Oppose Hike in Petrol and Diesel Prices
March 1, 2008
Oppose Hike in Petrol and Diesel Prices
Nepal: A Positive Step Forward
February 27, 2008
The decision of the interim parliament in
There are numerous external and internal forces interested in creating obstacles for the advancement of the people along the democratic path.
In this situation, what course
The advance towards a federal democratic republic by the people of
Land Struggle in Kerala Takes Decisive Step Forward
February 27, 2008
Land Struggle in Kerala Takes Decisive Step Forward
After the occupation of nearly 6000 acres of land by thousands of landless, agricultural workers families in Kerala in Wynad, Kannur and Pathanamthitta districts already, the land struggle has taken a decisive step forward when nearly 1000 adivasi, dalit and other landless families, under the leadership of Land Struggle Committee led by CPI(ML), occupied about 500 acres of land under illegal custody of Harrison Malayalam Limited (HML) now owned by Goyenkas in Meppadi village of Wynad from 24th January. Preparations are going on for mobilising the landless and to occupy agricultural land in other districts also with the slogan “land to the tillers”. 200 members of 100 landless families were arrested in Kollam district when they were trying to occupy Tenmala estate of HML on 27th January.
After publishing an agrarian struggle programme demanding distribution of government land, surplus land, vested forest land, land illegally occupied by plantation owners, land held by plantations after the lease period was over, land illegally transferred by plantations, paddy land left uncultivated and land under the custody of land mafias, etc. amounting to more than 10 lakhs acres, organising campaigns all over the state and submitting memorandum to the state government, CPI(ML) organised land struggle committees mobilising thousands of Adivasi, dalit and other landless and agricultural workers families in different districts. Now the struggle for occupation of land is started.
Though Kerala Land Reform Act came to existence in 1973, only a small part of the 4 lakh acres of surplus land was distributed to the landless. Similarly, though Adivasi Land Protection Act was promulgated by central government in 1975, the alienated lands were not restored to Adivasis. In the decades that followed land accumulation went on increasing, while the number of landless peasants and agricultural workers also went on increasing. No action was taken by consecutive governments to take over the illegally held land and to distribute it along with above mentioned type of lands to the landless, in spite of many struggles and assurances from government.
It is in this context, CPI(ML)-led Land Struggle Committees, after state-wide campaign, have started occupying the land. The committee leaders have asked the district administration not to create provocations through police interventions. It is a mass movement which will go on till land is distributed to the landless. If any untoward incident take place, as happened in Muthanga struggle five years back, the government will be fully responsible for it.
CPI(ML) Central Committee greets the Kerala State Committee for launching the land struggle. It demands that the police forces should be withdrawn and the landless and agricultural labourers should be given the land they have occupied. State government should not put down the struggle for land by the landless going on in Karnataka, Tamilnadu, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh under the leadership of the party using police force. Even if force is used the struggles are bound to intensify and spread to more states. The Central Committee demands that the central and state governments should stop taking over and transfer of agricultural land for SEZs, for corporate farming and in the name of industrialisation and real estate development, and distribute surplus land, fallow forest lands, government lands and land occupied by land mafias to the adivasis, dalits and other landless peasants and agricultural workers. CPI(ML) supports the landless families who are participating in the struggle for land and calls on all landless people to join this historic struggle for land to the tillers.
New Delhi K.N. Ramachandran
28-01-2008 Secretary, Party Centre, CPI(ML)
Fight Against Revisionism, the Main Danger
February 25, 2008
Fight Against Revisionism, the Main Danger
when the CPI(M) and CPI are going to hold their 19th and 20th Congresses respectively in a couple of months, once again these revisionists turned into social democrats, with the assistance of monopoly media, are engaged in distorting and vulgarizing revolutionary Marxism to peddle their opportunist political lines. Similar to their promoting the virtues of Soviet revisionism for almost four decades till Soviet Union disintegrated, they are now indulging in marketing present counter-revolutionary leadership in China in order to confuse and divert the masses from the path of revolutionary practice. Working within the ruling system, sharing power in two or three states, implementing ruling class policies, and propping up reactionary UPA government are repeated as the maximum that can be done in present situation. Even Singur and Nandigram are justified as glorious deeds. These renegades are proving what Lenin repeatedly emphasised: revisionism is the main danger within the international communist movement.
The experience of more than one and a half century of ICM prove that this danger along with the ‘left’ deviation, which are nothing but two sides of the same coin, repeatedly surface threatening to wipe out revolutionary Marxism. Kautskys, Krushchovs, Dengs are not isolated phenomena. They continue to come up challenging and revising cardinal principles of Marxism-Leninism and usurping leadership. That is why Lenin, Stalin and Mao repeatedly taught that the communists should always remain vigilant against the emergence of the main danger, revisionism and its twin, the ‘left’ deviation. Uncompromising struggle should be waged against them, to expose and exterminate them.
In this issue of Red Star we are publishing two articles focussing on the social democratic line of the CPI(M) and some extracts from Marxist classics to expose the real character of those who indulge in capital and market worshipping, alongwith an article ‘official Marxism in China today’, in continuation of our persistent struggle against all alien trends.
NGOs and Imperialism
February 25, 2008
NGOs and Imperialism
yves engeler
Any individual working for an aid organization is required to pass this exam and a B+ or higher must be achieved to attain “left wing” status. Please write 500 words answering each of three of the following questions.1) Do people really feel better when their elected government is destroyed by democracy promotion rather than subversion?2) Should it be called “aid” or “aiding and abetting” when you give a country weapons of mass destruction?3) Why is it called a non-governmental organization (NGO) when it gets most of its funding from governments?4) Why do progressive people, who think privatized medical and social welfare services are a right wing plot in their own wealthy countries, donate money to organizations that replace government-run services in poor countries?5) Are some major Western non-governmental organizations really just an arm of imperialism?Bonus marks will be awarded if you answer all five.Facing the reality that most development NGOs are heavily reliant on Western government “aid,” which is usually directed towards countries of geopolitical importance to the captains of capitalism, may be unpleasant for some “progressives,” but it is true nonetheless.A major principle of Canadian foreign aid, for example, has been that where the USA wields the big stick, Canada carries a police baton and offers a carrot. The major recipient of Canadian aid in 1999/2000 was the former Yugoslavia; Iraq and Afghanistan were top two recipients in 2003/2004; today Afghanistan and Haiti are Nos. 1 and 2. The intervention-equals-aid principle also exists for other western countries.Post-coup Haiti has been a bonanza for Canadian (mostly Quebec-based) NGOs.They have received tens of millions of dollars from the Canadian government.Montreal-based Alternatives, usually on the left of the NGO world, is but one example. With no operations in Haiti before 2004, the post-coup influx of Canadian “aid” dollars was too good an opportunity to pass up. The Haiti file was given to an Alternatives employee who was having difficulty raising money for his Africa dossier. Canadian imperialism showed a definite preference for media work in Haiti over Ghana and Alternatives was rewarded when it obliged. (Alternatives also made its way to Afghanistan.)According to the Canadian International Development Agency’s (CIDA) website, Alternatives has received $2.1 million for Haiti work over the past couple of years. Coincidentally, Alternatives has parroted the neoconservative narrative about Haiti. Their guest speaker on Haiti at the recent Quebec Social Forum was Chavanne Jean-Baptiste, an advisor for right-wing business candidate, Charles Henry-Baker’s failed presidential campaign. (It has been alleged that Baptiste’s organization provided support to the ex-military who lead the armed assault against the elected government in February 2004.) Alternatives other main Haitian invitee was Rene Colbert, editor of Alter Presse, who told this author in a private conversation there was no coup in February 2004 since Jean Bertrand Aristide was never elected.Many of the other Canadian NGOs that benefited from the coup called for Aristide’s overthrow. The Concertation Pour Haiti (CPH), an informal group of half a dozen NGOs, branded Aristide a “tyrant,” his government a “dictatorship,” and a “regime of terror” and in mid-February 2004 called for Aristide’s removal. This demand was made at the same time CIA-trained thugs swept across the country to oust Aristide.Quebec (and Haitian) NGO’s hysterical opposition to Aristide was certainly influenced by the politics of their government donors. An understanding that intervention would lead to increased aid also likely influenced it. The 1994 US invasion, which restored Aristide to office, created a boom for development NGOs in Haiti (making it the world leader in NGOs per square kilometre, according to some). Yet, securing financing became more difficult as international funding was curtailed along with foreign troops (and US police trainers) in the late 1990s and with the “intransigent” Aristide’s 2000 election. Not until Aristide was gone, and a post-coup government installed by the USA, France and Canada, did the aid spigot once gain turn back on for Canadian and Haitian NGOs.Haiti was not unique. In another part of the world, many NGOs supported “humanitarian intervention.” In her book, Fools’ Crusade, Diana Johnstone decries NGO support for Western imperialism in the former Yugoslavia. She points out: “When, as in Bosnia-Herzegovina or Kosovo, military intervention leads to an international protectorate, Western NGOs are granted a prominent role in local administration and receive a large share of public and private donations.” (Fools Crusade, Page 13)Of course imperialism is not only about military intervention. In Promoting Polyarchy: Globalization, US Intervention and Hegemony, William I. Robinson argues that “democracy promotion” is an important aspect of modern imperialism. It’s a change in US foreign policy from “earlier strategies to contain social and political mobilization through a focus on control of the state and governmental apparatus” to a process in which “the United States and local elites thoroughly penetrate civil society, and from therein, assure control over popular mobilization and mass movements…”The coloured revolutions in Eastern Europe are high-profile recent examples of “democracy promotion” at the service of western aims. In Haiti, as well, a variety of NGOs were funded to promote the US and Canadian version of democracy. Politics Without Sovereignty explains: “From 1998, USAID and DFID [the UK’s Department For International Development], among others, began to systematically subcontract to international NGOs including CARE, Action Aid, Save the Children, Oxfam, and Concern International to ‘build civil society capacity.’”According to a recent Vancouver Sun article, nearly a fifth of the Canadian International Development Agency’s budget, some $600 million, is now spent on initiatives directed towards “promoting democracy.” Last October CIDA established an Office of Democratic Governance. Of course, the US is the largest democracy promotion donor with the National Endowment for Democracy at the forefront. Its Democracy Projects Database coordinates 6,000 projects worldwide.The economic and social sides of imperialism also benefit NGOs. The neo-liberalism pushed by the IMF, World Bank, USAID, CIDA etc. breeds NGOs.As structurally adjusted states withdraw social services, NGOs flood in.Take Ghana, for instance. Since the late 1980s, a series of structural adjustment programs have diminished the state’s role in the economy. The donors that push neoliberalism argue that while reforms may bring with them social ills, their aid and NGOs will help to resolve these side effects.Back in the late 1980s the former president of CIDA, Margaret Catley-Carlson, explained to the Ghanaians: “We know that if you take on this [IMF] program of reform it will cost you. Your food prices are going to shoot up, and in the urban areas that is going to be very destabilizing. So we will put in some food aid [likely administered by NGOs] and help you out over this very difficult period.”The process of withdrawing the state has resulted in ever-growing dependence. With a hint of pride, Jeanine Cudmore, an employee of the CIDA-funded Social Enterprise Development Foundation, recently told the Montreal Gazette that in northern Ghana “the government relies on NGOs.”When the U.S. returned Aristide to office in 1994, it was on condition that he implement an economic agenda focused on further downsizing the state.International creditors argued that the flip side of this government downsizing would be increased aid, particularly to private sector NGOs. This “aid” money was to be channelled towards projects such as schools and hospitals run by private (usually non-profit) NGOs.A CIDA report released in 2005 stated that by 2004, “non-governmental actors [for-profit and not-for-profit] provided almost 80 percent of [Haiti’s] basic services.” While an NGO-run school may be better than no school at all, a cluster of privately run schools is not an ideal development model.Canada’s development agency has admitted as much. According to CIDA, “Supporting non-governmental actors contributed to the creation of parallel systems of service delivery. … In Haiti’s case, these actors [NGOs] were used as a way to circumvent the frustration of working with the government … this contributed to the establishment of parallel systems of service delivery, eroding legitimacy, capacity and will of the state to deliver key services.”NGOs are significant beneficiaries of modern imperialism: They soften the edges of neoliberalism, while democracy promotion and military interventions alike bring a windfall of contracts.Perhaps the question to be asked is: Are development NGOs compatible with real democracy?In Canada and many other countries, most people, including all of those who are on the left, oppose private health clinics, seeing them as a threat to our universal, government-run systems of medical care. People everywhere see public schools as an important part of democracy. Citizens in all First World countries demand social services provided by their governments.Yet the “development” model favoured in the Third World for the past two decades involves destroying government services and handing them over to NGOs that willingly participate in this undermining of democracyIf you see anything progressive about that, you’ll get a failing grade in the test above. [Yves Engler is the author of two books: Canada in Haiti: Waging War on the Poor Majority (with Anthony Fenton) and Playing Left Wing: From Rink Rat to Student Radical. Both books are available at www.turning.ca. - Red Star]
Selling Out The Sellers Of The Country
February 24, 2008
Articles
Selling Out The Sellers Of The Country
Sanjay Singhvi
The ongoing sell-out of India – its resources and its people – at the altar of imperialist globalisation is presently moving into a higher gear. Besides the package sale of our independence in the form of SEZs, our scientific heritage is being sold out in the name of the Nuclear Deal. In keeping with this general trend the allowing of FDI in retail trade in our country is also going to further the enslavement of the country and its people.
Understanding the dimensions
Retail trade, in India, is not something which is only a business or occupation. It has recently been accurately described as the largest form of disguised unemployment. As factories close and farmers are thrown out of their land; as lock-outs and closures rise and as GM crops fail and the monsoons ditch the farmers time and again, the only support that one can fully rely upon is “retail trade”. The farmer grows vegetables and his family sells them in the market. The fisherman catches fish and his family sells those. The worker whose factory has closed sells small eatables which his family spend their whole time upon preparing. Retail trade in India is the sponge which absorbs the vast masses of unemployed and underemployed and allows them to soak in a little of the wealth from those who have it – enough at least to subsist!A retailer is the middle-man between the producer and the consumer. This excludes direct transactions between the producer and bulk buyers like institutional and government buyers (which comes under wholesale). Otherwise, every article and service which is sold to the individual consumer in individual units or small lots comes under the banner of retail trade. The article sold may vary from a pin or a peanut to a motor car, an airplane or a yacht. The type of shop varies from the street vendor to the most plush, air-conditioned super-malls. Even the door-to-door canvasser, selling items from bathroom cleaners to mobile phone connection packets, all come within the ambit of retail trade.In India retail trade contributes 14% of the GDP and employs around 7% of the workforce. This is the largest sector of employment, next only to agriculture. Table 1 below shows how the service sector contributes to the GDP in India.Table 1: Components of Service Sector in IndiaComponents Share % in Growth during GDP (2002-03) 2002-03Construction 5.3 7.3 Trade 14.0 4.5 Hotels & Restaurants 1.1 4.0 Railways 1.1 5.7 Other Transport 4.3 6.0 Storage 0.1 -7.8 Communications 3.5 22.0 Banking & Insurance 6.9 11.6 Real Estate,Business/Legal Services 6.1 5.9Defence 5.9 5.3 Other Community &Social Services 7.8 6.2Total 56.1 7.2 Source: Presentation to FICCI by MBN Rao (Chairman, Indian Bank): “Strategy for Financing Service Sector” (Sept. 15, 2004), taken from paper by CPAS by Mohan Guruswamy, Kamal Sharma, J P Mohanty, T J Korah These figures clearly reflect the domination of trade as the main producer of wealth in the service sector. The contribution of 14% to the GDP must be seen in the background of the same statistic in other countries – 8% in China, 6% in Brazil and 10% in the US.1 It is therefore no surprise that A. T. Kearney, a management consultancy firm which brings out the Global Retail Development Index (GRDI) every year has ranked India as the top destination for investment in retail trade for the third year running.2 The rate of growth in retail sector is also phenomenal. The number of retail outlets in the country grew from 85 lakh outlets in 1996 to over 1.12 crore outlets in 20013 . Today, it is estimated that there are more than 1.5 crore retail outlets in the country, giving India a density of around 1.4 outlets for each 100 persons – among the highest densities in the world. Table 2 gives the relative rate of growth for sections of the service sector for the period from 1993-94 to 2002-03.The retail trade has grown in terms of money as well. A T Kearney had estimated the retail trade to be around 4,00,000 crore rupees in 2000 and had estimated that it would double by 2005. The Government of India’s figure for 2003 was around 3,82,000 crore rupees. A FICCI study of November 2003 (op. cit.) estimated the total retail business to be around Rs. 11,00,000 crores, or around 44% of GDP at the relevant time. A T Kearney’s GRDI of 2007 (op. cit.) estimates today’s retail business in India to be of the value of $ 350 billion (c. Rs. 14,00,000 crores) and predicts that it will grow to $427 billion (c. Rs. 18,00,000 crores) by 2010 and $635 billion (Rs. 27,00,000 crores) by 2015. (This is estimating a growth rate of around 9% per annum compounded.). In short the total retail business, by 2015, will account for the whole of today’s GDP!Retail trade in India today accounts for around 8% of the workforce. Though this is lower than in advanced countries (countries like US, UK and other European countries, have a large percentage of their employment in the service sector and hence have around 16% of the workforce employed in retail trade) it is a very large number in absolute terms. It means that around 5 crore people are employed in the retail trade. Allowing for 4 dependants for each employee in retail, it means that around 20% of India’s population is dependant upon retail trade.
Fragmentation and concentration
India’s retail trade in mainly in the “unorganised” sector. The “organised” sector includes only those establishments which are licensed, i.e. those which are registered under income tax laws, sales tax laws, etc. In India, the organised sector, as on today accounts for only 2% to 3% of the retail trade. The unorganised sector includes the pan-beediwala, the street vendors, and most small outlets. The large hypermarkets and supermarkets are what form the organised sector. The proportion of the organised sector in retail trade in India is one of the lowest in the world, even in comparison to other developing countries. This is brought out clearly by Table 3Table 3: Retail Trade in India & South East AsiaCountries Organised UnorganisedIndia 2 98China 20 80South Korea 15 85Indonesia 25 75Philippines 35 65Thailand 40 60Malaysia 50 50 Source: CRISIL quoted in CPAS report op. cit.Not only this, out of the around 1.5 crore retail outlets in the country, not more than 4% are bigger than 500 square feet. Organised retail in India employs around 5 lakh people while the other 395 lakhs are employed in the unorganised sector of the trade. The picture that thus emerges, of a collage of small fragmented retail outlets, is merely a reflection of the position of retail trade as the largest sector of “disguised unemployment”.It is this poor unemployed thelewala who is the real target of the MNCs. He and the corner kiranawala will be replaced by the Wal-Marts and the Carrefours and the Tescos. Coke and Pepsi came out with the five rupee bottle not to oust any opposition MNC or even any Indian producer of carbonated soft drinks but to put paid to the nimbupaniwala and the gannewala and the narielpaniwala. There is not doubt that in a capitalist economy, retailers provide a service. They make a profit out of providing this service. The main argument in favour of organised retail is that it provides a more efficient “supply chain” from the producer to the consumer. The key word to be considered here is “efficiency”. What is this efficiency? It is not as if organised retailers do not want a profit. What they argue is that instead of the profit being shared between so many small businessmen who intercede in the supply chain, it is more efficient to provide only one or two intermediaries in the process. What this argument means is that instead of so many small businessmen all taking their share of the profit, it is more “efficient” for Wal-Mart, Carrefour or Tesco to make a one time profit. However, this argument is as fallacious as the one that says that the market is the supreme leveller – and for the same reasons. Monopoly (modern imperialist economists prefer the word “monopsony”) skews the equation. Hundreds of nimbu paniwallas will be satisfied with a lesser aggregrate profit than one CEO of Wal-Mart. The “efficiency” will be reflected in the prices available to the consumer only till poor doodhwalla is driven out of business. It is then that the rapaciousness of the large retail firms will be allowed to unleash their unbridled fury. Such monopoly does get created and very fast. Of that there is no doubt. Retail of food products is one of the main sector of the retail trade (in India it is estimated to form around 60% of the total retail trade). In the period 1988 to 1997, when a similar concentration of retail outlets was taking place in European countries, the share of the top five firms in food retail grew from 10% to 25% for Italy, from 15% to 50% in Portugal and from just above 40% to almost 80% in Denmark4 . Between 1991 and 1998, the annual amount of mergers and acquisitions in international retail trade rose from US$1,729 to 17,967 million5 .Other developing countries like Thailand and Malaysia have seen sudden concentrations of their retail markets in few years after throwing the doors open to FDI. As we have seen above, today 40% and 50% respectively, of their retail trade is in the hands of organised big-format retailers. This has created such an adverse impact that both the countries have had to enact regulatory laws restricting the growth of retail trade.India too has already seen a massive growth in organised retailing. As we saw above the estimates of the total turnover of retail trade in India vary widely. However, the estimates for the growth of organised retailing are agreed upon by all consultants. All agree on the figure of Rs. 15,000 crore as the turnover of organised retail trade in India in 1999 and, more disturbingly, all agree that it is going to grow at a rate of 40% per annum. The latest GRDI of 2007 of A T Kearney & Co. cited above claims that the organised trade will grow by 40% per annum, compounded (CARG – Cumulative Annual Rate of Growth), Since the total retail trade is growing by only 9% per annum, the organised sector is expected to expand from 2% to 3% of the total at present to around 10% of the total by 2010 and around 19% of the total by 2015 (around $ 118 billion or Rs. 5,00,000 crores).
Effects on Employment
There are many studies to show that the growth of organised retailing and the entry of retail giants has consistently led to an overall loss of jobs in the retail sector. Professor Donella Meadows, director of the Sustainability institute reported that in Massachusetts (in the USA) a typical discount superstore added 140 jobs but destroyed 230 higher paying ones. She reports that within three to four years of Wal-Mart’s arrival, retail sales in a 20 mile radius come down by 25%, while between 20 to 50 miles away, they come down by 10%. Another study by Stephen J Goetz and Hema Swaminathan of the department of agricultural economic and rural sociology of the Pennsylvania State University (of 2004) entitled “Wal-Mart and Poverty” showed that American states with a greater number of Wal-Mart stores in 1987 had higher rates of poverty in 1999 than states where fewer stores were set up. “Equally important, the counties (states) which built new Wal-Mart stores between 1987-1998 also had high poverty rates” says the report. All this increased poverty came at a time when poverty rates nationally were otherwise on the decline.Though Sonia Gandhi dashed off a letter one fine morning to the PM that the effects of allowing FDI in retail upon unemployment must be more closely looked at, no real attempt is being made by the Government to gauge the effect of allowing corporate investment and FDI in retail upon the 1.5 crore retail outlets all over the country. One good argument on the basis of accepted projections has been made in this respect by CPAS (Centre for Policy Alternatives) in the study cited above6 The same argument was also put forth by two of the authors, Kamal Sharma and Jeevan Prakash Mohanty. Putting it in their words,“In 2004, Wal-Mart had a turnover of $256 billion and it recorded a net profit of $9 billion. Its 4,806 stores employs 1.4 million persons. The average size of a Wal-Mart outlet is 85,000 square feet and the average turnover about $53 million. The turnover per employee is $1,82,000. By contrast, the Indian retailer had a turnover of Rs 1,86,075 ($4,100 approximately) and only 4 per cent of the 12 million retail outlets occupied space larger than 500 square feet. The total turnover of the unorganised retail sector, which employs 39.5 million persons, was Rs 735,000 crore. India has 35 towns each with a population of over one million. If Wal-Mart were to open, on an average, one store in each of these 35 cities and if each achieved the average Wal-Mart performance per store, the turnover would amount to over Rs 8,033 crore and number of employees to only 10,195. Extrapolated to the rest of the country, it would mean displacing around 4,32,000 persons. In other words, every new Wal-Mart employee will render 40 retailers surplus. If FDI retailers with deep pockets were to take over 20 per cent of the retail trade, this would mean a turnover of Rs 1,47,000 crore. This represents an employment of about 43,000 persons, displacing nearly eight million persons in the unorganised retail sector.”While talking of the effect of FDI in retail upon unemployment, we are not going into the question of the quality of employment to be provided. The whole basis of the economics of “hyper-markets” is unbridled labour exploitation. Persons are usually employed only on a part-time basis, to allow for extended working hours. This, as noted by the OECD study mentioned above, is good for decreasing the bargaining power of the unions. Once the Government is committed to “organising” the retail trade, investment (whether foreign or domestic) can only be attracted by the promise of fat profits. This means a dilution of labour laws in various forms. It also speeds up the “race to the bottom” as a monopsony (buyers monopoly) develops. This means that large mega stores will buy only from the cheapest which means that there will be a pressure even on the suppliers (the manufacturers) to reduce wages of their workers. The ultimate effect is bound to be a massive pressure to further curb the rights of the working class, leading, in addition to a fall in employment, to a reduction in the overall quality of employment in society.
Burning the candle at both ends
Another argument given in support of the advent of FDI in retail is that it will help the farmer and other primary producers. They will be saved the rapacious exploitation of the middle-men – the agents and the touts and they will be able to directly approach the customer. This argument is also pure hogwash. As concentration and monopoly grows, it is not only the consumer who gets squeezed but also the supplier. By 1997 super-markets and the larger “hyper-markets” like Wal-Mart accounted for 92% of the fresh produce sold in the US. The top 5 retailers had cornered 70% of the market in the UK. In such a situation, the farmers will have to compete to vie for a place on the shelves of Wal-Mart and Reliance. As a Brazilian shoe factory owner is reported to have commented on the scramble to put their products on the shelves of big retailers, “We don’t sell, we get bought!”7 A 1981 UN study showed that out of the cost of Philippines bananas sold in Japan by an MNC, only 17% of the retail price was the “retained value”; similarly only 35% of the cost of Thailand pineapples sold by ‘Dole’ and MNC was retained, out of which only 10% went to the agriculturist, while 25% went to the processing and canning process, which, in turn, was done by a subsidiary of the MNC. Another recent study has shown that in the case of bananas sold in Europe by US MNCs, the farmer got 10% while the workers got between 1.5% to 9%. The most recent study by Oxfam also reaches the same findings – only more so!. The breakup of each dollar spent on an apple in Wal-Mart was8 :Farm Labor 5%Farm Income 4%Supermarket 42%Importer’s commission and duty 7%UK handling 7%Shipping 12%Transport and customs 6%Farm inputs and packaging 17%Why FDI now?For many years, the Government in India has not allowed FDI in retail trade. As a part of the negotiations on GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services), each country was required to make a Schedule of Commitments (SC) about specific commitments regarding national treatment and market access in specific sectors or sub-sectors. The Government of India did not make any commitment on retail trade during the discussion on GATS known as the Doha Development Agenda. A commitment on national treatment in retail trade would have meant that foreigners would have to be given the same rights as domestic investors in this service sector. However, after the initial discussions at Doha ended in a dismal failure, due to the US insistence on subsidies to its farmers, outside the official WTO negotiations, the Government has proved to be amenable to the pressures put upon it by the imperialist powers to open up the retail sector. The official Policy on FDI of the Indian Government still says that no FDI will be allowed in retail trade. However, the Government has later diluted this stand by allowing 51% FDI in single-brand retail (McDonalds, Levis, Arrow, Louis Vouitton, etc.), removed a need for approval for FDI in wholesale and allowed FDI through franchisees. All this has won it pats on the head from the imperialist top dogs. The joint statement on trade issued by Bush and Manmohan Singh on March 6, 2006, when Bush visited India reads:“Since the creation of the TPF9 , India has liberalized its restrictions governing foreign direct investment in the retail sector (allowing 51% FDI in retail trade for single brand products), and removed an approval requirement for 100% FDI in wholesale stores. Going forward, the two governments have agreed to continue under the TPF a dialogue on investment restrictions, especially in the retail, financial services, and insurance sectors, and to seek to identify potential sector-specific investment joint initiatives (e.g., transportation, agroprocessing).”When Manmohan Singh visited London, Tony Blair’s main chastisement was that British business longed for the Indian retail sector to be opened up. In keeping with all this pressure, the Finance Minister, P. Chidambaram, in his mid-year review 2004-05 said,“On retail, the review notes that creating an effective supply chain from the producer to the consumer is critical for development of many sectors, particularly processed and semi-processed agro-products. In this context, it says, the role that could be played by organised retail chains, including international ones merits careful attention.”The actual situation today is that international retail giants have already rushed in with saliva dripping to have a head start. Metro AG of Germany was one of the first off the block who came in under the policy amendment allowing 100% FDI in wholesale trade. Metro stores now exist in Bangalore, Hyderabad and will soon open in Kolkatta and Mumbai. They have come in under the “Cash & Carry” format, supposedly for wholesale trade. They are supposed to sell only from business to business (B2B) and are not supposed to sell to individuals. However, the loophole is that there is no restriction on the minimum amount that a customer must buy. As long as the bill can be made out in the name of a business, they are happy. They have been selling quite openly to doctors, lawyers, employees of IT firms and others as long as the bill can be made out in the name of a business. Each customer is given a card, ostensibly to certify that the holder is a business and not an end consumer. However, owners of jewellery stores have been known to buy footwear and owners of security businesses are known to buy food articles for home consumption. The Karnataka Government itself, after an investigation has admitted that 70% of the sales are in the nature of retail sales. The shopkeepers of Bangalore, operating under the traditional format, get their goods delivered to their shop on credit and a van comes back after a few days to take back the unsold goods. They require neither cash nor do they have to carry. Whey would they want to go to Metro? Interestingly, in January 2004, the shopkeepers of Bangalore through their association had challenged Metro in the High Court. The lawyer for Metro was none other than P. Chidambaram.On 6th August, Walmart has also entered into an agreement with Bharati to set up such cash and carry operations in India. This arrangement is likely to be even more of a façade. Alongside with the stores of the Joint Venture, which will operate only on the wholesale format, Bharati will also be setting up its own retail stores. So Bharati can act as the retailer buying from the joint venture stores and selling in their own stores. Of course, the whole thing will only be an eyewash and both the stores will, in fact, be one operation, allowing Wal-Mart to blatantly violate the legal restraints.Shoprite, a South African megastore has opened shop in the same “Cash & Carry” format in Mumbai. Metro is expanding and has recently offered to invest $ 6.5 billion in Haryana. Reliance has already made its intention to enter the “Cash & Carry” format and has been seen making overtures to Tesco. Marks & Spencer of UK has already started operating on the basis of franchise. Ahold of the Netherlands and Carrefour of France are also waiting in the wings.Already there is a buzz in the corridors of power that the Government will allow FDI in retail trade in a few sectors, like electronic goods and construction materials. Whether this rumor is well-founded or not, the fact remains that the Government is bound to allow FDI in retail trade, sooner or later, given its commitment to globalisation, WTO and the enslavement of India.In further deference to the wishes of the almighty MNCs and corporate houses, the APMC Acts all over the country are being amended to allow mega stores to purchase and store fresh produce directly from the farmers. One of the main grouses of Metro in Bangalore was that it was not allowed to do this. Now this concern has also been addressed by the Governments at the centre and in the states.
The solution to the riddle
Many divergent and different views are being put forward for and against the entry of FDI in retail. Swashbucklers like Subramaniam Swamy are not scared of being openly linked to US imperialism and make out totally false and baseless arguments to push FDI in foreign trade, like pointing to non-existent compulsions under the WTO, baseless promises of growth in employment, etc. P. Chidambaram, Manmohan Singh, Vajpayee, Yashwant Sinha, have also come out openly in favour of FDI in retail trade without even adverting to the question of how to tackle unemployment, despite Sonia Gandhi’s much-publicised missive to the PM. All different state governments, including the CPM-led “Left front” Government are also allowing FDI in trade. Metro is to set up shop in Kolkatta soon.The CPM, as usual is blundering along the social democratic path of compromise. An article in “Peoples Democracy” in early 2004 had decried how the Metro stores in Bangalore were, in reality, retail outlets that were, in collusion with the State Government, pulling the wool over the eyes of the law which does not allow FDI in retail trade. Today the same Metro is poised to set up shop in Buddhadeb’s Kolkatta. The Left parties’ note on this question, drafted in October 2005 and published in “People’s Democracy” has clearly stated how there is no case for FDI in retail trade in India, particularly in view of the job losses expected. However, the latest official stand of the CPM, published on 30th May 2007, is more in terms of a caution to the Government to “regulate” the organised retail trade, not to prohibit it. Besides making a cryptic comment that “Not allowing MNCs to operate in the retail sector should be the starting point of the national policy on retail.” the actual recommendations do not contain any prohibition of FDI or MNCs in retail trade. There is no mention in this policy, supposedly on regulation of organised retail trade, about the pressures due to WTO negotiations; no criticism of globalisation or of neo-liberal policies.Most economists who have written on this question, if at all they have opposed the entry of FDI in retail, have mainly harped on the effects on employment. However, the creation of unemployment is merely one aspect of the problem. True as it is that the entry of FDI in retail will lead to massive unemployment, as seen from the argument of Guruswamy et al cited above, the insight of Dipankar Dey in the cited paper is also true that, “…in reality we may not observe any visible change in the unemployment level. Only the percentage of disguised employed (rather disguised unemployed) population in the retail sector would increase.”Communists are not against “efficiency” in the retail sector as in everything else. Under socialism, “retail” does not remain a business at all. It forms an inalienable part of the system of “production, distribution and exchange”. The socialist government will see that the best possible quality of goods will reach all the people in optimum quantities as early as possible. This will be the gauge of “efficiency”, not growth of GDP, or of profits or even of employment. Attempts will have to be made to reach quality goods to remote places. This poses a far greater and more important challenge than creating an artificial market for luxury goods. The amounts spent on “competition” such as on advertisement, on brand equity, etc. will all go to the benefit of the eventual consumer. Socialism is not opposed to “choice” but in fact stands for “informed choice”. Choice will be on a scientific basis, based on the particular needs (and even tastes) of each consumer and not on the basis of false advertising claims (“Coca Cola – Khane ka swad badhaye!”).Even a consistently democratic attitude towards the retail trade militates against the entry of FDI. As shown above, the coming of mega-retailers is bound to result in monopoly in both buying and selling. Democracy is always opposed to monopoly. The OECD study cited above states explicitly, “The process of concentration and internationalisation often proceeds as follows. To achieve economies of scale, commercial groups try to increase their size primarily in their domestic markets. Once a certain level of concentration has been reached, development on domestic markets becomes difficult and distribution groups tend to look for markets abroad. Given that regulatory barriers to entry are often high (see below), it is frequently easier to penetrate a market by purchasing or teaming up with groups that are already established.”10 It is the process of crisis which leads the retailing behemoths to look outward ever in search of newer markets. This crisis of imperialism was also behind forcing the GATT and GATS down the throats of the people of the world at large. GATS is languishing agreement on the Doha Development Agreement due to the insistence of the US and European countries to continue subsidies to their farmers. In the meantime, imperialism is pressurising neo-colonies to accept market access and national treatment for services. It is in this background that we must view the question of FDI in retail trade. Viewing it as a mere question of employment, devoid of the context of imperialist globalisation, will be to distort the true meaning of the problem.A more meaningful and proper slogan has been taken by the myriad organisations of retailers who have come together to oppose the latest transaction in the great sale of the country. They have raised the slogan for throwing corporates and FDI out of the retail trade in India. This a much more democratic slogan than the meek regulations sought by the CPM. Only a consistently democratic slogan can take us towards the path of socialism in this question. We must demand the total prohibition of FDI and corporate houses in retail and wholesale trade. The wholesale trade must be brought totally under the purview of the state. Regulatory bodies like the APMC, Tea Board, Coffee Board, etc. must be strengthened and spread, not dismantled. A large movement is growing on this question. Many demonstrations were held all over the country with the demand of kicking out FDI and Corporates from the retail trade on 9th August this year. Our party has also held seminars and demonstrations on this question in various places like Durg, Bhopal, Mumbai, etc. The selling out of the retail sector is inextricably linked to other issues like corporate and contract farming, which will be used by the mega stores to stock their shelves; SEZs where there will be a planned proliferation of mega stores as well as cheap production facilities for them; etc. The fight against FDI in retail is linked to the larger question of imperialist globalisation and the struggle for smashing the WTO. It is necessary for all democrats and communist revolutionaries to come together to fight against this new manifestation of neo-liberalism. Footnotes: 1 Letter by Ashwani in ET 22nd Aug 2005 2 GRDI 2007 by A T Kearney & Co. 3 FICCI survey of 5th-6th November 2003, www.ficci.com 4 OECD Economic Studies No. 32, 2001/1, attributed to OECD, Economic Census, 2000 5 Op. cit. attributed to ILO, 1999 6 FDI in India’s retail sector : More Bad than Good? By Mohan Guruswamy et al. www.cpasind.com 7 Quoted in study by Dipankar Dey, ICFAI Business School 8 All the figures in this para are from Dipankar Dey’s above cited paper 9 TPF stands for Trade Policy Forum. India is only one of three countries in which such a cabinet level standing forum with the US exists. 10 OECD, Economic Studies No. 32, 2001/1
CPI(ML) Liberation On The Rightist Path
February 22, 2008
On Jyoti Basu’s Embrace of Capitalism as the Only Road to Industrialization
P.J. James
CPI(M) leader Jyothi Basu’s recent statement on capitalism and capital as the only path to industrialization and his character-ization of capitalism as the “motive force” of the future have evoked quick responses from diverse sections of the political spectrum. This is an approach to the issues involved in this debate from the perspective of Marxist political economy.
At the outset, it should unequivocally be stated that capitalism, as Marx and Lenin have put, is a historically determined social system and that today’s capitalism is fundamentally and qualitatively different from the 19th century laissez-faire capitalism whose major trend, in spite of its characteristic social antagonisms, was production-oriented. According to Marx, as an economic system, compared with all previous modes of production, capitalism had been immensely productive. For instance, highlighting the productive power of capitalism, Marx said: “ The bourgeoisie during its rule of scarce hundred years, created more colossal productive forces than all preceding generations together.” Yet, Marx was fully convinced that a socialist society would be infinitely more productive because it would remove capitalism’s “antagonistic conditions” of production and distribution which is inherent in the social character of capitalist production and private nature of its appropriation. This prediction of Marx was proved scientifically correct through Soviet industrialization under Stalin.
Following the footsteps of Marx, Lenin made an in depth analysis of the character of capital and capitalism in the context of the transition of competitive capitalism to monopoly capitalism or imperialism. In his 1916 epoch making study “Imperialism: The Highest Stage of Capitalism”, Lenin made an objective historical evaluation of the real essence of capital’s so called productive potential. In this study, he identified a fundamental transfor-mation that has occurred in the character itself of capital under imperialism. Based on a rigorous enquiry in to capital’s laws of motion since the 1870s, Lenin said that as capitalism transforms into imperialism or finance capitalism, the productive aspect of capital lags behind its inherent speculative aspect. According to him, the capitalist decay and parasitism associated with the rapid growth of a parasitic capitalist class in all leading capitalist countries who lives idly on speculative gains from what he calls “coupon clipping” or money spinning businesses has assumed the major trend in the economy. Rather than earning profits by engaging in production, major sections of “financial oligarchs” try to accumulate immense money capital simply by engaging in financial speculation in stock and money markets. The possibility of obtaining super profits from speculation by force of their monopolistic position coupled with captive control over technology has weakened the capitalist stimulus to engage in production and create employment. To be precise, “speculation”, according to Lenin, was “the economic basis of imperialist ascendancy”. World imperialist powers and international monopolies who mostly thrive on mere speculation influence “all the social-political condition of the countries affected in general” (Imperialism…,p.122). As pointed out by him, “the economic parasitism of capital is engaged in a deliberate retardation of technical progress” and productive forces resulting in the “tendency to stagnation and decay”. Regarding the “economic parasitism” which gets “upper hand” in society and which engulfs every sphere of social life in imperialist countries, Lenin unequivocally said: “The export of capital, one of the most essential economic bases of imperialism, still more completely isolates the rentiers from production and sets the seal of parasitism on the whole country that lives by exploiting the labour of several overseas countries and colonies”. (Ibid.p.120)
Today, under imperialist globalization, the decay and degeneration associated with capitalism and capital have assumed phenomenal levels compared with that explained by Lenin in his 1916 work. At present, globalization is led not by industrial capital but by speculative finance capital which has grown hundreds of thousands times larger than the former. For instance, Alan Greenspan, former chairman of American Federal Reserve System is reported to have said that only two percent of the financial capital transactions in the world have anything to do with productive economic activities, the rest being outright speculation. Even academic experts have pointed out this fact time and again. For, while, Basu, the self professed Marxist has characterized the present day capitalism and capital as productive and the only source of industrialization, Joseph Stiglitz, former World Bank chief Economist and Nobel Prize Winner in his book Globalization and its Discontents based on a study of several countries under the Fund- Bank tutelage has called them as grave yards of industrialization. According to Stiglitz, globalization which is the present day form of capitalism is engaged in destroying whatever industrial base these countries had accomplished in yesteryears through Keynesian state led economic and industrial policies. As a result, what is occurring is an unprecedented situation of de-industrialization, joblessness, and agricultural retardation. Another economist, Davison Buddhoo, who later resigned from the post of IMF’s Executive Director, on the basis of his long experience with Fund-Bank policies in Afro-Asian-Latin American countries has pinpointed that the so called development led by international capital is transforming them as mere speculative bubbles. In fact, it is to camouflage this ongoing unprecedented deindustrialization and joblessness that various imperialist agencies in their international economic reports have started using the euphemistic phrase “jobless growth”. To be precise, it is at a time when global capitalism is undermining the very condition of industrialization and development in neocolonial countries that the CPI (M) leadership in India is seeking refuge in the so called productive potential of capital.
As already noted, capitalism’s productivity and its role as an inevitable condition of industrialization ceased to exist with its transformation into imperialism or finance capitalism. The formation of Soviet Union and the task of industrialization undertaken by it outside the orbit of finance capital had proved this. While Soviet Union under Stalin was marching forward with its socialist path of industrialization, the Great Economic Depression of the 1930s resulting in the widespread destruction of productive forces including rampant joblessness which engulfed the whole capitalist-imperialist system amply proved the correctness of Lenin’s analysis of capital and exposed the myth of capitalism’s capacity to develop the world economy. On the other hand, the enormous growth of productive forces under socialism also brought to light the fact that socialism is the only alternative to the moribund capitalist system. The rapid industrialization of Soviet Union under central planning and its impact on the whole world also exploded the imperialists’ cherished myth about the inefficiency of socialist planning. That Soviet Union remained totally immune from the devastating economic crises of the 1930s had been another severe ideological blow to imperialist development theoreticians.
Even while overtly opposing socialism and Lenin’s analysis of imperialism, this unprecedented capitalist crisis compelled imperialist experts to covertly admit the inherent speculative character of capital as stated by Lenin. This is well reflected in Keynesianism which remained as the leading bourgeois economic doctrine and post-war capitalist ideology until the 1970s.Originating in the economic crisis of the 1930s, Keynesianism identified the speculative character of capitalism as one of the major causes of all evils. Therefore, Keynes advocated a “euthanasia” for speculative capital and stood for appropriate state action to divert capital to the sphere of production from the sphere of speculation. As elucidated in the last chapter of his famous work, The General Theory of Employment Interest and Money, which was considered the gospel of capitalism till the seventies, Keynes argued that capital can continue to be ‘productive’ only under the strict social and political control enforced by the state with a national development perspective. Despite being one of the staunchest defenders of capitalism, he reiterated that if left uncontrolled, capital would flow into speculation and parasitism resulting in unemployment and stagnation as is manifested in the turbulence of the 1930s.
Put it differently, Keynesianism, contrary to what CPI (M) leadership says, had been a confession that laissez-fair capitalism was no longer capable of developing the economy or creating the required employment. Full employment to the people, according to Keynes, was quite unthinkable under capitalism and instead what he suggested had been a situation of partial or “underemployment equilibrium”. Obviously, it was Keynesianism that lay behind the conceptualization of the welfare state during the quarter century following the Second World War. Of course, different versions of Keynesianism could be seen in Afro-Asian-Latin American countries which came in to existence after ‘de-colonization’. As is obvious, it was this Keynesian state control over capital and not freely floating finance capital that yielded a “golden age of capitalism” during 1945-70.
Unlike today’s neo-liberal spectrum ranging from Fund- Bank economists to the Indian social democrats who staunchly uphold the unfettered movement of finance capital across countries as the key to industrialization and development, the policy of state intervention in the economy albeit with several limitations was the cause for the emergence of an import- substitution industrialization in neocolonial countries like India. No doubt, the favourable ideological and political context arising from the success of socialist planning and industrialization in Soviet Union and erstwhile socialist countries and the advancement made by national liberation movements on the one hand and the world wide economic crisis confronting capitalism on the other had been the factors that compelled imperialism to concede a domestic industrial structure at least in countries like India. In the specific case of India, even the leading sections of comprador bourgeoisie who find it difficult to withstand the onslaught by imperialist finance capital themselves came forward for a state led industrialization through the so called “Tata-Birla Plan” or “Bombay Plan” in 1944 which later became the guideline of the Second Five Year Plan. No doubt, unlike present day CPI (M) leaders’ unconditional allegiance to capitalism as exemplified in Basu’s statement, the role of state and public sector in economic and social development was an ideologically accepted one during the Nehruvian era that lasted till the 1980s. This orientation could be seen at the international level too. Evidences of this orientation may be seen in the UN declarations on Development Decades in the sixties and seventies culminating in the UN General Assembly Resolution on a New International Economic Order in mid-1970s. To be precise, the development vision that thus got strengthened had a ‘democratic’ and welfare emphasis. In fact, this was the context that prompted even ruling classes in neocolonial countries to use the term ‘socialism’ in spite of their firm subservience to imperialism and domestic feudal forces. Of course, the industrialization and so called national development that occurred during the welfare era in these countries including India had not been the logical outcome of unhindered imperialist capital expansion but the result of an intense ideological and political struggle between socialist and progressive forces on the one hand, and imperialist forces on the other. To put it differently, while advancing with its neocolonial plunder in diverse forms, it was imperialism’s fear of communism and international working class movement that led to the emergence of the welfare state and domestic industrialization under high tariff walls in countries like India.
However, imperialist globalization led by finance capital which is bouncing back with intensified vigour on account of a whole set of interconnected ideological, political and economic factors arising from the temporary setbacks suffered by international communist movement has led to a reorientation of international political economy altogether and a reversal of the earlier development trajectories. Under neo-liberalism which has buried all Keynesian prescriptions, finance capital being totally freed from the erstwhile controls, it is not the productive but the speculative aspect of capital that is advancing. While CPI (M) leaders are seeking salvation in the ‘lingering productive potential’ of finance capital, the latter has already led to an unprecedented destruction of productive forces as manifested in widespread de-industrialization, joblessness and agricultural stagnation in India. Failure to comprehend or deliberate negation of the basic Marxist-Leninist approach to capital by Basu and company has resulted in their complete ignorance of the logic of finance capital that undermines the very condition of industrialization and development in Afro-Asian-Latin American countries under imperialist globalization.
An argument often put forward by CPI (M) leadership is that foreign capital brings with it the latest technology. But even academic studies have refuted this claim. For, even during the ‘welfare era’, in the name of technology transfer, MNCs had been transplanting the most obsolete technologies to poor countries at exorbitant prices. Under imperialist globalization, with WTO’s stringent intellectual property regime as codified in the notorious TRIPs, finance capital has fully established its sway over global technology. Moreover, using the latest technologies relating to production, transportation, communication and information, imperialist capital has launched a new international division of labour called post- Fordism which aims at a fundamental restructuring of the basis of industrialization in Afro-Asian-Latin American countries and subjugation of workers to a system of ‘hire and fire’ based on flexible specialization. Instead of promoting industrialization as propagated by CPI (M) ideologues, today global capital is utilizing the new technological advances and post-Fordist organization of work for global market expansion and financial speculation. The best example is that of Information Technology which not only enhances a new international division of labour based on post-Fordism but is also evolving as an end in itself rather than as a means of increasing production and creating employment.
Regarding the so called inflow of capital from imperialist countries which is another argument for attracting MNCs, even according to official data, share of the so called foreign direct investment (FDI) which is supposed to be ‘industrial’ in total foreign capital investment is dwindling and that of foreign institutional investment(FII) which is out rightly speculative is fast expanding. According to studies conducted by UNCTAD, more than 85 percent of the ‘industrial’ investment made by MNCs in Afro-Asian-Latin American countries is mobilized from domestic sources within these countries themselves. The Enron fiasco in India has clearly proved this. And during the era of ‘controlled capitalism’ itself, as UNCTAD studies have shown, for every dollar invested in neocolonial countries, MNCs, especially American MNCs had repatriated 4.25 dollars abroad. Under neo-liberalism where global finance capital movement is totally free, the plunder would be several times higher.
In brief, CPI (M) leadership’s embrace of capital and capitalism under imperialist globalization as the only alternative for development has come at a time when the decay and destruction associated with the latter have assumed horrible dimensions. Today, the scheduled banks in India have a deposit of about Rs. 25 lakhs. The question is not one of lack of funds, but the approach to it. The laws of motion of capital under neo-liberalism make it clear that concerted and systematic ideological and political confrontation with finance capital is indispensable for any industrialization and meaningful development in neo-colonial countries. For this, progressive forces have to improve and sharpen their theoretical understanding on global capital and its operations. Certainly, imperialist capital is no more an engine of growth. At a time when the Latin American countries are trying to impose nationally oriented restrictions on the free movement of capital in diverse forms, surrender of the self-professed Marxists before imperialist finance capital is definitely an eye opener to all the well meaning people in the country.
