PRAGOTI

President Hugo Chavez's recent victory in Venezuela's presidential elections is another step in making the path to socialism irreversible in that country. Whether Chavez will manage to heed some of his leftist critics and allies and evolve further reforms that broaden the scope of the socialist project remains to be seen, but the signs are promising.   

The authors, Rohit and Srinivasan Ramani, of the original introductory piece - "What Does 21st Century Socialism Mean" respond to Arjun Sengupta's critique of it. 

The successful culmination of a new Constitution in a republican Nepal was an imperative for the alternative to it would have been anarchy. But that Constitution without a meaningful agreement on state restructuring was fruitless. 

 The Foreign Educational Institutions (Regulation of Entry and Operations) Bill has been tabled in the Parliament. The new bill allows for setting up of off-shore campuses for educational institutions, which would be given complete freedom to determine fee structure and admission criteria. The Bill draws from policy prescriptions that were enunciated in a Commerce Ministry consultation note in the first UPA government in 2005, and the rationale underlying the bill reflects the government’s continued subscription to the neoliberal ideology. The emphasis in the Bill pertains toward rampant commercialization of the higher education sector, a process which could have far reaching and unhealthy consequences for the sector. This note highlights the problems with the Bill and why it is needed to oppose its introduction in Parliament.