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Letters

Aadhaar
I have a Vodafone mobile connection. For some while I have been getting messages from Vodafone asking me to link my phone with my Aadhaar card. I received one this morning.

Is Vodafone aware of the Supreme Court’s ruling on the right to privacy and its implications for Aadhaar?
Mukul Dube, New Delhi

Moore, not Blake
Akoke Mukherjee in his article ‘Light of Naxalbari Glowing for 50 Years’ in Autumn Number, 2017 has quoted a stanza from a song by Thomas Moore but has associated it to William Blake.
Ramakrishna Bhattacharyya, Kolkata

The Geological Karl Marx
Everybody knows the philosopher and political economist Karl Marx (1818-1883). But who knows that this most influential man, with his eclectic taste in reading, was also interested in geology? This side of the author of The Communist Manifesto and Das Kapital, 'the geological Karl Marx', so-to-speak, can now be explored by means of the 26th volume of the 4th section of the monumental edition of the complete works of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, the Marx-Engels-Gesamtausgabe (aptly abbreviated MEGA).

The history of the edition is full of tragedy in itself. A first attempt to edit the works of Karl Marx (1818-1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820-1895), from the 1920s onwards, was violently truncated when several of the Russian and German editors became victims of the terror regimes of the Nazis and of Stalin. A new, second and historical-critical MEGA was begun in the early 1970s, under the auspices of various political organizations of the USSR and the German Democratic Republic. This edition was abandoned following the German reunification, but rapidly picked up again in 1992, in a scholarly manner free from ideological restriction, under the editorship of the Berhn-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften [www.bbaw.de/fors chung/mega/index.html]
Martina Kölbl-Elbert, Germany

Bail to Medha
Medha Patkar gets bail from Indore High Court today after she was denied bail from session court. Narmada Bachao Andolan hails it as a victory against the repressive Madhya Pradesh government which came down heavily on the peaceful protest against forceful eviction and illegal unjust submergence. Three other ousters, Vijay, Santu, and Dhurji, who were jailed along with Medha Patkar are facing serious charges of 307 and 308. While on the other hand, disappointed with the callousness of BJP government in Madhya Pradesh towards Narmada oustees, the chief of village Bajrikheda along with other members resigned from BJP in large number.

Medha Patkar is expected to be released tomorrow from Dhar jail where she has spent 15 days. Peaceful protestors along with Medha Patkar are facing serious criminal charges which are put against them in an arbitrary manner. This is an attempt of the government to divert the focus of the movement from legitimate demands of complete and just rehabilitation as per NWDT Award and MP Rehabilitation Policy before submergence. Badwani administration is also targeting key activists of NBA by putting false charges on them.

However, the state government of Madhya Pradesh stands exposed in front of affected villagers who are uniting themselves against any plot to displace them without rehabilitation. This consciousness is shaking the local support base of BJP which is in power in the state. After village Khapadkheda, the chief of village Bajrikheda BJP along with other villagers resigned in large number from BJP's membership. Both these villages fall in Dhar district.

Hundreds of villagers of Kukshi, Badwam, Sondul Patti, and Villages of Manavar (Avalda, Pichhodi, Nisarpur, Gaangli, Ekalvaara, Perkhad, Bagud), one of the affected villages of SSP, gathered for public meeting in their villages and written letter to Prime Minister and Chief  Minister of Madhya Pradesh demanding permanent rehabilitation and opposed temporary rehabilitation arrangements. These villagers had also written for the release of Medha Patkar, Durji, Santu and Vijaybhai.

Rahul Yadav, Amulya Nidhi, Mukesh Bhagoria, Kamla Yadav, Shyaama Bahan, Bhagirath Dhangar,
Narmada Bachao Andolan

28-08-2017

Frontier
Vol. 50, No.17, Oct 29 - Nov 4, 2017