Monday, November 11, 2013

“A Leader Must Be Able to Feel Each and Every Problem of the People” .

Intro: Kranti Diwas of the ruling Sikkim Democratic Front was held in the party office on 22 June, 2013. Extracted below is the address of the SDF party president, Chief Minister Pawan Chamling on the occasion:
I extend my greetings and welcome to all my friends from the party. I want to say a few things today. But before that I would like to welcome those who have joined our party from today. I am confident that they will serve and contribute towards the welfare of the people of Sikkim.  
The former speakers spoke on some historical components regarding our party. SDF is not a party of a particular caste. It is a party of all the Sikkimese people. It has taken thousands of years for the Sikkimese community to be built. Society needs to be formed before the formation of a caste and a group needs to be formed before forming a society. A community comes into existence only after completing these steps. Development of caste leads to community. In this way, caste, community, society develops. We must also possess knowledge about the formation of the Sikkimese community. We will not be misguided because of our ignorance if we have knowledge about such things. Our party is a party of all the Sikkimese people. We must know this. If we don’t have knowledge about this, we will be misled on the basis of caste/ community. Even many of our party workers are not clear about the philosophy, views about social justice and other things about our party. Some of our party workers have no knowledge about the stand that our party has taken for the upliftment of the Sikkimese community which results in these things being confined only to words. Sikkimese society is possible only when we mix Bhutia, Lepcha, Nepali, Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, Muslim and businessmen.
But saying Bhutia, Lepcha, Nepali is not enough. Not all Bhutias are the same. Some Bhutias are affluent and related to the Chogyals while some Bhutias are farmers, some are poor and downtrodden. This kind of social inequality has existed for a long time. There were feudals among the Bhutias too. Similarly, there were rich Lepchas and poor Lepchas. There was class difference. In the Nepali community also, there were the high class Brahmins and low caste Scheduled Castes. There were rich landlords and poor farmers too. The class difference was stark in the Nepali community. Similarly, there are also religious differences in the Sikkimese community. There are Bhutia Christians, there are Lepcha Christians and Buddhist and Christians among Nepalis. Another difference is the gender difference. Women in our society since time immemorial have been at the receiving end of sufferings and torture. They had developed the habit of tolerance. We are working to free our society from such social exploitation and oppression. Our party did and is doing the kind of politics that would do away with social exploitation and class exploitation. Our revolution is to end the class difference. Our revolution is a process of building anew. Our revolution will continue unless our society becomes the way we want it to become. But these differences and inequalities will not be removed by merely issuing verbal message against them. We need to continually waken our society to remove these evils. That is why we must not let our revolutionary programmes and our revolution die.
We have given equal rights to women. We have provided reservation for women and in elections in the local bodies. If we go to see, women are safe. On the contrary, men seem to be unsafe. We have established Women’s Commission, Women’s Court and Atrocities Court. But our women are still victims of injustice. Why is this happening? The reason is that our women have not become capable, conscious and aware as yet. Our revolution is to make women capable, aware and conscious. It is a big thing to change an incapable girl from a village to a capable, educated and an aware one. Women should be capable of taking responsibilities. So our struggle is a long one. It takes thousands of years to develop human society. We have done so much in the last 20 years. Education is the greatest medium that makes women capable. We must educate our women. Hen our party workers interact with the people, they must talk about the principles, policies and philosophy of the party. Our party workers must speak the language of social justice, pro-democracy, pro-poor and pro-people. You must be responsible in your speech. You must not believe in hearsay. I want the leaders of our party to be honest and committed. You must take the responsibility of the Government, party and the society. You all are very sensitive. I have faith in you.
The Sikkim Democratic Front is a party of the Sikkimese community. We must think about the ordinary poor people who live in villages. We must think about their problems and their families. Our party must think about nutrition for children, treatment for the ill and post- childbirth care. Our party must think why our children drop out from school. They must think as to how our children can be made skilled and independent. Our party must think about the senior citizens and women because SDF is their party too. Ministers, MLAs and party workers on all levels must think this way. Government, party and leader must be able to feel every problem of the people. All our party workers must be humane and sensitive. Only then our party will become the party of the Sikkimese people and it will become the party of the Sikkimese community. Bhutias, Lepchas and Nepalis who are well off can manage without our help. But we have to think about the rights, opportunities for those poor Bhutias, Lepchas and Nepalis. We have been providing many conveniences for the poor. But this does not make them wealthy overnight because they lack knowledge and capability. This is the basic problem and it leads to class discrimination. It is a daunting challenge and a Herculean task for us to uplift all the poor people in the society. It may take hundreds of years to accomplish this. Our job is to bring the sub standard people to a higher level and develop their knowledge and intellect. This will be possible only when the new generation of the poor are educated and their intellect reaches a higher level. That is why we are working to uplift the poor. Great personalities like Lenin, Marx and Lincoln also did not become immediately successful. Whatever you say but we have been considerably successful. That is why our revolution is a revolution to make the ignorant knowledgeable. Our revolution is a revolution to make the poor rich, to make the helpless independent. Our revolution is a revolution to make every Sikkimese their owner and their master.
We must take our party to the villages. Our party workers must follow the direction and philosophy of the party. We all have to work to strengthen Sikkim and the Sikkimese people. The Constitution gives equal rights to everyone but it cannot give equal results. Only the educated and able people can transform their rights into results. We are on a mission to make our people capable. We want to make Sikkimese people capable of enjoying the rights given to them by the Constitution. People are not being able to take advantage of their status despite being Scheduled Tribes. Nobody, whether Other Backward Classes, Most Backward Class, Scheduled Castes or Scheduled Tribes cannot enjoy equal rights unless the poor are at par with the rich. We can call this a democratic paradox.
We have a development model that is designed to uplift the poor.  This is our biggest programme. The biggest programme of the SDF party is to make a classless society of the Sikkimese community. If you ask anyone about the problem in Sikkim, he will say unemployment is a problem. Some political traders and reactionaries are trying to politicise the unemployed people. We are worried about this. Today the literacy rate in Sikkim is 83%. Ten percent are elderly citizens and seven percent are children. We can say that we have almost 100 percent literacy. Nowhere in the world do all educated people get jobs. It is impossible for 100 percent of the people to get government jobs. We have to accept this reality. We cannot solve unemployment problem only with government job. Many countries have accepted this truth. But in Sikkim, Sikkimese people get all the jobs. We have safeguarded it. But we must make our society aware. There is cut throat competition for jobs. There is reservation for everyone.  No injustice has been done to anyone on the basis of caste, birth or religion.
Now you get jobs on the basis of your merit in the interview and not on the basis of certificate. You must prepare well for the interview. You must develop your personality. This message should go to everyone. The job of the government is to provide alternatives for government jobs. And we are doing that. But some people cannot accept this and they go around talking about unemployment. We want to train our drop outs and convert them into capable human resource. Our party workers must spread this kind of messages to the people the way I do. You must see into the problems of the people. Educated youth must also give advice. You must encourage people to engage in tourism, floriculture, agriculture related professions.   There is a huge demand for candidates in pharmacy. We must advice the youth to study pharmacy. Some people allege that we have sold our rivers etc but nobody talks about the benefits that power projects and the advantages of organic farming. We have done such work that a revenue of Rs. 1,00000 crore will be generated in the next 35 years. People will get to enjoy the fruit of all our hard work. But we must do the work by ourselves otherwise people from outside will come and reap the benefits. We must bring a change in our mindset. We need a revolution, a revolution that will bring a change in our profession.  We need a revolution in our thoughts.
Now nobody will be poor in Sikkim. Nobody will be hungry. But everybody will have to work. Everyone must make use of the opportunities. That is our dream and programme. It is a revolution to make Sikkim poverty-free and a producer State. You are in the party high command. So you need to take the responsibility of the party and the Government. People complain that they don’t get anything. Founder workers must be more concerned about all these things. Seniors must work with greater responsibility. Seniors have a big contribution towards a better Sikkim. You must not have grievances. You must take the responsibility of the village, party and the Government. MLAs, party office bearers, Panchayats must look up to the founder members.
All our friends from the party must look towards the villages. Now we have party offices in every ward. We must run these offices properly. You must study the party literature and also distribute them. The people of the village have to take the responsibility of the village. Gram Panchayats must resolve the problems at the village level, district level Panchayats and party workers must handle the problems of the districts and constituency level workers should handle the problems of the constituencies. The problems of the women’s wing and other fronts of the party must be solved then and there. SDF party is the party of the poor. It is a party of the Scheduled Castes, it is a party of the Scheduled Tribes. It is a party of the OBCs and MBCs. SDF is the last party of all the Sikkimese people.
Our party is not a party of goondaism. And it is not a party that tolerates goondaism. It is a party which teaches a lesson to people who do injustice. But we must not have resentment against each other in the party. We are in the mission for building anew. We all are members of this great campaign. We have been working with our focus on villages. We will further strengthen our focus. We must give an answer to the rumours floated by the opposition. We must ensure timely completion of all sanctioned work and schemes. All the work must be qualitative. People have a grievance that there is no OAP in villages. Our party workers must find out why people are not getting it. Sometimes I hear that our friends from the party have grievances against the Government. Ninety nine percent of the work of the Government is to make policies. The work of the bureaucracy is to implement the policies. It is the work of the employees. People have not suffered because of the policies, programmes and schemes of the Government.  We are the number one State in the country in these things. If people are suffering, it is only from the level of the bureaucracy. Our party must look into such things. If people are the masters of the Government then they are also the masters of the officers and employees as well. We see delay in implementation of work. There should be a debate on this in the whole of Sikkim. The message should go to employees that people should not suffer. We have not given any trouble to the people.
Different kinds of pamphlets are being circulated in villages. Lots of things are said on social media. We must condemn false accusations immediately. I want to request you to work hard like I do. We will soon have youth meetings and youth awareness programmes in all the four districts.  We must include everyone in our campaign. The youth need Sikkim more than I do. The youth will be more affected if something goes wrong with Sikkim. If our youth are not aware about politics then who will run Sikkim in the future?  SDF is a mutual party of the Sikkimese community. Let’s include all youth in the SDF party. You all are leaders like me. That is why all of you have to take the same amount of responsibility that I take. If somebody falls sick in a village then the party must help that person. Let’s run the party like a big society, a big family. Let this Kranti Diwas be historic.
Thank you!

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