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Virus of patriarchal societies, where men have engaged in domestic violence against women from time immemorial, has multiplied during the Covid-19 triggered lockdown. Home, considered often the violent space for women, where abuse goes unchecked frequently, also goes unchecked behind closed doors. While all of us are focused on the pandemic, violence has crept up swiftly and silently all over the world making yet another global crisis. Its alarming state prompted United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres to appeal to the world communityto deal with domestic violence immediately and resolutely. In India, domestic violence has gone up more than two-fold, said an official source.

After 75 day of the Lockdown, several relaxations have been granted to ease return of the system back to rails for easy run though it’s a difficult process to restore the economy back to rails with several areas still remaining in the strangle hold of the restricted operation. Even then it is also a time to review the credit and debit sides of the balance sheet as the lockdown for a long duration was the first experiment.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Friday, June 5, 2020 marked the highest single-day spike in covid positive cases in the State with the number crossing the 100 mark for the first time. As many as 111 people tested positive causing grave concern in health circles.

It is better not to be pessimist. But one thing is certain that to what extent the latest intervention of Supreme Court will help the workers seeking refuge in their native places, ameliorate their condition and minimise their miseries is a matter for deep concern.

On March 24, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi imposed a nationwide lockdown on India, there were, reportedly, a mere 500 Covid-19 cases in India. The situation could have been dealt with by imposing limited restrictions on socio-economic activity and delineating local containment areas/zones – the strategy adopted successfully by almost all Asian countries. Such a targeted and calibrated approach would have kept the economy alive and avoided the devastation that has been inflicted on the livelihoods of millions of Indians. The impetuous decision on the lockdown needlessly plunged millions of Indians into enormous loss and suffering.

‘Shock and awe’ has come to stay as a cardinal feature of Narendra Modi’s policy pronouncements. Its first major manifestation was demonetisation, which was announced without proper consultations and even went against wise counsel, to the limited extent it was sought. And the result has been a complete flop.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Covid management policy is increasingly showing its faultlines as the virus surges ahead exponentially in the country and the death rates also continue hiking. Corona is a new disease and all the countries are at wits end to deal with this life threatening disease which originated in China. India with its huge 132 billion populations will naturally face a tough battle in tackling the virus. But the problem with the present PM is that he thinks that he knows everything and the PMO is the real think tank of the country which has solutions for all problems including a challenging one like coronavirus.

Several concerns have been expressed with respect to this recent change to the nature of workspace in the socio-legal sphere of the country. It is essential to note that ever since this way to work has become the convention now, there may arise various issues in the near future regarding ‘cyber workplace harassment’. Thus, the article focuses on the need to extend the protection of Sexual Harassment of Women at Workplace (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2013 [“POSH Act”] to digital workspaces thereby providing similar protection to the victims as it exists in physical workplaces.

There is a massive problem of external debt building up for the third world, of which the recent Argentine debt crisis was only one manifestation. At the root of the problem is the collapse of primary commodity prices in the world market which began in April 2011. In March and April 2020 this fall of course has been precipitous, but even if we leave aside these two months which fall within the pandemic period we find that between April 2011 and December 2019 there has been a 38 per cent fall in the All Commodity Price Index prepared by the IMF (base 2016).

Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, has hijacked the concept of self-reliance (Atmanirbhar Bharat). He claims this is the way to revive growth and make the 21st century, India’s century. Behind such bombast lies a crude contradiction and deception. The Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan special package announced to realise this goal has exposed the reality – the aim is to make India’s economy more dependent on international finance capital and to privatise India’s natural resources to benefit foreign and Indian big business.