My Father's Paintings

 
 
 
 

New Ray of Hope

The contribution of Indian left organizations since the days of freedom struggle has been prolific and unmatched. Post the first world war, whether they were influenced by the success of Russian Revolution or they they sought shelter into Mao's philosophy, their contribution has been second to none. Post India's independence, the communist movement of India took a completely different shape and still carried on with good work. They acted as a constructive opposition to the system's 'anti-proletariat' moves whenever required.

The biggest contribution of the Left Movement of India came in the shape of the great Trade Union movement when they were able to mobilize the great Indian working class, especially the workers in the manufacturing sector. It continued for a very long time. But today it seems to have lost the glory and is derailed by with the help of an organized propaganda under which the elite capitalists and the bourgeoisie have worked overnight to destabilize the whole of the movement. Closure of manual manufacturing units and the advent of mechanized processes further weakened this movement and the complacency of our Marxist leaders towards this fast changing scenario added fuel to the fire. The rightest forces in India worked overtime to stop any noticeable progress in organized trade union movements and workers agitation.

But I think the Left has woken up from its long sleep. The period of silence seems to be coming to an end. The parties here may have come to realize that without mobilizing the masses, the peasants and the working class it is impossible to create a conducive environment for a people's government. But it doesn't necessarily mean opposing the modernization and industrialization. What Buddhadeb Bhattacharya (the current chief minister of West Bengal where the left government has been in power for past 30 years) is doing is exactly the same which the Marxists should be doing to keep pace with the change. What Russia did with liberalization is no example but what China did is certainly a good example to follow.

Very recently I was reading an article published in an Indian News Weekly called 'The Week' published by the Malyalaya Manorama group. The article was about some definite signs of revival of the trade union spirit of the Indian Left Parties. In a meeting of all left parties held a few weeks ago, it was decided to reopen the closed books of the trade union movement. It was about organizing the 140,000 odd unorganized private security guards in India and the case in point of the abnormal exploitation of them as a laborers.

Here I have a very agonizing personal experience to narrate. My car met with a small accident and it required repair. I went to one of the largest service centers of Suzuki in my area. While I was waiting for the service engineer to attend my complaint, I came across a very touching scene. An old man, who was positioned as a security guard, was continuously crying and despite relentless efforts from his fellowmen he didn't stop. As a humanitarian, I was a little touched and was anxious to know what was the reason behind his agony. I was told by another security guard that the old fellow lost his brother a day before. The reason for his pain was more than justified. In India, specially in the rural parts, we still believe in the concept of joint (extended) families where generations live together as a single group. He went on talking to some of his relatives over phone and then started convincing them that the last rituals should take place in a proper way. He was still crying very badly. It made me really very emotional. Being a native of Madhya Pradesh (a state quite far from the National Capital Region NCR), the old man showed his inability to reach before a day later. But the most cruel aspect is yet to come. The so called managers (who are fit to be called bourgeoisie in today's conditions) were completely apathetic towards the old man's sorrow. I wanted to help this man but was waiting for the right occasion. The managers ruthlessly ignored him and probably sanctioned his leave with a lot of reluctance in their eyes. He was a security guard - a non-existent person for the Suzuki Service Center and part of the unorganized labor labeled as 'private security guards' who are hired on temporary contracts with no certainty of their jobs the next morning. This is the cruel face of contemporary capitalist society and the ruthlessness that rules our minds as humans. So, if the new trade union movement starts with this breed, its a good sign of revival.

As an extension to it, the communist parties of India should also take into stride the largest of all such unorganized workers - the ones who work as temporary farmers. They are the biggest force to be mobilized and taken into the mainstream. I think what Nepalese communists did was a perfect example to be followed here as well. The most downtrodden ones should the the first set of people taken into confidence and without attacking their primary beliefs and sentiments they should be taken as the primary cadre of the left parties.

This will not only help the left movement to proliferate beyond the traditional territories like West Bengal, Kerala and Tripura but also help mobilize the masses in an organized way.

Deals, Deaths and Democracy

One of America's most famous presidents Franklin Roosevelt once mentioned of four freedoms and I quote: "The first is freedom of speech and expression - everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of everyone to worship God in his own way, everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want . . . everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear . . . anywhere in the world."

Another famous American quote, coming from the strongest known President ever(my choice) Abraham Lincoln says and I quote: "America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves."

Now let me return to India. All of us Indians who are politically aware recall the golden words he gave to the first constituent assembly: "Long years ago we made a tryst with destiny... A moment comes which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, then an age ends, and when the soul of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance. It is fitting that at this solemn moment we take the pledge of dedication to India and her people and to the still larger cause of humanity. We end today a period of ill fortune and India discovers herself again. The achievement we celebrate today is but a step, an opening of opportunity, to the greater triumphs and achievements that await us. . . and power bring responsibility."

You must be wondering why am I quoting these long old statements before even writing anything on my own.

The context to which I want to attribute these quotes is as recent as a couple of days ago when our social fabric got shattered once again with blasts causing severe damage to our fellow Indians in Bangalore followed by Ahmedabad in just two days. In past 2-3 years, there have been numerous public attacks which has shaken our democracy to its core. Roosevelt is proven wrong here. When Nehru said "We end today a period of ill fortune and India discovers herself again", he must have never thought of that the ill fortune will continue even after 60 years.

The quote from Lincoln is verbatim correct here. "America (we can, for a moment, replace this with India) will never be destroyed from outside...." Its us Indians, our passion for embracing the western economic system, usage of sectarianism to our short-term gains and using religion to spread horror all around who have contributed to this outrage and our democracy has been belittled as a mockery and nothing more.

Not withstanding the fact that our political system is still not shaken beyond repair, we must stay reminded that we are far from claiming ourselves as citizens living in a Welfare State.

As copied from Wikipedia a welfare state means: an ideal model in which the state assumes primary responsibility for the welfare of its citizens. This responsibility in theory ought to be comprehensive, because all aspects of welfare are considered and universally applied to citizens as a right. 'Welfare state' can also mean the creation of a "safety net" of minimum standards." If we discount 50 percent of what an ideal welfare state is all about, we are still miles away to be fit into this category. I am talking of a welfare state purely in terms of what Roosevelt said 'freedom from fear'. So it shall not be confused at all with poverty elevation or social re-engineering (at least not in today's topic). While our current government is still not getting out of the nostalgia of a fake (more fabricated than a real) win on the vote of confidence and is just paying heed to the issues like nuclear deals etc., the deaths caused by the negligence of internal security are loudly saying that we are far from being a welfare state, which obviously means eradication of poverty, establishment of social justice, creating opportunities for the people living in rural areas (note that I am not referring here just the employment opportunities for the unemployed youth of rural India), making self-sufficiency the motive of Indian economy etc. etc.

At every stage we are forced to think whether we are living in such livid conditions is fact that we can ignore or are we so helpless that we can't prevent our nation from these fundamentalist catastrophic incidents.

When we talk of such regular incidents of terrorism/fundamentalist attacks, we can't be ignorant of our foreign policy which govern our relations with the rest of the world. For a minute if I deviate here and make a mention of our changing foreign policy, it won't be out of context. After independence the major milestone for our foreign policy and state sovereignty was Nonalignment (which gave birth to the movement known as 'Nonaligned Movement/NAM'). Agreed we were in a bipolar world at that time and there were two blocks in which the whole of the world was divided. The political commentators today claim that the Soviet block doesn't exist anymore and thus the NAM became irrelevant or defunct. Fact is that the even if we pacify ourselves that world became unipolar (with America as the only pole), the theory is grossly incorrect. It may be true that the other pole (the emerging communist block with the South American nations as the new face of communism) is not so powerful, but the world still remains bipolar. So maintaining the nonaligned status and upholding the NAM fundamentals would have been a better choice than to just succumb to the American pressures of all kinds - be it economic, political, social or nuclear (for that matter). The fundamentals of NAM kept us awake and vigilant all the time and it allowed us to maintain our sovereignty to the maximum. Moment we gave up on those ideas and starting falling in for the American subjugation, the results were what we have been facing for long low. The terror in the Valley, fundamentalist attacks in other parts of our nation, compromise on the principles of sovereignty - are all results of our deviation from the NAM fundamentals. If our affiliation towards America and its western allies was not so evident, I don't see any reason for the concentration of fundamentalist forces tarnishing our social fabric. By saying this I really do not want to justify any of their (terrorist's) action but would surely like to emphasize the impact of the deviation of our policies. There was a time when Late Rajiv Gandhi criticized US attack on Iraq in the beginning of 1990s and stood by the principle of NAM to condemn any unjustified attack on any weaker nation. But today our policy makers are not at all ashamed of withdrawal from those principles. They show complete apathy towards American atrocities in the middle east. And by doing so they buy in the concept of American subjugation (along with its allied partners like Israel) to attack the so called Muslim but otherwise third world countries like Lebanon, Iran and create a hegemony-like situation in the region. Though I am of the strong belief that the fundamentalist forces don't have any religion but I would prefer to differ from the view that they are enemy to the entire world. If they were so, why is China able to save itself from any of their nefarious plans? Why do you think they are not able to make much dent into the South American countries? So, coming back to the lackluster foreign policy due to which we have to face these attacks, it is proved that we are made the scapegoat because of our own weaknesses and not because the enemy is stronger. As far as the intentions of these fundamentalist forces are concerned, they are here to just disrupt the normalcy and gain the attention of the nation. We all know that fundamentalists have (except for an exception of Afghanistan) never succeeded in shaking democracies or any other form of government but they have certainly succeeded in creating social imbalances. They have also worked to weaken the democratic fundamentals of a country.

And coming back to our original debate, when the common man dies (with a few aberrations of a few top people also sacrificing their lives) we need to introspect what's the reason behind all of it. We need to introspect that if we have lost this freedom, because we destroyed it ourselves.