Someone shared this on social media... This is what Karl Marx wrote in 1870. Indeed, very relevant today, as it was nearly 150 years, including for working class in India... --- The ordinary English worker hates the Irish worker as a competitor who lowers his standard of life. In relation to the Irish worker, he regards himself as a member of the ruling nation and consequently, he becomes a tool of the English aristocrats and capitalists against Ireland, thus strengthening their domination "over himself".  He cherishes religious, social, and national prejudices against the Irish worker. His attitude towards him is much the same as that of the “poor whites” to the Negroes in the former slave states of the U.S.A.. The Irishman pays him back with interest in his own money. He sees in the English worker both the accomplice and the stupid tool of the English rulers in Ireland. This antagonism is artificially kept alive and intensified by the press, the pulpit, the comi...

The other day I met someone I had never met, though this relative happens to be a very distant relative. I had heard a lot about him. This gentleman, whom I met at another of my relative's place, once happened to be a friend of top Gujarat activist Achyut Yagnik, who passed away in August. This gentleman is a US citizen though was in Ahmedabad recently.  I had heard about hm from Achyutbhai many a time. He would tell me how nice this gentleman was, though only to add, "He is quite conservative." I informed this elderly man about the death of his old friend and showed him on my mobile a blog -- an obituary -- I had written on Achyutbhai. This gentleman only, "I didn't know he had died." After I told him that I always regarded Achyutbhai as my friend, philosopher and guide, his reaction totally took me aback. "Achyut was an extremist. He would write anything without caring about anyone", he said, even when he was preparing to leave for th...

Funding Tech startups in top business-friendly Indian states has witnessed a major fall, a data intelligence platform for private market research has said in a series of reports it has released this month. Analysing Tech startup data of Telangana, Maharashtra, Delhi NCR, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Kerala,  Tracxn Technologies Ltd , the Bengaluru-based research firm, finds that except for Kerala, funding witnessed a fall of anywhere between 61% and 85%. The Tracxn  findings  come amidst Government of India  seeking to give  a major boost to startups in new and emerging technologies, quoting Prime Minister Narendra Modi wanting to especially encourage them in Tier 2 and 3 cities. A Tech startup is  defined  as “a company whose purpose is to bring technology products or services to market. These companies deliver new technology products or services or deliver existing Technology products or services in new ways.” Coming to individual states, the r...

Strange are the ways of Jio Fibre Service in Ahmedabad. On noticing for two consecutive days that there is a problem between the set top box and TV with HDMI connection getting snapped too frequently (see video below) we decided to ask to take the help of a Jio service engineer last Saturday to visit at our home.  Following a prompt but unresolved visit by a technician on Sunday, I got umpteen number of SMSes "rescheduling" visits. In between, I kept receiving SMSes claiming that the problem "has been solved", even I "didn't allow a visiting engineer to take photo", but the rescheduled visit never happened. But let me kick start from the beginning as to what happened and how Jio service appears to have gone to dogs. Following an online chat on Jio WhatsApp number on Saturday afternoon, we received an SMS at 1:48 pm stating, and I quote: "Dear Customer, Service request no SR00001V4POI has been raised in your account. You will receive an update for ...

A Congressional Briefing on Capitol Hill, Washington DC, has taken strong exception to the Biden administration's decision to sell India reaper drones. Speaking on the occasion at the briefing, titled "US Arms Sales to India: The role of the US Congress," Human Rights Watch Asia advocacy director John Sifton criticized “bad optics” of the Biden administration’s intent to sell the Indian government 31 armed MQ-9 reaper drones with accompanying munitions. 

In a surprise article, well known academic and journalist, currently with Cato Institute, US, Swaminathan Aiyar, has disputed the Sangh Parivar claim that India was a "sone ki chidiya" during the so-called Hindu period of history. Published in the Economic and Political Weekly (EPW) following peer review, a story in The Print based on Aiyar's article says that during what is called the Hindu period of 1-1000 AD,  the per capita GDP and population growth were both stagnant, no better than the  world’s. In fact, the growth of per capita income of India was zero, just as bad in most other parts of the world, not better.

In a sharp admission, several Indian diaspora human rights groups in the US have regretted that there is “a lack of awareness about Hindu supremacy” in the country, leading to “well-meaning centrist and progressive institutions to mis-recognize Hindu supremacists as representative of the wider, far more diverse, and more liberal Indian American community.” A new  report , “The Global VHP’s Trail of Violence”, prepared by Savera: United Against Supremacy with the active involvement of Ambedkar King Study Circle, India Civil Watch International, Dalit Solidarity Forum, Indian American Muslim Council and Hindus for Human Rights, goes out of the way to acknowledge a complete failure to counter Hindu supremacist organisations in the US. Without being explicit on whose failure it is, the report rues, “American politicians and civil society are frequently hoodwinked into collaborating with and legitimizing a far-right movement that operates under the guise of being a minority community wi...

Bollywood actress Poonam Pandey was in news recently for her fake death drama in order to propagate a cervical cancer vaccine. Counterview carried an excellent piece by Dr Amitav Bannerjee on how glitz and glamour was being used for a vaccine which has no basis, pointing out, the average age of those suffering from the deadly disease is 50, while she is 32. An article  in LinkedIn said a multinational corporation was behind the campaign for the vaccine.  Be that as it may, the "campaign" for the vaccine came even as Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her budget supported the case for vaccine -- imagine! -- for girls aged 6 to 14!  There is reason to wonder: Are Poonam Pandey and Nirmala Sitharaman connected in any way?  I was searching for a Poonam Pandey photo on Google -- and lo, I seem to have found the connection: she is seen on a motorbike with a Ram Temple flag fixed on it. One can now hope to see her propagate for BJP during Lok Sabha po...

Offering a collection of his articles published in the Mumbai-based daily “Free Press Journal” (FPJ) between 2020 and 2022, Anil Kumar Singh’s recently-released book  The Fault With Reality: New Experiments With Truth  gives enough indication as to why and how the so-called mainstream media would give “free run” to a journalist, and under which circumstances this “free run” could possibly be withdrawn. Former metro editor of “The Times of India”, Mumbai, Singh’s column in the daily “The Fault With Reality” in FPJ, which he began at the start of the pandemic, was suddenly discontinued following his last piece  ‘India isn’t a safe place for comedians either’  (May 7, 2022), where he scathingly asks, “Where was the need to rely on the global index published by the Paris-based Reporters Without Borders when hundreds of your own brethren are being locked up under trumped-up charges ranging from sedition to spreading infectious diseases?” While the book doesn’t contain thi...

Community leader Chhanalal with Raghlo, the petty thief Released across Gujarat and Mumbai last Friday, not unexpectedly, “Kamthaan”, a Gujarati feature film based Ashwinee Bhatt’s novel, has received wide appreciation from the audience as well as the media for action, direction and production. While the Times of India, in a  review , has given it 4 out of 5 stars to the movie, calling it “out-and-out comedy”, replete with “laugh riot”, individuals from Gujarati industry are quoted as appreciating the movie with “applause”. Social media has appreciative comments ranging from Modi bhakt actors Manoj Joshi and Paresh Rawal, to top Dalit rights leader and Congress MLA Jignesh Mevani. Set in an imaginative small town of Central Gujarat and timed around 2000, when BJP chief minister Keshubhai Patel ruled the state, there is nothing to complain about the manner in which the  Harfanmaula Films  produced the movie -- acting, direction, story telling. What, however, appears to be ...