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In early 1994, the U.P. government announced the auctioning of 2,500 trees overlooking the Alakhnanda river in the upper reaches of what is now Uttarakhand. Lumberjacks arrived in Raini village to cut trees. A local girl saw them and informed the villagers. Women in large group came out and stopped the lumberjacks by hugging the trees. Three local women—Gaura Devi, Sudeshna Devi and Bahni Devi championed the cause. Through the days that followed, the women refused to leave the trees. That marked the beginning of chipko (hug) movement.

Farmers' agitation against three farm laws completes six months on May 26, the day on which Narendra Modi became Prime Minister of India seven years ago. It may be just a coincidence, but is politically significant as Black Day for all except Modi and his fan club. Observance as a Black Day by farmers is of course symbolic, but a reason enough for stirring conscience of a prime minister who had assured the country for 'doubling of farmers income by 2022’.

The second wave of the Covid-19 virus in the country has been very painful. The disturbing pictures of people grappling for oxygen and the darkness of the nights being lit by hundreds of funeral pyres in the over-crowded crematories — also resulting in dumping of bodies in the river Ganga — have shocked the people of the country. Although, dumping of bodies, rooted in traditions of some Hindus, in river Ganga isn’t a first — had occurred in the pre-Covid era too. But it can’t be denied that the present situation is also responsible for many floating bodies.

It is certainly not a happy situation as the courts are seen increasingly overstepping the boundaries between the Executive and Judiciary to the extent that there is probably need to redefine the relationship. The debate on whether the courts are right or wrong in what they are doing can go on, but the sad fact is that the situation is the result of a void that has been created by the utter failure of the government, and at times a criminal abdication of responsibility on the part of the government. We have had situations when faced with no help forthcoming from the government, even hospitals had to approach the courts for vital supplies of oxygen and medicines and the courts obliged. Otherwise, we would have seen even a greater tragedy. This is not to say that the tragedy that Indians have endured was any less severe.

The Indian filmmaking legend Satyajit Ray stepped into his 100th year on May 2, 2021. The maestro died in 1992, at the age of only 71. He left us without finishing many of the proposed film and writing projects which he had undertaken in his last years. Bengal lost not just a great filmmaker, but also a writer of extraordinary calibre, who opened up the Bengali children and adults to a new world of adventure and science fiction in their mother tongue.

New Delhi: Shiv Thapa, Sanjeet and Tokyo-bound Simranjit Kaur alongside two others booked semi-final berths as Indian pugilists assured themselves of 12 medals at the ASBC Asian Boxing Championships in Dubai.

Failure of leadership, failure of democratic governance, total failure of public institutions, failure of judiciary, concentration of power in one man, failure of collective responsibility of the Union Ministers with all of them having been reduced as sycophants to their leader always singingpaean to him, gross mismanagement of the Covid-19, failed lockdown 2020, leaving people in the lurch to fend for themselves to die uncared for lack of oxygen, shortages of hospital beds, shortages of medicines, non-availability of ambulances, their black marketing, allowing patients to collapseon pavements of hospitals, on roads, in vehicles, in homes, indignity in deaths, floating of corpses in the Ganga, burying loved ones in shallow sandy ditches along the rivers, such dead bodies surfacing and being eaten by carnivorous animals, serpentine queue of people at funerals, burial sites, suppression of data on number of deaths especially in BJP ruled states, denial of facts, massive losses of jobs and livelihoods, allowing police and other law enforcement agencies to run berserk against people that includes opposition, arbitrary exercise of power with elements of shocks, awe, surprises, without forethought, without pre-planning, without pre-consultations, without consensus, ensuring speedy march to making India a majoritarian Hindu Rashtra, castration of the Constitution without formal amendments, emasculation of the Election Commission into a subordinate department, preference for unwarranted Central Vista redevelopment on a war footing over lives of the grieving people and at the top of all such mess ups, all out efforts to spread positivity amidst all around darkness, as never before, to protect the leader as one above the board mark the culmination of the second year of the second term of the NDA Union Government on May 30, 2021, in all, the last seven years.

New Delhi: India’s Mohammad Hussamuddin crashed out as he lost to the world champion and top-seed Mirazizbek Mirzahalilov in the 56kg quarter-finals at the SBC Asian Boxing Championships in Dubai on Tuesday.

Bam Ganatantrik Jote (Left Democratic) front comprising Bangladesh Samajtontri Dal, Communist Party of Bangladesh, Bangladesh Samajtontri Dal Marxvadi, United Communist League of Bangladesh, Samajtontri Andolan and Ganatantric Biplabi Dal in a joint statement demanded that the criminal case against the leading Bengali morninger Prothom Alo senior reporter Rozina Islam be withdrawn unconditionally. The forty-two year-old reporter was arrested nearly a week ago, was released from women’s cell of prison of Kashimpur Central prison in Dhaka on Sunday after a Dhaka court had granted her bail. The Dhaka Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Baki Billah granted the bail upon a bond of Tk5,000 and submission of her . The interim bail was granted till 15 July.

LUCKNOW: BJP is busy with damage control following the drubbing it received in the recently held panchayat polls. There have several meetings of the party’s central leadership with the state leaders to chalk out a strategy to improve the image of the party and the government to face the assembly polls early next year.