COMMUNISTS have always been a thorn in the flesh for the rightwing. It therefore comes as no surprise that the October 11, 2026 issue of the Organiser, the RSS mouthpiece, has once again resorted to the familiar tactic of attempting to falsify history and attack communists in furtherance of its communal agenda. The editorial of the weekly, while eulogising Ashok Singhal on his birth centenary, declares that “The Communist-Islamist machinations on the intellectual front was the biggest hurdle to Ram Mandir reconstruction.”

ONE of the cardinal principles of a vibrant, organic democracy is the manner in which elections are held. What is important in this connection is transparency, impartiality and accountability of the body administering elections. Whatever be the aberrations or peculiarities of the TN Sheshan (former CEC) period, the impartial authority that the ECI should possess was made public during those days. Ever since Gyanesh Kumar took over, just the opposite has been the case.

The New Delhi Declaration of the All-India Convention of Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM) and the Joint Declaration of the National Convention of Workers and Farmers held on July 28 and 29, respectively, at New Delhi will be marked in modern India's history as a decisive strategic action plan to demand a shift in development policy to protect the interests of the working people.

THE 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi, held on September 12-13, 2026, produced a 140-point Declaration that is at once an assertion of Global South aspirations and a mirror to the contradictions of the grouping itself. For the Left, the task is neither to applaud nor to dismiss, but to read the document critically, recognising where it advances the struggle against US-led unipolarity, where it falls short, and where the Indian government's own conduct betrays the Declaration’s spirit.

JUSTICE Deepak Gupta, a former judge of the Supreme Court, marked the eightieth anniversary of Independence by asking in print what few in his position have dared to ask; how free are we, the citizens of India? His answer in The Tribune was unsparing. The constitutional courts “have not shown the requisite sensitivity or strength”; the right to liberty “is violated with impunity, and the courts in many cases have become mute spectators”; and “the collegium system has failed.