March by the Landless: an NGO Drama Enacted for Congress

For days the ‘national dailies’ reported about the march of the landless people from Gwalior to Delhi demanding land reforms and statutory backing for right to shelter, homestead and agricultural land. Few years before also PV Rajgopal, leader of Ekta Parshad, had organized a march like this following a Bharat Yatra with lot of media attention. Like this time, then also he had met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and had received blessings for the yatra. Then the yatra had culminated at Ramlila grounds, blessed by leaders of Congress and UPA government and agreement was signed to fulfil the very same demands. Before starting another yatra now, spending crores of rupees, Rajgopal did not even feel it necessary to tell the public what was the fate of the earlier one. It seems none of the leading journalist who covered it also felt it necessary to ask this inconvenient question to him. That is the privilege enjoyed by the NGOs, especially when they are organizing programs like this yatra to favour the government in power.

This time representative of UPA government, union minister for rural development, Jairam Ramesh, met Rajgopal and other jan satyagraha leaders at Agra itself on 11th October and signed an agreement with them bringing an end to the long march. The drama was well enacted with the government refusing to sign the tenpoint agreement ten days before when the yatra was going to start from Gwalior, but signing it after a well advertised march for ten days! According to the agreement homestead land of ten cents for all landless rural poor, fast track settlement of land cases through tribunals, legal aid and enhanced land access to adivasis etc are assured. The agreement signed last time also included almost all these promises. But what happened to that is known to all. Still the landless people and adivasis are cheated repeatedly giving false promises, diverting them from the path of struggle to achieve these demands. Both the UPA government and Rajgopal like NGO chiefs can now congratulate each other for cheating the masses through this well enacted drama.