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The union government decision on October 22 to launch the new series for retail inflation for industrial workers shifting the base year to 2016 from 2001 has come suddenly to the central trade unions. They are still studying the implications of the Government decision. The centre, however, said that dearness allowance, which is linked to the Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers (CPI-IW), will remain unchanged for now. But it may undergo change in future, indications were given.

BHOPAL: Election propaganda in Madhya Pradesh has turned into highly polemical. Top party leaders are hurling abuses against each other. The language is not only unparliamentarily but is also derogatory. Every day new abuse is coined. Kamal Nath without naming Imarti Devi, now a minister, described her as “item”. BJP leader protested against it and claimed that the word “item” was derogatory and demanded apology but Kamal Nath declined to do so. He claimed that it was not derogatory. But difficulty increased when Rahul Gandhi remarked that it was not in good taste. While controversy about the term “item” was still continuing, Imarti Devi herself hurled abuse against Kamal Nath describing him a vagabond (Kabadi) from Kolkatta. She also called his sisters and female members of his family as “item”.

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief Mohan Bhagwat could no more hide his intentions and control his feeling and on Sunday he publically confessed “India is a "Hindu Rashtra" and Hindutva is the essence of its self-hood.

The Kashmir scene is going from bad to worse. The release of the arrested leaders has opened a Pandora’s box, eliminating the possibility of a return to normality in the foreseeable future. If the BJP presumed that a relaxation of the harsh measures of the last one year will lead to an easing of the situation, it was grossly mistaken.

The CBI has been declared unwelcome guests by half a dozen states, the latest being Maharashtra, which recently revoked the general consent for the central agency to investigate cases in its territory without the need to seek the state government’s permission in individual cases.

The assembly poll, in Bihar the first phase of which begins on October 28, has assumed unusual significance in the national politics signalling at last some possibility of a big anti-BJP backlash if the outcome on November 10 becomes favourable to the RJD led Gathbandhan. The electoral campaign in Bihar has undergone many twists and turns in the last three weeks since the poll dates were mentioned. Now in the final days before the three phase polling starts, the ground has become unusually volatile with the RJD led front getting unprecedented response from the voters which has stunned the Front leaders themselves.

Millions of people are reversing back into poverty in India and million others are being pushed into extreme poverty. The World Bank report on ‘Poverty and Shared Prosperity 2020: Reversals of Fortune’ has specifically mentioned this trend, that has been accelerating in the COVID-19 era. Moreover, the efforts of putting poverty reduction and development back on track, is being hampered even in terms of proper planning and implementation due to concealing of real data by the government of India. Lined-up poverty estimates for South Asia not reported for 1997-2001 and after 2014 because of lack of population coverage, the report said. Incidentally, most of the unreported years are marked by BJP rule first during ‘Shining India’ and now under ‘Good Days’.

In the electoral political history of Bihar, this is for the first time the manifestos or “Sankalp Patra” of political parties have emerged as the most favourite issues for political discourses. The discussion is not confined to the living rooms of the rich or middle class, these have succeeded in attracting the attention of the villagers.

In his address to the nation on 20th October the Prime Minister warned the countrymen not to let loose the precautions against Corona Virus and that till there is a medicine we cannot be careless towards this virus. Therefore precautions like using masks, maintaining physical distance, washing and sanitising hands must continue. These small measures can protect a person from catching the corona virus infection.

If you look at the bodypolitick of the country without saffron-tinted glasses, if you truly see, you will find a very, very sick organism indeed. An organism that’s cannibalising on its own heart, brain and lungs to feed a massive belly of unrestrained State power. An organism that’s chewing on its own intellectual vascular system by unleashing worms and maggots of institutional corrosion on its living, breathing parts. You see men and women of great heart chained and put en bloc in jails. From the 33-year-old Umar Khalid to the 83-year-old Jesuit priest, Father Stan Swamy, the prisons are engulfing more and more living, breathing, dissenting parts of this otherwise rotting Gargantua.