PBI – The only alternative
-- Ravindra Singh
The freedom fighters had dreamt of a country where everybody would have access to the basic needs – food, clothes, shelter, education and medication; where nobody would undergo any hardships and face any exploitation; where people would have the right to elect the government of their choice, which would rule the state according to the needs and aspirations of the common man. To make all this possible the country was given a well-thought constitution clearly spelling out the roles of the legislative, the executive and the judiciary.
But 66 years later despite tremendous development in science and technology, we have ended up facing degeneration and chaos in almost every field. There is stark economic disparity with 10% of Indians owning more than 50% of the nation’s wealth. The capitalistic model of economy has caused a loop-sided development of the country, leading to the tumourous growth a few metropolitan cities by exploiting the resources of the remote and backward areas of the country.
There is a complete breakdown of law and order. The rich and mighty are able to get away with any crime while the poor perish in the jails for a petty crime or no crime. In the field of education, there is no room for spiritual or moral values. The schools and colleges are churning out lakhs of qualified graduates every year with no guarantee that they will land suitable jobs with adequate salary. Therefore, getting a job with a handsome salary and then living a hedonistic life-style has become the sole target of so-called education.
Politics has become the last refuge of scoundrels. Unscrupulous and scheming politicians with the sole objective of grabbing power with their rhetoric, money and muscle have turned democracy into mobocracy. Corruption, like God, has become omnipresent and omnipotent. Some top scams — Bellary mining scam(worth 16000 crores), Satyam Scam(worth Rs 8000 crores),The Fodder Scam (worth Rs950 crores), Telgi Scam (worth Rs20,000 crores),The Hawala Scandal (worth more than Rs1000 crores), Commonwealth Games Scam (worth Rs35000 crores),2G Spectrum Scam (worth Rs 1.76 lakh crores) and Coal allocation Scam (worth Rs1.86 lakh crores) – form just the tip of the iceberg. In fact all the scams since 1947 are together worth more than 20.23 trillion USD.1
It is in this gloomy phase of history that Proutist Bloc, India (PBI) has emerged on the socio-political scene of India with a viable alternative to the existing political parties. Although there are more than 1500 political parties in the country and externally they may look different, all of them are basically subservient to the capitalistic interests. Their difference lies only in the way they operate to influence the electorates by using various tactics. To appreciate the real significance of PBI, let’s put it vis-à-vis other political parties of India
Parties based on differences
There are political parties that claim to fight for the rights and interests of particular religions, communities and castes. Whether or not such parties have actually benefitted those sections of the society can be a moot point, their leaders have been undoubtedly benefitted. By abetting sectarian and communal differences and clashes they have been able to command a huge number of blind followers and thus amassed lots of wealth.
PBI is committed to work for all because it is based on Neo-humanism, that says that the entire creation is the expression of one entity called the Supreme Consciousness. Everything originates from it, dwells in it and finally merges in it. So while other parties are promoting divisiveness, PBI wants to unite all on the sentiments of universalism and anti-exploitation sentiment.
Personality-based parties
There are political parties in India which are based on the charisma of a personality. They have no ideology. Only the leader of the party is glorified and projected as the messiah, who is supposed to have the solutions to all the problems of the country.
The Indian National Congress or Congress(I), which has been ruling India since 1947 with brief intermissions, has been completely a one family show – right from Jawahar Lal Nehru to Indira Gandhi to Rajiv Gandhi to Sonia Gandhi and now Rahul Gandhi. Despite being in power for the longest period of time, Congress has ended up giving Food Security – a euphemism for alms-giving—to about 70% of the population.
PBI firmly believes that to lead the country in the right direction we need two things:
(1) Moralist leadership (2) Impeccable philosophy.
Today most political parties talk of morality. They don’t have any clear or complete concept or definition of morality. But PBI has laid down 16 practical principles to be followed imperatively by its members. These are:
(1) Ahimsa (non-harming)
(2) Satya (benevolent truth)
(3) Asteya (non-stealing)
(4) Aparigraha (moderation)
(5) Brahmcharya (univerasal love)
(6) Socha (cleanliness)
(7) Santosha (contentment)
(8) Tapah (sacrifice)
(9) Swadhyay (wisdom study)
(10) Ishwar pranidhan (cosmic shelter)
(11) Forgiveness
(12) Humility
(13) Sacrifice for the idealogy
(14) Exemplary conduct
(15) No mudslinging
(16) Sense of responsibility and discipline
As for impeccable guiding philosophy, besides Neo-humanism,which has been already explained, PBI has PROUT — Progresssive Utilisation Theory—propounded in 1959 by Shri Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar,the founder of PBI.The 16 principles of PROUT explain how the resources of the world can be utilized rationally to meet the physical,mental and spiritual needs of every living being; how agriculture,industry and trade need to reorganized for maximum production and rational distribution.
While PBI believes that both– the individual and the system—need to be reformed as clearly defined set of universal values and principles, other parties are completely confused and disoriented.
Parties based on reaction
Many parties are based on a reaction. For example, the communist parties, born out of reactions to capitalistic exploitation ; many regional parties based on reactions to the exploitation of a particular region or language.Such parties easily become popular because they express the anger of the people. But in the long run they fail to deliver in the absence of farsightedness.
For example, in a reaction to extreme economic disparity created by capitalism, communist parties brought everything under the state control, depriving people of any private property abruptly and unpsychologically. It led to state-capitalism. All the wealth got concentrated in the hands of party leaders and bureaucrats. Lakhs of people were killed for showing dissent. The result was ultimate downfall of Communist regimes.
PBI is not a reaction to immediate circumstances. It is not just a reaction to capitalism or communism. Its socio-economic theory—PROUT—gives a rational and psychological solutions to the problems. It says since the physical wealth in the world is limited, nobody should be allowed to accumulate it beyond a socially-approved limit. The maximum income must not more than ten times of the minimum income.
PBI believes that if a person continues to hoard money even after having accumulated enough for his present and future needs, he is suffering from a mental disease that needs to be treated. Therefore capitalists must be stopped legally from hoarding away the wealth. Besides they should be inspired for mental and spiritual development.
Pseudo-revolutionary parties
It is no longer a secret that in a democracy every political party is sponsored by small or big capitalists. The money for contesting elections comes from their pockets and therefore, after the elections, the economy is shaped to serve their interests. But recently in the era of globalization and neo-liberalism, some non-conventional political forces have emerged in the country. These are the political parties whose founders are related to one or another NGO.
The organizations such as IMF, WTO, Transparency International, World Economic Forum, World Bank etc ,which are controlled by imperialist countries like US,England,France etc together with big capitalists like Ford and Rockefeller give lakhs of dollars as donation to the various NGOs working in Latin American, Asian and African countries for strengthening democracy, the right to information, transparency in administration and government, and for the removal of corruption.
The question arises why these countries and capitalists are taking so much interest in removing corruptions and for the establishment of democracy ?
In fact through these NGOs,their political parties and their movements these countries and capitalists want to do the following:
- To delay the real revolution — In the name of globalization and liberalization, these imperialist countries with their MNCs have captured the markets of the developing and the undeveloped countries. They are exploiting the people and resources of these countries. They have easily bought the leaders of these developing countries, but it was difficult for them to buy or corrupt the non-political but conscious and vocal people. So they decided to handle them differently. They obliged and established these intellectually developed people as leaders among the native population by giving them emerging leaderships awards like Magsaysay. And since nobody can continue a movement or a revolution with an empty belly, these new class of leaders were encouraged to run their NGOs entirely funded by foreign capitalists. According to a report of The Times Of India( Feb. 23,2014) 50 to 80% of the grants given to these NGOs is used in maintaining the establishment.
Thus by talking about democracy, modernization, empowerment, humanism, social justice, anti-imperialism, human rights, anti-corruption and development, these capitalistic agencies are able to get the support of the progressive and revolutionary sections of society. These NGOs sponsor the seminars, workshops, projects, various studies, tours, researches etc of disgruntled intellectuals, artists, film makers and writers, and turn them into salaried activists diverting them from the real revolution. These intellectuals easily get the support and sympathy of the public and are thus able shape the public opinion. These sponsored leaders may not be intentionally acting as the agents of imperialistic ambitions, but it can’t be denied that they are being used.
- To diffuse tension— The capitalistic greed has forced 80% of the world’s population to live a pathetic life. The exploited sections of the society—workers, farmers, lower middle class—are very angry. The situation is very explosive and can turn violent any time. To diffuse this tension, these capitalistic exploiters launch protest movements against themselves with the help of the NGOs patronized by them. What a safe way to have the anger released!
- To divert the attention from the real problem – Today there are anti-corruption movements not only in India but also in many other countries like Brazil, Thailand, Turkey, Nigeria, Russia, China, Quebec, Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Yaman, Tunisia, Bahrain, Syria, Jordan, Sudan, Kuwait, Ukraine, Indonesia etc. These are all mostly supported and financed by World Bank, IMF, WTO and international NGOs. These NGOs and the political parties supported by them are all busy convincing the people that all the problems like poverty, unemployment, price-rise and capitalistic exploitation are the result of corruption. And to get rid of the corruption in government and administration, they have suggested certain economic measures like liberalization of economy, opening up markets, trade and industries for foreign investors, minimum government control and privatization besides some political, administrative and judicial reforms.
It is, therefore, not surprising that the founder of a newly formed party, who is also a Magsaysay Award winner and ran an NGO, has been able to convince the people that a new law or Janlokpal alone can do away with corruption. He says, “I am not against capitalism. I am against cronycapitalism.” It is tantamount to saying, “ I am not against cancer. I am against bad cancer.”
But PBI strongly believes that corruption is not a disease but a symptom of a disease. The underlying disease is capitalism,that encourages greed, selfishness, materialism, hedonism, unhealthy competition and economic disparity leading people to corrupt behavior and practices. To maximize their profits, capitalists can stoop to the abysmal depth of immorality. PBI boldly declares:
CAPITALISM is a disease and PROUT is the cure.
PBI – The only alternative
From the discussion above it can be concluded that only Proutist Bloc, India
- a) can unite all on the basis of universalism and anti-exploitation sentiment
- b) has clear and concise definition of morality
- c) has a blueprint for reforming the individual and the system
- d) has a perfect socio-economic theory called PROUT and
- e) is NOT nurtured with the money of the capitalists.
Being the first of its kind in the human history and committed to establish new paradigms in social, political and economic spheres, PBI has unprecedented number of obstacles to overcome. It does not believe in resorting to populism and gimmicks to catch the imagination of the public. Rather it wants to educate them about the real issues and the solutions. It does not get involved in blame-game and mudslinging to gain political mileage. It has a constructive approach to politics and is trying to bring about a positive change in the collective psychology,preparing the people for a genuine revolution within democratic frame.
