View Articles

New Delhi: The Sports ministry on Friday announced that it will not send any official delegation to Tokyo Olympics.

A recent report published by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) titled Complicit: 2020 GLOBAL NUCLEAR WEAPONS SPENDING has brought forwards startling facts on the total insensitivity of the governments and the nuclear weapons industry during the Pandemic which has already cost 37.5 lakh lives. In addition the health problems, including the mental ones, of those who fell ill but recovered are unaccountable.

Buddhadeb Dasgupta, one of the most talented film makers of Bengal who stirred the international film festivals year after year with his films of 'other kind' passed away in his South Kolkata flat on June 10 morning during sleep. He was 77, ailing for the last five years due to his severe kidney problems, was on dialysis, but till the last days, he was mentally active dreaming about new subjects, relating to lonely people, extraordinariness of the ordinary and the changing relationship of individual with surroundings- that can be close relations or nature or some objects of the past.

Two autocrats cannot survive on the same political plane and the RSS was using the political contradictions between the two Hindutva icon of the country is playing to consolidate its own grip on the ideological frame work which was threatened by their personality contradictions, by putting one against the other. The meeting between prime minister Narendra Modi and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Friday in New Delhi but the outcome, whatever it is, may be fragile.

As if the shorter version of Covid-19 wasn’t enough, there’s the Long Covid to contend with. The lucky ones get struck by a sudden halt to heart beat and the call from heaven! This happened to a TV journalist who had made enemies. Also to a prominent cardiologist who was making you-tube videos from his AIIMS bed, advising people on how to beat Covid-19, only for the coronavirus to claim him. Long Covid didn’t get to haunt him.

Cryptocurrency, by its very nature, has been a millennial obsession and it is perhaps in the fitness of things that El Salvador under its millennial president Nayib Bukele has become the first ever country to declare bitcoin, the leading cryptocurrency, a legal currency. Bukele’s administration believes that the historical move will bring financial inclusion to all Salvadorians and in its turn boost investment, tourism, innovation and bring economic prosperity to the country.

Not a day passes without some attack on the federal structure and infringement of states’ rights taking place. If one day, the centre unilaterally announced a vaccine policy whereby states are asked to procure vaccines and pay for them, then another day, the chief secretary of West Bengal is summoned to Delhi to report for duty on the day of his retirement. The next time, the centre is stepping in to prevent the Delhi government from implementing its door-step delivery of rations. On another occasion, the Punjab government finds that the centre has stopped the payment under the Rural Development Fund due to it amounting to hundreds of crores of rupees; it is being penalised for its opposition to the farm laws.

The recent Supreme Court decision in quashing sedition charges against Vinod Dua for his alleged criticism of the Prime Minister constitutes a hastening development for our country. Since 2014 onwards, sedition cases are slapped on people at an accelerated pace. 160 per cent rise in such cases is indicative of the Modi regime’s repressive approach to stifle dissent, criticism and to suppress people’s legitimate and constitutionally guaranteed right to protest.

In Bangladesh, the tea industry is thriving on the strength of rising income levels within the country. Apparently, because they earn more, people tend to drink more tea. Average per capita consumption has risen according to some estimates, almost five fold, from around 90 to over 500 grammes during the past decade. As a result, many people consume several cups a day, a habit they share with their Indian counterparts, especially those living in the E/NE states.

Sardar Tarlochan Singh was very popular figure in Parliament even though he had only a short-term of three years in the Rajya Sabha. Apart from Parliament, he excelled in public relations. He was public relation man of the late President Gyani Zail Singh in Rashtrapati Bhavan and did a excellent job. He ably defended the President in all sorts of odd situations which Zail Singh often created. Tarlochan was himself very popular with the press. The reason was that he was always available to them. Some of media persons were his personal friend.