I hold no brief for Mamata Banerjee but cannot help but wonder on what exactly has she done to deserve the hostility of the ELM? If it is on account of her rusticity, the media darling Lalu can give her tips anyday. If it is her propensity to throw tantrums, she can learn a thing or two from Jayalalitha. If it is her opportunism, she will be a student to the likes of Nitish, Naveen and Paswan and if it her populism, Manmohan Singh can teach her a thing or two.
Just imagine, a single woman who almost single handedly fought a mighty party / Government apparatus for over two decades and is known to by incorruptible (by standards of Indian politicians) is treated like a virago by the ELM. Her fault, she does not pay obeisance to the reigning matron at 10, Janpath and more critically, she is not seen as favoring the business houses. So, Mamata is berated for protesting against the Teesta water treaty. Her fault – she protested against the unfair share which Bangladesh was being provided under the treaty. The ELM conveniently declared her as being against National Interests and for putting provincial considerations over the National ones. Pray tell us, is Bengal not India? How can something which is bad for Bengal be good for India and most importantly, how can one claim that by giving away National assets, India gains. A question to all r those who still like in the make believe world of only give and no take, please tell how exactly did India gain by giving away rights on Tibet to China, by giving over Manipuri land to Burma, by handing over Katchtheevu to Sri Lanka, by handing over Tees Bigha, Tin Bigha and the Ganga water to Bangladesh? Both the Indus Water Treaty and the Ganges Water treaty are loaded in favor of the smaller nation. What did India gain with these acts of magnanimity that it should be more magnanimous?
Mamata is chided for her land use policy. So, what should be done? All the sharecroppers and small land owners be gassed or sent to gulags? Or have Kalinganagar, Nandigram, Vedic Village, Bhatta Parsaul repeated in thousands of villages of Bengal? While it is certainly Government’s business to promote trade and commerce, it is not its business to act as cronies of business houses trying to make money in the guise of growth.
The ELM’s dislike of Mamata has reached newer heights with the Railways fare hike by Dinesh Trivedi. Sadly, the commentary provided by the ELM only serves to buttress the notion that a vast majority of people who masquerade as journalists are career discards who could do nothing better in life. Firstly, simply because Dinesh Trivedi declared the fare hike in terms of paise per km, it was declared by those sanctimonious people as marginal hikes. Of course, had they managed to clear their basic arithmetic examinations in school, they would have known that existing fares were (in progressive scale) less than 30 paise per km for second class rail travel and Rs 1.01 for AC second class travel. The hikes proposed by Dinesh Trivedi are marginal only if 15%-20% hikes are marginal. Another pretender from the same ilk, Vivian Fernandes, who happens to head a media company claims that fares had not been raised for the last two decades! Huh!
This is not to say that there was no case at all for a fare hike. At the same time, a mere fare hike does not make either the Railway budget progressive or Dinesh Trivedi a reformer. What has Trivedi done except to raise fares? There is absolutely nothing in the budget which would help reduce superfluous expenditure, improve safety, improve maintenance, improve passenger amenities or at the very minimum, improve cleanliness and punctuality. If claims of bringing down Opex Ratio is being greeted with orgasmic sighs, it only shows the barrenness of their intellect for it does not take much to understand that if revenue is increased, opex ratio will come down even when expenses are not reduced. No sir, Mr Trivedi has been hailed simply because he ostensibly stood against Mamata (though the entire saga reeks of having been fixed by the main protagonists).
It is funny that precisely the same set of people start crying themselves hoarse when airfares climb upwards. Haven’t airfares been static for more than a decade? Should they at least not been tripled since everything has become so expensive? No, they haven’t for scale has also resulted in economies and airways have also cut down on superfluous expenses.
That we are back to the Indira and Rajiv years in terms of budgets seems to have escaped notice of the ELM completely. In those years, each budget would mean increased taxes, increased prices. This year, we have had hikes in Excise, Service Tax and Train Tickets. Almost everything will be more expensive. Reforms are dead and so is the India growth story. The ELM which went breathless commending UPA 1 & early UPA 2 for growth is strangely silent now. It never bothered to accept that economy performs with a time lag, i.e., policy decisions have a gestation of at least 2 years to bear fruit. UPA 1 reaped benefits of NDA policies and now chickens of UPA1 are coming home to roost. Long live the Italian matron! Long live NAC and long live Manmohan!
