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Pawan Mondal (28), a resident of Dakshin Barasat in South 24 Parganas district, is a bricklaying mason by profession. In the lockdown period of the Covid-19 second wave, Mondal along with his two sons and his wife are running from pillar to post to get some benefit under the cess fund meant for welfare of the construction workers. But he has had no luck.

With no prospects of an early end to the ongoing civil strife in Myanmar, the exodus of Burmese refugees to India’s Northeastern states has swelled from a trickle to a torrent. As of now, various media reports suggest that the number of people crossing over to Mizoram, Manipur and Nagaland within only five months may have crossed 16,000 and counting. More than the head count, it is the overall financial/administrative /diplomatic fallout of the situation in Myanmar that plagues the NDA II Government.

When the rivers in the country began swelling with corpses, they got buried in the shallow sand graves. Soon in the strong wind, sand moved and then came the thieves who took away the last sheet. In the glaring sun they all lay exposed. We all have lost our voices, and stare at the calamity that has befallen us. The dead have lost count, they remain unsighted, innumerable. They are among those for whom no report speaks. In death also they are excess in the society.

The blight of the pandemic which has caused mass suffering and deaths during the second wave is now compounded by the manifold miseries inflicted on the people by the Modi government. The people are experiencing unemployment, falling incomes and hunger. On top of this comes the rising inflation and price rise of essential commodities – a creation of the policies of the government.

On June 22, 1941—80 years ago—the Nazi juggernaut, having already waged a “blitzkrieg” (lightning war) across Europe and occupied ten countries, smashed into the Soviet Union with what Hitler considered overwhelming forces. Hitler announced that Moscow would fall in four or six weeks. By autumn, he boasted, the Nazi war machine would be on its way to India, there to link up with Japan.

Multan-born athlete, Milkha Singh, took up running after he saw his parents and seven siblings murdered during partition. His father’s last words were what saved him, and later gave India its first Commonwealth gold in 1958. Milkha passed away last week. What were his father’s last words and message were not known.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The signs are ominous for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Kerala. The lotus is in deep waters. There is no escaping that conclusion. The party, which is trying to emerge as a third force in the secular state, is now struggling to survive in the state’s political landscape.

The army which overthrew the elected government in Myanmar and took over power on February 1 has not only gagged the voice of the opposition but effectively blanked out any news emanating from that country except those vetted by the junta. Since April, hardly any news about the situation prevailing in the country has come out in foreign newspapers.

Aggression against Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee is the only design to salvage the image and prestige of Narendra Modi and Amit Shah after the BJP met with its waterloo in the Bengal assembly election. Though both the leaders were caught in their nasty domestic fight with the UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath on who to dictate future politics in the state, they continued with their scheming to trap Mamata in Chakravyuha.

There is little doubt in anybody’s mind that it is Congress that stands between Modi government and yet another term for it in 2024. But this role is best performed by the party in terms of omission rather than commission. If it has to be successful in fulfilling this national duty, which is to deny Modi another term because it will have disastrous consequences for the ‘idea of India, it has to adopt a self-effacing approach, and not allow the challenge to Modi to flounder on the inflated ego of the party leadership.