In pre-liberalisation India, Left parties had a well-earned reputation of being the bugbears of industrialisation. Striking work at the drop of a hammer, making unreasonable labour demands, employing violence to have their way, forcing lockouts… left-backed unions had emerged as a major stumbling block. In post-liberalisation India, the Left parties have targetted their sickles on the stock markets, on the privatisation of public sector units, on land acquisiton for dams and special economic zones, on executive salaries, on petrol and diesel prices, on the nuclear deal, and such like.
Yesterday, in an uncharacteristic outburst, finance minister P. Chidambaram lashed out at the Left, indirectly accusing them of enjoying power without responsibility, for criticising and opposing everything being done by the UPA government of Manmohan Singh, including the Rs 60,000 crore farm loan waiver. “Those who say market growth is irrelevant and those who say the growth only helps the rich are the worst enemies of the poor. It is because of the growth, the Government is able to do many development programmes,” Chidambaram had said on Saturday in Madurai.
Question: Is the Left an enemy of the poor, or is it a necessary evil, a tempering factor, in the face of rampant liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation? Is the left making friends of the poor and underprivileged by batting for them, or is it condemning them to a life in the trenches? Is the Left opposition making India a better, more conscientious country, or is it dividing the nation between them and us, the haves and havenots? Is the Left adopting double standards by cheering China for the very sins it accuses India of?
Are the Left parties which are in power in just three States, and with 60+ MPs in the Lok Sabha, holding an entire country to ransom? Or is it reminding the nation that in the midst of all the progress and development, the glitz and glamour of Incredible India, there is a need for social conscience without which Atulya Bharat will perish?
Left is not just enemy to the growth of the country. they are enemy to nation it self. they got only one idealogy is to oppose US and BJP.
the same way they have no words to china where they are against to india.
Nowhere in the world has communism been successful in building up an economically strong country. Communism will work only if all citizens are perfect and selfless which is asking for the impossible. Communists want to discount the wealth-building ability of entrepreneurs and want to adopt the impossibility of public sector efficiency. They seem to forget that we are all human prone to errors of corruption, lack of accountability and what not. The utopia that they dream of can never be realised.
One rule for Modi one for Marx? An entire post on the left with no reference to bengal of 2007-2008?
In post-liberalisation India, the Left parties have targetted their sickles … on land acquisiton for dams and special economic zones, …
I am confused now. When they blocked out the police, the army and the media, slapped patkar around, and sent their AK nalvatt eLu wielding armed militias and killed god knows how many, they were targeting sickles on land acquisition for SEZ?
When they defended their actions with “our people and their people” they were batting for the poor and underpriviliged and uniting us?
Depending upon what they have or havenot, there are a lot of classes in india. apart from the obvious categories, some people have CPI’s backing others not. hussain has(not chappals, backing) and taslima not for example. some parties have media’s backing others not.
Against all evidence, even if we assume that CPI and the media bats for the obvious categories, who bats for the rest of the havenots?
Any doubts still? Visit Calcutta to see how the left have looted a once prosperous state and reduced it to penury and how they have enriched themselves at the cost of the “poor” people for 25 glorious years.
Communists do not bring poor people above the poverty line. Instead they want to drag those that are above poverty line back into poverty and penury. They want to distribute, not wealth, but poverty. History of communism bears testimony to this. Communist countries were/are in utter poverty and penury. Congress is doing a disservice to the nation by aligning with the left parties for power and thereby causing immense harm to the development of the nation. Need of the hour is for the BJP and Congress is get together and halt these dangerous alien ideologies taking root in India.
Communist parties are turning out to be biggest hypocrites in Indian politics. It seems that they have different yard stick for everyone except for themselves. They don’t seem to be interested with idea of inclusive growth, instead are happy to distribute poverty. By doing all this they are doing a congress act … they just want to keep commie vote bank happy.
Some one said, “The smallest act of kindness is worth more than the grandest intention”. Merely expressing your good intentions/ideology is not enough, you need to back it up with actions, which I personally feel you have never done & always failed at it miserably. All said and done, I have a simple question to communist parties/commies … List me three biggest achievements of commies in independent India ?
Communism is a death cult. It is a well known fact that once communists gain power anywhere (China, West Bengal), they systematically decimate the opposition until everyone is a cadre.
I switch off my TV the moment one of the communists appear. I then sprinkle some holy water before turning it on again
Left is always right. And why? Here’s why: http://anirudhbhati.com/2008/03/07/left-is-always-right/
Is the Left an enemy of the poor,… Did the sun rise in the East today?
Shows the types of political forces men like Chidambaram have to deal with when they sit down to chart the course of our nation. Not an envious job at all!
I don’t know if the left covers it, But, worker rights are important. I remember seeing a picture of laborers working in the iron ore mines of the billionaires from bellary. They didn’t even have a pair of gloves to do their job with. I can imagine what paltry sums they got paid, if they got paid at all. So, the left is important in keeping a check on brutal unregulated Capitalism from exploiting poor, helpless folk. But, they seem more interested in running guns for China and pimping for an illusionary “Non Aligned Movement”!!
What India needs is a free market economy, less government, and proper labor standards. The Left can play a great role in creating proper rights for workers. On everything else they should just shut the fuck up!!
Melange,
“So, the left is important in keeping a check on brutal unregulated Capitalism from exploiting poor, helpless folk.”
The best way is for the helpless folk to help themselves. And the government ought to create conditions for them with the means to do so. As you said proper standards, regulatory bodies and social justice within the reach of all.
I dont think its the problem with ideology of any party. Left is doing this stuff to maintain its uniqueness in Indian politics.
The “Left” in India has never had its priorities or its ideology clear.
The “Far Left” has been for a militant overthrow of the Government and therefore politically marginal at best.
The more “moderate Left” which stands for Parliamentary democracy and the like, is never sure where it stands at any given time, except for a series of antis… anti-globalization, anti-US, anti-BJP, ant-this, anti-that. It has never been able to define its ideology in clear positive terms that differentiate it from the Congress. Most of the Left’s supposedly “positive” positions, such as land reforms, worker’s rights, pro-farmer positions have long been usurped by the Congress. The last is especially ironic, since Communists everywhere have hated farmers and peasants with a virulent, visceral loathing as being anti-modernist and too superstitious and just plain stupid.
The commies are a bunch of losers who, cannot do any good and, wont let anyone else do an any good to the country. Nowhere in the world have we heard of economic prosperity brought about by communist ideology. Russia and China have long abandoned fiscal communism. As a matter of fact, their Gini coefficient is greater than that of US, Japan and other capitalist countries which means that inequality is higher in Russia and China than in the US.
Even in India, the two commie states WB and Kerala have begun to embrace free-market ideologies.
The problem with the Indian Left is that they are generally reactive to other’s ideas rather than having ideas of their own. For example, when the government allowed the opening up of the retail sector to private guys, the Left went hammer and tongs opposing that, saying it would destroy the cornerstore. But they were silent when it was argued that the farmer would benefit because of the increased competition in that sector. They conveniently chose to abandon the farmer in favour of the middlemen.
Labour reforms is another issue they are opposed to – obviously to protect their unions. But they have never been able to counter the argument that labour reforms will help in creating more jobs.
They see the stock market as a gambling house driven by greed and recklessness. But for all its faults, the stock market is more dispassionate and rational compared to them.
The only time they made some sense was when the opposed the WTO obligations on the patent rights of medicines – but were unable to stop it.
The Left’s main ideology is to fault others rather than providing practical solutions. They are eternally condemned to oppose anything that is being done.
We are not against poor. We are against inequality. Hence we distribute poverty equally.
Communists are a bunch of self-centered egoists (do you know kannur) who can do anything to stay in power. Thank god I do not live in kerala or WB shame on their citizens. When I was in school I had debated for communists but now realize its too big a sacrifice to ask for from fickle minded homo-sapiens.The Left better be LEFT out of everything.
P. Carrot! Nicely put!!
The contribution of the Communists and Trade Unions to the development of Mysore is an example. They targeted employment-providing industries like KR Mills, Jawa, MMC and a host of other industies, majority of them are in the iddle and small scale sector. First it was Flag meetings, then Strikes and ultimately lock outs thereby both the entrpreneur and the workers were on the streets . The Sickle made these workers sick and just disappeared. Left , they have not left anything. Only the Party cardholders are enjoying..
@ Carrot
Distributing the poverty was the aim of communism initially. The Indian commies have forgot that ideology long back. They are China boot licking assholes.
Even the very idea of distributing poverty is disturbing. You need to distribute wealth, not poverty. For that you need to generate wealth, for which a bunch of these morons are so opposed to.