Word: kerala
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...every school day of his childhood, my grandfather padded barefoot down eight kilometers of dirt track to go to class. His family was poor, but understood this blistering walk was the ticket to a better life - one that would lead him from an obscure village in Kerala to success in India's cities. A landmark bill put into effect this month aims to open his path to all, making free education a fundamental right for children between 6 and 14. The law is sorely needed in a country with the world's largest population of young people. At least...
...Brush aside the flowery tributes, though, and what Basu leaves behind is a party in decline, unable to stand up for the increasingly urgent needs of India's poor. Basu's home state of West Bengal is one of two in India (the other is Kerala) where communists have been a major electoral force since the late 1960s. But while the left in Kerala has been in and out of office, Basu's Communist Party of India (Marxist) has been an unquestioned force in West Bengal for decades. Early in his political career, Basu harnessed the threat of massive strikes...
...Indian government last fashioned new states in 2000, when three largely remote and impoverished regions were elevated in status. At least two of them - Chhattisgarh and Uttarakhand - have shown marked progress since their inception. Small states like Kerala in the south and Haryana in the north, both with populations under 30 million, boast some of India's highest development indicators. Backers of further decentralization even point to the original, idealistic Gandhian vision for India - of a republic brought together not by a strong central government, but an "ocean" of egalitarian and self-sufficient villages...
...accomplished home cooks; Bhushi also worked as a part-time caterer while studying for a Ph.D. in anthropology at the University of Chicago.) They do not cook in bulk or cut corners, so each dish has a distinct array of flavors. Idukki pork (named after a district of Kerala) is fork-tender and bathed in coconut gravy, while the toddy-shop fish (another dish native to Kerala, made with lots of chili and tomato) is dense with flavor. The semiya payasam - often a bland, milky pudding - is creamy, toothsome and studded with cashews...
...parties of India, along with the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the ruling Congress party. Competing for 130 seats, they only won 20, losing more than half their seats in the 543-seat lower house and suffering particularly costly setbacks in their strongholds of West Bengal and Kerala. In the last government, the Communists and their allies - known collectively as the Left Front - were an influential part of the ruling coalition. Now they have been relegated to the fringes of Parliament. "This necessitates action and rethinking," said Prakash Karat, general secretary of the Communist Party of India-Marxist...