Taking a closer look at the political ideology of those that are targeting the Akshaya Patra Foundation

In Current Affairs
09:11 PM, Dec 17, 2018
Yashas Prasad

The Akshaya Patra Foundation (APF) which has been doing a fabulous job of serving mid-day meals for students in government schools and aided schools has denied request from the Department of Public Instruction to include onions and garlic in the meals served. The request was issued based on the Karnataka State Food Commission.⁽¹⁾ The APF provides mid-day meals for close to 4.5 lakh students in Karnataka and 1.6 million students throughout India. ⁽²⁾⁽³⁾An initiative of International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), APF provides satvik food which strictly excludes meat, eggs, onions and garlic. Please keep in mind that I am only attempting to highlight the political ideology of the organizations against APF and demonstrate a larger pattern that exists in relation to the issue and that I am not interested in the merits of vegetarian or non-vegetarian diet in this article.

After rejecting the request of including eggs, onion and garlic, close to 150 ‘civil society groups’ have urged the State Government to cancel the contract with the non-profit APF alleging dearth of nutritional value in the mid-day meals among other reasons. Some of the ‘civil society groups’ demanding that the Karnataka Govt not sign the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) are viz. Jan Swasthya Abhiyan and the Right to Food Campaign (RTFC) ⁽¹⁾. Let us take a closer look at these groups and try to figure out their ideological and political leanings. The RTFC is set in motion by a bunch of left leaning individuals and organizations, some of them with some very questionable pasts, controversial remarks which have not been subjects of intense media scrutiny and debate like the cow vigilantism issue. It is quite surprising how the mainstream media does not give any depth or detail about their affiliations, so, I try to examine some prominent members and organizations in this article. RTFC has what they call a steering group which consists of members from ‘like-minded’ organizations⁽⁴⁾. Some of the prominent names are Annie Raja from National Federation for Indian Women, Anuradha Talwar and Gautam Mody (Modi) from New Trade Union Initiative (NTUI), Aruna Roy from National Campaign for People's Right to Information, Colin Gonsalves from Human Rights Law Network (HRLN) and Kavita Srivastava and Binayak Sen from People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) among others.

Let us start with the Gautam Mody and Anuradha Talwar’s New Trade Union Initiative (NTUI). This organization has a slogan of Unity, Democracy and Militancy. There is a blatant call for violence against the state and bizarre justification for the same in the name of discontentment due to insufficient wages among workers and other issues. The ‘Preamble’ of this organization states –

“The NTUI shall become the voice and inspiration of working women and men, of the oppressed and the discriminated, and of physical and intellectual labor. We shall act, decisively and militantly, at all times and on all occasions, to protect and expand their interests”. ⁽⁵⁾

In its Third General Assembly 2013: Resolution No. 1, NTUI seeks to justify violence (past or potential) by trying to victimize ‘imperialist globalization’.

“Imperialist globalization is essentially an offensive against the working people, a fact known to working class and people all over the world from their own lived experience. Therefore, their opposition and resistance have grown in scale and militancy”. ⁽⁵⁾

NTUI also cites the case of call for 2 day strike as a positive approach by Central Trade Union (CTUs) in February 2013 but regrets not being able to include or galvanize more ‘militant’ organizations to join the strike and but says it addressed this issue.⁽⁵⁾

“In addition, large numbers of federations and organizations, more militant and more rooted among the unorganized workers, were not brought into this convergent process, a weakness that NTUI made an effort to address.”

In the Third General Assembly 2013: Resolution No. 2, NTUI calls for “building a militant struggle for a living wage and to increase the wage share” ⁽⁶⁾. Notice, the number of times the word militant or militantly is used? You might think that might be all, but they are not done yet. In their ‘NTUI Intent Document’ they go on to say,

“the learning of the defensive struggles of the last few years has been that the line of defence cannot be held within the framework of existing bargaining structures, but by militantly mobilizing to change, reshape and restructure the bargaining framework itself in a manner that increases the bargaining strength of workers”. And again, “our call is for expanding the base of the trade union movement, to go all out in organizing the unorganized and to organize them militantly ⁽⁷⁾.

Surprisingly for a trade union, NTUI seems to have strong opinions about the Rohingya refugee crisis⁽⁸⁾ and the Kashmir issue⁽⁹⁾ and their stand in both these issues is against the national interests of India, to say the least.

Now I would like to bring to the notice of the readers an incident that occurred in July 2012, where an HR Manager named Awanish Kumar Dev was beaten and burnt to death by ‘agitating workers’ as a part of the struggle between management at Maruti Suzuki, Manesar and its unionized workforce. Awanish’s brother Avinash insists that it was not a spontaneous attack but planned⁽¹⁰⁾. I don’t know about you, but I’m inclined to believe that repeated call for militant mobilization of workers might have something to do with it.⁽¹⁰⁾Mody has denied the workers’ role in the death of Awanish Kumar Dev as reported by First Post⁽¹¹⁾but elsewhere is quoted as saying “…they have extremely exploited wage conditions. So, if some of the workers have strong militant leanings, that should not be surprising, at least that should not be surprising for us”⁽¹¹⁾.

Coincidentally, Anuradha Talwar who was named as the Secretary – West Bengal on NTUI’s website in 2013 was reportedly entrusted with the task to review the mid-day meal program by the West Bengal Government just before the death of 23 children in Bihar after consuming mid-day meals.⁽¹³⁾

Colin Gonsalves, a Supreme Court Lawyer, extolled as “one of the most complete human rights lawyers of his generation”, co-founded Human Rights Law Network (HRLN). He has many international recognitions to his name.⁽¹⁴⁾In an interview, in 2010, while responding to a question about violence in the red corridor he stated that although he is a non-violent person he completely understands the need for the Naxalites to use violence and that it is justified that they use violence in order to collectively retaliate against the atrocities of the State and other corporations, insinuating that the Indian State is at fault and goes on to suggest that there will be a civil war like situation in the country in the future⁽¹⁵⁾. In October 2018, at Hyderabad, he said, “I have no fear and no shame in saying that revolution is the way forward to change the country. We also know that for initiating social change, the revolution would not come without violence”, as reported by the Indian Express.⁽¹⁶⁾ He has filed a petition on behalf of 6000 Rohingyas in the Supreme Court against their deportation.

It's an understatement to say that Binayak Sen and Kavita Srivastava of People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) have been under the scanner of the law enforcement agencies. In 2010, Sen was convicted for helping the Maoists to set up bank accounts and carrying messages and was later granted bail by the Supreme Court in 2011. The Supreme Court in its judgement said he may be ‘sympathizer’ but that does not make him guilty of sedition ⁽¹⁷⁾. But it also did not give any reason for granting bail and left the conditions of bail to discretion of the concerned trial court. ⁽¹⁸⁾In 2011, Chhattisgarh Police with the help of Rajasthan Police raided Kavita Srivastava’s Jaipur home on suspicion of sheltering or having links with a woman Naxalite, Soni Sodi. ⁽¹⁹⁾Srivastava was also one among the few ‘prominent’ persons to sign a letter demanding the release of the recently arrested left wing extremist activists in the Bhima Koregoan case by the Maharashtra Police.

There is one more aspect that makes these organizations ‘like-minded’ and that is their contempt for the Hindu way of life. The Hindu society faces the brunt of missionary activities, especially in the Maoists hot bed, with its hands tied to the back – the funds generated for proselytizing activities is massive whereas Hindus are still fighting legal battles to take control of their temples, to make matters worse there are no anti conversion laws throughout the country to prevent the demographic change in the meanwhile. Some trusts affiliated with the Hindu institutions like ISCKON are undoubtedly on the radar of these organizations, and this is indeed a very calculated move to gain strategic ground.

These organizations have a proven track record of working against the national interests hiding behind politically correct causes as virtue signaling social justice warriors. What baffles me is the absence of mainstream media spotlight on these organizations – no major media house has highlighted the political inclinations of these organizations and repeated call for violence in some cases. I leave it to the readers to judge if these activists or organizations have any Indian or Hindu interests at heart or if they are consciously working against it - but there is abundant material I have referenced in this article to substantiate my claims.

References:

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Yashas Prasad

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