trouble in the world's largest democracy?

India, classified as the world’s largest democracy with more than 800 million citizens eligible to vote, is notwithstanding the title itself. Freedom of speech and expression is being cut while Indian farmers are struggling to live and fight for their rights.

Many international celebrities have called attention to what is happening in India, asking their fans to look into the matter where the workers are getting silenced by the current government for fighting the law.

Almost 60% of the Indian labor force works in the primary sector and while they have been romanticized as being the backbone of the country, the agricultural policies they are abided by have not made their life easier. From the second half of the 20th century, many innovations have been introduced in the sector such as genetically modified seeds and pesticides, but these have just forced the small farmers to take large loans in order to afford them.

Likewise, these credits have made their lives miserable. The producers, unable to repay them, have fallen into poverty and helped increase the country’s suicide rates. According to CNN, the amount of suicides has almost reached 100,000 in these last three decades. And this, of course, has made headlines due to the higher approach to the public thanks to the Internet.

Now, the actual political ruling party, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), tried to liberalize the agricultural industry by passing bills, but this had a counter-effect and the farmers have been left worse off than before. To fight this, the farmers started protesting in small groups this last August in the state of Punjab. Slowly, it spread all around the nation the following months and unions began emerging and becoming legitimate because these new rules not only screwed the poorer farmers but the whole agricultural sector.

By the eleventh month of last year, thousands of people marched in the country’s capital and suffered brutal suppression with tear gas and water cannons. Notwithstanding, they continued protesting by camping in the outskirts of the city and have not stopped since. Also, many 24-hour general strikes were declared and a quarter billion of the population have joined the cause in solidarity till now.

Consequently, the government was forced to introduce new reforms on the bills. However that did not satisfy the furious workers. They continued fighting by blocking roads with their tractors and feeding those who were camping outside Delhi. It is not a surprise that they were accused of helping spread the COVID-19 and of being unpatriotic, but Indians have a large history that proves their hunger for confronting oppression and this was not going to be a lesser cause.

The protests have escalated this new year with hundreds having marched over Red Fort, a symbolic landmark of Delhi, bringing the city to a halt. Ergo, the BJP pulled some fascist considered actions by broadcasting anti-protesting messages through the country’s media stations that are highly dependent on the government’s revenue. Several hashtags were created on Twitter (#IndiaAgainstPropaganda, #IndiaTogether) where the patriotic citizens showed their support for the president’s actions and called out celebrities for promoting hate against the countries.

The law enforcement is using military methods to tame the activists by introducing facial recognition software to hunt them down or cutting off the Internet in the state. As can be seen, the Indian regime is breaching the right to freedom of speech and expression of their own citizens. At the same time, it has tried to introduce a new budget plan by increasing public spending to improve roads and hospitals and announcing the vaccine scheme, but none of them help solve the bigger problem. It still prevails and has the danger of digging a bigger hole day by day.

Sources: BBC, CNN, Twitter.