Shiv Sena In Konkan Struggle: A Corporate Strategy
By Prabhat Sharan
23 April, 2011
Countercurrents.org
Has the people’s movement in Konkan been hijacked by the rabid right wing fascist party Shiv Sena? Going by reports appearing in the corporate media it appears that the movement which till now was moving on the lines of people’s aspirations and struggles, has now been taken over by the moribund Shiv Sena.
The Konkan movement which has been more of an amalgamation of Gandhian and leftist trends is suddenly facing an onslaught from a hungry and dying monster which till yesterday was thrashing in the swamp of wilderness, staring at its inevitable extinction.
To believe corporate media reports, it would seem that the movement till now had been facing a vacuum of leadership and for a parochial party like Shiv Sena gasping for a modicum of oxygen, people’s anger at the proposed Jaitapur nuclear power project has come as a life-saving ventilator.
However, strangely almost all corporate media reports failed to mention that the violence which erupted in the two hamlets in the neighbourhood of Jaitapur, were strongholds of Shiv Sena. There are no two opinions over the fact that even the people in these two hamlets were also disturbed by the anger sweeping the coastal region, but then there is also another fact that till date not many people from these two hamlets had taken part in the on-going Konkan Bachao (Save Konkan) movement per se.
To state that Shiv Sena has managed to ‘hijack,’ the movement is as good as stating that the party has taken over the reins of the movement due to lack of proper leadership; and that it has managed to bring to light the anger of natives. What is surprising is that the ground reality is totally contrary to the reports appearing in the corporate media.
The natives of Konkan region post-Dabhol scenario has always been shying away from political parties and has kept most of the politicians at bay from the struggles which are roiling in the region. The region is not just witnessing one Jaitapur nuclear power project protest movement; people of Konkan are also carrying out struggles against Bal Ganga Dam project, mining projects, port projects and proposed industrial parks.
Corporate bodies and the ruling parties like Congress and Nationalist Congress Party along with other parliamentary political parties even those sitting on the opposition benches, desperately want an influential stooge which can deflect the people’s movement to a harmless cove.
The ruling class very well knows the history of Shiv Sena. Right from late sixties when Shiv Sena was assiduously propped up by the industrialists with the help of Congress party to curb the increasing communist influence in the working class areas of Mumbai, till nineties the party has always been used to finish off and deflect people’s movement by drawing a huge larger than the life size image of it.
The ruling class very well know that like the Nazi party which in 1920s and 30s had managed to camouflage its real intention by adding the word “Socialism,” to its party name and red colour to its flag, Shiv Sena had also in the past successfully hoodwinked the masses and neutralized the movements by using ‘son-of-the-soil,’ or other similar slogan.
However, what the ruling class and parliamentary parties- a front for corporate bodies- fail to realize is that even by trying to give a larger than the life size image for Shiv Sena for its role in the sporadic violence, the people at this juncture are moved by a disruption to their collective memories and their livelihoods.
The ruling political parties as well as the corporate media is all out to covertly extend support to Shiv Sena’s overt violence in a bid to hide and gloss over the subterranean violence implicit in the anti-people policies being imposed in the region.
It is precisely for this reason that while Konkan protest movements riding rough waves in the face of State violence both overt and covert unleashed since the echo of first voice of dissent, till date people’s struggle had not been in the eye of the media.
Except as a matter of tokenism, people’s struggle in Konkan had largely been viewed as that of those just wanting a hike in the land sale rates. The region is already under a police siege and the eruption of violence was just a matter of fact.
Given the circumstances in post-Fukushima scenario, the desperate attempt to prop up Shiv Sena even though seemingly in a ‘negative manner,’ is more of a Trojan horse strategy being adopted by Congress and other political parties, so as to deflect the anger which they fear may light a fire in the minds of the oppressed and exploited across the country.
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