Delhi voters should study this scenario

Subhas Chandra Pattanayak

BJP never takes to confidence any person immediately on joining the party. It takes a lot of time to test the loyalty of the member before considering him/her for candidacy to any house of people’s representatives. In view of this, putting former police officer Kiran Bedi as a candidate for Delhi Assembly and simultaneously declaring her as the chief-ministerial candidate, immediately after her joining the party, seems very abnormal on part of BJP.

And the party of the obstinate communalists and rabid practitioners of capitalism is not supposed to act such abnormally, particularly in the matter of pre-setting a person for the top political post of the National Capital State.

So, is it possible that Kiran Bedi was secretly associated with BJP all through and has established her loyalty to BJP in the secret horizon of nefarious political design of the capitalists, which the top brass of the party had kept hidden from its rank and file so far with a secret agenda?

This prompts us to put our eyes on what was she doing as a secret agent of BJP,

She was an active member of Anna Team that had hijacked people’s awakening against capitalism in the last leg of the anti people administration of Manmohan Singh. Indian masses in general and media in particular have failed to read this reality. But lack of anybody’s ability to read history does not diminish the relevance of history, of what the people have seen, of what the Time was.

Trader-supremacism

Capitalism under Manmohan Singh had given birth to a time when people of India were devastated by trader-supremacism, having lost their inherent consumer-right to bargain on price of a commodity.

Singh, to whom strong opponents of his wrong economic policies were “left-viruses”, had been running a government that was helping the profiteers fleece the people by charging retail prices as they wished. Official responsibility of fixing “Maximum Retail Price” had been unofficially discarded and profiteers were putting price tags as arbitrarily as their avarice was prompting, which the consumers were being forced to pay or were being shown the door for reluctance to comply with whatever price the trader was charging. This trader-supremacism had spread from the malls to general markets. And, people were perishing as cost of living was skyrocketing.

It was clear that capitalism was killing the country.

Singh had no answer

Except recalcitrance and evasiveness, Manmohan Singh and his gang, who had been squandering away national wealth to serve the interest of the rich and had been dancing to the tune of America, had no answer to why the country was so pathetically failing in bettering the condition of the common man. Those who have not seen the Manmohan Singh phase of India’s life may never know how anti-people and anti-nation an elected government could ever be.

“Nonsense”

The year 2011 had witnessed how people of India were waking up against Manmohan Singh and his co-agents of capitalism. Singh had thrown the Country into such a labyrinth of corruption and chaos that, even experienced Congress leaders were seeking his replacement. His ill manners to escape answerability had provoked even Rahul Gandhi to use the word ‘nonsense’ which nobody with an iota of faith that whatever he was doing was intended to do good to the country could ever have digested. But Singh digested. He knew that adoption of the political economy of capitalism had harmed the country; but he had no courage to confess and step back. He was to continue in office till the people’s wrath against capitalism fizzles out or gets diverted to any peripheral syndrome towards which the capitalists had by then been working.

Capitalists’ strategy

The capitalists were sure that people’s fury against Singh and his gang would wipe out their prospects in India.Therefore, they were actively working to devise tricks to divert people’s attention from evils of capitalism to any evil of administration that may tally with the people’s awakening for a change, but keep capitalism safe.

The known instrument of capitalism – BJP – was too discredited under Vajpayee’s misrule to be of any direct help immediately. Therefore, strategically, the capitalist think tank did not want to project BJP as alternative to Congress, but preferred to project an individual who would appear like a Gandhian to be acceptable by all and could be used to divert the rising upsurge against evils of capitalism to a peripheral matter.

Exactly as Jayprakash Narayan was used to foil the spontaneous mass upsurge of the 1970s by projecting ‘Party-less democracy” as the remedy to ‘corrupt democracy’, Anna Hazare was used to foil the mass awakening of 2011against capitalistic misrule of Manmohan Singh by diverting it to a demand for Lokapal that he later called Jan Lokpal, which he claimed would end ‘corruption’ – the cause of misrule.

Methods were contrived to generate mass support for Anna so that people eager to strengthen their revolt against capitalistic corruption would accept him as the leader.

Specific media persons including Goebbels of Vajpayee in 2004 election, were hired to project Hazare as the new Avatar of Gandhi.Then the others to team up with Ana were picked up and planted. Kiran Vedi was one of them.

The ‘Anna Team’ as the media projected them, had only one purpose: creation of Lokpal that they eventually called – Jan Lokpal, christening their action as ‘India against corruption’.

Tricks of diversion

With corporate media severely affecting free thinking process of the common man while simultaneously projecting Hazare as the new incarnation of Gandhiji and rabid and ruling agents of capitalism rushing to him with reverence and assurances to honor his wishes, Anna and his team succeeded in diverting the mass awakening against capitalism to the peripheral issue of ombudsman.

Remarkable it is that, the Anna team had never uttered a single word against capitalism.

Had they not played this mischief, the Modian party might not have come to power. People should have rejected the agents of capitalism as they had rejected Vajpayee in 2004.

Eye-witnessed accouts of 2004

In the Vajpayee context, it may suffice to quote Sekhar Gupta, who, despite the Pro-Vajpayee role of Indian Express, had written there a signed leader saying, “this voter does not allow himself to be swayed by either charisma (in this case Vajpayee’s), or hype, as over “India Shining” backed by testosterone-laden advertisement campaigns” (Sekhar Gupta, Indian Express, May 8, 2004).

As rejection of Vajpayee-induced capitalism was clearly visible, Gupta had to further note, “The lesson is, no matter how much media you buy, how well you misuse the media you own and how much noise you make, this voter will not vote on the idea of “feel-good” unless he is really feeling better than before” (Ibid).

Yet, the people of India, who had rejected Vajpayee for the mischief of capitalism he played, have fallen again in the trap of capitalism as their fight against the capitalistic administration of Manmohan Singh got hijacked by Anna Hazare and his team including Kiran Bedi. Not only Bedi, but many eminent associates of Anna having also joined BJP. It has been clear that secret agents of BJP were with Anna Hazare as per their hidden agenda and have paved the path for continuation of capitalism despite people’s rejection having extinguished Manmohan Singh regime.

Delhi voters should study this scenario before casting their votes for Bedi and her troop.

Impose Ceiling on Private Wealth Mr. Modi, don’t threat Common Indian with Further Financial Burden

Subhas Chandra Pattanayak

Prime Minister Mr. Narendra Modi has expressed in a meeting of his party workers in Goa that the economic ruin his predecessor Manmohan Singh has pushed the country into, warrants tougher steps that may also affect the purse of the common man.

This makes two things clear:

Firstly, Modi was ignorant of the economic condition of India before he cultivated BJP pimps to market him as their prim-ministerial candidate. Had he any real knowledge about the country’s economic condition under Manmohan Singh, instead of now telling the people that, they are to bear the financial burden to help him rule them, he should have told them about how he was to salvage the country from the economic strait, if elected. He kept the people in dark about his ideas, and now threatens them with new financial burdens! If they were to be further exploited to help the juggernaut of Modi move, they could have refused him the mandate. They are now going to be cheated.

Secondly, Modi knew the details of the economic ruin Manmohan Singh had dragged the country into, where economic aggrandizers prospered and common man perished, as was bound to happen under capitalism. Modi had nothing to say against that, as he also belongs to the same nasty school of capitalism. In fact, in his entire electioneering, capitalism was never criticized. He had never uttered a single word of disapproval of Manmohan Singh’s political economy, because he is also to continue with the same baton. He deliberately hurled abusive words at the Congress President and her family and with the help of Goebbels in the media, made the election person-centric instead of ideology-centric. And, while doing so, he knew that the government he was to run will impose burdens on the common man so that his show shall continue unhindered, exactly as Manmohan Singh subjected the people to all sorts of nefarious exploitation by the capitalists and compradors with the assurance that the end result thereof would benefit the people.

In these pages we had shown how Anna Hazare was used to divert people’s spontaneous uprising against misrule of Manmohan Singh from ills of capitalism to corruption, as a prelude to emergence of a new mask of capitalism. And that new mask is Modi.

Yet, he was the best thing to happen, in absence of any effective alternative that could have brought Communism to power. Many alert Indians to whom Modi is an anathema to the purpose of Indian Republic, supported him under the pretension that the election 2014 was an opportunity to chose between American Imperialism represented by the Congress and Indian Capitalism represented by the BJP. So, it was patriotic for them to prefer the BJP.

Therefore, Modi’s emergence as the Prime Minister is based on patriotic preference of a large number of Indians, in the battle of American Imperialism versus Indian Capitalism.

This preference will not stay if Modi precipitates a battle between Capitalism and the common man.
As the Prime Minister, he is to run his administration which must ensure strong defense of the Republic and pursue the projects of welfare. And for these basic purposes, he must need enough money. As a man groping about in the dark now, he has expressed his mind to collect the money from the people. He must not proceed in this direction, because people have already been exhausted by paying for making the rich richer.

What should, then, he do?

Only two steps he has to take.

He has rightly taken the first step to recover black money stashed by dishonest Indians in foreign banks. He must expedite it and bring back the money from the coffers of the traitors.

The second step he should take, is, imposition of ceiling on private wealth and confiscation all wealth exceeding the ceiling.

The country has already had the experience of ceiling on landed properties. In view of this precedence, it is just and proper and entirely legal to impose ceiling on private wealth in terms of money and confiscate the excess amount.

So enormous funds, thus, would be available that there shall be no necessity to impose any more financial burden on the common man.

If he does not heed to this advice, a new era will come to Indian Republic through a new battle between capitalism and the common man, nobody knows how, though, when Modi fails as the last hope in the present circumstances, it must.

Kejriwal’s Tirade of Abuse Hurled at Indian Parliament is a Game that Plutocrats Play

Subhas Chandra Pattanayak

Indian Parliament, which has not yet been able to codify its privileges, had to hear vociferous harping on about its privilege breached by anti-corruption campaigner Arvind Kejriwal in attributing non-materialization of the Jan Lokpal Bill to its being a House of criminals, to whom the Bill cannot but be an anathema.

Cutting across party lines, members wanted punishment for Kejriwal for the tirades of abuse he had hurled at the rampart of democracy.

The Speaker, however, tactfully closed a short-duration discussion, propelled by debates on Monday, on Tuesday with remarks that any comment detrimental to dignity of Parliament was “unwarranted and unacceptable”.

Had it any impact on Kejriwal?

No.

To him, the House should have addressed itself to introspection instead of spending so much energy on reaction to his remark.

As 162 of its members are charged with heinous crimes, it would not be surprising if the Jan Lokpal Bill does not materialize, he claims to have said.

When reasoning out as to why the anti-corruption bill is not materializing in the Parliament is not a direct disrespect shown to the Parliament, it cannot be overlooked that the inordinate delay in bringing out the law is enhancing credibility of a combine that has no real agenda for eradication of corruption.

We are sure, adoption of the Bill and creation of the so-called Jan Lokpal will not end or even control corruption in India.

As long as right viruses rule the roost, corruption shall continue to grow; because corruption is a method that adopters of Political Economy of Inequality – the plutocrats – use to stay safe and to prosper.

So, the opposite economy i.e. the Political Economy of Equality is the only way to curb corruption.

Kejriwal and his forum, the so-called Anna team, do not subscribe to Political Economy of Equality.

So, we suspect, they are just a combine that acts to divert mass awakening against corruption by promoting an environment that does not encourage evolution of Political Economy of Equality as the pivot of Indian progress.

Passive resistance to corruption is no resistance; because no corruption is passively practiced. It is aggressively practiced by self-seekers and therefore, its eradication entirely depends on aggressive attack on factors of corruption. The so-called Anna team and its so-called Gandhian way is not for aggressive attack and hence, is, in reality, against eradication of corruption.

The corrupt fellows that have ruined India have been enhancing credibility of this shrewd combine, so that the masses of India, who are waking up against maladies the country is suffering from, can be misled by this team to accept corruption as the substitute to corruption in the same way the people had accepted the Janata conglomerate as substitute to the Congress government, misled by Jayaprakash Narayan in the 1970s.

It would be wrong not to remember that when sporadic but aggressive protests against economic inequalities and exploitation were in the rise and the people suffocated due to corruption in every sphere of administration were in massive numbers joining the protests, Anna Hazare, with a Gandhi cap, was all on a sudden projected by corporate media as the new Gandhi capable of freeing the country of corruption and the most corrupt team so far to have taken over power, led by Dr. Manmohan Singh, had rushed to Anna in a way that only enhanced his credibility in public eyes exactly as Indira Gandhi had enhanced JP’s credibility by accepting him as the greatest political arbitrator, by forcing out of office her party’s Chief Minister of Gujarat Chimanbhai Patel on 9 February 1974 at his instance. But that, JP was not really against corruption manifested when the same Chimanbhai, after being expelled from the Congress on corruption charges, became the chief architect of a government by Janata Morcha that took oath on 18 June 1975. This Janata Morcha was so corrupt that it could not even complete one year in office and on 12 March 1975, its life had ended leading to rebirth of a Congress government in the state.

So, the corrupt government of Manmohan Singh inviting Anna to draft a Bill for the Lokpal of his concept, a group of elite of no unquestionable track records emerging as members of Anna team, the extra-constitutional drafting of the Bill fetching official collaboration through joint sessions of the so-called Anna team with committee of central ministers, the deliberate official delays in consideration thereof to give the Anna team required situations to consolidate its credibility as the real crusader against corruption by insisting on its ready adoption, the rabid right-wingers rallying behind him, denigration of Parliament by a Mumbai mainstream actor from Anna’s hunger-strike podium, Kejriwal’s tirades against MPs, barren reprimands behind his back in the house melting in a ruling of no action against attributing mala fide motive to Parliament and willful attempt to denigrate its dignity in public eyes, another member of the Anna team – Kiran Bedi – supporting and justifying Kejriwal even after the Speaker’s ruling, are a few samples of instances that have been used to enhance credibility of the so-called Anna movement, just to create a situation where people will like to rely more and more upon Anna in the present phase of their awakening so that in the consequence, the real beneficiaries of the current system stay safe, as the so-called JP movement had ensured, sans any change in political economy that has helped them build up their private empires in the Republic of India.

So, the unpunished tirade of abuse hurled at the Parliament of India by Anna team is a part of the game that plutocrats are shrewdly playing, and nothing else.

For every Indian patriot, to whom emancipation of the people matters, this poses a challenge.

Yet, Hazare Made Misrulers Fidget

Anna Hazare, no doubt, hijacked mass awakening against plutocratic misrule to a peripheral syndrome that we have discussed earlier.

To the right-wingers’ delight, this has succeeded in stymieing for the time being the revolutionary uprising against creation of an India of the rich within the India of the Indians.

Yet, the way Manmohan Singh government has responded to his fast for creation of Jan Lokpal is indicative of how the misrulers are in fidgets when faced with forcing circumstances to act against grafts. Developments that we have marked, make me sure of this.

One:

The Prime Minister, nervous of public wrath against misrule on watching public response to Anna’s April fast, as a way-out, elevated him to an extra-constitutional partner in law making by deputing his ministers to co-author with him a draft Bill for his conceived Lokpal. But when the ministers failed to hoodwink him and his team, they were recalled as clumsily as they were engaged and the government rushed into placing a rash draft before the Loksabha claiming official prerogative in that regard, with Dr. Singh asserting that it is the Parliament’s prerogative to pass the Bill with whatever amendment it thinks necessary to form a powerful Lokpal which the civil society wants.

Two:

As Anna went on threatening with fast from August 16, 2011 against this betrayal, the police was used to frustrate that by denying him the location he wanted to carry out his program.

Even as senior ministers were engaged to convince the public that there was no political pressure on the police to deny him permission for fasting at his preferred site, Dr. Singh tried to play his misleading best from the customary Independence Day podium where crux of his speech was devoted to the issue of corruption, while, shrewdly, he was stressing that eradication of corruption would not be possible through hunger-strikes. If Lokpal is needed to end corruption, and a specific law is required for that, his government has already placed a Bill for the purpose before the Parliament, he said.

Three:

The police with a motive to suppress his proposed agitation and to browbeat his team, arrested Anna.

Even though the union home minister was claiming that there was no political interference in police work, and in arresting Anna, the police has acted as per its own wisdom and shall continue to act free of pressure, it was political dictation alone that set him free sans any charge or condition.

Shenanigans were such that he was, on his own accord, allowed to stay in the jail till the Ramlila Maidan in the very heart of the Capital city was prepared to host his fast, the preceding police stance completely discarded.

Such a farce of putting a person in jail and releasing him under orders not of judiciary but as the government wanted and allowing him to stay in jail till he decides to come out to start his fasting in the public, is unprecedented and indicative only of the nervousness that Manmohan Singh government suffers from, when faced with an agitation against corruption.

Four:

As the fasting went on, Dr. Singh not only frequently deputed his ministers to persuade Anna to give up, but also particular officers of high rank, believed to be having personal rapport with Anna, were summoned from his home state to prevail upon him not to continue with the fast.

And, the Parliament was made to jump over its rules to offer a standing ovation to Anna, as the Prime Minister put his salutes to him on records of the House and the Speaker got off her chair to take a standing position to express the appreciations of the whole House of what contribution he has made to the country by fasting against corruption and to appeal him on behalf of the entire House to end his fast. In this exercise, Dr. Singh had to say on records that the House shall consider the official Bill along with the parallel Bill Anna has been insisting upon and two other documents – not on records as Bills but purported to be so- sans any prejudice, if that helps improvisation of the official Bill, the aim being creation of a “strong” Lokpal.

This unprecedented stance never matches with the stance that gave birth to the official Bill placed before the Loksabha and makes it clear that afraid of what would happen, the political power holders have resorted to this tactics.

Five:

Yet again, through Rahul Gandhi, fresh attempts were made to freeze the Bills sine die under veil of giving the Lokpal a constitutional status and validity.

Halting of the announced agenda to discuss Anna’s Bill on Friday and Rahul’s reading out a written speech stressing upon bestowal of constitutional status to the Lokpal like that of the Election Commission which has amusing similarity with the versions of former CEC T.N.Seshan, is not without any time-consuming idea.

But people’s wrath against the politicians basking under the powers and privileges of Parliament is so very visible that the parliamentarians next day did not put any premium on Rahul’s suggestion and in stead, adopted a resolution to accommodate the three points advanced by Anna in the Lokpal Bill that stress upon the scope of the ombudsman’s area of operation only.

Criminals are happy:

The criminals and politicians in power – there are 180 members in the parliament that reportedly have criminal antecedents – are happy that the mass awakening against plutocratic misrule has been successfully channelized into an Annanized agitation against corruption and finally has fizzled out by adoption of a resolution in the Loksabha to create a Lokpal with jurisdiction comprising the areas Anna has stressed upon.

Anna has ended his fast at the summit of his image building as the new Indian messiah by corporate media as well as political stooges of capitalism, to whom the ever expanding left-revolution against the environment of plutocracy in India is a matter of constant worry.

By agreeing to incorporate Anna’s three suggestions in creation of a “strong” Lokpal and by giving a day to the Loksabha to express its mind thereon, the misrulers have of course evaded the instant pressure and succeeded in stymieing the left upsurge.

Whether or not he has hoodwinked the gullible people or himself has been hoodwinked by plutocrats in power, is a different matter to materialize in course of time; but, for now, it is apparent that, Hazare has made the misrulers fidget.

New Danger to Indian Democracy: Anna Hazare

No doubt, Dr. Manmohan Singh has damaged indian democracy by rendering its resolution for socialism inconsequential under sheer misuse of prime ministerial powers. His reign has ruined common Indian’s confidence in administration. Unbridled price rise of essential commodities has shattered Indians’ dreams for a fair living. Administrative priority on private industry under guise of globalization has impoverished maximum majority of Indians, specifically those that have for generations been in self-employment as small and marginal farmers even as shrinkage of employment opportunities in public sector has pushed the highly qualified young persons into such pusillanimous mentality that they acquiesce into exploitive service conditions in the private sector and many work as bonded workers though of elite class.

In Singh’s regime, dignity of the Parliament has been destroyed. The Country has been forced to suffer the ignominy of having a Parliament that allowed the American nuke deal without even examining the text of the Act that controls the deal and did not solve the riddle of note-for-vote in the Loksabha in the context of Dr. Singh’s confidence motion after his allies broke away as all their attempts failed to dissuade him from the said sad deal. Not even yet the ignominy has ended.

When the world is rising against nuclear power, Dr. Singh is suppressing the people in India to provide business prospects to foreigners by planting their nuke plants in Indian soil as is going on in Jaitapur.

The money his government has denied the exchequer to get, in a single instance of scam in 2G spectrum, is so huge, as calculated by the CAG – the nation’s constitutional authority of audit – that, had the country thus not been cheated, every citizen could have got sufficient tax relief without any disadvantage caused to the ongoing projects and the current plan.

There are other mega scams, exposed by CAG, such as the one in the commonwealth games, in which, the national supreme auditor has spotted demonstrable improprieties practiced by the PMO and the Delhi CMO whereas the Opposition sees the needle of suspicion pointing straight to Dr. Singh and his protege, the CM of Delhi, Shila Dixit. Singh’s regime has become a regime of scams and protection of black money.

Had Dr. Singh taken required steps to retrieve the already known black money stashed in secret accounts in foreign banks by the traitors of India, every inch of cultivable lands in the country could have been irrigated with that money. But he did not, probably because, that could have led to retrieve the massive amount of secret money stashed by Sonia Gandhi family in Swiss Banks as exposed by the Schweizer Illustrierte of Switzerland in its issue of November 19, 1991 leading to its discussion in Indian parliament and subsequent authentication by its publisher and harped on umpteen times by Indian Media and eminent journalists and jurists ever since.

Black money has created an India of the mafia within India of the Indians.

Corruption has engulfed the country in every sphere, from Parliament to Panchayats, from judiciary to public servants even to the extent of peons.

The situation is so alarming that even the Prime Minister has admitted this in his customary speech on the occasion of Independence Day on August 15, 2011.

“Corruption manifests itself in many forms. In some instances, funds meant for
schemes for the welfare of the common man end up in the pocket of government
officials. In some other instances government discretion is used to favor a selected
few. There are also cases where government contracts are wrongfully awarded to the
wrong people”, he has admitted.

In his speech he has said, “In some cases, functionaries of the Central government face allegations of corruption. In other cases, it is the functionaries of various State governments.” But, he has said, his government has also “no magic wand” to save the country from corruption.

What a Prime Minister! He has been seeking a magic wand! Why he is not resigning if without a magic wand he cannot control corruption? His job is a political job and not of a magician. His economic policies and rule of bulls that he has encouraged has been increasing corruption and instead of taking a turnabout, he has been ruining India in search of a magic wand!

When in his independence day speech he has asserted that “there is no single big step which we can take to eradicate corruption” and maintained that he “will say nothing more on this subject”, he has uttered not a single word against black money that the traitors have stashed in secret accounts outside India. Nothing could have been more patronizing to the traitors than this stance of Dr. Singh.

Therefore, the people of India are eager to stop this. They are eager to be extricated from this quagmire. They want to save their democracy from the danger that Dr. Singh has created. So there is a new awakening of Indian masses against Singh’s misrule. It is so very clear that even senior Congress leaders are projecting an alternative in Rahul Gandhi when he is in Office, without bothering for how embarrassing it is to the incumbent PM. They know, with Dr. Singh in Office, it would be impossible for their party to return to power in the coming election.

If people reject the party of Dr. Singh for all the crime his government has committed against the country, who should take over?

It is natural for BJP as the main Opposition to aspire for office.

But this party of profiteers had sabotaged India by selling out profit fetching public sector undertakings to private operators in dubious deals during Vajpayee’s Prime Ministership and had unleashed a loot raj by private sector that had devoured national assets and helped its organizers amass huge black money.

As for example, Pramod Mahajan, son of a school teacher of low income, had become a multi-billionaire while basking in Vajpayee’s proximity by the time of his death in the hands of his younger brother in a family feud over sharing the money.

The misrule was so menacing that people had refused BJP a fresh mandate.

But BJP is incorrigible.

Being a party of profit fetchers, its members had no qualms for collecting cash in bribe to put specific questions in the Parliament. The Parliament was so very embarrassed that it had to terminate their membership. And, on challenge, the Supreme Court had to refuse to restore them.

It had to change its national President Banguru Laxmana after he was captured in camera while taking bribe to facilitate illegal deals even in the area of defense of the country.

When these are sample instances of the past, its present is also blackened with corruption. It has members, who, once in power, indulge in rampant corruption, the latest instance being Yeddyurappa of Karnataka,

who had to quit Chief Minister post a few weeks ago on determination of his corruption by the State’s Ombudsman. So, even if people reject the Congress, BJP cannot be sure of victory.

Against this backdrop, a very interesting phenomenon is taking shape. That is, the possibility of revival of the country’s resolution for socialism; because sans socialism the country cannot be extricated from the quagmire it has fallen into. When in these pages I had to advance an argument for imposition of ceiling on private property, I had done so with this reality in mind.

That the strongest champions of socialism – the Communists – have recently suffered a set back specifically in West Bengal Assembly elections, is in no way indicative to people’s preference for non-socialism.

The set back to Communists in power in a province or two was bound to happen under impact of capitalistic opportunism that Dr. Singh’s government has enhanced in continuation to that of Atal Bihari Vajpayee of BJP, specifically as, while taking oath of office, the Communists were legally bound to pledged themselves to a non-communist constitution.

No wonder, the Communists experimentation with power has not proved beneficial to Communism. But Communism has spread its support base in majority of Indian provinces where revolutionaries instead of seeking power through elections are acting as active voice of the suffering but silent majority. There is possibility that the new awakening of masses against Dr. Singh’s misrule, perceivably inspired by the ultra-left’s relentless struggle against capitalism, against exploitation and corruption, may metamorphose into an ideological evolution of India on the basis of political economy and in the opposite pattern of what Dr. Singh has clamped on India. This is why Indian rich is worried.

They are in search of a new mask to retain their reign over India if the current mass awakening ousts Manmohan Singh from power and denies BJP to take advantage. To keep the emerged era of plutocracy in tact, they want just to divert public wrath from the real danger of wealth amassing to a peripheral issue of corruption.For this a new mask is needed through which the gullible people can be mislead again. Their new find is Anna Hazare.

The rich is helping Hazare to hijack the mass awakening against corruption like they had used Jayaprakash Narayan in the early 1970s. I see a tremendous similarity between emergence both of Anna and Narayan as leaders of mass movements against misrule.

Smt. Indira Gandhi of the Congress Party was then the Prime Minister. The country was drowned under corruption. Now Dr. Manmohan Singh of the same Congress Party is the Prime Minister. The country is drowned under corruption.

Indira was heading a government that was so corrupt that wrath of the masses had irrupted into a wild, disorganized agitation strong enough to throw her from throne to the dustbin and to completely change the system of administration she was running.

But her system of administration was suiting the country’s rising mafia, merchant communities and black-money world. For them the system was to be sustained. Through JP that was ensured. A freedom fighter of repute, not soiled by power-politics, he was accepted by the masses to lead their agitation. Indira Gandhi had to go from office. But a more corrupt government had to come in. Beginning from Morarjee to Biju Patnaik, the very same people who had corrupted the Congress and therefore had been jettisoned from that party, had emerged as stars in the movement that JP had taken over as leader and after the election, were in the new government in the name of Janata. And JP was discarded by all of them and the Ministers including Prime Minister Morarjee Deasai indulged in so much corruption and nepotism that the first non-Congress Government collapsed under its own load of filth.

This happened because the mass movement was diverted by JP from awakening against capitalism to slogan against corruption.

The same tactics is being now used by Indian rich through their new mask: Anna Hazare.

If body temperature of a person is alarmingly high, the Doctor must try to bring it down. Therefore, it would be his primary duty to determine the root cause of rise in body temperature. Temperature enhancing malaria cannot be cured by medicines meant for filariasis that also heightens body temperature.

Therefore, he must first determine the cause of rise in body temperature, which, to medical science, is just a symptom of a disease.

Anna Hazare and his team comprising Arvind Kejriwal, Kiran Bedi, Prasant Bhusan et al is misdirecting the movement against misrule to appointment of an ombudsman against corruption. As appointment of a doctor does not cure a disease, appointment of an ombudsman will not eradicate corruption.

Corruption is a symptom, not the disease. Corruption has its root in Indian Constitution that allows individuals to accumulate wealth. Opportunity to acquire and accumulate wealth as personal property without any limit is contributing to corruption. It is because of the political economy of capitalism that Manmohan Singh has initiated in India and has been executing. If corruption is to be eradicated, its root cause – capitalism – is to be removed from political agenda of India. Creation of a Jan Lokpal cannot save the country from corruption. Only social ownership of means of production can.

The so-called team Anna is not for this. Hence the spontaneous mass movement against inequality and misrule is just being hijacked through Hazare by the the same segment of India society that benefit from capitalism and the movement, if goes this way, like that of the movement of 1970s, will melt eventually in a new phase of plutocratic misrule and incorrigible corruption.

Therefore, a new danger to Indian democracy is Anna Hazare. If he and his team do not like to be termed like this, they may steer the movement to at least a demand for a ceiling on private property.

It is Time for Indian Patriotic Intelligentsia to Wake up

Subhas Chandra Pattanayak

Let it be clear from the beginning that this posting is addressed only to the Indian patriotic intelligentsia. Every member of Indian intelligentsia cannot be a patriot; because therein, there are self-seekers and traitors who have ruined post-independence India. Therefore the word ‘patriotic’ is deliberately used for distinguishing who of Indian intelligentsia can work for the country.

It is time, the Indian patriotic intelligentsia should wake up and save the country from fellows like Baba Ramdev and Anna Hazare who want to hijack common Indians’ awakening against corruption and black-money and all such havoc that the politicians in power, hand-in-glove with salaried officials and private trade-tycoons, have been playing with the masses, exactly as the shrewd self-seekers, under the cover of Jayprakash Narayan, had hijacked the mass awakening of 1974-76 and destroyed it within a mere span of two years of anarchy, facilitating thereby return to power of Ms. Indira Gandhi against whose misrule the people all over the country had joined the students of Gujurat and Bihar before JP vitiated their spontaneous uprising with jargons like party-less democracy and total revolution.

Those two years of anarchy, known to Indian political history as the period of Janata rule, were the years of political opportunism, religious revivalism, anti-welfarism, elitism, nepotism, favoritism, intraparty factionalism, interdepartmental antagonism and all sorts of corruption in every sphere of administration. The Janata Government had to die a premature death for all these syndromes. And, in its death, the mass uprising against misrule had also died.

Why did it happen?

It happened because, the fellows that had hijacked the people’s uprising against Congress misrule and thereby replaced Indira Gandhi’s government, had no political ideology other than what the Congress was practicing. All of them, individually and collectively, were practitioners of the same political economy, the same Economy of Inequality.

The same pattern

Anna Hazare and Ramdev resemble the same pattern. They are the new editions of JP and his collaborators of the 1970s. They have not focussed on the root of corruption; but are posing as fellows who can root out corruption. They have not uttered a single word so far against Economy of Inequality.

Economy of inequality

Economy of inequality is the root of all maladies that India is afflicted with. And it has been affecting India since the days of formation of the Constitution.

The Congress being in majority in the Constituent Assembly and the propertied class comprising its majority therein, had discarded the ideals of freedom movement, the ideals of equality and fraternity and had legitimized the Economy of Inequality in the Constitution.

It was easier for the Congress to perpetuate this inequality as it occupied power when the Republic of India was created on the basis of this Constitution.

The new editions of JP

Consequent upon this, the country has gone astray and corruption – the game, the rich play for fetching profit and property expansion – has spread into every sphere of administration.

As the radical Indians are raising their weapons against this foul play of the rich, causing corresponding awakening in silent majority of Indians, like in 1970s, the new editions of JP and his collaborators – Hazare, Ramdev and the elites – have been trying to hijack the new awakening in a manner that emits concern over corruption, but never stresses on elimination of the anti-national ingredients of economic and social inequality enshrined in the Constitution, even though those ingredients have helped corruption to grow and engulf the country.

That the Constitution of India bears the seeds of maladies the country is now afflicted with, deserves serious attention inasmuch as it was confessed even by its framers.

Maladies located by Laxminarayan Sahu
In the Constituent Assembly

On the third reading of the draft Constitution, renowned representative of Orissa in the Constituent Assembly, Laxminarayan Sahu had made it clear that in framing the Constitution, the Assembly had “deviated from the ideals” it had sat for.

“The ideals on which this Draft Constitution is framed have no manifest relation to the fundamental spirit of India”, he had pointed out.

For the rich people who constituted majority of the Congress that had majority of the seats in the Constituent Assembly, the Government of India Act framed and enforced by the British Government to protect its own interest, i.e. the interest of the exploiters, the property owners, the administrators and elite, was more suitable. Hence they had ensured that the Constitution of free India must carry the pro-rich provisions of that Act of the British rulers and if possible, similar provisions from other countries.

Coming down heavily upon this treachery against the people, Sahu had said, “I feel that this Constitution has become a queer and unwholesome amalgam on account of the varied provisions it has borrowed from the Government of India Act and the other Constitutions of the world, things that cannot be compounded to form a harmonious whole. ……… I can assure you that this …….. would not prove suitable and would break down soon after being brought into operation”

Sahu was shocked by the attempts to provide shock-absorbers of exploitation in the Constitution. “Mr. Kamath has quietly introduced in it the God too. Some people hold that there is no God. The people of India do not want God”, he had thundered.

He regretted that, when the Constitution had imported certain anti-people provisions from the British made Government of India Act, it had omitted the provisions that were somewhat lenient with the people in matters of civil liberties. “People have been so much fettered (by provisions in the constitution) that even the civil liberties enjoyed by them during the British regime would be available to them no more. ……….You will see that on the enforcement of this Constitution very few civil liberties will remain”.

Sahu had emphatically pointed out the contradiction the Constitution was carrying. He had scaldingly criticized the secret agenda of the rich to gag welfare programs. “On the one hand we give opportunity for private profit and on the other, we say that the resources of the Government are limited”, he had said.

No other debater was as clear as he in matter of the contradictions the Constitution was pregnant with. He had said, “India is a country of villages. In complete disregard of the villages we have turned into citizens and ask for rights of citizenship. I would say that we should have ‘village-zen-ship’ rights also. I do not see ‘village-zen-ship’ rights anywhere in this Constitution”.

Therefore, to him, the Constitution was “altogether useless and worthless”. He did not see “anything substantial in it”.

Dr. Ambedkar’s confession

In answering to the third reading of the draft Constitution, with apparent attention to what Sahu had said, before it was adopted, Dr. Ambedkar had also confessed that the Constitution was carrying contradictions, harmful enough to shatter India, unless removed by the people’s representatives in the earliest opportunity.

He had “acknowledged” that there was “complete absence” of equality and fraternity in the Constitution.

On complete absence of equality

On “complete absence” of equality he had said, “On the social plane, we have in India a society based on the principle of graded inequality which means elevation for some and degradation for others. On the economic plane, we have a society in which there are some who have immense wealth as against many who live in abject poverty. On the 26th of January 1950, we are going to enter into a life of contradictions. In politics we will have equality and in social and economic life we will have inequality. In Politics we will be recognizing the principle of one man one vote and one vote one value. In our social and economic life, we shall, by reason of our social and economic structure, continue to deny the principle of one man one value. How long shall we continue to live this life of contradictions ? How long shall we continue to deny equality in our social and economic life ? If we continue to deny it for long, we will do so only by putting our political democracy in peril. We must remove this contradiction at the earliest possible moment or else those who suffer from inequality will blow up the structure of political democracy which this Assembly has so laboriously built up”.

On complete absence of fraternity

On “complete absence” of fraternity, Ambedkar had said, “Fraternity means a sense of common brotherhood of all Indians—of Indians being one people. It is the principle which gives unity and solidarity to social life. It is a difficult thing to achieve. ……… I remember the days when politically-minded Indians resented the expression ” the people of India “. They preferred the expression ” the Indian nation. ” I am of opinion that in believing that we are a nation, we are cherishing a great delusion. How can people, divided into several thousands of castes, be a nation ? The sooner we realize, that, we are not as yet a nation in the social and psychological sense of the word, the better for us. For then only we shall realize the necessity of becoming a nation and seriously think of ways and means of realizing the goal. The realization of this goal is going to be very difficult—far more difficult than it has been in the United States. The United States has no caste problem. In India there are castes. The castes are anti-national in the first place, because they bring about separation in social life. They are anti-national also because they generate jealousy and antipathy between caste and caste. But we must overcome all these difficulties if we wish to become a nation in reality. For fraternity can be a fact only when there is a nation. Without fraternity, equality and liberty will be no deeper than coats of paint”.

Congress on anti-nation mode

But the ruling Congress is killing what Ambedkar had stood for in the Constituent Assembly.

It has started to destroy whatever semblance of national unity we have had, by promulgating caste based census, which, as per Ambedkar quoted above, would, for all time to come, obstruct fraternity to grow in India.

Dogs of the same breed

Looking into our political scenarios, we see, how the Congress party with its dominating majority had ignored all objections to provisions of inequality in the Constitution in the Constituent Assembly and subsequently, by occupying power in free India under the same Constitution, had made it interminable by running the country under the civil and criminal laws of the British days wherein social and economic inequalities are treated in terms of providence. The dogs of the same breed – the Janata and the BJP – as and when they have occupied power after the spontaneous mass revolution of 1970s was hijacked by the anti-Congress fronts of self-seekers, have contributed their might to this mischief. Economy of inequality thus enforced by all the political parties that have occupied power in the centre so far, has transformed Indian democracy to a plutocracy.

Indian Democracy transformed into Plutocracy

As both the systems – democracy and plutocracy – are run by elected representatives, maximum numbers of Indians – illiterate and ignorant as they are – fail to understand the difference between the two and mistake plutocracy for democracy.

This is how, basking under misconceived sense of equality in voting right, which their democracy under Indian Constitution has granted them, they have foolishly contributed to strengthening of plutocracy, which, under the mask of election, is in reality the rule by the representatives of the rich for benefit of the rich.

The rich generates corruption

And the rich knows no limit in richness as avarice has no limit. Hence, enhancing richness is the only mission of the rich. And, to succeed in this mission, as competitions amongst the rich to reach the targets to become richer or the richest are ever increasing, the process generates corruption.

Unless this phenomenon is understood, how can corruption be fought against? Neither Hazare nor Ramdev has understood this phenomenon. They have never made demands for change of the Constitution to eliminate social and economic inequality. They have never campaigned against Economy of Inequality. Corruption and black-money are issues of Political Economy. Neither of them subscribe to any Political Economy.

The Farce

Even as how fake and farcical is Hazare’s so-called anti-corruption call is focussed in these pages earlier, the way Ramdev has been going on giving Prime Minister Manmohan Singh certificates of non-corruption, makes his call against corruption a bigger farce. If this farce is not stopped, there is every possibility of derailment of the people’s spontaneous awakening against corruption and black-money, as had happened in the 1970s.

Let it not happen.

The last hope

Hence it is required of patriotic intelligentsia of India to wake up to the awakening of Indian masses against corruption and black-money. Till accumulation of private profit is banned by necessary change in the Constitution, accumulation of black money cannot be stopped. Accumulation of private profit cannot be stopped unless accumulation of private property is banned. Accumulation of private property cannot be banned as long as private ownership continues on means of production. So a thorough change in the Constitution is required. In normal course and under guidance of Hazares and Ramdevs it can never happen. The people are to bring forth this change by their own force.

The people of India shall have to force the governments – both central and provincial – to change the Constitution to eliminate Economy of Inequality by banning private property and private ownership on means of production. There are a few who are trying to do it. But they are being branded as law breakers and are being subjected to various methods of torture by the corrupt State, exactly as freedom fighters were being tortured by the exploitive British colonialists.

India’s leftwing politicians are the only ones who could have given the required leadership in this critical juncture. But compromise with the agents of imperialism and Industry in pursuit of power at various stages in post-independence India, has ruined their credibility so severely that, they are no more in a position to guide the present phase of mass awakening against corruption and black-money. Hence, from beyond the beaten track of politics, non-political patriotic intelligentsia is the last hope for guiding the rising mass awakening against corruption and black-money that Economy of Inequality has generated.

The country has gone astray by adopting Economy of Inequality. It can be saved, only if Economy of Equality is adopted.

And hence, the rising mass awakening against corruption and black-money needs be saved from the tricks of Hazares and Ramdevs, whom the corrupt government of Manmohan Singh has already favored with extra-constitutional importance to enable them to divert public attention from the root of corruption to the tip of corruption so that at the base, Economy of Inequality remains unaffected and plutocracy becomes stronger. The support of rabid rightist BJP and RSS to Ramdev in his acrobatics of fasting against corruption and black-money has made it unambiguously clear that, the fellows having vested interest in maintaining the status quo are trying to hijack the spontaneous mass awakening against corruption and black-money exactly as had happened in 1970s.

Indian patriotic intelligentsia should pay urgent attention to this phenomenon and wake up to defeat this design of plutocracy by bringing about a new revolution against Economy of Inequality. Otherwise, this time also the country shall miss the opportunity for emancipation.

Hazare Farce Becomes Murkier: Jan Lokpal Bill Just A Hoodwinking Formulation; It Cannot End Corruption

Subhas Chandra Pattanayak

Anna Hazare’s is a hoodwinking farce formulated to mislead the masses that want end of the corrupt regime. It is as bad as a medicine prescribed for an undiagnosed disease.

Right on private property is the basic cause of corruption. Eliminate this right, corruption shall end.

Any agitation for end of corruption without putting priority on elimination of private property is an agitation against emancipation of india from the labyrinth of economic contradiction that the Constitution, in the words of its author Dr. Ambedkar, has pushed the country into.

Dr. Ambedkar had hoped that the first parliament, formed on the constitution by representatives of the people, would take steps for removal of the contradiction, which he had pointed out as economic inequality; but it did not happen.

Dr. Ambedkar had warned in the same speech that unless the first Parliament passes laws to obliterate the contradiction by removing the right to private property that helps the rich to become richer, the Republic so laboriously created by the Constituent Assembly shall be destroyed by the victims of economic inequality.

This is bound to happen. And, this has started happening as is discernible in the very fact that even non-violent sympathizers of the victims of economic inequality are being prosecuted against for sedition.

Hazare’s conception will cause more hazards inasmuch as the so-called mechanism against corruption, if at all formed in terms of his demand, as and when formed and functions, will only multiply unending litigations that will never end corruption.

Indian constitution is so very defective that right on property will not normally end.

If right on property will not normally end, avarice will not end. Then corruption will never end.

We ought to understand that in the environment of plutocracy, when right on property is being protected and consumerism savagely encouraged, persons in positions will be anxious to accumulate as much property as possible; because that is the only way to enhance and retain their consumer ability and comfort in India.

Corruption being the only way to acquire property to match the ambitions that plutocracy has been generating, peons to the prime minister, every office-bearer of this country is bound to indulge in corruption.

So the constitution that provides for protection of right to acquire and retain private property needs be changed if India is to be free of corruption. It is not easy to change. Therefore attempts must be made to put ceiling on private property. Within the framework of the constitution, at a time, ceiling was imposed on landed property. Steps need be taken to impose ceiling on properties commutable on terms of money too, with immediate effect.

In these pages, I have written on this necessity on different contexts earlier.

If India is to be saved, ceiling on property of the rich is a must in order to curb, if not eliminate, economic inequality, which, if done, will drastically reduce corruption. Then, the country can be addressed to eliminate the root cause of corruption, private property that private ownership over means of production basically creates.

The other reason of corruption is candidate-constituency link in elections.

Political leaders resort to corruption to collect money from operators of trade and industry to keep well-fed their pet packs of vote-catchers in the constituencies they represent and use their political influence for benefit of those fund providers, even though, thereby, the nation suffers the loss.

One of India’s top revered leaders of freedom movement, Nabakrishna Chowdhury, who, when Orissa’s Chief Minister, in May 1955 had warned the nation of this syndrome in the A.I.C.C. meeting at Berhampore. But Nehru and others had preferred to ignore this warning. Later in his famous speech while inaugurating the Gandhi Tattwa Prachar Kendra at Balasore on 14 July 1963 that hit headlines all over the country and abroad, he had described how Nehru’s trusted lieutenant Rafi Ahmed Kidwai was engaged in raising such funds. He had said, “Huge amounts are raised at the time of elections from big mine-owners and rich businessmen for which no detailed accounts are kept”. On the other hand, he had exposed, “As the businessmen have to pay taxes, they do not show this amount in the actual accounts book which they have to show to the Income Tax department. They keep note of these amounts in their personal note books”. (Annexure I to the Report of Commission of Enquiry headed by Sarjoo Prasad). He had also indicated how large portion of the money so collected in the name of election fund was being grabbed by the leaders in charge of funds collection and / or the top leader of the Party. Though Chowdhury had told this of his own party, i.e. the Indian National Congress, it cannot be said for certain that there is any political party in India which can be viewed as a party free of this syndrome.

All of the political parties collect money for funding elections. Over and above the fund received from the parties, individual candidates invest money in their respective constituencies and try to convert the constituencies into personal domains as is evidenced by terms like “my constituency”. This “my constituency” concept is the main cause of politicians resorting to corruption, which as they grow in stature, grows in velocity and viciousness.

How to get rid of this syndrome is discussed here.

Anna Hazare type of agitation is far from addressing to the causes of corruption discussed. Therefore, it can be said that it is an attempt to divert attention from the necessity to wipe out corruption.

Correspondences between Hazare and Congress chief Sonia Gandhi, charges of corruption against co-chair of the drafting committee of the Jan Lokpal Bill that Hazare espouses, ruling party attempt through Digvijay Singh to further embarrass the said co-chair and various other developments hitting headlines make the farce murkier and makes it clear that no combine of practitioners of corruption can bring out any method or mechanism for elimination of corruption.

Corruption is growing because the country is going on the capitalist way. Only the opposite political economy can stop corruption.