Crucial state assembly elections are in the offing in Kerala, West Bengal, Assam and Tamilnadu and the union territory of Pondicherry. These elections will be held from March 27 up to April 29.
Majority of people in our country are facing severe obstacles in their daily lives. The dislocation in the lives of 90 per cent of the population due to the Covidpandemic and failure of the ruling BJP regime in providing help has caused unprecedented crisis. Escalating prices of all essential commodities including kerosene and cooking gas, massive unemployment and unavailability of jobs and livelihood, rampant privatisation of essential services including education and health, etc. has imposed huge burden on women to keep the home fires burning.
The BJP government has resorted to dismantling the public distribution system which will lead to an increase in hunger, malnutrition and starvation deaths. It has also launched a full scale attack on the hard earned rights of workers and farmers,through the four labour codes and three farm laws, against which the farmers and citizens of our country are protesting for more than three months.Violence against women and girl children, Dalits and minorities has escalated sharply.
Our electoral fight in all these states is for raising the voice and concerns of women as well as to protect democracy and people’s constitutional rights against various authoritarian, fascistic and communal forces backed by the BJP-RSS government at the centre.
In this battle, members of AIDWA and women members of other Left mass organisations are playing a major role as candidates in the elections, as grassroots campaigners and as organisers at the booth level; they are defying money power and muscle power on the strength of their faith in their ideology and their organisation. They are in the forefront in the struggles for people’s rights, for defending democracy and secularism, bravely resisting repression and police brutality.
The All India Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA) appeals to all people, especially women, to elect candidates from the Left and democratic forces and defeat the pro-corporate, communal BJP and its allies in all states, and also the Congress-led UDF in Kerala and the TMC in West Bengal.
AIDWAcongratulates all the women candidates for their courage and conviction and wishes to reassure them that though the times are dark and the terrain is hard, we are sure that their victories in this crucial electoral battle will ring in a new day for people, particularly women.
