People's Democracy

Election Speech Of

S R Pillai On DD

DEAR friends,

The 14th Lok Sabha elections is taking place  at an important juncture in the history of the country.  The outcome will certainly influence the future course of developments.

The NDA government's policies are ruinous for the people  and the country.  The anti-people character of the policies is glaringly manifested in the agrarian sector which provides livelihood support to more than two-third of the country's population.

The tall claims  of the NDA about the achievements in the agricultural sector are untrue. The agricultural sector is experiencing an unprecedented growing crisis.   More and more people are dying  due to starvation. The number of suicides of the rural people are increasing.  Poverty is expanding.  Unemployment is rising. The per capita production and availability of foodgrains have fallen and reached a low level unprecedented in the last five decades. The workdays  and wages of agricultural workers are declining. Indebtedness is growing. Marginalisation of the rural poor is taking place at a faster pace.

The fall in price of agricultural commodities and the rise in price of agricultural  inputs have increased the miseries.  The unevenness in growth and development is growing.  The recent spurt in agricultural production is not part of a consistent growth pattern in agricultural production but only due to good monsoon.  Even after 56 years of independence and more than five decades of planning, agriculture continues to be a gamble with the monsoons.

The growing agrarian crisis is the result of the State-sponsored phase of capitalist development since independence and   the liberalisation phase of capitalist development since 1991.  The liberalisation phase witnessed a reactionary change in policies.   The State is withdrawing from economic affairs and handing over to capitalist market forces.  The poor have suffered.  Many non-Left state governments are reversing the land reform process to develop the  land market. Public investments in areas such as irrigation, electricity, science and technology, infrastructural facilities, public health and public education and subsidies provided to agricultural inputs, including seeds, water, electricity, fertiliser, pesticides and agricultural implements have been reduced. 

The public  distribution system is being dismantled.  The restrictions on import and export  have been removed and tariff rates on imports have been reduced. These measures have increased the import of heavily subsidised agricultural commodities leading to price crash.    Steps have been taken to privatise water and to create  water monopolies.   Bio-diversity has been a common property of farmers and local communities.  This rich wealth is being converted into the private property of a handful of Indian big business and multinational companies. 

The development strategy of the NDA is designed to serve the interests of a narrow section of rural rich, big business and MNCs. Even the Congress has no policies different from this.

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) stands for an alternative  development strategy that seeks for active intervention by the State in economic affairs and based on the interests of the common people. A rapid increase in productivity and production alone can ensure overall development.  This is dependent on releasing the creative energy and labour enthusiasm of millions of peasants and agricultural workers.  This is possible only by  breaking up land concentration and traditional  system of exploitation and distributing land to agricultural labour and poor peasants. 

Steps should be taken to protect the interests of the poor from disadvantage due to the uneven distribution of assets.  The major share of concessions and benefits should reach the disadvantaged sections.  A comprehensive legislation should be passed for agricultural workers  to ensure employment guarantee, minimum wages and social security measures such as provident fund, pension, gratuity, leave, accident benefits, unemployment allowance etc.    Public investments should  be increased. Self-sufficiency in foodgrain production should be ensured. The government should provide remunerative prices for agricultural commodities. Institutional credit facilities should be expanded.  A comprehensive insurance scheme covering crops and cattle should be implemented.

In order to implement these alternative policies, it is necessary to strengthen the CPI(M) and increase the representation of Left in Parliament.

(April 23, 2004)