P. Sainath

Antara Raman

Illustration

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What the media can never openly admit is that the
largest peaceful democratic protest the world has seen in years – certainly
the greatest organised at the height of the pandemic – has won a mighty victory.


A victory that carries forward a legacy. Farmers of
all kinds, men and women – including from Adivasi and Dalit communities –
played a crucial role in this country’s struggle for freedom. And in the 75th
year of our Independence, the farmers at Delhi’s gates reiterated the spirit of
that great struggle.Prime Minister Modi has announced he is backing
off and repealing the farm laws in the upcoming winter session of Parliament
starting on the 29th of this month. He says he is doing so after failing to
persuade ‘a section of farmers despite best efforts’.  Just a section, mind you, that he could not
convince to accept that the three discredited farm laws were really good for
them. Not a word on, or for, the over 600 farmers who have died in the course
of this historic struggle. His failure, he makes it clear, is only in his
skills of persuasion, in not getting that ‘section of farmers’ to see the
light. No failure attaches to the laws themselves or to how his government
rammed them through right in the middle of a pandemic.Well, the Khalistanis, anti-nationals, bogus
activists masquerading as farmers, have graduated to being ‘a section of
farmers’ who declined to be persuaded by Mr. Modi’s chilling charms. Refused to
be persuaded? What was the manner and method of persuasion? By denying them entry
to the capital city to explain their grievances? By blocking them with trenches
and barbed wire? By hitting them with water cannons? By converting their camps
into little gulags? By having crony media vilify the farmers every day? By
running them over with vehicles – allegedly owned by a union minister or his
son? That’s this government’s idea of persuasion? If those were its ‘best
efforts’ we’d hate to see its worst ones.

The Prime Minister made at least seven visits
overseas this year alone (like the latest one for CoP26). But never once found
the time to just drive down a few kilometres from his residence to visit tens
of thousands of farmers at Delhi’s gates, whose agony touched so many people everywhere in the country. Would that not have been a genuine effort at
persuasion?

From the first month of the present protests, I
was barraged with questions from media and others about how long could they possibly hold out? The
farmers have answered that question. But they also know that this fantastic
victory of theirs is a first step. That the repeal means getting the corporate
foot off the cultivator’s neck for now – but a raft of other problems from MSP
and procurement, to much larger issues of economic policies, still demand
resolution.The anchors on television tell us – as if it is a stunning
revelation – that this backing off by the government must have something to do
with the upcoming Assembly elections in five states next February.

The same media failed to tell you anything about
the significance of the bypoll results in 29 Assembly and 3 Parliamentary
constituencies announced on November 3. Read the editorials around that time –
see what passed for analysis on television. They spoke of ruling parties
usually winning bypolls, of some anger locally – and not just with the BJP and more
such blah. Few editorials had a word to say about two factors influencing those
poll results – the farmers’ protests and Covid-19 mismanagement.

Mr. Modi’s announcement today shows that he at
least, and at last, has wisely understood the importance of both those factors.
He knows that some huge defeats have taken place in states where the farmers’
agitation is intense. States like Rajasthan and Himachal – but which a media,
parroting to its audiences that it was all Punjab and Haryana, could not factor
into their analyses.When last did we see the BJP or any sangh parivar formation come third and fourth
in two constituencies in Rajasthan? Or take the pasting they got in Himachal
where they lost all three Assembly and one Parliament seat? 

In Haryana, as the protestors put it, “the entire
government from CM to DM” was there campaigning for the BJP; where the Congress
foolishly put up a candidate against Abhay Chautala, who had resigned on the
farmers’ issue; where union ministers pitched in with great strength – the BJP  still lost. The Congress candidate lost his
deposit but managed to shave a bit off Chautala’s margin – he still won by over
6,000 votes.All three states felt the impact of the farmers’
protests – and unlike the corpo-crawlers, the Prime Minister has understood
that. With the impact of those protests in western Uttar Pradesh, to which was
added the self-inflicted damage of the appalling murders at Lakhimpur Kheri,
and with elections to come in that state in perhaps 90 days from now, he saw
the light. 

In three months’ time, the BJP government will
have to answer the question – if the opposition has the sense to raise it – of
whatever happened to the doubling of farmers’ incomes by 2022? The 77th round
of the NSS (National Sample Survey, 2018-19) shows a fall in the share of
income from crop cultivation for farmers – forget a doubling of farmer incomes
overall. It also shows an absolute decline in
real income from crop cultivation.

The farmers have actually done much more than
achieve that resolute demand for the repeal of the laws. Their struggle has
profoundly impacted the politics of this country. As did their distress in the 2004 general elections.

This is not at all the end of the agrarian crisis.
It is the beginning of a new phase of the battle on the larger issues of that
crisis. Farmer protests have been on for a long time now. And particularly
strongly since 2018, when the Adivasi farmers of Maharashtra electrified the
nation with their astonishing 182-km march on foot from Nashik to Mumbai. Then
too, it began with their being dismissed as ‘urban naxals’, as not real farmers,
and the rest of the blah. Their march routed their vilifiers.There are many victories here today. Not the least
of which is the one the farmers have scored over corporate media. On the farm
issue (as on so many others), that media functioned as extra power AAA
batteries (Amplifying Ambani Adani +).

Between December and next April, we will mark 200
years of the launch of two great journals (both by Raja Rammohan Roy) that
could be said to have been the beginning of a truly Indian (owned and felt)
press. One of which – Mirat-ul-Akhbar
– brilliantly exposed the angrezi administration
over the killing of Pratap Narayan Das from a whipping ordered by a judge in
Comilla (now in Chittagong, Bangladesh). Roy’s powerful editorial resulted in
the judge being hauled up and tried by the highest court of the time.

The Governor General reacted to this by
terrorising the press. Promulgating a draconian new Press Ordinance, he sought
to bring them to heel. Refusing to submit to this, Roy announced he was
shutting down Mirat-ul-Akhbar rather
than submit to what he called degrading and humiliating laws and circumstances.
(And went on to take his battle to and through other journals!)

That was journalism of courage. Not the journalism
of crony courage and capitulation we’ve seen on the farm issue. Pursued with a
veneer of ‘concern’ for the farmers in unsigned editorials while slamming them on
the op-ed pages as wealthy farmers ‘seeking socialism for the rich.’The Indian Express,
the Times of India, almost the whole
spectrum of newspapers – would say, essentially, that these were rural yokels
who only needed to be spoken to sweetly. The edits invariably ended on the appeal:
but do not withdraw these laws, they’re really good. Ditto for much of the rest
of the media.

Did any of these publications once tell their
readers – on the standoff between farmers and corporates – that Mukesh Ambani’s
personal wealth of 84.5 billion dollars (Forbes 2021) was closing in
very fast on the GSDP of the state of Punjab (about 85.5 billion)? Did they
once tell you that the wealth of Ambani and Adani (who clocked $50.5 billion)
together was greater than the GSDP of either Punjab or Haryana?

Well, there are extenuating circumstances. Ambani
is the biggest owner of media in India. And in those media that he does not
own, probably the greatest advertiser. The wealth of these two corporate barons
can be and is often written about – generally in a celebratory tone. This is
the journalism of corpo-crawl.Already there is bleating about how this cunning
strategy – the backing off – will have significant impact in the Punjab Assembly
polls. That Amarinder Singh has projected this as a victory he engineered by
resigning from the Congress and negotiating with Modi. That this will alter the
poll picture there. But the hundreds of thousands of people in that
state who have participated in that struggle know whose victory it is. The
hearts of the people of Punjab are with those in the protest camps who have
endured one of Delhi’s worst winters in decades, a scorching summer, rains
thereafter, and miserable treatment from Mr. Modi and his captive media. And perhaps the most important thing the
protestors have achieved is this: to inspire resistance in other spheres as
well, to a government that simply throws its detractors into prison or
otherwise hounds and harasses them. That freely arrests citizens, including
journalists, under the UAPA, and cracks down on independent media for ‘economic
offences’. This day isn’t just a win for the farmers. It’s a win for the battle
for civil liberties and human rights. A win for Indian democracy.

Farmers win on many fronts, media fails on all

কৃষি আইন: জয়ী চির-সংগ্রামী চাষি, গোহারা মোসাহেব মিডিয়া

କୃଷକମାନେ ଅନେକ କ୍ଷେତ୍ରରେ ବିଜୟୀ ହେଲେ, ମିଡିଆ ସମସ୍ତ କ୍ଷେତ୍ରରେ ବିଫଳ ହେଲା

రైతులు అన్ని రకాలుగా గెలిచారు, మీడియా పూర్తిగా ఓడిపోయింది

കർഷകരുടെ നിരവധി വിജയങ്ങള്‍, മാദ്ധ്യമങ്ങളുടെ പരാജയങ്ങള്‍

বহু দিশত কৃষকৰ জয়, মিডিয়াৰ সৰ্বত্ৰে পৰাজয়

ખેડૂતોની અનેક મોરચે જીત, પ્રસાર માધ્યમોની તમામ મોરચે હાર

ਕਿਸਾਨਾਂ ਦੀ ਜਿੱਤ ਨੇ ਲਿਖੀ ਜਮਹੂਰੀਅਤ ਦੀ ਨਵੀਂ ਇਬਾਰਤ, ਝੋਲ਼ੀਚੁੱਕ ਮੀਡੀਆ ਪਿਆ ਲੱਭੇ ਨੁੱਕਰਾਂ...

வெற்றியடைந்த விவசாயிகளும் தோற்று நிற்கும் ஊடகங்களும்

किसानों की जीत से जम्हूरियत की जीत, हर मोर्चे पर मीडिया की हार

हर एक आघाडीवर शेतकऱ्यांची जीत, माध्यमं चीत

کسانوں کی فتح، میڈیا کے منہ پر ایک بڑا طمانچہ

ಹಲವು ಬಗೆಯಲ್ಲಿ ಗೆದ್ದ ರೈತರು ಮತ್ತು ಎಲ್ಲ ವಿಧದಲ್ಲೂ ಸೋತುಹೋದ ಮಾಧ್ಯಮ

Mumbai

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Farmers win on many fronts, media fails on all

The repeal of the three farm laws came about not because the PM failed to ‘persuade’ some farmers, but because many farmers stood resolute, even as a craven media devalued their struggle and strength

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