Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.
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State elections portrayed as success for Communist Parties
‘Communists’ garner the votes of poor but policies are increasingly pro-business The much awaited results of five state elections in India – in West Bengal, Assam, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Pondicherry – have gone more or less along predicted lines. Except for the fact that the competing shower of promises of goodies and freebies in…
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The other India protests against Bush visit
Bush seeks to boost business deals and allies in the region It was spectacular from the point of view of huge numbers of people participating spontaneously in the anti-Bush protests. As the popular environmental activist and writer Arundathi Roy commented before the arrival of Bush, he was “just not welcome”! It was not just the…
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Colossal general strike shakes country
Fifty million workers take action against privatisation On 29 September, a national, one-day strike, took place across India, mainly effecting air, rail and banking services. Airports and government and private sector offices were closed, as were many schools and colleges. Unions were protesting against the Congress-dominated government’s economic ‘reforms’, in the first national strike since…
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may day protest 2005
The members of the New Socialist Alternative (CWI-India) took part in the May Day 2005 demonstrations in the ‘silicon city’ of India – Bangalore – with a two-page leaflet in the Kannada language. The theme was: “Enough of the horrors of Capitalism – We need Socialism now!”. New Socialist Alternative was the only organisation which…
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India: A disaster made worse by poverty
INDIA SAW more than 15,000 killed as the tidal wave pounded southern fishing villages with Tamil Nadu and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands the worst hit. Thousands are still missing. In Andhra Pradesh alone, 400 fishermen were missing immediately after the first strikes. The Hindu newspaper, published in southern India, reported that 40 children playing…
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Ruling BJP is Swept Aside in India
A POLITICAL earthquake has rocked south Asia following India’s general election. Millions of workers, the dispossessed and rural poor decisively rejected the ‘neo-liberal’ policies of the ruling Hindu nationalist coalition government led by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its prime minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee. The BJP and its allies (who, historically, have practised a…
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Indian Election: The Awesome Verdict
“Not only has the country been stunned by the awesome verdict, the entire free world must learn from the courage of the poor, illiterate, the voiceless and the underprivileged of the earth’s largest democracy as they punish rulers who thought their realm consisted of only 150 million for whom India was definitely ’shining’.” Editorial of…
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Indian elections: Who feels good?
“It is generally the Indian middle class and the rich who are feeling good, but there are so many others, belonging to the lower middle class, belonging to the peasantry, belonging to the working class, who are not feeling good.” That view, from analyst Kumar Kaldeep, quoted by Radio Netherlands is important to keep in…
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General election – Reject them all!
The jumbo circus of Indian elections with all its fanfare and trickery has come visiting once again. New Socialist Alternative, India General election. Text of a leaflet distributed by New Socialist Alternative across India in the course of the present General Election. Reject them all! The two main camps in the fray have no fundamental…
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Call Centres and ‘Outsourcing’: The New Satanic Mills
There are 5,500 UK call centres employing 400,000 workers, many of whom have no union representation and work in appalling conditions. These workers are now threatened with “off-shoring” or “out-sourcing”. Dave Moody, from Taunton Socialist Party explains how this workforce can be organised to fight for job security and better pay and working conditions. Call…
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