Call for Bharat Bandh shows Yechury's left with no bright ideas

On November 28, the day Left parties had given a call for Bharat Bandh, NDTV's Kerala bureau chief Sneha Koshy tweeted a photograph of a long queue of tourists sitting on the pavement outside the Thiruvananthapuram railway station. In a second tweet, she pointed out that even though the Pinarayi Vijayan government had said tourists are exempted, they had to report to the station at 5 am for boarding trains leaving after noon.

People stranded outside #Trivandrum railway station!! #Kerala taking 'God's Own Country' tag too seriously (Bhagwan bharose ????)! pic.twitter.com/UEEKBq4glm

— Sneha Koshy (@SnehaMKoshy) November 28, 2016

#Kerala @vijayanpinarayi govt: Tourists exempted from hartal;#Tourists: Made to reach railway station by 5am for trains past12 noon #Hartal

— Sneha Koshy (@SnehaMKoshy) November 28, 2016

God's own country was God's own (Bandh) country, yet again.

For a state that depends heavily on revenue generated by tourism (Rs 26689 crore in 2015), this is criminal. Especially when demonetisation has already troubled them enough in the past three weeks. Most of the foreign tourists have spent considerable time standing in ATM queues, trying to get their hand on currency notes of lower denomination. Even the common man is not spared, with liquidity crunch leading to fewer footfalls at shopping malls. Business sentiment is dull in Kerala, like it is in the rest of India.

In the popular discourse that the BJP is aggressively putting forth, the Left looks like it is offering "Bharat Bandh" as a riposte to the ruling party's "India First". No wonder, the PM is able to take a jibe at it saying while he wants to shut out corruption and black money, the opposition wants to shut down the country.

But given the DNA of the Left, the bandh has always been the only rabbit out of the red hat they take out, when confronted with a problem. If there was ever a hare-brained idea to rebut the inconvenience caused to the public due to demonetisation, it was the call for a bharat bandh.

But then it is hardly surprising. Rewind to August when Pinarayi Vijayan himself endorsed the all-India strike call given by the CPM on September 2 over labour issues. He even posted on Facebook saying : "Ahead of the all-India strike on September 2, CPM central committee has begun an online campaign. You can show your support for the strike in the link below by clicking on the red button."

Extremely ironical because governments are not meant to endorse their states to shut down. But in the manner the Left operates, the powers-that-be make a distinction between the party and the government.

Bandhs in Kerala are total, earning for it the sobriquet of "Hartal's own country". Life comes to a standstill as offices, buses and commercial establishments do not risk facing the wrath of the powerful and militant trade unions.

In 2015, the state saw 300 regional strikes and three statewide strikes. It means some part of Kerala was "bandh" almost every other day of the year.

The industry estimates that a one-day bandh in Kerala causes a loss of nearly Rs 1000 crore to the state exchequer. This does not include the agriculture sector. Which is why nudged by the Kerala High court, the then Oommen Chandy government brought in the Kerala Regulation of Hartal Bill 2015 in November last year. But in the face of sharp criticism of its provisions by the LDF, which was in the opposition then, it was referred to a select committee.

The LDF called the Bill "anti-people and anti-democratic", arguing that the right to strike is a fundamental right. The anger was because the Bill provided for six months imprisonment or fine up to Rs 10000 or both for forceful shutting down of shops or restricting officials from attending office.

Kerala's image as an investor-friendly destination has also suffered because work culture isn't exactly its strong point. Investment has also suffered over the years because Kerala's political parties and trade unions are known to call for flash bandhs at the drop of a hat.

The Left love bandhs. In fact, EP Jayarajan, who was asked to step down as Industries minister last month after allegations of nepotism, had in September said that industrialists in Kerala should support bandhs. What's more, he said this while addressing an investors' meet organised by the Kerala State Small Industries Association. His reasoning was that if they do not support a shutdown, it will spoil the positive business sentiment that exists in Kerala. By that Jayarajan meant that hartals keep labour force happy and so managements should take a benevolent view of strikes.

The fact that no other party of the opposition supported the Left's call to observe Bharat Bandh should open Sitaram Yechury's eyes to the reality. That if a bandh is the only out-of-the-box idea they can think of, they will soon be boxed out of the political ring and left out in the cold.