Friday, September 21, 2012

Bharat Band


BHARAT BANDH, 20TH SEPTEMBER 2012.

We all have witnessed the tamasha on Bharat Bandh, a call given by BJP and eight opposition parties.  Otherwise what would have been a serious affair has turned out to be a ridiculous event.  What is very strange and unacceptable is that CPM and CPI were sharing the stage with BJP.  Later Sitaram Yechuri was questioned about his participation in the Bandh and sharing the stage with BJP. He resorted to justify his stand by saying that the event was called by traders and he was with the traders’ agitation against FDI in retail.  He even went out to bring Mulayam Singh Yadhav to the venue to share the cause with BJP and others.  We shall reflect on the drama staged by Mulayam Singh later.

Does CPM and CPI not know that when NDA under the leadership of BJP was in power they were keen to get FDI in multi brand retail to India?  Do they not know the stand NDA and particularly BJP had taken on disinvestment and their zeal to implement the Neo Liberal policies initiated by Narasimha Rao?  BPJ and its spokesperson Ravi Shankar Prasad admitted just two days before the Bandh that they would allow FDI in retail but their approach would be different.  He admitted this when he was cornered with a question of their plan to bring in FDI in retail to India during their rule and that in Panjab where they share power with Akali Dal, Walmart is already operating since some years.  He had argued that the time for FDI retail is not ripe yet.  The he was taunted with a statement, ‘the time will be ripe when BJP comes to power’.  There seems to be so much truth in this.

We should recall the revelation made by Wiki leaks cables.  On May 6, 2005 Arun Jaitley seemed to have remarked to Robert Blake at the US embassy that 'Hindu nationalism' is an 'opportunistic issue' for his party (Economic Times and DNA March 26, 2011).   Given this revelation we know that the agitation by BJP against FDI in retail is also an opportunist issue and they will implement this the moment they come to power.
It is pity that when the toiling masses are looking at the left parties to champion their cause and take a principled stand on the issues related to their plight that the left decides to play a drama.

After a while CPM leaders are seen into another honeymoon with Mulayam Singh Yadhav about 20 meters away from the venue of NDA drama.  Mulayam made it clear that he was not with BJP and NDA in their bandh.  He even succeeded in preventing Telugu Desam chief, Chandra Babu Naidu from joining with the BJP on their stage.  Here Mulayam Singh Yadhav declares a third front, an alternative to BJP led NDA and Congress led UPA.  Who authorised him to make this declaration?  He complains that the UPA did not consult him on FDI retail or diesel price hike.  But an important issue such as formation of Third Front he seemed to have consulted no one and all the parties outside UPA and NDA are supposed to be part of this front.  May be the Left parties and TDP would be the only constituents of this front.  With all his show of agitation against FDI in retial, diesel price hike etc he still continues to support UPA.  Whereas Mamata walked out of alliance with UPA on these issues she did not call for a bandh in West Bengal.

We are not sure why Mayavati, Naveen Patnaik, Jaya Lalitha, Shiv Sena, Mamata Banerjee did not participate in the bandh.  Are they in the Fourth Front?

Sunday, September 16, 2012

POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC IRONY


Political irony: it takes courage to be coward!

Today we find ourselves in irony of sort.  This irony is both on political level as well as economic level.

On Political Level:  The parties who oppose each other and some sit on the extreme poles from each other find themselves on the same side.

Trinamool congress of Mamata Banergee is a staunch opponent of the Left Front.  The cadres of CPM and Trinamool kill each other.  But today they speak in the same tune.  They oppose Congress’ reform programme.  Similarly, the BJP is an antithesis of the Left Front, CPM, in particular.  But both the parties will be together in Bharat Bandh on 20th of September.  Sitaram Yechuri spoke in exactly the same language as L.K. Advani while announcing the date for Bharat Bandh.  This scenario speaks for the chaos in our political situation in the country. 

 This is exactly the same scenario we find in the economic situation.

The Coalgate scam has revealed that every political party is in involved in this scam.  Starting with the Left Front government, Binju Janata Dal and ending with BJP everyone has a share in this scam.  BJP who makes a hue and cry of the (perceived) loss in the coal gate did not have any issue in making the entire monsoon session get washed out in the flood of their agitations in the house of the Parliament.  This loss is a loss to the public exchequer.

Today we seem to be in another crisis caused by the so called courageous stand taken by Manmohan Singh.  He has announced the series of reforms to bring the nation out of crisis and put it on growth mode.  

BJP’s call for National bandh on 20th of September is an irony.  In the heart of heart BJP has nothing against these reforms.  They would have carried out these reforms ten years ago. BJP’s spokesperson Mr. Piyush claimed to the NDTV that NDA disinvested only loss making Public sector units.  This is a false claim as NDA had disinvested profit making units at rock bottom prices by lumping these with the loss making units. "Rs. 87 crores shares were sold stood at Rs 34.83, as compared with the average price of Rs 109.61 realized since then."  "In June 2002, Batra Hospitality Private Limited (BHPL) acquired the Centaur Hotel at Mumbai airport for Rs 83 crore on a 'slump sale' basis, involving the transfer of the entire business and property of the hotel to the buyer. A few months later, in October 2002, BHPL sold the same property to the Sahara India group for Rs 115 crore. The fact that BHPL could earn a close-to-40 per cent return on its investment in the matter of four months makes clear that the original sale price was grossly undervalued."

C.P. Chandrasekhar has brought out in his most recent article in the Front Line the irony of growth.  Let me quote:
“Judged in terms of content and not just outcomes, economic reform under the UPA has involved reshaping the role of the state. Earlier, especially during the post-Independence years until the 1970s, the role of the state was seen as that of using the tax-cum-subsidy regime as a means to raise the rate of investment in the economy and ensure that such investment was allocated across sectors in ways considered appropriate for maximising growth. This not only made the state a growth-leader of sorts, but required it to regulate and also engage in economic activity, including production.

“Unfortunately, the outcome of this strategy pursued relentlessly by UPA I and II despite the "lack of consensus" has been quite divisive. While growth has boosted profits and delivered some benefits to a small upper-middle class, it has failed to ensure employment and livelihoods for the majority. The results from the National Sample Survey with reference year 2009-10 suggest that while the deceleration of employment growth recorded during 1993-94 to 1999-2000 had been partially reversed in the period 1999-2000 to 2004-05, the record over the five years after 2004-05 is even worse than it was during the 1990s. Over the five-year period 2004-05 to 2009-10, employment declined at an annual rate of 0.34 per cent in rural areas and rose at the rate of just 1.36 per cent in urban areas. In the aggregate, the volume of principal and subsidiary status employment rose by a negligible 0.1 per cent. This period included the years when GDP growth was at its highest. But that growth did not generate livelihoods for the unemployed and the underemployed in the country.”  C.P. Chandrasekhar, “Nation Redefined”, Front Line Sept 21, 2012.

What Manmohan calls as a bold step and a big risk is in reality an easy way out of the present economic slowdown.  Creating a climate for foreign investment is not an act of great courage.  It is a surrender of a weak and helpless nation.  It does not need courage to make the foreign investors to come and take over.  This approach comes from a false notion of development. 

The only people who praised this move of Manmohan Singh are the corporates and the American press.  There were no takers of this reform in other section of people in India. 

It would have taken a great courage on the part of the Prime Minister to bring about reform in agriculture.  It would need a great vision to bring about land reform and infrastructure development in rural area so that the productivity and growth in agriculture could be speeded up.  This would generate employment in rural area, stop migration and generate demand so that we do not need to worship the holy cow of export dependent economy.  Export dependence has another face called import dependent.  These both faces get squared up and in the process the large population, particularly in the country side get left out of the development goals.

I would particularly like to invite the Left Parties to do a little bit of introspection rather than tail the BJP in participating in their Bharat Bandh on 20th of September. It is important that they should set for themselves a task of increasing their influence among people and in the political process to bring the poor, the oppressed and the exploited to the centre stage of politics and economic development.  They had discounted the possibility of a Third Front.  While this could be right calculation they should realise that the rightness of this calculation is because the Left is of no consequence in the political scene of the country.  Their hands are soiled with the blood of the farmers who gave their lives in opposing land acquisition in Nandigram and Singur.