Q10 Development and Vision of India
Congress slams Modi, says Gujarat was prosperous long before he became CM https://www.nationalheraldindia.com/india/congress-slams-modi-says-gujarat-was-prosperous-long-before-he-became-cm "PM claims there's a plot to defame Gujarat. The truth, which he is incapable of saying, is that long before he became CM, Gujarat had already emerged as an economic powerhouse due to its spirit of enterprise." Public sector investments by Congress governments catalysed Gujarat's growth, Congress MP Jairam Ramesh said
"Public sector investments by INC govts catalysed the state's growth," he tweeted.
"India & USA are under the gravest threat to their Democracies" | Suketu Mehta Aug 23, 2022 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsYUHG7lKFI
Suketu Mehta speaks to Barkha Dutt about the country of his birth, the free speech debate. He is among the 100 writers to come together under PEN-America to write about India at 75, an anthology of essays that examine where the country stands more than 7 decades after independence.
‘As goes India, so goes democracy’ https://scroll.in/article/1030219/suketu-mehta-as-goes-india-so-goes-democracy Aug 15, 2022
To mark India’s 75th Independence Day, PEN America asked authors from India and the Indian diaspora to write short texts expressing what they felt. people of other religions are actively harassed, even lynched on the streets; their freedom to practice their religion in their own way is circumscribed. And when they protest, they are jailed and their houses bulldozed. Most worrying, much of the judiciary seems to be sympathetic to the Hindu nationalist agenda, and issues its verdicts accordingly.
When countries safeguard the rights of their minorities, they also safeguard, as a happy side effect, the rights and wellbeing of their majorities. If a judiciary forbids discrimination against, say, Muslims, it is also much more likely to forbid discrimination against, say, LGBTQ+ people. The obverse is also true: when they do not safeguard the rights of their minorities, every other citizen’s rights are in peril.
Romila Thapar—I don't like Modi's India, it's too Narrow & Limited; History won’t be Kind to Him https://youtu.be/x65z6USSfPQ?t=68 Aug 10, 2022 In an interview about how she views the last 75 years of India’s independence and what sort of country India has become, someone who is considered our foremost historian, Romila Thapar, has said she doesn’t like Modi’s India. Explaining why, she said it’s too narrow and too limited.
Gandhian Politics in Contemporary India https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeZAY7nb0qA Prof Anand Kumar. Aug 18, 2022
Professor Anand Kumar will speak on how to make sense of the relevance of Gandhian politics in contemporary India. His talk will help contextualize Gandhi and his politics, especially his commitment towards an ethical life and society based on the ideals of truth and nonviolence, and his vision of Swaraj (freedom); Swadeshi (indigenous development); and Sarvoday (well-being of all through participatory democracy) — to be realized through a judicious combination of character-building, constructive program,
non-cooperation, and Satyagraha. Professor Kumar charts the evolution of Gandhian politics and the bewildering diversity among his followers in the early post-Gandhi period (1948 – 1979), and traces the multiple struggles faced — and strategies adopted — by Gandhian organisations and leaders as India moved into the era of Globalization and Hindu majoritarianism. He maintains that followers of Gandhian ideals face unprecedented challenges in contemporary India, in their continuing pursuit of nation-building, communal harmony, and a balanced coexistence of nature and humanity.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDScaYXMTBk Conversation with Anand Kumar | Story of a Free Thinker, Troublemaker, Socialist Sociologist
https://countercurrents.org/2022/07/capitalism-and-unmaking-of-democracy/
Rule of law, transparency, accountability and citizenship rights are fundamental pillars of constitutional democracy. These pillars are eroding rapidly. The democratic cultures based on equality, liberty, justice, reason, science, secularism, tolerance and mutual respect for dissenting and diverse opinions are declining across the globe. The corporatisation of electoral campaigns, market command over political parties, corporate control over political processes and policies are mortal threat to the citizenship rights and democratic polity. The capitalist assault on democratic governance is creating conditions of political, economic, social and cultural crises, and giving rise to reactionary forces. Major democracies in Europe, Americas, Asia, Africa and Oceania are facing the crisis of legitimacy and citizens are losing trust over their own states and governments.
The democratic governments are not representing their citizens interests but standing behind the crony capitalist corporates. The culture of depoliticization is growing in a massive scale which accelerates the fall of democracies as the most reliable form of governance. Such a trend helps capitalism as a system to survive and to expand their control over every spheres of lives as depoliticization normalises democratic deficiency. The sharp decline of democracy in principle and practice helps an unaccountable, illiberal and unsustainable capitalist system to grow with the help of reactionary and conservative forces in the society. In search of profit, capitalism creates conflicts to control human and natural resources with the help of a securitised police state.
In a market led democracy, state and government, rule of people’s power is replaced by rule of money power. The millionaires and billionaires are funding political parties to participate in the democratic electoral processes to access state power and legitimise their profit seeking illegitimate systemic drive to control all resources. The infiltration of money into politics threatens the very foundation of democracy as a form of governance by the people, where majority rule to respect minorities, and uphold the interests of the masses. The corporate mega donors and their non-profit and civil society organisations are sponsoring political leaders and their parties with unlimited funding to shape corporate friendly policies at the cost of people and the planet. The data driven social media platforms are accelerating these processes of market led corporate control over our democratic polity by hiding every form of available alternatives.
The corporate led consulting firms are managing public relations and manipulating public opinions with the help of false propaganda. Edward Bernays in his book, Propaganda (1921) argues that “the conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds are moulded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of.” Such strategy creates social, political and cultural foundations in service of capitalism by transforming need-based politics to a fraudulent desire-based politics, which can’t be achieved.
The British firm Strategic Communications Limited Group (SCL) is the parent company of the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica has played a major role in different political campaigns in America, Europe and Asia. In the name of providing data and analysis, such firms have unprecedented influence in shaping public opinion in support of reactionary political ideologies threatening democratic politics in different parts of the world. Such practices undermine democracy and citizenship rights by promoting false narratives.
In this context, struggle to save democracy is a struggle against capitalism. The survival of democracy depends on preventing corporations that subvert democratic institutions and processes Capitalism is not compatible with democracy that ensures equality, citizenship rights, liberty, justice, secularism and scientific ethos in the society. The working of democracy depends on deepening the struggles against capitalism. The local, regional, national and global solidarity of all struggles against capitalism is central to uphold democratic values in defence of people and the planet. Let people decide how to reform their democracy and revolt against capitalism for the very survival of lives, livelihoods and the planet. Democracy is a product of mass struggles against all forms of inequalities and exploitations. It is time for the masses to struggle and reclaim democracy from the claws of capitalism.
Bhabani Shankar Nayak, University of Glasgow, UK
23/07/2022
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