An Open Letter to Dr. Manmohan Singh on Demonetization Debate

Dear Dr.Singh,

I, as a common man of this nation, have the highest regard for you as an economic expert and for your contribution towards liberalization of the nation’s economy as Finance Minister. During your long career when you wore many hats – from Professor to RBI Governor and from Dy. Chairman of Planning Commission to Union Finance Minister – you had earned respect for your acumen and revolutionary steps to change the economic landscape of this nation. Till then this nation saw your technocrat side rather than the political side and even your ideological adversaries - be it in the field of Finance or Politics - had to hold you in high esteem for your personal & profession integrity and apolitical work in the nation’s interest. Finally you became Prime Minister for 10 long years. However, watching you speak in the Rajya Sabha a few days back, I felt that your political compulsions interfered with your honest assessment of the Demonetization as an economic expert.

Probably, this same compulsion pushed the technocrat in you to the background making your 10 years as Prime Minister – the worst in terms of corruption and scam in our nation’s history. It was during your Prime Ministership that we saw CWG scam, 2G spectrum scam, Coal block allocation scam, AgustaWestland helicopter scam, Tatra truck scam, Antrix Devas scam, Cash-for-Vote scam, Adarsh Housing Society scam, Banking sector scam etc. And these were just a handful among many more such blatant plunder of the nation’s resources and tax payer’s money. Obeying your political master Sonia Gandhi’s command & digesting insults at the hands of her worthless spoilt brat Rahul Gandhi - you had only watched helplessly as the economy & the government machinery of the country disintegrated right before your eyes. You had even justified the monumental loot of the nation, saying it was coalition dharma. What action did you take to curb black money? In spite of serious criticism by the Supreme Court of India, your Govt. was so unrelenting & remorseless that it even refused to establish a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to investigate black money.

During your 7 minutes speech in Rajya Sabha, you had used a few words/phrases like, "monumental mismanagement, organised loot, legalised plunder and In the long run all of us are dead" etc. to describe the Demonetization process of the present Govt and I would attempt to answer you on behalf of the common men of India on each of the points you had raised against Demonetization.

It’s a no brainer that Prime Minister Modi with this single stroke of demonetization has destroyed the base of corruption in India built over several decades. With this single move, the current Govt has made a serious attempt for the first time ever to tackle all the three aspects of black money affecting the economy i.e. a parallel cash economy, counterfeit currency and terror financing.

The demonetization decision was not taken without thorough and systematic planning to curb black money. This is evident from the fact that in the first ever Cabinet meeting of the Modi Govt, decision to form the SIT to investigate black money was cleared which was till then kept in cold storage under your Govt. Tax treaties were renegotiated and signed with various foreign Govts to collect information on suspected persons, their bank accounts and transactions in tax heavens around the world. This made it much harder to hide cash abroad as well as round tripping of funds to India. As per various monitoring agencies around the world, this led to drying up of outflow of black money from India and created fear in the hearts of people who had such money stacked in accounts and other investments in tax heavens & elsewhere. Then the Black Money (Undisclosed Foreign Income & Assets) and Imposition of Tax Act, 2015 was introduced to bring back black money stashed abroad and its compliance window ended on 30 Sept’15. This act also had various stringent provisions for penalty and prosecution of foreign black money holder’s unearthed during future investigation by the tax dept. Govt also made it mandatory effective January’16, to quote PAN for all sale & purchase of goods & services above Rs.2 lakh in a bid to curb black money. This move brought all high-value household purchases like high-end electronic gadgets, foreign holiday packages, luxury items like expensive watches & gold jewellery purchases under the lens of the tax dept. After that, this Govt's black money declaration scheme received a record Rs. 65,250 cr in the IDS during the 4 months window that closed in October’16. PM Modi publicly declared that this was the last & final opportunity for tax evaders to come clean in the eyes of law. Simultaneously, this Govt opened more than 25.5 crore Jan-Dhan accounts for people from the lower strata of the economic pyramid & working in the unorganized sector and nearly 20 crore "Rupay" debit cards were issued to people who were out of the formal banking system of the country. All these steps were directed towards promoting greater financial transparency and more accounted transaction in India. So, the demonetisation scheme forms a major part of this series and clearly not a decision taken in haste to curb the menace of black money. PM Modi has also announced that he would not stop here and after 30th Dec’16, many more strong & effective measures will be taken to eliminate this menace, “Benami Property” being his next target. While it’s correct that there have been long queues and disruptions of economic activities in the short term, neither the bonafide intent nor the execution by Govt can be questioned as no one in this world has any experience or expertise of such a humongous exercise. Many of the problems seen today could never have been anticipated and a few which were anticipated could not have been mitigated by taking advanced action as the surprise element would have been lost for sure. It is the surprise element, due to which this demonetisation exercise is set to yield phenomenal results. PM Modi has rightly said that majority of the heart burn is from those who didn’t get enough time or notice to hide or convert their black money as well as black deeds. During your tenure of 10 years, you never dared to even take 1/10th of the above steps to curb black money and had you acted that little probably demonetization would not have been reqd now. So, for you to call demonetization a “monumental mismanagement” is insane.

And who knows better than you, what is “Organised loot & Legalized Plunder”? It is your party’s rule for 60+ years which brought our nation to such a pathetic state and reached pinnacle under your Prime Ministership. We common men are suffering today due to your mis governance and wrong doings. Such comments do not behove a man who allowed organised loot & legalized plunder of public money at monumental scale for 10 years. While PM Modi has carried out a “surgical strike” on black money amassed by the corrupt politicians & economic criminals and declared those as “Toilet Paper”, you never had even the guts & the spine to stand up to the nefarious designs of some members of your party & cabinet even as they were plundering our exchequer under the patronage of your high command.

Dr. Singh, as per your claim, some 70 people allegedly died while exchanging currency notes/withdrawing money, but you never bothered about the lakhs of people who died due to not having currency notes during your rule. Also, when you were the Finance Minister in 1992, you were a silent spectator to the stock market scam from Harshad Mehta. The stocks crashed and many innocent people including retired persons lost all their life’s saving, many 100s died of stroke or committed suicide. But none was compensated. Where were your sympathy then for those dead? He who winks at crime is no better than the criminal committing it. Yes, the common men have been inconvenienced by Modi Govt's demonetisation of the high-value currency notes and face a period of hardship but unlike during your regime, now they don't have to cope with double-digit inflation that halved their meagre income and are not cheated of their hard-earned money through elaborate scams.

You had talked about Keynesian theory that “in the long run all of us are dead”. But by saying the above, you actually contradicted your biggest achievement - had you not taken the “long run” into consideration, no economic reform of 1992 would have been possible. Yes, we are all dead in the long run but that doesn’t justify a Govt. not doing enough for our future generations. We surely will be dead in the long run but this nation will still be alive. And our future generation will hold us responsible for not doing our duty to give them a clean, corruption free, progressive and developed India. India of today’s generation required demonetisation because Dr. Singh, as Prime Minister you had failed to implement the Keynes theory. And neither could you control the side-effects of corruption, nepotism and misuse of public spending. Just accept honestly Dr. Singh, that you had your chances but you botched it up.

We the common men of this nation, are amazed at the logic and arguments your party and alliance partners are putting forward. Since, PM Modi won the 2014 elections, all of you were daring him to act against black money as he had promised during his campaign. You all had even accused him of “jumla baazi” and being hand in glove with the black money hoarders. When he launched the Jan Dhan Yojna accounts, you had ridiculed him for wasting effort and investment in unnecessary actions and pointed to the low deposit in those accounts. When he announced voluntary disclosure schemes for declaring black money, you had taunted him by assuring low response and failure. When he raided black money hoarders, you had accused him of Tax Terrorism. But when Demonetization happened, suddenly you remembered those poor people who don’t have a bank account and may face inconvenience while exchanging/withdrawing hard earned money? And your party, whose 60+ years of socialistic pattern of license-permit raj, which made a virtue of standing in queues - from ration to kerosene/gas, phone/electricity connection to train/bus tickets, Hospital treatment to birth/death certificates, seeds/fertilizer to trade license – suddenly realized that that queues are the worst form of oppression in this nation?

The problem of Black money or rather the parallel economy created over 60+ years of mainly Congress rule, can't be solved so easily. It needs some innovative, drastic and disruptive measures. PM Modi has dared to do that. He has attempted to clean the muck, make the economy robust and establish confidence of the people in the system. Any disruptive solution will have a bit of inconvenience. Those, whose rule was hall mark of “organised loot, legalized plunder and monumental mismanagement” are the least qualified to talk on this subject. You had failed to pick the right person for the right job in your ministry without political consideration and even failed to control your fellow ministers. The money that was looted during your rule is enough to rectify all the downside you are pointing out about the demonetisation process. Had you exercised enough check and balance during your tenure, we wouldn't have required this extreme step by PM Modi. Over 80% of the citizens suffering short term inconvenience today are supporting the demonetization process as they see a better tomorrow with revolutionary transformation. If you had expressed these words/phrases, atleast 3 years back also it would have been a worthy assessment of your Govt.

We have been listening to only complains from the opposition parties since the demonetization process has been initiated. But till now nobody has been able to give a convincing reply on the evils of this process. Only short term inconvenience to people, cash crunch etc. has been highlighted as the main issues. Can't the opposition see the positive aspect of the move? The huge deposits of cash in banks due to demonetization will increase liquidity with banks and supply of money in the market will increase leading to interest rates coming down, which will promote investment in the country. As the investment increases, production of goods and services will rise, leading to increase in employment and thereby income of the people. As the disposable income of people increases, consumption of the goods and services will increase, which will ultimately increase GDP of the country. This current process will also lead to more tax collection for the Govt leading to development of infrastructure. Govt will also be able to spend the additional money unearthed by way of demonetisation (between Rs.3 lakh crore to Rs. 4.5 lakh crore) on social services like affordable housing, education and health care etc. Can’t they see the black money stashed for years been made valueless overnight, counterfeit and terror funding crushed? My sincere apologies Dr.Singh, but we the common men of this nation never expected such bogus allegations and baseless statement from an erudite scholar and experienced technocrat like you. You should have given good suggestions to tide over the present situation rather than making common cause with the corrupt, criminal and anti-national brigade of politicians, journalists and intellectuals who have baked their bread by plundering this nation for long. This nation requires your knowledge and expertise in the development & growth of the nation & its common men and not for the development of your party/alliance or its leaders, who have no emotion for our progress. Can this nation expect this much from an economic expert like you Dr Singh or are we asking for too much? Please be sensible to our national interest atleast at the twilight of your long illustrious career which was marred by self-goal in the 10 years of your Prime Ministership. Only then history will be kind to you Dr. Singh.

With best regards,

A Common Man

Demonization of Demonetization

While the entire Nation is appreciating and applauding PM Modi for his bold and revolutionary decision to demonetize Rs.500 & 1000 currency notes, most of the opposition political parties are criticizing his action citing inconvenience to the common men. But this nation has seen through their such pathetic argument. It’s not very difficult to understand the shock these parties are in due to Modi’s historic decision. It has created a sever tremor in their stashed black money kept hidden in bundles of Rs.500 & 1000 currency notes. The pain of seeing their huge treasure turning into toilet papers overnight is making them speak nonsense. But their lame arguments so far have been shrill, hysterical and devoid of substance or logic. Rather, their reaction to demonetization has shown a collective brain–freeze on their part. The common men are facing this hardship with courage and with a hope of a better tomorrow & greater good for this nation. The Govt. is also working 24 hrs. for making the process of exchange, deposit and withdrawal of currency notes faster and smoother. The entire Govt machinery is giving topmost priority to this process in the next 50 days period and continuously monitoring & improving the process.

The demonization of the demonetization decision has largely come from three political groups and their affiliate media, activists and intellectuals. They are A) Congress, B) Communists and C) Regional political parties like AAP, TMC, SP, BSP, NC, DMK, Shiva Sena etc. But let’s understand why do they condemn the demonetization decision? Is it because it is really a bad decision for our nation?

The reason Congress is opposing the move as Modi has hit not only at their “Khajana of Black Money” amassed over a long time but also at the root of their black money generating, circulating, multiplying and storing machinery. It is also due to the fact that Modi is trying to change the entire social, political & economic culture and discourse of India. If Modi succeeds, India's politics will change forever as then people will vote based on whether the Govt. is corruption free, builds roads & other infrastructure, provides 24 hrs. power, arranges for education, healthcare, world class manufacturing & services facilities, provides an intermediary free fare market for produces and helps people by creating opportunities for livelihood & prosper instead of voting just on caste & minority appeasement, subsidies and free bees. This is not acceptable to Congress as they are never really interested in India progressing to become a developed nation. They want to have more poor and socially divisive population, dirty-filthy cities, towns & villages, corrupt and scam full governance - so that they can continue to bake their bread on India’s woes and Nehru-Gandhi Pvt. Ltd retain their hold on power. Congress and its leaders, institutionalized corruption in India & made it into an industry, looted national resources and thousands of crores of tax payers’ money meant for development of the nation, destroyed & subverted every institution and office, twisted & distorted the social, political and economic discourse for clinging to power and even supported the enemies of the nation for own benefit. They made the nation dirty, mediocre, apologetic, submissive, divisive and status quoist so that they can continue to rule and amass wealth by deceiving & misleading the common men.

It’s a no brainer that Communism is the single biggest political ideology that was responsible for spread of large scale hunger, poverty, strife and mass genocide around the world. It’s the single most hypocritical and regressive political ideology which oppressed the masses it claims to represent using brutality and denial of fundamental rights wherever it flourished. But irony is that the Indian ideological descendants of Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot are giving sermon and certificate to the Modi Govt. of not being sincere to the poor and marginalized common men. These failed communist politicians who don’t have any nationwide political base and ready to sleep anytime with corrupt and criminal Congress & Regional forces to remain relevant are frothing from their mouth showing their outrage at Modi Govt’s decision of demonetization. While they provide leap service saying Black money should be eradicated, CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury says that Modi Govt. cannot decide the way people of the country live and warned of widespread protest against the “unacceptable” step. As per him India should remain an 80% cash economy which he calls “payment and settlement”. This “payment & settlement” is actually the “socialistic pattern of economy” adopted by India since independence due to hijacking of our Economic Model by different shades of Left-wing thinkers. They created a “License & Permit Raj”, supported by the failed public sector policies - where getting a phone connection took 5 to 10 years, getting a gas cylinder took 10 years, having 1 TV channel controlled by Govt. and going to ration shop for ration to kerosene etc. This system actively encouraged corruption and Govt. employees & middlemen became extortionists. Politicians became experts at stealing public funds. The Frankenstein state with a massive corrupt system, created over 60 years, found new ways to extend itself by conferring new rights on the hapless people - right to information, right to work (MNREGA), right to food, right to education and right to health etc. These are nothing but the state seeking new ways to retain the system of loot based on public resources. While Political wings of the Communist parties have pretended to be with parliamentary democracy, their underground Maoist-Leninist arms wings continue to wage a bloody war in various parts of the country to overthrow the democratic system to establish a "proletariat" ruled by a Marxist politburo of dictatorial governance. Seeing their hold eroding on the Indian Governance, Economic and Education system under Modi Govt, these hypocrites are demonizing the demonetization process.

The third vocal group is the various single leader (or family) centric Regional Political Parties like AAP, SP, BSP, TMC, DMK, Shiva Sena, National Conference etc. If we look at the track record of these regional political parties, we find that they have never done any good to their state or people they claim to represent. This is because caste or region based politics is just a parochial and selfish tactic of these vested politicians, just to get some short term political mileage. They just exploit economic reasons for political dividends and use these only as a short cut to achieve their own political and economic ambitions by emotionally exploiting the sentiments of the people they represent. Also, each of these political parties and their leaders are the most corrupt, criminal and anti-developmental. This is because once they come to power, they realize that they can remain relevant only till such time the people they represent remain socially, educationally, economically and even politically underdeveloped. Whenever and wherever they come to power, they push their state and common men backward by atleast 3x of the time they remain in power. The rise of Modi and BJP has heralded doom for their caste and regional politics. They are losing grip on their vote bank due to rise of developmental politics based on nationalism under Prime Minister Modi. Demonetization has hit them hard as they have lost their huge stock of black money earned through corruption during their rule in various states of the country and this is making their political future bleak in the coming assembly elections. Hence, they are demanding a roll back else threatening violence & riot.

Though all the above political groups are citing inconvenience to the common men as the main reason for opposing demonetization, their concern is not about poor people or their sufferings, but they want common men to remain poor and suffer continuously so that they can use them at their convenience for political mileage. PM Modi rightly says that we need freedom from the status quoist mindset and that the nation is "restless" for a systemic change. Modi is the change agent and all the above opposition parties are status-quoist. Corruption and black money are the biggest hindrances in our nation’s march towards development. The short term inconvenience that we are facing is worth and just a small sacrifice, when looked at the larger interest of our country's economy and fight against corruption and terrorism. So, it’s a solemn duty of every honest and nationalist citizen of this nation to support Prime Minister Modi in his endeavour to track & eliminate black money and thereby corruption from our country. We must stand with the Govt. in foiling the evil design of these corrupt and criminal elements to incite violence and create anarchy. We are fighting this war for ourselves and for our future generations. If we fail to stand up and help PM Modi defeat this corrupt and criminal Congressi-Marxists-Radical-Jihadi-Castiest (CMRJC) brigade of politicians and their supporter/ sympathizer/ collaborator media, activists & intellectuals, our future generation will never forgive us. They will hold us responsible for not doing our duty to give them a clean, corruption free, progressive and developed India.

Surgical Strike on Black Money & Terror Funding

Corruption and black money are the biggest hindrances in our nation’s march towards development. Also, it is the lifeline for terrorism and the proxy war waged by Pakistan on our nation for last 3 decades. They are spreading counterfeit currency notes to destabilize India economically and through Islamic Jihad.   By stopping  circulation of the current  500 and 1,000 rupee currency notes effective  9^th Nov, the Modi Govt. has effectively forced the entire nation to go to the banks or post offices to have their cash in hand in those denominations  added to their bank accounts thereby  forcing them to declare all such cash holdings. This move will have a massive impact on the black money and counterfeiting ecosystem prevalent in the country. This is because the monetary value of 500 and 1,000 currency notes in circulation far outstrips any other denomination, as the chart below shows. Also, 85% of all cash holding are in these two denominations. This very bold  strategy adapted by Modi Govt to dismantle the black economy and the terror funding infrastructure, deserves the highest compliment from every nationalist and patriotic Indian citizen. This should have been done long back but no Prime Minister or political party earlier had enough guts the way Modi has demonstrated and  had turned a blind eye, as there is political patronage to the whole business. He did it very systematically. When we look back, its now evident that the decision was not sudden. It started with the drive for bank account for all including for those who are at the lowest level of the economic pyramid, then linked bank accounts with aadhar etc., then brought disclosure of bank account in income tax return, added to it the various data mining and collection tools in the hands of the economic vigilance & tax authorities, then the income disclosure scheme. And finally this masterstroke. Truly a systematic effort at eliminating and punishing the back economy in the last 2 years.

All of us, of course, have to suffer some short term inconvenience but all that is worth it and is just a small sacrifice, when looked at the larger interest of our country's economy and fight against corruption and terrorism. While the common people are rejoicing  at the announcement, there are some Politicians/Political parties, Media and Individuals with vested interest are unable to digest this masterstroke and are raising irrelevant questions and issues. These political parties and their supporters /sympathizers  are very upset and protesting. They are taking the alibi that the move will cause inconvenience to the poor and common men. But the real reason for their opposing this move is not very difficult to figure out. Prime Minister Modi’s masterstroke aimed at curbing black money could have a far-reaching impact for political parties. It is estimated that about 70% of the funding for political parties come from undocumented sources. With Assembly elections round the corner in states like Punjab, UP, Goa etc., the pulling out of 500 and 1,000 currency notes could pose serious problems for most political parties and candidates.  Opposition political parties - specially Congress, Communists, the Castiest  and  Regional parties -  who have plundered common people through various scams over  almost 6 decades are hell bent upon opposing any move by the current Govt.  for their own interest and anti-national agenda. Also, huge unaccounted cash generated from corrupt practices are being held by individuals or organizations, which have become useless overnight and a major loss to them. The hawala money and counterfeit currency in the hands of the anti-India organizations/individuals have lost use overnight. A Home Ministry report says that remittances worth about Rs 23,000 crore per year reaches only Kerala through the hawala channel. So one can guess how much such money comes to the whole country in only one year. What is alarming is that also large fund comes to the country, camouflaged as money for charity or religion. Another report that analyses these money  found that majority of these are controlled by ISI and other such anti India organizations/individuals.

So, dear Politicians, Journalists, Jholawala Intellectuals & Activists – representing, supporting, sympathizing  - Congressis, Communists, Libtards, Castists & Jihadi lovers - kindly do not worry for inconvenience to the poor common men of this nation.  You have taught us enough resilience to bear with inconvenience through - your agitations, protests, bandhs, hartals on flimsy issues.  And to stand in Ques since our independence for …

Birth/Death certificate
Ration
Kerosene
Hospital treatment
School/College admission

Seeds & Fertilizer

License for business/industry

Jobs

Train & Bus tickets
Electricity/Water/LPG/Phone connections and then to pay these bills

Municipality/Sales/Income tax
Darshans at Religious places
And above all for Voting you to power to plunder us.

So, this time for a few days, we don't mind to stand in the Bank/Post office/ATM Ques to prove our honesty and expose your black money as well as black deeds.

We are not frustrated and complaining. It’s our duty to  support our Prime Minister to bring systemic change in our nation. Our Armed Forces are fighting enemies of our nation at the border and it’s our duty to join them to fight internal as well as external enemies of our nation who are trying to destroy  us economically with the help of some of our own unscrupulous countrymen. We are fighting  this war for ourselves and for our future generations. Drastic change does not come slowly, it hits like a hammer and breaks all that is regressive and status quoist.  It can be inconvenient in the short term but it will be revolutionary transformation in the long run. We don’t mind bearing this short term inconvenience today, for a better tomorrow.