2017 IS beginning on a dismal note for millions of people in India. They have lost their livelihoods and are deprived of their hard-earned wages. Many are unable to access their meager savings which are locked up out of reach in banks. All this pain has been inflicted on them by Narendra Modi’s quixotic demonetisation announced on November 8. With the fifty days for depositing old notes ending on December 30, there are no signs of the travails of the people coming to an end. So the new year begins with the continuing cash war on the people.

The abrupt withdrawal of the Rs 500 and 1000 notes and the resulting cash crunch due to the non-availability of new currency notes has hit the economy hard. Even before demonetisation, the economic situation was turning bleak, notwithstanding the inflated GDP growth figures. From April to October 2016 industrial production had declined by 0.3 percent. The trade deficit continued to widen with exports showing no signs of sustained revival. The prospects of an increased agricultural output after two years of successive droughts have now taken a hit with the lack of cash paralysing the rural economy. There is a notable decline in output in all sectors and a sharp fall in consumer demand.

All this spells more pain for the common people in the form of increasing joblessness and loss of incomes in the forthcoming year.

The outgoing year was also marked by the crisis in Kashmir where a prolonged mass uprising erupted after the killing of the Hizbul commander Burhan Wani. The brutal repression which was unleashed by the security forces on the mass protests saw the deaths of over 85 persons mostly young men and teenagers. The world also saw the horrific blindings of young people caused by pellet guns. The Modi government stubbornly refused to initiate a political dialogue with all concerned in Jammu & Kashmir and reinforced the image of the Indian State as an occupying force in the Kashmir valley.

The Kashmiri people became the victims of the national chauvinism fostered by the Modi government that sought to suppress the popular uprising in the name of fighting terrorism.

An extension of this national chauvinism has been the worsening of relations with Pakistan and a rupture in the process of dialogue between the two countries. A hallmark of the Modi regime’s belligerent attitude was the “surgical strikes” conducted in the end of September. This was widely used to project the image of Modi as a strong and decisive leader. The illusionary success of the surgical strikes became evident soon after with the extremist attacks on the army bases in Baramulla and Nagrota. Rather than curbing the terrorist strikes, there has been an upswing in the number of attacks on army bases and the incidents of cross border firing across the Line of Control. 63 Indian army soldiers have been killed in 2016 in Jammu & Kashmir, double the number of the previous year.

The Hindutva style nationalism has had its pernicious effects on rights of citizens and freedom of expression. 2016 began with the filing of sedition cases against leaders of the student union of Jawaharlal Nehru University. The branding of political dissent and opposition to Hindutva as “anti-national” continued throughout the year. Browbeating writers and artists and promoting obscurantist and irrational values became the order of the day.

If the vicious campaign on cow slaughter saw the gruesome killing of Mohammad Akhlaq in 2015, the rampaging gau rakshaks perpetrated the Una outrage in Gujarat in 2016. The death of Rohith Vemula and the atrocity in Una led to a countrywide movement by the dalit and Left organisations against the anti-dalit Hindutva forces.

The Modi government took further steps to deepen the alliance with the United States. 2016 saw the renewal of the Indo-US Defence Framework Agreement for another ten years. Soon after came the Logistics Supply Agreement. This was followed by the announcement that India would be a major defence partner of the United States. With the Trump presidency in place, one can expect the Modi government to strengthen this subordinate relationship with all its rightwing consequences for India’s domestic policies.

The September 2 general strike involving more than 150 million workers and employees; the peasant and tribal struggles against forcible land acquisitions and dispossession of land in Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and other places; the student movements centred around the Hyderabad Central University, JNU and other educational institutions; the innumerable struggles for MNREGA, Forests Rights Act and PDS implementation; struggles against atrocities on women and for women’s equality and the protests against Hindutva attacks on freedom of expression and for dalit rights – all these have occurred in 2016.

But the scope and intensity of the movements and struggles have been insufficient to make a political impact to counter the rightwing offensive. Such struggles must be intensified and taken up in new areas and amongst new sections of the people in the coming year, especially in view of the serious economic difficulties the people will face due to the consequences of demonetisation.

Normally one would welcome the new year with good tidings and optimism. But these are not conventional times. Worldwide, the right wing forces, xenophobia and racism are on the rise. Within India, their ideological soul mates rule the roost. What this portends is more authoritarianism, more rightwing attacks on the people’s economic rights and more communalism. To fend off these attacks and to unite the people to struggle for an alternative should be the resolve of all Left, democratic and progressive forces. What is required is the resolute work to build the unity of the Left and democratic forces through class and mass struggles.

(December 29, 2016)