Forum Fragrance of the soil-the reason to live
In the year 2016, Punjab state legislated, ''The Punjab Settlement of Agricultural Indebtedness Act'', which was later amended in the year 2018. It had taken almost 11 years to make this law, which has not been implemented till day. The institutional loans have been partially waived off, but the loans from private lenders at very high rates have not been touched despite existence of legislation in this regard. In the year 2016, farmers of Tamil Nadu had marched to New Delhi in the most miserable conditions. In the year 2017, agitating farmers of Madhya Pradesh had to face the bullets and in the year 2018, thousands of Maharashtra farmers had to undertake long march to Bombay, in the most inhospitable conditions. It is a gospel truth that even before the legislation of 3 new laws in Sept 2020, the life of the farmers' of this country was uncomfortable. But the farmers now consider the new laws to be their death warrants.
''O jaane walo jao na ghar apna chhorh ke, mata bula rahi hai tumhe haath jorh ke,''this soulful song was picturized on great Indian actress Nargis,in magnum -opus of Indian cinema Mother India, where she beckons her fellow villagers not to leave the village, after the fury of the floods had devastated it and they started to leave. Presently, the farmers, across the country, are leaving their lands and villages and converging near Delhi, when they think that the three new laws ,recently legislated, will oust them from their lands and farmery permanently. Their houses, their cattle-heads, their fields and their orchards are missing them and beckoning them to return for their sake. Legendary film maker Mehboob kKhan, had very thoughtfully made this film ,very minutely depicting the miseries of the farmers, at the hands of nature and the greedy money-lenders. The film was made at his own village Bilimora, in Baroda district of Gujrat state. Sukhi lala, a greedy shahukar of the village, so heartlessly inflicted atrocities and insults on the family that it compelled Birju, one son of Radha(Nargis), to become a rebel.
Prior to making Mother India, Mehboob Khan had made AAN in the year 1952. In this film, he portrayed that the extremely loyal farmers also acted as sword-arm of any benevolent regime, in time of any external aggression. But, if the ruler turned out to be a tyrant, these loyal brave hearts, did not hesitate to raise their swords against such rulers. In film 'Shikasat', made by Ramesh Sehgal, in 1954, the atrocities against the farmers have been vividly delineated and, as in AAN, in this film also, Dilip Kumar delivers the farmers from tyrraneous and miserable life. Incidentally, it was Ramesh Sehgal who gave break to Sunil Dutt in film Railway Platform in 1954 who played Birju in film Mother India later, in 1957.
In 1989,when the extremism was at its zenith in Punjab, and no solution was in sight, the new PM,VP Singh, immediately after taking the oath, came to Golden Temple at Amritsar. It raised hopes of the people towards a solution. But nothing happened in the next some months, except that the same PM came to Golden Temple, once again.On 20th December ,this year, a day after the martyrdom day of Guru Tegh Bahadur ji , PM paid obeisance at Gurdwara Bangla Sahib, again raising hopes of solution of the problem. This is the right time to save the farmers from the sukhi lalas, who will reach, every nook and corner of the country, at breakneck speed, if brakes are not put now. Let statesmanship replace mundane politics.
Surinderjit Singh Sandhu
Failed to serve masters in 1962, doing it now
Pakistan was the first country that treated India with contempt in 1948 and grabbed the entire territory of PoK- Indian land. Then came China in 1962 audaciously and grabbed the entire Aksai Chin territory of India. When it tried to repeat the misadventure during Prime Minister Narendra Modi it was met with a stout reply and successful diplomacy checking China in its tracks on expansionism through economic and military strategy of string of pearls and economic cooperation. The failed China and Pakistan supporters have grown wings in the democratic liberal set up of India and want to serve their masters now loyally. So, they are openly inviting China to attack India. As a part, they have devised the farmers’ agitation and violence in Punjab. They are confident of destabilising the government at the centre and states specially chosen for the plan- Punjab, Bihar, UP, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Assam and the 7 sisters in the NE, J&K UT and Ladakh UT. They are moving with strategy whereas the politicians don’t even realize the enveloping dangers to national security, territory and sovereignty. They are caught in the maze of political jargons like communalism, regionalism, language etc. They do not acknowledge the great achievements of every single communist country in the world in registering high industrial and economic growth rate in the past 73 years and world class corporates creating huge wealth for them. On the contrary, the communists in India cannot boast of a single corporate giant promoted by them in any state of India ruled by them even though industry, education, health and agriculture have been in state subjects within the executive authority of those communist regimes. They only destroyed every industry creating jobs or wealth. And they do not regret having done so. They carry the same with whatever little others have succeeded in achieving. All other parties with pretensions of socialism, progressivism, liberalism, Gandhism, anti-Gandhism, Left-Right-middle etc. have similar record. Attacks organised on the Indian economy are meant to harm India as a nation and destabilise a strong and popular government under Narendra Modi, so that they can render service to their masters now and rule poor India as regents on their behalf. In the early years of our independence we were a pitiably poor country. Besides poverty, we were a feudal country of millions of fealty serving their masters for free called beggar (which was to be outlawed by the Constitution of Free India later). The mesmerism of Marxism in those days was so powerful that associating with the communist ideology was a statement of being forward looking. Many people named their children after Marx, Lenin, Stalin and even conjunction of Marx & Lenin coining a new name. Later Mao was added to the litany. As political power came in the hands of such people, they shifted priority to their siblings and dynasty. The then Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, was struggling to take India on a path of industrialisation and all round development and the communists were opposing every move of the government. As ignorant and idealistic youth, my generation bought the dream of a revolution promising everything, particularly equitable distribution of wealth and means of livelihood and income. It came as an intensely painful disillusionment to see the insincerity of the leaders professing ideology publicly but acting pragmatic in life. We are in the year 2021 and it is a different India. The exploitation of the Kisan, Majdoor, Farmers (in case they are assigned a different category), students and poor citizens must end and political parties adopt service to the people as their motto and work sincerely to solve problems by explaining the benefits of the 3 Laws instead of the current tod-bhod ki rajniti and make a public appeal to the farmers to call off the agitation forthwith.
M L Gupta
Thanks whispersinthecorridors
11 IRS-Customs promoted to PrCC/PrDG of Customs grade. Thanks to whispersinthecorridors
Nilima
