CONGRESS SANDESH COMPLETES ITS SEVEN YEAR

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Showers of Rain and EmpathyOpinionPraveen DavarFor a people reeling under drought the whirlwind visit of CongressPresident to Tonk on June 23 was a divine gift. Within minutes of Smt.Sonia Gandhi’s arrival in this central eastern district of Rajasthancommenced a heavy downpour, not only in Tonk, but almost all over thestate. “Soniaji aayin, barish laayin” became more of a reality than amere slogan amongst the rural folk.The Congress President decided to visit Tonk to console families offarmers killed in police firing in Sohila village on June 13 as also makean on-the-spot assessment of the water scarcity being faced by thefarmers. As the Vasundhara Raje government failed to take any steptowards fulfillment of its election promise, the farmers felt cheated anddecided to launch a peaceful agitation against the state government onJune 13. It was during this agitation that police resorted to unprovokedfiring to disperse the crowd that killed four young farmers and one womanstanding in a balcony, a hundred metres from the spot.Soon after the tragic incident the Pradesh Congress led by its President,Dr. B. D. Kalla swung into action and demanded a compensation of Rs.5 lakhs and a job per family of each killed. Demonstrations were held allover the state under the leadership of DCC Presidents which yieldedthe desired result: the Vasundhara Raje government acceded to thedemand of the Pradesh Congress in totality.The Congress President, who visited the families of each of the fivevictims spread over three villages – Bawari, Jharana and Sohila – arrivedfrom Jaipur in the morning. Nearly 5000 people, far above theexpectations of the organizers and security agencies, greeted Smt. SoniaGandhi at the Bawari helipad.Overwhelmed by the enthusiasm of the crowd, the Congress Presidentwent around the whole barricade encircling the helipad and spoke tothe rural folk, halting regularly after every few steps, exhibiting greatconcern and sympathy. “We want water from Bisalpur” was the demandof everyone who managed to have his voice heard by the CongressPresident. Many others, including women, demanded penal actionagainst policemen who fired the fatal shots.Smt. Sonia Gandhi, who was accompanied by AICC General Secretaries,Shri Ashok Gehlot and Shri Mukul Wasnik, was received at the helipadby the PCC President, Dr. B. D. Kalla, Union Ministers, Shri Shish RamOla and Shri Namo Narain Meena, the DCC President, Shri Banwari LalBairwa and Capt. Praveen Davar, Secretary AICC, besides Zila Pramukhand local Congress leaders.From the helipad the Congress President drove to Bawari village andmet the family of the deceased Om Prakash Malli (40) who was thefather of 5 children. Condoling Om Prakash’s widow Soniaji said: ”HumPani Layenge, and gave her Rs. 2 lakhs raised by the party for providingrelief to the victims families.” From Bawari the Congress President’scavalcade motored to Jhirana village where it started raining heavilythe moment Smt. Sonia Gandhi left the house of the first victim, MadanJat (22), whose death at a young age of 22, was perhaps the mosttouching and unfortunate of all the five victims. By the time Smt. SoniaGandhi left Jhirana, where she consoled families of two other victims.Ram Narain (48) and Ram Kishan (32) – the␣␣village was flooded withknee deep waters. Completely drenched the Congress President andher team left Jhirana for Sohila village where she met the family ofHansa Devi, who was killed by a stray bullet.The Congress President wound up her visit by meeting all the injuredadmitted in the District and made enquiries about their treatment. Shealso sought details about the incident from injured who told her that thepolice had fired without any warning.Speaking to the media, later, Smt. Sonia Gandhi described the policefiring as “barbaric” and “shocking”. In reply to another question sheassured that the central government would provide all assistance if thestate government sent any worthwhile proposal for irrigation.The Congress President presented Rs. 2 lakhs each to the families ofthe five killed and Rs. 10,000 each to the eleven injured. “Spend thismoney for educating your children”, she advised the widow of RamNarain.This was Smt. Sonia Gandhi’s first visit to Rajasthan after the last LokSabha elections. Besides providing renewed hope to the farmers whoconsidered her coming as “auspicious”, the Congress President’s visitbreathed new life in the rank and file of the Pradesh Congress which,under a new leadership, is gearing up to fight the anti-farmer and antipoorpolicies of the Vasundhara Raje government with renewed vigourand determination. ❖16Congress SandeshJuly, 2005
Sow The SeedsChina’s economic reforms started with the aim of substantiallyincreasing agricultural production and raising peasant incomes.India has much to learn from this model.In 1978 when Deng Xiaoping started on his economic reforms, it was toagriculture that he turned. He had already supported limited privateplots along with Liu Shaoqi in 1961-62 after the Great Leap Forward of1958 failed to deliver on its promises. The communes floundered largelybecause of unrealistic targets and even more unrealistic claims.The ideological hype of catching up with Britain, the practice of meltingpots to make steel in the backyard steel furnaces just left the peasants,weary and starving. This coupled with a drought led to hundreds dyingof famine. China’s much touted commune model was first called afailure by none other than the great Eighth Route army general andMao’s comrade-in-arms, Marshal Peng Dehuai, at the LushanConference of 1959. He of course, lost his job. During this period, andduring the Cultural Revolution, all that mattered was quotations fromthe Red Book. The economy could go hang itself. And it did.Deng’s reform started in a limited fashion with what came to be calledthe household contract responsibility system, where peasant familieswere expected to provide the State with a fixed amount of produce andwere allowed to sell the rest in the open market. The aims of thereformers were to revitalize and substantially increase agriculturalproduction and to raise peasant incomes by making the householdresponsible for its own welfare and success. This was the first stage,where land remained in the name of the State but peasants were allowedto contract land and effectively use them as family plots.The combined efforts of these reforms was to increase rural incomesby a factor of three. The year 1983-84 saw the first 10,000 yuanhouseholds. Suddenly, the peasants were rich if one keeps in mind thefact that urban private enterprise remained limited to the free tradezones along China’s east coast. These successful peasant families werefeted in the press and almost overnight, it became glorious to be rich.For the first time, rural incomes were higher than in urban areas.Here Deng was far-sighted. He went in for economic reforms beforepolitical reforms. This small scale privatization was followed by consistentattempts to develop town and village enterprises. It is this sector thatIndia can learn from – the development of small towns from a cluster ofvillages, the diversification of the rural economy by creating commercialenterprises, especially small scale manufacturing units which service alargely local economy; encouraging and supporting the manufacturesector at all levels wherever possible. China was able to do this, becauseViewpoint- Dr. Ravni Thakurits free trade and industrial zones were catering largely to an exportmarket while its old industrial areas in the North West – towns likeShenyang – were tied down by inefficient State management and theunwillingness of the State to continue supporting loss-makingenterprises.The State provided exactly what it should be providing – an expandingand efficient development of infrastructure such as highways, ruralconnectivity, fast trains and avenues for training manpower in differentsectors. China’s rural reform strategy served a dual purpose. It allowedthe creation of new areas of development, created surplus labour for itsmassive industrial and manufacturing sector and took industrialdevelopment into smaller areas. Second, it kept a check on rural tourban migration.China always maintained its urban cradle-to-grave welfare scheme bykeeping 80 percent of its peasants confined to rural areas through whatwas known as the household registration system (Hukou Zhindu). Thissystem was further maintained by the coupon system for grain, cottonand other daily necessities. One could only get coupons if one wasregistered as a native of the place. Thus in Beijing, you would need aBeijing registration. This too has changed today. China’s floating ormigrant population made up of millions of surplus rural labour, providesthe manpower for its rapid economic advancement.Small towns are fast turning into big towns and cities like Beijing andShanghai compete with the best in the world. China’s aim with ruralindustrialization is to turn its 70:30 rural-urban population into a 50:50.Two things stand out in this reform process. A single-mindeddetermination coupled with China not being afraid of foreign investment.Land still hasn’t been privatized. It is leased by the State on long-termleases and can be further leased. A 1999 land use law also restrictsthe conditions under which land can be taken out of cultivation of grainfor commercial purposes. Unfair and hidden taxes also remain a problem,where in some areas they can go as high as 50 percent of the householdincome. But there is debate in China about how soon peasants andrural entrepreneurs will be able to legitimately buy land, like they cannow buy urban houses, leading to the final re-emergence of ‘privateproperty’.These debates are further accompanied by grassroots democracy, whereelections have been held directly at the village and county levels. China’sexperiment with democracy, like its experiments with the liberalizationof the economy, are also starting from the rural areas. And if the economyis anything to go by, this too will succeed. ❖July, 2005Congress Sandesh17
Page 1 and 2: Rs. 10Vol. VII No. 11July, 2005CONG
Page 4 and 5: Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singhat
Page 6 and 7: Letter to the EditorDismiss Raje Go
Page 8 and 9: Terror Struck AgainThe timing of th
Page 10 and 11: Honouredby the legacy of our immedi
Page 12 and 13: Putin, Sonia Gandhi For BringingPeo
Page 14 and 15: CP’s Russia Visitneed to strength
Page 16 and 17: Economically Vital ProjectSpeechSon
Page 18 and 19: Congress Condemn Terrorist AttackAy
Page 22 and 23: India’s Contribution Acknowledged
Page 24 and 25: Rahul Gandhi’s BirthdayRemeberenc
Page 26 and 27: ANDHRA PRADESHSandesh Yatra Appeal
Page 28 and 29: States WatchThe speakers reiterated
Page 30 and 31: States WatchAddressing newspersons
Page 32 and 33: ReportMahila CongressDuring May and
Page 34 and 35: AICCDiaryCODE OF ETHICS03.06.2005:
Page 36: Photofile1 23 4␣␣5 671. TNCC ge

CONGRESS SANDESH COMPLETES ITS SEVEN YEAR

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