[Reader-list] Be ready for a fascist onslaught, says CPI(Maoist)

Tue Jun 10 19:58:18 CDT 2014

I agree Jyoti.
There's another point that has some bearing on current voting, which is the
changed context from even perhaps the previous NDA regime 15 years ago.
Which is the penetration and spread of capitalist relations in Indian
agriculture, barring a few pockets, capital and capitalists market
relations have penetrated areas to a degree unprecedented in India. You
might know that I am interested in climate change in India, and this point
about market relations in agriculture comes across in many conversations
and meetings with people from different states. That old and famous debate
in the EPW in the 1970s about the mode of production in India is in my view
by now a settled question: India is firmly capitalist, and I think that
influences voting patterns as well. Actually this latter is a commonplace,
the question is how,
The second point relates to the spread of capitalism in India, because it
then changes the way in which exploitation plays itself out. It is no
longer that brutal extra-economic coercive exploitation; though the latter
does not disappear in a caste-ridden society like India, there is a greater
shift to what I suppose, pace Marx, can be called relative surplus value.
Which also means that even as people's (or some people's but quite wide)
incomes may actually rise (still at 1996 real levels, as RUPE's superb post
some weeks back pointed out), even as incomes rise, their quality of life
declines because everything is now under the market including some things
for which they may have depended on their community or the commons. And
they are working longer hours or faster, basically running to stay in the
same place. But the nature of exploitation is different from what it used
to be. Which also changes the way that people look at the world.
My apologies for the length of the post again.
warmly,
Nagraj

On 10 June 2014 21:31, Jyoti Punwani <jyoti.punwani at gmail.com> wrote:

> thanks nagraj, agree with most of what u say only to add that modi's
> projection of someone steeped in the hindu religion, and also someone who
> represents a clear break fm the congress -style-including nehru; and his
> projection of a strong, nationalistic, sardar patel style, also worked.
>
>
> On 10 June 2014 17:58, Nagraj Adve <nagraj.adve at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Having commented rather severely on the CPI (Maoist) statement, it's only
>> fair that I put across what I think. At the cost of some repetition of
>> earlier mails from me, here's what I feel, briefly:
>> 1. People at large have largely voted for a mainstream pattern of
>> development. This runs against much of what activists like us have argued
>> for politically for years. This vote for 'development' is much wider than
>> the 31% vote share cornered by the BJP. This message is accentuated by the
>> fact that for the first time in a number of elections there were a number
>> of candidates from social movements - Medha, Lingaraj, Uday Kumar, a number
>> of others in different states - who presented at least a clear critique of
>> the dominant trajectory, had a very high reputation for integrity, had
>> worked hard among people for years and decades, and yet were all decisively
>> not voted for. There are complex reasons why this is the case besides
>> people opting for mainstream development, but we cannot be blind to this
>> rejection.
>> 2. The vote was more a vote for Modi than the BJP per se and is
>> reflected, contrarily, in a number of BJP candidates winning who otherwise
>> would not have.
>> 3. As much as his and the BJP's Hindu majoritarian history and politics,
>> even more so people voted for what they perceived as Modi's role in
>> governance and 'development'. Much as fine empirical analysis by Dreze and
>> others pointed out that the Gujarat model was at best mediocre, millions of
>> voters - and the over 100 million young first time voters in particular
>> possibly - voted based on their sense of his experience, however limited or
>> flawed their reading may be. This was a wave but it was not generated by
>> MNCs or landlords alone or other social forces the CPI (Maoist) quoted
>> statement mentions. Much as we may not like Modi's message, his
>> articulation of what he stood for on a number of issues was remarkably
>> lucid. The people at large were very clear about what they were voting for.
>> 4. It is EXTREMELY disturbing that people at large in India seem to vote
>> broadly for the Right rather than the Left at times of economic crises. It
>> is particularly disturbing as economic crises are going to accentuate in
>> the near future as capitalism is possibly in its worst crisis ever,
>> economic, in resources (peak oil and minerals constraints) and ecological
>> (climate change, loss of biodiversity, etc), all of which are going to
>> worsen.
>> 5. Our situation (by 'our' I mean the broad Left in this country, both
>> non-Party and Party left across the Left spectrum) is made even more feeble
>> by the fact that there seems to be no *economic *alternative on the
>> scale necessary. Political alternatives exist (like in Latin America and
>> elsewhere) but they do not pose economic alternatives to capitalism and its
>> logic.
>> This mail is already too long so I will keep it short though much remains
>> to be said. If true, the above - and the fact that repression on
>> resistance, on workers and the Left in general will surely increase (it
>> already has: Rajasthan govt's new take on workers' rights; possibly greater
>> military role against Maoist movements) - should influence our future
>> politics. At the bare minimum, it merits serious introspection and honest
>> but frank, non-polemical discussion among all of us even as we recover from
>> this and plunge back into our political work.
>>  Nagraj
>>
>>
>>
>> On 10 June 2014 17:05, Nagraj Adve <nagraj.adve at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> This press release as has been quoted just misses the point in hiding
>>> behind the Party's old rhetoric. I can never fathom why the Maoist party -
>>> and much analysis by others - assumes that people are naive fools. No
>>> number of "MNCs, imperialists, big landlords" can generate a wave. Putting
>>> one's head in the sand may be good policy for an ostrich, but it does not
>>> make for good analysis.
>>> Nagraj
>>>
>>>
>>> On 10 June 2014 13:13, Vivek Sundara. <viveksundara at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Date: 10 June 2014
>>>> Subject: Be ready for a fascist onslaught, says CPI(Maoist) - The Hindu
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/be-ready-for-a-fascist-onslaught-says-cpimaoist/article6099546.ece#.U5a2TwFXJmA.gmail
>>>>    Today's Paper >> NATIONAL
>>>>   RAIPUR, June 10, 2014
>>>> Be ready for a fascist onslaught, says CPI(Maoist)
>>>>
>>>> Pavan Dahat
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> The outlawed Communist Party of India (Maoist) has said that the new
>>>> National Democratic Alliance government will be no different from the
>>>> previous United Progressive Alliance government and will implement the
>>>> "same neo-liberal policies."
>>>>
>>>> In its first reaction to the formation of a new dispensation at the
>>>> Centre, the CPI (Maoist), in a press note signed by its central committee
>>>> spokesperson, Abhay, said: "The victory of the BJP under [Narendra] Modi
>>>> indicates the intensification of exploitation, oppression and fascism in
>>>> the country."
>>>>
>>>> "The real meaning of the Gujarat Model, which will now extend to the
>>>> whole country, is the suppression of all forms of dissent, including that
>>>> of workers, peasants, religious minorities, particularly Muslims, and other
>>>> exploited and oppressed sections of society," the note said.
>>>>
>>>> "The NDA's clear majority in Parliament, the absence of a strong
>>>> parliamentary opposition, and most importantly, the RSS-BJP's Hindutva
>>>> agenda are indications of the coming fascist onslaught."
>>>>
>>>> The note appealed for building "a widespread struggle to fight back the
>>>> threat from Brahmanical Hindu-fascists by uniting all revolutionary and
>>>> democratic forces."
>>>>
>>>> The BJP won "by using the people's pent-up anger against the Congress."
>>>> Criticising the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the note said: "The RSS played
>>>> a central role in orchestrating anti-Muslim attacks and stirring up Hindu
>>>> religious chauvinism, particularly through the attacks in Muzaffarnagar."
>>>>
>>>> The CPI(Maoist) said the election manifesto of the BJP did not forget
>>>> to present its anti-Muslim, anti-Kashmir and Hindutva agenda, and promised
>>>> to scrap Article 370, impose a Uniform Civil Code and build a Ram temple.
>>>>
>>>> The Modi-wave, the CPI(Maoist) said, "has been put forward by the
>>>> imperialists, the MNCs and big landlords to divert the people's wrath
>>>> against the neo-liberal policies of the ruling classes and usher in fascism
>>>> as Hitler did to serve their interests more effectively."
>>>>
>>>> Cautioning people on their "illusion of good days under Modi," the
>>>> party said the condition of the masses would deteriorate further on all
>>>> fronts.
>>>>
>>>> *The real meaning of the Gujarat Model, which will now extend to the
>>>> whole country, is the suppression of all forms of dissent*
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
>>>> Groups "Free Binayak Sen" group.
>>>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send
>>>> an email to free-binayaksen+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
>>>> To post to this group, send email to free-binayaksen at googlegroups.com.
>>>> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/free-binayaksen.
>>>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>  --
>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
>> "Free Binayak Sen" group.
>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an
>> email to free-binayaksen+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
>> To post to this group, send email to free-binayaksen at googlegroups.com.
>> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/free-binayaksen.
>> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
>>
>
>
>
> --
> rgds
> jyoti
>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
> "Free Binayak Sen" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an
> email to free-binayaksen+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
> To post to this group, send email to free-binayaksen at googlegroups.com.
> Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/free-binayaksen.
> For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
>