Through
Parliamentary Elections of 2014 of India, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) under
leadership of Narendra Modi was elected to power in New Delhi. Main issues
raised by BJP leadership for impressing voters were price rise and black money
deposited by Indian in foreign banks. During the 3 years of Modi Government in
office, prices of all industrial products have doubled while those of
agricultural produce have seen marginal rise due to government controls. It is
notable here that industrial producers are mostly urban while agri-producers
are rural. This in turn means that during the said period, urban population has
enriched itself while the rural population has slided back on the prosperity
scale. Industrial products are purchased and used mostly by urban population
composed of employees of the Government of thse of organized sector whose
income levels are exhorbitantly higher than those of the rural people, hence
there is no considerable impact on their prosperity level. Rural people using
and consuming highly-priced industrial products have been mercilessly chiseled
by high prices of industrial products.
Government
controls prices of agricultural produce for these falling under essential
commodities, so that survival of poor sections of population is not endangered.
Under this background and pretext, there is no logic for rise in prices of
industrial products. This gap in prices escalation has made rich people richer
and poor people poorer.
During
election campaign of 2014, BJP leadership have expressly promised bringing back
of India’s money in foreign Banks within 50 days in office. Even Ram Deva also
organized a camaign to this effect. After coming to power, the issue is
conveniently forgotten, and no progress has been made in this matter even in
1000 days of the Government in office. Ram Deva getting multiple benefits of
BJP in power has also forgotten the issue. Thus, Modi Government has miserably
failed on both the counts of their election campaign promises.
In 2014,
Samajwadi Party (SP) government was ruling U.P. State with heavy hand promoting
criminals and interests of Muslim community only. BJP leadership, during 2014
election campaign had promised to dismiss SP government in U.P. immediately on
coming to power in New Delhi. Since, Narendra Modi has friendly relationship
with SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadava, said promise of election campaign was
forgotten. It is notable here that, India’s two most corrupt politicians are
Mulayam Singh of U.P. and Sharad Pawar of Maharashtra. Narendra Modi has very
amicable relationships with both of these. This reflects on honesty of the
present Prime Minister Modi.
Currency Fiasco
Modi
Government put all their energy in demonetisation of high value currency notes
in circulation, throwing the whole financial system of the country out of gear.
This was promised that demonetization would be beneficial to the nation and her
poor people, and that the problems faced by common people for cash scarcity in
Banks due to demonetization would be taken care of withing 50 days ie by
December 31, 2016. While there is no cash shortage in urban Bank branches,
account holders of rural branches have been suffering for cash scarcity even
today, after 6 months of the promised date.
Due to
no-cash in rural Bank branches, account holders have lost faith in the whole
banking system, hence avoiding depositing their savings in the Banks and
getting their money transferred through such Bank branches. So far, the
government has not shown a single benefit of the demonetization. Of course,
favorite Bank Branch Managers have been greatly benefitted by demonetization through
using their power of converting black currency notes for heavy prices.
Jan-Dhan Yojana
Modi
Government launched Jan-Dhan Yojana prompting every citizen to have a Bank
Account and deposit their savings in the account. This way, it is claimed by
the PM himself that the government collected Rs 110,000 millions due to this
scheme. Money so collected was loaned out to big business persons like Malya,
Ambani, Adani, etc. After the said deposits by the poor people, Bank branches
were declared cashless through demonetization, so that the depositors failed to
get back their own money to meet their needs. Again, rich were made richer, and
poor poorer.
With Jan
Dhan Yojana, number of accounts in every Bank branch was doubled, but the Banks
refused to increase their staff to serve the increased number of account
holders, hence quality of service by Bank branches has considerably degraded.
Digital India Dream
PM Modi is
bent upon linking every citizen with Internet for various purposes of life, and
he is pursuing this goal at war scale, without knowing that the country not yet
have the infrastructure required for serving this purpose. In my village only
150 km from Delhi, like 40 percent of India’s village, still doesn’t have
network signal strength suitable for an Internet connection. I am constrained
to go to my rooftop after midnight hours whenever I wish the connectivity. Even
then, I fail many times. Only possbility of connectivity is through BSNL
Broadband with a landline phone. I had been their customer for 3 years but
never got satisfactory service from them. Secondly, my ID used to be grossly
misused by local exchange staff for connecting others with the Internet with
bills to me. Actually, BSNL staff in rural exchanges have been at their places
for decades with a cot in the exchange for sleeping during daytime. They don’t
want any customer for BSNL.
River Sand
Due to
misrepresentation by the Government of India, Supreme Court considers even
taking river sand under Mining Act, and have imposed strict punitive measures
on people for taking some sand for building their houses. As a result, local
police finds it a good source of their illicit income because people
essentially need the sand for which they must to the police personnel, or get
arrested. A by-product of this is that price of river sand has quadrupled durig
the last 3 years.
Sand is
regularly produced by rivers in huge quantities as these descend from mountains
to plains, and it is spread throughout the length of the rivers. People have
been getting the sand from nearby rivers since known past without causing any
damage to the ecology. If the sand is not removed from river beds, it would
block flow of the river forcing it to change path. Hence, there is no need for
any regulatory measures on getting sand from a river.
Now
Governments are issuing licenses to traders for digging out river sand at
far-away places and selling to the consumers. With this arrangement, the
consumers are forced to pay a heavy price to contractor and for long distance
transport, or steal the sand from a nearby river bed and pay a bribe to local
police. Whole exercise of the Government is quite foolish, anti-people, and
causing ecological damages.
What a
Government is supposed to provide to people are adequate public health
services, unifor education, speedy justice, work at their usual residence, and
public services like roads, electricity gridlines, etc. But Modi government has
not paid any attention to these in their 3 years in office, but have involved
in creating controversies through intruding into private lives of people.
