Editorial

The outcome of the presidential election in Sri Lanka has sprung a major surprise. Rejecting the two parties or coalitions that have long dominated Sri Lankan politics - the Sri Lanka Freedom Party and the United National Party - Sri Lanka has opted for a new choice. Anura Kumara Dissanayake, leader of the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) has won the presidency as a candidate supported by the coalition National People's Power (NPP).

Even as elections to Haryana and Maharashtra, held simultaneously in a single phase on October 21 in 2019, are being held separately with Maharashtra election dates yet to be announced, the Modi cabinet is once again trying to shift the spotlight to its pet 'One Nation, One Election' (ONOE) agenda. The cabinet has accepted the report submitted by the committee chaired by former President Ramnath Kovind regarding the ONOE scheme and announced its resolve to implement it.

Among India's many new normals, it is now also normal for the Prime Minister to visit the Chief Justice at his residence to take part in a 'private' religious function for the sake of organised publicity. Prime Minister Modi wearing a Maharashtrian cap and offering prayers to Lord Ganesh at CJI Chandrachud's residence on the occasion of Ganesh Chaturthi is now international news.

On 9 September, Dhanbad, the coal capital of India in the Jharkhand-West Bengal border region witnessed a historic rally of the red flag. The occasion was the declaration of the merger of the Marxist Coordination Committee founded in 1972 by Comrade AK Roy with the Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) founded by Comrade Charu Mazumdar in 1969.

Rattled by the 2024 election outcome, the Modi government and the Sangh-BJP establishment are working on a multi-pronged strategy to counter the growing opposition of the people. The budget session found the Modi government somewhat on the back foot. The government had to refer the proposed Waqf Board bill to a Joint Parliamentary Committee and defer the idea of legislating measures of control for social media. Even the UPSC was asked to withdraw a circular for lateral entry recruitment to the Union bureaucracy.

Bulldozer raj. If we are to choose one metaphor to illustrate the terror, injustice, impunity and arrogance that have emerged as the hallmarks of BJP rule in the Modi era, the bulldozer symbolises them all. The use of the bulldozer as a tool of 'governance' began in Uttar Pradesh under Yogi Adityanath's stewardship and today other BJP-ruled states, Madhya Pradesh in particular, have also adopted this model with great alacrity.

The horrific rape and murder of a 31-year-old postgraduate trainee doctor in Kolkata's RG Kar Medical College and Hospital has triggered a massive people's assertion in West Bengal powered by a remarkable women’s initiative called 'Reclaim the Night' – derived from an international movement - on the eve of Independence Day. This August 15, the focus was turned on the crucial question of women's freedom, women's safety and women's inalienable right to a dignified and democratic life in today's India.

Hindenburg Research's second report on the Adani scam is in some ways even more explosive than the first report that had rocked the world eighteen months ago. The first report had exposed the monumental corporate fraud perpetrated by the Adani group and pushed Gautam Adani down the global ladder of wealth. Questions were raised across India, including in the Indian parliament, about the Modi-Adani nexus.

On 1st August 2024, a 7-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court delivered a 6:1 majority judgment upholding the legality of sub-classification of Scheduled castes-Scheduled Tribes for the purposes of reservation. No carte blanche, though, is granted by the Court.

The first full budget of the third term of the Modi government has left even large sections of the middle class support base of the regime highly disillusioned and angry. Even Godi Media anchors have started raising inconvenient questions before the Finance Minister. A budget coming in the wake of an election in which the economic crisis cast such a long shadow and the ruling party lost its majority could not remain completely quiet about the concerns haunting the country.