Electricity workers, employees and officers have been on agitation for the last 224 days against the privatization of Purvanchal and Dakshinchal Vidyut Vitran Nigam by the Yogi government. Recently on 22 June, the employees held a big electricity panchayat in Lucknow in which farmers’ organizations as well as consumer organizations also participated. Against this privatization, electricity workers from all over the country have decided to join the national strike organized by the workers’ organizations on 9 July. The government has brought a tremendous repression on this movement. Thousands of employees, especially employee leaders, have been transferred to far-flung areas. About three thousand contract workers have been fired from their jobs. Cases have been filed against the officials of three major organizations, Engineers Association, Junior Engineers Organization and Technical Employees Organization on the basis of fake investigation of disproportionate assets. Many employees have been restricted by giving notice. Even in violation of Article 311 of the Constitution, the revised rules for dismissing employees from work without any notice have been implemented contrary to natural justice. ESMA is imposed in the entire state and in the electricity department, prohibitory orders have been imposed to completely ban work boycotts, strikes etc. Overall, an atmosphere of terror has been created in the state by the Yogi government.
The government said in newspaper advertisements in favour of privatization that this will provide customers with quality of service, efficiency, rural income, agricultural productivity, immediate resolution of complaints, reliability, digital service, industrial development in rural areas and 24 hours 7 days electricity service. Regarding these claims, electricity employees say that as far as digital service etc. are concerned, facilities like fault registration, 1912 call center, Vidyut mobile consumer app etc. are still in place. Privatization will cause great harm to rural income and agricultural productivity. The facilities that farmers are getting today like subsidy or free electricity for irrigation and separate rural feeders and agricultural feeders for cheap electricity, all this will end. Consumers will be forced to buy very expensive electricity. Even before privatization, the government has proposed to increase the price of electricity, so that the companies can make immense profits after privatization. As far as line loss is concerned, the employees have said with figures that line loss in the private sector is more than in the government sector. Electricity employees also say that the truth of the talk of privatization based on losses is that at present the total loss of the Power Corporation is 1 lakh 18000 crores, while the outstanding as per 2023-24 is 1 lakh 15000 crores. In this too, the biggest outstanding is of government departments and big businessmen, whose recovery will reduce the deficit. Also, the subsidy money that the government is giving right now under its constitutional obligations has also been included in the loss, which is absolutely wrong.
It is a matter of quality, efficiency, responsibility and reliability of service by the private sector. In this context, the recent plane crash in Ahmedabad is a living example of this. Where such a terrible destruction happened after Air India, run by the Government of India, was handed over to the Tata Group. Ambani’s Jio mobile network is also an example for the advocates of privatization. It was expanded by ruining the government BSNL. This company, which started its business by giving free network, is today fixing arbitrary tariffs. Now, despite the threat to the security of the country, Jio and Bharti Group’s Airtel have signed an agreement with American capitalist Elon Musk’s company Starlink.
Actually, the BJP-RSS government is helping a few capital houses to loot the country’s natural resources, public property, economic sources and labour force. Modi and Yogi’s government is also engaged in handing over the electricity department of Uttar Pradesh to a few capital houses of Gujarat. As is reported, companies like Tata, Adani and Torrent Power are engaged in buying Purvanchal and Dakshinanchal Vidyut Vitran Nigam. It is also true that whenever the BJP government has come to power in the country and the states, the privatization of the power sector has increased. During the Atal government, Enron had signed a power deal in which national interests were put at stake. The Electricity Act 2003, which opened the way for privatization at the national level, was passed during the BJP rule, and the division of the electricity board in Uttar Pradesh. Now the Modi government has come up with the Electricity Amendment Bill, which will end the system of subsidy and cross subsidy. According to an estimate, farmers will have to pay Rs 10,000 per month for irrigation connections of 7.5 horsepower. This will badly affect agricultural productivity. Not only this, the situation is so bad that Grant Thornton Company, which gave a false affidavit in America and was punished, was appointed as a transaction consultant against the rules, whose proposals have also been returned by the Electricity Regulatory Commission with objections.
In this privatization also, a big loot of government property is being carried out. According to the employees organizations, the Dakshinchal and Purvanchal Discoms, whose privatization has been announced, have works worth Rs. 42,968 crores going on in the Redeveloped Distribution Area Improvement Scheme. Also, under the business plan, works worth thousands of crores of rupees have been done and are still going on in Purvanchal and Dakshinchal. This money being spent from the government treasury made from the taxpayer’s money will be handed over to corporate companies for free. Not only this, there is an attempt to sell all the property and capital that the Discoms have for a pittance. This is the reason why no one is being told anything about the e-tender of these Discoms. Even rejecting the policy of transparency, information about this will not be available online because the government has put a condition that only those who participate in this tender process will be able to know about these tenders.
In fact, this privatization being done by the BJP government is against national interests, it is very important to make a political issue and to run a big dialogue campaign to alert the general public about the harm caused by it. Till now, only the top bureaucrats of the electricity department are being targeted by the employees organizations in the movement, which is not enough. There is a need to broaden the anti-privatization movement. Not only the Vidyut Karamchari Joint Sangharsh Samiti, but going beyond this, an anti-privatization platform should be formed for its leadership center. There is an immediate need to include anti-privatization parties, farmers’ organizations, various labour and employee organizations, student-youth organizations, environmentalists, civil society and people from the enlightened class in it.
Today electricity will come under the fundamental right of the common citizen. The dignity of the individual has been talked about in the Preamble of the Constitution and in Article 21 it is considered the responsibility of the government to ensure a dignified life. Today electricity is an essential condition for providing a dignified life to any citizen. Therefore, the decision of privatization is against the constitutional obligations of the state. There should also be a consideration of intervention in the court on this.
The kind of repression and oppression the government is doing and the constant restrictions are being imposed on leaders through the courts. There is a need to think about the form and methods of the movement as well. The birth and functioning of the trade union was in the era of the welfare state. Where the industrial capitalist system, terrorized by the rule of workers, adopted the welfare form of the system. Many rights were given in this era. Today the era has changed, this is the era of finance capital where the government and government institutions have become agents of a few capital houses. Now the entire government has moved towards a system of autocracy for the benefit and protection of these capital houses. Continuous attacks are being made on democratic rights and restrictions are being imposed on democratic activities. In such a situation, forms of movement like strike or work boycott are not very relevant in today’s era. Therefore, constitutional peaceful democratic methods of movement will have to be considered. Support of various sections of the society will have to be gained in favour of the anti-privatization movement through fasting and indefinite dharna. Above all, the ongoing movement against privatization has to be turned into a political movement and a big public dialogue needs to be conducted on this. Only when the people of the entire state stand up against it, the government will be forced to take back its steps on this.
Courtesy: Counter Currents