People's Democracy

THE National Platform of mass-organisations (NPMO) held an impressive convention at the Zila Prishad Hall, Dharamshala workers of different employees and trade union organisations, including anganwadi workers, AIKS activists and bank and insurance employees attended in large number despite the heavy rain.

The main objective of the convention was to highlight how the pernicious policies of globalisation, liberalisation and privatisation dictated by the WTO wre being utilised even more viciously by the NDA government in its own class-interest and in the interest of US imperialism to ruin the Indian people. Inaugurating the convention, Suneet Chopra, joint secretary, All India Agricultural Workers Union gave facts and figures of how these policies were leading to famine conditions, with a starvation death even in the grainrich Kangra district of Himachal, while grain lay rotting in FCI godowns all round. The NDA government was prepared to sell it to USA as pig-feed at Rs 4.30 per kg or even throw it into the sea rather give it to those starving all over the country. At the same time, it was ruining farmers by importing US wheat at 130 dollars per quintal while Indian farmers were forced to make distress sales at Rs 380-Rs 420 per quintal.

He pointed out how the agricultural market was forced open from 1999-2000 under pressure from the US, ruining tea, coffee, rubber, coconut and cotton growers all over the country and leading to hundreds of suicides, was now being compounded by the entry of milk products with a subsidy of over 730 dollars a tonne, which Indian cattle owners could not compete with, faced with rising prices of cattle feed and degraded stock. All this while the government was giving them false hopes of a white revolution while it was preparing to destroy their market. He pointed out how the government continued to lie to the people about more jobs and better growth in industry, while figures showed the opposite.

The Indian people were forced to pay more for all kinds of service from electricity, to postage and even for roads, education and healthcare, while foreign companies were looting thousands of corers by using the Mauritius route and out national wealth of the public-sector was being squandered away. No one made deals like BALCO and Air India without underhand payments. The Tehelka.com and US-64 scam had demonstrated how corruption had reached intolerable limits. The government would have to change these policies or quit.

A number of Kisan activists, including AIKS (Ashoka Road) leader Sat Pal, AIKS (Ajoy Bhawan) leader Saligram and others pointed out the importance of struggles for peoples forest rights as part and parcel of the land struggle, of the demand to deal with animal pests like monkeys and wild bear of proper protection of crop varieties and subsidies of all sorts to farmers. The peasantry they noted was prepared to fight for concrete demands.

The serious financial situation in the country was highlighted by Rakesh Gautam of AIBEA, R L Sharma of LIC, S R Kapoor of NZIEA, who pointed out how in a world where 120 crore people had an income of less than 1 dollar a day and 250 crores earned less than 2 dollars a day, the policies of IMF, the World Bank and WTO would be opposed. And they were being opposed as events in Seattle, Stockholm and Genoa had demonstrated. The NPMO had been among the first to resist them with a massive demonstration in New Delhi. It was a pity that initiative had not been brought down to the ground level with the same unity of purpose, they felt.

They also highlighted the danger to our financial independence from the loot of financial institutions like UTI and IFCI, with the threat spreading to IDBI and LIC with the NDA-led government driving the country to bankruptcy by siphoning funds through bogus firms connected with the BJP and RSS. Dr P C Awasthi, a retired professor, pointed out how the NDA-led government had moved to corrupt parliamentarians as a whole by a gross increase in MPs wages and allowances when the government claimed to have no money for health and education. He appealed to all Left and democratic political parties to make their opposition to this disgraceful move public and visible.

Closing the session, CITU district president, Kapoor Singh Supahiya thanked the speakers for their incisive comments and concrete suggestions for struggle. He proposed a demand charter be prepared in a week’s time and a campaign be organised in early September to bring these issues out on the streets. The conference then closed with resounding slogans.