India
Farmers Continue Their Fight for Justice
Without Letup
Bhartiya Kisan Union national
convention, January 29, 2024, Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh.
Farmers decided at a national convention of the Bhartiya Kisan Union (Indian Farmers' Union) in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh in January to intensify their struggle for the minimum support price (MSP) for their crops. They are demanding cost plus 50 per cent as suggested in the 2018 report of the Swaminathan National Commission on Farmers. A press release from the convention reported that Chaudhary Rakesh Tikait, national spokesperson of the Indian Farmers' Union, addressing the panchayat on the last day, said that the price of sugarcane that had just been announced by the Uttar Pradesh government that day is not sufficient. Farmers were expecting a greater increase as expenditures on farming are increasing daily. The farmers are not getting a reasonable price for their crops relative to the cost of producing them. He said: "Let us all together strengthen the village unit under our district. The work of youth unit in the organization is not to give memorandum for problems; it should work together with senior officers. "
A Kisan Mahakumbh was organized on January 18, the last day of the four-day national convention. National and state level officeholders who attended the session addressed everyone and discussed the problems of farmers farming in their respective states as well as the organization.
In a joint press conference in Delhi, also on January 18, the Central Trade Union Organizations (CTU) said that they would join the farmers through sectoral/industrial strikes. The CTU leaders maintained that the government not only betrayed the farmers of the country by denying them the MSP, as per the recommendations of the Swaminathan Commission, but it was also pushing relentless privatization of public sector undertakings (PSUs) and denying the workers a livable wage.
Bhartiya Kisan Union national convention,
January 29, 2024, Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh.
In the joint statement, Samyukta Kisan Morcha (United Farmers' Protest -- SKM) and the CTU said: "This government is continuously carrying on barbarous onslaughts on the lives and livelihood of the toiling people as a whole and aggressively pursuing anti-worker, anti-farmer and anti-people measures through various legislation, executive orders and policy drives. It is unconstitutionally denying the rights of elected state governments. It is suppressing all democratic assertions of various sections of the people and all voices of dissent. It is continuing with the dangerous game plan of communalizing the polity and constitutional institutions, utterly misusing and abusing administrative authorities and agencies. The Union Government attacks freedom of media and shamelessly protects the criminals accused of sexual harassment by the victims thus eroding the trust of the people in law and order."
The CTU and SKM reiterated their "resolve to take up the historic responsibility to counter and defeat the communal corporate nexus through intensified campaigns among the people and intensified struggle till the above demands are achieved."
A human chain protest against the central government was subsequently held in Kerala. The protest chain extended from Kasaragod railway station to the front gate of Raj Bhavan in Thiruvananthapuram. Reports inform that several hundred thousand people participated.
Tractor parades across the country were subsequently held on January 26 and a very successful nationwide strike of farmers and workers' took place on February 16.
SKM pointed out: "Anger of farmers against the corporate and communal policies of the Narendra Modi Government has boiled over today with their huge participation in the Grameen Bharat Bandh, a call given along with Industrial/Sectoral Strike jointly with Joint Platform Central Trade Unions, Independent Federations, Associations and other organizations of workers, women, youth and students. The strike action reflected anger of the people against the brutal repression by the Modi government and the BJP-led state government of Haryana on the farmers at Shambhu Border of Punjab marching to Delhi. One of the largest ever mass actions of the people in Independent India has helped to put back the people's livelihood issues on the national agenda just ahead of the forthcoming general election to the Lok Sabha."
In villages and towns people gathered and discussed the charter of their 21 demands, problems and policies of the corporate controlled state and government. They also discussed solutions to the problems they face. Many asked: for how long are we going to beg the corporates, their state and government for a life of dignity? Has the time not come that we take matters in our hands? We are the Anndata, we produce food, we provide goods and services, run offices, institutions. We run everything. Why can't we run the affairs of society without these political parties and institutions that are anti-people? Another world is possible.
Vibrant discussions on alternatives are taking place across India among farmers, workers, women, youth and toilers.
The farmers' protests have met state terror. On February 16, many farmers' leaders were picked up and taken into custody. Farmers have been stopped on the roads, barricaded, fired upon and attacked. But they are very innovative. One farmer spent five hours with an approximately $5 kite/reel going after a $6,000 drone dropping tear gas grenades on protesters until he was able to bring it down.
Farmers protest near Delhi border faces state terror, February
16, 2024.
Farmers block highways near Shandhu border,
February 18, 2024
Bharatiya Kisan Union held its monthly Panchayat in Sisauli, Muzaffarnagar on February 17. On February 18, SKM met to plan its strategy. The central government also held a meeting with the farmers at the same time but meetings organized by the government are seen as attempts to hoodwink the farmers and people and prolong their misery. For the past 50 years, governments have formed many committees but farmers have been pauperized and pushed into debt and misery. Because of corporate control of inputs and the price of the produce of farmers, farmers have become pauperized and the corporates have made super profits. That is why farmers, workers and toilers are discussing how they can become rulers themselves and enforce people's control of decisions and resources, not the corporate control.
The terror of the Indian state has not dampened their spirits. Corporates that control the Indian state can go to any length to steal the lands of the farmers to maximize their profits. A retired army officer said that the situation is worse than on the India/Pakistan border. What the corporates and their states have been doing in the Northeast, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and other tribal areas is now being done to the farmers of India. In order to steal their lands, they are being viciously attacked by the government. What was being done on the periphery for decades has been brought to the centre, revealing the essence of liberal democracy -- land theft, genocide and repression in service of corporations.
Tractor parade, January 26, 2024, Sangrur,
India
According to a published report, a family that makes 70,000 rupees per month (about $1,140 Canadian) is considered "affluent" in India and only four per cent of people have such an income. It shows that after 75 years of independence, the people of India have been continuously pauperized. Ministers of the central government pull figures out of a hat and claim that in five years India will have a $10 trillion economy or a $30 trillion economy in 20 years. Of course, they move on after making these statements.
On the other hand, more than 850 million people live on five kilograms of grain per month. Another report pointed out that in spite of the Bonded Labour Abolition Act of 1976, thousands of men, women and children remain in bonded labour. It's an open secret and authorities are complicit in maintaining it.
Government hospitals in India are full of filth. India spends a little over two per cent of its GDP on public health care, one of the lowest in the world. Most people have to pay about half of health care spending out of their own pocket -- especially for medicines. Private doctors, clinics and hospitals mop up some 80 per cent of the total health care spending. More than 55 million people are pushed back into poverty every year because of "catastrophic" health expenses, which affect some 17 per cent of households, according to a report provided by the World Heath Organization.
Meanwhile, the factional fighting within the ranks of the rulers intensifies in the run up to elections. Rahul Gandhi started his "Yatra for justice" from Manipur where the people are attacked by the Central Government without respite. Yatra is a Sanskrit word which can refer to a physical journey, a tour of different areas or a pilgrimage. Gandhi said he wants to listen to people and change the cycle of violence, inequality and injustice that the BJP has imposed on India. A young woman said that if, instead of going on a Yatra, Rahul Gandhi and his Congress Party can build even one village in Karnataka -- where they are in power -- free of injustice, caste oppression and violence against women, that will be a much better project than going on a Yatra.
Like Prime Minister Modi and the BJP, Gandhi is also peddling the disinformation touted by the state to keep the people disempowered. Everything is about deception and fraud. Modi and the BJP are selling a dream with Ram Lala; Gandhi and Congress are selling another dream devoid of anything concrete. Both are diversions. Actions speak louder than words.
For their part more and more people are engaging in discussion about various problems they face and how to provide them with solutions which go in their favour. Congress has been part of the problem so far. It wants to come to power to favour the interests it serves.
Renovation of all relations between humans and humans and humans and nature is needed in order to put in place a democracy which favours the people. This includes control of resources, cooperative farming and the affirmation of the people's right to be. All have emerged as the historic necessity of our times.
People are discussing ways and means to accomplish these goals. Kisan University at the Morchas outlined what people must do. They do not split the ranks of the people on any basis, including by lobbying for this or that party which seeks to disempower them with an electoral process where the people neither select the candidates nor issue any control over the decisions which are taken in their name. The BJP, Congress and CPI(M) all work to derail people in service of the ruling elite.
The anti-people attacks in Ayodhya started once again. Due to the refusal of the Shankaracharyas to attend the consecration ceremony of the Ram temple in Ayodhya on January 22, it was claimed that Hindutva is split into Political Hindutva represented by BJP and its affiliates, and religious Hindutava represented by the Shankaracharyas. They call it a political project of Modi to win elections as he has no other issue or track record to fight on. All the promises he has ever made have not been fulfilled, so it is an attempt to hijack the religious sentiments of the people of India for elections.
On the other hand, Dalits are saying that whether political or religious Hindutava, both promote and perpetuate caste oppression and Brahmin supremacy. They have nothing to gain from it and they are calling on people not to get caught in this trap. Things are done in their name which they have never decided nor endorsed, they point out.
The Indian Farmers' Union has announced that it will organize a one-day mega-gathering -- a Kisan Mahapanchayat -- in the country's capital Delhi on March 14, where farmers from across the country will join in.
This article was published in
Volume 54
Number 13 - February 23, 2024
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/Tmlm2024/Articles/MS541320.HTM
Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca