Internal Matters; how much internal are they?
India is witnessing one of the most grand and prolonged farmer’s agitation for around 3 months. The farmers are protesting on outer borders of the capital city of India, New Delhi e.g. Singhu border, Ghazipur border and Tikri border. These protests are in the opposition of recently passed Farm Bills via ordinance method which has raised the eyebrows about the intentions of the current government. Starting with the demand for the continuation of MSP(minimum support price) the protestors have upgraded their demands and now they want these laws to be completely repealed.
Recently these protests have taken some interesting turns. seeing the unfortunate event of Lal Kila, where the religious flags were unfurled, it was seeming that the protest will loose its grip and support among common people. But the solidarity and unity of farmer leaders have prevented this from happening. Recently the Indian farmer’s protest attracted international attention when singer Rihanna, former adult actress Mia Khalifa, Meena Harris and international environment activist Greta Thunberg extended their support to the Indian farmers through twitter by tweeting about the farmer’s protests in India.
These tweets unleashed a mixed wave of hatred and support among the Indians. Some supported this gesture by saying that this is an issue of international importance and some serious human rights are in question here, while others, including the government officials, claimed that this issue is India’s internal matter so any foreigner does not have any right to comment about that.
Now the question arises that, is this issue really an ‘Internal Matter’?
Seeing this whole issue from a hawk-eye view it can be said that the obsession of NDA(national democratic alliance) government with the trespassing of the established parliamentary norms and the apathy of the ruling class towards the grievances of the farmers has resulted in ignorance of the farmers for several days despite the fact that they were protesting under the open sky in the bone freezing cold of December and January outside Delhi borders. Inability of the government to find a common ground of talks with the farmers for several cold days and chilling nights has been resulted in the deaths of 150 plus farmers deaths while being in the protest. And these deaths and the other casualties has made this whole issue a clear example of human rights violation.
After that social media has played an important role by branding this farmer’s protest as Anti-National and Separatists and alleged them to be funded through Khalistani groups. And some of the vocal BJP supporters like Kangna Ranaut and some BJP leaders like Kapil Mishra allegedly claimed that there is Chines involvement. They also claimed the involvement of other foreign powers which are conspiring for the balkanisation of the nation.
Human rights violation, political apathy and name-shaming for political gains, these are some of the things which can not be considered as an internal matter of a country. If the question of ‘Internal Matter’ is to be decided in this manner than we will end up branding most of the pressing international issues as ‘Internal Matters’ of one country or another, be it Rohingya issue, #BlackLifeMatter issue, #MeToo or the Uighur Muslims issue or this Farmer’s Protest in India.
If the government of India want this issue to be treated as it’s Internal Matter then it will have to deal with the farmers accordingly. For that the Government can not ignore the demands of the farmers and they must be treated sympathetically. The government can no longer maintain it’s attitude of show-off where it seems like something is happening but nothing constructive comes out of it. the government will have to be on board to resolve this situation of dead lock between farmers and government.
The government is claiming is claiming that it is ready to discuss on the farm bills clause by clause. So in this situation, according to former finance minister of India Mr. Yashwant Sinha, the government should withdraw the Farm Bills and try to discuss it with special committee which will include all the stakeholders. This will reduce the skepticism of the common public about the intentions of the government.
