The biggest protest in Human history is currently happening in India, and when I say biggest I mean that this strike makes up one in thirty of the entire world population.
So big.
Very big.
That’s 250 Million people on strike, to put that in perspective that’s as if every single person in the USA were on strike or even more clear, nearly four times as many people as live in the entire UK are currently on strike in India.
Strikes have become ever more common in India in recent years with Modi’s far right government putting in place ever harsher restrictions on workers right, indeed the only major unions not to have gone on strike in India are those aligned with the ruling BJP. Modi has never been particularly popular with workers across India, and with the Government taking advantage of the Covid Crisis to push even more anti worker legislation into place a confrontation was inevitable.
What has made these protests in particular grow in size has been the large contingent of farmers unions that have also used the same day to March on the Indian capital city of Delhi to protest the government’s policies that threaten to bring Neoliberalism out from the cities and into into the farming communities that still form a major part of the Indian economy.
Unlike the worker’s from the city, which predominantly are from the poorer working class the farmers union protests appear to have drawn in agricultural workers from all stratas, and the protesters seem prepared to push for their demands with tenacity, with some farmers union representatives saying the group surrounding Delhi have come with months of food to wait out the government.
This cross class movement isn’t the only united front forming in India with the myriad of communist parties of the region forming anti BJP coalitions, including the CPM and CPI, and even the Naxalite linked CPI(ML) Liberation. To those not familiar with Indian Leftist politics (we won’t shame you here but you should feel ashamed all the same) this might be confusing and just appear to be a stream of letters I threw at you but this is a bigger deal than you might first think.
India, despite being a region forced to through the horrors of imperialism and now the gruelling gears of global capitalism (or perhaps because of this) is a place where not only are communists more popular than in the west, they’ve also shown themselves as to be able to govern. Kerala, one of the richest states in India has largely been run by a moderate communist party and ran well. A reputation communist don’t enjoy in most of Europe, except perhaps in local elections in France.
What does this mean in the context of the current strike action? Perhaps not much but the communists parties new found warmth to anti BJP coalitions, the worker’s unions ability to organize and agitate and now with new found support from both rural poor, and even rural landowners (groups typically not found in unity with Marxists) it is possible this movement could form into something that can effectively oppose the ruling far right Indian Government.
There are hurdles in place and a difficult road in front of the nascent movement and the battle is not even won yet, to speak nothing of the class war but I for one am optimistic. To end our article we would like to leave you with words of Actor Deep Sindu, who has come out in support of this recent wave of protests and industrial action.
“This is a revolution, sir”
ACU 