• Safeguarding of independence requires a clean break with the colonial past and a thoroughgoing renewal of India

• In Defence of the Right to Strike

• The struggle to ensure punishment for the guilty
  must be kept up and intensified!

• There is need to establish a law to try crimes of genocide

• WTO Ministerial Conference at Cancun

• British nationals incarcerated in Guantanamo
  Blair government connives with US imperialists on military trials

• Maharashtra—Crisis in Higher Education

• General Myers visits India:
  Back-door military dealings with US imperialism

• Supreme Court ruling declaring strikes illegal part of anti-social offensive against working people

• Supreme Court declares a person with more than two children cannot be a Sarpanch!

• Initiative for Peace in South Asia

• Diversionary Discourse

Safeguarding of independence requires a clean break with the colonial past and a thoroughgoing renewal of India

The 56th anniversary of Indian independence comes at a time when the sovereignty of India, as an independent state, is itself under serious threat. The growing influence and domination of international monopoly companies and financial institutions over the Indian economy and its markets, impact of the WTO and the growing external debt of the various states in South Asia are all indisputable factors. They are factors that work towards undermining the independence and sovereignty of India and other states in the neighbourhood. The biggest danger and threat to freedom at this time stems from the drive of US imperialism to establish its unrivalled domination over the globe. Increasing Indo-US military collaboration is a fact of life, as evidenced by the recent visit to India of General Myers, the chief of staff of the US armed forces.

When colonial rule came to an end 56 years ago, those who took over the reigns of power over partitioned India chose to retain the colonial state institutions and the economic system of capitalist plunder and empire building that they served. The Indian big bourgeoisie, at the head of the second most populous country in the world, is today pursuing an anti-social and imperialist course, seeking to collaborate with other big powers so as to profit from imperialist war and armed occupation of other countries. It is further fascising and beefing up the colonial state apparatus that was left behind by the British rulers, to suppress any resistance to the stepped up plunder of the land and labour of India that is going on in the name of liberalisation and privatisation.

The experience of these 56 years shows that independence, without social transformation, is an empty word. The leaders of the Indian National Congress, representing the interests of the big capitalists and big landlords of that time, took over the reigns of power in 1947 with the slogan of achieving political independence, while they actively worked to prevent a social revolution. They chose to retain and further perfect both the economic system and the political superstructure built by the British.

Full 56 years later, Indian society is still mired in a deep and all-sided crisis. "Independence" is an empty word for the vast majority of the population. The economic system does not satisfy the claims of the workers and peasants, who constitute the majority. The political system and process of representative democracy exclude the workers and peasants from decision making. State organised communal and fascist terror, the systematic use of these weapons to arouse passions as well as keep the toiling masses in a state of perpetual insecurity characterise Indian society today. Women and men have no freedom to even walk on the streets without fear in many parts of India.

Even as the ruling class pursues policies that threaten the freedom and sovereignty of India, it is exploiting the slogan of threat to national security to deprive people of their rights and freedoms. And to top it all, there is actually a real danger that the big bourgeoisie could further mortgage the independence of the Indian State itself, in its eagerness to pursue its own narrow imperialist aims.

Formal independence that was gained in 1947 transferred sovereignty from the British Crown into the hands of political and bureaucratic institutions in India and Pakistan, created and left behind by the colonialists. Sovereignty, the supreme power to decide in the name of the whole country, resides today in the hands of political and military cliques in South Asia, headed by trusted agents of imperialism and the local bourgeoisie. As long as this remains the case, and the toiling majority is excluded from decision making, the cause of independence and freedom will remain under threat and seriously compromised.

In order to make a clean break with the colonial past and thereby complete the tasks of the anti-colonial struggle, it is necessary to establish the political system and political process afresh. It is necessary to vest sovereignty in the hands of the working people, organised in their places of work and residence. It is necessary for the working class and hitherto oppressed masses of people to be empowered to decide on behalf of the whole of society. They can then deploy the economic resources of India to ensure security of livelihood and prosperity for all, while preventing such resources from being plundered by capitalists and imperialists, Indian and foreign.

On an immediate basis, the working class and people of India should demand that the Government of India must follow an anti-imperialist foreign policy, and call on the Government of Pakistan to do the same. The time has come to contest the claims of the present day rulers that they are acting in the interests of freedom and independence of the nations and peoples. We must demand that no government in South Asia must give any space to the Anglo-American war machine. We must demand that all regional problems and disputes must be discussed between the states of South Asia, but not with any outside power behind the backs of other South Asian states.

The cause of independence and sovereignty of the nations and peoples of South Asia cannot be left in the hands of the traitorous bourgeois classes and their parties in power. The workers and peasants of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and other countries of the region need to take up this cause into their own hands.

The struggle for a principled anti-imperialist foreign policy today is part and parcel of the struggle for the renewal of India on a modern democratic basis. In the final analysis, it is when the working class and peoples are empowered and their economic needs are satisfied that their independence and sovereignty will be really safe. Only then will freedom cease to be an empty word for the majority of Indians.

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In Defence of the Right to Strike

Wage labour is distinguished — from slave labour or serf labour — by the fact that the wage worker sells, not his soul, but a fixed number of hours of labour power per day, in exchange for a pre-assigned compensation in the form of salary or wages plus benefits, if any. Such a contract, as every legal contract in society, requires enabling and enforcing mechanisms. However, in a class divided society headed by the capitalist class, the mechanisms of state power and of ‘law and order’ enforce the dictate of capital, while they pretend to treat every citizen equally.

Faced with an unequal exchange with the employers, and a legal system that is biased in favour of the employer class, the employees can enforce the conditions of their employment only by threatening to or actually organising to go on strike. Totally disregarding this fact of modern social life, the Supreme Court of India has declared that a large section of employees, including teachers, doctors and others employed by the central and state governments, have "no fundamental, legal, moral or equitable right to go on strike". This is tantamount to asking employees to submit to the whims and fancies of their employers. The same judgement also contains the assertion, by way of justifying the verdict, that "Strike as a weapon is mostly misused, which results in chaos and total mal-administration."

If, according to the learned judges of the Supreme Court, strike as a weapon "is mostly misused", what about that minority of cases when even they admit that it is legitimately used? Even for a legitimate cause the workers must not go on strike, according to this judgement, because a strike by its very nature leads to suffering for society and the "public at large". The learned judges did not examine whether the economic and political systems, in the absence of any strike by anyone, benefit the "public at large" or only a small minority in society. They did not examine any of the conditions that have given rise to the weapon of strike, in the first place.

The logic presented by the Supreme Court is fundamentally no different than the medieval brahmanical dictat that the labouring castes have only duties and no rights, allegedly because if they have rights they will misuse them. It is also no different than the ‘rule of law’ imposed by the British colonialists, according to whom Indians did not know how to rule themselves and therefore needed the white men to rule over them.

The colonial ‘rule of law’ was designed to ensure that anyone who resisted the colonial plunder of this land was suppressed and deemed to be a threat to peace, order and good government. The latest verdict of the Supreme Court against the right to strike shows very starkly that India remains enslaved to the colonial legacy, with the difference that it is the Indian big bourgeoisie, the brown sahebs who are in command today.

The verdict of the Supreme Court constitutes a fascist attack on the fundamental rights of the working class. It has naturally led to widespread anger and opposition on the part of the workers all across the length and breadth of India.

With the aim of winning over the peasantry and urban middle strata on to its side and isolating the working class, the Indian bourgeoisie and all its spokesmen are carrying out dirty propaganda against the trade union movement, for "misusing" the weapon of strike and "holding the country to ransom". However, it must not be forgotten that the peasants of Haryana were recently arrested under the National Security Act for organising rasta roko to assert their claims. Which shows that the fascist offensive of the bourgeoisie is directed against workers and peasants, in short against the vast majority of the Indian population.

Alongside the organising of mass rallies to protest the fascist verdict against the right to strike, the working class of India needs to step up the ideological struggle against the lying propaganda of the bourgeoisie, so as to win over the peasants in the united struggle against the bourgeois offensive.

Trade unions in India have taken a united stand against the Supreme Court verdict, cutting across party affiliations, in defence of the right to strike. They must now demand of every political party to take a clear and open stand on this vital question. Workers and peasants must ask every political representative who comes to ask for their votes: where do you stand on the question of the right to strike? Are you for or against the rights of labour?

The times are calling on the Indian working class to show its mettle. Indian communists must rise to the occasion and provide united leadership to the class struggle at this crucial hour.

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The struggle to ensure punishment for the guilty
must be kept up and intensified!

Following the judgement of the fast-track court in Vadodara on June 27, in which all the 21 accused in the Best Bakery case were acquitted on grounds of "lack of evidence", the key witness in the case, Zahira Sheikh had approached the NHRC, seeking its intervention for reopening the case. She had alleged that she and the other witnesses had been forced to change their statements in court, because of threats to their lives and the hostile, communally-charged environment in which they were compelled to live. The NHRC sent its own team to Vadodara to carry out investigations and subsequently asked the Gujarat government to appeal to the High Court against the fast track court judgement.

Meanwhile, prominent members of the judiciary and many concerned citizens have condemned the fast-track court judgement in the Best Bakery case as a "travesty of justice". Several human rights and civil liberties organisations and activists working among the victims of the communal carnage have criticised the judgement and stepped up their efforts to secure justice for the victims and punishment for the guilty. This has thrown the entire judicial system and process into a crisis of credibility and raised some very important questions in the minds of people. Can the victims of state-organised communal violence ever hope to get justice and see the guilty punished, within this system? The present judicial process is based on the assumption that the state is impartial and above the rest of society and can prosecute individuals for violating the norms of society. But what if the state itself is the organiser of crimes against the society? The police and the judiciary are also part of the same state machinery that incites and organises communal violence; so can one arm of the state be expected to prosecute another?

The present crisis of credibility of the existing judicial system and process must be utilised to step up the demand for punishment of those guilty of such heinous crimes against the people. It must be utilised to step up the struggle for establishing such mechanisms that will enable the people to prosecute and punish the guilty, irrespective of what positions they may hold within the state machinery.

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There is need to establish a law to try crimes of genocide

A women’s panel, sponsored by Citizen’s Initiative, Ahmedabad, stated in its fact-finding report on the Gujarat carnage of 2002 that "there was pre-planning, organisation and precision in the targeting". This was confirmed by ‘A Report to the Nation’, another report on the carnage. It said: "Certain crucial aspects of the carrying out of the pogrom required systematic planning well in advance of the Godhra incident. The lists the rioters possessed and used (to target the Muslim community) must have been compiled over time..."

If one applies the two criteria suggested in these cases to the events in Gujarat, based on the compelling evidence of the National Human Rights Commission Reports, the various fact finding reports and the Citizen’s Tribunal Report, the only way one can understand what happened in Gujarat is as genocide.

In the facts of this case, there is no doubt that violence was systematically perpetuated against a minority community. Muslim men and women were targeted for rape and murder, they had to flee from their homes in villages, cities and towns, their establishments were systematically targeted and against whom pamphlets calling for annihilation, rape and economic boycott were issued.

The scale of atrocities covered 17 districts in Gujarat and, the violence resulted in over one lakh people fleeing their homes and the deaths of over 2,000 people. Property worth over Rs. 3,000 crores belonging to Muslims was destroyed.

The Indian government is a signatory to the International Convention against Genocide. As a signatory, the Genocide Convention imposes three principal sets of obligations on the Indian government. First, the Indian government has recognised genocide as an international crime which it has "undertaken to prevent and punish" (Article I). Second, it has undertaken to enact "the necessary legislation to give effect to the provisions" of the Convention, "and, in particular, to provide effective penalties for persons guilty of genocide or any of the other acts" related to genocide (Article V). Third, it has a duty to try persons charged with genocide or any of the related acts, through "a competent tribunal" (Article VI). This duty clearly casts a further obligation to put in place or designate tribunals competent to try such persons.

Since it acceded to the Convention in 1959, the Indian state has taken no steps to comply with the Convention obligations by effecting necessary changes in the country’s internal law. Article 51 (c) of the Indian Constitution requires the state to endeavour to "foster respect for international law and treaty obligations". Keeping this in view, Article 253 mandates Parliament to make any law "for implementing any treaty, agreement or convention". But the Indian state has failed to enact the necessary enabling legislation for the Genocide Convention because it goes against its policy of "divide and rule", borrowed from the British colonialists, through the organisation of crimes of genocidal proportions against minority communities.

Although the principles embodied in the Convention are part of general international law and therefore, part of the "common law of India", they are not self-executory. The penalties for genocide and acts associated with it need to be prescribed and the "competent tribunal" to try these offences need to be designated or established.

The key aspect of state organised massacres is that they are state organised. When the organiser of crimes is itself the judge and the prosecutor, it is not possible to expect justice. There arises the question of who will punish the guilty and what mechanisms must be put in place to achieve the same. Clearly, it will have to be the people who will have to punish the guilty, and the mechanisms need to be created for this. Building public opinion for a law to try crimes of genocide will be a step in this direction.

Genocide and international law

In 1946, the U.N. General Assembly unanimously affirmed that "genocide is a crime under international law which the civilised world condemns, and for the commission of which principals and accomplices — whether private individuals, public officials or statesmen, and whether the crime is committed on religious, racial, political or any other grounds — are punishable". (Resolution 96 (I), December 11, 1946). This resolution paved the way for the eventual adoption in 1948 of the Genocide Convention.

Exactly two years later, the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide came into being. According to it, all the contracting parties agreed that ‘‘genocide...is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish’’.

According to Article VI of this Convention, ‘‘persons charged with genocide shall be tried by a competent tribunal of the state in the territory of which the act was committed, or by such international penal tribunals as may have jurisdiction with respect to those contracting parties which shall have accepted its jurisdiction’’.

In1951, the International Court of Justice ruled that "the principles underlying the Convention are principles which are recognised by civilised nations as binding on states, even without any conventional (i.e. treaty) obligation" (Reservations to the Genocide Convention case, 1951).

The Indian state is bound by the general international law obligations to prevent and punish acts of genocide. India became a party to the 1948 Genocide Convention on August 27, 1959.

The Convention defines genocide to mean "any of the following acts with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; (d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; (and) (e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group" (Article II).

The Convention renders punishable not only acts of genocide, but also other related acts, namely, conspiracy to commit genocide; direct and public incitement to commit genocide; attempt to commit genocide; and complicity in genocide (Article III).

The Convention also proclaims that "persons committing genocide or any of the other acts enumerated in Article III shall be punished, whether they are constitutionally responsible rulers, public officials or private individuals" (Article IV).

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WTO Ministerial Conference at Cancun

After the Seattle Ministerial Conference in 1999, which was met with massive protest actions throughout the world, and the Doha Round in 2001, the WTO is organising the next Ministerial Conference in Cancun. It is expected that the Cancun Conference will mirror the growing inter-imperialist contradictions, the continued manoeuvres of US imperialism to bend trade rules to suit its hegemonic intentions and the fears and apprehensions of the economically developing countries who find themselves getting more and more marginalised in the world economy.

Most of the discussions in the Conference are expected to be dominated by the US and the European Union, centring around the question of agricultural subsidies and fixing of protective tariffs for manufactured goods. The negotiations relate to what are called the "green box" subsidies – income support given to farmers and which are not production-linked – and "blue box" subsidies which are production-linked. These subsidies, which are generally cornered by the biggest capitalist farmers in the US and EU, are used by the imperialist powers to eliminate competition from the economically developing countries and capture world markets for foodgrains, edible oils and other commodities.

The US and other imperialists have also been using the WTO Conferences and Rounds to extend the sphere of influence of the WTO to newer areas such as TRIPs and investments. The aim of the imperialist powers is to establish a universal trade protocol that will give them unrestricted rights over the world’s markets, remove trade barriers and protective tariffs for the free entry of their multinationals, and control over the intellectual property rights of the world’s peoples.

The WTO has actually served as the bludgeon of the imperialist powers to impose unequal trade treaties on the world’s peoples. The positions that the Indian government has taken in the trade forum have been unprincipled. Its manoeuvres in the WTO negotiations have been guided by the interests of the big bourgeoisie and not by the needs of the vast majority of the Indian people. The Indian ruling class has been using the anti-imperialist sentiment of the Indian people as a bargaining tool with other imperialist powers to win for itself concessions at the cost of the lives and livelihoods of the working class and peasantry. How else can one portray the concessions that the Indian ruling class has agreed to in the world forum, in terms of lifting import restrictions and lowering protective tariffs on thousands of agricultural and industrial commodities, and the resulting devastation in several sectors of the economy such as textiles, garments, and edible oil. In return, the Indian ruling class has been given improved access for its exports of software, automobiles and pharmaceuticals.

Throughout, the world, the working class and peasantry are demanding that their concerns should be addressed in the WTO. The actions that are being planned by working class and peasant organisations to put before the Indian government their concerns in the runup to the Cancun summit assume great significance.

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British nationals incarcerated in Guantanamo
Blair government connives with US imperialists on military trials

It has been recently revealed that the Blair government has declined to have the nine British nationals among the detainees repatriated to Britain and tried there. The Blair government fears that there is really no evidence against them that could stand scrutiny in a British court of law. So, instead of demanding their immediate release, the Blair government has instead requested the US to try them in a military court which has very low standards of evidence, and in which they could be easily convicted merely on the assertion of the US imperialists that they are, in fact "terrorists"! The spokesman of the Blair government has in fact stated that "The Prime Minister made clear to the President (Bush) that it was unlikely that the men would face trial in Britain, and that it could be embarrassing if they are released on their return after the US had branded them as major players in a terrorist network." (emphasis ours)

Thus, the Blair government, which went to war in Afghanistan and Iraq in the name of defending freedom and democracy and protecting the world from "terrorism", has no remorse in denying its own nationals basic human rights. They have nothing against the fact that their nationals have been denied access to proper legal aid and held without trial for over 18 months! They do not fear that their nationals could be wrongly convicted and imprisoned or even executed on the basis of flimsy, trumped up evidence in a US kangaroo military court. Instead, what is of great concern to them is that if these individuals were to be released for lack of credible evidence by the British courts and the embarrassment of this happening after the US had branded them as terrorists! What greater indictment of the sham concern of the Blair government for freedom and democracy can be asked for? This underscores once again the utterly reprehensible manner in which the Anglo-American imperialist have thrown all civilised norms to the winds.

This unholy collaboration between the US and British imperialists to cover up and commit the crimes of miscarriage of justice merely to prevent "embarrassment" shows once again that they are the greatest criminals today. All peace and justice loving people of the world must step up their struggle against these scourges of mankind. They must be brought to trial and punished for all the injustice, deaths, genocide and destruction that they have wrecked on humanity!

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Maharashtra—Crisis in Higher Education

Attempts to make education yet another profit-making activity have been going on for many years in our country. Encouragement to private education institutions, first for professional courses and then for all other courses, and deliberate neglect of government educational institutions has been visible for the last many years, particularly in the states of Karnataka, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. Every year the private institutions have been successfully putting pressure on the respective state governments so that they can keep enhancing their profit year after year. The Central government has been actively encouraging the commercialization of education by cutting down grants to Universities and diluting the standards for approval of new professional colleges and courses.

The Vajpayee government constituted a high power committee headed by Mukesh Ambani and Kumaramangalam Birla, to draw the guidelines for higher education, based on the principle of privatization. TheAmbani-Birla committee recommended that the government spending on education should be reduced from 3.5% to 1.75%. Though the report has not been accepted officially, its spirit has entered the system to such an extent that all the policies related to higher education are leading to privatization. This is also reflected in the 10th plan policy document of the UGC.

A large number of the private educational institutions have taken care to declare themselves to be Minority Educational Institutions (MEIs) and therefore eligible to both grants from the state as well as freedom of managerial control in the areas of recrutiment of teachers, salries for employes and fees for students, as well as admission of students. Hundreds of legal cases were filed all over the country by MEIs which were all clubbed by the Supreme Court, and a judgment was announced on 31 October, 2002. Thisjudgement gave a big boost to private businesses in the field of education. This one development is going to deprive lakhs of young aspirants from higher education by taking education beyond their means.

The Scene in Maharashtra

After Karnataka, Maharashtra is the second state in the country where private educational institutes have proliferated and commercialization of education has reached a new high. As the following table shows, there has been a spectacular rise in the number of higher education institutes. This rise is due to unaided institutes whose only aim is profit-making.

What is the quality of education being offered?

• There is a gradual and systematic reduction in the existing teaching posts in the state level.

• Hourly basis appointments are attempted to be the main mechanism available for the appointments in degree college, where a teacher gets Rs.83 per lecture, with no other benefit.

• There is a proliferation of unaided, self-financing courses. This is a major threat for the aided institutes where the infrastructure built up by public finance is gradually accommodating private courses. There is a general apathy for existing courses.

• For about 3 years, no college in Maharashtra has received non-salary grant. All the aspects of the day-to-day running of colleges have been adversely affected.

• The government has taken no initiative to pay arrears to a large number of teachers.

In Maharashtra, there are 149 engineering colleges; 131 private, non-aided; 18 are government aided. The private colleges accommodate 90% of the students, but suffer from a number of infrastructure problems.

The most acute is the non-appointment of teachers. There are about 7200 teachers in non-aided colleges, whereas the actual requirement as per the AICTE norms is 15,500. Only 4,200 are permanent and the rest are temporary. They get a remuneration varying from Rs. 2000 to Rs.8000 per month. Enormous pressure is there on the existing staff during examinations. Engineering results cannot be declared on time.

Even the permanent teachers are cheated of their salary by the managements while implementing the fifth pay scale. Prior to the implementation, private managements pressurized the government for the revision of the tuition fee structure. On May 15, 2000, the government issued a circular regarding the revision of tuition fees applicable to the private engineering students. However, the date of implementation of the fifth pay recommendations was deferred from 1.1.96 to 1.8.2000. Private managements avoided paying arrears of 55 months to the teachers and pocketed the amount!

There are 16 private medical colleges in Maharashtra. Some of them lack 500-bed hospitals, essential equipment and a qualified faculty - mandatory requirements for a medical college. Such colleges produce doctors who have rarely examined patients. But they get a certificate from the MCI (Medical Council of India) - according to rules, the MCI has to give notice before it arrives for an inspection. The management sees to it that on the inspection day, the requisite facilities are there. Some managements convert their general hospitals to dental hospitals overnight to meet the norms of inspection.

Likewise, engineering colleges share equipment, shunting circuits and computers from one institute to another to pass muster with the All India Council of Technical Education. Many such institutes thus deprive their students of the requisite practical training and produce graduates who are unwmployable in the market.

With facilities like this, is it surprising that the number of students who pass their first year engineering can be lower than 20%?

Till this year, seats in unaided institutes used to be in two categories - "free" (or "merit") seats and "paid" seats. In engineering, while the paid seats had fees of more than Rs.52000 per year, the "free" seats had fees of more than Rs. 10000! The difference of just one mark could mean a huge difference in the expense. It could also mean the difference between being able to do a course of your choice or not. At the same time, as the allowed class strengths in colleges are more than a hundred, the quality of teaching suffers. Coaching classes have become vitally necessary and the competition starts at the level of getting an entry into the top coaching classes itself. All this adds up to tremendous pressure on the students as well as on the parents.

This year the scene has become unimaginably worse. Nearly 6 months after finishing their Higher Secondary Board examinations, students in Maharashtra who want to enter professional courses are nervously twiddling their thumbs, waiting for the admission procedure to be declared. No one knows when that will be done and students have started wondering whether they will lose a term or maybe even a year in the process. What is absolutely clear is that as a result of the Supreme Court judgment, fees for these courses have zoomed up, far beyond the reach of most meritorious students. Many youth are going to be denied the opportunity to study courses for which they have the requisite aptitude because they lack the requisite money power.

Till this year, 5% of the available seats in unaided institutes were for NRIs, with NRI fees. This year 15% of the seats are from the "management quota". The seats in the management quota of various colleges are already being sold at unheard of prices - lakhs of rupees for engineering and tens of lakhs for medical!

The nightmare does not end with getting one’s degree, because there are very few good jobs available. That is why many students pursue further studies. Institutes offering MBAs and MCAs have also proliferated and are minting money. At the lower end of the spectrum, one even finds the education degrees and diplomas like B.Ed. and D.Ed. being sold for lakhs of rupees.

A glance at the following table will reveal who are the beneficiaries of this state of affairs.

Half the cabinet in Maharashtra has a stake in the lucrative educational pie. As is evident, the Shikshan Samrats belong to all the major political parties that have been in power at one time or another in the state.

A sampling of the Shikshan Samrats and what they control:

Datta Meghe, former minister, NCP:

• Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, Wardha
• Sharad Pawar Dental College, Wardha
• Radhikabai Meghe Dental College, Wardha
• Yeshwantrao Chavan Engineering College, Nagpur
• Datta Meghe College of Engineering, Navi Mumbai

Rohidas Patil, former minister, Congress:

• Annasaheb Chudaman Patil College of Engineering, Navi Mumbai
• Annasaheb Chudaman Patil Memorial Medical College, Dhule

• Bharati Vidyapeeth’s Dental College and Hospital, Pune
• Bharati Vidyapeeth’s College of Engineering, Navi Mumbai

Ranjit Deshmukh, MPCC president:

• Lata Mangeshkar Medical College and Hospital, Nagpur

N.K.P. Salve, former Union minister, Congress:

• N.K.P. Salve Institute of Medical Science and Research Centre, Nagpur

Gopinath Munde, former Deputy C.M., BJP:

• Atharva College of Engineering, Malad, Mumbai

Vilasrao Deshmukh, former C.M., Congress:

• Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Technology, Mumbai

Ramrao Adik, former deputy C.M., Congress:

• Ramrao Adik Institute of technology, Navi Mumbai

Manohar Joshi, former C.M., Shiv Sena:

• Kohinoor Technical Institute, branches in many cities

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General Myers visits India:
Back-door military dealings with US imperialism

Myers held intensive talks with National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra, Defence Secretary Ajay Prasad, the chairman of the Chiefs of Staff committee and Chief of the Naval Staff, Madhavendra Singh and Chief of Army Staff, N.C.Vij.

One of the major issues that these talks are reported to have focussed on is a review of the joint Indo-US military exercises that have been conducted over the last 2 years. Myers is believed to have proposed a new schedule of military exercises to replace the existing series, in order to strengthen "bilateral defence relationship" through these and other means.

Myers is also reported to have reviewed the Indian army’s massive request for military hardware and equipment, worth over Rs. 200 crores. This includes request for specialised counter-insurgency equipment and nuclear, biological and chemical warfare suits. Indian military officials are gleeful over the "first major Indo-US weapons deal in 3 decades" that appears to have "worked out" with the arrival of a set of weapon locating radars (WLR’s) to help locate and neutralise hostile artillery batteries. Indian officials are also reported to have requested Myers to take steps for facilitating sale to India of the Israeli "Arrow" anti-missile system, which is currently being blocked by US.

Although officially it has been denied that there was any talk about sending Indian troops to Iraq, Myers did admit to the press at the conclusion of his visit, that they "exchanged views on the situation in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan", that he had come to "ascertain Indian sensibilities on sending troops to Iraq" and "possible Indian troop deployment options there", in case of a formal UN mandate on international peacekeepers. He welcomed any "contribution to peacekeeping" in Iraq and Afghanistan, where several thousand US troops are already stationed.

Earlier last month, when the Indian government had formally declared that Indian troops would not be sent to Iraq, it may be recalled that the clause "for now" had been added, together with a qualifier that the government was not averse to sending Indian troops to Iraq under "UN command". It has also been widely reported in the media that a division-size force of the Indian army is being kept in readiness, fully equipped for the role envisaged for Indian troops in Iraq. Myers’ visit to India from Baghdad was obviously intended to ensure that the discussions on troop deployment in Iraq are kept open and actual preparations for it go on, even as the US tries to get a UN mandate for its criminal activities in Iraq.

It was the mass opposition of the people that forced the Government of India to take a stand against sending Indian troops to Iraq. However, a section of the big bourgeoisie of our country remains very eager to exploit the situation in Iraq for its own superprofits and for this reason, is pushing for the "larger role" that the US imperialists are promising the Indian rulers. Our rulers also see, in the growing military alliance with the US imperialists, a means to realise their own hegemonic aspirations towards the other countries and peoples of this region.

The growing Indo-US military collaboration, Indian participation in the nefarious activities of the US against the freedom and sovereignty of other nations, and the increasing US imperialist interference in India and this entire region pose grave threats to our peace and security. They pose a grave threat to the freedom and sovereignty of our nations and must be resolutely opposed.

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Supreme Court ruling declaring strikes illegal part of anti-social offensive against working people

"Take strike in any field, it can be easily realised that the weapon does more harm than any justice. Sufferer is the society-public at large.".. "In the case of strike by a teacher, entire educational system suffers; many students are prevented from appearing in their examinations which ultimately affect their whole career. In case of strikes by doctors, innocent patients suffer, if transport employees go on strike, the entire movement of society comes to a standstill and business is adversely affected." The Supreme Court Bench recommended to employees with grievances to "do some more work honestly, diligently and efficiently, such gesture would not only be appreciated by the authority but also by people at large". The Supreme Court judgement sheds crocodile tears about the large number of educated unemployed in India, averring that those with jobs are in a "privileged" position.

The Supreme Court judgement against the working class of India is not accidental. Today the Indian big bourgeoisie, through its political parties in power in the Centre and states, is pursuing, vigorously, the course of globalisation through liberalisation and privatisation. The capitalist system and the policy pursued by the governments are leading to great increase in the unemployed. The privatisation of education and health care is leading to making education and health care even more out of the reach of the masses, just as it is leading to pressure on the service conditions of teachers, doctors and other people working in these sectors. There have been powerful protests from doctors, teachers, and other sections of working people against privatisation. Right now, a major strike of junior doctors of Madhya Pradesh is going on. The Supreme Court is justifying repression of these struggles taking the specious plea it is concerned about the public at large.

The Supreme Court does not care to indict the capitalist system and the government policies for causing suffering to the broad masses of people. When the bourgeoisie cuts back on production, throws out workers, saying the market is flooded with goods, is it really true? Is it not the case that the bourgeoisie is "striking", cutting back on goods to the market, to keep its profit margins high? Is it no the case that society at large suffers? However, one will not hear the honourable Supreme Court ruling that capitalists have no right to cut back production, no right to throw out workers citing the same.

The Supreme Court ruling is part of the anti-social offensive of the ruling class and imperialism. Precisely because it lacks credibility, the bourgeoisie is resorting to the Courts to legalise its anti-social offensive. For instance, the BALCO privatisation case was rejected by the Supreme Court declaring that privatisation was a matter of government policy, which could not be challenged in Court. In other words, the Supreme Court does not care if government policy leads to suffering for broad masses of people, leads to increased unemployment, or leads to sell out of national assets. It comes into the act to defend this policy, when it is challenged by the toiling masses. All this is leading to a credibility crisis for the courts as well.

Conditions force people to act. Conditions are forcing the bourgeoisie and the government to operate in a particular way. The same conditions are forcing the industrial workers, government employees, teachers, doctors, transport workers, students, the peasants and other sections of society to take the path of struggle. The Supreme Court ruling reconfirms to the working class and working people at large that the courts of India, like the executive and legislature, are merely instruments to legitimise the rule of the big bourgeoisie over the working masses.

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Supreme Court declares a person with more than two children cannot be a Sarpanch!

The Haryana and Rajasthan acts are part of the effort to restrict the right to elect and be elected. At this time, in India the right to vote is granted to all citizens with the exceptions that they should not be underage (below 18 years), of unsound mind, should not have been convicted of certain crimes, and are not insolvent. To stand for elections for Assemblies and Parliament, the same restrictions apply, except that the lower age limit is 25 years. Now with the Supreme Court upholding of the Haryana and Rajasthan acts, only people with two or less children can stand for Panchayat Sarpanch elections.

The Haryana and Rajasthan acts covering Panchayat elections are blatantly anti-democratic as they violate the fundamental requirement of a modern democracy that every adult citizen must enjoy the right to elect and be elected. Under the existing system of party dominated democracy, the right to be elected is already restricted on account of the money and muscle power required, and by the domination of bourgeois parties over the polity. This latest move is a further restriction of the right to be elected. It disenfranchises a large section of the electorate, preventing them from being elected as heads of panchayats. It is being sought to be justified with the reactionary bourgeois propaganda that blames the problems of India on her population, and the problem of the growth of population on the peasantry, workers and religious minorities.

Universal suffrage was a forward step in the political development of society. In India this was gained along with political independence from colonialism. Before that only Indian men with educational qualifications and private property could be elected to the colonial provincial assemblies.

The demand of the times is that democracy should be modernised so that every member of society can actually enjoy the right to elect and be elected. Restrictions on the right to be elected, under whatever pretext, constitute a retrograde step, a movement in the backward direction. All progressive forces must resolutely oppose these retrograde measures.

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Initiative for Peace in South Asia

Initiating the discussion, the spokesperson of LRS identified the challenges to the efforts of peoples of South Asia to end the state of hostilities and mistrust and establish lasting peace in South Asia. It was and remains a deliberate policy of the imperialist powers, headed by the US, to foment discord amongst the peoples of South Asia. The divisions and animosity created by the British colonialists during the partition, the colonial legacy in the subcontinent have been perpetuated by the ruling cliques, who have collaborated with imperialism to suppress the strivings for peace, progress and prosperity of their own people as well as all the peoples of this region.

The conquest of Afghanistan and Iraq by US imperialism, and its greatly intensified military and political interference in the subcontinent, are posing great dangers to the sovereignty of the peoples and threatening to engulf this region in war. In this situation, the roles played by the ruling cliques of India and Pakistan, of constantly exacerbating their mutual animosities, while conniving with the US strategy in this region, are extremely hazardous. All conscious forces in the region are coming to the realisation that the people have to unite in defence of peace and sovereignty, against the US imperialist threat.

The governments of the region must be pressurised to withdraw any privileges given to the war machines of the US and other powers and to desist from granting such privileges in the future. They must be constrained not to participate in any war of occupation and assault that the US and other powers wage against the peoples of the world in quest of world supremacy. They must be made to agree to resolve all the regional problems and disputes through bilateral and multilateral discussions without the interference of any outside power for mutual benefit and progress of the peoples of the region. They must be encouraged to create mechanisms to empower the peoples of the region to play their central role in deciding on the economic and foreign policies of the region and strengthen mutual trade and cultural exchanges.

It was pointed out that all those forces in India and other countries of South Asia who justify collaboration with US imperialism in these times must be isolated and exposed as enemies of freedom and sovereignty of the peoples. This is a necessary condition for the struggle to advance.

Recalling the trauma of partition, Kuldip Nayyar questioned why the people of this region, related by ties of blood and history, cannot come together to build a strong South Asian identity. Narrating the overwhelming response that he received when he visited Pakistan as a member of the parliamentary delegation, he elaborated on his efforts to make parliamentarians of both India and Pakistan pass a common resolution expressing regret at the gruesome slaughter of partition.

The close interconnection between militarisation, state terrorism and communal and fascist violence was dwelt upon by Kamal Mitra Chenoy, who lucidly brought out the grave danger from war, for the peoples of this region. Linking the question of fighting for peace with the struggle for democracy, Prof. Mohanty pointed out the huge drain of the region’s resources on account of militarisation and demanded that these resources be mobilised to deal with the burning problems of hunger, poverty and unemployment, illiteracy and poor health, so widespread in India, Pakistan and in other countries of this subcontinent.

The demand that the collaborators with imperialism in this region be exposed as the enemies of the people and of peace and security in the region was raised by Jagdish of the Jan Pratirodh Manch. Narrating the incident of the young peasant boy from Pakistan, who, totally unaware of the political hostilities between our two countries, had inadvertently strayed into a village on the Indian side of the border while grazing cattle and was being incarcerated here for nearly 2 months, activists from the border areas also highlighted the terrible hardships and traumas of the people living in those parts, who feel like one family, forcibly and brutally divided.

The danger of the growing US imperialist interference in the region, the diverting of precious resources from vital sectors, such as education and public health, into militarisation and the benefits of peace in this region for all our peoples were some of the important issues raised by D. Raja.

Concluding the discussions, Prakash Rao, the Convenor of Lok Raj Sangathan, referred to the unifying thread in the different presentations made at the meeting. There was unanimous agreement that the danger to sovereignty, to peace, to security and prosperity for the peoples comes from the unbridled drive of US imperialism for domination of the world, including South Asia. He pointed out that it is very important to understand that the source of terrorism is imperialism, that all the capitalist-imperialist states world over, including the states in South Asia, promote terrorism to advance their aims. US imperialism is the biggest terrorist state the world has ever known. The biggest threats to peace in the region are the activities of various imperialist powers, especially US imperialism. The imperialist powers are fishing in troubled waters in the region. There are forces in the region which collaborate with imperialism to keep the people divided. The present situation is one of heightened dangers. At the same time, there is heightened consciousness amongst peoples of these dangers. We must make use of the opportunities to make decisive advances in the interests of peace and freedom, security and prosperity of our peoples, Prakash Rao concluded.

The meeting ended in an atmosphere full of optimism and resolve to carry on the struggle for ending the period of division and mistrust and opening the path to progress, prosperity and security for the peoples of this region.

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Diversionary Discourse

Everytime there is an upsurge of popular anger against the methods of rule of the bourgoisie, the latter comes up with a diversionary discourse. For example, there has been a remarkable unity in the popular mind about the genocide in Gujarat of 2002. The outcry against the genocide cut across all traditional boundaries. Even organs of the Indian state such as the National Human Rights Commission have expressed outrage at the behaviour of the lower courts, the police and in general against the Gujarat Government, which has led to the latter filing a case in the High Court against the acquittal of those accused in the Best Bakery case.

Nevertheless, at the same time the Supreme Court of India has suddenly launched a call for a Uniform Civil Code. This has been enthusiastically supported by sections of the bourgeois media as well. What precisely is the context of this call at this time? Is this to somehow say that the plight of Muslims and other religious minorities in India is their own making? At a time when the people of India are calling for an end to violence that is most often engineered by political parties with the collusion of the state, why the shedding of crocodile tears that the country does not have a uniform civil code? Is there today a call from below for a uniform civil code, or is there a call for the end to injustice perpetrated on vulnerable sections of the society?

Under the prevailing conditions, even the right to life has been reduced to a formality on paper. There is no right to dignity, to employment, to security, and hence the call for a uniform civil code under these circumstances would lead a thinking individual to believe that this call is meant to vitiate the tense atmosphere that is already prevailing in the country.

Another diversionary matter in the recent past that has erupted is the one pertaining to contesting for office at the village level by an individual who has parented more than two children. When the call goes up from the masses to improve their lot, the bourgeoisie’s reply is that ‘you are in the condition that you are in, because there are too many of you.’ It has been established that while the fertility rates are brought down only by the upliftment and education of the masses, especially that of women. In this scenario, to raise the Malthusian bogey of overpopoulation being the cause of poverty is yet another example of the bankruptcy of the bourgeoisie. These lies must be exposed.

Sincerely, A. Narayan, Bangalore

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