Just like the price of the essential commodities, the price of gold is also rocketing with out any control. As per reports the price of one sovereign has reached the astronomous amount of Rs. 17,960 more than Rs. 560/- of yesterday’s price. For a gram the price at present is Rs. 2215/- The rich are happy and they are purchasing it as a very good investment.
What about the common people. Gold is gradually getting out of his reach. In India, where gold ornaments are unavoidable to the bride at the time of marriage and other important functions, what the poor people can do now to fulfil the requirements. He has to take more and more loans and perish.
The Government is simply looking away. Of course, it is not worried about the crores of poor people but is more concerned with the rich, how to make more profit.

Hectic preparations are going on to make the Dharna by Casual-Contract workers at BSNL Corporate Office on 26th August a great success.
The massive dharna is called by the BSNL Casual and Contract Workers Federation as decided in its Central Executive Commitee meeting. The main demands of the dharna are Regularisation of left-out TSMs and Casual labour, Payment of minimum wage to contract workers, implementation of social security measures like EPF and ESI, No retrenchment etc. Hundreds of workers are expected to participate in the dharna from all parts of the country.
This is one section of workers who are denied all their legitimate rights. It is only with the help of the regular workers that their issues could be settled. Hence all the regular workers should extend all help and support to these downtrodden section of workers.

The 27 storey skysraper constructed by Mukesh Ambani to house his family has come in to the lime-light once again, this time for the alleged grabbing of land of the Wakf Board.
It is reported that the land was purchased from the Wakf Board for Rs. 21.5 crore by Ambani while the market price was much higher. The second point is that there is no provision to sell the Wakf Board land.
A vigilance case is going on in this connection. There is a demand for the CBI enquiry, but the Maharashtra Government has opposed it.
Even the Government kneels before the super rich and powerful people.

After meeting the Indian big business and corporates and assuring them that the ‘reforms’ will be aggressively taken forward, the Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee is now pressurising the Congress MPs in the Standing Committees to speed up the bills for returning to the Parliament for taking speedy decisions.
What are the bills that the Government urgently wants to pass and please the corporates?
They are 1)Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority(PFRDA) Bill
2)Banking Regulations Amendment Bill
3) Insurance Laws (Amendment) Bill etc.
The PFRDA Bill is intended to appoint a Regulatory Authority for Pension Fund, utilise the pension fund corpus for the market, gradually change the pension rules to the detriment of the workers. etc. The government has already changed the defined pension for government employees to contributory pension scheme for those retired after 01-01-2004. Moves are afloat to change the pension scheme for those who are recruited before 01-01-2004 also. The pension security of the government employees will be in jeopardy if the bill is made in to an Act.
The Banking Regulations (Amendment) Bill is intended to de-regularise the banking rules to the benefit of the rich and corporates. The Insurance Laws(Amendment) Bill is intended to ‘liberalise’ the sector and allow unlimited FDI as also favour the private banks.
All these Bills could not be moved and passed in the Parliament during the period of the UPA I government due to the stiff opposition of the Left Parties without whose support the government could not continue. Now that the UPA II government has got majority without the support Left Parties, it wants to steam-roller these bills at the earliest. That is why the Finance Minister is on an aggressive mood.
The workers and their unions have opposed all these bills and have gone on agitation also. But at this stage, the struggle should be further strengthened to compel the government to drop the bills.

One comrade from Chennai reported today that some bad pictures are appearing in the home page of my blog-site. I checked myself in my laptop, but there was nothing. Another comrade also reported from Chennai the same thing. After some time both the comrades contacted and intimated that it is normal now. Except from Chennai, nobody reported any thing unusual.
It seems that either some technical fault might have come or some mischief makers are on the job. My request to them is not to hack the website and confuse the visitors.

The First Congress of the Indian National Congress was held at Bombay on 3rd August 1885. Although it was only a moderate organisation seeking some concessions from the British Government at that time, gradually it grew in to a mighty movement of the people for achieving Independence from the British rulers. And we got Independence on 15th August 1947.
After Independence, the Congress changed. Its priorities have changed. Instead of caring for the ‘daridra narayanas’, it is now caring for the MNCs and big business. It is submerged in huge corruption cases.
Will the Indian National Congress be able to have an introspection of what has happened to it? How is it that the high traditions and sacrifices upheld by the leaders of the Independence struggle have been discarded and has fallen to the corruptions and moral depredations?

Each day more and more problems are coming in to the way of the Prime Minister. After former Minister A.Raja has stated that the PM and the former Finance Minister Chidambaram were in the loop on all decisions regarding allotment of 2G, it has been revealed now that PMO was responsible for appointment of Kalmadi as Chief of Common Wealth Games Organisation instead of a Government Officer as is the system. It is also reported that Sunil Dutt, then Sorts Minister, has opposed the proposal to appoint Kalmadi, but it was over-ruled by the PMO.
It seems that the Prime Minister has been involving in all these decisions making or atleast is fully aware of the same. Is it this ugly situation that the Government is strongly opposing the inclusion of Prime Minister in the Lok Pal Bill?

Nobody has any doubt that the UPA II Government under the leadership of the three promoters/pensioners ( Dr.Manmohan Singh, Ahluwalia and Chidambaram), of Bretton Wood Institutions( World Bank, IMF and WTO)will continue aggressively with the anti-people anti-worker reforms. This has now been clearly spelt out by the present Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma, in a special meeting called by the FM with the captains of Industries. The industrialists included Ratan Tata, Anil Ambani, Sunil Mittal, Anand Mahindra, Shashi Ruia, N.R.Narayana Murthy, Venu Srinivasa, G.V.K.Reddy and others.
The Finance Minister assured that the Banking Laws Amendment Bill, Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority Bill,Insurance Lawa Amendment Bill, Life Insurance Corporation Bill etc. will be passed in this Monsoon session itself. The progressive sections of the people and the working class organisations have been opposing these bills which are intended to take away the hard-won rights of the workers as also to utilse the pension corpus for the benefit of market which may shatter the pension of the retired workers. The FM never called or discussed with the representative of the workers on these bills which are completely against their interests. It has become very clear that whose interests are most important to the government. It is not the interest of the workers but the interests of the MNCs and big business.
A sustained and united struggle is required to correct the priorities of the government. Start preparations for the same now itself.

W.Bengal had always some difficulty with its ‘West’. It did not give any benefit to anybody. Having the ‘West’ tag, it used to be always in the last being one of the last alphabet. In any conference, the delegates from W.Bengal gets the last chance to speak. It is the same with the Central Government meetings also. By the time a lot of time have been taken by others and the delegates lose interest. In another way, W.Bengal is not in the west of the country. It is on the east. Due to the partition and the Bangladesh taking its name, Indian Bengal became W.bengal.
Now Mamata Government is trying to change the name to Bongo or Bongodesh. Certain historians have pointed out that the original name of Bengal was Bongo and it became as Bengal at a later period. It is called Vangadesh in the puranans.
So, West Bengal will have a new name based on the old name as Bongo or Bongodesh? Do the Bengalis cherish the name?

The CBI has calculated the loss to the government from 2G spectrum allotment as Rs. 30,984.55 crore, while according to CAG report it is Rs. 1.76 lakh crore. According to R.K.Chandolia, IAS and Personal Secretary to former Minister A.Raja, the break up of the loss for issuing licence to the companies is as follows:
Company No of licences Loss to Govenment
Tata 19 GSM 3 CDMA Rs. 4930.66 crore
Unitech 22 Rs. 4441-05
Datacom 21 Rs. 4239.19
Loop 21 Rs. 4239.19
Reliance 14 Rs. 3379.58
Shyam 21 CDMA 1 GSM Rs. 2650.03
Swan 13 GSM Rs. 2624.26
Idea 9 GSM Rs. 1816.8
S-Tel 6 GSM Rs. 1211.2
Spice 4 GSM Rs. 807.46
Allianz 2 GSM Rs. 403.73
HFCL 1 GSM Rs. 241.4
Total Rs.30984.55 Crore

According to Chandolia, all the companies who got the licences have got windfall benefit. He might have pointed out this to escape from conviction, but it seems that there is something fishy and some private companies are being allowed to escape. The Prime Ministe and former Finance Minister P.Chidambaram have got a lot to explain before the people of India.