People Face Excruciating Situation

  Harkishan Singh Surjeet

THE major events in the last one odd month go to vindicate the CPI(M)’s position on the international and national situations, also indicating what an excruciating situation is currently facing the people of India and the world. During this period, as is widely perceived, US imperialists have intensified their drive to impose their economic, political and military hegemony over the world. The US role in Iraq is there for all to see. Having brutally mauled Iraq, a country with the second biggest oil reserve in the world, US imperialists are out to loot its resources in a most unabashed manner. Even before the US began its war against the Saddam regime, its thinktanks had been planning about how they would ‘reconstruct’ the country once it was conquered. But the last four odd months have left no illusion whatsoever about what an imperialist power means when it talks of ‘reconstruction’ of a conquered country. One may well recall how the British plundered the resources of India and other conquered countries of Asia and Africa even while they boasted of their ‘civilising’ mission in these lands. As an Urdu poet, ‘Shad’ Azeemabadi, tauntingly said more than a century ago ---

Sabza pamaal, kali shaakh pe murjhai hai,

Aur hai shor ki gulshan mein bahar ayee hai!

(The greenery is dead and the bud has faded on the twig; and yet there is a noise that the spring has indeed come to the garden.)

MARAUDERS ON RAMPAGE

BUT as the old Hegel said, history repeats itself though on a higher plane. And today we do see the history of imperialism repeating itself in Iraq on a higher plane. In the very first contract meant for ‘reconstruction’ of Iraq, a company controlled by US vice president Dick Cheney did corner billions of dollars. And there is no gainsaying that this money was not doled out by the Bush administration but came out of the plunder of Iraqi oil wealth. Since then, the open loot of Iraq has gone on unabated.

Another ploy the Americans proffered was about restoration of democracy in Iraq. This itself is perhaps the cruellest joke of the post-war era. A country that intervened in dozens of countries on the flimsiest of pleas, that waged a number of unjustifiable wars from Korea in the east to tiny Grenada in the west, whose CIA and FBI plotted the assassination of a number of leaders from Mossuddiq of Iran to Lumumba of Congo to Allende of Chile and also in our own subcontinent, a country that propped up a host of blood-mongering dictators in all parts of the world, whose army trained so many killers that the School of the Americas came to be popularly known as the School of Assassins --- it is such a country that has been posing itself as the ‘saviour’ of democracy in the world and says it has a right to intervene wherever democracy is in peril --- in its perception. 

And what kind of democracy the Americans want to build in Iraq after the ouster of Saddam Hussein? There was a time when they had set up puppet regimes in South Vietnam, South Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia, Chile and a host of other countries --- all in the name of safeguarding democracy. It is another thing that the people did not relish the American brand of democracy and threw out their puppets one by one. And now the Bush and Company want to build the same kind of ‘democracy’ in Iraq, so that imperialist marauders may go on rampage through that land, fully aware that their puppets would be there to protect and help them at every step.

INSTANCE OF RECOLONISATION

BEFORE the Americans started their war against Iraq, their plea was that it was necessary to divest the country of the weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) that could pose a grave threat to world peace and humanity. The plea was taken even after two lengthy rounds of inspections under the UN auspices certified that Iraq had no WMDs. Nay, chief weapons inspector Hans Blix was vocal in debunking the US-British claim in this regard. But all this did not matter for Bush and (His Master’s Voice) Blair. The US-UK intelligence even went so far as to insinuate that Saddam was trying to buy uranium from Niger. But the world knows how this piece of intelligence, which Bush even used in his State of the Republic address, proved to be a hoax --- and a cruel and costly hoax at that. It is not for nothing that the popularity of both Bush and Blair has steadily fallen in these few months.

But this is precisely what prompted Bush to change tack. Now that no WMDs have been found and are not likely to be found as there exist none, this former Texas executioner has stopped talking about the WMDs and has reverted to the earlier slogan of launching a “war against terror” throughout the world. It was on the same flimsy plea that he has already doled out threats to Cuba, Iran, Syria, Jordan, Libya and DPR Korea. But if Bush has his way, it may mean only one thing. During his tenure as governor, Texas got the notoriety of having the highest number of executions in the US. Isn’t his slogan of a “war against terror” aimed to extend his execution regime on the global plane?

This thing proves only one thing: that the US not only propped up terrorist groups in various parts of the world (the Taliban were only the latest example); rather the US is itself the biggest terrorist force in the world.

The US aim in Iraq is plain enough. As we said in these columns earlier, the US occupation of Iraq is the first instance of recolonisation in the post-war period and in this lies its insidious nature. Nay, to this end the US has sidetracked the UN system, thus creating a situation similar to the one when the League of Nations was made defunct and contributed to the outbreak of the second world war. This is why, setting aside their differences on other issues, all the peace-loving and freedom-loving people have to rise in unison against this recolonisation drive, and tell the world gendarme that its hegemonic designs would never be allowed to succeed.

In the meantime, resistance is gradually building up in Iraq and, though belatedly, the Americans have admitted that they are facing a guerrilla war type situation in Iraq. This is all the more reason that the world peoples extend a helping hand to the people of Iraq who are waging a war to oust the Americans from their country.

The situation, from the US point of view, is not comfortable. Its soldiers are getting killed everyday; the number of those killed after the war has already exceeded the number who died during the occupation war. And when the coffins reaching the US would lead to an uproar back home, is now only a matter of time. The spectre of Vietnam war has already started haunting the Americans, and the Bush and Company are desperate about how to take their soldiers out of the fireline and make other nations sacrifice their jawans for the sake of US hegemony.

BJP GETTING DESPERATE

ONE of the countries the US contacted for help in this regard was India; before March 1998 they could not have dared to make such a ‘request’ as they made to the Vajpayee regime. The latter, as we know, was over-eager to do the American bidding in this regard, though it could not do so because of the mass opposition and also because the monsoon session of parliament was then in the offing. Yet the government’s intentions in this regard are not above suspicion and the Indian people have to keep up their vigil, more so after this parliament session is over. Another reason for not acceding to the US ‘request’ is the BJP’s own desperation as the party has nothing to show to the people as its achievement.

And now that elections to five state assemblies are approaching, the BJP, that has a big stake in four of these states, appears like a drowning man with just one straw to clutch upon. This is why the entire Sangh Parivar has vehemently raised the issue of Ayodhya as its only hope. It was with this aim that, from behind the curtain, the PMO moved a pawn in the form of Swami Jayendra Saraswati, the Shankaracharya of Kanchi, to hold a show of dialogue with the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB). It was very clear from July 1 at least that the so called offer of dialogue was but a ploy to trap the Muslims and then to blame them for the failure of the dialogue. Nay, this is precisely what the Sangh Parivar is doing these days.

As this issue has already been commented upon in these columns, we do not intend to go into its details again.

One thing is certain, however. During the run-up to the assembly polls in November, that are to be followed by general elections to Lok Sabha some time in 2004, the saffron brigade is trying all means at its disposal to escape its imminent doom. Even though the venom-spewing Togadia was incarcerated in Rajasthan and the Parivar could not organise any agitation against the state government, he is going on holding trishul diksha programmes in other states (for example, he did it in UDF ruled Kerala) where the governments are not likely to act tough against him. Yet, the Rajasthan example did indicate what a bunch of paper tigers the Parivar is.

On the other hand, since the AIMPLB rejected the terms put forward by Kanchi Shankaracharya, as these terms were indeed heavily loaded in favour of the Sangh Parivar, the latter has become doubly vocal. The RSS conclave at Kanyakumari demanded that the union government pass a legislation to pave the way for temple construction at Ayodhya and the BJP, senior partner in the NDA government, even began to explore its possibility. The main part of the exercise was to gauge the reaction of other parties, particularly the main opposition party, and also of its NDA allies. In this duration, many parties, including those in the NDA and the TDP that is supporting the government from outside, made it clear that they would not allow the government to play this game and that a court verdict was the only way to solve the Ayodhya tangle. Yet, in its old style of blowing hot and blowing cold at the same time, the brigade is still harping on this theme and seeking to force the government to bring the desired legislation in parliament and get it passed. The BJP also toyed with the idea of getting such a legislation passed in a joint session of parliament, as it does not have a majority in Rajya Sabha. It also hopes that the imminent retirement of several nominated members may give it a chance to contrive a majority in the upper house.

VAJPAYEE’S DRAMATICS

IT was in this situation that the prime minister’s speech at Ayodhya, where he had gone to take part in Ramchandra Das Paramhans’s funeral, caused a big flutter in the country. There, in presence of his deputy Advani and other BJP, RSS and VHP leaders, he said his government was committed to clear the ground for temple construction though he refused to set a deadline.

On the occasion, Advani reiterated what Vajpayee had said at Kumarakom in Kerala --- that the construction of a temple at the Babri site would be the fulfillment of a “national sentiment.” Soon after, Vajpayee told a group of BJP parliamentarians that his government wanted to build a temple in Ayodhya but was constrained due to the BJP’s lack of majority.

However, true to his salt, Vajpayee did not take long to issue denials. Cornered by opposition parties, he told the Lok Sabha that he was misreported by the media and that his opinion on the issue was still unchanged --- that the Ayodhya dispute can be solved either through talks or through a court verdict.

There is nothing new in all this. This was not the first occasion that Vajpayee made his pro-Sangh leanings clear and then indulged in ifs and buts when cornered. But this is not only a part of the blow hot blow cold policy of the Sangh Parivar. Rather, the latest episode once again shows the so called moderate Vajpayee as the dramabaaz par excellence. Somewhere in this issue we are reproducing a report from The Times of India, that lays bare the true essence of our prime minister. 

A LESSON FOR ALLIES

IN the meantime, some disturbing episodes have come to light. One of them is that Tamilnadu chief minister Ms Jayalalitha has extended support to the idea of a legislation on Ayodhya, thus giving the BJP a shot in the arm which this party badly needed. Earlier, misusing her majority in the state assembly, she even got a law passed to ban conversions in the state. The way she brutally suppressed the strike of state employees and teachers is also in keeping with the BJP’s style of functioning. Clearly, Ms Jayalalitha is itching to join the NDA bandwagon again, after toppling the Vajpayee government once, in April 1999. As for Antony in neighbouring Kerala, the less said the better. He is behaving more like a saffronite than as a Congressman. And if one excepts the controversy on the Taj Heritage Corridor issue, the BJP has given Ms Mayawati of UP every chance to behave as autocratically as she can. On the contrary, two smaller parties in Goa have already paid the price for aligning with the BJP. While Vajpayee never tires of talking of “coalition dharma,” his party engineered splits in the allied parties to have a majority of its own. And the latest revelation is that it was the BJP that conspired to oust the Mukut Mithi government in Arunachal Pradesh.

It is in this backdrop that the recent developments in Punjab are to be seen. The Akali-BJP coalition ruled the state for full five years, and then suffered a humiliating defeat in February 2002. And one does not have to go far to seek the reasons for this defeat. During its tenure, the coalition utterly mismanaged the state and heaped many burdens upon the people. At the same time, chief minister Parkash Singh Badal and his cohorts literally milked the state exchequer under the benign eyes of the BJP, “the party of principles,” that had promised to root out corruption from public life.

The details are gory, to say the least. It was reported that, spread over 1500 square yards, Badal’s palatial bungalow had as many as 29 air conditioners; even its bathrooms were fitted with ACs. Then, when Badal’s daughter insisted at having a big bungalow of her own, he got a same size bungalow for her. His sons and other relatives too are known to have grossly misused his position to mint money. The scandal perpetrated, with his blessings, by the Punjab Public Service Commission’s chief is not likely to be surpassed soon, insofar as similar bodies are concerned.

All this only underlines how far the Akalis have strayed from their glorious traditions of the pre-independence days.

Badal’s misdemeanours came to public notice after the change of regime in Punjab, and no one is sure how many more skeletons would tumble down from Badal’s cupboard in the days to come. In Haryana, Om Prakash Chautala, another BJP ally, has not squandered a single opportunity to garner filthy lucre.

It was therefore not for nothing that Badal’s men lost even panchayat polls in his own village; two of his brothers-in-law also lost panchayat polls in their village. In passing, one may well recall how Badal had lost in the Gurudwara Prabandhak Committee polls in Delhi some two years ago.

It is in this situation that Badal was constrained to resurrect Gurcharan Singh Tohra from his political grave. Till only a month or so ago, Badal considered Tohra his enemy number one. Earlier, Badal even contrived to get Tohra defeated in SGPC elections and this was what had forced Tohra, who had been the SPGC chief for many terms in a row, to float his own Akali Dal faction. These factions even fought each other in the assembly polls. But now the situation has turned 180 degrees and Badal had to join hands with Tohra so as to buttress his shaking position and sagging morale. On the other hand, Tohra too was desperate to regain the presidentship of the SGPC where Badal men hold the majority.

On his part, union home minister and deputy prime minister, Advani, too openly came out in defence of Badal, and the world saw how he was trying to defend the indefensible. Now, Tohra or no Tohra, Advani or no Advani, there is no doubt that if only Amarinder Singh, the present chief minister, persists with the ongoing inquiries, Badal would soon meet his waterloo.

This holds out a lesson for the BJP’s existing and prospective allies --- that by aligning with the BJP they have nothing but to lose, either the Punjab way or the Goa way. While some of the allies have parted company, some others are in two minds (e g DMK) and still others (like Ms Mamata) are sulking in the wilderness. In sum, the BJP’s defeat in the coming elections is more or less certain; it is up to the allies to save themselves or perish.

But this is by no means an automatic process. Our democratic and secular masses have to assert and come forward to save the very future of India as a civilised, secular nation with a composite culture and syncretic ethos. Needless to say, the prime responsibility for this devolves upon the Left parties who have to mobilise these masses in action on the burning issues facing the country and its people.