Get real, Comrades!

If words can destroy this was it. Comrades Bardhan and Yechury of the Left Front have between themselves helped wipe out several thousand crores of wealth of small and big investors with two sentences. One said the stock market can go to hell and the other said the disinvestment ministry will be closed down. The Sensex tumbled over 200 points. Forget what West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadev Bhattacharya is doing. Forget the lessons CPM leaders may have learnt on their innumerable trips to China. Forget Jyoti Basu8217;s voice of moderation. These guys are breathing old style commie fire. That was the message the markets took. So who8217;ll pick up the tab now? Get real, Comrades. You are now in the real world.

First get real about Verdict 2004. The Congress and BJP share between themselves more than 50 per cent of the popular vote. Both parties have followed a set of economic policies over the past decade that the Left has relentlessly criticised. While the Congress and BJP have had differences on specifics, including on disinvestments, they have both in opposition supported economic bills brought forward by the other in government. Now comes the Left Front with no doubt an impressive surge in its popular vote, but one that is a fraction of the vote share of the Congress and the BJP and one that is confined largely to Bengal and Kerala, with some picked up with the help of allies like the Congress in states like Andhra Pradesh. But so puffed up is the Left with its 8220;parliamentary revolution8221; and a record of 64 MPs, that it thinks it has the mandate to run the entire country! This is the height of presumption. True, such self-importance is aided by the deal-making capabilities of CPM bossman Harkishan Singh Surjeet. But merely because the likes of Mulayam Singh Yadav, Deve Gowda and Sharad Pawar have appointed Surjeet as their deal maker, does not mean that the Left tail can be presumptuous enough to wag the coalitional policy dog. That too before a common minimum programme has been worked out.

Perhaps some Left leaders think that giving loud and rhetorical speeches would mean no harm since the idea is to keep the comrades happy. But the impact of Bardhan8217;s intemperate outbursts and Yechury8217;s partisan demand has been destructive for the stock market. Remember, if investors are scared away from India they can go elsewhere. The loss is not theirs but ours. Remember also that stock markets are here to stay. Even Shanghai has one. So there is no point in lecturing about finance capital and the wages of globalisation. This is the real world. A mere 64 MPs are not going to make globalised, market-friendly, capitalist India a Stalinist cul-de-sac. So, rather than ask the markets to go to hell, it may be a better idea to find out how markets work and why people in power must talk in measured tones so as not to make them needlessly nervous, destroying people8217;s wealth in the process. And, remember, 8220;people in power8221; means you too, Comrades!