Democracy and Economy; Both in Danger under BJP Government

Every passing day that the BJP government continues to digress from matters of national importance, India will continue to become weaker under the Modi led government. The government continues to drum up false national pride over nonissues even as its actions (or inaction) further weaken India. The BJP for long has got its fundamental understanding of democracy and national strength wrong.

A nation is her people. If the people are unhealthy, so is the nation; if the people are unhappy, so is the nation; if the people are struggling to cope with a tattered economy, so is the nation. What the people are, the nation is. And the primary focus of any government must be to assuage the people’s anxieties and suffering and thereby make the nation strong. However, the BJP often equates the government with the nation and aggrandizes to itself the status of the nation. Any questions posed to it are intentionally misconstrued to mean that India is being questioned. In fact, the converse is true. Any question posed by the people directly or through the opposition leaders, must be treated as India posing a question to the government. This is the fundamental essence of democracy that the BJP must learn.

Once it understands the basics of our polity and democracy, it would perhaps make the BJP understand the importance of managing the economy efficiently. Every aspect of our sociopolitical life depends on ensuring better management of the economy. To ensure that India is a strong nation, we must work to promote sustainable development, which cannot be achieved without inclusiveness and socioeconomic justice.

It is this fundamental misunderstanding that the BJP government suffers from which is weakening India. It is this misunderstanding that makes the BJP falsely believe that monies donated to the PM CARES fund need not be audited by the CAG. It is this misunderstanding of India and her democracy, that the government refused to answer a question by Rahul Gandhi in parliament and inform India who the top most wilful defaulters in India are. Or perhaps, the BJP understands the nuances of democracy but are brazenly breaching our trust because the biggest wilful defaulters have resulted in India’s financial system being brought to the brink of collapse. And most of them are known to be embarrassingly close to people in the government including.

The BJP government is now using the arguments of “national pride and nation building” as excuses to hide from its utter malfeasance. In times of and unprecedented and massive crisis, the BJP government rather than putting money into the hands of the people is burdening us with taxes. It must understand that new or higher taxes can be justified only when the economy is doing well. But by the BJP’s own admission our economy is in shatters, which was had to deal with a slew of ill thought policies, starting from demonetization. In order to make up for the losses they have caused to the national exchequer, due to rampant crony capitalism and faulty policies, the excise duty has been increased by a whopping ₹10 per litre & ₹13 per litre on diesel. The tax on petrol is now to ₹32.98 per litre and that on diesel is ₹31.83. In comparison, when the Modi government took charge in 2014, it was ₹9.48 per litre on petrol & ₹3.56 a litre on diesel.

We’re paying silently without questioning the government on why Indian’s financial condition has become so dire. We are afraid to question because large sections of the mass media in connivance with the government have equated questioning the government or even the BJP with questioning India. As duty bound citizens, we must all resist India’s descent into tyranny. Do not stop questioning. Do not let the BJP damage our democratic traditions and institutions. Do not let the BJP weaken India. Questioning the government and seeking answers is an act of patriotism.