Public Comment

Indian farmers are angry with Prime Minister’s Modi’s policies of neoliberalism and inequality. Hundreds of thousands marched in New Delhi demanding repeal of new laws that maintain agricultural products at historic lows. This is a complete betrayal of promises made to famers in the 2014 election.

In a bid to win over farmers, Modi's Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) said in its 2014 general election manifesto that all crop prices should be fixed at a minimum of 50% higher than the production costs. In 2016, Modi promised to boost the country's agriculture sector with a target of doubling the income of farmers by 2022. Agriculture is the main source of income for more than half of India’s 1.3 billion people. Many farmers are no longer able to maintain a living wage and have been driven into bankruptcy and suicide. An estimated 250 million workers participated in the strike making it the largest strike in the world. Police beat back peaceful demonstrators, many in their late sixties and seventies, with lathes and water cannons in the freezing cold weather.

This comes as COVID rages through India, which has reported more cases than any country in the world outside the United States. India’s working class endorsed the demands of the farmers. 

Many artists and poets returned their civilian awards. Punjab’s famous athletes sent their medals to Modi in solidarity with the farmers. It was a tremendous show of unity and solidarity, when millions of workers were saying, “We are with the farmers.” 

With unemployment hovering around 27% many farmers are unable to survive. In just two years, from 2018 to 2019, over 20,000 farmers died by suicide. Meanwhile the richest man in India, Mukesh Ambani, made $12 million an hour since the lockdown began. The farmers’ agitation rattled the Modi government prompting them to imprison opposition leaders. The chief minister of Delhi, Mr. Kejriwal has openly come out in support of the farmers’ demands to roll back Mr. Modi’s agricultural policies. India’s tone deaf, Prime Minister, Narendra Modi dismissed the protests as a “conspiracy by the opposition.” Little wonder Modi and Donald Trump became such bosom friends. The autocratic Modi doesn’t seem to have learned from his heavy handed polices. Let us hope the powerful voices of India’s courageous farmers will change his mind. To introduce such unpopular polices during raging pandemic is excessive cruel and short-sighted.