Sangh Parivar scared of potential of farmers struggle to facilitate emergence of non-communal platform to dismantle divisive construct, challenge Modi

 

Potential of farmers struggle to catalyse rise of non-communal platform scares Sangh Parivar

Jagtar Singh

 Ground Zero

The ongoing struggle commanded by the farmers from Punjab who happen to be predominantly Sikhs has rattled the Sangh Parivar that has launched  atrocious campaign to vilify it as being the under-cover mobilisation for Khalistan.

This first ever such massive non-communal mobilisation of the people on the very basic  issue of survival has the potential to facilitate emergence of non-communal broader platform to challenge and dismantle the divisive regime constructed over the years by the Sangh Parivar of which Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a very refined product. Every policy of this regime is dictated by the agenda of constructing a Hindu India. The farmers struggle can get transformed into broader platform for non-communal forces that is absent till now. This is what scares the Sangh Parivar that is trying to demolish this struggle as being part of Khalistan agenda.

The Sangh Parivar should know that Punjab has history of the most peaceful struggles in the Indian sub-continent, besides the militant ones.

Narendra Modi has not so far faced such stiff resistance to his economic and other policies that include demonitisation and unplanned lockdown that have dealt a disastrous blow to the economy resulting in massive unemployment and shrinking of income of the people at large while the assets of the corporates have multiplied during the same period.

Punjab’s socio-political dynamics and economics is different from other states and this what the Modi government seems to have initially miscalculated while attacking this agitation as by people who were misguided by the Congress or some other forces. Ironically, even the Shiromani Akali Dal that for years claimed itself to be the party of farmers failed to comprehend the potential of this struggle going by the way Parkash Singh Badal, Sukhbir Singh Badal and Harsimrat Kaur Badal defended the ordinances initially. Sukhbir Singh Badal even went to the extent of saying that the people who were agitating were not farmers but “Naxalites” and misguided. The party  failed to resist pressure of this struggle and was forced to end its more than two decade old alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party.

However, the Sangh Parivar has finally realised the wider threat to its agenda from the resistance put up by the farmers in Punjab in which their colleagues from other states have joined now.

The issue is very simple. The government has to explain as to why virtually this very model that was adopted in Bihar in 2008 has not succeeded. Bihar is a free market but the produce from that state comes to the regulated mandis in Punjab.

Moreover, private traders are free to buy even in Punjab and Haryana but the MSP regime is applicable only to wheat and paddy in these two states, not the other crops. Private buyers don’t purchase maize at MSP in Punjab but at prices much below. These are the basic issues that the Modi government must address.

The struggle has been triggered in that very sector that has sustained the economy after the disastrous demonitisation, GST and lockdown.

The Modi government faced first sustained opposition on the Citizens Amendment Act but it did not affect the people at large. This was confined to the Muslims and many of the opposition parties failed to take pragmatic position against this divisive onslaught. The COVID outbreak killed that agitation.

The Modi government subsequently opted for introducing policy changes in the farm sector under COVID.  The first resistance erupted in Punjab where, ironically, the farmers are divided into more than 30 organisations and the political party that used to articulate their issues at one time stands alienated from them.

The farmers organisations represent all the colours in the rainbow. The two main Communist parties can’t win even a single seat in Punjab at their own but the Left has a strong base among the farmers and about 13 organisations of farmers and farm workers are associated with the progressive ideology.

It may be mentioned here that the doctrine of the Sikh religion itself is the most progressive and humanitarian.

With the Congress continuing to be on the suicidal path at the national level and there being no other such pan-India outfit, space is vacant for non-communal articulations.

The farmers platform can expand further to rope in other sections to mobilise resistance against   what are being conceived to be anti-people policies of the Modi government.

This is what the Sangh Parivar is scared of and hence the campaign to attack these farmers as Khalistanis.

But then the people who support the idea of Khalistan too live in Punjab and many of them are also farmers. Like farmers associated with other ideologies, the Khalistan farmers too have a right to resist they policies that every farmer in Punjab perceive to be anti-farmer. The Sanghis should read the verdict of the Supreme Court on the idea of Khalistan.

However, the Khalistan propaganda can be used as a weapon at this very stage  to  crush this struggle and defeat any proposed move to evolve common platform.

The likely emergence of non-communal platform would depend upon the outcome of this struggle.