The Politics and Economics of Development Under Neoliberalism

Friends,

The elections to the Lok Sabha this year are being held in the backdrop of intense popular anger against the outcomes of the economic policies followed by the ruling classes of the country. These outcomes include, among others, increased poverty, worsening unemployment, a reduction in real incomes for a majority of the population, and corporate encroachment on the assets and livelihoods of the most marginalised sections of society. 23 years of neoliberal economic ‘reforms’ in India have turned out to be 23 years of relentless assaults on the Indian people. All the political formations which were in power during these years – the Congress/UPA, BJP/NDA and the United Front – followed the same basic set of economic policies which piled misery upon the Indian people.

While the outcomes of these ‘reforms’ are more well-known, what is often not recognised is that the reasons given out for rolling out liberalisation measures in 1991 were bogus. It is often claimed that the country had no choice but to adopt the structural adjustment policies prescribed by the IMF. But as Prabhat Patnaik and C P Chandrasekhar (the latter is the speaker in tonight’s public meeting in Lohit mess) pointed out in an important paper in EPW in 1995, the economic crisis at that time was almost entirely speculative in origin, having little to do with the developments in the real sectors of the economy. The vulnerability of the economy to speculative forces was itself in part a result of the gradual 'liberalisation' measures put in place during the second half of the 1980s. Even the foreign exchange crunch could have been easily averted if the Indian banks had not refused to accept the accumulated savings of Indians working in Kuwait who wished to shift the money to India during the Gulf War (about $5-7 billion were reportedly lost to the western banks as a result). Moreover, the magnitude of forex reserves at the end of March 1991 was still large enough to cover almost three months' imports, which was generally considered 'safe' enough in the Indian context.  When import restrictions were imposed (by March 1991), it was the speculative outflow of funds and not the trade or current account deficit which was responsible for the foreign exchange crunch. And yet the Indian government went in for the full gamut of structural adjustment policies - not because of any objective necessity, but because the IMF and the World Bank, as well as elements within the Indian government and the business class (the leading sections of the Indian ruling classes, in short) considered this a golden opportunity to jettison altogether the dirigiste regime which had prevailed since independence.

The problems associated with the economic regime that prevailed till 1991 were very different from what right-wing economists would want us to believe. The dirigiste regime was rife with contradictions – a key factor being the fact that a continuous growth in state spending was essential for the growth of the domestic market, while at the same time the state exchequer was the medium through which large-scale transfers were made to the capitalist and proto-capitalist groups; the state in other words was an instrument for the primary accumulation of capital. These two roles that the state had to perform were incompatible in the long run. But what the ruling classes wanted to do was to eliminate every aspect of the economic regime which were inconvenient for capital – which included the interventionist nature of the state, and the sizeable public sector that the economy had come to acquire.

That 2.8 lakh farmers have committed suicide in India since 1995 is perhaps the most horrifying outcome of the economic reform measures put in place in our country. The deep agrarian crisis in India is a direct result of measures which include actual declines in central government revenue expenditure on rural development, cuts in subsidies, declines in public infrastructure and energy investments that affect rural areas, dismantling of the universal public distribution system, reduction in priority sector lending by banks which reduced the availability of rural credit and pushed peasants into the hands of moneylenders, and the liberalisation of external trade. Trade liberalisation, which entailed the removal of quantitative restrictions and reduction in import tariffs, was instrumental in triggering severe crashes in the prices of a number of important crops and in causing increased volatility in crop prices. The decline in real incomes and the high indebtedness which the peasantry fell prey to resulted in the most blood curdling episode of structural violence the country has seen in recent times, something which can only be called policy-driven mass murder.

The failure to create jobs is yet another important feature of the era of neoliberal reforms. This phenomenon used to be called ‘jobless growth’ when growth rates were high, but now even the much trumpeted economic growth rates have come down. The National Sample Surveys of 2004-05 and 2009-10 show that even during the period of extraordinarily high growth between these two years, the number of those who reported their “usual status” as being employed increased by a mere 0.8 percent per year. The population of the country grew at around 1.5 percent per annum during the same period.

Neoliberal economic reforms have resulted in vicious attacks on the workers in India. Jobs have become increasingly contractualised and casualised, thus diminishing job security. This in turn has meant that it is far more difficult for workers today to unionise for their rights, as employers find it easier to "hire and fire" workers. Successive governments, instead of implementing laws designed to protect workers, have sought to dilute, weaken and do away with labour laws. They have actively encouraged the mushrooming of Export Processing Zones and Special Economic Zones where labour laws effectively do not apply. And yet it is often not recognised that as per data (and contrary to the lies peddled by the corporate media), far more mandays (61%) are lost due to investor strikes (lockouts) rather than workers' strikes (39%).

State policy under neoliberalism, which focusses on appeasing finance capital, has entailed a withdrawal of the State from its role in supporting and protecting petty production against the onslaughts of big capital. This has exposed petty producers (such as peasants, craftsmen, fishermen and artisans), and also petty traders to a process of expropriation. Such expropriation has occurred both through a direct takeover by big capital of their assets, like land, at throwaway prices, and also through a reduction in their incomes, and hence their capacity to survive. The dispossessed petty producers throng urban areas in search of work, adding to the number of job-seekers. This, along with the inability to create new jobs, has worsened the problem of unemployment in the country.

The neoliberal era has been a time when big capital is out to grab assets at throwaway prices or for free, including the property of petty producers as mentioned above, along with common property, tribal property (through predatory mining by corporates) and state property (through privatisation). This period in other words has seen a process of “primitive accumulation of capital” with a vengeance. This process often requires the complicity of state personnel, which forms the basis of the big ticket corporate-led corruption that we have seen in this period.

The high inflation that has hit the people hard in recent times (10% as measured by the Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers during 2008-13) has resulted in an absolute fall in the real incomes of vast sections of society. This phenomenon again is a result of the anti-people policies which characterise neoliberalism — India’s vulnerability to the effects of changes in international prices has increased with trade liberalisation and the deregulation of the administered price regime in the oil sector. At the same time, increased industrial concentration due to the dilution of anti-monopoly measures and reduced regulation has encouraged a profit driven escalation in the prices of manufactured goods such as pharmaceuticals. The imbalances between demand and supply of primary products are accentuated by the government’s reluctance to release additional food through the public distribution system in order to limit subsidies. The drive to reduce subsidies has also resulted in a continuous increase in the prices of commodities such as petroleum and fertilisers whose prices are administered. In some instances, as in the case of natural gas, price increases are not even driven by costs, but a shameless attempt to provide large transfers to industrial groups like Reliance. These increases have fed into the costs and prices of other commodities.

The need of the hour is to intensify our fight against the anti-people policies pursued by the ruling classes of the country, and a better understanding of the politics and economics of development under neoliberalism is essential to sharpen this struggle.

We invite one and all to tonight’s public meeting in Lohit Mess, to be addressed by Prof. C.P. Chandrasekhar.

Protest the Supreme Court Verdict Upholding Section 377 of the IPC!

In a major setback to the LGBT community as well as to democratic and human rights, the Supreme Court has set aside the Delhi High Court ruling which had decriminalized homosexuality and which had read down section 377 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). The Delhi HC verdict of 2009 had observed that Section 377 is violative of Articles 21 (Right to Protection of Life and Personal Liberty), 14 (Right to Equality before Law) and 15 (Prohibition of Discrimination on Grounds of Religion, Race, Caste, Sex or Place) of the Constitution. In overturning the HC verdict, the SC has sought to absolve itself from the responsibility of confirming what ought to be a basic human right of consenting adults. What the Court has upheld is a colonial-era law which discriminates against sexual minorities and criminalizes their sexual behaviour— Section 377 makes the consensual sexual activity of homosexual adults an offence punishable with up to life imprisonment. It is indeed outrageous that this draconian law classifies homosexuality as being “against the order of nature”, when the fact is that homosexuality is observed in more than 1500 species in nature.

Heteronormativity, or the institutionalized imposition of heterosexuality as a norm, finds place amongst the most oppressive features of our society. Deeply tied in with the institution of the patriarchal family, it is a part of the larger complex of gender violence, oppression and exploitation. Every regressive aspect of gender relations – skewed gender roles, objectification of women, sexual violence – has a deep connection with the imposed norm of heterosexuality. The fight against heteronormativity must necessarily, therefore, be a part of the struggle for democratizing gender relations and the institution of the family. The SC verdict, by striking a major blow to the movement for LGBT rights, represents the desperate flailing of the forces of reaction against precisely such a struggle for democratization.

The last couple of decades, marked by wide-ranging neoliberal reforms, have seen an increasing communalization of our society. An integral part of this process of communalization has been a strengthening of the most reactionary facets of our social world – from caste structures to domination based on gender. While on the one hand, the neoliberal dispensation has ushered in the worst forms of commodification of women, on the other, the growing communalization of our social space has produced increasingly repressive and tyrannical control over love and sexuality. From obnoxious forms of moral policing to khap panchayat-led honour crimes, there is a rising onslaught on the very fundamental freedom of choice. Combatting the growing communalization of our society, therefore, requires a vigorous defense of these freedoms – from the freedom to choose one’s partner in marriage, to the freedom to exercise choices based on one’s sexual orientation. Vigorous assertion and recognition of these freedoms occupy, therefore, a central place in the project of pushing back communal, reactionary forces. The SC judgment is a direct assault on this project.

The SC judgment highlights once more how religious bigotry is an arch enemy of the fundamental liberties of the people. The case in the Supreme Court saw a veritable confluence of religious bigots of every hue – with the likes of Baba Ramdev and elements of the Sangh Parivar leading the pack – rally vigorously against fundamental sexual freedoms. The SC judgment is being hailed and commended by zealots across the board, irrespective of religious denomination. These charlatans and self-proclaimed religious “leaders” need to be reminded that the history of progressive movements across the country is a testament to religion increasingly becoming an arena of contestation. Waves of social reform movements, increasingly under the leadership of oppressed, marginalized and exploited sections, are questioning and challenging the tyrannical and oppressive aspects of established religion. SFI appeals to all progressive sections to stand together in rock solid unity in these struggles.

The SC judgment, very disturbingly, brings out the increasing sway of the forces of reaction on the judiciary. From the Ayodhya verdict, to the many blanket acquittals in the cases of carnage wreaked by the Ranvir Sena, to the current decision, casteist, feudal, and reactionary prejudice has increasingly tended to cloud judicial judgements. The SFI believes that this tendency poses a fundamental threat to the very fabric of our democratic system. In the current case, though, a legislation can potentially overturn the judgment. SFI demands that the central government immediately take up the task of passing a law decriminalizing alternative sexualities and recognizing the fundamental rights of sexual minorities.

The struggle for ensuring and safeguarding the rights of marginalized sexualities is a long and protracted one. SFI stands in firm solidarity with this arduous battle.

Omprakash Valmiki Departs; The Task of Annihilation of Caste Is Still On!

SFI expresses deep condolences on the demise of noted Hindi writer Omprakash Valmiki, whose works paved way for a movement of Dalit assertion in Hindi Literature and its power centres of upper caste domination. In his demise Hindi literature has lost a powerful champion of the assertion of the voices of the unheard and hence also one of the most important figures in the democratisation of a space which still continues to be largely undemocratic.

Omprakash Valmiki was born in Western Uttar Pradesh’s Muzaffarnagar district and had a rough and deprived childhood, which formed the material basis of him questioning the very basis of the society based on the foundations of caste discrimination. Jabalpur’s Marxist study groups brought him in contact with the rich realism of Gorky and Chekhov; while Bombay gave him the fire of the poetry of Namdeo Dhasal, Daya Pawar and the Dalit Panther’s politics of resistance. It was Chandapur though where he became totally absorbed in the Dalit movement. He says: “It was in this part of the country that I came across the marvellous glow of Dalit consciousness. The self-fulfilment that I experienced in connecting with the Dalit movement was a truly unique experience for me.”

He emerged on the horizon of Hindi literature as a comet which was not to vanish into flames; rather it sparked a thousand other comets. Modern Hindi literature had been a citadel of upper caste dominance right since the days of the Nagari Pracharini Sabha and the control of the mathadhish-s over the Hindi departments, publishing houses and magazines across North India still remains more or less intact. Unlike in Marathi or Telugu Literature, Dalits were largely underrepresented in Hindi literature until the late 1980s, when a spurt of works by Dalit writers were published and new magazines and literary groups with focus on Dalit literature started coming up. This period coincided with publication of Valmiki’s autobiographical work Joothan, which announced the arrival of Dalit literature onto the stage of Hindi literature. The genre of autobiography has since then emerged as a powerful means of the assertion of Dalit subjectivity that translates victimhood into a weapon of resistance. Casteism and untouchability were something which Valmiki saw everywhere from his village in Western UP to the cosmopolitan Bombay, and throughout Joothan, there is a definite urge in extending the individual experience to the ongoing movements and towards the creation of a Dalit identity. The publication of Joothan and Valmiki’s surname itself created ripples in the literary circles of Hindi. He says: “This surname is now an indispensable part of my name. Omprakash has no identity without it. ‘Identity ‘and ‘recognition’, the two words say a lot by themselves. Dr. Ambedkar was born in a Dalit family. But Ambedkar signifies a Brahmin caste name; it was a pseudonym given by a Brahmin teacher of his. When joined with ‘Bhimrao’ however it becomes his identity, completely changing its meaning in the process. Today ‘Bhimrao’ has no meaning without ‘Ambedkar’.”

The emergence of Dalit literature has been a step forward in the larger task of the democratisation of Indian Society. While remembering Omprakash Valmiki, it is important to underscore the fact that true democratisation and concrete advances towards the goal of his entire life – the annihilation of caste – can be made only when “annihilate caste” becomes the slogan of all democratic sections of the country. The coming together of progressive forces is absolutely necessary to take the fight against casteism and Brahmanism to its logical conclusion. Today when our Universities and public life continue to be engulfed by the fangs of caste, when huge dropout rates of students belonging to deprived backgrounds is not merely a statistic but a naked display of caste discrimination, the urgency of this task cannot be overemphasised. It is in rising up to the urgency of our times that we will be able to do justice to the memory of Omprakash Valmiki.

Groundbreaking Struggle against Sexual Harassment and Ragging in Pondicherry University

The Pondicherry University (PU) administration has gone to extraordinary lengths to protect criminal elements who indulged in sexual harassment, ragging and intimidation of girl students in the campus. Instead of punishing those who engaged in such criminal activities, the administration suspended the girl complainants and others who stood by them! The students are on indefinite hunger strike now, and the Madras High Court has stayed the suspensions.

The series of events that led to this began when Jithu, a senior male student, verbally abused two girl students (Kavya M and Vidya T Appukuttan) a few weeks back. When the girls told him that this is not the way to talk, he threatened to rape them. A complaint was filed against the aggressor, and the police filed an FIR against him under IPC sections 506 and 509. In the subsequent days, the students who supported the girl students were threatened and abused, and on October 1 morning, a gang of hooligans manhandled them. They threatened that they would cut off the legs of the students who stood with the girl students if the assailant was suspended from the University because of the complaint filed by the girl students. The gang also brutally beat up one of the students; his tooth was broken and he had to be admitted in JIPMER, Pondicherry. The security personnel of the University remained mute spectators throughout even as the gang unleashed violence.

When one of the girl students who were harassed approached the Vice-Chancellor with her grievance, she was discouraged from filing the complaint – the VC’s prime “concern” was that the “reputation” of the institution would be spoiled. Ever since she filed the complaint, the girl student has been continuously subjected to intimidation and threatened that she wouldn’t be allowed to complete her course of study in the University. Even more shockingly, the attempts to intimidate her were being led by Mr. Praveen, a faculty member of the Department of Physical Education. There were also attempts to slap false cases on the students who helped the girls in filing the complaint against the attacker.

The students of the University conducted a massive protest on 1 October night against these criminal acts in the campus. The protest saw massive participation of girl students and others, who demanded that the University must take steps on an urgent basis to stop ragging, sexual harassment and goonda raj in the campus, and that the University must set up a Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment (GSCASH) to address complaints of sexual harassment in the University.

The subsequent days saw further attempts to harass the girl complainant. The university administration issued showcause notices to Kavya and Vidya along with the students who stood by them, for "creating a tense situation in the campus", for talking to the media and so on! The students of PU, however, did not take it lying down. They fought back the patriarchal administration’s machinations fearlessly through campaigns and protests. Students and other democratic sections led by SFI and AIDWA staged another protest demonstration on 23 October in Puducherry demanding strict action against the sexual harassers and the setting up of GSCASH.

But in a decision that could only be termed illogical, irrational and shocking, the PU administration issued a memorandum, signed by the university Registrar, suspending the two girl students and five other students who stood by them. In the memorandum, the university administration sought to equate the aggressors and the victims by portraying the acts of sexual harassment and ragging as merely a case of “mutual fight and exchange of abusive words”. The other charges were even more ridiculous – “having approached the media to release the news without obtaining due permission from the University” and having organised “unauthorised protests within the university campus” are the other “crimes” that the students have supposedly engaged in. 

Since when did talking to the media and holding peaceful protests become crimes in this country? Since when did "the right to freedom of speech and expression", and "the right to assemble peaceably and without arms" cease to be part of the Fundamental Rights guaranteed by the Constitution of India? The right to protest against injustice constitutes the very essence of democracy, the suppression of which has become the hallmark of the Pondicherry University administration.

Kavya, one of the complainants suspended by the University, was on an indefinite hunger strike from Monday (4 November 2013) against the despotic, vindictive measures by the University administration. Most condemnably, the police forcibly arrested her on Thursday night. But her mantle was taken up by Vidya, Abhijith and Rony, who went on hunger strike immediately. Within hours (on Friday, 8 November), the Madras High Court issued a stay order on the University's decision to suspend the students. The struggle of the student community for justice will now continue with renewed vigour.

SFI has demanded that the Union Minister of Human Resource Development, the UGC and the Vice-President of India (who is the Chancellor of PU) must intervene to ensure the safety and security of girl students in the campus and to ensure that the culprits in the case are given exemplary punishment. We demand that a GSCASH be set up in the University immediately as the students have been demanding, and that action be taken against those in the administration who sought to protect those who engaged in sexual harassment and ragging.

It is of deep concern to the student community that 16 years after the Supreme Court in its Vishaka judgement of 1997 laid down binding directives regarding the formation of committees to deal with cases of sexual harassment, GSCASH has still not been formed even in most central Universities. SFI demands that GSCASH be constituted in all Universities and colleges in the country in order to effectively address cases of sexual harassment in campuses and to sensitise students on gender issues. The incidents in PU underscore the need for intensifying our struggle for gender justice and against ragging in campuses across the country.

Condemn the Attack by RSS-ABVP on SFI Activists in Himachal Pradesh University!

TNUEF Conducts Successful Struggle against Caste Discrimination

Public Meeting on "Muzaffarnagar and Beyond"