[WSMDiscuss] Fwd: Published today -- Statement in Solidarity with Farmers...

[Jai Sen]

EN / FR

Saturday, February 27, 2021

India in movement…, Canada in movement…, International solidarity in movement…, Farmers in movement, Peasants in movement…, Resistance in movement…, Democracy in movement…, History in movement…, Herstory in movement…

[Further to the post of a Sign-on Solidarity Statement on February 18, 2021 (and *separate / different from another solidarity statement also posted on this list and then featured in the post on February 21 'Happened in US 40 Years Ago' : 87 US Farmers' Unions Speak Out for Indian Farmers' Protest’, @ https://thewire.in/agriculture/usa-farmers-unions-msp-protests-reagan <https://thewire.in/agriculture/usa-farmers-unions-msp-protests-reagan>), here is another major expression of international, transnational solidarity with the Farmers of India :

Statement of Solidarity with Farmers of India

Canadian Labour Congress (CLC), Alberta Federation of Labour (AFL), British Columbia Federation of Labour (BCFL), British Columbia Teachers’ Federation (BCTF), Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW), and others

[see attached documents for full Statement, full list of signatories, and Press Release]



ALSO, HAPPENING TOMORROW :

Cultural Resistance Against Fascism : Farmers Protest in India

Date and Time : Sunday Feb 28, 8pm EST / 5pm PST

Organised by : Teesri Duniya, CERAS, and Cinema Politica in Montreal, and Gurusharan Singh Lecture Committee, Vancouver

Speakers :

Navkiran Natt is a student-youth activist and researcher who works between Punjab and Delhi. She is trained as a dentist and later completed her Masters in Film Studies from Ambedkar University, Delhi. She works on transnational Punjabi migration and its reflections in Punjabi popular culture. She also did a podcast series on the health implications of the Green revolution in Punjab

Mukesh Kulriya  is a PhD student in Herb Alpert School of Music, University of California, Los Angeles, USA. He is a member of the editorial team, Trolley Times. He has been student activist since 2013 and is associated with All India Students Association (AISA)

https://www.trolleytimes.online/ <https://www.trolleytimes.online/>
PLEASE NOTE :

To attend YOU MUST pre-register for the zoom event at :

https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0qf-iqrD8oGNy77DgO0vpN1ypyUHkoPdT9?_x_zm_rtaid=KyTfxu_3SS2Q15Oh9-WY4g.1614355345473.57d2bf84d3113a714849f23110592ced&_x_zm_rhtaid=278 <https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0qf-iqrD8oGNy77DgO0vpN1ypyUHkoPdT9?_x_zm_rtaid=KyTfxu_3SS2Q15Oh9-WY4g.1614355345473.57d2bf84d3113a714849f23110592ced&_x_zm_rhtaid=278>
 

fwd

> Begin forwarded message:
> 
> From: dolores chew <dolchew at hotmail.com>
> Subject: Published today -- Statement in Solidarity with Farmers...
> Date: February 27, 2021 at 8:17:03 AM EST
> To: Jai Sen <jai.sen at cacim.net>
> 

Saturday 27th February

For immediate release

Leading unions and community organizations across Canada and elsewhere express support for India’s farmers

In a full-page ad in today’s Toronto Star, labour, community and civil society organizations in Canada and elsewhere expressed their support for India’s farmers. This Declaration of Solidarity comes at a time when thousands of farmers in India have been engaged for months in the largest and longest sustained non-violent resistance movement in Indian and possibly world history, surpassing Mahatma Gandhi’s historic 1930 Dandi March against the abhorrent British colonial Salt Law. The Declaration is part of a growing movement outside India to demonstrate that the world is watching and that we are firmly behind the farmers and their struggle to survive.   

The farmers are protesting farm laws that will destroy the livelihoods of the millions employed in agriculture in India while blatantly advancing the interests of Prime Minister Modi’s corporate cronies. This is a struggle for survival that has brought out farmers and agricultural workers throughout the country, across class and caste lines. For almost four months now, hundreds of thousands have been protesting peacefully in the outdoors, braving the freezing winter and withstanding water cannons, tear gas, and barricades. Over 200 have died. Women from farm families are on the front lines. Even older farmers in their 80s are active participants.

Prime Minister Modi rammed the farm laws through Parliament in September, through dubious process and without debate, relying on a pliant media and pandemic conditions to muffle opposition outside Parliament. This happened without consultation with farmers’ representatives. When despite continued attempts at repression, the movement only grew stronger, the government launched an all-out effort to vilify and criminalize the farmers, including through arrests. The farmers’ movement has now also become a movement to defend the democratic rights to free speech, assembly, and peaceful dissent enshrined in the Indian Constitution, in resistance to Modi’s increasingly authoritarian regime.

“In these last months, the world has watched tens of thousands of Indian farmers and farm workers leave their fields for the streets to protest the corporate takeover of their livelihoods,” said Hassan Yussuff, President of the Canadian Labour Congress. “Canadian unions support their fight to repeal laws that will impoverish millions of small farmers and leave more farm workers unemployed.”

At this historic moment we stand with Indian farmers in their struggle for survival, for justice, for democracy, for a say in determining and protecting their futures and that of successive generations.  The Government of India must repeal the unjust farm laws and meet the farmers’ demands.

 

Feroz Mehdi (Français) 514-982-6606 ext. 2247

Dolores Chew (English) 514-885-5976




Statement of Solidarity with Farmers of India 
The farmers’ agitation for the repeal of the pro-corporate farm laws has become the largest and longest sustained non-violent movement in Indian history, surpassing Mahatma Gandhi’s historic Dandi March against the abhorrent Salt Law of the British colonial regime. 

The Modi regime rammed the farm laws stealthily through Parliament in September 2020, using its brute majority in the Lok Sabha, resorting to the questionable maneuver of a voice vote in the Rajya Sabha where it did not have a majority, and counting on the pandemic to muffle opposition outside Parliament. These laws were drafted without any consultation with farmers or their representatives, the farmers’ unions. The farmers have consistently opposed these laws, which go against the promises and commitments made to farmers by different governments over several decades. This is especially ironic given that Prime Minister Modi’s BJP campaigned on a pro-farmer platform, including making a minimum support price (MSP) mandatory and implementing the Swaminathan Report that is critical to saving India’s agriculture and farmers. The laws blatantly advance the interests of Modi’s crony corporate capitalists, such as Ambani and Adani, against those of the vast majority of the agricultural sector, effectively throwing farmers to the corporate sharks. 

The government and its propaganda machines, acting in the interests of a narrower and more exclusively corporate elite than any government has in independent India’s history, have concentrated not on finding solutions but on delegitimizing the protests and all who support them as representing special interests (large and rich farmers) in prosperous states. Nothing can be further from the truth. This movement goes back to at least to 2017 and the unions associated with it represent a wide cross section of the farming community from across the country - from agricultural labour to marginal, small and medium peasantry. The All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee (AIKSCC) represents 250 organizations from 20 states, a unique broad coalition, from Dalit agricultural laborers to small and middle peasants. In fact it is the AIKSSC which through a private members bill (supported by 21 political parties other than the BJP) introduced in 2018 a reform agenda towards making farming debt-free and sustainable. 

For several months the hundreds of thousands of farmers protesting peacefully on the borders of the national capital have faced and withstood brutal repressive policing including water cannons, tear gas and barricades in the near freezing conditions of a Delhi winter. 220 farmers have died as a result of the harsh conditions, a few unfortunately by their own hands as despair overcame them. The full participation of women in the protests, whether as tractor drivers or marchers, is another notable feature of the farmers’ agitation. Denying and defying the patriarchal stereotypes of rural north India through their participation in the protests, the women have demonstrated their full status as farmers on par with men. Another feature is the participation of older farmers, some in their 80s, providing evidence of the determination of the entire farm community to defy the diktats of a repressive regime. 

After the attempt of the regime to subvert the non-violent peaceful protest demonstrations on January 26, the farmers’ agitation has now entered a new phase. First, the already growing support for it from farmers across India is now even stronger, with vast gatherings or mahapanchayats of farmers held in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Punjab. Second, with the state’s vilification and criminalization of the farmers and those who have come out in support of them, including youth, journalists and human rights defenders, the movement has now acquired the character of a broad-based attempt to defend the very democratic rights enshrined in the Indian Constitution, most importantly, the freedom of speech and assembly and the right of peaceful dissent from and opposition to the actions and policies of the government. Third, the recent declarations of support for the farm laws by the IMF and the US government indicate the range of forces backing them, adding an anti-imperialist dimension to the struggle against them. 2 

As organizations that work to extend and defend democratic rights, we recognize that an attack on such rights anywhere is an attack on them everywhere. The farmers are literally sacrificing their well-being and putting their lives on the line to uphold these constitutional guarantees on behalf of all the people of India and are setting a glorious example to the entire world. Their heroism and their sacrifice deserve our strong support and our undying gratitude. 

We salute the heroism of the farmers and pay homage to the departed souls who sacrificed their all to the larger cause. We demand that the Government of India stop vilifying the movement and criminalising the human and democratic rights defenders and others who are part of the widespread support for it from diverse sections of Indian people. 

We support the farmers’ demands that the Government of India take the following actions: 
REPEAL THE UNJUST PRO-CORPORATE FARM LAWS 
REPEAL THE ELECTRICITY ACT 
REPEAL THE POLLUTION PENALTY ON FARMERS 
EXTEND MSP AT SWAMINATHAN COMMISSION RECOMMENDED RATE OF C2+50% TO ALL FARM PRODUCTS 
PROVIDE WRITTEN GUARANTEE OF MSP 

Signatories: 
Canadian Labour Congress (CLC)/ Congrès du travail du Canada (CTC) 
Alberta Federation of Labour (AFL) 
British Columbia Federation of Labour (BCFL) 
British Columbia Teachers’ Federation (BCTF) 
Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE)/ Syndicat canadien de la function publique (SCFP) 
Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW)/ Syndicat des travailleurs et travailleuses des postes (STTP) 
Conseil central du Montréal métropolitain – CSN 
Fédération nationale des enseignantes et des enseignants du Québec-CSN 
Hospital Employees' Union (HEU) 
Manitoba Federation of Labour (MFL) 
National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) 
Ontario Federation of Labour (OFL) 
Saskatchewan Federation of Labour 
Unifor National 
United Steelworkers (USW)/Le Syndicat des Métallos, Canada 
Toronto and York Region Labour Council 
Vancouver & District Labour Council 
Academics and Activists Against Hate, Canada 
Alternatives, Montréal 3 
Alternatives International 
Ambedkarite Buddhist Association of Texas (ABAT) 
Anti Caste Discrimination Alliance, UK 
Asian Canadian Labour Alliance (ACLA) 
Les Artistes pour la Paix 
Between the Lines Books, Toronto 
Campaign Against Criminalising Communities, UK 
Canadian Foreign Policy Institute 
Canadians Against Oppression and Persecution 
Caring for Social Justice Collective/Collectif Soignons la justice sociale, Québec 
CareMongering International 
Centre de travailleurs et travailleuses immigrant/es/Immigrant Workers’ Centre (CTI/IWC), Montreal 
Centre for Study and Research in South Asia (CERAS), Montreal 
Collectif-CEDETIM, France 
The Corner House, UK 
Crescent Hub, The 
Community Food Centres Canada/ Centres communautaires d’alimentation du Canada 
Dalit Solidarity Forum-USA 
Democracy Equality and Secularism in South Asia, Winnipeg 
Disha, Canada 
East India Defence Committee, Vancouver 
ETC Group, Quebec 
Europe solidaire sans frontières (ESSF), France 
Fédération des femmes du Québec (FFQ)/Québec Women’s Federation 
Femmes de diverses origines/Women of Diverse Origins (FDO-WDO), Montreal 
Fernwood Publishing, Halifax and Winnipeg 
Foundation the London Story Netherlands 
Geopolitical Economy Research Group 
Global Justice Ecology Project 
Good Jobs for All Coalition, Toronto 
Gursharan Singh Memorial Lecture Committee, Vancouver 
Himalaya Seniors of Quebec (HSQ) 
Hindus for Human Rights (HfHR) 
India Civil Watch International (ICWI) 
India Civil Watch-Montrreal 
India Solidarity, Germany 
Indian Resistance Network, Norway 
Indian Scheduled Caste Welfare Association UK 
Indian Workers’ Association GB (COC), UK 
Justice for All 
Justicia for Migrant Workers (J4MW), Canada 
Khanyisa Education and Development Trust, South Africa 
Kurdish People’s Assembly, UK 
The Kurdish Women’s Initiative in the UK 
Makukhanye Rural Movement, South Africa 
Montreal Serai 
Pakistan Organization of Quebec (POQ) 
Pash Memorial International Trust 
Peace in Kurdistan, UK 
People's Health Movement Canada/Mouvement populaire pour la santé au Canada 4 
Progressive Cultural Association, Calgary 
Punjabi Cultural Association (PCA) Edmonton. 
Punjabi Literary and Cultural Association, Winnipeg 
Qualitative Research Lab-Global South 
Quebec Movement for Peace 
Respecting Elders Communities against Abuse/Ressources Ethnoculturelles Contre l’Abus envers 
les Aîné(e)s(RECAA), Montreal 
Rete jin Milano and CISDA (Italian Coordination in Support of Afghan Women) 
Ryerson Centre for Studies in Food Security, Toronto 
Sarokaran Di Awaaz, Toronto 
Secular Peoples’ Association, Edmonton 
Shri Guru Ravidas Sabha Derby (UK) 
Sikh Virsa International, Calgary 
SOAS India Society (School of Oriental and African Studies, London, UK) 
The Social Justice Centre, Kwantlen Polytechnic University, B.C. 
Socialist Project, Canada 
Society for Socialist Studies, Canada 
South Asian Dalit and Adivasi Network (SADAN) 
South Asian Women’s Community Centre (SAWCC)/Centre communautaire des femmes sud-asiatiques, 
Montreal 
Southall Black Sisters, UK 
South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD) 
South Asian Youth (SAY) Collective/Collectif jeuneusse sud-asiatiques (JSA)/, Montreal 
South Durban Community Environmental Alliance, South Africa 
Taraksheel Cultural Society of Canada 
Toronto Association for Democracy in China 
Teesri Duniya, Montreal 
Unitarian Church of Montreal/Église unitarienne de Montréal 
Voices Against Fascism in India 
West Coast Coalition Against Racism (WCCAR), Vancouver 
Women Defend Rojava, UK 


>> Cultural Resistance Against Fascism: Farmers Protest in India
>> 
>> In September the Government of India passed three new farm laws that dismantled decades long structures that offered guaranteed prices to farmers for certain crops creating a stable guide to make decisions and investments for the following crop cycle. This was done to open up the market for farmers and introduce private players. The laws were passed without consultation with the farmers. Agriculture is the primary source of livelihood for about 58% of India's population, and the new laws according to farmers will create an unequal marketplace and allow big companies to drive down prices. The passing of these laws have led to the biggest protests currently ongoing in the world. In this event we discuss the impact of the laws, the ongoing movement, and the modes of cultural resistance put up by the newspaper Trolley Times which has emerged during this movement
>> 
>> Date and Time: 28th Feb, 8pm EST/5pm PST
>> 
>> Speakers-
>> 
>> 
>> Navkiran Natt is a student-youth activist and researcher who works between Punjab and Delhi. She is trained as a dentist and later completed her Masters in Film Studies from Ambedkar University, Delhi. She works on transnational Punjabi migration and its reflections in Punjabi popular culture. She also did a podcast series on the health implications of the Green revolution in Punjab
>> 
>> Mukesh Kulriya  is a PhD student in Herb Alpert School of Music, University of California, Los Angeles, USA. He is a member of the editorial team, Trolley Times. He has been student activist since 2013 and is associated with All India Students Association (AISA)
>> 
>> https://www.trolleytimes.online/ <https://www.trolleytimes.online/>
>> 
>> To attend YOUR MUST pre-register for the zoom event at 
>> https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0qf-iqrD8oGNy77DgO0vpN1ypyUHkoPdT9?_x_zm_rtaid=KyTfxu_3SS2Q15Oh9-WY4g.1614355345473.57d2bf84d3113a714849f23110592ced&_x_zm_rhtaid=278 <https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZ0qf-iqrD8oGNy77DgO0vpN1ypyUHkoPdT9?_x_zm_rtaid=KyTfxu_3SS2Q15Oh9-WY4g.1614355345473.57d2bf84d3113a714849f23110592ced&_x_zm_rhtaid=278>
>> 
>> The event has been sponsored by Teesri Duniya, CERAS, and Cinema Politica in Montreal, and Gurusharan Singh Lecture Committee, Vancouver. 
>> 
> --

____________________________

Jai Sen

Independent researcher, editor; Senior Fellow at the School of International Development and Globalisation Studies at the University of Ottawa

jai.sen at cacim.net <mailto:jai.sen at cacim.net> &  <mailto:jsen at uottawa.ca>jsen at uottawa.ca <mailto:jsen at uottawa.ca>
Now based in Ottawa, Canada, on unsurrendered Anishinaabe territory (+1-613-282 2900) and in New Delhi, India (+91-98189 11325)

Check out something new – including for copies of the first two books below, at a discount, and much more : The Movements of Movements <https://movementsofmovements.net/>
Jai Sen, ed, 2017 – The Movements of Movements, Part 1 : What Makes Us Move ?.  New Delhi : OpenWord and Oakland, CA : PM Press.  Ebook and hard copy available at PM Press <http://www.pmpress.org/>; hard copy only also at The Movements of Movements <https://movementsofmovements.net/>
Jai Sen, ed, 2018a – The Movements of Movements, Part 2 : Rethinking Our Dance.  Ebook and hard copy available at PM Press <http://www.pmpress.org/>; hard copy only also at The Movements of Movements <https://movementsofmovements.net/>
Jai Sen, ed, 2018b – The Movements of Movements, Part 1 : What Makes Us Move ?  (Indian edition). New Delhi : AuthorsUpfront, in collaboration with OpenWord and PM Press.  Hard copy available at MOM1AmazonIN <https://www.amazon.in/dp/9387280101/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1522884070&sr=8-2&keywords=movements+of+movements+jai+sen>, MOM1Flipkart <https://www.flipkart.com/the-movements-of-movements/p/itmf3zg7h79ecpgj?pid=9789387280106&lid=LSTBOK9789387280106NBA1CH&marketplace=FLIPKART&srno=s_1_1&otracker=search&fm=SEARCH&iid=ff35b702-e6a8-4423-b014-16c84f6f0092.9789387280106.SEARCH&ppt=Search%20Page>, and MOM1AUpFront <http://www.authorsupfront.com/movements.htm>
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