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We have faced several dramatic weather disasters which claimed far too many lives and livelihoods in 2022. From extreme floods to heat and drought, weather and climate disasters affected millions and cost billions, indicating that climate change has intensified this year, and in the next in 2023, the world would need greater preparedness to face it.

If any one thing defines 2022 it is Russia’s Ukraine war. Coming close on the heels of the covid pandemic, unleashed by China’s callus and lackadaisical handling of the initial outbreak, world’s woes are brimming over.

India’s 2022 began with hopes of a rebound from covid-induced downturn, which materialized to a large extent as the year progressed, but is winding down to a close with dark clouds beginning to appear on the horizon over threats of a return to the pandemic environment.

Nine assembly elections will take place between February and December 2023 stretching from Telangana to Tripura. Collectively these polls will be the last chance for opposition to test the mettle of the incumbent BJP before the May 2024 general elections.

The 28th Kolkata International Film Festival has come too fast, only 8 months after its last incarnation in this year’s April, and this time it lasted seven days, between December 16 and 22. The promotional campaigns were intriguing from the outset: giant banners were installed across the city with photoshopped images of old Indian film stars sitting next to their Western counterparts. From Howrah Station to Hazra Crossing, they boasted the global ambition at the heart of the festival: ‘Meet the world at the world of cinema.’ Every sign pointed towards an assured claim of sharing the same plane with the best of the contemporary world cinema. However, it seems that some things are easier said than done. Any objective analysis of decisions regarding the scheduling, location of venues, and the overall infrastructure of projection and audience management is bound to cast serious doubt on such boisterous claim.

Dr. Anita Bose Pfaff, daughter of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and Emilie Schenkl, has expressed her dismay at the erosion of secular values in India in the recent period and how her father had always fought for building India as a secular state. In an interview at her home in Germany, Dr. Plaff said “I can talk about my father's political and personal practices in this context. As I said earlier, the independent India that Subhash Chandra dreamed of was a secular state. But he himself was a theist, religious man. This is very important. Religion is a private matter, but the state must be secular.’

There has been much discussion in public about the index of industrial production for October 2022 being 4 per cent lower than the index for October 2021; and quite rightly so, since no obvious explanations like a Covid-induced lockdown or even its residual lingering effects can be adduced to explain this fall. Covid, for the present at any rate, is a matter of the past; hence such a sharp and apparently intriguing fall in industrial production in October points to something more basic, some deep-rooted malaise in the Indian economy.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi wasted breath warning Indians that “Covid is not over yet”. Who does not know that? Also, asking Wayanad MP Rahul Gandhi to mask up was asinine. If nothing else, the Gandhi scion is clairvoyant. Rahul was the first politician to warn the Modi government of a second Covid wave. And who does not know how many lives the second wave took.

If the tone and tenor of Narendra Modi’s speech at the high level meeting held on Thursday to discuss the strategy to fight covid is any indicator, it is obvious that Rahul Gandhi would have to terminate his Bharat Jodo Yatra even before reaching Delhi, not to speak of Kashmir. Emphasising "Covid is not over yet" Modi cautioned against complacency, called for strict vigil and directed that the ongoing surveillance measures, especially at international airports be strengthened.

Two things have clearly emerged during four-days 42nd session of AITUC held during December 16-20 in Alappuzha. First, India is plagued by decent work deficit and dismal status of unorganized sector, and the second, the unity of trade unions, the only tool that can counter the onslaughts on the rights of the workforce in the fast-changing world of work. The common thread in between the two was the concern voiced in all the 60 seminars that relates to the onslaught unleased by the Modi government against the workforce in the country.