P.Govinda Pillai had transcended a world of intrigues He was a firm member of the CPM whose rules and regulations are rigid and inflexible. But P.Govinda Pillai, the writer, thinker, intellectual and ideologue, transcended all these trammels and postulated his views, reactions and affirmations, occasionally earning the wrath of steely-framed party apparatus. He was a Buddha, Ram, or Jesus Christ in the matter of renunciation. When positions were taken away from him, he took it in his stride and did not have a vengeful attitude towards his tormentors. All the same he remained a staunch Marxist. That is what gives him a shining personality. We see a lot of people, leaders, and powerful people who have earned their hour of reputation by intrigues, committing a lot of wrongs against others. He was a member of the nobility, a class that is vanishing rapidly in the intellectual world.

Hospital managements are taking the foolish path; they are leaving the nurses to organise themselves strongly The hospital managements are taking the foolish route by denying a fair deal to nurses, most of whom are women. When the managements become rigid, and as of now all of them are more than rigid when it comes to paying nurses, the organising capacity of the Nightingales gets stronger. Sheer will to live would spur them to go to any extent. Private hospitals are run by managements of all hues, religious and otherwise, to make a fast buck. Because when it comes to the question of life and death, human beings would go the whole hog to cling on to a worthy or unworthy life. Forget about the fact for a moment that it would be the prerogative of God Almighty to call us back to the unknown world. Nurses have already become well organised and they have gained the capacity to paralyse the health sector. Even the knowledgeable Labour Minister Shibu Baby John has recently been harping on taking action against the striking nurses. Pray, tell us what action can you take against the striking nurses? Would you put them in jail for demanding fair wages. Shibu Baby John has been telling us that minimum wages are being paid. What is this minimum wage? Would it come to, say Rs 15,000 per month? The Minister does not say anything about revising upwards the so-called minimum wages. The government has a lot of powers to insist on fair wages to nurses being paid to them. Any nursing course can be started by a management, provided it has a hospital. At the time of sanctioning courses and adding new batches, the government and the nursing council can insist on a clause, to the effect that the nurses in the respective hospitals should be paid fair wages. These days, the state government has been going back on the promises made to the nurses earlier. With the result that the nurses would get organised further and there would come a time when the managements would have to dance to the tune of the Nightingales, if the managements' reticence goes on like this. Better pay the nurses, say Rs 15,000 per month, and don't go in a round-about way to fleece money from this sum by other means.