International Viewpoint - online socialist magazine

2021 West Bengal Elections: Populist Right wins, Fascists Gain and the Left Disappears

Kunal Chattopadhyay — 2021-09-02T10:39:03Z

With quite some time having elapsed since the election results to the West Bengal Assembly were announced on 2 May, we need to start by providing a bird's eye view of the results before probing into details. And this can be summed up by saying that this is the most right-wing Bengal Assembly elected not only in independent India, but even going back to the Government of India Act 1935 and the elections of 1937.

- Features / India

The Struggle Against Dalit Oppression in India

Kunal Chattopadhyay — 2020-08-08T06:43:24Z

Review of Anand Teltumbde, Republic of Caste: Thinking Equality in the Time of Neoliberal Hindutva (Navayana, 2018)

- Reviews section / India, Reviews

The Corona Virus Pandemic and Past Pandemics

Kunal Chattopadhyay — 2020-04-04T08:29:27Z

The Corona virus threat has been declared a pandemic by the World Health Organisation. How not to respond to it from the left is easily seen, by apparently leftist posts circulating in social media (Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter), which suddenly wake up to how many people die because of hunger, how many die due to dengue, or due to various other ailments. These are not serious responses, and usually by individuals who on other days seldom care about the collapse of public healthcare, or the causes of world hunger.

- IV543 - April 2020 / India, Covid-19 Pandemic

Understanding the Catastrophic Victory of the Fascists and the Long Term Consequences

Kunal Chattopadhyay — 2019-06-13T09:03:20Z

The Indian parliamentary elections of 2019 ended with a huge victory for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its allies in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). What was significant was not just the huge increase in votes and seats of the BJP and the NDA, but the total shift of votes and discourse to the right. Any attempt to minimise this by mechanically referring to classical Marxist texts and quotations would be suicidal.

- IV533 - June 2019 / India

India on Strike

Kunal Chattopadhyay, Soma Marik — 2016-10-10T11:55:22Z

In the midst of a right-wing onslaught, Indian workers carried out one of the largest strikes in world history.

- IV501 - October 2016 / India

Trupti Shah (1962-2016): Communist, Feminist, Human Rights Activist, Fighter for Environmental Justice

Kunal Chattopadhyay — 2016-05-30T07:53:15Z

The movements for socialism, women's liberation, secularism, environmental rights, all suffered profoundly with the demise of Trupti Shah on 26th May evening. [1]

- In Memoriam - Obituaries and appreciations / Obituary, Fourth International, Women

Communal fascism and its dangers

Kunal Chattopadhyay — 2014-11-04T09:03:04Z

This is an edited version of a speech given at the Calcutta Press Club by the author in April 2014 as part of a national seminar on Communal fascism. It is reprinted here as part of our discussion on the question of imperialism.

- Imperialisms today / Marxism, India, Religion, Far Right

Early Soviet Commitment to Environment Protection and its Decline

Kunal Chattopadhyay — 2014-10-08T08:10:52Z

This paper argues that while the environmentalist movements have often charged that Marxism has been productivist and has ignored the ecological concerns, the reality is more complex. The focus has actually been on Stalinist industrialisation and similar processes. It will be necessary to look at the early Soviet period, when a wide ranging attempt was made at conservationism.

- Features / Ecology and the Environment, Historical events and figures, Features

Greater than the Might of Armies

Kunal Chattopadhyay, Soma Marik, Sushovan Dhar — 2013-03-02T16:29:32Z

Over one hundred million workers across India struck work for two days, on 20 and 21 February. The precise number is difficult to ascertain, but the strike went beyond the expectation of the trade union leaders and the bosses alike. This makes it probably the biggest general strike in working class history. Throughout the two days of the strike, Indian television channels and the internet were filled with comments on how the strike was a flop, how it was useless, how workers were violent, how the trade union leaders were selfish people leading poor workers up the garden path. The very vehemence of these campaigns was evidence of the gradual awakening of a sleeping giant, the working class of India, showing its massive power. Were this force to be mobilised properly, were it to fight for its goals with a greater clarity of vision, it could claim to be greater than the might of armies. But today, it is still partially hobbled. Both dimensionsâ€”the struggle and the limitationâ€”require explanations.

- IV458 - March 2013 / India

A first assessment of Indian strike - to break their haughty power

Kunal Chattopadhyay — 2012-03-09T15:54:14Z

Eleven all India trade union federations and about 5000 trade unions came together to call an industrial strike on 28 February 2012. It was reworked to become a general strike. This was against repeated court orders, according to which calling bandhs or hartals, i.e., total shut downs, which are of course political acts directed against the government over the heads of individual bosses, are not to be tolerated. In a number of provinces, governments reacted sharply.

- IV446 - March 2012 / India, Trade unions/workplace organizing