Opinion View from the Left: Parliament Impasse
CPM’s People’s Democracy blames the Narendra Modi government for the impasse.
Narendra Modi.
Talking about the winter session of Parliament, the CPM’s People’s Democracy blames the Narendra Modi government for the impasse, saying it was “primarily due to the obduracy of this Modi government in not giving the House even a modicum of assurance on contentious issues”. The editorial says the government was unable to “satisfy… Parliament” on either of the two issues of conversion and government circulars asking educational institutions to celebrate December 25 as “Good Governance Day”.
“What the Modi government is seeking in the name of a new legislation is naked efforts at sharpening communal polarisation through campaigns against religious minorities in the country,” the editorial argues on the anti-conversion bill.
“Ministers accused the Left parties that the insistence on the prime minister and prime minister alone giving such an assurance is the blatant excuse for disrupting parliamentary proceedings. On the contrary, on the earlier occasion, when a minister of state in the Union cabinet made completely unacceptable and obnoxious insinuations against the BJP’s opponents, the prime minister indeed gave an assurance that such happenings will not repeat. But then, what is the result? The BJP ministers and MPs continue with unrestricted abandon… That is why the prime minister is now being asked to not merely give assurances but promise action this time round,” it adds.
SILENT PM
The CPI’s New Age says Prime Minister Modi’s reluctance to come to the Rajya Sabha to “explain his government’s stand on all the rubbish the BJP members of Parliament are doling out on a daily basis to divert people’s attention from the real socio-economic issues” seemed to be a “calculated move”.
“Despite Modi’s reprimand of his own minister of state Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti in both Houses… various outfits of the Sangh Parivar and BJP MPs are continuing their tirade against the very secular democratic fabric of the country… Of course, it was expected that the RSS… [would] sooner or later resort to this path. But the haste it has shown and the way the government has adopted the attitude of looking the other way shows that the whole plan has full backing of the government and that is the reason Narendra Modi is not ready to disapprove it publicly,” says the editorial.
AFTER PESHAWAR
The CPI(ML)’s ML Update talks about the “barbaric massacre” of school students in Peshawar and says this has “underlined the senselessness and inhumanity of the toxic cocktail of religion and politics”.
“This unspeakable crime must mark the beginning of the end of the Taliban and intensify our resistance against every variety of religious fundamentalist violence. The Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as well as the Boko Haram and ISIS plan and execute the deliberate, cold-blooded, planned massacre of unarmed innocents in the name of religion,” the editorial says, adding that the Peshawar massacre “could mark a turning point for Pakistan”
“What is striking and welcome, after recent episodes of terrorism, has been the refusal of people to succumb to the climate of Islamophobia… In many ways, the Peshawar massacre and Pakistan’s current situation is a warning to India, of the consequences of the toxic mix of religion and politics and of being a tool of US imperialism in the region,” the editorial stresses, adding, “The Pakistani state needs to urgently introspect, take stock and correct course…”
Compiled by Ruhi Tewari
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