Focus on the Global South- India - On The National Political Agenda

The three issues have already emerged on our political landscape. But they are being viewed by the mainstream political formations more as grist to the mill of competitive, opportunist, electoral politics. They seem to be perceived as discreet phenomena, each having its own distinct logic with little interconnection. Worse still, in their eyes, these are mere hiccups, although they are discomforting and sometimes, even unnerving. The galloping growth, the strengthening of internal security apparatus and the camouflage of the 'human face' are expected to 'take care' of such sporadic episodes. This is considered to be sober and sound politics, in contrast to the reckless, vicious and divisive politics of stoking religious and caste animosities for petty political gains, of which there is no dearth. Eclecticism, pragmatism and opportunism that characterize the mainstream approaches miss the wood for the trees, misconceive the spreading forest fire as sporadic arson, or, even worse, treat it as an opportunity to roast their political game.

The three issues are connected with one another integrally and cannot be viewed in isolation or eclectically. The themes they invoke are part of a longer historical continuum at the national level. They are also vitally linked to contemporary global processes.

The agrarian crisis and the threatened decimation of the peasantry are causally connected with the process of globalising growth¹, which is the accepted agenda of all mainstream political formations. The marginalized peasantry, the forest dwelling Adivasis and the landless poor depending on agriculture and allied activities for their livelihood are the first and the worst victims of the unfolding logic of the globalising growth. A large mass of the Muslim minority falls in the two of these affected categories. And as a community they suffer from a serious jeopardy arising out of the US's global politics of Islamophobia and its inevitable repercussions, particularly in our country where the ruling elite has chosen not to question, much less to expose and resist, this politics. Growing assertion of these marginalized classes is the dialectical response to the developing situation.

Amelioration of the peasantry, secularism, and social justice were the three objective functions, which defined our national freedom movement, a remarkable and unique mass movement against colonialism in the modern times. It is not that these desiderata were realized in their entirety in actuality. But they contributed immensely to the process of nation building. Without their articulation, the Indian Nation could never be a viable entity. The trinity of the issues on the national political agenda underlines the contemporary reality of the developing challenge to these basic principles and the emerging response to this challenge.

The dynamics of the situation can be better understood if we place it in the global perspective. Three major contradictions can be clearly perceived at the global level in contemporary times:
* North vs South;
* "Growth" vs Environment Conservation;
* Corporate Capital vs the stagnating median (North) and the poor masses (South).

Concurrently, three crises situations have emerged at the global level:

* Military Confrontation between the US forces and the West Asian Nationalism;
* Fragility of the Global Financial System;
* Threatened decimation of the world peasantry, particularly in the third world.

The circuitry of interconnections between these contradictions and crises situations at the global level, on the one hand, and the three issues on the national political agenda, on the other, passes through the critical junction built in by the pursuit of globalising growth by the ruling elite at the national level. The basic contradiction at the national level between such a pursuit by the ruling elite and the abiding wider objectives of peasant amelioration, upholding secularism and ensuring social justice, generates the trinity of the national political agenda.

The logic of globalised growth persuades the ruling elite to ignore, obfuscate or minimize the three major contradictions at the global level. More dangerous, it compels the ruling establishment to stand by the wrong side of these contradictions (North, "Growth", Corporate Capital) and against the right side (South, Conservation of Environment, Poorer masses). Consequentially, in responding to the global crises, the ruling classes find themselves either defenceless (as in regard to fragility of the global financial system and the threatened decimation of the third world peasantry) or on the wrong side (as in case of military confrontation of the US with the West Asian Nationalism).

What implications does the foregoing have for the strategies to be adopted? First, we must recognize that single issue strategies, or strategies based on eclectic or opportunistic combination of issues or isolated, sporadic strategies would not work. Also, while in the nature of things, that is to say, deriving from the wider social objective functions and the historical continuum of which they are part, the strategy has to be conceived and operationalised at the national level, it can not be viewed in isolation, overlooking the contradictions, crises situations and the potential allies/adversaries in the global context. (The ruling elite has already grasped this and has established its linkages with its allies in the global context.) Indeed the global context and the global solidarity are becoming increasingly far more significant, if not critical, elements in evolving a national strategy.

In operational terms, at the national level, we should work for a Grand Alliance of Peasantry, Adivasis, Dalits, OBCs and Moslems against the elite agenda of globalising growth. At the international level we need to forge an alliance with the right side of the three contradictions at the global level.

What are the policies that would need to be adopted in pursuance of such a strategy? The following is the ten- point priority list pertaining to critical areas:
* Disengagement from the US strategic design and opposing US militarism and Islamophobia;
* Strengthening the autonomy of the Indian Financial System and protecting it from the fragility (and the rapacity) of the international system; working for regional financial co-operation eg. Asian Monetary Union;
* Defeating the WTO/AoA paradigm on agriculture;
* Defeating Corporate takeover of Indian agriculture and expropriation of rural and urban land;
* Evolving a peasant- centric alternative for South- South cooperation in agricultural production and trade;
* Alternative national policies on agriculture and industry which will not only repudiate the elite strategy of globalising growth but also promote self-reliance; inter-personal, inter-class² and inter- regional equity; and conservation of environment. It will imply a radical reconstruction of the agrarian mode of production and employment- intensive and mass consumption -oriented rural industrialization;
* Legally guaranteed preferential opportunity in education and employment for the socially disadvantaged classes and communities;
* Introducing Common School System from the primary level;
* A national wages and incomes policy severely limiting the disparity across the sectors and classes;
* A new energy policy consistent with the reorientation of the strategic, agrarian and industrial policies.

Endnotes:

1 By globalising growth we mean growth, which is dependent and volatile, unequalising and polarizing, environment- endangering and livelihood- displacing.
2 The term ' Inter- class' here refers to socially and educationally backward and advanced classes.