People in
India have been devastated by wage cuts, job losses and rising prices. There is
a steep rise in the prices of metals and construction materials. Foundries are protesting
and demanding the government to take steps to control the price of raw
materials. But VHP is planning to raise funds from people, who are already hit by dual
crisis of recession and covid, to build a grant temple for a Rama, a nonentity unborn
in Ayodhya. Why don’t they raise it from foreign funds.
According
to ILO, wages in India have fallen by 3.6% for organized workers and 22.6
percent for unorganized workers. So far the BJP government has provided only 0.75
per cent fiscal stimulus, the fiscal packages given after the first stimulus in
no way can be called fiscal stimulus , but just monetary/credit schemes.
Finance Ministry deceitfully propagating that as it has given a judicious mix
of 10 per cent fiscal stimulus economy is recovering so fast. The so called
wealth creators are not at all willing to give any kind of stimulus to the depressed
economy, who themselves have given economic stimulus to foreign countries. In
2020 alone, Indian companies have invested about $ 13 billion in foreign
countries.
In 2020, the dollar
depreciated by more than 6 per cent and dollar index is faltering in 90s. In December
alone foreign inflows of 64,940 Crores Rs invested in to Indian markets come. Yet,
the Indian rupee continues to depreciate against the dollar and remains the weakest
currency in Asia. While other Asian currencies have appreciated, the Indian
rupee has been prevented from appreciating by the RBI's open market operations.
The RBI continues to buy more than $ 10,000 billion US dollar in 2020 alone, which
is around 4 percent of GDP. This is said to keep up the export competitiveness
of India from falling. But Exports make up only a small part of India's total
economic activities. The value of exports has further declined in this year due
to Covid attack. It is foolish to argue that exports can stimulate economic
growth when international trade is itself in downtrend. As crude oil prices
have risen, the RBI's measures devalued rupee and have pushed up India's import
bill and trade deficit. The government would have been able to provide
additional fiscal stimulus if the RBI had monetized the budget deficit in other
words if RBI had lent money directly to the central government, instead of
doing the reckless job of buying US dollars. Assuming If the fiscal stimulus were
not given to the big business as usual instead jobs and handouts were given to people
to raise their purchasing power, the demand could have been restored to an
extent which could have an multiplier effect in stimulating the economy. The
trade deficit and inflation could also have been controlled to certain extent. It
is not possible for RBI to monetize the deficit arbitrarily without the request
of the central government. But the BJP government trapped in a neo liberal box thinking
neither has knowledge nor courage to think and take an alternative trajectory. so
the path to welfare is blocked.
Without imposing
restrictions to reduce India's trade deficit, Finance Minister has announced
that there will be no restrictions on the import of raw materials and
intermediate products. BJP’s so called policy of self-reliance in economy is reeling
under the feet.
Who has
been helped by RBI's open market operations and the 4 per cent bank REPO? It
only helps big companies listed on the stock exchanges. A stock market bubble burst
is in the offing. Large companies are raising a large amount of capital through
initial public offering in the stock market. The price of their shares is many
times higher than their intrinsic value. Small companies are struggling to
raise capital. The price of their shares has fallen below their intrinsic
value. Investors see recession as an opportunity to profiteer by buying shares
at a lower price. They only buy and accumulate shares in large companies as
they consider it safe to bet. The market capitalization of family-owned
corporations and businesses rose by 31 per cent increased to 115 trillion Rs.
Adani's green stocks alone are upped by 565 percent. The combined market
capitalization of all private sector companies in the stock market has
increased by 24.4 per cent this year to over Rs 142.4 lakh crore. The wealth of
the richest people in India has increased by 33 per cent to $ 364 billion this
year.
Mukesh Ambani, who sees
his own growth as India's growth, says that the digital Indianization of BJP
govt. will rise per capita income. Needless to say whose per capita income will
rise. Contravening the environmental norms reliance Group is going to implement
gas extraction project on the east coast of India. In 2021, the government is planning
to auction at least 300 more mining blocks. The Supreme Court has not even nominally
acknowledged the primacy of environmental norms. Supreme Court's recent judgment
that national highway projects do not require environmental clearance and the
Salem-Chennai eight-lane road project can be continued is highly reprehensible.
Needless to say, this will only hatch up tying of new projects with national
highway projects to avoid environmental clearance. In
October, the centre’s allocation of tax revenue to the states dropped by
one-fifth. Currently, allocations to central sector schemes are also reduced by
9 percent. The BJP government’s opportunistic
policies enabled the big corporations to reap at an exorbitant interest rates what
they given as electoral funds to parties and can continue to feed the BJP
parasite how else will it flourish.
Nitin Gadkari said that
the government will help to increase MSMEs contribution to GDP from 30 per cent
to 40 per cent and plans to create another 5 crore jobs from small and medium
enterprises. But the reality is small businesses are struggling to get credit. In
India in order to get loan MSMEs have to follow the same BASEL norms as it was
for large corporations. It is only the large corporations with high market base
are able to get cheap loan, MSMEs given its small market base has to pay a
higher interest for getting loan. This inhibits MSMEs growth potential and in
no way this can be justified. Credit
service has become inaccessible to Small businesses and has been severely
affected by Basel norms. India’s Associations of 740 MSME enterprises with its
20 Lakh members have demanded for the suspension of BASEL rules in the banking
sector.
But as if none of this
is known, Central Bank Governor ShaktiKanda Das’s mere vocal advocacy of saying
that banks should focus more on cash-flow based lending rather than relying on collateral
doesn’t help them actually.
After
regaining power in 2019, the BJP government planned to mobilize large sums of
money by privatizing public sector enterprises, as a part of which it set a
target of divesting Rs 2.1 lakh crore this fiscal. This year the divestment of
public sector companies is not as fast as the government intended to do. The
BJP government has so far raised Rs 42,871.94 crore by privatizing public
sector shares this year. Anil Agarwal is planning to buy public sector shares
for $ 10 billion and eagerly Waiting for their market value to plummet. Anil
Agarwal, responsible for polluted air , a surge in cancer cases and respiratory diseases in Tuticorin
and accountable for the killing
of 13 people involved in the Sterlite protest, now cloaked as a ‘philanthrophist’
says that the profits of the business
should help the most important people in the community and that nothing is more
important than safeguarding the healthy future of our women and children!
The performance and
value of public sector companies are not given due importance and the
government is pushing only to increase their market price. The more they try
the less they succeed.It has been stated that the continuous sale of shares by
the government is the main reason for the under performance of the PSU in Stock
exchanges. The BSE index of PSUs fell 18 per cent even in the frenzied market
climate. It is the niggardliness of the BJP govt and the profit-driven private
medical institutions, responsible for the large number of casualties and deaths
caused by Covid-19. Despite that no attempt has been made to increase
government investment in the healthcare sector, The Niti Aayog has again aimed
for increasing the share of private companies in the health sector.
Let us assume a person owns assets worth one
crore rupees. Without investing it in a productive way If (s)he lives only by
selling parts and pieces of the asset, certainly the value of assets will fall
right. How shall we call it growth or degrowth? We can only refer it as stagnation
not growth, it will also be considered as spendthriftiness. Not even a fool can
assert it as development. But the Indian government each year live by selling
parts and parcels of public property to private sector and refer it as development!.
The growth in India is not the growth of the people but the growth of private
corporations. India ranks 131st out of 189 countries, slips one place further , in the United Nations
Development Program (UNDP)'s Human Development Index 2019. But in ease of doing
business index India moved up 14 places to 63rd position. From this it is not
difficult to see what kind of growth trajectory India is pursuing.
Inflation:
In November Consumer price inflation increased
to 6.93 per cent, while food inflation soared to 9.10 per cent. Prices of
vegetables soared to 15.63 per cent. Pulses became dearer by 17.91 per cent.
Egg prices increased by 20.26 percent. Fish and meat prices increased by 16.67
per cent. In Tamil Nadu Inflation increased to 6.74 per cent.
Production in October:
According to the Index of Industrial
Production released by the Ministry of Statistics, the production in primary
sectors increased by 3.6 percent. In the mining sector growth is fallen by 1.5
percent. In the manufacturing sector, output grew by 3.5 per cent and
electricity generation increased by 11.2 per cent.
in the use-based classification Production of
primary goods fell by 3.3 per cent. Production of non-durable consumer goods
(7.5%), capital goods (3.3%), intermediate goods (0.8%), construction materials
(7.8%) and durable consumer goods (17.6%) increased.
National Family Welfare Survey 2019-20:
The results of the first phase of the
National Family Welfare Survey conducted in 22 States / Union Territories have
been released by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. This survey was
previously conducted in 2015-16. There has been no significant improvement in
the number of men and women educated for at least 10 years in 2019-20.The
number of child marriages has increased in Tripura, Manipur and Assam as
compared to 2015-16. Child marriages are still high in West Bengal (41.6 per
cent) and Bihar (40.8 per cent). The number of children and women with anemia still
remain high in most of the parts in 2019-20. In Kashmir, Tripura, Gujarat and
West Bengal There is an increase in the number of children and women with
anemia than what is observed in 2015-16. The number of anemic men in Kashmir is
higher comparing to other states which is
one of the indicator how much Kashmiris
are suffering by the repression unleashed by central govt. Spousal violence has increased
in five states - Karnataka, Sikkim, Maharashtra, Himachal Pradesh and Assam.
Sexual violence has increased in five states - Assam, Karnataka, Maharashtra,
Meghalaya and West Bengal. In 20 states / Union territories surveyed less than
1 percent of men undergo sterilization. How unjust it is to impose the extra
burden of sterilization to women who already bear the brunt of the family
system such as childbirth, child rearing, and chores. This is just one of the
many indicators of gender inequality in India.
Due to Covid crisis there is more than 9
percent decline in the number of female workers which will only exacerbate
gender inequality.
The United Kingdom, which has left the EU, is
planning to sign a free trade agreement with India in 2021. In WTO December meeting
in Geneva, The negotiation to exclude the Covid-19 vaccine from intellectual
property rights (TRIPS) in order to make it accessible to all countries is
opposed by the United States and the European Union and failed without
consensus. The inhumane World Trade Organization (WTO) has abandoned developing
poor countries and crores of people without purchasing power to die at the
mercy of the market. WTO Negotiations to ban export fiscal stimulus to protect
fish resources have also failed.
The Finance Minister is proud that she has
not missed any opportunity to make proper use of this dual crisis period to
carry out anti-people reforms, and now she is receiving the demands and
suggestions from the High Level Advisory Committees of business groups for the
next Budget Statement. The US President has awarded Narendra Modi for his
prowess in oppressing the Indian people and states and for threatening peace in
the Asiatic region. The Finance Minister and the Prime Minister continue to
ignore the millions of farmers who have been struggling for more than a month
in the bitter cold in Delhi. So far, more than 33 farmers have sacrificed their
lives for the cause. The centre has suspended winter session of parliament just
to ignore the demands of the farmers. As a result, central ministries and
departments are facing a cash crunch. Narendra Modi, who take pride of keeping
the tax rate for corporations lowest in the world, is now concerned to promote
the interests of the real estate sector
not an iota about farmers. This undemocratic
Fascist regime, according to Amitabh Kant is toomuch-democracy! which he
condemns as an obstacle to reforms. The Delhi Chalo" struggle started by Punjab
and Haryana farmers who have been religiously, racially and economically
oppressed has now spread all over India.
A large group in India is accumulating more and more wealth doing nothing. But
the farmers who fed us are cultivating the land and growing crops even when
they are struggling. Along with onions our Farmers are sowing the seeds of revolution.
No one can stop its growth.
