An article, ‘Mr Justice, We Want Social Justice’, says “... the very first amendment to our Constitution was necessitated by the reluctance of the Supreme Court to allow reservations for the SC, STs in education.”

Explaining the reasons behind the amendment, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru stated “In order that any special provision that the state may make for the educational, economic or social advancement of any backward class of citizens may not be challenged on the ground of being discriminatory, it is proposed that Article 15(3) should be suitably amplified”. This amendment, argues the article, also led to the insertion of the Ninth Schedule in the Constitution to safeguard land reform legislation. “Unfortunately even after more than 55 years of the first amendment to the Constitution there are many ‘challenges’ for any special provision that is enacted for the advancement of the backward sections in our country”, it says.

Founding father

Though the CPM had resolutely opposed the line put forth by P.C. Joshi, a general secretary of the undivided communist party whose birth centenary is being celebrated this year, both CPI and CPM are together celebrating the event. “...it will be unhistorical and unmarxist to deny his role and contribution to the building of the party and developing a Marxist outlook, particularly in the nineteen thirties and forties. As such, he must be ranked as one of the main leaders who built the Communist Party”, writes CPM general secretary Prakash Karat. Joshi has to be given due credit for the building of the all India Communist Party and the development of its mass base, he says.

Karat reprises his roles at the time of post-war upsurge which began in 1945. “The Tebhaga movement, the Punnapra Vayalar struggle, the Tripura struggle, the RIN mutiny, the campaign for the release of the INA prisoners and the historic Telengana armed struggle... all took place in this period. The Communist Party emerged as the spearhead of the anti-feudal and anti-imperialist struggles between 1945 and 1948. This was a period when, in the militant struggles against feudalism and the British rulers, thousands laid down their lives. It is in these areas that the Communist movement still holds major influence”, says Karat.

Car trouble

The party organ has raised the issue of the plight of US workers in the automobile manufacturing industry, while explaining what ails the American car makers. “US workers are today being made to pay for the past sins of their corporate employers and of the American state. Even as workers are being asked to accept lower wages and benefits, managerial remunerations continue to be obscenely high, one way or another, even in bad times. The president of Delphi, now under bankruptcy, was paid a bonus of $2.75 million against a salary of $1.15 million! And 460 executives on salaries of around $475,000 were paid bonuses of $450,000 even as their firms were posting huge losses,” says an article ‘The US Car Industry: One Down, Two To Go’.

As for the US automobile industry and its ‘Big 3 in the Detroit belt’ — General Motors, Ford and Chrysler — stark evidence of its decline was the decision last week by DaimlerChrysler to put its US arm, Chrysler Motor Corporation, up for sale and offers made for it of around US$ 4.5 billion (Rs 20,000 crore). “Peanuts really, when you consider that Chrysler, always the smallest of the Big 3, once had a total market capitalisation equivalent to the GDP of some countries such as Australia”, says the article.

Compiled by Jayanth Jacob