Monopolistic aggression unabated, just follow Montek and Chidambaram!Every political statement and news updates irrelevant in the Killing fields!
Palash Biswas
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Monopolistic aggression unabated, just follow Montek and Chidambaram!Every political statement and news updates irrelevant in the Killing fields!The poverty line redefined exposes the growth story. Every politician is doing his best to defend it.Forget rating agencies as team Chidambaram Motek combined sustains well the genocide culture very very well.Noting that India continued to be the second fastest growing economy in the world after China, Finance Minister P Chidambaram today said people should not be worried about the current slow down and expressed hope of achieving six per cent growth this fiscal.What does it mean?
We failed to follow the finance minister in United States of America where he succeeded to sell of India and his visit has been followed up by US Vice President Joe Bidden to commercialise Indo Us Nuclear Deal. We almost forgot that once upon a time, the Marxists withdrew support from UPA One government just to stall the deal and the Nation witnessed an unprecedented parliamentary opera.
While I pointed out this to Mr. P Sainath, the Hindu editor, who documented the mass suicide of Indian farmers., he informed that the left arranged a protest march in Mumbai. The number of farmers opting for suicide is twenty five hundred thousands. But we have no information of whatsoever protests in Bengal, Tripura and Kerala. Our dear comrades have not got over the shock of losing power in Bengal. Even now polit bureau and Comrade general secretary seem to be much engaged in bengal equations and at the same time, it is highly likely that the Bengal line has to be sustained which insists on knots with estranged bed partner, the Congress for the survival of leftist parliamentary politics.
Agrarian India is ejected out of Indian economy. It is the issue which in not focused at all.Before I met, my teacher in government inter college Naintal called me from London on the eve of the much awaited meeting with P sainath and reminded that we should not make India Modi. P Sainath further explained very clearly. It is never a game between Rahul vs Modi. It is, in fact, Modi vs Modi. Since corporate India and global capital have opted for Modi as Manmohan failed to accomplish the set agenda despite Chidambaram and Montek.
P Sainath and Vandana shiva were the speakers in a mass convention against monopolistic aggression against agrarian India. It was very generous initiative that he reached the venue forty minutes before the schedule and we talked on the unaddressed issues. I am lucky to have a teacher like Tarachandra Tripathi who always locates me from anywhere of the globe. I am lucky to have a lifetime meeting with Mr P Sainath considering his enormous contribution compared to my very very humble status.
The fact is that all the issues are economic and notoriously made political. As Sainath clarified that Dr Amartya Sen never did indulge himself in the political Rahul vs Modi infight. He was just dealing the economic issues as he is best known for. A TV Channel reporter asked him a question and he responded in negative answer. His economic ideas have never been made issues. Indian masses are quite unaware of his studies. But his simple response created a political storm. It is the phenomenon which stops us to follow Mr Chidambaram who replaced Pranab Mukherjee retiring as President in the Raisina Hills. Chidambaram killed GAAR proposed by Pranab. Since then he and Montek made an excellent team to push for second generation of reforms.
Mind you Chidambaram said ,
"People should remember India continues to be the second fastest growing economy after China. Even China's growth which was at 10 per cent has come down to seven per cent now, while our growth has slid to five per cent from nine per cent," he said at a bank function here.
"Economic slowdown is there in all the countries. When there is slow growth rate in the world, India cannot remain unaffected," he said inaugurating the 2110th branch of the Indian Bank in this small town in his Sivaganga Lok Sabha constituency.
We do always fail to decode Chidambaram and Montek and indulge ourselves in false graphics, statics, definitions, scales, ratings, indices and so on.
Chidambaram said even European countries had been affected by the economic slow down.
Many countries including Mexico Brazil were behind India, he said.
Expressing hope that the country's growth would touch six per cent this year, he said "People should be confident..self confident and take bank loan to invest in farm sector, small industries, housing etc. You should hope for bright tomorrow, and not worry about the slow down."
On the petroleum products prices, he said it had gone up due to the price of crude oil touching 108 US Dollars per barrel, adding the price of petrol and diesel would show a declining trend only if crude came below USD 100 per barrel.
Below Poverty Line (India) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poverty_in_India
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Mar 20, 2012 - Accepting that the poverty line was linked to the PDS system, Mr. Sen... to survive in India. we the citizens of India should be said SURVIVORS.
Half of rural India below poverty line | Business Standard
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Booklet from FAMA on entry of big capital in retail in Bengal and India
FAMA or the Forum Against Monopolistic Aggression is fighting against the entry of big capital in retail in Bengal and India, and the consequent dispossession of millions of small traders, their employees, people employed in transportation, storage, etc. This booklet, produced in 2008, provides a comprehensive introduction to the subject.
Contents: (1) Introduction: Entry of monopolistic capital in unorganised retail in Bengal and India (2) Why unorganised retail is a profitable vista for big business (3) The international experience (4) A summary of the present situation of unorganised retail in India (5) How the present situation is changing with the entry of big capital (6) The myth of job creation and the contraction of employment (7) Predatory pricing: customers take a hit (8) How agriculture will be affected: an increase in farmer suicide? (9) The new culture of consumption (10) Adverse effects on the environment (11) The hypocrisy of Parliamentary parties (12) Conclusion: comments on the struggle ahead
Click here to read booklet on monopolistic aggression of big capital in retail [PDF, Bengali, 3MB] »
- See more at: http://sanhati.com/literature/1049/#sthash.neBp379G.dpuf
http://sanhati.com/literature/1049/
If you think the debate over genetically modified (GM) crops has ended with Union minister Jairam Ramesh settling for a two-year moratorium on the commercial release of Bt-Brinjal, Dr Pushpa Bhargava has some shocking facts for you. According to Bhargava, who's considered as the father of genetic engineering in India, the battle is far from over since GM products, mostly from the US, are flooding markets of big cities like Kolkata through big food chains.
Vandana Shiva dealt the topic afresh.We are waiting for her text as well as the text of the speech delivered by P Sainath. This time the venue was Calcutta University Centenary Hall which was almost houseful to hear the giants.
Anti-agrarian policies will hit farmers: Sainath
SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
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Says a sustained struggle alone will change this situation
The governments' anti-agrarian policies and the impending entry of corporate houses in the agriculture sector will create a crisis for farmers in near future, according to P. Sainath, Rural Affairs Editor, The Hindu. A sustained struggle alone would change this situation, he said.
He was addressing the All India Kisan Sabha's special seminar here on Sunday to motivate farmers to participate in the 33rd all India conference to be held in Cuddalore between July 24 and 27 to discuss 'Farming, poverty and growth'.
"Farmers' struggle in the 60's and 70's compelled the government to enforce land reforms. The same can be repeated only if the farmers start an intense battle afresh," he said.
Mr. Sainath predicted that the Union Government's decision to upwardly revise the gas price to benefit Mukhesh Ambani's company would double electricity tariff and fertilizer prices also in near future and hence the already dwindling population of farmers would decline further, which would help the ruling class to take farming from the farmers' hands to the corporate houses.
"The adverse situations prevailing in the country's farming sector drive 2,000 farmers every day out of their profession to become agricultural labourer and India is witnessing unprecedented migrations of these labourers from rural areas to the urban areas in search of livelihood that would lead to the creation of 'census towns' where there will be no basic infrastructure," Mr. Sainath said.
The noted journalist, who has studied extensively the plight of farmers' suicides in the country, said that the cotton farmers, who could buy one kilogram of local seed for just Rs.9 just a decade ago, had to buy the BT cotton seed for Rs.4,000 a kilogram in 2012. The farmer, who had to spend just Rs.2,500 for growing cotton on an acre in a rain-fed area 10 years ago, had to shell out anywhere between Rs. 15,000 and Rs. 20,000 now.
Even as the domestic price for cotton was crashing, the government, in a bid to help the local mill owners, banned cotton export even though cotton price at the international market was so high.
Similarly, the multinational companies that encouraged the Kerala farmers to go in for vanilla cultivation and gave attractive procurement price for just two seasons let them down after they started receiving the cash crop from other countries. Subsequently, it led to thousands of vanilla farmers landing in debt trap, he noted.
"An MBA graduate from corporate companies will form farmers' groups, teach ragi, chilli, cumin cultivation to our agriculturists, who have already got rich experience in cultivating a range of crops even in adverse conditions. This entry by the MNCs is an attempt to gobble farm subsidies to the tune of thousands of crores of rupees," Mr. Sainath warned.
He also came down heavily on the governments and the banks which were giving farm loans to the rich while letting down the farmers, the real beneficiaries.
Over 2,000 fewer farmers every day
P. SAINATH
The mistaken notion that the 53 per cent of India's population dependent on agriculture are all farmers lead many to dismiss the country's massive farmers' suicides as trivial. Photo: AP
The mistaken notion that the 53 per cent of India's population 'dependent on agriculture' are all 'farmers' leads many to dismiss the massive farmers' suicides as trivial
There are nearly 15 million farmers ('Main' cultivators) fewer than there were in 1991. Over 7.7 million less since 2001, as the latest Census data show. On average, that's about 2,035 farmers losing 'Main Cultivator' status every single day for the last 20 years. And in a time of jobless growth, they've had few places to go beyond the lowest, menial ends of the service sector.
A December 2012 report of the Institute of Applied Manpower Research (IAMR) — a part of the Planning Commission — puts it this way: "employment in total and in non-agricultural sectors has not been growing. This jobless growth in recent years has been accompanied by growth in casualization and informalization." It speaks of an "an absolute shift in workers from agriculture of 15 million to services and industry." But many within the sector also likely moved from farmer to agricultural labourer status. Swelling the agrarian underclass.
So how many farmers do we have?
Census 2011 tells us we now have 95.8 million cultivators for whom farming is their main occupation. That's less than 8 per cent of the population. (Down from 103 million in 2001 and 110 million in 1991). Include all marginal cultivators (22.8 million) and that is still less than 10 per cent of the population.
Even if you count together all cultivators and agricultural labourers, the number would be around 263 million or 22 per cent of the population. (Interestingly, this reduced figure comes after a few big states have actually reported a rise in the total number of cultivators. Since 85 per cent of all marginal workers reported more than a 100 days work, this could possibly reflect the reverse pull of MNREGA, among other factors).
Between 1981 and 1991, the number of cultivators (main workers), actually went up from 92 million to 110 million. So the huge decline comes post-1991.
Hold on: aren't 53 per cent of the population farmers?
No. That's a common fallacy. The over 600 million Indians dependent on agriculture are not all farmers. They are deployed in an array of related activities — including fisheries. This confusion is widespread and innocent.
Yet, there are also a few whose colossal ignorance leads them to dismiss the country's massive farmers' suicides as trivial. For instance: "at least half of the Indian workforce is engaged in farming. This fact points to a much lower suicide rate per 100,000 individuals for farmers than in the general population." Note how easily those 'engaged in farming' become 'farmers!'
As a notion it borders on the whacko. It goes: After all, 53 out of every 100 Indians are farmers. So our 270,940 farm suicides since 1995 are a low number on a population base of over 600 million. So low that we should be agitated over how the suicide rate in the general population can be brought "down to the levels prevailing amongst farmers."
Never mind for now the appalling moral position that a quarter of a million human beings taking their lives is hardly alarming. The Bhopal gas tragedy, the worst industrial disaster in human terms, claimed over 20,000 lives. But in this perverse logic, since that was less than 0.003 per cent of the then population, it is rendered meaningless. That position says more about its authors than about the suicides. It shows they are clueless about who a farmer is — and about what the data show.
It shows even greater ignorance of who defines and counts a 'farmer suicide.' The Census records cultivators. The police count suicides. The police do not read the Census. Not for definitions, anyway.
The Census groups the population into workers and non-workers. The latter would be infants, children, students, housewives, unemployed, aged and retired people. Farmers, or cultivators come under 'Workers' — a huge category covering many varied groups. Now rural workers account for close to 70 per cent of all workers. And rural workers consist of farmers, agricultural labourers and non-farm workers.
Cultivators (main workers) in the Census are barely eight per cent of the population as a whole. (That's after a two-decade secular decline in this group). The ongoing farm suicides — 184,169 of them since 2001 according to the National Crime Records Bureau — are taking place on a smaller and shrinking base. Their intensity has hardly diminished. In most of the States accounting for two-thirds of all farm suicides, the intensity has likely risen.
Of course distress affects a much wider population dependent on agriculture. (Farmer bankruptcies crush the village carpenter, and even play a role in weaver suicides). The sufferings of others are as real. It is not as if the agricultural labourer or non-farm worker is having a great time. Both sections have seen distress migrations — and suicides. (For that matter the owner of a small industrial unit in an urban city could be distress-hit). Their suicides are no less tragic. But it is vital to know who officially gets counted as a farmer. And who gets listed in the 'farmers' suicides. For that tells us more about the ongoing tragedy and gives us a sense of its awful scale.
Everybody who works in the film industry is not an actor. Everyone in the educational system is not a student. And all those in the 53 per cent of the population related to the farming sector are not farmers. Even among those who are, only a limited group gets counted as such when police and governments make farmers' suicide lists. Cultivators are counted by the Census. Suicides are recorded by police stations across the country. The numbers collated by State governments. Very different approaches are involved.
The Census considers someone a cultivator if he or she operates a piece of land — which they may or may not own; State governments and police count only those with a title to land as farmers. The Census records two kinds of cultivators: 'Main workers' and 'marginal workers.' The latter are more like agricultural labourers or non-farm workers since farming is not their main activity. A 'Main worker' in cultivation is someone for whom that is the major occupation for at least half the year. That group makes barely eight per cent of the population as a whole.
Suicides among the others in the agrarian world (within that "53 per cent") won't be recorded as 'farmer suicides.' Try getting State governments and their police to do that! Even within the 'recognised' eight per cent, those whose title to land is not clear will not be listed as farmers' suicides, should they take their own lives. For instance, women and tenant farmers are routinely excluded. Even eldest sons running the farms — with the land still in the names of their aged fathers — would also be omitted.
Police and State governments run the suicide lists, not the Census. Nor does the NCRB, which has neither the vested interest nor the ability to fiddle that data. It merely collates what the State Crime Record Bureaus submit to it. Hence, the Chhattisgarh government could brazenly declare a 'zero farm suicides' figure in 2011. That after the State saw over 7,500 of them (by its own admission) between 2006-10. With all the fiddles in the data, the numbers and intensity remain appalling.
Maharashtra revels in such fraud. With close to 54,000 since 1995, the State has been the worst in farm suicides for over a decade. And even those numbers conceal major exclusions. They've invented categories like 'Farmer's relatives suicides,' or "non-genuine" suicides, in order to further trim the numbers. So the State governments and their police, have immense power in re-defining who a farmer is. Watch out for more and more States doing 'a Chhattisgarh' and declaring 'zero' farm suicides in coming months and years.
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The mistaken notion that the 53 per cent of India's population dependent on agriculture are all farmers lead many to dismiss the country's massive farmers' suicides as trivial. Photo: AP
Earlier Bhargava, who spoke on the agrarian crisis and GM crops at an event organized by the Forum Against Monopolistic Aggression earlier, pointed out that 70% of imported food products are genetically modified in the USA. But unfortunately, there is not a single laboratory in India to test GM food products.
"This absence (of laboratory) is deliberate to prevent any interruption to the smooth functioning of US-based MNCs. Unfortunately, consumers are not aware of it," Bhargava claimed. He demanded a moratorium on all GM foods till there was irrefutable science-based impartial evidence to prove the products were safe for consuumption.
Majority of agrarian activists at the seminar resonated Bhargava's sentiment. They felt there's a long battle ahead with various union ministers, including agriculture minister Sharad Pawar, wanting the moratorium reversed as they felt the current data provided by the company (Monsanto-Mahyco) and the tests carried out by them were sufficient to warrant commercialization of the crop.
Bhargava, founder director of the Centre for Cellular & Molecular Biology and a Supreme Court nominee to the GEAC (Genetic Engineering Approval Committee), accused the government at the Centre of being in "hands-in-gloves" with the multinational companies to introduce GM crops in India. But GM crop would only push farmers towards destruction and death. He referred to the series of farmers' suicide after the failure of Bt-Cotton, the only GM crop allowed to grow in India, to drive home his argument.
While describing the genetic technology as one of the biggest scientific breakthrough for mankind, Bhargava said that GM crops involve a series of issues related to human health, soil fertility and seed sovereignty of the farmers.
"Food is the biggest business in this world. Whoever controls food production can control anything on this earth. To control the food business, one needs to control the seed business and agro-chemical business. Companies like Monsanto-Mahyco are only up to this."
"The time has come when we must say collectively a big no to FDI in agriculture," he signed off amidst thunderous applause.
First Genetically Engineered
Food Crop Opposed
Press Statement of the Citizens' Expert Committee on BT Brinjal (via Sanhati)
TEACHERS AND SCIENTISTS AGAINST MALDEVELOPMENT (TASAM)
8 Lenin Sarani, Kolkata-700 013
FORUM AGAINST MONOPOLISTIC AGGRESSION (FAMA)
266/1 CIT Scheme 6, Kolkata -700 054
THE CONCERN OVER BT BRINJAL AND OVER GM CROPS IN GENERAL
We express our grave concern over and firm opposition to the decision of the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC) of the central government to approve the first genetically engineered food crop, Bt brinjal, which will allow Monsanto to market Bt brinjal in India. We firmly believe that this attempt by the government to force Bt brinjal on India is a move towards establishing corporate multinational control over our agriculture and food supply, and to expand the GM foods market to India, to the detriment of the health and the livelihoods of our people. The joint Indo-US Agricultural Knowledge Initiative (AKI) is a major component of this strategy. Brinjal is an important and indigenous food crop for farmers in India, especially in West Bengal, which is the largest producer of brinjal (30% of total production) in India. Furthermore, there is no shortage of production for which we need to introduce such a seed. Genetically modified foods (GMF), have been a cause of major concern for scientists, agricultural experts, environmental activists and farmers. In India, controversy has surrounded the introduction and commercialization of the first GM crop, Bt cotton, by Maharashtra Hybrid Seed Co (MahyCo), the Indian subsidiary of the US multinational giant Monsanto, which is aggressively developing and marketing GM crops.
BT COTTON - AN EXAMPLE OF CLAIMS VERSUS PERFORMANCE
A large number of reports now show that Bt cotton has failed as a crop: its yields have not been what had been forecast by the company, and inputs in terms of fertilizers and pesticides have been more than that of non GM cotton. On the contrary what has been achieved is the widespread pesticide resistance of the insect pest and contamination of the natural cotton plant by pollen flow from Bt cotton plants. As a result, now in places like Gujarat and Maharashtra, the only cotton seeds available are of the GM variety, leaving the cotton growers at the mercy of Monsanto. It is no wonder that the highest number of farmer suicides are among the cotton growers of Maharashtra.
SAFETY ISSUES
The safety of genetically engineered food is not proven, and many countries, particulary the European Union (EU), have banned GMOs out of concern of potential adverse effect on human health. Especially, there is need of extra caution about a crop that will be directly eaten.
POLITICAL PRESSURE
The process in which the GEAC approved the Bt brinjal itself shows that it functioned under political and corporate pressure. Dr Arjula R Reddy, vice-chancellor of Yogi Bemana university, Chair of the Expert Committee (EC2) which was appointed to give the experts' report on Bt brinjal, and co-chair, GEAC had confessed to have been under tremendous pressure from the Agriculture Minister, the GEAC and the industry to approve Bt Brinjal. The chair of EC2 has admitted that various requisite tests on the safety of Bt Brinjal have not been done and stated that without them (the tests), at this stage, we do not know whether Bt Brinjal is safe or not. Some tests have been done only on mice in controlled laboratory conditions, whereas it is known that open grazing on GM plants by cattle, which does not control amount and variety of intake, have led to morbidity and mortality.
DEMANDS
We demand immediate withdrawal of the report of the GEAC which approves Bt brinjal, and cancellation of the proceedings for approval. Moreover, as it is a subject on the State List, the West Bengal government should take the initiative to ban the marketing of Bt brinjal seeds and the production of Bt brinjal in West Bengal to protect the livelihoods of brinjal growers and the health of millions of consumers. We also demand total scrapping of the AKI.
Abhee Dutt-Mazumder, Convener, TASAM
Asis Kusum Ghosh, Convener, FAMA
(on behalf of the Citizens' Expert Committee on BT Brinjal)
Dated: The 8th January 2009, Kolkata
Contact: 9433008117, 9831100464
http://marxistupdate.blogspot.in/2010/01/press-statement-of-citizens-expert.html
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