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India loses its last left-wing government after five decades

India loses its last left-wing government after five decades

Bengaluru, India – In the sultry August heat of 2007, India’s government under Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was sweating over the future of negotiations with the United States over a landmark nuclear deal. The proposed agreement aimed to ease access to nuclear fuel and technology in exchange for greater international scrutiny of India’s facilities. The problem? India’s communists – suspicious of the US – were opposed to the deal. And they were India’s kingmakers. Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list With 62 seats in India’s lower house in parliament, their support was holding up the Singh government. And the so-called Left Front threatened to withdraw that support if the PM went ahead with the deal. Though Singh eventually gambled and convinced other parties to support him in parliament, and pushed through the deal in the face of communist opposition, that moment marked the high point of the political left’s clout in India. On Monday, nearly two decades later, that influence appeared to have reached its nadir. According to early results from a range of state elections, the left has been swept from power in Kerala, the southern state that was the first in the world to have a democratically elected communist government – and the last state in India where communists were in power. The United Democratic Front, led by the Congress party – the main national opposition – had won or was leading in 98 seats in the legislature of 140 seats by late afternoon. The Left Democratic Front – as the grouping of left-wing parties in Kerala is called — had won or was leading in 35 seats. Advertisement The state has long been a stronghold for left-wing politics and ideology. In the late 1950s, it gave the world its first democratically elected communist government, when the Communist Party of India (CPI) led Kerala from April 1957 to July 1959. That was before the government of Jawaharlal Nehru, the Congress leader and India’s first prime minister, sacked the communist authorities after they started land and educational reforms. Since 1977, at least one Indian state has always been ruled by the left. Not any more. “This year’s election results indicate that, for the first time, the left may not come to power in any state,” Rahul Verma told Al Jazeera. He is a political scientist and a fellow at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR), a think- tank based in New Delhi. Left losing across the country The Left Front, an alliance of left-wing political parties in West Bengal, was in power there from 1977 to 2011, when the Trinamool Congress, led by Mamata Banerjee, ended its long rule. In Tripura, the Left Front ruled from 1993 until 2018, when the BJP won. In Kerala, the LDF and the UDF have swapped power for decades: Before the latest election, the left was in power since 2016. Even in India’s parliamentary elections, the left has seen a steady decline — from 62 in the 2004 election, to just eight seats now. Rajarshi Dasgupta, an assistant professor at the Centre for Political Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, told Al Jazeera that the left’s hold was always limited, and only managed to develop pockets or regions where they became influential and electorally powerful, such as Kerala, Tripura and West Bengal. “Their presence in the Hindi-speaking belt [primarily in North India] was largely limited to industrial areas, which declined with the decline of trade union politics,” he said. “The larger reason for their limited outreach is, in my opinion, their incapacity to address questions of caste and gender, and the changing nature of capitalism, especially after liberalisation,” he added. Harish Vasudevan, an independent social activist and public interest litigation specialist lawyer, told Al Jazeera that the political trend in India is where right-wing ideology is favoured. “But more than that, the left has partially lost their leftist ideology and [has] compromised,” he said. Role of the left in Kerala The left first came to power in Kerala under the CPI in April 1957. EMS Namboodiripad, an iconic communist leader, became the state’s first chief minister. His government brought about important land and education reforms in the state. Advertisement But those reforms sparked major protests from the Congress – ruling nationally, but in opposition in the state and the church, which were worried about their influence being weakened. The Nehru government used a controversial constitutional provision to sack the Namboodiripad government. In 1960, when new elections were held, the CPI lost to a Congress-led-alliance. The CPI subsequently fractured into several parties that, since the 1970s, have worked together. The outgoing government of LDF Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has focussed on improving Kerala’s infrastructure and welfare schemes. During the COVID-19 pandemic, his government’s strategy to tackle the coronavirus was widely praised as a model for containing the pandemic, as other parts of the country struggled to stop its spread. “As far as the poor and vulnerable are concerned, Kerala has given them special attention during these difficult times. We have strived to ensure total social security. Accordingly, 55 lakh [5.5 million] people – elderly, differently abled and widows – in Kerala have been paid 8,500 rupees ($89) each,” Vijayan told Al Jazeera in a May 2020 interview. A year later, when elections were held in the state, he made history by returning to power, breaking a 40-year tradition of alternating power with the Congress-led UDF. Last November, after carrying out his four-year Extreme Poverty Alleviation Project (EPEP), Vijayan declared Kerala free from extreme poverty, becoming the first Indian state to achieve that. But experts say, despite the successes, the LDF’s credibility in Kerala has taken a beating in recent years. “In Kerala, the LDF had always played their rebel role against the power abuse. But in the last five years, the party started speaking in the language of power,” Vasudevan told Al Jazeera. He noted that in this year’s state elections, traditional left voters voted against the LDF “as

Does Trump hold ‘all the cards’ against Iran in the Strait of Hormuz?

Does Trump hold ‘all the cards’ against Iran in the Strait of Hormuz?

“I have all the cards,” posted the White House on its X account on Sunday, alongside an image of President Donald Trump holding playing cards from the Uno game, in a message appearing to signal Washington’s confidence in its ongoing war on Iran. Uno is a card game in which the winner is the first to get rid of all their cards. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list The post came after Trump announced on his Truth Social platform that the US military would begin guiding ships stranded around the Strait of Hormuz by the war on Monday, in a sign that the conflict could further escalate, despite the near-month-long fragile ceasefire. Tehran has been effectively blocking nearly all shipping from the Gulf for more than two months, after the US and Israel attacked Iran two months ago, disrupting global energy supplies. “We have told these countries that we will guide their ships safely out of these restricted waterways, so that they can freely and ably get on with their business,” Trump said, dubbing the campaign “Project Freedom”. “They are merely neutral and innocent bystanders!” The president added that US negotiators were engaged in “very positive discussions” with Tehran, which could lead to “something very positive” without further elaboration. Iran, however, reacted by insisting that the security of the waterway was in the hands of its armed forces, and warned that “any safe passage and navigation in any situation” should be “carried out in coordination with the armed forces”. On Monday, the Iranian Fars news agency reported that a US warship had been hit by two Iranian drones, the claim was denied by US Central Command. Advertisement So what leverage do the US and Iran hold over each other, and what happens next? In response to Trump’s “I have all the cards” social media post, Iran’s Consulate General in Hyderabad, India, posted its own image on X. “Yes, we have less cards,” Iran’s consulate in the Indian city of Hyderabad wrote on X, together with a photo of an Iranian military spokesperson holding four Uno cards compared to Trump’s five, pointing out that usually holding all the cards means you are losing, not winning, in the game of Uno. In response to Trump’s “Project Freedom” declaration, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) warned that ships deemed to be in breach of its rules in the Strait of Hormuz “will be stopped by force”, while insisting there has been no change in how it manages traffic through the strategic waterway. On Monday, it issued a new map of the Strait of Hormuz with boundaries extending further to the east than its previous one, and said any ship travelling between the two sides must coordinate with the IRGC first. “There has been no change in the management process of the Strait of Hormuz,” spokesperson Sardar Mohebbi said, adding that vessels that comply with the “transit protocols issued by the IRGC Navy” will be “safe and secure”. “Other maritime movements that are contrary to the declared principles of the IRGC Navy will face serious risks. Violating vessels will be stopped by force,” he said. What leverage does the US have over Iran? Sanctions The United States’ most enduring source of leverage over Iran remains its sanctions regime, which was launched in 1979 when Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini declared Iran an Islamic Republic. Successive US administrations over the past 47 years have hit Tehran with a series of financial restrictions targeting Iran’s banking, oil exports and access to international markets – the US says the sanctions are a response to Iran’s nuclear programme. Sanctions have significantly constrained Iran’s economy, limiting government revenue and contributing to inflation and currency depreciation. Measures enforced through the US Treasury also deter other countries and companies from engaging with Iran, further strangling its economy. The economic pressure has been central to US strategy towards Iran, particularly during its attempts to force Tehran back to negotiations over its nuclear programme, under both Democratic and Republican administrations. Military power Beyond economics, the US maintains overwhelming military superiority, especially air power. Aircraft carriers, long-range bombers and precision strike capabilities give Washington the ability to target Iranian infrastructure with relatively low risk to its own forces. Advertisement US bases across the Gulf, as well as military partnerships with regional allies – most notably Israel – reinforce this advantage. American forces, together with the Israeli army, have killed more than 3,000 people, and struck thousands of sites across Iran in the current war, including Iran’s energy and nuclear sites. Naval blockade Since mid-April, the United States has enforced a widespread naval blockade of Iranian ports and ships. The operation began on April 13 after talks between Washington and Tehran collapsed, with US forces ordered to stop or divert vessels entering or leaving Iranian ports. US forces have since intercepted or turned back dozens of ships, and seized a container ship, the Touska. On Monday, the US announced that its crew had been repatriated to Iran from Pakistan, where they were taken after their ship was captured in the Gulf of Oman last month. According to Trump, the blockade is designed to choke Iran’s oil exports, its main revenue source. US officials say the measures have severely disrupted Iran’s trade, which relies heavily on sea routes. What leverage does Iran have? Strait of Hormuz The vital waterway is Iran’s most significant strategic asset, the narrow passage ships one-fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies in peacetime. Tehran has effectively closed the strait since the war began on February 28, sending global oil and gas prices soaring and energy markets into turmoil. Iran has repeatedly demonstrated its ability to target shipping, seize vessels, or conduct military exercises, demonstrating its ability to close or restrict the strait. The result is soaring energy prices globally, forcing many countries to implement severe austerity measures to soften the blow. Last week in the US, the average price of a gallon (3.8 litres) of gasoline

Satellite imagery reveals how Sudan’s war scorched its ‘breadbasket’

Satellite imagery reveals how Sudan’s war scorched its ‘breadbasket’

For the past three years, reports of wartime atrocities and dire humanitarian crises have been making the headlines from Sudan. Now, satellite imagery shows the extent of the damage to the country’s agriculture and industrial sectors. An Al Jazeera digital investigation using Sentinel-2 satellite imagery and the Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) reveals the devastating toll of the war on Sudan’s largest irrigated farming projects in the central states of Gezira, Sennar, and Khartoum. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list The fertile plains of central Sudan – known as the country’s “breadbasket” – have been devastated, the images show, with the vibrant, geometric green grids that once defined the country’s agricultural heartland now faded into a barren, dusty brown. Sudan descended into a bloody civil war on April 15, 2023 following a power struggle between the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a powerful paramilitary force, and the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). Fighting first erupted in the capital Khartoum, but soon spread to other regions. The RSF initially made swift gains, advancing across Sudan’s agricultural heartland, primarily in central and eastern Sudan, specifically the states of Gezira, Sennar, and Khartoum – in late 2023. The fighting devastated a vast swath of the region that is crucial for the food security of one of the poorest nations on earth. In the town of Abu Quta in northern Gezira state, RSF fighters equipped with heavy machine guns looted markets, the local police station, and the agricultural bank in December 2023. In response, desperate farmers resorted to flooding their own irrigation canals. They sacrificed their crops, turning fields into mud traps to halt the RSF’s heavily armed pickup trucks. (Al Jazeera) What began as a desperate defence on the ground has now been captured from space. Advertisement The data exposes a stark pattern: a catastrophic agricultural collapse during RSF control in 2024, followed by a fragile, limited recovery after the SAF regained territory in 2025. The collapse of Gezira For decades, the Gezira Scheme, an irrigation project launched in Gezira state, was the agricultural backbone of Sudan. Spanning some 924,000 hectares (2.28 million acres) between the Blue and White Nile Rivers, the project features more than 8,000 kilometres (4,970 miles) of canals and historically produced half of the country’s wheat. After the RSF captured Wad Madani, the capital of Gezira state, in December 2023, the agricultural system disintegrated. The collapse was not caused by climate anomalies. Independent assessments, including a study by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), confirm that wheat production in Gezira plummeted by 58 percent during the 2023-2024 season. This decline was the result of a systematic dismantling of agricultural infrastructure. The European Union Agency for Asylum documented RSF fighters diverting irrigation channels, flooding agricultural lands, and even using bags of harvested crops as makeshift bridges over canals. The FAO noted that the al-Haiwawa canal, a critical artery serving 2,360 farmers across 48 villages, was among the most severely damaged. The economic impact on the farming community was severe. Hussein Saad, a former farmer and member of the Gezira and Al-Managil Farmers Alliance, told Radio Dabanga that the cost of a 50kg bag of fertiliser skyrocketed from 20,000 Sudanese pounds ($33) to 120,000 ($200), while tractor rental prices tripled. Armed fighters looted the national seed bank and drained World Food Programme warehouses in Wad Madani that had held enough food to sustain 1.5 million people for a month. Furthermore, an RSF-imposed telecommunications blackout in early 2024 paralysed financial transfers. This forced the closure of 200 out of 300 local soup kitchens that were keeping displaced families alive. Similar devastation was recorded in the Rahad and Suki Schemes located in Sennar and Gedaref states, covering 126,000 hectares (311,350 acres) and 37,800 hectares (93,400 acres), respectively. Under RSF control throughout 2024, crop health in both areas drastically deteriorated. Reading the satellite data Measuring the destruction required distinguishing between actual agriculture and overgrown weeds. While the NDVI measures the density and health of green vegetation, it cannot inherently differentiate between crops and wild grass that often reclaims abandoned fields. Advertisement However, in engineered, irrigated schemes like Gezira and Rahad, agriculture relies on human coordination: operating pump stations, opening water gates on strict schedules, and applying fertiliser. When the system works, satellite imagery shows unmistakable, geometric rectangular grids. When the system collapses, as the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (FEWS NET) noted, these distinctive patterns vanish, replaced by chaotic, irregular patches of green and brown indicating abandoned lands. A fragile recovery The satellite data highlights a direct correlation between military control and food security. In November 2024, the SAF recaptured Singa in Sennar state, followed by Wad Madani in January 2025. By March 2025, the army controlled most of both states. Following the army’s control, NDVI data from December 2025 showed a notable improvement in crop health across the Gezira, Rahad, and Suki Schemes. While far from pre-war levels, the return of geometric green grids indicates that farmers cautiously resumed planting. This aligns with an Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report, which previously warned that 25.6 million people, which is half the country’s population, faced acute food insecurity, including 755,000 in catastrophic famine conditions. By late 2025, the IPC noted that 3.4 million people were no longer in crisis levels, attributing the improvement explicitly to the gradual stabilisation in Gezira, Sennar, and Khartoum following the RSF withdrawal. The Khartoum control group To definitively rule out climate anomalies, investigators used Khartoum state as a “control group”. Khartoum shares the same climate zone and rainfall patterns as Gezira, located just 150km (93 miles) to the north, but it experienced a different military trajectory. The SAF only declared full control of Khartoum in May 2025, just six months before the December satellite analysis. Imagery of four major agricultural projects around the capital – North Bahri, East Nile, Sundus, and Kutranj, all located within Khartoum state, which came under army control in May 2025 – showed no significant recovery in 2025. The fields lacked