We are happy to announce the launching of the online AIDWA newsletter. The Covid-19 pandemic and the wholly unplanned national lockdown since 24 March has hampered our activities on the ground to some extent and made direct communication difficult for us. The RSS-BJP Government at the helm of the country has been merely using the situation to strengthen its repressive regime and to add to the woes of the people. We cannot afford to give in to their heinous tactics of locking down all resistance against their rule of unreason. We intend our newsletter to be a means of carrying the message of our all-out struggle on behalf of scientific thinking, justice and equality and to act as a supplement to our on-going resistance on the ground.
We hope all of you will be enthused by the message the articles in this number convey and find directions in it for taking our movement forward. It contains:
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An Overview of the situation by Mariam Dhawale.
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A Report from Kerala on their battle against COVID-19 by P. Satheedevi.
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An interview of K.K.Shailaja, AIDWA leader and present Health Minister of Kerala by Dr. T. Geena Kumary.
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An article on COVID-19 pandemic as a public health crisis by Sudha Sundaraman.
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An article on women workers and labour law reforms during the pandemic by Archana Prasad.
We have also provided you with some excerpts from AIDWA’s Report on the communal violence in Delhi in February 2020 which has been uploaded in our website. The activists of our Delhi State Committee played a significant role not only in providing relief after the violence but in restoring the self-confidence of the women affected by it. The Report is based on their experience.
We rely on you to circulate our newsletter as widely as possible and also to send us reports, surveys, comments, reviews, interviews and any other matter suitable for subsequent numbers of this newsletter in English. Matter from regional languages in translation is also welcome.
Hoping we can use our newsletter as a powerful means of communication both among ourselves and with people all over the country concerned with justice and equality,
With warm greetings,
Malini Bhattacharya, President,
AIDWA.
