New Democracy, August 2014

Organ of the Central Committee, CPI(ML)
August, 2014 August, 2014

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Union Budget 2014-15
For the Corporate;
Against the People
The Union Budget for 2014-'15 presented by the Finance Minister on
July 10th is, in its basic features, a continuation of the neoliberal policies
of erstwhile Manmohan Singh-Chidambaram dispensation. It demonstrates
on the one hand, that all talk of change by the ruling class parties is
essentially a call to preserve the status quo and on the other, it also
demonstrates broad consensus among ruling class parties on these
economic policies. This Budget ignores the concerns of common people,
the problems faced by them in their daily lives, which were showcased by
the BJP for coming to power in the recently held elections- like price-rise,
increasing unemployment, rampant corruption and worsening conditions of
the people.
No measures have been announced by the Govt. to check the rise in
prices of essential commodities, rather the Union Govt. has steeply hiked
passenger fares and freight charges for railways, the latter having a
cascading effect on the prices of all essential commodities. Moreover,
prices of petroleum products including kerosene and cooking gas have
been increased which will further increase the economic burden on the
common people, already groaning under heavy economic burden. Similarly,
no concrete measures have been announced to address stagnation and
downturn in the basic sectors of economy like agriculture and industry
which provide employment to overwhelming sections of the people of the
country. The Finance Minister has adopted a symbolic approach on serious
questions, forming committees here and making token allocations there.
BJP Govt. has basically lived upto Modis statement in the course of recent
elections that his Govt. would continue the economic policies of Manmohan
Singh Govt.; rather, speeding up implementation of these policies where
Manmohan Singh Govt. had faced difficulties. Arun Jaitley sounded just
like his predecessor, Chidambaram, announcing scheme after scheme with
token allocations, most of which are just repackaging and renaming of
existing schemes. On the other hand, the Finance Minister announced big
concessions to corporate, both foreign and domestic.
Over the years the Budget has lost much of its sheen through year
round increase in administered prices and new taxes; rather there are
seldom new taxes levied in the Budget. The data used in the Budget is
also manipulated to paint a rosy picture which does not exist. Budget
estimates of revenue receipts are inflated to contain fiscal deficit on paper.
When Chidambaram had, in his interim Budget, announced a hefty increase
of over 17% in the revenue receipts with just 4.5% economic growth
projection, then opposition, BJP, had criticized this jugglery with figures.
But now Arun Jaitley has retained the very same figures with very same
economic growth projection. On the other hand, many allocations on social
sector have been announced without there being any intention to spend
that amount. Lower expenditure on these heads than that budgeted show a
pattern over the years. To make their allocations sound much higher than
in the past, it has become a habit of Finance Ministers to compare their
Budget estimates, particularly on the expenditures on social sector, with
actual expenditure incurred in the past which is invariably lower.
Despite declining credibility of its numbers and allocations particularly
relating to social sector spending, the general direction of the policy can
be discerned from the Budget. And here it is a continuation of earlier policies
pursued by UPA Govt. Only the general direction of burdening the common
people and giving largesse to MNCs and also Indian corporate has been
taken further. The Central Govt. has no desire to address the real causes
of the economic downturn and has pinned all hopes on inviting FDI and
opting for Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode (public expenditure and
private profit) for accelerating the economy. It does not wish to acknowledge
or understand that this policy framework is at the root of the present
deepening economic crisis. It is offering more of the same.
Introducing his Budget proposals, the Union Finance Minister mentioned
the serious situation of the world economy, declining rate of growth in
emerging economies and growing conflicts in the Middle-East as excuses
to say that there is extremely limited fiscal space available to him. That
this was merely an excuse is apparent from his Budget proposals for he
spurned all avenues wherefrom he could enlarge this space. He made empty
claims of achieving high growth rate in three to four years but did not outline
any measures to achieve that except pinning his hopes on FDI and PPP to
somehow achieve this. Obviously these dreams are being sold to gullible
people. Ignoring the deep crisis affecting agriculture and manufacturing
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sectors, he laid one sided emphasis on construction industry and
infrastructure for achieving higher growth which, in the absence of growth
in agriculture and industries, will only lead to further deepening of crisis
and increasing the debt burden.
Budget proposals and the Economic Survey presented a day earlier
disclose a deep economic crisis. Revenue deficit is continuously rising.
Revenue income of the Central Govt. (share of Central Govt. in taxes
collected) is over 30 % less than the routine expenses (non-plan expenditure)
of the Govt. Payment on debts (interest payment and payment of
instalments due) is nearly one third of the total expenditure and more than
half of the revenue income of the Central Govt. Indian Govt. has nearly 60
lakh crore rupees of loan of which 22 lakh crore is foreign loan. Along with
it, nearly a third of Govt. expenses are incurred on Armed Forces and
Central Police Forces while more than a fifth of expenditure is incurred on
Govt. employees (their salaries, pensions and other benefits). Obviously
there is nothing left for spending on people. Symbolic schemes,
announcement of schemes which are not to be implemented and empty
demagogy is kept for the people. All work of economic growth and
development is left to FDI and PPP mode.
Like it s predecessor govts. Modi Govt. has taken recourse to
disinvestment through which it plans to generate 63,000 crore rupees, two
third of which will come from disinvestment in public sector industries.
This selling of family silver, the assets created by the hard toil of Indian
people, to meet the day to day expenditure of the Govt., shows the dire
straits the economy is in as well as the willingness of the NDA Govt. to do
everything to benefit the corporate and to not tax the rich.
BJP Govt has made much of the subsidy burden on account of food,
fertilizer and fuel subsidies. Though Mr. Arun Jaitley has not announced
any cut in them in the Budget, he has formed a committee to review them,
thus hanging a Damocles sword over them. On the other hand there is no
measure for recovering Non-Performing Assets from corporate nor any talk
of the heavy subsidies given annually to big capitalists in the form of taxes
forgone.
Another important feature of the Budget is a continuous decline in the
growth of Plan expenditure. This growth rate was over 20% in 2008-09. In
the year 2013-14 (last year) it declined to 6.58 % and in the current budget
it has been further decreased to 3.54 %. This is the truth of Modis slogan
of development!
Modi Govt., like its predecessor Govt., is prepared to do everything to
attract Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). It has announced its intention of
raising FDI cap in insurance to 49% and allowing 49% FDI in defense
production thus allowing increased foreign control in the vital sectors of
defense production and capital generation. In a queer turn of phrase, Modi
describes this permitting of 49% FDI in defense production as a step in
achieving self-reliance in defense production. India is one of best performers
in insurance sector and finance firms are eyeing its insurance sector to
gain control of the domestic capital generation.
Several concessions have been announced in the Budget for foreign
funds investing in Indian share market as well as for Indian companies
raising loans in the foreign markets. The Finance Minister has also
announced the intention of his Govt. to speed up mining, particularly mining
of minerals which is obviously in the interest of MNCs and Indian corporate.
Financial sector reforms have been announced to increase trade in currency
and for increasing loan facilities to corporate.
The problems of agriculture, the biggest employer of the work force of
the country, have been ignored. The amount of credit has been enhanced
only for land owners in agriculture, which would benefit a handful of landlords
while peasants are getting increasingly crushed by burden of debts leading
to continuing suicides by peasants. There is meagre allocation to Prime
Minister Irrigation Scheme while agriculture in the major part of India is
still rain dependent. Govt. of India does not want to address the systemic
causes of stagnation in Indian agriculture and land reforms have been all
but forgotten. There has been no announcement to give relief to small and
medium peasants. Govt., besides making available increased loans to
landlords, also wishes in their interest to allow use of MGNREGS for
agricultural operations. Govt. has also ignored the falling rate of growth in
agricultural production in the areas of so-called Green Revolution. The Govt.
has also started the process of interlinking of river basins. This will lead to
massive displacement of peasantry, huge use of energy and would affect
the rights of states over river waters.
The second biggest employer, the manufacturing sector, has also been
neglected in the Budget and no steps have been announced for removing
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the causes for deep crisis in this sector. A fund has been established for
small and medium industries but no attention has been paid to their biggest
problem i.e. ensuring a market for their products. Textile industry, one of
the big employers, has been cursorily dealt with and an announcement has
been made of setting up six mega centres with 200 crore rupees allocation.
Without any plan or policies to address the crisis of manufacturing sector
due to the falling demand in foreign markets and stagnant demand in
domestic market, the plan of industrial corridors and of setting up of urban
centres in them which will displace peasants and other people on a big
scale, would only be a bonanza for real estate magnates.
It may be relevant to point out the direction of BJP Govt., that in the
Budget income from customs (tax on imports from foreign countries) has
been reduced while income from excise (tax on domestic production) has
been increased. Swadeshiwallas are silent on this.
Govt.s main emphasis is on construction industry and infrastructure
for which several concessions have been announced. In this regard the
direction of past years budgets has been carried forward. For this foreign
and corporate capital is being invited on a large scale. But there is not
even a mention of the conditions of construction workers who work and
live in inhuman conditions. Govt. has announced operationalization of
existing Special Economic Zones (SEZs) and establishment of 6 new SEZs
which is but another name for granting unbridled rights to foreign and
domestic corporate to not implement labour laws (which the NDA Govt.
any way wishes to amend, abridging workers rights), for grabbing the land
of peasants and not to pay due taxes. BJP Govt. has once again
resurrected SEZ model of development.
BJP Govt. has continued with the neglect of social sectors like Health
and Education. The announcement of opening of new institutions is not
matched by allocations made for them. With govt. continuing to ignore the
peoples needs in health and education, these sectors have become happy
hunting ground for profit makers, a large amount of black money being
generated in these sectors. The Finance Minister has also announced
promotion of solar energy but the allocation made in the Budget does not
show seriousness of the Govt.
Tax cuts have been announced on some items of consumption by
urban middle classes, but on the whole economic burden on the common
people has been increased.
Neglect of rural areas is quite evident in the Budget proposals. Big
reduction has been made in Prime Minister Rural Road Development
Scheme and Indira Awas and Grameen Vikas. While allocation for the former
has been reduced from Rs. 21,700 crores to Rs. 14,391 crores, for the
latter the allocation has been reduced from Rs. 21,184 crores to Rs. 16,000
crores. The allocations for Mididay Meal, Drinking Water Supply and
Cleanliness, Sarva Siksha Abhiyan and MGNREGS have been kept almost
at the existing levels. For implementation of Food Security Act (FSA), Rs.
1 lakh 13 thousand crores have been allocated. It is of interest to note that
earlier during discussion on FSA in Rajya Sabha, the then opposition leader
in the House, the same Mr. Jaitley, had said that the allocation for earlier
schemes which the govt. had included in the Act was already to the tune of
Rs. 1 lakh 13 thousand crores. The Govt. had then estimated the total
expenditure on the implementation of the Act as Rs. 1 lakh 25 thousand
crores. Opposition leader Jaitley had ridiculed the allocation terming it at
almost the level of the existing schemes, but Finance Minister Jaitley
brought it even further down to the level of already incurred expenditure.
There have been no steps in the Budget to check the rise in the prices of
essential commodities or to increase employment opportunities.
This Budget of Modi Govt., full of jugglery of figures, hiding of real
intent and making of symbolic announcements for the people, is in fact for
the corporate. It is payback time to the corporate who had done everything
to bring Modi led BJP to power. It neglects concerns of the people, rather
increases burden on them. This carries forward the same policies which
are responsible for the present economic crisis and for increasing poverty,
destitution, miseries and hardships of the people. Issues of workers,
peasants, youth and oppressed sections have been sidelined.
This Budget is full of symbolic schemes and schemes with nominal
allocation which have been named after leaders of Sangh parivar. This
renaming is the new feature of this Budget.
(Statement issued by the CentraI Committee of
CPI(ML)-New Democracy on JuIy 10, 014)
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Corporates Polavaram
Project Displaces Tribals
& Peasants in Four States
Apar na
The powerful contractor politicians of erstwhile Seemandhra (now
Andhra Pradesh) were parcelled out stretches of the proposed Polavaram
project as packages by the Chief Minister of then Andhra Pradesh, YS
Rajshekhar Reddy (YSR) of Congress. Now they are forcefully exerting for
the project to materialize. The Congress led UPA-II Govt. finally conceded
Telengana with one hand. With the other, it gave the Polavaram project the
status of a national project, thus projecting it as the price demanded by
the people of Seemandhra for the re-creation of Telengana. It further sent
an Andhra Pradesh Reorganization (Amendment) Ordinance to the
President, seeking to transfer seven mandals of Khammam District of the
newly (to be) recreated state of Telengana to Andhra, with the sole purpose
of drowning all of them under the waters of the proposed dam. Its logic was
that in this way the opposition to the project could be silenced.
The BJP led NDA Govt., immediately post its formation, issued an
Ordinance to the same effect, shrugging off the responsibility onto the
previous Govt. Of course, no one believed this. The movement for
Telengana clearly specified that it meant ten districts (including whole of
Khammam with Bhadrachalam obviously) with Hyderabad as its capital.
The BJP was a Party which extended support to this movement and it
obviously knows that exclusion of any part from the state was not the
demand. Besides, the supporters of creation of Telengana have always
opposed the Polavaram dam. But BJP, with this act, satisfied NDA member
Chandra Babu Naidu who was acting on behalf of corporate and the
contractor politicians of today's Andhra Pradesh. It also satisfied its own
position on the interlinking of rivers of India. In its first session of Parliament
thus, it moved and passed the Andhra Pradesh Reorganization (Amendment)
Bill 2014 with 32 amendments, in the Lok Sabha without discussion and
with the help of Congress in the Rajya Sabha. Introducing the Bill, Home
Minister Rajnath Singh said it was prepared by the previous Govt.
The people of Telengana are against the project and bitterly oppose the
Bill. The people of Seemandhra did not oppose Telengana formation the
protests projected did not intensify but stopped overnight when Telengana
was formed. But the people of Seemandhra do oppose the Coastal Corridor
project tooth and nail and it is for this that Polavaram is needed. In both
houses of Parliament, the Trinamool Congress, the Biju Janata Dal and
the TRS argued and opposed the Bill. Now the Bill awaits the assent of the
President of India.
A National project of Corporate
The proposed Polavaram project is now a national project, and it will
be funded by the Govt. of India at a projected cost of twenty thousand
crore rupees. (This is what has been gained for a project for which funding
could not be found earlierr by YSR). But the word national can also be
seen in other ways. It is also national because it involves four states of
the country. Telengana is vociferously protesting against it, and so is the
Odisha Govt. Odisha and Chhattisgarh have petitions pending in the
Supreme Court against the project, whatever the BJP led Chhattisgarh
Govt. chooses to do now. On the 12
th
of July Telengana observed complete
bandh against the transfer of seven mandals to Andhra and against the
project. So also in Odisha, on 14
th
July, a hartal was observed in four
districts Malkangiri, Koraput, Rayagadha, and Navrangpur, called by the
ruling BJD against the proposed dam. While the contractor politicians of
Andhra are trying to manufacture an impression of satisfaction of
Seemandhra people, while there is a media hype surrounding the supposed
benefits from the Project to the people of that state, the people of Andhra
have bitterly opposed all steps towards making the coastal corridor a
reality. However the Naidu Govt. and to some extent the Telengana Govt.
also, seek to portray opposition to the project as one of conflict between
the interests of the two states. The only supporters of the Project are the
contractor politicians of Andhra and the corporate.
This project is also a national one because it puts before the people of
the country the need to formulate their opinion on the desirability of mega
dams and projects. What actually is their relation to development of the
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people or is development synonymous with corporate contractor interests?
Most importantly, this project is national because it needs from us an
answer about how this country should treat its tribal population, especially
in the context of how it treated them in the name of temples of Modern
India. Whose were the gods of these temples? Is it our intention to keep
up these policies which have populated our cities with domestics from
tribals of Jharkhand, with trafficking of their women and girls?
The contours of the Polavaram project and the issues it has raked up
help to clearly formulate the questions around it, which people of the country
need answer.
Amendment Against Constitutional Provisions
The Andhra Pradesh Reorganization (Amendment) Bill 2014 passed by
Parliament in its current session is aimed only at facilitating the Polavaram
project. It seeks to transfer all the villages of the Mandals of Kukunoor,
Velairpadu, Burgumpadu, Chintoor, Kunnavaram, Vararamachandrapuram
and Bhadrachalam (except the revenue village of Bhadrachalam with the
temple town) to Andhra Pradesh. This is in violation of Articles 3 and 4 of
the Constitution that define the process to be adopted in case of transfer
of territories from one state to the other. The amendment also violates
Article 244 that provides mandatory process for administration and control
of scheduled areas in accordance with the Fifth Schedule. This requires
consultation and approval of the Tribal Advisory Council in the state as all
seven mandals are in scheduled areas.
The Polavaram Project Transfer of Godavari water to Krishna
Basin
The Polavaram project envisages a massive earth and rock filled dam
with 44 vents across the Godavari river at the Polavaram village in West
Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh. The river here emerges from the last
of the Eastern Ghats into plains with alluvial sandy soil. The river width
here is 1500 meters. The highest point of the dam will be at 150 feet from
the tip to the lowest point in the river bed. There will be two canals leading
out of the dam. 80,000 million cubic meters of water will be transferred to
Krishna Basin by the right canal. The water will pour into Budameru in
Vijaywada which opens into the Krishna River upstream of Prakasam
barrage.
The stated aims are to irrigate 54 mandals in four districts of Andhra
Pradesh (Krishna, Vishakhapatnam, East and West Godavari) to increase
agricultural production by irrigating 7.21 lakh acres. It will generate 960 MV
of electricity. It will supply water for drinking to Visakhapatnam and other
small towns en route. It will facilitate recreation and pisciculture. The right
canal will be 174 Km long and the 181.53 Km left canal will go to
Visakhapatnam District and connect with the Yaleur main canal. The water
is to feed the proposed Vizag Kakinada Industrial corridor, five SEZs (one
is Kakinada SEZ), two industrial parks in Kakinada and Peddapuram, an
Apparel Park, a Pharma City, a naval establishment and also an atomic
research station. The water will also feed the Visakha industrial water supply
project which will give water for 365 days to industries. The benefits of the
water pouring into the Krishna for its riparian states is another subject of
propaganda of Andhra Govt., with even postulation of drinking water supply
to Chennai. The APIIC preparing for the industrial corridor claims to have
already given 30,000 acres land to industrialists and further claims a land
bank of 82,000 acres. This entails massive land acquisition and these are
most likely all figures on paper as Coastal Corridor Industrial Project is
being vehemently opposed by peasantry of Andhra Pradesh. However, no
doubt it is very attractive for corporate.
The Polavaram Dam reservoir will drown 276 revenue (one revenue
village has several tribal villages) villages of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh, all
in scheduled areas. There include 600 tribal villages in East Godavari district
and Bhadrachalam area, 200 villages in West Godavari district. Of these,
of the 524 villages from Khammam mandals , 363 went to E. Godavari
Dist. and 161 went to W. Godavari Dist. Thus a total of 2.7 lakh people will
be displaced from Andhra and Telengana taken together. Over 50% of
those who will be displaced are tribals. The rest are other communities
dependent on the forest and the scheduled castes. Around two lakh people
will be displaced from the seven mandals of Khammam alone. The
tributaries of the Godavari, the Sabari and the Sileru, run along the Odisha
Chhattisgarh border through scheduled areas. Eight villages or more of the
Konta taluk of Dantewada District of Chhattisgarh and four villages in Mota
block in Malkangiri District of Odisha will also be submerged.
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Embankments are not the Solution; Clearances Irregular
Interestingly the Forest Clearance of the Dam in July 2010 is conditional
on making embankments so that there should be no submergence in
Chhattisgarh and Odisha. The Govt. of erstwhile Andhra Pradesh had
suggested constructing a 30.2 km long protective wall in Odisha and a
29.12 km long embankment in Chhattisgarh. The earlier Environmental
Clearance taken in 2005 neither mentioned the embankments nor the
possibility of the submergence of land of other states. This discrepancy
came to light in 2009 when the project got clearance from the Central Water
Commission (CWC), hence the provision inserted in the Forest Clearance.
The Odisha Govt. opposed the embankments saying large reservoirs
have been made on the Sabari and the lower Sileru. Water will flow from
these into the Godavari river impacting the safety of the embankments. In
2011, the Central Govt. asked the erstwhile AP Govt. to decrease the
height of the dam. However the reply was that then diversion of water to
the Krishna delta would not be possible. In Odisha and Chhattisgarh, to
date there has been no public hearing to determine the views of the tribals,
no environmental clearance and no CWC clearance for the submergence.
Even if embankments are to be made forest land for it will have to be
acquired, but there has been no movement on these aspects. The heights
of the embankments were supposed to range from 10 30 metres. There
has been no assessment to gauge the maximum flood levels that could
impact these embankments. Odisha also maintains that a large part of
Malkangiri district will get inundated due to the project and that the flood
assessment project was flawed. In Parliament in July 2014, BJD MP
Bhartruhari Mehtab stated that his party was not against the Polavaram
project but the arbitrariness with which the height of the dam has been
increased. However he did give one new information that not just a handful
but 307 villages of Odisha and Chhattisgarh would be drowned due to
Polavaram project.
Regarding embankments, experience in Bihar has amply shown that
the water spills over to spread into the areas surrounding the embankments
and inundates them, resulting in flooding. This leads to permanent water
logging in these areas and therefore transfers the mayhem. It is no solution
the problems it will generate will aggravate the initial situation.
Among the other assets due for submergence are archeological sites
as well as ancient forests in the mandals of Khammam which are the last
of their kind here. The area is also part of the Singareni coal belt and large
stretches of coal and other mineral deposits will be submerged. The
Papikondalu Wildlife Sanctury will go under water. In the projected
submergence area, cotton in grown in 10,000 acres, paddy in another 10,000
acres and tobacco in 6000 acres. Thus, valuable agricultural land of
Telengana in Khammam will be submerged. Overall the estimate is that
some 4000 acres of forest land will be destroyed.
In addition, the project lacks mandatory approvals including clearance
for revised costs by Expenditure Committee, Central Electrical Authority
cl earance for power component and other several such technical
requirements.
Cultural Genocide of Tribals; Environmental Disaster in the
Eastern Ghats
Of the around three lakh population which stands to be displaced from
all the areas which will be submerged (2 lakh are from the seven mandals
of Khammam alone) over 50% are tribals i.e. over one and a half lakh
tribals stand to be displaced. Thus the Polavaram project is in violation of
the National Tribal Policy which states that Any project which displaces
more than 50,000 tribal people should not be taken up.
India is a signatory to International Covenants regarding protection of
tribal communities and safety of their environment. Tribal life is intricately
linked to habitat. To pick up a community and transpose it into another
area destroys the tribal community and life. Thus habitat preservation is
mandatory and the Polavaram Project will destroy the habitat of a massive
number of tribals.
The Konda Reddy tribals are a primitive tribal community found solely
in these forests. The Koya tribals (or Kandhs) inhabit these forest and also
those of Chhattisgarh and Odisha. These are the two tribal communities
primary in these areas. The natural habitat of the Konda Reddy tribe is
going to be completely wiped out. The Koya tribes have already seen
disruption and migration towards the Khammam mandals from Chhattisgarh
due to the Central Govt.s ongoing war against people in Chhattisgarh.
The tribal areas or scheduled areas of the country come under Schedule
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5 of the Constitution. It is the responsibility of the President of India to
oversee the rights of the inhabitants of these areas. The AP (Reorganization)
Bill violates Article 244 of the Constitution which provides mandatory process
for administration and control of the Scheduled Areas in accordance with
the Fifth Schedule. The 5
th
Schedule also provides that no changes can be
made in these areas without the consultation and approval of the Tribal
Advisory Council of the state.
The Forest Rights of the tribals imperiled by the projected dam have
anyway not been determined. For this, in the case of mining in Niyamgiri
hills of Odisha, the Supreme Court ordered conduction of Gram Sabhas
(palli sabhas) under the direct supervision of the District Judge. The AP
Govt. (erstwhile) had falsely asserted in the course of getting Environmental
Clearance in 2005 that gram sabha meetings have been held in the area.
They have, of course, also not been held in the submergence areas in
Odisha and Chhattisgarh either. When the Forest Rights have not been
determined anyway, how would the issues of rehabilitation and land for
land be decided at all it is another matter that the word rehabilitation is
pointless here as it cannot recreate habitat. Chandrababu Naidu, Chief
Minister of Andhra, has grandly asserted that since the seven mandals of
Telengana are now transferred, Telangana need not be concerned as
rehabilitation is his Govt.s work. He is wrong, way off the mark; not only
the Khammam belt, but also for the tribals of scheduled areas of pre-transfer
East and West Godavari Districts, whose habitats will be drowned, the
President of India is directly concerned; the Project is to be a national
one, so that the people of India have a direct responsibility to be concerned.
Both with the Project as well as with the amendment just passed in the
Parliament, a contiguous tribal belt will be dismembered. Various
committees incl uding Bhauria Committee have recommended that
administrative integrity of the tribal areas should achieved. What to talk of
integrity, this entire population will be displaced and resettled in a new
habitat absolutely unlikely to resemble their forest homes.
In February 2009, the Environment Mi nist rys Expert Appraisal
Committee for River Valley and Hydroelectric projects directed the Andhra
Govt. to conduct public hearings in both states , Odisha and Chhattisgarh,
for the embankments. This was not done.
The Polavaram project is in violation of the Right to Fair Compensation
and Transparency in Land Acquisition Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act
2013, which provides land for land in command area for the affected people
under irrigation projects and protection to ensure that All benefits including
the reservation benefits available to STs and SCs in the affected areas
shall continue in the resettlement area. It is also mandatory to obtaining
prior consent of concerned Gram Sabhas or the Panchayats in the Scheduled
Areas under the Panchayat Extension to Scheduled Areas Act (PESA)
1996.
All these are the legal issues linked to the tribal population of the area.
The other issues are equally serious and deserve equally serious
consideration. This tribal population of Andhra, Telengana and also
Chhattisgarh and Odisha will, at best, be uprooted, rehabilitated by being
given some place for housing, may be some land and some compensation
money whose value anyway they are usually at a loss to comprehend.
Their lifestyle in the forest, their integration with the habitat, the integration
of the women with the forest and the food sources and herbs it provides,
their cultural life, cannot be recreated. This is the experience of India over
so many years, and the victims of those years are still scattered throughout
India. The tribal women bear the heaviest end of the stick. At the time of
the Kalinganagar struggle in Odisha, those who saw the surrounding area
were witness to the rehabilitation of tribals by other corporate who had
built industries in the surrounding areas. Small sheds roofed by tin, with a
few chicken roaming in the area, with the tribal women working as unskilled
labour in nearby constructions, roaming erect, carrying loads of bricks on
their heads in the blazing sun. The cultural, linguistic and ethnic identities
of the tribal population a massive number- are at stake and their claim to
the land and their forests must be upheld. There is no adulation for the
cave days involved here. The sort of integration done in India leads to
the worst patriarchal distortions of old tribal norms apart from rootlessness,
impoverishment and other aspects mentioned earlier.
For what is it to be staked? For a massive project which will displace
even more people than the gargantuan Narmada project (which displaced
over 60,000 tribals), drown pristine forests and productive agricultural land
in Telengana. Many small projects made across the Godavari can equally
be used for power generation, for irrigation, without the massive
displacement and destruction. But 20,000 crore rupees are much coveted;
the fact that the dam is being championed by the very contractor politicians
NEW DEMOCRACY
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indicates the pressures involved. Chandra Babu Naidu, the current CM of
Andhra Pradesh, in his earlier role as CM of the undivided state, was the
blue eyed boy of imperialism and is known for his service to corporate for
whom he had put up the whole state for loot. The fact is that the entire
question of the validity of massive projects is questionable and scientific
use of knowledge allows use of natural resources without decimating natural
habitats and assets.
For what else will it be staked? These facts are worse.
Irrigation Camouflage- Irrigating Irrigated Land
According to the claims relating to the Polavaram project, 7.21 lakh
acres of land will be brought under irrigation in the four districts of Krishna,
East and West Godavari and Vishakapatnam. Another interpretation is
that irrigation will be stabilized in these areas. 129,000 ha are supposed
to be irrigated by the right canal and 162,000 ha by the left canal ( 2.5
acres is one hectare). However the erstwhile AP Govt. had already built
two lift irrigation projects parallel to the canal-Tatipuda and Pushkharam,
to irrigate around 161.874 ha of the total area supposed to be irrigated by
the Polavaram project. The Chagalnadu lift irrigation scheme, the Torrigedda
and the Yeleru schemes already irrigate more than 51,800 ha. Thus the
major part of the projected area is already irrigated by alternative schemes.
Around 80,000 ha or so land remains. These can be irrigated at drastically
lower costs and by drastically smaller projects. Currently, the cost of
irrigation of each hectare of land, it is estimated, will be around ten lakh
rupees, excluding the maintenance cost. According to E.A. S. Sarma, the
cost of supposedly irrigating every five acres of land here wil l be
displacement of one tribal family.
Even the Govt. of Indias official data shows 71% of the right canal
command areas as already under irrigation since 1999. The International
Water Management institute based in Sri Lanka that studied the Krishna
Godavari river link found that 95% of the area to be irrigated by the right
canal was already irrigated; the rest 5% of the area was not under cultivation.
Rather, it is the Telengana area which needs irrigation. Having officially
50% of the joint states cultivated land, Telengana got only 32% of the
states irrigation potential. This year, of the total peasant suicides in
Telengana, reported 30 were in Warangal district, the the reason was crop
failure dur to failure of monsoon. Actually from the around 650 tmc surplus
waters of the Godavari upto now, water needs to be allocated to Telengana
using equitable water distribution. Small dams across the Godavari in
Telengana area which will provide irrigation without displacement on a
massive scale are the need of the hour.
Water is for Industry- The Powerful Capitalists of Andhra.
Irrigation is only a camouflage. The waters of the Godavari are actually
being harnessed to provide an abundance of water to the coastal corridor
project being envisaged along the eastern coast including industrial corridor
from Vishakhapatnam to Kakinada for the corporate and MNCs expected
here. This corridor is to be served by the second port of Vishakhapatnam.
The people of Andhra have bitterly opposed the massive land acquisitions
that are preliminary to the project. The fragile ecosystem in the Eastern
Ghats, one of the finest in the world, is at stake. The fisher folk of
Vishakhapatnam fought tooth and nail against the second port constructed
there endangering their livelihoods. The peasantry of Srikakulam fought
and gave their lives to prevent thermal power stations from devouring their
lands. The people of Nellore, Guntur and Prakasam districts have opposed
land acquisitions for corporate.
The fact that is vital to understanding Polavaram is that the corporate
of Andhra Pradesh is the fastest growing group of big capitalists in the
country. One study says The latest generation entrants into the political
arena emerged in the political landscape of Andhra Pradesh in the late
1990s and these are predominantly industrialists and businessmen who
have sought to promote their business interests by entering the political
arena and leveraging political power for their own profit. ('Hegemony over
Politics and Power', Vijay Burgula and others) It further states, Capital
formation by the Seemandhra leadership over the last three to four decades
has been built on state resources and specifically from Telengana resources
with the help of the politician bureaucrat- legal nexus. Since 2000
especially, infrastructure work in the form of government contracts have
been overwhelmingly awarded to Seemandhra contractors with political
connections. The importance of government civil construction works in the
accumulation of capital by the Seemandhra capitalists is borne out by the
fact that 27 out of the top 30 infrastructure companies in India are from AP
NEW DEMOCRACY
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and not one of these is from Telengana.
Who needs the Polavaram project? It is needed for water supply for the
industrial corridor primarily, with its projected SEZs, its chemical and apparel
parks and the continual water supply for 365 days to the Vishaka Industrial
hub. It is the capitalists, the corporate, who actually stand to benefit and
the people of Andhra Pradesh who will be among the losers. But the ruling
politicians and the Naidu Govt. are trying to manufacture opinion in Andhra
in favour of the project .They desperately project its national stature as a
victory for Andhra not for themselves and they hide its role for the coastal
corridor and mask it as needed for irrigation in Andhra.
Flood Threat Misrepresented
The envi ronmental cl earance of the Proj ect is based on an
Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). However several issues have
come to light since this was carried out. In 2006 the Central Water
Commission (CWC) changed its flood situation estimate. The Polavaram
Project went by the Probable Maximum Flood (PMF) level of 1,02,000 cubic
metre per second (cumecs) for designing the spillway. The National Institute
of Hydrology of the Ministry of Water Resources of the GOI found that if
the dam bursts the peak flood will be of 1,98,200 cumecs. Based on recent
rainfall trends and flood history, a peak flood of 254,000 cumecs is a reality.
This will wash away the dam. This is the opinion of T. Hanumantha Rao,
former chief engineer of AP Govt.
Further, in 1986 and 2010 Bhadrachalam town was innundated and the
valley flooded by floods in Godavari. If the Polavaram reservoir is full and
flood waters come from the Indravati and Pranhita rivers and the dam gives
way, the Godavari delta towns and the Aurthur Cotton Barrage will be
threatened by flood waters.
Corruption Rampant, Clearances Pending
In addition the project is plagued by corruption costs. The costs have
escalated many times over. The tenders for the dam head works have
been cancelled time and again by the A.P. High Court due to allegations of
corruption. The project also lacks certain mandatory approvals and
clearances, but of course these can be all stream rolled over by a sold out
Central Govt.
Interlinking of Rivers
The Polavaram dam is part of the national water linking project under
Ministry of Water Resources and was designed for water redistribution. In
this case, Godavari is considered to have a water surplus basin and the
Krishna a deficient one. In 2008 the estimate was that 644 tm cft of unused
water flowed down the Godavari to the Bay of Bengal. Thus this is a project
corresponding to the outlook of both the BJP and the NDA Govt. It
devastates the people, the environment and ecology and affects the riparian
interests of the states.
Are Concerns Purely Academic?
The proponents of Polavaram project, and they are powerful, are quite
clear about how they classify the criticism of his project. They say that the
unused water of the Godavari floods the East Godavari District every year.
They say it is not only downstream states that need to bother about upstream
states; the upstream states also have a responsibility to the downstream
ones. They scorn the purely academic concerns who worry about, few
thousand hectares of farm lands and forests. A specific complaint is against
Odisha and Chhattisgarh having agreed to a hydroelectric project at Konta
earlier. The contention is that the land submergence due to that project
would have been much more than under Polavaram Project but the states
were agreeable.
The issue can be resolved scientifically. More use of the Godavari
water upstream will solve the problem of flooding downstream is the
argument. The fact is that successive Govts. of erstwhile AP paid little
heed to the development of irrigation facilities of Telangana region.
Telengana must plan and fully use its share of the waters of Godavari far
more effectively for the use of the people. This was one of the arguments
of the need for Telengana formation.
Conclusion
About half a century or so ago, the power of man in harnessing the
environment, breaking up mountains, exploiting mineral resources as though
there was no limit, building massive projects, were all aspects of asserting
application of science to use nature for human development. But there is
gradual realization that development is class specific and the tribals and
NEW DEMOCRACY
19 20
indigenous people, the poor, the scheduled castes have been sacrificed at
its alter. There is growing appreciation of the finite nature of natural
resources, of the need to apply science to preserve the environment. There
is development in using science for common good without entailing
devastation and displacement. There is urgent need for peoples movements
to defend the tribal people, ecology and natural resources against those
classes whose vision does not extend beyond furthering their own plunder.
The Polavaram Project should definitely be scrapped and its status as a
national project should be revoked obviously. The coastal corridor project
must be withdrawn. Small dams across the Godavari should be urgently
constructed to harness water both to irrigate Telengana and if necessary
to augment the irrigation in Andhra.
The hurry with which NDA Govt. rushed the transfer Bill, showed utter
contempt for people particularly tribals. It also showed that corporate
continue to call the shots in Delhi.
WTO Talks : BJP Govt.s posturing
is due to coming state elections
Much is being made of Govt. of Indias stand at Geneva WTO meeting
of linking trade facilitation agreement with agreement of food grain stocks
held by the Govt. This resulted in failure of adhering to the deadline of
July 31, 2014 for concluding trade facilitation agreement which was agreed
to at the Bali Ministerial Meeting in December 2013.
The UPA Govt. had in fact surrendered before the pressure of western
imperialist countries in agreeing to Bali accords which envisaged trade
facilitation agreement by July 31 this year and four year peace period for
Govt. stocks for food grains. The main dispute is over the level of subsidies
that can be given to agriculture which have to be within 10 percent of the
food grain prices calculated at the average of prices obtaining in 1986 to
1988. This was one of the provision of Agreement on Agriculture (AOA) of
WTO. While western countries could get much higher subsidies for their
farmers through blue and green boxes, the product linked subsidies were
to be regulated which are the norm in third world countries. This unequal
agreement was condemned by the peasant organizations and revolutionary
organizations at the time of conclusion of WTO negotiations on the basis
of Dunkel Draft. The warnings given then have not only come true but have
come to haunt the rulers of India and other third world countries who had
happily cheered the WTO agreement. They and the corporate media had
sung peans in the praise of WTO but none of the supposed benefits shown
by them have been translated into reality. This agreement was in favour of
developed capitalist countries and remains so.
Before Bali Ministerial Meeting, the then Commerce Minister, Anand
Sharma, had promised that he would not compromise on food security but
his Govt. caved into pressure. Moreover, Indian Govt. broke ranks with 33
third world countries to dilute the food security provision. UPA Govt s
stand was condemned by different political parties and all the peasants
organizations. There was no doubt that UPA Govt. had betrayed the interests
of the people of the country and its peasantry to please the imperialist
powers.
Since Bali meeting the Govt. has changed at the Centre. BJP led NDA
Govt. has taken the stand of not signing the trade facilitation agreement by
July 31, 2014 and in this Indian Govt. has been supported by a number of
third world govts. including Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia. So far so good.
But what is unsettling is that Indian Govt. is not taking a principled position
on the issue and is preparing the ground for an Anand Sharma act later. Of
particular importance is the fact that the Indian Govt. has promised to get
back to negotiations in September 2014.
Hindustan Times (24
th
July 2014) quoted a Govt. functionary that, The
government will seek a postponement of the deal of the TFA, which seeks
to speed up procedures and make trade easier and cheaper across nations,
to December 31, 2014. But the date of concluding discussion on food
security is four years away, then what is the relevance of demanding
postponement to December 31, 2014? What will happen between July 2014
and December 2014 for which the Govt. is keen to postpone this act?
In the mean time, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has thundered that his
Govt. will not compromise on the interests of the farmers. He contrasted
the position of his govt. with that of his predecessor to assert that UPA
Govt. had compromised the interests of Indian peasants. But on the other
hand, his plenipotentiary Finance Minister is preparing the ground for volte
face. He stated that his Govt. will be agreeable to signing the TFA in case
NEW DEMOCRACY
21 22
substantial progress is made on the question of food security i.e.
agricultural subsidies. He obviously did not point out what would be such
a progress in the view of his Govt. This was obviously meant to send
signal to the imperialist countries that the present NDA Govt. is not opposed
to TFA favourable to their interests and would do so in due course of time
just like its predecessor UPA Govt. This probably was in response to
criticism by western powers of the stand of Indian Govt. which has signaled
to them to wait for some time.
What is NDA Govt. waiting for? Why this posturing at this time? Between
now and December 2014 lie important state elections in Maharashtra,
Jharkhand, Haryana, J&K and possibly Delhi. This would be a crucial test
whether corporate financed and corporate media manufactured Modi Wave
has lasted even a few months or faded away like other consumer products
advertized and sold by them. A good show in these state elections would
not only help in engineering defections in other states and forming govts.
or precipitating elections there, but would also bolster BJP's strength in
the Rajya Sabha where it is in hopeless minority. Govts. of present ruling
classes only do something positive when they are compelled to, left to
themselves they only launch attacks against the people. No wonder the
corporate campaigned for a stable or majority govt.
Pronouncements of Govt. functionaries give rise to doubts about the
Govt.'s sincerity on the issue. It is likely that this posturing is only for
coming elections when the Govt. will try to sell whatever agreement it can
get from imperialist countries to be in national interest. Imperialist countries
do not mind giving such excuses so long as their interests are advanced.
Do not underestimate the power of doublespeak of RSS trainees who can
term FDI in defense production as bolstering national production of defense
equipment. They will try to show their surrender before the imperialist powers
as one more demonstration of growing power and prestige under BJP rule.
Nor should one underestimate their capacities for going back on their earlier
stand or from their poll promises.
Peasant organizations should build an effective and widespread struggle
on the issue and oppose provisions of AoA. They should not allow
themselves to be complacent nor rely on the Govt. to secure their rights.
They should build and intensify their struggle to meet any exingency of the
situation and safeguard their interests.
Lift the Siege of Gaza
Palestinians' Sacrifices Advance
their National Struggle
The massive attack on Gaza by Zionist Israeli forces has been continuing
for over a month. Israel started bombing Gaza from July 7, 2014 and invaded
the strip from July 18th. In ferocity and cruelty, Israeli forces bettered their
own records. They bombed hospitals, schools, mosques, the sole power
station, even a university, killing over 2000 people, most of them civilians,
a large portion of them women and children. According to UN estimates,
over 73 percent of those killed were civilians. Compared to this only three
civilians have been killed among 67 Israelis killed in battle. Lethal weapons
have been used against unarmed civilians with reports of depleted uranium
being used by Israel which is going to affect generations to come as had
happened in Iraq. 40% of the infrastructure of Gaza has been destroyed
with rows and rows of houses reduced to rubble.
Gaza, a small strip of 360 sq. km. bordering the Mediterranean sea, in
which over 1.8 million Palestinians live, has been an open jail for many,
many years with the jailors having no responsibility towards their prisoners.
The occupying power, Israel, has been raining death and unleashing
destruction of houses and infrastructure periodically. Gaza, supposed to
be under Palestinian rule, is permitted to have neither airport nor sea port.
Its border crossings are manned by Israeli soldiers in East and North while
it has Rafa crossing with Egypt in the South. Even medicines and other
essential articles are not permitted to go through the crossings. And yet,
Palestinians display courage and heroism in abundance, drawing on the
reserve which communities facing national survival muster, building and
rebuilding their lives, but not surrendering before the powers exercising
control over conditions of their living.
The avowed provocation for the current massive onslaught has been
abduction and killing of three Jewish youth in West Bank. Israeli authorities
knew about the deaths of these youth and the identity of the killers but they
deliberately hid this news from the public and even from the parents of
these youth to whip up hysteria in Israel for this murderous attack on Gaza.
Hamas, the ruling group in Gaza, denied its involvement in abduction or
NEW DEMOCRACY
23 24
murder, and Israel Govt. knew it well before launching this attack. However,
this incident was only a pretext like earlier ones when Israel Govt. launched
such attacks on Palestinians. The whole objective of Israels attack had
little to do with this incident but with the other development which had
changed the landscape of the Palestinian national forces and their struggle.
Recently, Palestinian factions, Fatah and Hamas, ruling in Gaza and
West Bank respectively, have forged unity. This should have ended Western
and Israeli charade that Palestinians are divided and hence there is no
Palestinian representative to talk to for peace in Palestine. But western
powers and Israel openly and bitterly, opposed this Palestinian unity terming
it unity with terrorists. Israels Prime Minister Netanyahu posed the
question before Fatah leader and Palestinian Authority President Mohd.
Abbas to choose between peace with us or peace with Hamas. But the
fact is that this unity came about only after winding up of Kerry Mission of
Obama Admn. for peace in Palestine. This mission was only to start the
dialogue between Israel and Palestinian leadership in which it failed. While
winding up the mission, Secretary Kerry did not mention that it was due to
intransigence of Israel that he had to abandon his mission. Israeli rulers
actually do not want any peace talks nor any peace, what they want is just
a camouflage of talks while they pursue their design of gobbling up of more
and more Palestinian lands. What they want is a Palestinian partner who
would help in this game. Abbas was a partner but only to a limited extent.
Lack of any progress, and it was intended to be so, robbed him of credibility
among Palestinians. When he started pressing for substantial talks, Israeli
rulers started saying that there is no partner to talk to thereby undermining
his position further. Israel did everything to ridicule him and in the process
lent strength to Hamas who were any way saying that there was nothing to
be achieved by such talks.
Israeli attack is aimed at striking at this unity of Palestinians. They want
to seriously damage Hamas. But they also want, through this mayhem of
death and destruction, to turn Palestinians away from Hamas, trying to
drive home the message that they would be able to survive only if they
abandon Hamas. It is a terroristic aggression where civilian casualties are
not only a collateral damage but the very objective of aggression. Israel
wants Palestinians to give up any hope and any struggle for their national
rights. Israel wants Palestinians to continue to live in Gaza like enclaves
at the mercy of Israeli rulers. Any sign of resistance, howsoever feeble,
they portray as terrorism and lack of resistance as acquiescence in their
design. They are not a partner for peace if they struggle, and there is no
need of peace if they do not. This is the logic of all colonial aggressors.
The present Israeli invasion has taken place in the background of rising
struggles of Arab people against pro-imperialist autocratic regimes of Arab
countries. This outburst from December 2010 unnerved the pro-imperialist
regimes in the Middle East, the Arab monarchies, who sought to direct this
anger into Shia-Sunni conflict and also use it to overthrow regimes not to
the liking of their western imperialist masters. They poured in arms,
ammunition, funds and mercenary fighters to achieve this objective. On
the other hand, the struggle of the people of Iraq and Afghanistan against
US led invasions of their countries and the explosion of global financial
economic crisis, severely undermined the position of US imperialism and
changed the unipolar world into a multipolar world. In this background of
decline of presiding imperialist power and incline in the peoples movements,
Muslim Brotherhood (MB) came to power in Egypt and Tunisia which was
not to the liking of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf monarchies, barring Qatar.
The US camp in the Middle-East got divided on the question of attitude to
MB. Saudi rulers and other Gulf monarchies supported and bankrolled the
military coup in Egypt. US imperialists, while trying to keep their camp
together, fell in line with Saudi led group in supporting military coup in
Egypt. Hamas, itself an offshoot of Muslim Brotherhood, was caught in the
unfolding scenario even as Palestinian issue took a backseat for some
time. Hamas shifted its headquarters from Damascus as Hamas and Syrian
ruling group fell on the opposite sides of sectarian divide deepened by
allies of western imperialist powers.
Due to intensification of contradictions among imperialist powers and also
among the Middle East allies of US imperialism and other western imperialist
powers, three types of forces struggled to shape the contours of Middle
East in the backdrop of rising struggle of Arab people. Iran, Syrian Govt.,
Hizbollah of Lebanon and many forces in the Middle East countries
supported by Russian imperialism constituted one group. The other large
group of supporters of western imperialist powers too suffered internal
divisions. Saudi monarchy along with other Gulf monarchies, monarchies
of Jordan and Morocco, Army rulers of Egypt constituted anti-MB section
while Turkey, Qatar and MB constituted another section. Their growing
conflicts brought great disorder in the Middle East. It is in this situation of
NEW DEMOCRACY
25 26
sharp divisions in Arab world, that Kerry mission was wound up and Israeli
rulers saw no reason to humour even the pliable Abbas. But Fatah Hamas
unity created a new situation. Israel struck, mindful of support it was going
to receive from Saudi rulers, Egyptian military rulers and Jordan.
But the best of scripts tend to go awry. The heinous Zionist attacks and
valiant Palestinian resistance did not go unnoticed. In this regard, the
monopoly of corporate controlled Zionist supporter western media did not
have the last word. Social media played a singular role in disseminating
the uncomfortable images of women and children being massacred, schools
and hospitals being bombed, in brief the plight of Gazans was brought to a
large section of the people even in western countries stirring public opinion
against Zionist crimes against humanity. Large public demonstrations were
held in western countries against Israeli aggression which the western
corporate media denoted as revival of anti-semitism in western Europe.
Govts. stood apart from the public opinion. Even in USA, increasing number
of people disapproved of the Israeli attacks even as US Govt. supported
Israeli Govt. Social media played a singular role in not permitting corporate
media in determining what to tell the people. Israel and its western supporters
complained of a PR war against Israel, without contradicting anything which
has turned the public opinion against their genocidal war. They lamented
the fact of facts of war reaching the people of the western countries which
have resulted in largest demonstrations against Israeli aggression and
brutalities against Palestinians.
US imperialist rulers, while expressing concern over civilian casualties,
actually aided and abetted murderous campaign of Israel. While their concern
was sham, only for public consumption, their military support to Israel was
real and substantial. Not only have they helped Israel build an Iron Dome
to ward off Palestinian rockets from causing any damage, during the present
war itself they provided huge quantities of arms and ammunition to Israel
which was used by Israel against Palestinians. Not only that, they provided
intelligence inputs to help Israel target Hamas organization, both its military
and civilian wings. US imperialism continues to be the main supporter of
the Zionist rulers of Israel. Other west European powers have also been
supporting Israels war.
Israeli brutalities have faced world wide condemnation. International Human
Rights Council voted to investigate Israel for its crimes against humanity.
USA was the only country voting against this resolution while west European
countries abstained. It reflected peoples anger against Zionist crimes
against Palestinians.
Israeli attack is an open-ended aggression. They launched this attack to
pursue those who had abducted and killed three Jewish youth and to
demolish alleged terror network of Hamas. Then they changed the objective
to eliminate Hamas' capacity to fire rockets into Israel which have been a
continuous occurrence for several years and whose effect they have
effectively neutralized through Iron Dome shield put into place with US
help. Again they changed their war objective to eliminating tunnels whose
existence was well known to them for years and which have again been a
common feature in such warfare. All this while they have demolished civilian
infrastructure targeting Hamas activists in particular, not bothering to
differentiate between its military wing and civilians. Their changing the
objectives of their war has been to fulfil their design to crush the Palestinians.
Having unleashed a murderous campaign against Palestinians in Gaza,
Israeli rulers are caught in a dilemma. They have destroyed what they set
out to destroy. But continuing presence of Israeli Army in Gaza makes
them prone to attacks in which they must suffer casualties. But they cannot
cease to attack without some semblance of having silenced Hamas and
other resistance groups. Hence the increasing clamour for cease fire on
behalf of Israel, US Admn. and their allies in the Middle East. Egyptian
military rulers have played a particularly pro-Israel role in this conflict. They
had virtually closed Rafa crossing and did not permit even essential articles
including medicines to reach Gaza. Even during the conflict they proposed
a ceasefire accommodating all the demands of Israeli rulers but not any of
those of the Palestinian resistance. Obviously Hamas and other resistance
groups refused to accept the ceasefire proposed by Egyptian Govt. Later
unconditional humanitarian ceasefire proposed by United Nations for 72
hours was observed.
The desperation of Israeli rulers and their western backers for ceasefire
due to rising public anger in western countries as well as Israeli rulers
having no further immediate agenda, is manifesting itself in a number of
ways. Israeli media, which supported this murderous brutal war, is counting
among its achievements a broad front including Saudi Arabia, Egypt,
Jordan, Morroco and other gulf monarchies supporting it. They are also
exhorting Mohd. Abbas to play a leading role in reaching a ceasefire while
they had earlier spared no effort in running him down and ridiculing him.
NEW DEMOCRACY
27 28
Now their new found love for Abbas only underscores their uneasiness at
continuing war in Gaza. Jailors have become prisoners of their own creation!
The most unheralded and unforeseen (by Israeli rulers and their US backers)
outcome of the present war has been bringing the issue of lifting the siege
of Gaza on the agenda. Hamas and Palestinian resistance organizations
have refused to discuss the ceasefire without discussing lifting of siege of
Gaza. This issue is the most important immediate issue in the war going
on in Gaza. Economic blockade of Gaza by Israel is against all norms of
international law but Zionist Israeli rulers hardly bother about the law. Without
lifting of siege of Gaza, ceasefire would only be a brief interregnum between
periods of war. People of Gaza, over a million of them refugees registered
with UN, deserve to have freedom to build their lives free of economic
blockade. And for this siege of Gaza should be lifted completely and
permanently.
However, even this would prove to be only a longer interregnum unless
the national aspirations of Palestinians are addressed, their lands restored
to them and their freedom to live in their land is recognized. Demand for
Free Palestine recognizing the rights of Arab Palestinians to their homeland
should be the basis of a democratic solution to the problem. Even UN has
recognized the right of Palestinians to return to their homes, from which
they were forcibly and violently displaced in 1948 (Naqba), but the Israeli
rulers and their western imperialist backers have refused to recognize this
right. They talk of UN only when it suits imperialist interests but trample on
its resolutions when they do not. Long term peace in Palestine depends on
the recognition of Palestinians rights.
War in Gaza is part of continuing offensive of Zionist Israeli rulers and
the Palestinian resistance. Establishment of Jewish homeland in Palestine,
later Jewish state there, was endorsed by Western colonial powers to
dominate this region after industrial refining of oil started. It is no wonder
that meaningful steps in this direction were taken by victorious imperialist
powers of First World War after dismantling Ottaman empire. While the
rest of the Arab land was parcelled among the supporters of British and
French imperialist powers, Palestine was marked for settling Jews to carve
out a national homeland. (Balfour Declaration) This was much before the
holocaust enacted by Nazis. This was part of the design of western
imperialist powers to dominate this region. The other limb of this design,
the Arab monarchies particularly Saud family rule in peninsular Arabia, has
been the mainstay of imperialist influence in this oil rich region. These
monarchies and other pro-imperialist dictators like military rulers of Egypt
have been subverting, blunting and opposing the Palestinians national
struggle. In the present war also, they have come out favouring Israeli
rulers and opposing Palestinian resistance. They act as breakwaters to
steady the ship of imperialist influence in the region. It is aptly remarked
that the road to Jerusalem goes through Cairo and Riyadh.
The underlying cause of disturbancesin Palestine is Zionism. Described
as a form of racism by United Nations, Zionism want to appropriate the
whole of Palestine for Jews which entails forcibly and violently displacing
Palestinian Arabs from their homes. Israeli Zionist rulers are trying to
accomplish this through a series of attacks and gobbling up of Palestinian
lands. To advance towards peace in Palestine, Zionism must be thoroughly
defeated. Without accomplishing this, no meaningful peace talks can be
held, less any meaningful steps taken towards establishing peace in
Palestine.
Presently, there are increasing conflicts among imperialist powers and
different forces active in the Middle East even as Palestinians fight against
odds to keep their national flag fluttering. Middle East is undergoing change
and this change is traversing a zig-zag course dependent as it is on the
peoples struggles as well as the interplay between these forces. Several
new factors and actors are coming into play even as great disorder under
heaven descends on the Middle East, throwing monarchies into panic and
imperialists into trying all machinations to keep intact their influence.
The present conflict despite and because of heavy sacrifices made by
Palestinians will result in further advancing the national struggle of
Palestinians.
NEW DEMOCRACY
29 30
Punjab: Militant Struggle of Dalits
for their share of Panchayat land
Since the past few months, in the district of Sangrur (Punjab) there has
been a struggle going on for cultivable land. Struggle started for 'nazul'
land in village Sekha.42 bighas of land earmarked for dalits was forcefully
occupied by landlords since past 30 years. People gathered under the flag
of PMU and marched in the village against the landlords. They then
recaptured the land from the landlords.
On this issue, 17 villages organised a meeting in town Dhanoula and
formed Zameen Prapti Sangharsh Committee (ZPSC). A decision was taken
in this meeting to organize a People's Conference. 1700 people from 67
villages participated in the conference held at Badrukhan. Some decisions
were taken here. Firstly, it was decided that struggles will be built to
recapture land marked for dalit peasants from the occupation of landlords.
Secondly, it was demanded that the Land Ceiling be lowered from the current
17 acres and the new ceiling be enforced. It was decided that ZPSC will
struggle for redistribution of the ceiling surplus land thus released to landless
and poor farmers. Thirdly, ZPSC will also struggle to ensure that dalit
peasants get the land earmarked for them from the total panchayat land.
Fourthly, ZPSC demanded that plots be allocated to people who have no
shelter and no land for their domestic waste. Finally, ZPSC will also struggle
against the ration depot owners for better distribution of rations.
According to the Panchayat Act of Punjab, one third of Panchayat land
has to be leased for farming only to dalits and only they can plough that
land. However, in most villages, the landlords themselves are farming the
land after bidding for it in the name of dalits. This mechanism has become
part and parcel of agricultural practice in Punjab over the past decades.
Because of this, dalits who should have been allotted this land and who
worked on farms, have been rendered unemployed. As industries are not
sufficiently developed in Punjab, they do not offer many employment
opportunities. Thus dalits, who are thirty percent of Punjabs population,
face increasing unemployment. In addition, though the Govt. of Punjab
sought to wean them away from struggles through ration schemes but these
schemes are failing due to lack of funds and due to corruption. Hence
dalits are facing severe economic difficulties.
Since past some time, as mentioned above, a struggle is going on in
district Sangrur under the ZPSC for the panchayat land reserved for dalits
(nazul land) to be leased out to them. This time, when the bidding for land
started, dalits asked for these lands in four villages- Baopur, Balad Kalan,
Aalo Arakh and Namol. Because of the peoples struggle in Aalo Arakh
village, the landlords had to give dalits 26 bighas of land, but in the other
three villages the landlords flatly refused to do so. In Baopur village, the
dalits were boycotted, they were stopped from going to toilet and from
cutting grass for their livestock. Dalits were beaten when they went to
toilet on the farms. The Sangharsh Committee fought against this and
protested twice in front of the DC office. At last the Administration had to
ensure that the dalits were given their share of the land which was 26
acres. However, landlords who boycotted the dalits have still not been
punished; rather a case under section 307 IPC has been registered against
Sangharsh Committee leaders.
In the village Matoi, whenever dalit girls went to the fields to gather
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fodder for cattle, the son of the Sarpanch used to stalk them and mentally
and sexually harass them. These girls study in various colleges. They
used to gather in the temple and here they were organized to stand against
the Sarpanch and his son. They decided to bid for the dalit share in panchayti
land. During the bidding ,when they were stopped from bidding they rejected
the first bidding. During the second bidding, when the dalit girls went against
the higher caste bidders like the Sarpanch and other landlords, the landlords
sent out their men (hooligans) to attack the ZPSC leaders, girls and the
other villagers. Due to this ZPSC took action to regularize a dharna in front
of DSP office. Under the pressure of this dharna, police registered a FIR
but did not include any offence under SC/ST Act.
In Balad Kalan village, there is a total of 370 acres of Panchayat land,
so 123 acres should be given to the dalits. Under the leadership of
Sangharsh Committee, dalits stopped the bidding for this land six times. In
the course of this, they held road blocks, they surrounded BDOs office
and they protested in front of the SDM office. However, the entire
Administration supported the landlords and higher caste bidders while the
ZPSC mobilized the small peasants of the higher castes to come forward
and support the dalits. The entire police force of district Sangrur was sent
to the BDO office at Bhawanigarh, the place of the seventh bidding. When
the people marched forward to the spot to stop the landlords and higher
castes from bidding, they were severely lathi charged. This happened three
times with the people gathering again each time, in the course of which
four people including women were severely beaten. Forty people were
arrested under section 307 IPC. In protest against this, effigies were burnt
in different parts of Punjab by ZPSC, PMU and KKU. On 10
th
July a protest
took place at the DC office. Again on 21
st
July, 6000 people took part in a
protest in which DC office was gheraoed. The protesters were addressed
by leaders of the struggle including President of Pendu Mazdoor Union,
Com. Tarsem Peter, KKU leader Datar Singh, NBS leader Raminder Singh,
PSU leader Rajinder Singh and ZPSC leader Gurmukh Singh. This struggle
is still continuing.
BJP-RSS Design of
Communal Polarization
Must be Resisted
Elevation of Amit Shah as BJP President is not only to reward him for
the big bounty of seats in UP for BJP but is indicative of the direction the
ruling RSS-BJP dispensation wishes to take. It is an ominous sign for the
times to come, with BJP having a majority of its own in Lok Sabha and
also delineates the challenges progressive and democratic forces are going
to f ace. The chal lenge is all t he more serious gi ven t he deep
communalization in the unelected wings of Indian state viz. bureaucracy,
security and intelligence agencies and even judiciary. Any reliance on any
of these wings to slow the RSS-BJP offensive is nave and ignoring the
danger. The fight against this has to be essentially political, to be fought in
all spheres of political, economic and cultural life of the country.
Manderins in Jhandewalan and Nagpur know very well that peoples
disenchantment with Congress rule and support of the corporate have
propelled them to power. They also know that they can neither deliver on
peoples expectations nor chart a new course in clean and responsive
governance. They are the party of the extreme right wing of the ruling
classes and articulate and serve the interests of the ruling classes. They
represent and serve the forces which stand to benefit from the status quo.
But the decimation of Congress shows that status quo is untenable. Hence
the larger sections of ruling classes rallied around Modi led BJP to pre-
empt the struggle of the people for change and to substitute a virtual change
for real change. They do not want to change the policy orientation of UPA
regime and well understand the peoples disenchantment with that policy
framework which burdened the common people and benefitted a small
minority. Rather they want to advance implementation of these very policies.
The anti-people character of this policy framework which caught up with
the UPA, would also result in disenchantment with NDA. Escalating rise in
prices, particularly of food items, rampant corruption, growing unemployment
and shrinking job opportunities, worsening conditions of peasant masses,
and on top of it, corporates drive to maximize their profits through loot of
NEW DEMOCRACY
33 34
mineral resources, cheapening of labour further though those employed
are only living at subsistence level and the tightening stranglehold of foreign
capital in all walks of economic life are bound to further accentuate peoples
anger and fuel peoples protests. Land reforms and succor to small and
middle peasants are already no go areas while Govt. is out to further squeeze
them by cutting down on 'subsidies'. NDA is committed to further intensify
implementation of these policies and for that purpose alone corporate
brought them to power. This could not but disillusion the people and
disillusionment is setting in quite early. Modis jugglery of words cannot
hide for long his servility to dominant interests.
It is here that BJPs USP, Hindutva, comes into the picture. Through
deepening communal divisions they prevent and disrupt the unity of the
people, so essential to wage a determined fight against anti-people policies
and rule of the ruling classes. While all ruling class parties pander to religious
and caste divisions in the country, BJP-RSS elevate it to the level of a
principle. While all ruling class parties ignore the issues of minorities leading
to their continuously deteriorating conditions, BJP-RSS justify it in the
name of this country belonging to Hindus and minorities are relegated to
second class citizens. To drive their point home, they systematically
propagate communal hatred, engineer communal discord and foment
communal disturbances including violence against minorities. Ruling classes
take this as a useful weapon to dissipate peoples anger and prevent people
rising against their rule.
RSS-BJP have mastered the art of targeting minorities, particularly
Muslims. They have worked on many aspects of this in their Hindutva
laboratory in Gujarat. They have been continuously working on their strategy
and tools. Currently the twin focus is targeting Muslim youth as guilty of
terrorist attacks and for deepening communal division among masses
through Bahu Beti Izzat campaign. They have coined terms like Love Jehad
to hide their real motives behind such moves. The latter was well worked
out in Gujarat. In a illuminating report from RSS-BJPs Hindutva Laboratory
in Gujarat, Minorities in the eye of Communal Attack prepared by Nishant
Natya Manch and Progressive Organization of Women in 1999 and published
by CPI(ML)-New Democracy, these manoeuvres were clearly spelt out much
before the communal carnage of 2002, which was then in the making. The
report highlighted this Bahu Beti Izzat campaign in Gujarat targeting Muslim
and Christian minorities there. It was to be replicated in Muzaffarnagar in
2013 in preparation of 2014 elections. Modi led BJP has effectively silenced
Muslims and Christians in Gujarat, forcing them to disappear from the
public discourse. All this talk of Muslims of Gujarat being favourably
disposed to Modi and BJP is humbug. It only shows that they have no
viable alternative. Congress, the other major party of ruling classes in
Gujarat, has been lukewarm towards their issues and has singularly refrained
from taking them up. Congress has been building up majority communalism
in the hope of getting their votes and also those of minorities by showing
the fear of such forces. This has been the strategy of so-called secular
parties of the ruling classes. But such carefully orchestrated campaigns
run the risk of going overboard, its practitioners running the risk of falling
between two stools and being upstaged by more extremist practitioners of
the craft. This fate has already befallen the Congress.
The second important aspect has been targeting of Muslim youth in the
name of combating terror. Ruling class parties have systematically targeted
educated Muslim youth for terror attacks, rounding them up in large numbers
and incarcerating them for decades. Even if they are eventually acquitted
by the Courts, almost their entire lives are spent in jails. This insidious
campaign, equating Muslim youth with bomb blasts targeting innocent
civilians continues, continues despite Hindu extremists being the accused
of many such attacks. RSS-BJP leaders openly extol such accused persons
and yet gloat over their anti-terrorism thanks to indulgence of Congress
and other ruling class parties under whose rule Muslim youth have been
continuously rounded up and incarcerated. Indian ruling class parties in
this regard have followed the pattern of western imperialist powers who
have conducted a systematic campaign equating Islamic fundamentalism
with terrorism.
These two aspects- bahu beti izzat campaigns and targeting educated
Muslim youth for terrorist attacks, are complementary parts of the strategy
to further marginalize Muslims and make them disappear from national
discourse.
RSS-BJP have sharpened their tools. They have targeted the most
populous province of Uttar Pradesh as their new laboratory. They have
been emboldened by the rich harvest of seats in the recent Lok Sabha
elections. They have chosen western UP as the main arena for their
communal mobilization and polarization. Muzaffarnagar has added to their
repository of experience. Several reports, including the one by intellectuals
from Delhi (Dr. Mohan Rao, Dr. Ish Mishra, Dr. Vikas Bajpai and Ms. Pragya
NEW DEMOCRACY
35 36
Singh) published by CPI(ML)-New Democracy, have brought out in detail
the insidious communal campaign run by RSS-BJP in the name of bahu
beti izzat. The aforementioned report also highlighted the role of bureaucracy
and of the SPs state govt. in this regard. It also showed how RSS-BJP,
drawing on the social divisions in western UP and utilizing the insecurities
among the landed peasantry, succeeded in pitting Jats against Muslims.
Thousands of Muslims, the main source of agricultural labour in this region,
displaced from their villages are still living in camps, uncared for and even
unrecognized. The attackers are roaming free and police officers are busy
exonerating them through reviews of their cases. A number of cases of
rapes of Muslim women are not being attended to and no action taken.
BJP denies them and SP minimizes them to save the image of their state
govt.
Muslims constitute nearly one third of the population in western UP and
in many places even more than that. Obviously there will be daily conflicts
involving Muslims and other communities on a myriad of issues as are the
conflicts between different other communities, particularly land owning
castes and dalits. Such contradictions among the people are of daily
occurrence in western UP as elsewhere. RSS-BJP have chosen this area
because of large number of Muslims whose conflicts with other social groups
can be woven into a communal matrix. This also displays a heinous and
dangerous campaign of RSS-BJP to make divisions among oppressed, to
pit oppressed castes against Muslims, both to isolate Muslims further and
to make electoral inroads among the oppressed castes. Targets are carefully
chosen. Obviously all these can only succeed due to communalization of
police and bureaucracy and a Media helping in communal polarization of
society. From a few examples we can know how ordinary conflicts have
been used for this purpose.
In Akbarpur Chanderi, a Muslim majority village near Kanth in Mordabad
district, the victorious BJP MP deliberately created a dispute. Here dalits
have a Shiva temple where they traditionally used a loudspeaker for a few
days annually around a festival they celebrate. The BJP MP from Moradabad
donated a sum of money for the dalits to buy a loudspeaker. Not only that,
he instructed them to play it round the year. They were asked to leave
tapes playing when they went out for work. During ramzan days, Muslims
objected and the administration removed the loudspeaker. The MP
descended on the village again to get it restored. RSS-BJP mobilized their
top leaders on the issue. They tried to communally polarize the area, tried
to make inroads among dalits and even threatened the police and
administration officials to beware of their future as BJP was going to come
to power soon in UP. The threats to the officials issued by senior BJP
leaders have ominous portents. It is not surprising that the officers body
has remained mum on this threat. Playing music before mosques,
particularly during ramzan and at azan times, has traditionally been a potent
weapon of sowing communal discord in the country. In UP in particular, it
was widely used by Hindu Mahasabha, in 1920s which saw widespread
communal disturbances in UP. This issue was so prominent that many
observers, including the ruling British, dubbed it as Cow Music issue. A
team of AIKMS of Moradabad district consisting of Dr. Jaipal Singh and
Mr. Sanjay, met a large number of people including dalits and they all
corroborated these facts.
In the above incident we find a deliberate plan to sow discord between
dalits and Muslims, both oppressed communities in UP. The same pattern
was observed in Sasaram in Bihar where a youth was taken into custody
for sending a religiously offensive SMS to a number of people. The youth
belonged to a backward caste. RSS-BJP rumour mill sprung into action.
They propagated that the above youth was being brutally beaten by a Muslim
police officer even when the police station incharge and other policemen
were non-Muslims. This insidious campaign was launched to mobilize a
large number of people to target the police station. In the ensuing gherao,
two people were killed in police firing. A team of Janadhikar Manch, Rohtas,
consisting of Dr. B.B. Singh, Convenor, and Shri R.P.Singh, Advocate and
a member of the Manch, highlighted a number of facts including the baseless
charges against the Muslim junior police officer and also the fact that the
RSS-BJP machinery openly worked to mobilize the people and precipitate
trouble. Here again, a backward community was pitted against Muslims in
an area where communal trouble has hitherto been unknown. Relative
success of RSS-BJP in mobilizing backwards and dalits has to be seen in
the backdrop of the ruling class parties claiming to represent these sections
ignoring the basic issues affecting masses of these communities and only
using them for their enjoyment of power.
In Saharanpur (UP), RSS-BJP ran an anti-Muslim campaign utilizing a
dispute between Muslims and Sikhs over a piece of land where Sikhs
constructed an extension of a Gurudwara. The land in question was sold
by a Muslim landowner decades back and it was bought by a Sikh body
traversing some hands in between. The land had a private mosque on this
NEW DEMOCRACY
37 38
small piece of land. Litigation was decided in favour of Sikhs and the latest
round also resulted in withdrawal of the petition after the death of the
petitioner. Three persons died in the conflict and hundreds of shops were
burnt causing big damage to property. This incident highlighted the need
for vigilance by different communities including minority communities, to
be vigilant of criminal elements from within their own community who were
used by ruling class parties to deepen communal divisions. RSS-BJP saw
in this a good opportunity to pit one minority against another. They played
an active role in fometing trouble there and launched a virulent and violent
campaign against Muslims. They launched a number of attacks in different
parts of the country.
RSS-BJPs bid to utilize every issue for its anti-Muslim propaganda
and for stirring up anti-Muslim violence was demonstrated by the eagerness
with which they jumped on the issue of an upper caste girl in a village in
Meerut who was employed to teach in a Madarsa. How the RSS-BJP
concocted the story of gang rape and conversion is now out in the open.
There was no truth in the story but RSS-BJP have no regard for the facts.
They are past masters in distortions and deliberate falsehoods.
There are a number of communal incidents orchestrated by RSS-BJP
in different parts of the country, particularly in UP. According to a report
there have been more than six hundred such disturbances in UP since
NDA Govt. coming to power at the Centre, two thirds of them in the twelve
constituencies going to by-polls on August 21, 2014. The spate of communal
disturbances are alarming and disclose a deeper conspiracy for carving
out communal divisions in the country where different caste groups are
being mobilized against Muslims. The so-called secular parties have done
nothing to address the real issues of minorities, particularly Muslims, whose
conditions have deteriorated continuously over the decades since 1947.
While their record in this regard is abysmal, by their conduct they have
tried to give an impression that they care for Muslims which is being
cynically termed by RSS-BJP as their appeasement policy.
While RSS-BJP have gone about systematically, to bring about communal
polarization, their Govt. at the Centre has moved systematically to infuse
more of their adherents into the different wings of the state. The Central
Govt. refused to accept the recommendation of Supreme Court collegium
of the name of Gopal Subramaniam as Supreme Court judge. This was due
to his role as amicus curie in the fake encounter cases in Gujarat. All the
senior legal functionaries appointed by this Central Govt. have been
representing Gujarat Govt. in 2002 violence against Muslims related cases.
Not only this, the judge of the CBI court trying a fake encounter case
wherein Amit Shah is one of the accused, has been transferred. This
approach seems to have had an effect on the judges. Maya Kodnani and
Bajrangi, both convicted in the Naroda Patya mass killings case, have
been granted bail. RSS-BJP Govt. is moving systematically to place its
nominees in all branches of the state. These aspects of activities of RSS-
BJP Govt. are interconnected as well as complementary.
For the first time, BJP has a majority of its own in Lok Sabha and
hence monopoly over executive power. They also have the luxury to plan
their moves patiently. While BJP leaders talk of shunning communal
violence, they launch and support campaigns targeting minorities. A techie
is murdered in Pune, meat sellers are beaten in Gurgaon and they are
routinely subjected to harassment while Modi talks of a communal violence
free ten years.
RSS-BJP have also launched an insidious campaign to teach distorted
history to school students so that their distorted imaginary views are taken
as facts by the current generation being taught in schools. The appointment
of a non-entity in historical studies as President of ICHR has drawn flak
from established and respected names in historical research. Similarly,
books of one Dinanath Batra, close to RSS, are being taught in schools in
Gujarat. Disturbances are routinely created by outfits sponsored and run
by RSS against all views contrary to their communal version of history and
society. These outfits attack every expression of democratic dissent while
RSS-BJP provide cover for them. With RSS-BJP in power now, these groups
will be unleashed with greater ferocity and regularity.
RSS-BJP talk of equality for all communities and rail against
appeasement of minorities, particularly Muslims. Their talk of equality is
basically directed against attending to extreme poverty and destitution
among Muslim masses. Their talk of equality is to deepen and perpetuate
already existing inequality. They create a smokescreen of appeasement of
Muslims to cover up their anti-minority designs.
But more importantly, as BJP Govt. starts to intensify the implementation
of anti-people policies, peoples resistance to these steps would definitely
grow. Their attempts to displace tribals and other peasants in a large number
NEW DEMOCRACY
39 40
and hand over the mineral resources and their lands to corporate will be
resisted by the tribals and other peasants. It is not accidental that Modi
always mentions communist revolutionaries as his biggest adversaries.
His erstwhile mentor and later competitior, L.K. Advani, in his stint as
Union Home Minister, had termed Naxalites as the enemies of the India of
his dreams. RSS-BJP Govt. will definitely intensify attacks on communist
revolutionaries. It is sheer hypocrisy that these perpetrators of violence
against Muslims should lecture to others about the virtues of shunning
violence even as they sharpen tools of repression and increase armed
intervention against peoples movements.
They wish to intensify their attacks on workers by amending labour
laws and making them more anti-labour, giving free hand to capitalists to
remove the workers at will and to evade their responsibility for their dues-
all this to increase profits of corporate. This too will be resisted by workers.
Their empty talk of generating employment will be exposed soon while
price-rise will continue to increase burden on the people, while corruption
will continue to harass the people and act as a tool to rob the resources
and public exchequer. All these vices, some continuing and some
aggravating, will definitely bring more and more people into struggle. There
will come the test of RSS-BJP and their communal politics to prevent,
subvert and disrupt the peoples struggles. There will come the test of their
utility to ruling classes whether they can deliver where Manmohan Singh-
Sonia Gandhi dispensation failed. Congress is accusing BJP of stealing
their ideas and policies thereby betraying a policy consensus among the
ruling class parties.
A determined struggle against communalism should be an integral part
of the struggling forces drive against anti-people policies of BJP led NDA
Govt. as unfolded through their Budget and other policy pronouncements.
This struggle should encompass all aspects of the offensive in economic,
political, social and cultural spheres. All forces that can be united on this
issue should be mobilized. Efforts for joint struggles on different aspects
of their offensive should be made. Particular attention should be paid to
unite all forces that can be united to combat communal attacks and defend
lives and properties of minorities. We should try to play our due role in
meeting this offensive both on our own initiative as well as through joint
struggles. And we should exert utmost to increase our capacity in playing
such a role.
PROPOSED LABOUR LAW
AMENDMENTS IN THE
SERVICE OF CAPITAL
B Pr adeep .
A World Bank document dated September 15, 2004 and titled Country
Strategy for India had the following to state in regard to what has today
become the central theme for amendments to the existing labour laws,
that is, labour flexibility. Labour Inflexibility: Restrictions on the hiring and
firing of workers by medium and large firms are one of the greatest
challenges of doing business in India. Employment in registered firms (those
with more than 100 employees) is highly protected. Any registered firm
wishing to retrench labour can only do so with the permission of the state
government which is rarely granted. These provisions make labour
rationalization very difficult. They are obviously especially burdensome
for exporters It goes on, Further the use of contract labour is restricted
to temporary activities by the Contract Labour Act. This has been the
consistent position of the World Bank in its economic reforms programmes
right since the eighties and nineties. The new economic policies, dictated
as they were by the IMF-WB, that came into play in 1991 in the country
contained the direction to bring about labour flexibility. In 2001, the Report
of the Task Force of the Planning Commission on Employment Opportunities
and the report of the 2
nd
National Labour Commission echoed this theme.
The dominant discourse in the country since the nineties in particular has
been the arguments to usher in labour market flexibility. In order to attain
this flexibility, it is said, so-called restrictive laws need to be changed.
They say these laws impede growth and investments in the country. The
proposed amendments to some of the labour laws that the NDA government
is planning to bring in cannot be seen in isolation from this discourse.
Many bills towards this end were pending for long under the UPA government
and now the present dispensation at the Centre is preparing to bring in
these changes in the labour laws making Rajasthan the inaugural point.
It is not that the existing labour laws in the country are sacrosanct and
NEW DEMOCRACY
41 42
should not be subjected to changes but when the changes infringe upon
the rights of the workers at large and when these distinctly go to strengthen
the hands of capital, then they should be questioned and opposed. Because
whatever little exists in these laws as rights or guarantees for workers are
those that were realized as a result of long struggles of the workers in the
country.
Secondly, even these are not implemented and again it is the workers
who put pressure for getting them enforced. That is why we see in the
count ry even t oday workers and unions raising the demand f or
implementation of labour laws. The propaganda that labour flexibility does
not exist in the country is entirely false and these laws have not been able
to stop retrenchments, closures and lay-offs. How many workers slogging
in the unorganized sectors of the economy enjoy the benefits of minimum
wage? There are thousands of units in the country that do not give the
workers wage slips, maintain records and registers. The increasing tendency
to employ on contract basis or the growth in appointing temporary labour in
the last two decades has led to insecurity despite the laws.
On the 31
st
July, the Rajasthan Assembly had passed changes to the
Factories Act, Industrial Disputes Act, The Contract Labour Act and
Apprentices Act. The Chief minister Vasundhara Raje promised that she
would convene a meeting of the Trade Unions before the introduction of
the bills in the Assembly, but that never took place and the bills were
placed in the Assembly and passed. The Central government has also
proposed amendments to the Factories Act in addition to the changes in
the Minimum Wages Act and labour laws that envisage maintenance of
records. Let us briefly examine some of the proposed changes that have a
bearing on the lives of the workers at large.
The proposed changes in the Factories Act essentially take out a large
chunk of the workforce from the purview of the Act by reducing the number
of workers to be covered by the Act by increasing the requirement of
coverage under the Act from the existing 10 to 20 workersiin units using
power and from 20 to 40 in units without power. This means that those
slogging in the small units in the unorganized sector like the quarries, brick-
kilns will be out of the purview of the Act. This would also lead to increased
outsourcing by medium and big companies thus pushing many more into
the ambit of the unorganized. The existing Factories Act does not permit
women workers to work in night shifts though in many establishments like
in the IT sector, women do work in the night shifts. This ban is sought to
be lifted with an amendment allowing women to work in night shifts which
raises serious concerns in regard to safety and health of women. The Union
Government has proposed another amendment to the Act to raise the
overtime limit of the present 50 hrs/quarter year to 100 hrs/quarter yr. This
means in the life of a worker more hours or more labour power is expended
bearing on his/her health but accruing more profits to the employer.
In regard to the law that enjoins upon the management to maintain records
and registers, the Union government proposed amendments would remove
all such controls over employers. As it is an overwhelming majority of the
workforce in the country do not have records of their wages and labour that
have to be maintained by employers. Now with the freeing of employers
from maintaining records more workers are pushed into the ocean of the
millions who are faceless". Very often we hear of the term inspector Raj
which has become a pretext now to remove certain minimum responsibilities
on the part of employer. Regular inspections of factories and establishments
by labour officers to oversee the implementation of labour laws have never
been the rule in the country and with the proposed amendments employers
would enjoy more freedom putting the workers to more disadvantages.
The NDA govt. intends to bring certain changes in the Minimum Wages
Act in terms of introducing a national floor level for minimum wage that
was proposed by the earlier UPA government. But fixing a minimum level
of wage should be reasonable and realistic taking into consideration all
aspects of life that determines a minimum wage. The present floor level
wage is fixed at Rs.115 which is far too low to even sustain a worker and
his/her family. In many states unions have advanced the demand of a
minimum wage that ranges between 15 to 25 thousand. In the course of
continuous erosion in the real wages of the workers and the depression of
wages by the employers, fixation of a floor level minimum wage must be
determined taking into consideration all these factors.
The most important of the proposed amendments in the labour laws are
the changes proposed in the Industrial Dispute Act, that the Rajasthan
government is envisaging. The applicability of Chapter VB of the Act is
now sought to be restricted to factories and establishments that have over
300 workers instead of the presnt 100. In the present Act for retrenching
workers, imposing lay-offs and closures, the employer employing more
than 100 must seek the permission of the government. With the increase
NEW DEMOCRACY
43 44
in the number to 300, the employers are now at liberty to hire and fire more
workers as a large number of establishments will go out of the purview of
Chapter VB of the Act. As it is, violations of this clause abound and now
with the proposed amendment, more and more number of workers would be
forced out of employment.This was what capital wanted in terms of realising
labour flexibility and the Rajasthan Government and the Union Government
too would now give the desired freedom to hire and fire labour at will.
Second important change that is intended to be brought is the increase
in the present 15% for according the status of a representative union to
30%. As it is, there are several cases where the right to Union is curtailed
by employers and the enforcement agency does not go to protect this right
very often leading to workers' unrest manifesting in various forms. The
proposed change would further strengthen the hands of the employers to
stifle normal trade union rights of the workers. If there are more than one
union in any establishment and the question of recognition comes up the
majority union should be accorded recognition. To make 30% as a condition
for according the status of a representative union is to circumvent the
right to collective bargaining.
The Contract Labour (R and A) Act is sought to be changed to the
advantage of the principal employer. At present, establishments employing
twenty or more workers are covered by the Act and now the government
intends to reduce the coverage of this Act only to those units that employ
more than 50 workers. This means more number of workers would be thrown
out of the purview of the Act thus depriving them of whatever little benefits
they would get under the Act. One of the means adopted by the employers
to realize labour flexibility is the employment of contract labour. Since
1991, with new economic policies, contractualisation and casualisation of
labour have enormously increased. Today, in many manufacturing units
and in the service sector too contract workers outnumber regular workers.
As it is these contract workers in most cases are denied the benefits of the
Act and the present amendments would throw out a large chunk of this
workforce from the frame of these formal entitlements. The amendments,
on the other hand, provide protection to the principal employer from any
violations of the Act by the contractor. This apart, over the years the
employers in many sectors, in order to escape from this Act, are employing
workers on what is now called as fixed term contract (FTC), which is
temporary employment for a decided period.
There are proposals to amend the Apprentices Act,1961 that in essence
strengthen the hands of the employers and free him/her from regulations.
Section 8 of the Act is sought to be amended in a way that gives more
flexibility to the employer in engaging apprentices. Recruitment policy will
be decided by the employer and the amendments to sections 2 and 37
would free the managements from government regulations. Giving flexibility
to the employer and freeing him/her from government regulations would
lead to a situation where the issue of absorption of an apprentice would
entirely be left to the employer. On top of all this it would be the state
government that will bear half or quarter of the costs of the apprentices as
the case may be.
All in all the proposed amendments to the existing labour laws are
distinctly in favour of capital and against labour and they need to be opposed.
The agenda for changes in the labour laws is the agenda set by capital, the
corporates and the BJP-led NDA which came to power with the strong
support of the corporate sector cannot but express its gratitude to them by
trying to implement the set agenda.
Shah Commission on illegal mining of Iron Ore in Jharkhand
Deep Nexus of Govts. And
Miners to Loot the Land
The Shah Commission was set up by the UPA-II Central Govt. in 2010
to look into illegal mining of iron ore and manganese in seven states
following demands of movements. The frenzied illegal mining of that period
can be chiefly related to the soaring of demand from China for even a
lesser quality iron ore following a construction boom in that country and
also their development of techniques to enrich the lower quality ores to
satisfy their requirements. The Shah Commission, in its term, submitted
The National Committee of the Indian Federation of Trade Unions
(IFTU) will hold an All India Convention against anti-worker changes in
labour laws in New Delhi on 11th September 014 at Ambedkar Bhawan
from 11 AM onwards.
NEW DEMOCRACY
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an interim overall report, reports on Goa, Karnataka, and Odisha and the
first part of its report on Jharkhand. It had not even been able to begin work
on Chhattisgarh. The part report on Jharkhand, in four volumes, was
submitted to the Central Govt. on 26
th
November 2013 and thereafter the
Govt. denied extension of term to the Shah Commission.
On 25
th
January 2014, in answer to the Supreme Court, the Central
Govt. refused to extend the term of the Shah Commission, saying it was
unwarranted and that its terms of reference had been substantially met.
It also refused to share the Jharkhand report with the Supreme Court saying
it would infringe the rights of Parliament. Reports have to be considered
by the Union Cabinet and placed before Parliament along with an Action
Taken Report (ATR) within six months of receiving the Report. In this case
the Govt. maintained it had asked the state Govt. and the companies
concerned to place their comments on the Report by the 26
th
of December
so that it could be considered by the Cabinet.
There could be several reasons for non granting of extension to the
Shah Commission. First, it had already forced banning of mining of iron ore
in at least two states, even though the Supreme Court later restarted the
mining. Second and more importantly, the demand from China which had
fuelled the frenzied rise in illegal mining had tapered off and also the peoples
movements they had given rise to and people were awaiting the
Commissions reports. It is the possible explanation for the Odisha Govt.
simply denying that any illegal mining took place in Odisha in the face of
the documentation of the Commission. Thirdly, the reports were bringing
out the deep connivance of the entire state machinery and the govts. in the
loot of the land.
Regarding Jharkhand, the Report shows a situation somewhat different
from that of other states. Here illegal mining is not quite associated with
the China boom alone. Of the total of 42 mining leases in the State for
mining of iron ore and manganese, 40 are operating on deemed extensions,
some for decades. Companies have earlier operated their leases for two
decades. One year before the lease expires they are to place applications
for renewal. Twenty four companies are functioning on deemed extensions
for the past 20 years, three companies for between 15 to 20 years, seven
companies for between 10 to 15 years, five companies for 5 to 10 years
and one company for less than 5 years. The Shah Commission has blamed
the Jharkhand Govt. for the delay in lease renewals and stated that the
loss from deemed extensions runs into hundreds of crores of rupees i.e.
no stamp duty has been paid which is paid at the time of renewal. Such
companies include SAIL( Steel Authority of India)s mines, Tata Steel,
Singhbhum Minerals, Rameshwar Jute Mills, General Produce Ltd, Odisha
Manganese and Minerals Pvt. Ltd. 18 out of these total of 40 leases also
operated without environment al clearances. Some had conditional
clearances but the conditions were not executed. These conditions pertained
to non pollution of the two perennial rivers Karo and Kaina, to not harm the
fauna like elephants, sloth bear, Indian wolf etc. The violaters include
Karampada Iron Ore Mines owned by Shah Brothers, Singhbhum Minerals,
Rungta Mines, Usha Martin Mines, Tata Steel and others. In these, the
Nirmul and Pradeep mines as well as several mines of SAIL are situated
within the elephant reserve area.
The Commission states that the delays of the state Govt. also bred
corruption The unreasonable delay has resulted in widespread corruption
that too while minerals were exported at high prices during the China boom.
It summarizes that 22,000 crore rupees worth illegal mining took place in
Jharkhand and earnings from illegal export of iron ore was worth 2747 crore
rupees. There was illegal production in 26 iron ore and manganese (deemed)
leases. Involved are SAIL, Tata Steel, Rungta Mines, Usha Martin,
Rameshwar Jute Mills, Singhbhum Minerals Co. Out of the 42 leases there
were land encroachments in 25 mining leases amounting to 267.96 ha. of
which 143.6 ha. was used to illegally extract ore. Overall, the Commission
stated that 14,403 crore rupees' fines should be taken from the iron ore
mines and 138 crore rupees from the manganese mines for environmental
violations. It said the value would be higher had factors such as consent to
operate, production without mining plan, forest clearance been taken into
account.
The Shah Commission has pointed out that the Indian Bureau of Mines
has approved schemes to increase production irrationally. It also pointed
out that the Jharkhand Govt. had allowed a number of crushers to operate
along the border with Odisha in West Singhbhum district. There were 80
such of which 60 had licences. The Odisha Govt.s complaint has been
that it was difficult to stop illegal mining with this facility available once the
ore crossed the border.
The Commission has also made a comment on the pending applications
for iron ore and manganese mining. It has listed the proposed leases with
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48
stage one approvals granted Jindal Steel Power Ltd, Electro Steel , JSW
and those pending as proposed leases from Bhushan Steel, Sesa Goa,
Rungta Mines, Arcelor Mittal, and Tata Steel. The Commission says that
the stage 1 approvals should be reconsidered and the approvals under
Section 51 of the MMDR Act 1957 should be withdrawn. Regarding the
Saranda forest it says that of the total forest area of 85,770 ha. 24% is
leased which is too high a figure and the fresh proposals will lead to
fragmentation of the forest. It suggests that all leases be legally terminated
and then land be granted in public auction to an extent that there is no
further fragmentation of the forest. Overall it takes the position that the
present production capacity in the country is 180 MTPA which is more
than enough for the requirements of the steel plants in the country even if
there is a growth rate of 10% for the next ten years. The implication is that
no further mines are needed.
In fact the Commission uses the term On the way to finish regarding
the Saranda forests.23605 sq. km of Jharkhand is forest area- they cover
29.6% area of the state. 82% are protected forests and the rest are reserve
forests. The Saranda forest is considered the zenith of sal forests in India.
It gives birth to many streams which feed into the Karo and Koina rivers.
Saranda falls into West Singhbhum's core reserve area for elephants into
which so many mines are infiltrating. In fact this infiltration of mines into
elephant reserves has led to the displaced animals moving towards human
habitations. They destroy crops and become targets of people's ire as in
Bankura where a movement arose for this reason against encroachment in
elephants' Reserves.
In the third and fourth volume within the last chapter of this first part of
the Report, the Commission touches on two interesting cases and
reproduces entire letters of erstwhile ministers of Environment Jairam
Ramesh and Jayanthi Natarajan. They reveal much about where the rot
begins. Shah Commission has written only a simple sentence that all those
in the above chapter should be acted against. In one case, Jayanthi
Natarajan approved diversion of 55.79 ha. of forest land on 4.2.2012. This
was land as detailed in a proposal sent by the Jharkhand Govt. The Minister
stated in her letter that, the usual stringent conditions will be laid down.
Letters were interchanged between Ramesh and the PM, Natarajan and
the PM in which she pointed out that Rameshs objections were placed
before the Cabinet Committee on investments and not approved. Two simple
facts are stated in the Report. One, regarding the mine approved by Ms.
Natarajan, that once a proposal has been rejected ( in this case, twice) by
the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) it cannot be approved . This is the
position of the Supreme Court. Second , the facts as stated in Natarajans
letter are exposed on a few points viz, the project (Electro Steel Casting)
was located within the Elephant Reserve and no mines exist in the Kalilabad
block of Saranda, not even an old Usha Martin mine as alleged by Natarajan.
About the last, the Commission remarks to the effect that if that mine was
inappropriate some change should be made and it need not be followed as
an example.(Electro Steel Casting is one of the mines in the Stage 1
clearance which the Commission has suggested should be scrapped.) The
earlier letter of Jairam Ramesh, when he was Environment Minister, to the
FAC is also reproduced in which he overrules their objection and allows
the Chiria mines(belonging to SAIL) and also mentions in the letter that the
only other time he over rode the FAC was in the case of POSCO.
The Commission has noted the poor state of Compensatory Afforestation
(CA) and said part of the reason is that the areas allocated are either
unsuitable or Maoist dominated and of course there is no intent. It records
that in the CCF (Central) meeting the Chief Conservator of Forests had
reported that in Latehar division the talk with a Maoist Commander clarified
that the Govt. does not recognize the rights of actual cultivators (not the
legal owners) over the land in the various transactions. Thus most times
the area under cultivation by villagers, including Ho tribals, is transferred
for CA purposes.
Overall, this Report, like the other reports of the Shah Commission,
has unearthed the deep politician corporate nexus in the mining sector.
The ATR is full of is being looked into and being investigated. The only
action taken is the Enforcement Directorate lodging two cases against Mr.
P.K. Jain, an iron ore exporter. Who will take action on the issues raised
by these reports? The BJP led Govt. has been brought to power by the
corporate to remove the hurdles that peoples struggles have created for
unbridled mining, also by forcing changes in the laws pertaining to land
acquisitions. Arun Jaitley, in his maiden Budget speech, swore the intent
of his govt. to remove hurdles in mining. Only the people of India can stop
the rape of the land.
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Gujarat Model of Agricultural
Development : Myth & Reality
Ashish Mital
Gujarat model of development, particularly growth in the agricultural
sector attributed to Modis tenure as CM, has been widely acclaimed in the
media. Indias ruling classes, mainly the MNC led corporate sector, the
media houses run by them had suddenly discovered this model in 2011
and had gone gung ho over it. Since then they have chosen their best
representative for the Prime Ministers post and ensured his victory. Now
they along with everyone who wants Indian markets to open up, the World
Bank President and US Secretary of State John Kerry, have been
demanding immediate implementation of this model.
This model, as projected, has been made to appear like an oasis of
greenery, in a widespread desert outside Gujarat. Several facts however
show that Gujarat has actually not risen above the other states in parameters
of social development, in fact, has slid somewhat under Modi. However it
is not the subject of this article to detail those parameters.
During the course of the Lok Sabha poll campaign, ruling classes
successfully hid under their magical veil promising growth and expected
good days of BJP rule, the real cause of crises in the economy. This
cause, the rule of unpatriotic, comprador capitalists and big landlords and
their Liberalization policies, has wrecked havoc on the people, even the
middle classes. It has led to rapid growth of inflation, unemployment,
corruption, indebtedness, forced eviction from land and city bastis, severe
deprivation of civic amenities, degradation of environment and more and
severe natural disasters, serious water scarcity, and a much more
insensitive administration coupled with a sharp attack on the democratic
rights. The performance of Gujarat during these last years needs to be
objectively evaluated against the massive propaganda blitz of it having
done well and also against other states.
In the background some broad facts need to be kept in mind. One is
that after Modi came to power in Oct 2001, anti Muslim violence of February-
March 2002 saw more than 2000 Muslims being butchered in an organized
and coordinated attack by BJP led Hindu communal forces in connivance
with state forces. According to 2011 Census 89% of the states population
is Hindu and 9% is Muslim. Secondly, along with this, came the thrust of
liberalization and deregulation of Gujarats economy and attempt to turn it
into a manufacturing hub. And thirdly, that contrary to all claims of a Gujarat
Model of Development, the performance of main crops since 2003-04 to
2012-13 shows that the production of food grains has grown only by about
10% in 9 years from 6.737 mt to 7.325 mt, oilseed production has in fact
come down to nearly half from 5.85 mt to 2.893 mt and cotton has grown
around 12% every year from 4.28 m bales to 8.68 m bales/yr.
Despite this, the Vibrant Gujarat Summit in Gandhinagar in January
2013 claimed an economic growth of 10.4 % in the last five years, 16%
contribution to the industrial production of the country, industrial growth
rate of 13%, agricultural growth rate of 11-12%, 22 per cent of Indias export,
having established one international and six domestic airports, 23 power
plants, wide road, rail and gas pipeline network, 55 SEZs and building a
business friendly regulatory environment that attracts private investors from
other parts of India as well as overseas.
This Modi Model needs to be scanned for truth under a magnifying
glass.
Agricultural Growth under Modi Discrepancies in Claims:
Though some persons claim that rapid industrial development, including
port development had made Gujarat Indias fastest-growing state, Gujarats
success, according to an IFPRI study, Secret of Gujarats Agrarian Miracle
after 2000", (Tushaar Shah, Ashok Gulati, Hemant P, Ganga Shreedhar, R
C Jain) states that its success lay in its agricultural performance which
was the highest amongst different states. This study published in EPW in
2009 stated that between 2000-01 and 2007-08 agricultural value added
grew at 9.6% per year (despite a major drought in 2002) which is more than
double of Indias agricultural growth rate, much faster than Punjabs farm
growth during green revolution heyday and indeed the fastest rate recorded
anywhere in the world. It claims that annual growth rates of nearly aII major
crops significantly accelerated after 2000 compared to before and hence
Gujarat agriculture is being projected as a model for other states to follow.
According to it the growth rate for wheat and pulses in Gujarat nearly
doubled and in cotton it jumped over 3.5 times (see for 1990s and 2000s).
It insists that the coefficient of variation for all crops and crop groups has
NEW DEMOCRACY
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been lower in the period after 2000 than before.
It is relevant that agriculture contributes only around 15 per cent of
Gujarats GDP and provides employment to almost 51.58 per cent of its
population (similar to other states). Its contribution to the GDP of Vibrant
Gujarat could only have been to the extent of 15% while its contribution to
the problem of unemployment could have been immense.
In later articles, basing on data from the Central Statistical Organisation,
Gulathi has contended that agriculture growth in Gujarat from 2001-02 to
2011-12 is around 9.8 per cent at constant prices, although Alagh states
that it has been around 5.5-5.6 per cent during the same period. The state
government has itself claimed increase in growth rate from 3.3 per cent in
the 1990s to 11.1 per cent during the decade between 2002 and 2012.
Gulati paints the following picture. While the overall performance of
agriculture improved very marginally from 2.9% per annum growth in the
1990s to 3.3% in the 2000s, certain states demonstrated a much bigger
turn around. Going by the agri-GDP growth registered at state-level during
the 2000s, Gujarat tops the list with 9.8% per annum growth, up from a
meagre 2% during 1990s. He gives the corresponding figures for other
states. Kerala has been zero for the 2000s (down from 1.3% during 1990s),
UP, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal have grown less than 3%, while the success
stories have been in Rajasthan (9.6%), Chhattisgarh (8.9%), Madhya
Pradesh (7.4%) and Jharkhand (6.9%). He also attributes several factors
to this success from technological success of Bt cotton, to check dams
recharging groundwater, to Narmada waters, to Jyotigram giving regular
and reliable power supply in rural areas, Krishi Mahotsav which transformed
the agri-extension landscape, ever-flourishing dairy sector and well
connected, good quality roads in rural areas.
On the other hand agriculture growth rate in Gujarat during the 11th
plan, (2007-08 to 2011-12) records just 4.9% growth and the state was
ranked eighth amongst all states in India. The growth performance in other
states during 11
th
plan was Madhya Pradesh (7.6%), Chhatisgarh (7.6%),
Rajasthan (7.4%), Jharkhand (6.0%) and Karnataka (5.6%) and Gujarat
(4.9 per cent), Punjab (1.6%), Maharashtra (2.0%), Tamil Nadu (2.2%),
West Bengal (2.8%), Uttar Pradesh (3.3%) and Haryana (3.3%). This period
also saw a decline in production in one year as a result of late onset of
monsoon and deficient rainfall in several states. The production of coarse
cereals was severely affected in Gujarat.
What can be concluded from these widely varying figures that
have been put out?
1. CIaims of Growth: The first obvious conclusion is that there is no
uniformity in the claims of high growth rate during the period of Modis rule
and this is highlighted by the results of different studies/authors. The various
studies themselves begin their period of analysis from varying figures of
2%(Gulathi) and 3.3% (state govt) and then they claim growth rates of
9.8% (Gulathi), 11.1% (Gujarat Govt) and 5.6% (Alagh) and for the latter
period the Planning Commission gives figure of 4.9%. Obviously these
studies have taken different base years and some have purposefully taken
poor agricultural base years to begin with in order to reach artificially high
and erroneous results.
2. ActuaI Growth: The second issue is what has the agricultural growth
rate actually been during Modis rule? If we take the figures from the years
2003-04 onwards, the figures for acreage and production for different crops
would exclude a major long period of drought up to 2001-02 and would also
more correctly reflect the contribution of Modi administration as he came
to power in Oct 2001 and his contribution would take about a year or two to
make its impact on agriculture.
Food Grain production in Gujarat
Year Area (000 Hectares) Production (000 tonnes)
2003-04 4209 6737
2004-05 3984 5588
2005-06 3845 6345
2006-07 4791 6497
2007-08 4481 8206
2008-09 3983 6345
2009-10 3596 5605
2010-11 4905 10071
2011-12 4735 9257
2012-13 3681 7325
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Oilseeds production in Gujarat
Year Area (000 Hectares) Production (000 tonnes)
2003-04 3071 5850
2004-05 2994 2930
2005-06 2962 4657
2006-07 2848 2587
2007-08 2852 4699
2008-09 2874 3932
2009-10 2686 3010
2010-11 3110 5142
2011-12 3130 5035
2012-13 2540 2893
Cotton production in Gujarat
Year Area (000 Hectares) Production (000 bales)
2003-04 1695 4280
2004-05 1920 5903
2005-06 2011 6872
2006-07 2390 8787
2007-08 2422 8276
2008-09 2354 7014
2009-10 2464 7401
2010-11 2623 9825
2011-12 3003 10375
2012-13 2515 8680
The variation in these figures is so huge that calculation of growth in
terms of percentages per year will lead to incorrect results, unless averages
over 5 or 10 year periods are compared. From these figures of 2003-04 to
2012-13 we can see that food grain production has grown only at 0.969%
per annum over 9 years. Only if we selectively take the favourable figure of
up to 2010-11, the annual growth rate in food grain production comes to
7.07% pa. On the other hand the figures for 2012-13 show an absolute fall
in food grain production of more than 10% from 8.21mt to 7.325 mt.
Similarly, net production of oilseeds has come down by almost 40% in
these 9 years and has varied every year. Figures for cotton show that it
grew to more than double from '03-'04 by '06-'07 and thereafter it has
stagnated. Obviously the conclusion that wheat production nearly doubled
and cotton grew 3.5 times is totally misplaced for Modis period of rule and
any model thereof to be followed. The figures highlight a complete lack of
uniformity in growth in acreage and production during this Modi period. The
coefficient of variation is rather high.
If we compare the figures for 2012-13 to the previous year it is obvious
that there is a very drastic fall across the board, which some authors claim
has resulted from another year of low rainfall. The data for growth in urban
structures on farm land in Gujarat, displacement of farmers and rise in
construction labour etc. as a cause for this also needs to be looked at
closely. The figures for area and production of food grains and other crops
for these two years is as follows:
Crop Area (million Hectares) Production (million tonnes)
2011-12 2012-13 2011-12 2012-13
Rice 0.836 0.703 1.79 1.503
Wheat 1.351 1.05 4.072 3.135
Jowar 0.124 0.088 0.14 0.116
Bajra 0.866 0.619 1.612 1.071
Pulses 0.96 0.68 0.78 0.61
Total food grains 4.74 3.68 8.87 7.32
Cotton 2.96 2.5 12 m bales 8.73 m
9 Oil Seeds 3.13 2.54 5.04 2.89
Across the board, the acreage has fallen very significantly. The acreage
of only one crop, i.e. tobacco has increased in these two years, from
148,000 hectares to 158,000 hectares. The danger from this reduction in
acreage must also be viewed in light of BJPs national plank of developing
India with 100 new cities, high tech cities, industrial hubs, SEZs, industial
corridors, etc.
Some observations here by various authors on forced displacement of
farmers and conversion of agricultural land will help understand the
development course that is leading to the above figures. Anamika Gupta
NEW DEMOCRACY
55 56
writes that farmers are losing their agricultural land to private industries
and Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation, a state agency meant to
facilitate the entry of private industries in Gujarat. The Adani group was
given over 5 crore square metres of land along the coast at a meagre rate
ranging from Re.1 to Rs.32 a square metre.. ... for industrial use and port
development, instead, it sold/leased out a significant portion of it to other
corporate groups, flouting norms. Special Economic Zone in Mundra, spread
over 10,000 hectares, displaced 56 fishing villages and 126 settlements....
Tata Motors with 440 ha of land in Sanand, near Ahmedabad to set up the
Tata Nano manufacturing unit. ... the Ford group and Peugeot have already
established a unit. Maruti Suzuki is the latest entrant in the game owing to
continuing workers unrest at its plant in Manesar, Haryana."
Another report highlights social activist, 97 year old Chunibhai Vaidya
of Ahmedabad being involved with 22 land-related movements in the state
which is stream rolling over agricultural land, water bodies and pastureland.
He says Gaon ki jameen gao ki, sarkar ki nahin. Recently there was a
protest march by 5,000 farmers from Mehsana to Gandhinagar against the
forced acquisition of their fertile land for a special investment region (SIR),
forcing the government to rescind its order. In 2008, farmers from 15 villages
around Mahuva in Bhavnagar district protested against the government
move to allot to the Nirma group a piece of land without bothering about a
water body there which had revived agriculture in the region. The Mahuva
struggle lasted for three years and ended with a victory in March 2011
when the Ministry of Environment and Forests revoked environment
clearance given to the cement factory.
Variation in YieId: Another important factor would be to study the growth
or variation in yield of major crops in Gujarat during this period. Between
2003-04 to 2012-13 the variation in yield (kg per hectare) for Kharif food
grains in successive years was 1405, 1146, 1238, 1037, 1380, 1311, 1204,
1374, 1403 and 1625 kgs. For rabi crops it was 2319, 2201, 2298, 2123,
2660, 2177, 2308, 2581, 2542 and 2542 kgs. For pulses it was 748, 675,
704, 593, 843, 777, 705, 812, 815 and 900 kgs while for oilseeds it was
1958, 910, 1543, 779, 1610, 1351, 1049, 1699, 1607 and 1072 kgs.
The only correct conclusion from these figures, thus, is a high variation
in acreage, in yield and in production and a complete lack of stability,
rather there is high volatility in growth according to these three major
traditional parameters of agricultural development in Gujarat.
One study, Gujarats Agricultural Growth Story: Exploding Some Myths
(M. Dinesh Kumar, A. Narayanamoorthy, OP Singh, MVK Sivamohan,
Manoj Sharma and Nitin Bassi) states that growth observed after 2002 is
nothing but a good recovery from a major dip in production occurred during
the drought years of 1999 and 2000. They forcefully dismiss the
suggestions that HYV cotton has caught on like wild fire and that improved
irrigation has led to massive increase in acreage of wheat and cotton,
explaining that production has become highly erratic, with sharp declines
in production during drought years. HYV cotton, they say has increased
yield from a mere 130kg/ha in 1949-50 to 624kg/ha in 2006-07 but it is
highly susceptible to monsoons unlike in the past. The reason is . heavily
dependent on the availability of water not only from the rains but in the
aquifers and surface reservoirs."
3. Comparision with other States: The third aspect to be studied is
whether, as per the claimants of high agricultural growth during Modi period,
Gujarat demonstrates any higher growth rate as compared to other states.
As per the figures quoted and parameters taken in studies of Gulati et al,
Planning Commission and others, such a claim does not stand. Gujarat is
not the only state with high agri GDP figures, some others are at par and
some have performed better. So there is NO Gujarat Model of Agricultural
growth.
4. What has Grown: The fourth and most important factor to be concluded
is the fact of what has grown in this so called Model. Previously agricultural
growth was mainly determined as a growth in crop production, acreage and
yield. Now a new parameter is being highlighted and that is Agricultural
GDP at constant prices.
GDP is the market valuation of the crops grown and can vary, that is
rise or fall even if the actual production has remained same or even fallen,
dependent on the market valuation of that crop changing relatively, even
after accounting for inflation. With high demand of certain items and change
in cropping pattern in favour of such crops, the GDP growth will be high.
This is precisely what seems to have happened in Gujarat and in a number
of other states which are being shown to have registered a high growth rate
of agri GDP. A shift in cropping pattern to commercial crops, rise in demand
as such and its increase due to agro-processing, shift to high market value
products, high export demand, etc. has raised the relative market value of
some farm produce. The overall agricultural GDP has thus risen. This Modi
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magic has manifested with increased penetration of companies in
agriculture. It is probably the single most important factor.
It should be clear that this does not in any way reflect a 5 % or 9% or
11% growth in crop production or an increase in farmers' security or the
countrys food security. In fact a shift towards better marketable crops, in
India where vast majority of farmers have poor investment capacity, is a
shift towards greater company inputs, greater indebtedness of farmers,
deterioration in their conditions and a bigger food crisis for the poor.
Data on farmers indebtedness available is of 2003 which shows 59%
farmers of Gujarat to be indebted while All India figure was 48.6%. Gujarat
is one of the states on the list of farmers' suicides. According to news
reports, 489 farmers committed suicide in Gujarat from 2003 to 2007, and
112 suicides took place from 2008 to 2012, with around 40 such incidents
occurring between August and December 2012 itself. Since most of these
deaths are recorded as accidental death, the actual figure could be much
higher. It is clear that it is not the farmers who are benefitting, but those
who have usurped the farmers land and rights to farming.
The variation in the agricultural GDP growth rates with the production
growth rates of all major crops which are supposed to have contributed to
it is as:
Year Agri GDP Percentage Growth in production
Food grain. Oilseeds Cotton Milk
2005-06 27.05 13.55 58.94 16.42
2006-07 -1.08 2.4 -44.45 27.87 8.2
2007-08 10.53 26.3 81.69 -5.82 5.0
2008-09 -8.71 -22.68 -16.32 -15.25
2009-10 -1.11 -11.66 -23.45 5.52 of 2 yrs
11.79
2010-11 25.50 79.68 70.83 32.75 5.39
2011-12 5.75 -8.08 -2.08 5.6 5.32
2012-13 -8.31. -20.87 -42.54 -16.34 5.07
The agricultural GDP growth for this above period of 8 years is an average
of 6.2 while food grain production during this period grew on average only
by 3.88% per year (production was particularly bad in 2004-05), oilseed
production came down by 0.15% per year, cotton production grew by 5.8%
per year and milk production grew by 6.9% (7 years data). These apart,
horticulture crops too are listed as a major contributor. The GDP growth as
a trend is higher than crop production and the reason is the role of market
forces.
Some observations on agricultural GDP growth
The Gujarat govt.s official websites note as on July 2014 is of the
year 2009. It claims to have successfully implemented the Second Green
Revolution, improved irrigation and increased crop intensity from 1-2 crops
to 3-4 crops. It states that the three main sources of growth in agriculture
in Gujarat are i) Cotton production, ii) Rapid growth of high value segment
like Dairy and Livestock, Fruits (banana, mango), and Vegetables (potato,
onions) which together have grown @ 12.8% p.a. since 2000-01 and iii)
Wheat growth from 0.6 mt in '00-'01 to 3.8 mt in '07-'08 @ of 28% pa. It also
lists growth in social forestry. Horticulture acreage in Gujarat has increased
from 5.89 lakh hectares in 1998-99 to 12.46 lakh hectares in 2007-08, while
production has gone up from 59.49 lakh tones to 144.74 lakh tones during
this period.
The study of Dinesh and his co workers observed that ... data for 11
years from 1988-89 (corresponding to the good rainfall year of 1988) to
1998-99 are taken. This was compared against the growth figures for the
period from 1998-99 (corresponding to the normal year of 1998) to 2005-06.
Our analysis shows that agricultural growth during the 11-year period, which
included the initial years of economic liberalization, was dramatic, and the
annual compounded growth rate clocked a figure of 20.8 per cent. .....
Also, the growth during the subsequent period (i.e., 1998-99 to 2005-06)
was a meagre 7.4 per cent.
According to this study the areas contributing to Gujarats agricultural
growth in terms of value of crops from 1980-'81 to 2005-'06 are Milk and
Dairying (21.9%), Cotton (15%), Horticulture crops (13.8%), Groundnut
(12%), Sugarcane (5.9%), Wheat (4.7%), Paddy (2.83%) and so on. Basic
food grains contribute very little to this GDP.
The study prepared by Assocham Economic Research Bureau (AERB)
says that in terms of milk production, Gujarat is ranked fifth with about
eight per cent share across India in total annual milk production of over
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120 million tonnes (mt). It has a growth rate of about 24 per cent in milk
production, which is above the all-India growth rate of about 19 per cent.
Drought Management under Modi rule, Irrigation, Sardar Sarovar
Dam, Jyotigram Yojna:
One important factor which needs comment is the question of drought
management in Gujarat, a state which has been reputed to be particularly
affected by it.
The Economic Times article of July 2009 is a good example of the kind
of propaganda blitz unleashed for Modis Gujarat. It highlights the adversity
caused by high water consuming MNC developed costly seeds (Green
Revolution) having led to reduced water table. It states that 70% Gujarat
is drought prone and arid. SSP projects canal network in 2009 was still
hopelessly incomplete and it irrigated only 0.1 million hectares. 82% of
irrigation in the state is from tube wells. By the mid-1990s, groundwater
extraction exceeded natural recharge in 31 talukas, and in another 12 talukas
it was 90% of the safe extraction yield.
It further states that as per IFPRI study 10,700 check dams were built
up to 2000, and helped drought-proof 32,000 hectares. But under Modi,
Gujarat built ten times as many check dams (as per web site in June 2007
there were 2,97,527 checkdams, boribunds and khet taluvadis or farm
ponds) which have played a big role in the agricultural growth of Saurashtra
and Kutch. Fair enough, but is there enough data from Saurashtra and
Kutch of the water table having risen and of these areas having shown
consistency in food production growth and in being able to fight out drought
conditions. If such data does exist, it has not been presented. It has only
been asserted by Gulati that agricultural growth in Saurashtra is driven by
a rise in production of banana, vegetables and to an extent wheat which is
too generalized a claim.
Another write up quotes the EPW paper stating The places where large
number of checkdams were set up .... Saurashtra-Kutch and North Gujarat,
the output per hectare increased by 43.6 per cent and 35.5 per cent,
respectively ... against an output increase of around 30 per cent in South
and Central Gujarat, where Narmada waters are available for cultivation.
This is obviously too meagre an increase to be of significance, because
arid conditions reduce productivity by more than half. In fact some scholars
view incomplete development of SSP canal infrastructure as a reason for
its incomplete impact on agricultural stabilization and excessive dependence
on rains. They claim that high growth took place only when there was enough
rainfall and when farmers pumped out water straight from the canals.
In 2013 Modi claimed that in the coming years, the same lack of water
that was seen as the reason behind Gujarats problems will now be the
reason behind the states progress. But Anamika Guptas paper states
that his Sujalam Sufalam Yojna (SSY announced 2003, target completion
2005) to provide irrigation and water supply to drought-prone north Gujarat,
the Sardar Sarovar Dam Project for Drinking Water Grid and River Interlinking
project have been mired in corruption. SSY is still not completed and North
Gujarat farmers still suffer.
In the Sardar Sarovar Dam Project, the cover up is massive. The dam
is estimated to generate 1 billion kwh of hydropower every year, for irrigation
of 1.8 million ha in Gujarat to benefit 1 million farmers. (Official website).
But crops have continued to fail each year in drought-prone areas. SSM
completion has been postponed to December 2014. Out of 75,000 km of
canal network projected, only 35% i.e. 26,000 km has been completed, of
which only 10,000 km was completed under the Modi government, since
2001.
A report by Tata Institute of Social Sciences says the Dam mainly
serves the needs of the energy-guzzling industries with greater percentage
of water being diverted now to power plants, city municipal corporations
and industries, without recovery of water charges.
The groundwater level in the state has been declining by an average of
about three metres per year. In February 2013, the government passed a
bill restricting farmers from extracting ground water from below 45 metres
without a license. This law, the Irrigation and Drainage Bill 2013 replaced
the earlier Gujarat Irrigation Act 1879. It mandates canal officers to monitor
irrigation and distribution, to maintain water gauges and arrest violators
who can be fined up to Rs 10,000 and sent to jail for 6 months In September
2012, Coca Cola opened its biggest production plant in Gujarats Kheda
district.
The EPW article claims that Gujarat promoted drip irrigation, badly
needed to conserve water in semi-arid districts and highlights 1 lakh acres
coverage and the govts financial support to drip irrigation. It simply parrots
general and MNC propaganda on drip irrigation and presents no data on the
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specific results obtained. Drip Irrigation is used after studying land
topography, soil, water, crop and agro-climatic conditions and is most useful
for crops and trees such as coconuts, containerized landscape trees, grapes,
bananas, ber, eggplant, citrus, strawberries, sugarcane, cotton, maize, and
tomatoes. It is used to conserve water and fertilizers. It does not apply to
conserve water in semi-arid districts as is being propagated. If not used
properly it causes waste of water, time and harvest.
Big claims have also been made: Modis Jyotigram scheme for power
has provided regular, high-quality electricity to villages. This has facilitated
a switch to high-value crops like mango, banana and wheat, continuous
power for non-agricultural uses has spurred diversification into non-farm
activities, vital for rural growth. The irrigated area has expanded at the rate
of 4.4% per year. The fastest growth in crops has been in wheat, followed
by cotton and fruits and vegetables.
None of these claims are substantiated by facts. Crop growth claim is
clearly incorrect. Irrigated area claim too is incorrect. There is hardly any
sign of non-farm activity growth. Neither is there any specific claim of
which non farm sector has seen growth, nor has there been any spurt in
growth of cottage industry. In fact, there are reports to the contrary that
60,000 small scale units have closed down in the last 10 years. Regular
power supply will be a support to high value crops is general knowledge,
but so will it support all crops. And the claim of 4.4% expansion in irrigated
area per year is totally bogus. As per available figures of 2006-07 and
2010-11 the total irrigation coverage has increased during this period from
39.5% to 45.5%. For rice it has increased from 57.5% to 61.5%, for wheat
from 89.1% to 98.0%, for cotton from 44.7% to 58.7%, for pulses from
10.8% to 13.3% and for oilseeds from 24.8% to 27.5%. This is no where
near a 4.4% annual increase in irrigation coverage.
These claims of improved water availability, irrigation and regular
electricity are just like a fairy tale that has been fitted into a presumed
claim of growth in crop production. The official website too make such
claims of increase in drip irrigation, interlinking of 21 rivers, more than 3
lakh water harvesting structures in past 5 years which have raised the
water table and ensured 4 times growth in agricultural income. Four times
increase in growth in agricultural income is also a very unlikely associate
of farm suicides. Increasing debts are a more likely associate.
Conceptually the building of check dams, village tanks, and bori-bunds
is very useful for Indian agriculture and small farmer needs as compared to
big irrigation projects because 90% rainfall comes in 2 3 months. But the
fact of their proper implementation in Gujarat and objectives achieved as
well as other factors of soil conditions needs objective consideration. The
proof of the pudding is always in the eating. Crop production results are not
in any way flattering. How then can any claim of improved services in
farming be acceptable on this basis?
Interestingly, Alagh claims improvement is due to the Sardar Sarovar
irrigation canal network while Gulati says good results have come from
areas like Saurashtra, which was not serviced by SSP while a third article
says that in 2005, the height of Sardar Sarovar dam was increased, but
only industries benefitted from it.
Anamika Gupta writes that Gujarat claims to be the only energy-surplus
state and it sells 600 MW surplus energy to neighbours. Modi rule claims
to have reduced transmission and dist ribution losses, done debt
restructuring, arrested power thefts, renegotiated power purchase
agreements with private players, provided separate power feeder lines for
agriculture and domestic needs, etc. It has huge Solar generation capacity
and is second after Tamil Nadu, in wind energy sector. Their Jyotigram
Yojana provides three-phase power supply to most villages.
But 86 per cent of the load shedding is in rural areas even though
electricity is indispensable for drawing groundwater for irrigation. And the
cost of electricity in Gujarat is much higher than the rest of India, because
energy is largely privatized, because the private players demand repeated
hike in power tariffs and because of the heavy reliance on imported coal
which is costly. These private investors, Tata Power, Reliance Power and
Adani Group have also been given large plots of fertile agricultural lands.
forcibly taken from farmers, at ridiculously low prices.
Another observer Sanjeev Kumar, says that during 1990s, the increment
in consumption of electricity was highest in domestic sector, agriculture
and in field of public water works while during 2000s the increase was
highest in commercial and industrial sector while the consumption in
agriculture decreased by around 16%.
The ReaI Growth: These various articles mention what has really grown in
Gujarats agriculture. Certainly it is not the basic infrastructure which will
benefit farmers. What has improved is vast networking of pukka roads in
villages. Network of private seed companies selling hitech seeds of bajra,
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64
castor and above all more than 20 Bt cotton varieties produced by 30
seed companies have grown. It is claimed that Gujarat has only 26% of
Indias cotton area, but 35.5% of its production and that rising world prices
and a huge jump in the MSP for cotton has helped. Contract farming has
grown and improved marketing. Gujarats famous dairy co-operative, Amul
has grown along with entry of Vimal Dairy and Vadilal Industries. Corporate
have entered agro-exports and agro-processing, organised food retail and
rural infrastructure development. Agrocel has taken up organic farming of
cotton and sesame seeds. Atreyas Agro and Godrej Agrovel plan contract
cultivation of jatropha and palm oil respectively. Food retail chains like
Food Bazaar, Reliance Fresh and Spencer have sprung up in Gujarats
cities, sourcing produce from farmers directly. Gujarat govt has worked
with companies and NGOs to reach out to farmers to adopt all these.
This then is the real change which has caused growth of commercial
infrastructure, corporate penetration in sale of inputs, contracting,
purchasing, agro processing, packaging, transporting and retailing. With
this has come growth in horticulture, some commercial crops which at
times include some food grains also and dairy and livestocks.
A word on important harmful impact of MNC monocultures, which surely
has added to farmers' woes, but are being hidden by the govt. These
monocultures harm crop diversity, reduce soil fertility, increase vulnerability
to climate and other vagaries and increase dependence on that one crop.
Crop failures become annual features in the face of erratic and inadequate
rainfall. Incidentally in April 2012, Gujarat government stopped procuring
the hybrid maize seeds from Monsanto due to some ill-effects which were
not disclosed.
'Rise' in EmpIoyment and Wages under Modi: Archana Prasad in her
paper Poverty and Dispossession in Gujarat Model of Development
concludes that The main driver of poverty within the state is the growing
landlessness in rural areas. Giving data exposing the exponential increase
in landlessness during 2009-10, she attributes this to the policies of
corporate agriculture and contract farming as the cornerstone of the Gujarat
model. It is clear, she states, that the increase is driven mainly by the
rise in the agricultural labour force, which appears to be a direct result of
the increase in export market driven corporate farming. Further, the rise in
female labour outstrips that of male labour, thus pointing to a growth in low
paid labour. This is also true of the rise in the urban female labour force.
Real wages in Gujarat are amongst the lowest in the country. According
to 68th round (2011-12) of NSSO report, daily wage for urban casual labour
in Gujarat is Rs. 144.52, compared to Rs. 170.10 national average. A rural
labour gets Rs 113 per day compared to the all-India average of Rs. 139
and the female workers are the worst off getting only Rs. 89 per day. The
growth rate of wage in Gujarat during 1990s was 3.70% which became
1.48% during 2000s while national figure increased from 1.54% to 3.78%.
Quoting NSSO data, Ruchika Rani and Kalaiyarasan A. show that the
growth rate of employment in Gujarat during 1993-94 to 2004-05 was 2.6
percent per annum and this came down to nearly zero from 2004-05 to
2009-10
The Report on Gujarats model of development, written for Jagriti Natya
Manch says, "Gujarat shows that in addition to poor gains in employment
there is increase in use of contract workers from 19 to 34 per cent between
2001 and 2008. It also shows an overall reduced position of workers with
the lowest share of wages in Gross Value added in the decade of 2000s in
comparison to Haryana, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu."
The share of Industry in GDP increased in Gujarat during 2004-05 to
2009-10 but its contribution to employment generation decreased.
Anamika Gupta observed that Modi claimed that Gujarat is the biggest
creator of jobs in the country. However, the Census 2011 points in the
opposite direction, besides revealing the startling case of missing farmers.
The number of farmers has plummeted by 3.55 lakh in 10 years (2001-11)
in Gujarat, that boasts of a double-digit growth in the agriculture sector.
The number of agricultural labourers have increased by a staggering 17
lakh during the same period.
The Human Tragedy of Gujarat ModeI: Gujarat presents a despicable
picture of tragic human development indices which we do not intend to
detail here. Victims of the pogrom of 2002 and the displaced of SSP live in
miserable conditions. Facts on malnutrition in children and poor poverty
management tell a tragic story. Monthly per capita consumption level data
of Gujarat highlights not only less consumption than earlier, but also a
greater deterioration in rural areas now when compared to the urban areas
of Gujarat.

New Democracy, August 2014

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Organ of the Central Committee, CPI(ML)

August, 2014 August, 2014

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