some more soundbites about the Puppets

So Narendra Modi has won his third term in office as the Chief Minister of India's new golden state, Gujarat. Most saw it coming, but most probably did not see coming the absolute majority with which he would win. True, the BJP has ten less seats than 2002 this time, at 117, and Congress has gained around the same number, but after all the hoopla that the Congress and the BJP rebels in the state, including biggie Keshubhai Patel, raised about the impending doom for Modi, has forced all these people to go into hiding after the rout.

Communists hate religion. I think thats a stereotype in today's world. The fact is that they only hate Hinduism right now, because they need the minority votes to survive. Thus when they see Modi has won, they choose to overlook the fact that the people of Gujarat have voted for him. They instead twist it and say communalism has won. The fact that those who voted for him are sane individuals of the state does not matter. Modi won because he is a wizard who has put a spell on them.

Modi needed to win and I hope his win is stop these agenda-less minority appeasers to stop and do a rethink. When it comes to appeasing the minorities for their votes, there is no limit for the Congress. Spineless that it is, it is even less concerned about things such as sovereignty and secularism, something which it carries on its sleeve. Its a hypocritical world we live in, and the sooner the people of India realize that they need to act if they have to get ahead in this world, the better it is. I hope they realize the grave danger this country came under by bringing the Communists into the national government.

The last four years have had nothing new. Congress proposes, Chinese Puppet deposes. The Prime Minister has done three things best - explain, explain and explain. The Communists have done three things best - threaten, bully and blackmail.

I have the new India Today with me, for the week of December 24, 2007. Its main article is about Prakash Karat, the CPI head. It has some nice tidbits about what the Communists are doing to the country. I have already posted about how they stopped Rajiv Gandhi from modernizing India's banks, and now here are some more crimes they are committing against the country.

"CPI (M), which lives in a time warp, continues to believe that the state knows best. Neither empirical evidence nor experience to the contrary matters. And thanks to their 60-plus strength in the Lok Sabha, the comrades have effectively played spoilsport in critical reforms, the worst hit being the financial sector. India's lumbering bureaucracy costs a packet in terms of salary, but it will cost much more in pension. Moving to a new pension system is imperative both for the Government and the employees, who will earn barely 8 percent this yeawr even as the Sensex has risen over 43 percent. The ones to be denied the dividends of growth are the very sections that the Left professes to protect.

Take banking sector reforms, which Manmohan promised as early as September 2004, but hasn't been able to deliver. The Government needs to fork out almost Rs. 40,000 crore to beef up the capital of public sector banks. It should bring down its equity and make a public offering, thereby bringing in capital while continuing to own majority shares. But the Left disagrees. The issue of privatisation, steeped in barefaced duplicity, is worse. The Left parties practice economics in Kolkata and politics and Delhi. They find nothing wrong in selling the landmark Great Eastern Hotel in Kolkata to a private chain, but stubbornly resist the sale of the rotting Ashoka Hotel in the national capital. Since May 2004, the Left has arm twisted the Government to fund sick PSU's to the extent of over Rs. 10,000 crore through investment and bailouts. Of the 48 central PSU's, only nine posted profits while 27 are making losses and 12 have shut shop.

More mysterious is the Left's stand on big retail. It has been proved the world over that retail chains provide opportunity for creation of logistics and supply chain networks, which in turn enables perishables to be stocked and helps curb both wastage and inflationary tendencies. Every year, food worth Rs. 59,000 crore is wasted and much of this loss is borne by farmers. It is also a fact that retain chains create employment and various levels and control migration from villages to cities. And of course, the chains bring affordability to consumers by bringing down prices. It should ideally form part of the Left manifesto, but they would have none of it.

The hypocrisy is just as obvious in the case of Special Economic Zones (SEZ's). The communists chose to stay silent till the farmers in West Bengal began protesting against land acquisition. Clearly, the state government is desperate for investments, which would create employment and generate revenue to pay for the ever-enlarging bureaucracy. Even on the issue of land for industry, CPI (M) has double standards. Outside Bengal, they don't want anyone to talk concession, yet thought nothing of promising land virtually free to Indonesia's Salim Group. Even when they did get on to the anti-SEZ bandwagon thanks to dissent within UPA, CPI(M) restricted itself to land acquisition and kept silent on the contentious issue of tax exemption, which could cost the Government over Rs. 1,00,000 crore ($25 Billion) by 2009. Ditto with the issue of tax concessions to industry, ranging from the exemption from long-term capital gains tax to dividend tax exemptions and tax holidays for big business that cost the government as much as Rs. 2,88,000 crore ($72 Billion). Exasperated, Manmohan once asked ""if we were promoting crony capitalism."" The Left kept quiet."