A Heartless Reform

'Mistimed and insensitive', this is how 'The Hindu' defined the UPA's decision to deregulate oil prices.The statement very much explains almost everything about this issue. Calling this action 'inevitable' sounds even more insensitive. According to Mr.Kaushik Basu, Chief Economic Advisor to the Finance Minister, "this reform will rationalise the way we spend money and fuel and will help India become a more efficient global player".The statement shows how much UPA has moved away from the much applauded pro-poor status, it has gained during their first tenure in the ministry.The prime minister's justification is that this reform is intended to safeguard the greater interests of our country. A very relevant question in this context, when the food inflation has touched a whooping 17 p.c is, 'who are we trying to include in the so called inclusive growth?'. The ministry is in fact trying to veil the cascading effect this fuel price hike can have on the prices of commodities.With the inflation curve climbing northwards everyday, this is undoubtedly the worst time for the implementation of such a reform.

The Petroleum Minister Murli Doera's argument that the implementation of this reform aims at saving the OMCs from bankruptcy is also unjustified.According to Petroleum Ministry's annual report, IOC posted a net profit of Rs. 10,998 crores in FY 2009-10 that too after holding the price line for the four major products – petrol,diesel, PDS kerosene and LPG for domestic use.BPC and HPC earned 834 crores and 544 crores respectively as profits in the same Financial Year. When the OMCs are making profits of this margin, the theory of these companies going bankrupt is hard to digest.

It is estimated that without the deregulation, for OMCs the subsidy burden is to produce an under-recovery of around 15,000 crores in FY2010 and around 39,000 crores for the FY2011. This fancy term 'under-recovery' can generate an idea in the mind of a common man reading these statistics that this 'price de-regulation is inevitable' .Under recovery is nothing but the difference between the import parity price [A price charged for a domestically produced good that is set equal to the domestic price of an equivalent imported good -- thus the world price plus transport cost plus tariff - courtsy:http://www.personal.umich.edu/~alandear/glossary/i.html] and the retail price of petrol, diesel,LPG & kerosene, before deregulation. Quoting The Hindu "Under-recoveries are notional losses that only lower book profits relative to some benchmark. Thus, there is little danger that the industry would be bankrupted even if prices were kept at their earlier levels".

When the inflation is rocket shooting to super-high levels,it is highly insensitive to make the common man share the burden of these under-recoveries by imposing the de-regulation on oil prices. The cascading effect of this price de-regulation on the price-hike of essentials have far reaching consequences. The concept of food security cannot be limited to distribution of foodgrains at subsidised rates to BPL families and fuel-price hike connot be de-linked from this.This insensitive reform is infact a denial of the basic right of a human being, 'food security'. The government must not forget the fact that, 77% of our population earn not more than Rs.20 a day for their survival. Whatever may be the reason, keeping their interests hostage is a highly callous and politically self-damaging act.

Understanding Jamaat-e-Islami in Kerala

Plachimeda, Express highway, Muthanga and now Kinaloor, every time ‘Solidarity’ take up social issues like this, its parent organization Jamaat-e-islami is making its strong presence felt in Kerala. To some extend Jamaat-e-Islami has been sucessful in creating an image of a progressive pro-people organization in Kerala. They made it possible by making their active presence felt in issues like gender-equality, democracy, dalit rights, environment protection, human rights etc. But there are strong reasons to believe that this is just a mask they have deliberately put on to hide their real nature to achieve their ulterior political motives.

To know their real nature, let’s have a look into the history of Jamaat-e-Islami. It was Abul Ala Maududi who found Jamaat-e-Islami in 1941. The basic concept he raised when he started Jamaat-e-Islami was that ‘a person who is Muslim by religion cannot be economically socialist or Politically Secular’. He proclaimed that Islam is not just a religion but a complete way of living. It must be noted that Maududi’s concepts were essentially against democracy. According to him the greatest threat Muslim community is facing are the progressive views of secularism and democracy. He believed that the ultimate power should be with God (Allah) and not with people. People are allowed to run a government only as the representatives of God to enact his wishes. Their basic idea is to bring in the ‘Rule of God on Earth’. Maududi calls in for a nationalism that is beyond the boundary of nations and urges Muslims to work to bring up a ‘Muslim nation’.

It is the same Jamaat-e-Islami, that has now come up with a progressive face in Kerala. It is out of the understanding that they cannot run their roots in Kerala exposing their real face, they have put on this mask of a progressive organization. To gain public support they started an 'intellectual Jihad'. In 1987 Jamt-e-islami launched 'Madhyamam' daily in Kerala. With a clear intention of creating a pro-people image, they started giving space for Leftist progressive writers and even naxelites in the Editorial/opinion pages of 'Madhyamam' daily. Later on columns of feminists, environmentalists and dalit rights activists started appearing frequently in 'Madhyamam' weekly. Their 'intellectual Jihad' didnt stop there. They started conducting workshops and seminars on relevant issues where eminent faces like Arundhathi Roy, Medha padker and Vandana Shivam took part. In 2003, Jamaat-e-Islami started their youth wing under then name 'Solidarity', which later became successful in getting into the headlines of daily news by taking up each and every issue in Kerala. How authentic Jamaat-e-Islami is in the issues that they started taking up recently is a topic worth discussing.

Starting with 'Gender-equality’: Feminist organizations started popping up in Kerala in 1980's. 'Bodhana', 'Prajodana', 'Manushi' etc were some among the popular feminist organizations of that time. In early 90's 'Kerala Sthree Vedi' was formed. It must be noted that none of these secular feminist organizations had a single Jamaat-e-Islami activist as its member. The reason for this is very simple, Jamaat-e-Islami never wanted to promote any sort of secular women's progressive movements. Maududi in his famous work 'Parda' says that 'women should be always dependent on men'. He pointed out that women’s being self-dependent is the basic reason of lack of stability in marriages and relationships in the west. Maududism and hence Jamaat-e-Islami in its very core is against empowerment of women.

Another tool Jamaat-e-Islami uses in its intellectual jihad is Dalit-rights. Without doubt, Jamaat-e-Islami is genuinely interested in promoting Dalit politics. But the fact of the matter is that, they are interested in promoting only 'Hindu-dalit politics'. Jamat-e-islam prefer looking at Muslims beyond dalit-non-dalit distinction and they fear that promoting Muslim-dalit movements can end up being a hindrance to their political motives. It must be noted that in North India, Jamt-e-islami tried to bring down all sort of Muslim-dalit-OBC movements. That is Jamat-e-islam do not beileve in secular-dalit politics. Hindu-dalit politics, they believe can act as tool to breakdown the unity of their 'Majority Hindutwa' opponents.

The third in the list is 'anti-imperialism'. Solidarity came up with the slogan 'Muthalalitham Valicheriyuka' (Throw-away Capitalism). They did postering and distributed leaflets across Kerala urging the people for the same. But they never mentioned anywhere about the alternative they suggest for 'capitalism'. Is it socialism?.. Defenitely not!!. For Jamaat-e-Islami the alternative of capitalism is Moududism. If we look closely we can see that they are in fact NOT against impereialiam as such, they are only against American Imperialism (Christian Imperialism, as they call it). All they want is to replace it with Muslim Imperialism.

Solidarity has taken up several environmental issues in Kerala. They joined the 'Plachimeda Samara Samithi'(2 years since the agitation started), came out supporting Dr.Nandakumar in the agitation against Philip Carbon company in Ernakulam and joined V.M Sudeheeran on the Black-sand (karimanal) Mining issue in Alappuzha. They are out there to support anyone who takes up any environmental issue, a desperate effort to improve their public image.

The believers of Maududist ideologies wearing a mask of a progresive organisation and promoting an intellectual jihad to gain public support is major political issue as far as Kerala is concerned. It is high time we realize that, it is our democracy, nationalism and above all the unity of our nation that is at stake when an organization whose ideologies at its very core is flawed and is against democracy and secularism is planning to set their feet in the Indian parliamentary politics.