In his Rajya Sabha address, Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked the farmers to end their agitation and gave them assurance that the minimum support price (MSP) arrangement will remain in place. But Modi did not shy away from attacking the opposition and professional agitators (aandolanjeevi) who are misleading the farmers to achieve their own ends.
PM Modi is very adept in coining new words. The country learnt this when he became the prime minister in 2014 after being the chief minister of Gujarat for over 12 years. Gujarat came to know about this knack of Modi during the 1980s when he was a pracharak with the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), and then in 1987 when he became general secretary, and then CM in 2001. As chief minister of Gujarat, he implemented schemes like the Jyotigram to Sagarkhedu successfully. Also, various programmes such as Udan to Pragati and Divyang to Atmanirbhar Bharat of the central government bear testimony of his efficiency.
On Monday, while replying to the motion of thanks on President Ram Nath Kovind’s address, PM Modi was speaking in the Rajya Sabha, and he once again proved how skilled he is at playing with words. He coined a new term “aandolanvaadi” (agitators) and also came up with a new expansion for FDI: “foreign destructive ideology”.
As is evident, these new words also express the anguish and pain of PM Modi which he is feeling in the form of farmers’ agitation that is currently going on in the country. The protests have on occasions assumed a very attacking posture, at times they have become violent, and on another occasion they have revealed that there is an international conspiracy behind them. Leftist and extremist elements along with professional agitators are fronting this farmers’ movement to achieve their own ends. Their foreign handlers and cooperators are aiding them. The PM has given indication about this and has substantiated this with his definition of words like aandolanjeevi and FDI.
Actually, Modi is pointing to the trend that some well-known names are trying to destabilise his government by raising one issue or another and they are also vitiating the peaceful environment in the country. Sometimes they are seen with an extremist students’ movement while on other occasions they ask women to lead protests. At times they are behind labour unrest while now they are orchestrating the protest that farmers are carrying out and with this they are trying to set the whole country on fire by inciting violence.
Modi had this inkling beforehand. When he was chief minister of Gujarat, he wanted to complete the Sardar Sarovar Dam project in time, which had been hanging for decades. But the biggest obstacle in the completion of this dam was the movement called Narmada Bachao Andolan (Save Narmada Agitation), which on occasions asked the tribal people to oppose it and then on other occasions it took the matter to the court to delay it. The agitation was led by Medha Patkar and it was said that she is carrying out these protests on the directions of foreign powers so that the work on the dam could be stopped. On many occasions, the people from this movement were involved in violent agitation.
Now the same Medha Patkar is also seen in the farmers’ agitation. As is obvious, Modi must have remembered those times two decades ago when the dam project was under the dark shadow of Narmada Bachao Andolan. Modi had great difficulty in pulling this project out of the mire of the protests. And after it was completed, he also finished the Statue of Unity project in Kevadia within a few years. After the completion of the statue of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, a symbol of the country’s unity, the same tribal people are now reaping the benefits of development. And it was Medha Patkar who was telling them that the completion of the dam had nothing to do with their development and that’s why she tried to stall the project too, by hook or by crook.
Medha Patkar, Yogendra Yadav, Prashant Bhushan, etc, are among the most visible faces in all the protests against the Modi government. The PM was actually pointing towards such people who are relevant only because of these agitations. Modi indicated that these people have a history of aiding protesters against several regimes in the past. When Modi coined the new expansion of FDI, he had in his mind the names of all those people and elements who are inciting the agitating farmers from foreign soils and are fomenting communal strife in the country. As expected, Modi could not have come up with a better descriptor for them. He wanted to warn the people of this country against these individuals who want to destabilise the country. He wanted to say this to his supporters who have sent him in power with their valuable votes in record numbers.
Modi made it amply clear in the Rajya Sabha that the agitation that is going on in the name of farmers is actually not in the interest of farmers and is against the interests of the country too. As far as farmers’ interests are concerned, the PM has shown his commitment towards them through Kisan Credit Card, Soil Health Card, Crop Insurance Scheme, PM Kisan Nidhi Yojana, Kisan Rail Yojana, Kisan Pension Yojana, and other initiatives.
The PM targeted even those parties who are trying to create an anti-Modi atmosphere in the country in the name of the farmers’ agitation, be it the Congress, the Left, or Rashtriya Lok Dal. In this connection, he cited the words of Chaudhary Charan Singh which he had said about small farmers and also quoted Dr Manmohan Singh’s remarks on the necessity of an all-India agriculture market. He also said that Lal Bahadur Shastri had started the Green Revolution and even that programme was opposed by the Left parties, as they are doing now. As far as the interests of poor farmers are concerned, they are going to be benefitted by the new farm laws, and if it is so, why this opposition to these laws, Modi asked.
The PM has made his position clear. The government is very serious about the farm laws because they are in the interests of the farmers. The government is ready to discuss the issue but it will not bow before any agitation or dharna. If any problem crops up because of the laws, the government will do a course correction, and Modi has assured the farmers about this. But he has made it amply evident that his government is not going to be pressured into changing its position by a ruckus inside Parliament or outside of it. It is not afraid of agitators and is not worried about the explosive ideology of ‘FDI’. He said that the real FDI is being received in record quantity and that too despite the economic crisis brought on by the coronavirus pandemic and a conspiracy to tarnish the image of the country by foreign powers.
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