Opinion Presidents address
The lead editorial in the latest issue of CPI(M) mouthpiece Peoples Democracy describes the Presidents address to the joint session of Parliament...
The lead editorial in the latest issue of CPI(M) mouthpiece Peoples Democracy describes the Presidents address to the joint session of Parliament as one which is full of bombastic claims. Many of the programmes and schemes that have been enumerated are actually a repetition and a follow-up of what was contained in the Common Minimum Programme of the previous government. This in itself constitutes an admission that much of what was promised last time around remains unfulfilled, it says.
This is confirmed by the fact that many of the flagship programmes like Rural Employment Guarantee and Bharat Nirman have been unable to fulfill their targets. While the NREGA has,on an average,given 48 days of work as against the promised 100,the government could achieve only 27 per cent of the target for rural electrification 56 per cent of the targeted expansion of irrigation, it says.
It claims that the government continues to be a state of denial on the impact of the global economic recession on India. On the Presidents view that the Indian economy has not suffered the kind of slowdown that has been witnessed in almost every other country,the editorial argues that this has been largely because of the Left parties which prevented the previous government from proceeding with unbridled financial liberalisation. The President has spoken of the governments commitment for an inclusive society and an inclusive economy as the goal set before the country by her government in 2004. What is the reality of the last five years?… Notwithstanding the bombastic claims of a high growth trajectory,until the global capitalist crisis and recession impacted upon us,the reality of economic reforms of liberalisation,privatisation and globalisation has been the creation of two Indias a shining India for a few and a suffering India for the vast majority, it says.
What the Left parties were able to prevent during the course of the last five years has now been brought to the centre stage.
This comes at a time when the US government has virtually nationalised General Motors which declared bankruptcy! Surely,resources need to be raised,but this must come from those sections who can afford and must part with their profits for nation building. This cannot come by decimating what has already been built by the public sector, it says.
Oz racism
An article by Politburo member Sitaram Yechury links the racist attacks against Indian students in Australia with the global financial crisis. He says to attribute such attacks as an expression of racism alone,in the present context of global recession,would be missing the woods for the trees. Racist outrages are an expression of a deeper malaise. Between January 2008 and January 2009,Australias GDP growth rate plummeted from 4.2 per cent to 0.3 per cent. The last quarter saw company profits falling by 7.2 per cent. Business investment tumbled at a record rate of nearly 9 per cent. Additionally,this year has seen one of Australias worst droughts. As a result of this,unemployment climbed to 5.4 per cent in April 2009 from 3.9 per cent in February 2008. The Australian prime minister has declared,for the first time,that the economy has moved into a state of recession. Though the Labour government in Australia has begun distributing a whopping 9.9 billion Australian dollars to low-income families directly,clearly serious problems of livelihood are affecting its people, he says.
The way of tackling the present crisis must be based on putting people before profits and not the other way around. This,however,requires the recognition that the path of neo-liberal globalisation of recent decades has ended, he says while noting that corporate India,however,continues to remain in the neo-liberal mindset,notwithstanding the collapse and bankruptcy of its global high priests.
Compiled by Manoj C.G.
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