August this year is going to be a month of intensive campaigns and demonstrations of the toiling people of our country, the workers, peasants and agricultural workers, the people who produce the wealth of our country. The working class and peasantry are set to vent their discontent and anger against the worsening of their working and living conditions due to the policies being pursued by the Modi led BJP government.
The National Convention of Workers held on 30th January 2023 by the joint platform of trade unions representing the overwhelming majority of workers from all sections in the country, has called for a series of programmes and campaign culminating in multiple days ‘mahapadav’ from 9th August 2023. Since the last several years, 9th August is being observed by the joint trade union movement to commemorate the ‘Quit India Day’ in 1942 when the hundreds of thousands of workers held huge demonstrations demanding the British colonial rulers to leave India. The Samyuka Kisan Morcha that led the historic peasants’ struggle against the three farm laws and forced the Modi government to repeal them has restarted its agitation against the non implementation of the assurances related to MSP and others. The SKM too has given a series of action programmes on the demands of the peasants.
CITU, AIKS and AIAWU, the three organisations representing workers, peasants and agricultural workers have also decided to continue the joint campaign on the demands jointly raised by them in the Mazdoor Kisan Sangharsh Rally on 5th April 2023. Linking these issues to the vision and aspirations of the lakhs of workers and peasants who participated in the struggle for Independence from British rule, they have decided to organise ‘night vigils’ on 14th August 2023 night against the Modi government’s policies that are pushing people again into conditions similar to the colonial era.
What is significant is that the joint platform of trade unions and the Samyukta Kisan Morcha, in their joint meeting held on 8th June 2023, decided not only to continue actions of mutual support and solidarity but also take up joint actions on common demands. A joint national convention by the joint trade union platform and the SKM is also being planned.
The Declaration unanimously adopted by the National Convention of Workers organised by the joint trade union platform on 30th January 2023 condemned the policies being implemented by the Modi government. It categorically stated that these policies are not only anti worker, anti peasant and anti people; they facilitate the loot of natural resources and national assets by the corporates, both Indian and foreign and thus are anti national as well. It called for intensive campaigns and actions to ‘Save the country and save the people’ from these disastrous policies that were pushing overwhelming majority of our people into distress and destitution.
For the first time since the 1990s, the number of people who are below the poverty line in India has increased. 75 million people were pushed into poverty in 2021 alone. The number of working poor is increasing as real wages are going down. The government is not taking any measure to control the skyrocketing prices. The basic rights of the workers – their right to organisation, collective bargaining and collective actions are under attack through the labour codes. The codes have put the social security benefits achieved by the workers in different sectors through years of struggles, in jeopardy. Despite repeated requests the Modi government has not called the Indian Labour Conference since 2015 giving up tripartism. Working conditions are deteriorating. Permanent jobs are vanishing. The number of contract, casual, daily rated, part time, temporary, fixed term etc workers, apprentices, trainees etc, with precarious working conditions is increasing. Unemployment has reached alarming levels. Despite the huge incentives and concessions, private investment has not picked up and thus there is no significant employment generation in the private sector. The Modi led government is not filling up the lakhs of posts lying vacant in the government departments. Instead, posts are being abolished in government departments and public sector undertakings. Over three lakhs posts are lying vacant in the Railways including in safety related categories resulting in accidents and loss of lives. The New Education Policy aims at centralisation and corporatisation of education depriving affordable education to the children of poorer families. Public education with its infrastructure is being handed over to private corporate educational institutions. In addition, the Modi led government, guided by the Hindutva communal RSS is promoting the RSS agenda of establishing a ‘Hindu Rashtra’. It is distorting the curriculum by changing the courses, text books and syllabus to influence young minds with its rabid Hindu supremacist ideology. The RSS is trying to replace the present Constitution with the Manusmriti that advocates brahamanical hierarchical society. The Declaration adopted in the National Convention of Workers made it clear that ‘what is required is to make the workers and the people aware that their real enemy, the cause of their miseries and the miseries of the nation, is the anti national destructive policy regime being operated by the corporate run government at the centre’. It is not the ‘others’, the workers and the common people believing in a different faith, speaking a different language, belonging to a different caste or place. Such divisive machinations of the RSS led communal forces only serve the interests of the big corporates by weakening struggles against the neoliberal policies. In addition the Modi government is increasingly using the State machinery and administration to suppress any opposition and resistance to its policies. The experience of the last nine years since the Modi government has been in power makes it very clear that this government is totally apathetic to the voices of the workers and the people in general. The working class has been consistently raising its collective voice against the attacks on the livelihood and living and working conditions of the toiling people. It has observed five country wide general strikes during this period, two of which, in 2019 and 2022, were for 2 days. In addition almost all sections of the workers and employees went on strike opposing the policies of the government. But the Modi led BJP government has turned a deaf ear to the demands of the workers. Drunk with power it is even violating Parliamentary and Constitutional norms and practices.
Advancing the struggle against neoliberal policies, protecting the hard won rights and benefits of the workers, the democratic rights of the people and the Constitution adopted by the people after Independence requires that the Modi government is defeated in the ensuing Parliament elections in 2024. This can be done by intensifying the united struggles of the working class, involving broader sections of the toiling masses, particularly the peasants and agricultural workers in these struggles and heightening these struggles to the level of defiance and resistance. With general elections less than one year away, the working class and the trade union movement have to utilise the intervening period to develop powerful campaigns at all levels, focussing on taking it up to the grass root level.
The action programmes in August and the campaigns preceding these are aimed at this. Following the national convention of workers, joint trade union conventions have been already held in almost all the states and campaign programmes have been chalked out to popularise the charter of demands. This has to be conducted through leaflets, group meetings, gate meetings, jathas and various other forms highlighting the specific issues of workers in different sectors and linking them with the overall neoliberal policy regime. The objective of the campaign is to reach all sections of workers irrespective of their trade union or political affiliations and create awareness about the disastrous impact of the Modi government’s policies which are destroying our national economy, and whatever manufacturing capacities and self reliance that we have achieved in the last over seventy years since Independence.
CITU, AIKS and AIAWU have also decided to conduct joint campaign on the charter of demands taking it up to the village/ grass root level. It has been decided to conduct joint meetings of the three organisations at the state, district and lower levels wherever possible to plan joint campaign for one week culminating in the night vigil on the night of 14th August. Efforts have to be made to involve the family members of the members of the three organisations and broader sections of society supporting the demands and interested in protecting the secular democratic character of our Republic.
The defeat of the BJP in the Karnataka assembly elections has exposed the myth of the invincibility of Modi. Despite the extensive campaign by Modi, Amit Shah, and other senior leaders including central ministers and chief ministers of BJP ruled states, the BJP was decisively defeated in the state. The issues of livelihood, employment etc came to the fore. The BJP was defeated in the areas dominated by the poorer sections. Earlier, BJP was defeated in Himachal Pradesh also where the NPS issue played an important role among the government employees.
The defeat of BJP in Karnataka has created confidence among the people in general that BJP, with all its money and muscle power and the support of the corporate media, can be decisively defeated. However, electoral defeat of BJP itself is no guarantee for reversal of neoliberal regime. Neither does it mean the waning of the influence of the RSS led communal divisive forces. What is required is a strong movement against the neoliberal regime by the working class conscious of its role in uniting all sections of the working people – the peasants, agricultural workers etc – and leading this struggle for a change in policies. The working class must be determined to defeat all machinations of the RSS and its outfits serving the big corporates to disrupt its unity and weaken united struggles against the corporate communal nexus. This alone will create the conditions for the success of the struggle for pro worker, pro people policies. There are no shortcuts. The campaigns of the joint trade union platform and the CITU, AIKS and AIAWU are meant to achieve this.
