DANIEL BLOCK: How the Facebook-Reliance combine and the farm laws pave the way for digital colonisation

In April 2020, Facebook purchased a 10-percent stake in Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio, the telecommunications arm of the Reliance empire. In addition to dominating telecom, Reliance is the largest player in petrochemicals and in retail. When its latest acquisition is complete, the company will control 40 percent – a large plurality – of India’s organised groceries sector. That could… Read More DANIEL BLOCK: How the Facebook-Reliance combine and the farm laws pave the way for digital colonisation

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Danish Siddiqui: Remembering India's Pulitzer prize-winning photographer

Pulitzer Prize-winning Indian photojournalist Danish Siddiqui was killed on Friday while covering a clash between Afghan security forces and Taliban fighters near a border crossing with Pakistan. Working for Reuters since 2010, Siddiqui covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Rohingya refugees crisis, the Hong Kong protests and Nepal earthquakes. Siddiqui was part of… Read More Danish Siddiqui: Remembering India's Pulitzer prize-winning photographer

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Chitrangada Choudhury: In a passing, the larger picture of dispossession

Blaming ‘the system’ alone for Fr. Swamy’s death obscures how India’s political economy is linked to deprival. When an officer from the National Investigation Agency (NIA) came to interrogate Father Stan Swamy last monsoon, the Jesuit sociologist, then 83, in turn asked him about police integrity, and why a father-son duo (P. Jayaraj and Bennicks)… Read More Chitrangada Choudhury: In a passing, the larger picture of dispossession

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Michael Roberts: 1% own 45% of the world’s personal wealth while nearly 3bn people have little or none / Fouâd Oveisy: On the Authoritarian Turn of Global Capital

Just 56m or 1% of adults out of 5.3bn globally are millionaires in net wealth terms. And they own 45% of all global personal wealth. The other 99% own the rest and there are nearly 3bn people in the world that have little or no wealth at all (after debts are deducted). Every year I… Read More Michael Roberts: 1% own 45% of the world’s personal wealth while nearly 3bn people have little or none / Fouâd Oveisy: On the Authoritarian Turn of Global Capital

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ASHUTOSH BHARDWAJ: Latest war cries against Naxals are absurd. Go visit Bastar, a war is already on

The most-quoted statement about the Naxal insurgency to demand an ‘all-out assault’ on the rebels, a statement that is again in currency following the recent Naxal attack in Chhattisgarh, has come from a prime minister not really known for his assertiveness. But what complicates the irony are the events before Manmohan Singh termed Naxals the “single biggest internal security… Read More ASHUTOSH BHARDWAJ: Latest war cries against Naxals are absurd. Go visit Bastar, a war is already on

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Korindo: Korean palm oil giant stripped of sustainability status

A Korean palm oil giant has been rejected from the world’s leading green certification body in the wake of a BBC investigation. The BBC had earlier found evidence that the Korindo group had been buying up swathes of Asia’s largest remaining rainforests in the remote Indonesian province of Papua. A visual analysis suggested that fires had then… Read More Korindo: Korean palm oil giant stripped of sustainability status

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MAHESH DONIA – Profit and Gloss Massive concealment of production and profits by aluminium giants

AT THE START of India’s struggle with the COVID-19 pandemic, the Aditya Birla Group and Vedanta Limited were among the first corporate donors to the PM CARES Fund—the emergency-relief fund helmed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, which his government has shielded from all public scrutiny amid questions over how it has been managed and spent. Within… Read More MAHESH DONIA – Profit and Gloss Massive concealment of production and profits by aluminium giants

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Delhi violence: Court pulls up police for “callous and farcical” investigation, imposes Rs 25,000 as fine

A sessions court in Delhi on Tuesday imposed a fine of Rs 25,000 on the police in a case related to the violence in the national Capital in February 2020, Bar and Bench reported. Additional Sessions Judge Vinod Yadav of the Karkardooma Court said that the investigation carried out in the matter was “callous and farcical”. The court was… Read More Delhi violence: Court pulls up police for “callous and farcical” investigation, imposes Rs 25,000 as fine

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Former Civil Servants Bemoan 'Complete Breakdown' of Governance in Uttar Pradesh

New Delhi: A group of former civil servants has written an open letter condemning the ‘complete breakdown’ of governance and blatant violation of the rule of law in Uttar Pradesh, saying the Yogi Adityanath government has “ushered in a model of governance which swerves further and further away from the values of the constitution and… Read More Former Civil Servants Bemoan 'Complete Breakdown' of Governance in Uttar Pradesh

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