in early fifties. He led the All India Youth Federation (AIYF) as its general secretary in its formative days. He was elected to the Lok Sabha thrice, in 1971, 1977 and 2004. He was also member of the Kerala legislative assembly for a term.
During his third term in Lok Sabha, Com. Chandrappan played a pioneering role in drafting the Forest Act, granting rights to forest dwellers on forest produce.
After graduating from the youth movement, he plunged into farmers’ struggle and led the All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) as its president. Comrade Chandrappan was the
youngest to be elected to the Central Executive of the CPI at its Kochi conference in 1971.
Com. C K Chandrappan was re-elected secretary of the Kerala state council at its recent state conference.
In the death of Comrade Chandrappan, CPI has lost a very dynamic and energetic leader. It will create a great void in Kerala itself.
The National Council of the CPI sends heartfelt condolences to Com. Bulu Roy Choudhary, his wife, and other members of the bereaved family as well as to the leadership and rank and file of the Party in Kerala.

He Marched to Death

Mainstream, VOL L, No 14, March 24, 2012
He Marched to Death

Bejoy Kumar Sinha

The eightyfirst anniversary of the martyrdom of Bhagat Singh falls on March 23 this year. On that day in 1931 he was executed alongwith his comrades, Rajguru and Sukhdev. Bhagat Singh’s birth centenary was befittingly observed on September 28, 2007. We are paying homage to the abiding memory of that indomitable revolutionary by presenting the following piece. The writer was a close associate of Bhagat Singh and sentenced to transportation for life as his casemate. In this article he narrates how the great revolutionary patriot literally marched to death, defying the might of British rule. This was published in Mainstream (March 21, 1964) from where it is being reproduced. —Editor

On the twenty-third of March, 1931, Sardar Bhagat Singh and his comrades, Rajguru and Sukhdev, were hanged in Lahore Central Jail. Sentencing him to death the trying judges observed: “Having regard to the deliberate and cowardly murder in which he took part and to his position as a leading member of the Conspiracy, he is sentenced to be hanged by the neck till he be dead.”

The Tribunal that delivered the judgment was constituted under the Lahore Conspiracy Case Ordinance promulgated by the Viceroy in 1930. There were two British judges and a loyal Indian judge. They had to give verdict to suit their masters, the alien rulers, against whom the revolutionaries had been waging a grim, sustained struggle.

Nation’s Hero

BUT their judgment was treated by the nation with the contempt it deserved. In the course of the trial Bhagat Singh had become the nation’s hero. Special coverage of daily papers carried detailed reports of his utterances and activities to the eager public.

He had killed Saunders, the Police Officer who had the audacity to shower lathi blows on Lala Lajpat Rai that finally proved fatal. Next he threw a bomb in the Central Assembly in protest against the government bill that was aimed at checking the growing radical labour movement in the country.

In the Delhi Bomb case trial he made the historic statement openly admitting the government charges and declaring that a veritable storm was about to break that would sweep away the imperialist regime and in its place establish an order of society that would end exploitation of man by man.

In the history of political trials in this country such a defiant and clear revolutionary statement was made for the first time. It carried the message of revolution to the remotest corner of the country. The statement got wide publicity even in foreign countries particularly in Ireland and Russia.

The Sardar was, then, taken to Lahore for his second trial as an accused in the Lahore Conspiracy Case of 1929. Here, along with his other comrades, he raised in the court the slogan of ‘Long Live Revolution’ which as Inquilab Zindabad became the battle city of the nation substituting Vande Mataram of the Bengal Partition days.

The government banned the raising of the slogan in public. But the people’s temper had been roused. All over Punjab, thousands of men and women came out on streets, faced government repression but rent the air with shouts of Inquilab Zindabad. Within a few days the government hastily beat a retreat.

Epic Hunger Strike

BY this time the epic Hunger Strike of Bhagat Singh and his comrades had already started, deman-ding civilised and humane treatment for Indian political prisoners, and protesting against the liberal rules and facilities for European criminals merely on racial grounds. Such hunger strike was again without a precedent in India’s freedom struggle. After 66 days Jatin Dar, one of the strikers, attained martyrdom. There was great agitation in the Central Assembly as also throughout the country and the authorities had to ultimately bow before the pressure.

The government was unnerved. The proceedings of the case, the activities of the accused helped to raise the revolutionary pitch of the country. It, therefore, resorted to the device of promulgating an ordinance to cut short the trial procedure. A tribunal of three judges was appointed. We came in conflict with the judges over their ruling. We defied it. It was all over the right of singing revolutionary songs before the commencement of the trial daily, as had been our practice in the lower courts.

We were brutally assaulted. Sardar and Raj-guru were specially belaboured by the police. We demanded apology from all the judges. It was not given. We refused to go to the court thereafter. A large number of policemen assaulted us and tried to carry us by force.

It all failed. And the farce of a trial then continued and ended without any of us accused being in the dock for months, or any defence lawyer being present to hold our brief. The judges completed their job—their allotted task—sentencing three of us to death and others to long terms of imprisonment, acquitting just two comrades. It was in October 1930.

Idol of the Nation

BY this time Bhagat Singh had become the adored idol of the nation’s youth. He had his mother, father, brother and sister everywhere in this vast country. Frantic efforts were made to save his life; at least to get the death sentence commuted to transportation for life.

There were mass mercy petitions, protest meetings, adjournment motion in the Central Assembly, prayers in temples and mosques, and processions. Gandhiji was trying hard to negotiate with the Viceroy Lord Irwin for commutation and was feeling hopeful.

But little did all these people know that while they wanted the Sardar to live, Bhagat Singh himself was not afraid of death; in fact, he almost yearned to die. And sitting in his condemned cell he was fearing that the people’s agitation might not come in the way of the fulfilment of his one sole desire, so near to his heart. Into this state of his mind I had a peep on the day I got the opportunity to meet him in his condemned cell (the small cage-like room, in which a prisoner under sentence of death is confined).

Last Interview

IT was December 1930. Eight of us, convicted along with him in the Lahore Conspiracy Case and sentenced to transportation for life, were also confined in cells in a yard just adjacent to his in the same jail. It was a bitterly cold winter morning. I was led by the Chief Jailor into the Sardar’s cell.

The permission to ‘interview’ him had been granted—I was told by the jailor on the way—to give us an opportunity to consult and decide about filing an appeal in the Privy Council. With a throbbing heart I followed the jail officer. I recalled how we had bidden farewell to each other on the day the judgment had been pronounced and were now meeting again, perhaps to part for ever.

I was lost in my thoughts when I was almost awakened as if from slumber, by a cheerful voice hailing me, ‘Bejoy, tum a gaye (Bejoy, you have come).’ Bhagat Singh was standing before me with his usual smile on his face.

I did not know what to say. I experienced a queer sensation. I felt that my friend and comrade, with whom I had worked and suffered for years, sharing the same hopes and fears, who stood so near to me at that moment, was a stranger from another world.

I just stood there without saying a word, when he looked at me, with eyes full of understanding, eyes that conveyed that he had sensed the storm that was raging in my heart.

He therefore broached the subject of our appeal in a deliberate matter-of-fact tone. The tension was broken and soon we were engrossed in discussion. Pandit Motilal Nehru, from his sick-bed in Simla, had asked us on behalf of the country to file an appeal in order to gain the necessary time to secure a general amnesty for all political prisoners.

Bhagat Singh’s words I still remember vividly. He said: ‘Bhai aise na ho ki phansi ruk jai (Brother, let it not happen that the hanging is stayed).’

He had no illusions about any amnesty being granted but he feared that as the prosecution evidence was weak and the trial had been conducted ex-parte, the death sentence might be commuted on appeal and he would then be deprived of the opportunity of furthering the cause of the revolution by dying for it. He pointed out to me hat he could serve the cause best by his death at that juncture. I agreed with him and we decided that we should, therefore, give our consent to a general appeal to be filed only on the technical ground that the Lahore Conspiracy Case Ordinance under which we were tried was ultra vires. He knew that such an appeal was bound to be rejected and desired that the period gained should be fully utilised for revolutionary propaganda throughout the country. When we had finished our discussion, the jailor politely asked me to go back to my cell. For a brief but unforgettable moment we closely embraced each other. With considerable difficulty, I held back the tears that welled up from my heart. With heavy steps I walked back to my yard.

In the interval between December and March the agitation and propaganda did mount steadily. But Bhagat Singh’s forecast came true. The appeal was rejected in London. Sardar got his chance. He literally marched to death so that his cause—the cause of oppressed people of his country—might triumph.

Kissing the gallows, with the black hold over his face, the last two words that he uttered were harbingers of a new dawn:

‘Inquilab Zindabad.’

(Mainstream, March 21, 1964)

Capitalism: A Ghost Story | Arundhati Roy

Capitalism: A Ghost Story | Arundhati Roy

Don't Roll Back -Railway Unions

Greetings to All Women

Video: Telecom Analysis

SC verdict on 2G licences

SC Verdict

New Delhi: The Supreme Court has cancelled 122 licenses for mobile networks issued during A Raja's tenure as Telecom Minister. The decision is likely to send India Inc into a seizure and impact foreign investor confidence. The verdict today impacts huge telecom players like Unitech Wireless, Aircel and Idea. The Supreme Court has asked the telecom regulator TRAI to make fresh recommendations for how 2G licenses should be allotted and said there should be fresh allotment through auction within four months.

Six telecom firms have been fined. Two of them, Etisalat and Uninor, have been penalized Rs. five crore each. Loop and Essar have been fined Rs. 50 lakhs each.

In another verdict, the Supreme Court has refused to order the CBI to investigate the role of Home Minister P Chidambaram in the telecom scam allegedly engineered by A Raja. The court said the decision will be taken by Judge OP Saini, who is handling the trial of the telecom scam, within two weeks. Judge Saini is also expected on Saturday to rule on another petition on whether Mr Chidambaram should be made a co-accused in the scam.

The Supreme Court, in a third important judgement this morning, refused to sanction a Special Investigation Team to over-see the CBI's inquiry on the telecom scam. It said the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) would monitor the investigation instead - the court asked the CBI to submit status reports to the CVC in sealed envelopes.

The government is in a huddle. Telecom Minister Kapil Sibal will meet the Prime Minister shortly and a Group of Ministers meeting has been called this afternoon.

While cancelling the 2G licenses that were issued by Mr Raja, the Supreme Court said they had been allotted in "an unconstitutional and arbitrary manner." Some companies who got the licenses were allegedly ineligible. Others like Aircel have been faulted for failing to meet their roll-out obligations - they are not offering their services they are contractually obliged to in the different areas or circles assigned to their licenses.

The verdicts today are based on petitions by Janata Party President Subramanian Swamy and lawyer-activist Prashant Bhushan. Mr Swamy, like opposition parties, says that Mr Chidambaram was aware of Mr Raja's elaborate ruse, and sanctioned the decisions that led to the swindle.

In 2008, Mr Raja ignored advice to hold an auction for licenses and spectrum. Instead, he followed a first-come-first-serve policy. But he twisted the guidelines so that companies who he allegedly colluded with jumped to the head of the queue and won licenses out of turn. They paid a pittance - the rates used in 2008 were based on the prices of 2001, even though India had many more mobile phone users by then. 122 licenses were issued. Mr Bhushan's petition asked for these to be cancelled.

In recent months, the Attorney General and the government's auditor have said the same. Some of the companies that won licenses have foreign partners. In fact, Unitech Wireless and Swan Telecom entered collaborations with Norway-based Telenor and Dubai-based Etisalat, earning huge investments. Technically, they diluted equity and did not sell their stake - laws at the time forbade those who bought licenses from selling them straight away to others. But the transactions, though legal, unveiled the ways in which the government had been shortchanged. If foreign partners were willing to pay such vast amounts for their share, clearly the telecom licenses had been undervalued. And private firms had been allowed to earn huge profits at the government's expense.

In the Supreme Court, Mr Swamy contended that Mr Chidambaram deserves to be questioned by the CBI for failing to reign in Mr Raja. The basis of Mr Swamy's petition lies in a note from the Finance Ministry that finds that Mr Chidambaram, as Finance Minister in 2008 when the scam unfolded, did not act rigorously enough to ensure that the spectrum was sold at fair prices.

The CBI has, in the past, objected to this, stating that there is nothing to suggest that Mr Chidambaram could have acted differently, and that it is incorrect to single out a minister as culpable for Mr Raja's actions. The government's stand in court is that a lower court is already hearing a petition by Mr Swamy seeking to make Mr Chidambaram a co-accused in the case and therefore that court should decide whether the Union Minister should be investigated or not.

The government has so far backed Mr Chidambaram vociferously, with the Prime Minister stating that the Home Minister enjoys his "complete confidence."

Read more at: http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/supreme-court-cancels-122-telecom-licenses-trial-court-to-decide-on-cbi-probe-for-chidambaram-172521?pfrom=home-bigstory&cp

Coal Wage Pact

Coal India wage Pact signed to increase wages by 25 per cent,


State-run Coal India (CIL) has signed a pact with its trade unions to increase wages by 25 per cent, which would put an additional burden of Rs 6,500 crore on the public sector unit.
The hike will benefit over 3.7 lakh workers of the world's largest coal producer.
"An agreement was signed between union representatives and CIL management late last night for increase in the wages under which minimum guaranteed benefit would be 25 per cent of gross as on June 30, 2011," a CIL official said.


N C Jha, whose term as CIL chairman ended on January 31, had said yesterday that the agreement would roughly cost the company Rs 6,500 crore extra and is likely to be absorbed either by enhancing output or by having a revisit on the pricing structure.
At present, CIL and its subsidiaries spend about Rs 20,000 crore annually on salaries of workers which is roughly over 40 per cent of the cost of production.
"The National Coal Wage Agreement has been signed and will be of five years tenure with effect from July 1, 2011. Increase in basic would be 88 per cent which will be reflected in all fixed allowances," India National Trade Union Congress representative S Q Zama said.
As per the new pact, the house rent allowance in non-urban areas would be two per cent of basic per month instead of fixed amount of Rs 150 a month, he said.
He added that the management has also agreed to provide special allowance to all workers as substitute of perks to executives which will be four per cent of the basic per month.
All the five unions--INTUC, BMS, HMS, AITUC and CITU--have requested coal minister Sriprakash Jaiswal to facilitate conclusion of the pact within seven months.
Source : PTI / Deccan Chronicle

Ramachandra Guha's Lecture

Thane Diasater Photos by AshokRajan ACS NFTE

Thane Diasater Photos by AshokRajan ACS NFTE

Our District Unions of Pondi and Cuddalore are up in their maximum efforts to restore services and relief works. Com Jayaraman Secy NFTE, Ashok ACS, Sridhar CEC Invitee,Kamaraj DS, Sundaramurthi DS, Anandhan DS with other leading comrades visited the affected Exchanges, Offices, Staff Qrs. Pattabi CS also accompanied them. Dt , Circle admn were appraised of the worst situation