Five Years After Demonetisation A Series of Articles https://scroll.in/topic/56454/five-years-after-demonetisation
Demonetisation, GST and lockdown: How the Modi government has wrecked India’s small businesses by Priya Dharshini, Ashish Kajla & Anirban Bhattacharya https://scroll.in/article/1011509/demonetisation-gst-and-lockdown-how-the-modi-government-has-wrecked-indias-small-businesses
Cumulatively seen, the demonetisation, the GST or the lockdown are in fact not short sprints – but a continuum – a five-year-long marathon – that has turned into a death trap for small businesses employing the bulk of the informal workforce. They have either been bought over or their market share has been steadily eroded by big business.
Recent National Crime Records Bureau data reveals that the pandemic year of 2020 saw more suicides among business people in India than even farmers. Among those who took the noose were mostly vendors (36%) and tradesmen (37%). Hate, bigotry and carefully camouflaged promises have either kept us distracted from these stark realities or have turned us into cheerleaders for a misplaced sense of pride. How long before we put an end to this death race?
Five years on, India’s sex workers are yet to recover from demonetisation’s devastation
Veshya Anyay Mukti Parishad · Nov 27, 2021 https://scroll.in/article/1011380/five-years-on-indias-sex-workers-are-yet-to-recover-from-demonetisations-devastation The stigmatised and marginalised group, which lacks access to formal banking, was one of the worst-hit following the note ban. The immediate impact of demonetisation on the sex worker community, their families and support systems was felt on the streets. Overnight, the number of customers dwindled because they did not have cash. People did not have the money to spend on sex workers and soon, they were unable to earn more than Rs 1,000 a day. The rates of their services decreased.
Following the note ban, sex workers could not use a lot of the money that they had already saved. The biggest problem that the group faced was an inability to pay bills, school fees and medical expenses. Many sex workers do not have documentation or bank accounts, and this issue was most prominent when demonetisation began. Many are still grappling with it in Covid-19 times.
Demonetisation has given rise to a state unanswerable to citizens Atul Sood · Nov 25, 2021 https://scroll.in/article/1011346/demonetisation-has-given-rise-to-a-state-unanswerable-to-citizens Citizens were told that the government would do the best for them and they did need not understand the rationale behind the policy choice.
The key to the project of demonetisation was to experiment with total mobilisation of society on a scale, where literally every citizen is enlisted in a policy cause, without revealing how it is guaranteed to work and what problems do they resolve. People were made to believe a premise, as limited as saying, since something tastes terrible it must be good for one’s health.
The moral and the political were in one leap intertwined when standing in line to withdraw one’s own money was a way to honour the country. Citizens were told that the government will do the best for its citizens and the citizens need not understand the rationale behind the policy choice. Questions were not to be asked, only sound bites were repeated – so was the new moral-political argument of the government.
There was an added moral-political dimension to this project – it introduced newer ways of personification of policy and ensuring participation in nation-building, all individually, with no associations or alliances. Questions of distributive consequences and transparency were effaced. Every citizen appeared either as a patriot or a criminal, and the state repeated that “the honest have nothing to fear”
Five years after demonetisation, SC still to set up a bench to hear the petitions challenging it. Umang Poddar · Nov 13, 2021 https://scroll.in/article/1010349/five-years-after-demonetisation-sc-still-to-set-up-a-bench-to-hear-the-petitions-challenging-it
In December 2016, the court had said the cases would be referred to a five-judge bench. It also framed nine questions to be considered. These questions pertained to the legality of demonetisation when considered under the Reserve Bank of India Act and the Constitution of India. The court was to also consider the extent of judicial review it can exercise in reviewing fiscal policy and whether demonetisation “suffers from procedural and/or substantive unreasonableness” and “excessive delegation of legislative powers” since it was carried out by a Ministry of Finance notification and not an act of parliament.
Kamini Jaiswal, a Supreme Court advocate who was arguing one of the petitions challenging demonetisation told Scroll.in: “What we could do is bring to the notice of the Hon’ble Supreme Court the illegality and lack of planning in the act of demonetisation, the gravity of the situation and the injustice resulting to the common man on the streets...But the Supreme Court did nothing.”
She added: “It was a major failure on the part of the Supreme Court to ignore the sensitivity of the issue, especially when it came to citizens’ right to livelihood and right to life.”
Demonetisation caused Indians needless pain. Modi must accept moral responsibility for it Thomas Franco · Nov 11, 2021 https://scroll.in/article/1009939/demonetisation-caused-indians-needless-pain-modi-must-accept-moral-responsibility-for-it Five years later, the economy is still reeling under the shock.
No, demonetisation wasn’t a good idea, badly executed – it was a ridiculous idea from the start
Rohit Azad · Nov 07, 2021 https://scroll.in/article/1009880/no-demonetisation-wasnt-a-good-idea-badly-executed-it-was-an-unworkable-idea-from-the-start
Five years later, it’s even more clear that demonetisation was a disaster for India
Arun Kumar · Nov 06, 2021 · https://scroll.in/article/1009871/five-years-later-its-even-more-clear-that-demonetisation-was-a-disaster-for-india