By S Sudhakar Reddy
On the face of it, economic policies of Modi government appear to be clueless and directionless. However, underneath there is a deep rooted conspiracy to systematically loot the nation in favour of the few who have put their puppet in the prime minister’s chair.
Deep economic manipulation by a few was put to an end by nationalisation of banks which was done at the behest of CPI. Nationalisation of banks put an end to the manipulated creation of artificial money crunch in the markets that would cause inflation of prices creating huge profits for companies owned by the same owners of the erstwhile banks. Nationalised banks played a huge role in the development of small and medium scale industries across the country which is now the backbone of the economy.
The banks created food security for the country by protecting agriculture through farming loans and insurance. Though the banks have not been able to meet the farming requirement to the full extent, farmers dependence on private money lenders has been greatly reduced. Nationalised banks promoted savings in Indian middle class through various schemes and enabled their housing, transport and education requirements. There was no more fear of the days of banks suddenly shuttering down and people’s money being lost into thin air. The nationalised banks through their sound financial decisions protected Indian economy through multiple economic recessions across the globe which struck even the most developed nations a severe blow.
However a few conglomerates that can be called the Indian Oligarchy continued to exert undue influence on successive governments to manipulate the banks into giving them undeserving loans which created large chunks of Non Performing Assets (NPAs) which caused financial stress to the banks. Bank employees under AIBEA and AIBOA have been even exposing this for decades. In contrast to the created public perception, it is one among the biggest businesses in the country that make up majority of the NPAs and not the small farmers.
Despite the government failing to take action against the defaulters and despite government failing to pay the banks for the various social and welfare initiatives for which it was supposed to pay, the nationalized banks as a whole continued to make profits for the government and also expanded their reach across urban and rural areas while developing their international network too. The nationalised banks had a unique character of belonging to different regions of the country which helped them to understand the local requirements better and therefore connect to the people culturally and thereby perform better. They also set up branches where people migrated more, be it in India or abroad, and maintained a constant support to them in their language and in their cultural atmosphere wherever they are.
The Indian oligarchy was not satisfied with influencing the government and wanted complete control of the same. They sponsored their candidate, Modi, who would fly out from his home city everyday in their private plane for campaigning and back by night to receive instructions on what to speak the next day. Their successful campaign put him in the chair and he continues to receive instructions from them about what to say and do and refuses to take any questions from anyone else.
His sponsors needed large volumes of credit from the banks and since the banks did not have that kind of cash volumes it was squeezed out of the people of the country in the form of demonetisation. Every Indian citizen had to rush to the bank to put his or her money into the banking system and yet there was no money in the ATM’s when withdrawals were required. Where did this money go? The RBI which was announcing how much money was received each day for the first few days suddenly went mute and did not announce any details for years.
The oligarchy wanted to squeeze out every rupee from the system and when the RBI governor was not agreeing to the same, he was replaced with Modi’s own person. Even this RBI governor’s conscience too seemed to come in the way and he too objected which led to majority of the RBI board being replaced and government decisions were pushed down the throat of this autonomous body.
However the financial appetite of the oligarchy could not be filled and they want loans of such massive size that only the merger of all banks can create credit of such enormous proportions. Government is mindlessly following their masters’ instructions and merging the banks which is a danger to the national economy. The social nature of the banks will be lost. The protection of economic security of the nation from global recessions will be severely damaged. The banking system reflecting the cultural diversity of the nation will be forever murdered.
Every excuse given by the government for bank mergers do not stand scrutiny very much like the excuses given during demonetisation. Not only will the mergers not help in the reduction of NPA’s but also create bigger NPA’s as bigger banks will give bigger loans, have bigger NPAs and result in big losses.
It is necessary for the people to understand the devious plans of this government and oppose the mergers and other disastrous economic policies of the oligarchy controlled government. (IPA Service)
The writer is former general secretary of the CPI.
