Art of the Smear: the Israel Lobby Busted

Sheldon Richman

In 2016 and 2017 Al Jazeera produced a program that unmistakenly documents the Israel government and U.S. Israel lobby’s all-out effort to spy on, smear, and disrupt American students and other activists who are working to build an understanding of the Palestinians’ plight. The Lobby — USA, however, has never been broadcast by Al Jazeera. Reporting indicates that it was suppressed after pressure from the lobby on the government of Qatar, which funds Al Jazeera. Nevertheless, it is now available at The Electronic Intifada and on YouTube. Watch all four parts here and here. What the program presents is shocking.

The Lobby — USA, which features an undercover journalist who won the trust of key pro-Israel operatives and who videoed revealing meetings, demonstrates beyond question the lengths to which the Israelis and their supporters in the United States will go to prevent a change in American thinking about the beleaguered Palestinians. The effort aims to smear Palestinian students in the United States and pro-Palestinian American activists and political candidates who criticize Israeli policy as anti-Semites and enablers of terrorism. The paid pro-Israel operatives, guided by Israeli government officials and embassy staff, have used social media and other channels in an attempt to destroy the career potential of student activists who work to raise Americans’ consciousness about the Palestinians. Establishment news operations, such as the Washington Post, are also implicated. Major targets are activists in the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) Movement and Students for Justice in Palestine.

Al Jazeera produced a similar program about Israeli interference in British politics, which led to resignations of a key Israeli embassy official and other reactions that confirmed Al Jazeera’s damaging charges.

I could not do justice to the program even in a long article. Instead, I will urge readers to watch it in its entirety — and think carefully about what it means.

As one critic of Israel asks on the program, if Russia or Iran or China were doing what Israel and its American friends are doing, most people would be outraged. This is hardly the first time that Israel and friends have been caught covertly and overtly trying to influence discourse and even elections here through smear campaigns against activists, writers, and political candidates, but this is certainly among the most flagrant and elaborate examples.

Let’s step back from the poisonous trees for a moment to view the forest. In 1948 the leaders of a European and nominally Jewish movement, Zionism, unilaterally declared the existence of the State of Israel, which they proclaimed the nation-state of all Jews everywhere, a status recently reaffirmed by the Israeli Knesset. (The UN General Assembly recommended partitioning Palestine into a larger Jewish state and a smaller Palestinian state, but it had no power to actually create the state of Israel.)

It so happened this state was built on land taken by force from the long-standing majority indigenous Palestinian population, most of which was Muslim and Christian. Hundreds were massacred, three-quarters of a million were driven from their homes, and the remainder were subjected to martial law for two decades, before being given third-class citizenship with no power to improve their legal status. (Arab nations half-heartedly tried to assist the overwhelmed Palestinians, although the king of Jordan worked with Israel to divide the spoils.) Almost 20 years later, the rest of Palestine was taken through warfare, producing what are known as the occupied territories in the West Bank, with its apartheid-like regime, and the Gaza Strip, which is nothing more than an open-air prison under a cruel Israeli blockade.

Why? Because a “Jewish State” could not be realized if it were populated by non-Jews. And if some non-Jews remained, the state could not be a liberal democratic state, with equality under the law, for obvious reasons. All this was aided from the start by European Christians who, apparently guilt-ridden over how the Jews of Europe had been tyrannized, culminating in the Nazi genocide, opted to assuage their guilt with the land, blood, and liberty of the innocent people of Palestine, long the plaything of colonial powers.

Since that time, Israel has repressed the Palestinians in a variety of ways, depending on whether they are in the state as it existed in 1949; the West Bank, which was seized during the June 1967 war; or the Gaza Strip (also called the Gaza Ghetto), also seized in that war. Meanwhile, millions of refugees — people (and descendants of people) driven from their homes by Zionism’s terrorist militias, have been confined to refugee camps, stateless, rightless, and destitute. At various time, Israel, with America’s backing, has cut deals with Arab states and Palestinian quislings for the purpose of keeping the Palestinians from winning their rights either in a single secular democratic state or through a two-state plan. Western political and media establishments have overwhelmingly sympathized with the Israelis and demonized the Palestinians (and Arabs and Muslims generally). It didn’t take long for the public to be propagandized, against all evidence, into believing that the Palestinians are the aggressors and the Israelis the victims. Apparently, a person is anti-Semitic if he objects to having his property stolen by someone who claims that property in the name of the Jewish People.

But after so many decades of Israeli wars, massacres, repression, and routine brutal dehumanization, the tide has started to turn. Israel pulverized Gaza and its people one too many times; it shot and broke the bones of too many children before too many video cameras. And so public opinion, especially among younger Americans — and particularly among younger Jewish Americans, has been turning against Israel. Then the BDS Movement arose to accomplish what a similar movement help to accomplish against apartheid South Africa: bringing world attention to an intolerable situation and take concrete steps to change it.

All of this has been too much for Israel’s ruling elite and its supporters in the United States, Great Britain, and elsewhere, and they are fighting back. They know they can’t win on the merits. Well-documented historical studies and basic morality have seen to that. So they smear their opponents as Jew-haters and supporters of terrorism. As one Israel lobby operator puts it in the Al Jazeera program, you discredit the message by discrediting the messenger — which is what The Israel Project, Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Israel on Campus Coalition, Canary Mission, Emergency Committee on Israel, Israeli Embassy in Washington, Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs, and the other co-conspirators have set out to do. Their goal, as their leaders themselves acknowledge, is to identify criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism. (Also see this.)

But it goes beyond that. The Israel lobby realizes that the anti-Semitism charge no long sticks so tenaciously to people who merely indict Israel for its obvious mistreatment of the Palestinians. So the lobby has resorted to a broader brush: it says that those who support BDS and the Palestinians are anti-American, anti-democracy, and anti-all-blessed-things. BDS and Students for Justice in Palestine, the lobby contends, are hate groups. This of course is patently absurd, but Israel’s side observes no limits it what it is willing to say and perhaps do to destroy the reputations anyone who realizes that the Israeli emperor has clothes.

Al Jazeera, the Electronic Intifada, Max Blumenthal’s The Gray Zone Project, and others have performed a much-needed service on behalf of freedom, justice, and decency. I urge you to watch this program and spread the word.

May’s Brexit Deal is an Insult to the British People

Ludwig Watzal

The British Prime Minister Theresa May presented the draft of the so-called Brexit deal with the EU to the House of Commons. The three-hour long confrontation showed that she would never get this deal approved, not even by her party. The MPs robbed the agreement like a dead body. Nevertheless, she insisted multiple times, “to see it through” because it would serve British national interests. Although May’s presentation in parliament was a disaster, she kept very coolly and resilient.

Close inspections reveal that this deal is a Greek gift to Great Britain and the British people. This deal will tie the UK forever and ever to the European Union. It’s absolute surrender to this anti-democratic European Union. Britain can’t negotiate individual trade agreements with any country, not even the United States. Such agreements stay an absolute prerogative of the EU! It’s precisely the opposite of what the British people have voted for on 23 June 2016. It’s not a complete reclamation of sovereignty but will degenerate the United Kingdom to a vassal state of the EU Commission. One has to ask, how Theresa May and her government could have approved such a horrible deal?

Many ministers and deputies resigned, the most famous one was the Brexit negotiator Dominic Raab. The latest opinion poll shows that less than 20 percent of the people back it. The EU got everything they ask for by May. The EU did not negotiate in good faith with the UK government. They stonewalled in every aspect of the process. The main aim of the EU was to demonstrate to the rest of the member states what comes up to a country that dares to leave this club.

This deal has no chance to get approved by the British parliament on 10 December. It’s dead in the water. May will face a no-confidence vote in her party. Neither the British people nor the conservative MPs have confidence in May anymore. She should be replaced by a Prime Minister who stands for a true Brexit and stands up to the EU Commission and its anti-democratic policy. The UK should get its full sovereignty and self-determination back and set an example to other countries who want to leave the EU. If the EU doesn’t make further elementary concessions, the UK should leave this crumbling European Union without a deal.

A separation from the EU would not lead to a disaster such as the German economic class wants the public to believe. They cry wolf to keep their financial and economic domination over Europe intact. The Brits can get along without the EU comfortably. Their exports amount into the EU only to seven percent of the total. Germany is much more dependent on the British market than vice versa. The British government could make good for the temporary dent in the export industry by stopping their amount to the EU.

“Brexit means Brexit. Britain won’t remain half in, half out” of the EU, once Theresa May said. On this promise, May has still to deliver.

India’s prosperity hinges on Religious Freedom

Mike Ghouse

The Indian-Americans have a moral duty to prevent India from being labeled as a “Country of Particular Concern” by the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).

If India were to be ascribed with such a label, it would hinder the flow of foreign direct investments and subsequent reversal of economic prosperity achieved in the last twenty years. This label may not affect the poor Indians, but it will severely impact all those Indians working in information technology related jobs and businesses involved in software development and services.

South Africa once was an apartheid nation, and its prosperity came to a grinding halt when the foreign corporations realized that they are supporting a regime that discriminates her citizens. The harassment, lynching, and killing of Dalits, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs and others in India needs to stop; if not, it will hurt all Indians as the investors will start pulling out of the country. Who wants to invest in a place where their investment is not secure?

The success of the American economy is based on the rule of law, the law is enforced equally, and no criminal will get away with the power of his or he monies. If someone violates the rules, the individual or the company will pay the penalty, and this builds confidence and trust in the society and frees them from tensions. Every Indian should feel secure about his or her faith, ethnicity, language and culture.

The First Amendment of America’s constitution serves as a model of success for any government. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

Ambassador Sam Brownback had once said that the prosperity of a nation hinges on religious freedom. Indeed, the success of a country is directly proportional to religious liberty. It frees people from the daily tensions of what to eat, drink, wear and believe. It allows them to become a productive employee to the company, and a fully participating member of the family by giving the family the full attention it deserves instead of worrying about a fellow employee at the place of work.

Furthermore, the quality of life is directly proportional to freedom from religious and cultural tensions.

The sense of security is diminishing rapidly. A Christian is apprehensive of going to the Church on a Sunday, and a Muslim is afraid of storing meat in his refrigerator should the vigilantes descend on him. The women including little girls are not safe either. The murderers and rapists got felicitated with Garlands from among the current leaders instead of sending them to prison. The man who lynched and brutally killed a Muslim man was videotaped and shared on WhatsApp, and the lyncher was rewarded with a party ticket to contest elections. This is shamefully a weekly occurrence.

Ambassador Brownback had once said referring to mob violence around the world. If the leaders respond immediately to such incidents and tell the nation that the lynching and harassment of fellow citizens will not be acceptable, then the violence will cease or at least mitigate. Unfortunately, the current Indian leadership has remained silent when vigilantes kill and maim the people, causing every Indian to live in fear – both the minorities and the ones who frighten.

Please note that Hindutva ideology propagated by RSS and its family of parties is not Hinduism. Hindutva is to Hinduism; what Islam is to Islamists. Hindutva and Islamist are anti-Hinduism and anti-Islam respectively. It may take a few generations for Hindutvadis and Islamists to see the value of respecting the otherness of the other and accepting the God-given uniqueness of the other. When we get there, conflicts will fade, and solutions emerge. Ultimately, every Indian wants to live in peace and feel secure about his faith and focus on contributing to the common good of the nation.

The Indian Americans have equal access to all the opportunities in the market without discrimination, and I hope the Indian Americans would want India to treat her minorities as America does hers. It is an embarrassment to note that a few Indian Americans don’t want Muslims, Christians, and Dalits to have equal rights in India. On top of it, they are poisoning their children with ill-will towards each other.

The good news is that most of the American Indian youth are rejecting the ugliness of their parents and choose to respect the otherness of the other. After all, they have to work with people of different faiths and races, and it would be a pain for them to work with others if their parents have dumped their biases on their children. Should parents poison their children?

We appeal to all the India oriented American organizations including the Hindu America Foundation, the Indian American Muslim Council, Federation of Indian American Christian Organization of North American to support our petition.

The petition will be addressed to the Government of India to issue Visa’s to the Commissioners of USCRIF. They can do the investigations about the plight of Kashmiri Pandits, Sikh Genocides, Gujarat Massacre, Lynching and harassment of Dalits, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, and others.

If India gets a “Clean Chit” it will ensure continued prosperity and investor confidence in India’s democracy. However, if the Indian government is found guilty of the violations of religious freedoms, then two choices left to deal with are; risk losing the confidence of the investors in the stability of India, or fix the problems and earn a clean chit. Every Indian American must ensure the sustainability of India’s democracy and prosperity.

In Washington DC, there are three Indians who regularly attend the meetings about religious freedom issues from among about seventy-five individuals to talk about the concerns in different nations. Jay Kansara has been representing the Hindu America Foundation, John Prabhudoss represents Federation of Indian American Christians of North America, and Mike Ghouse serves the Center for Pluralism, standing up for the rights of people from all faiths. Now, Ajit Sahi of Indian American Muslim Council has joined the group to address Religious freedom issues of Indian minorities. The Dalits and Sikhs have been represented on an off by different visitors.

Swami Agnivesh was in Washington DC and spoke to a group of defenders of religious freedom across the world. The Ambassador of religious liberty Hon. Sam Brownback presided the meeting. He was eloquent and precise, and it was an honor to meet the man whom I have come to admire for his stand on eradicating bonded labor, and fighting for religious freedom of all Indians.

Here is a short speech of Swami Agnivesh – https://youtu.be/eIwPXyQQi7g

Full speech of Swami Agnivesh delivered to the Religious freedom roundtable, chaired by the US Ambassador for Religious Freedom, Hon. Sam Brownback.

Dear Ambassador Brownback and my fellow campaigners for human rights and religious freedom. I am grateful to you for this opportunity to speak here. Since the time allotted for me to speak is limited, I will get to the point immediately.

There is a grave threat today to civil liberties in general and religious freedom in particular in India. Indeed, the levels of violence we see in today’s India against the social and religious minorities are in many ways unprecedented in recent decades. The victims of such vicious violence are some of India’s poorest and most disadvantaged communities. They include Muslims, Christians, the Dalits, who are the former untouchables of the Hindu caste society, and the Adivasis, or the indigenous tribal people whose very existence is under threat.

Moreover, the perpetrators of this violence are directly linked with the RSS, which is the mother organization of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP party. Especially since Mr. Modi became India’s prime minister in 2014, the attacks on the religious minorities have sharply increased. Armed mobs owing allegiance to the RSS and other Hindu groups have been lynching to death Muslims at will, accusing them of eating beef or slaughtering a cow. Such Hindu mobs also disrupt mixed-religion weddings in which the groom is Muslim, and the bride is Hindu because they don’t want Hindu girls to marry Muslim boys. There have been instances in which such Muslim grooms have been killed, too.

Similarly, these vigilante groups owing allegiance to the RSS have been attacking Christian Churches, priests, and congregants all over India. Once again, they blame the victims for the violence, accusing the Christians of converting Hindus to Christianity.

For thousands of years, the Dalits have suffered the worst violence and indignities at the hands of upper caste Hindus. However, now, that indignity is doubled because laws have been created to deny positive quota benefits to Dalits who convert out of Hinduism to Christianity and Islam. Converted Dalits face even greater violence and assault.

As for the Adivasis, the indigenous people, the RSS-BJP have for decades been forcing Hinduism on them even though millions of these Adivasis clearly state that they are not Hindus and they have their indigenous faiths. I have myself been a victim of their violence over the years. Twice in the last six months only I have been attacked by these violent mobs. Of course, it is futile to expect any police action against such violent perpetrators.

If I being a prominent human rights defender in India cannot expect the police to act against my attackers, you can imagine what would be the story of these social and religious minorities I have spoken about, the Dalits, the Adivasis, the Christians and the Muslims, who are being targeted in their hundreds of thousands across India.

Even more worrying is that some organizations in the United States that claim to represent the interest of the Hindus defend the highly divisive and violent activities of the RSS-BJP and instead blame the religious minorities. They try to create a false equivalence between the highly organized and structural violence of the RSS-BJP, who are in power in the federal government in India as well as more than a dozen and a half of India’s 29 states, and random acts of violence against Hindus that may occur.

The truth is that the biggest perpetrator of anti-minority violence in India is the RSS-BJP, which is now in power across India and is therefore grossly abusing its control of government machinery to provide impunity to its henchmen carrying out such violence. It would be a pity if the international community did not open its eyes and take notice of this worsening situation in the India of Mahatma Gandhi.

(Swami Agnivesh also added that he was coming from giving the keynote address at the Parliament for World’s Religions in Toronto, Canada and that the Hindu rightwing forces tried to prevent him from speaking there. He also said he had been a campaigner for justice for 50 years and had faced numerous attacks on his life, the most recent in Jharkhand in July, when hundreds of goons attacked him, and then again in Delhi in August. Swami Ji also spoke of his work with bonded laborers and said his organization had secured freedom and rehabilitation for more than 170,000 bonded laborers in India in the last thirty plus years.)

Educational Innovations through effective governance would be key to Sustainable Development Goals

Ravi Nitesh

While living in the world of information technology, today the ‘connectivity’ is what really matters. People of all age groups, gender, caste, religion and regions have access to global connectivity through internet available in their handsets and computers. This is comparatively a new phenomenon as a decade ago; neither connectivity nor hardware availability was in common reach, however with the visionary ideas of successive governments, gradually the connectivity was introduced. This enhanced connectivity and enhanced availability of hardware affected various fields of development. When it comes to education, that is one of the core foundations of development,  making people familiar with digital gadgets, computers becomes a primary need.

At a time when the world was working on laptops, many students in India were not even able to see how it looks like. They were unable to understand value of document storage in soft copies, e-books, soft note books and internet access. Having these was considered a privilege that could be entitled mostly by elites. Hardware (laptop/computer) was costly and a student could not afford to buy this on their own. Probably, by considering this need in Uttar Pradesh, It was the time when a political party named Samajwadi Party formed a new vision to remove this disparity. It is true that making an alignment with the time is what a wise decision should be and when it comes to ‘politics’, probably it should be more informed and visionary to take such decisions quickly.

In 2012, when the Samajwadi Party had brought a poll promise of laptop distribution to students with the aim to encourage them for higher education and remove disparity, the promise was very well received by people, particularly by youths. After forming the government, the party had distributed around 15 lacs laptops to students and it led the then U.P. Government of running world’s largest laptop distribution program.  Socialism, as understood with its theoretical form encourages bringing equality. In India, where inequality exists in social and economic status of population; this inequality affects educational system where poor, marginalised and deprived students do not get same opportunity as accessed by rich. To make balance, various schemes were made time to time, from mid-day meals to right to education. However, only ensuring the attendance in class cannot be said sufficient until students also receive useful resources to help them in their studies and to help them move with the time and technology. Another uniqueness of the program was the inclusiveness where students of all approved education systems (state and central boards, Sanskrit education, Urdu education and technical courses) were considered to take benefits to avoid any discrimination among them on the basis of their education system. A laptop couldn’t convert the life overnight, but could certainly help these students to dream and to achieve all what they want to. Success of the scheme can be understood with the fact that similar scheme was conducted by many other states also and even the present BJP government in Uttar Pradesh carried it.

As per report of All India Higher Education Survey, In India, enrolment in higher education (around 25%) is much lower than many countries (China 43%, USA 85%) and hence there is a strong need to frame policies that may encourage students to study, develop interest and understanding and getting enrolled for higher education. These can be achieved through working on focused approach starting from bringing equality and quality in primary, matric and intermediate levels; providing resources to students and to facilitate them to dream. This may be followed with establishing more universities and colleges to accommodate more and more students.  Facilitating students with laptops is not an imaginary or vague idea of equipping them towards education, but it also has proven research. A Michigan State University’s assistant professor researched in an educational institution about how distributing laptops to students can benefit their academics and found in its research results that students improved in various subjects and got opportunity to write, rewrite and edit their thoughts and answers. In many countries, students also have provisions to watch lectures of their teachers on laptops while at home.  Laptops allow enhanced access to technology, increase networking with peers, and develop enthusiasm and makes learning more interesting.

Though the Samajwadi Government had initiated the useful project of laptop distribution and the present government continued it, there is greater need now to bring more benefits with it where subject lectures can be recorded and stored, free connectivity can be provided to access academic resources and schools may have their digital libraries access with students laptops to allow them to go through various books, notes, assignments etc. Moreover, beneficiaries should also include open schooling system students. The state government may also consider creating a centralised portal where lectures on subject topics and standard books can be provided free. Doing these would be a serious effort towards SDG4 as it states ‘Achieving inclusive and quality education for all reaffirms the belief that education is one of the most powerful and proven vehicles for sustainable development. It also aims to provide equal access to affordable vocational training, to eliminate gender and wealth disparities, and to achieve universal access to quality higher education.’

Two Years after Demonetisation, the Nightmare Continues for India’s Informal Economy

Arun Kumar

The note-ban was a foolish attempt to tackle the black economy and a policy-induced self goal by the Narendra Modi government. The response to its fall-out is more authoritarianism.

Demonetisation is like a bad dream etched in our memories. Weddings were postponed and medical treatment was curtailed for lack of money. Long queues formed outside banks. Small businesses closed due to lack of working capital and their workers returned to their villages. Indians who never generated black money were the worst affected. Yet, the narrative that demonetisation would destroy the wealth of the corrupt was widely accepted.

This was because of the misperception that ‘black means cash’. If cash was squeezed out, the black economy would disappear at one stroke – justice being meted out to the corrupt. The Prime Minister said that for long-term gain one had to bear short-term pain. He likened it to ‘ahuti’ in a ‘yagya’. If the pain does not end in 50 days, Modi said, the public could give him any punishment and he would accept it.

Two years later, the pain persists but the government only continues to justify its error. It has refused to admit to the long-term damage to the economy, especially to marginalised Indians in the unorganised sectors. Instead, data from the organised sector is used to claim that the economy has recovered to a 7-8% rate of growth. This is treated as evidence that the pain was temporary.

The government did not survey the unorganised sectors to find out what was happening there. The underlying assumption is that the shock to the economy did not require a change in the old methodology for calculating growth. In that methodology, the organised sector is more or less the proxy for the unorganised sector. But the shock to the economy changed the ratio between the organised and the unorganised sectors. So, the ratio used prior to November 7, 2016, was no more valid after November 8, 2016.

Data from private surveys showed that the unorganised sector was hit hard. Surveys were conducted by Punjab Haryana Delhi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (PHDCCI), All India Manufacturers Organization (AIMO), State Bank of India (SBI) and many others including NGOs. The RBI survey released in March 2017 showed a sharp decline in deremand for consumer durables and so on.

Agriculture faced a crisis due to notes shortage. Produce could not be sold, the sowing of crops was delayed and the demand for the perishables like vegetables collapsed. Prices fell sharply, thereby impacting incomes of farmers. Banking also went into a crisis since normal banking operations stopped for months. With industry, trade and agriculture facing a crisis, the problem of NPAs only increased.

According to the Centre for Monitoring of Indian Economy (CMIE), investment fell sharply during that quarter. In effect, output, employment and investment declined, sending the economy into a tailspin from which it has not yet recovered. The impact of the goods and services tax (GST) from June-July 2017 again impacted the unorganised sectors and deepened the crisis. So, now the twin impact of demonetisation and GST is being felt in the economy. If the method of measuring quarterly growth of the economy is modified to take into account the decline in the unorganised sector (about 45% of GDP), the rate of growth would turn out to be less than 1% – what a crisis in an economy that was running well till October 2016.

Institutions like the RBI were damaged. Farmers, traders, workers and the young have been agitating. The government, sensing failure, has turned more authoritarian. The roots of the current problems with RBI are also contained in the impact of demonetisation. It was believed that Rs 3 to 4 lakh crore would not return and would become available to the government to give to the poor. Since this did not happen, now a dividend is sought from RBI out of its reserves.

Many identified the impact of demonetisation with a note shortage only. By the end of April 2017, 80% of the currency had come back into circulation and now it exceeds the amount on November 8, 2016.

Is the impact of demonetisation over? No. The impact was not just the shortage of currency in circulation, but via difficulties in transactions on the economy as a whole. It hit output, employment and investment, which will all have a long lasting impact.

All the demonetised notes were returned so little black money was squeezed out of the system. Black wealth held in the form of currency has got converted to new notes. People were being caught with lots of new currency. No one saw any rich people standing in the queues. They used various devices like Jan Dhan accounts, money mules and cash in hand to convert money.

Many saw demonetisation as a political move to eliminate the black money hoard held by the opposition before the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections. But the main reason was the constant attack by the opposition that the promised Rs 15 lakh per family had not materialised and it was just a ‘chunavi jumla’. The government’s steps to tackle the black economy such as the setting up of a SIT, the foreign money bill, Benami bill, etc., had yielded little results. The party in power needed a big bang and demonetisation was that step.

There are many misconceptions about the black economy. For instance, the promise to give every family Rs 15 lakh was based on the idea that all the black money is outside and can be easily brought back (within a month). If this was correct, demonetisation could not have worked because it has no impact on the black money held abroad. Further, only 10% of the black incomes generated annually go abroad and are partly round-tripped back. So, the bulk of it is here.

Another mistaken belief is that black incomes are generated in the informal sector. In a change of goal posts, it was argued that demonetisation will lead to the digitisation of the economy and to formalisation which would check the black economy.

But most incomes of this sector are way below the taxable limit. Black incomes are generated by only a few in this sector, like a well-off dhabawallah or a trader. Most black incomes are generated in the organised and formalised sectors, using under- and over-invoicing. If some from the informal sectors get formalised they would also resort to the same devices to generate black incomes.

Since all the money has come back into the banks, in another spin, the government has argued that a paper trail is now available to track those generating black incomes. To support this argument, data is cited on the increase in direct tax collection and the number of taxpayers. Given the expansion of the organised sectors at the expense of the unorganised and the rising disparities, this is to be expected. Further, the number of direct tax payers has increased due to the implementation of the Seventh Pay Commission award.

However, the rise in tax collection is not commensurate with the increase in numbers. But this is nothing new. In the past also, a large number of those filing returns have either declared nil income or declared very low incomes. It is reported that tax officers have been given targets and they are forcing businesses to declare incomes. This will not last and there are complaints of selective tax terrorism. Possibly this is the reason that the number of millionaires leaving the country is rising rapidly.

In brief, the shortage of notes was painful and faded away slowly but its long term implications are playing out. Inadequate demand from the unorganised sectors which were hit hard, deterioration of the investment climate and the inadequate employment generation have meant that the crisis continues even today.

Demonetisation is a policy-induced self-goal which damaged several institutions. The response to its political fallout is more authoritarianism.

Anti-stall feature in new Boeing planes may have contributed to Indonesian aviation disaster

Oscar Grenfell 

Last week, three US pilots unions, aviation experts and a number of airlines, including Indonesia’s Lion Air, stated that a feature of Boeing’s new 737 Max 8 aircraft may have contributed to a plane crash in the Java Sea on October 29 which killed 189 people. They have claimed that an automated system not present in previous Boeing models or mentioned in any of the company’s safety manuals may have triggered a catastrophic nosedive.

The Lion Air plane lost contact with air traffic control around 13 minutes after departing from Java for a routine commercial trip to Pangkal Pinang, the capital of the Bangka Belitung Islands province. Eyewitnesses reported that the plane plunged at an almost vertical angle into the Java Sea. There were no survivors.

While the report from an initial investigation by Indonesia’s National Transportation Safety Committee (NTSC) has yet to be released, statements by the country’s aviation officials have made clear that the plane had experienced mechanical issues during its previous four flights, with key pieces of equipment reportedly feeding false data to the cockpit.

Allegations aired last week, however, have indicated that the safety issue may be far broader than the ill-fated Lion Air Flight, potentially affecting the entire fleet of 737 Max 8 aircraft. There are currently 246 of the new model in operation around the world, while airlines in Australia, the US, Europe and internationally have orders for another 4,542 of the aircraft.

It has emerged that the 737 Max 8 model contains an automated mechanism, known as the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System, aimed at preventing it from stalling. If flight data indicates that there is an imminent risk of stalling, this mechanism sometimes forces down the plane’s nose without any action on the part of the pilots.

The mechanism is directed against a common cause of stalling incidents, which is a plane’s nose being pitched higher than it should be for the speed that it is travelling. The ability of such a mechanism to work effectively, however, is dependent on it being supplied accurate information by a complex network of sensors.

According to statements by the NTSC on November 5, the Lion Air plane’s Angle of Attack (AOA) sensors had repeatedly provided inaccurate information in the flights preceding the crash. AOA sensors feed information about the angle of wind passing over the wings of a plane, and how much lift it is getting.

Black box data indicated that on the last flight before the disaster, the right and left AOA sensors had given indications that diverged by about 20 degrees from one another. This resulted in a sudden nosedive, which the pilots were able to correct. After that flight, and before the crash, the plane’s AOA sensors were replaced.

The plane, however, had also experienced issues with its airspeed indicators. According to some aviation experts, this could have indicated a broader problem with the air data reference system, a key component which provides data from indicators for temperature, AOA, airspeed and altitude to the pilots’ electronic flight instrument system. If data falsely indicated that the plane’s nose was pitching up, it could have activated the anti-stall mechanism, triggering the catastrophic nosedive that led to the crash.

Most explosively, pilot unions, airlines and aviation experts have indicated there was no information about the model’s “auto-dive” in any of the handbooks or safety guidelines provided to pilots by Boeing.

On November 13, Jon Weaks, president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association in the US, told the Wall Street Journal: “We did not know this was on the [Boeing 737] MAX models.”

Weaks disputed claims that a safety bulletin issued by Boeing on November 8, in the wake of the crash, had merely reminded pilots of existing safety procedures. He said the bulletin’s reference to the anti-stalling mechanism was the first in any material from Boeing. Pilots were previously unaware of the means to disable the mechanism.

Dennis Tajer, communications committee chairman at the Allied Pilots Association, stated: “This was clearly a sign that the safety culture [at Boeing] was missing on a cylinder or two. We’re all on the same side looking at Boeing, saying, ‘What else you got?’”

On November 15, the Air Line Pilots Association, which represents United Continental Holdings Inc.’s flight crews, issued an open letter to the US Federal Aviation Administration, warning that it was “concerned that a potential, significant aviation system safety deficiency exists.”

The letter stated: “There appears to be a significant information gap, and we want to ensure that pilots operating these aircraft have all of the information they need to do so safely.”

Southwest, American Airlines and Lion Air all confirmed that the anti-stall mechanism was not included in any operating manual or safety guidelines for the Boeing 737 Max aircraft. Because the aircraft was presented as merely an improved version of previous 737 models, with few new features, pilots were provided with just three hours of computer-based training and a familiarisation flight before being certified.

The family of Doctor Rio Nanda Pratama, one of the victims of the Lion Air disaster, has responded to the revelations by filing a lawsuit alleging that Boeing is culpable because “it failed to inform its customers and pilots” of the new anti-stall mechanism.

The lawsuit has also claimed that under certain conditions, the auto-dive feature “can push the nose down unexpectedly and so strongly that the pilot cannot pull it back up in time to avoid a crash.”

Boeing has rejected claims that not enough information was provided to pilots, or that there are any potential safety issues with the new model.

Boeing is one of the largest aircraft manufacturers in the world and the biggest US exporter by dollar value. It had a net income of over $8 billion in 2017.

Sri Lankan president’s “all party conference” fails to overcome political crisis

Rohantha De Silva

Sri Lankan President Maithripala Sirisena, falsely posing as an arbiter of the rival factions fighting for state power, held an All Party Conference of parliamentary parties yesterday. The conference ended without any agreement between the contending groups.

The meeting was attended by several United National Party (UNP) MPs led by Ranil Wickremesinghe, who was dismissed as prime minister on October 26 by Sirisena, and leaders of the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, All Ceylon Muslim Congress and the Tamil Progressive Alliance of plantation unions.

The other faction was headed by former President Mahinda Rajapakse, who was appointed as new prime minister by Sirisena, and included several leading MPs from the Sri Lanka Podujana Peramuna (SLPP), Sri Lanka Freedom Party (SLFP) and the plantations-based Ceylon Workers Congress.

Parliamentary speaker Karu Jayasuriya was invited but did not participate in the meeting saying it was meant for political parties. There are sharp tensions between Sirisena and Jayasuriya. The president supports the Rajapakse faction while the speaker is a senior member of Wickremesinghe’s UNP.

The Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP) refused Sirisena’s invitation to the meeting, declaring that he was the “creator of the crisis” and that he had to resolve it. The JVP, which is attempting to distance itself from Wickremesinghe, is, however, backing his party’s efforts to regain power.

Sirisena’s meeting was convened against the back drop of three consecutive days of bitter parliamentary fighting between supporters of Rajapakse and of Wickremesinghe. Parliament was reconvened on Wednesday after the Supreme Court issued an interim ruling overturning President Sirisena’s dissolution of parliament.

Physical confrontations and violent clashes erupted when the UNP and opposition parties moved no-confidence motions against Rajapakse and his new government on Wednesday and Friday. Speaker Jayasuriya ruled that the resolutions were passed with majority support on both days. On Thursday, Rajapakse made a statement to the parliament, but it broke up after the opposition tried to move a resolution rejecting his speech.

Sirisena rejected the first no-confidence vote and called on the UNP to remove a section criticising his appointment of Rajapakse as prime minister as “unconstitutional.” At yesterday’s All Party Conference, he rejected Friday’s vote on the “modified” no-confidence motion, saying it should be voted on electronically, or by calling names, for it to be regarded as “trustworthy by the people and internationally.”

Sirisena also called on MPs to act “decently” but offered no explanation for the violent behaviour of his factional supporters. Sirisena and leaders of the rival factions are somewhat nervous about the political impact on the Sri Lankan masses of the unruly fighting in parliament, which was broadcast live on television.

The UNP leadership told Sirisena that they could bring the 113 MPs who supported the “no-confidence proposal” to meet with him. Sirisena rejected the suggestion.

After the meeting, however, the UNP leadership insisted they would submit another motion to the parliament today. Rajapakse supporters said they would not allow such a proposal unless it was “properly” presented.

Wickremesinghe, who is backed by the US and its allies, is determined to continue his bid for power. Colombo-based diplomats from the US, EU, UK, Australia and Japan visited Wickremesinghe at Temple Trees, the prime minister’s official residence, after yesterday’s All Party Conference.

On November 15, American, Japanese, Australian and Indian government officials meeting in Singapore, prior to the ASEAN summit, discussed the escalating political crisis in Sri Lanka. A US state department statement said that its senior officials stressed the need for joint efforts to “advance shared regional interests, including support for the new Maldivian government, and encouragement of an outcome to political developments in Sri Lanka consistent with democratic principles.”

Washington and its international allies have no concern for “democratic principles” but are motivated by their own imperialist concerns and, in particular, are determined to undermine all Chinese economic and political influence in the Asia-Pacific region.

Recently-elected Maldives President Ibrahim Mohamed Solih came to power last month with behind-the-scenes backing from Washington and New Delhi. The US and India opposed former Maldives President Abdulla Yameen because of his close ties with Beijing.

Sirisena became Sri Lankan president in 2015 following a regime-change operation to oust Rajapakse orchestrated by Washington and with Wickremesinghe’s help.

Washington had no opposition to Rajapakse’s authoritarian methods of rule but was hostile to his close ties with Beijing. The US considers that any government led by Rajapakse would be a pro-Chinese regime that would undermine its political and military preparations for war against China.

The International Monetary Fund is also putting pressure on Sirisena and Rajapakse, announcing that it has delayed the last instalment of a $1.5 billion bailout loan to Colombo. Sri Lankan Central Bank Governor Dr. Indrajit Coomaraswamy revealed last Wednesday that the IMF payment had been postponed, pending the outcome of the political crisis. Washington no doubt had a hand in this decision.

The international media is also widely using Chinese President Xi Jinping’s congratulatory message to Rajapakse—immediately following his appointment as prime minister—as “proof” of Beijing’s influence. China, which is manoeuvring to counter US geo-political activities, hopes that a Rajapakse regime would boost Colombo’s ties with Beijing.

Rajapakse, however, has sent signals to the US and India that his government would be prepared to work with them. In September, he visited New Delhi and met with Indian leaders, including Prime Minster Narendra Modi. When Donald Trump became US president in 2017, Rajapakse immediately sent a congratulatory message.

On Friday, Wickremesinghe cynically told the media that the ferocious fighting in parliament was a “blow to democracy” and “a blow to all of us who are voters of Sri Lanka in whom the sovereignty lies.” UNP governments, which instigated the almost 30-year war against the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, like all other bourgeois regimes in Sri Lanka, have systematically suppressed the democratic rights of the Sri Lankan masses.

Rajapakse, who endorses Sirisena’s call for new elections, continues to posture as a “defender” of democratic rights, declaring that if the Sri Lankan parliament is unable to resolve the political crisis, then “the people should be allowed to intervene. When the voters are given power, no one will have a problem.”

These claims are false. Rajapakse was voted out in the 2015 presidential election because workers and the poor opposed his attack on social and democratic rights and bloody atrocities carried out against the Tamil minority during the war.

The “democratic” demagogy of the Wickremesinghe and Sirisena-Rajapakse factions are bogus. Their real concern is not “democracy” but widespread social discontent and the eruption of protests and strikes among workers, youth and the poor.

Both formations, and their erstwhile allies, are political representatives of the venal Sri Lankan capitalist class. Whichever faction wins government will move, sooner rather than later and with the backing of international finance capital, to unleash vicious attacks on the rights of all working people.

The working class must urgently intervene on the basis of the revolutionary perspective advanced by the Socialist Equality Party, and to rally the working masses, the youth and the rural poor to fight for workers’ and peasants’ government based on a socialist program.

Thousands attend anti-fascist protest in London

Robert Stevens

Around 20,000 people demonstrated in London on Saturday against the rise of racism and fascism, marching from Great Portland Street and rallying at Whitehall.

The march followed recent events in Europe, including fascist riots in Chemnitz, Germany, the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue in the United States, and UK protests in support of English Defence League founder Tommy Robinson.

Contingents arrived from all parts of the country, with coaches laid on by trade unions and rally organisers. Many who marched were politically affiliated, reflected in the large number of local Labour Party and union branch banners.

While protesters registered their opposition to the rise of the far right, the nationalist and pro-capitalist programme of rally organisers provided no basis for workers and youth to fight the far right. This was reflected in the event’s official title, “National Unity Demonstration Against Racism and Fascism.”

The perspective of “national unity” against fascism is aimed at suppressing the independent mobilisation of the working class against capitalism. This was summed up in the frontpage slogan of the Stalinist Morning Star, distributed free of charge on the day, which stated, “Tens of thousands rally today for simple human decency.”

An appeal for the rally was made on November 1, with a statement published in the Guardian signed by a long list of Labour MPs and trade union bureaucrats, including key Corbyn allies John McDonnell and Dianne Abbott.

“The impact of neoliberalism and austerity … has driven the growth of the far right,” wrote the signatories, without mentioning that austerity and cuts are currently being enforced by Labour councils across the country on behalf of the Conservative central government.

Their statement also included Labour’s own election slogan, “We are the many. They are the few.” Much of the rally had the character of a pro-Corbyn event. Despite this, neither Corbyn nor Abbott nor McDonnell addressed the demonstration. Also absent was TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady.

This did not stop the various pseudo-left groups—led by the Socialist Workers Party via Stand Up To Racism, the Socialist Party, Counterfire and the Stalinist Communist Party of Great Britain—from building the march on a pro-Labour perspective. Rally speakers included Labour MP Catherine West, Labour MEP Claude Moraes and union officials Len McCluskey, Mark Serwotka, Kevin Courtney, Mick Cash and Matt Wrack.

A message from Dianne Abbott, read out to the rally, attacked the “hostile environment” enforced by the Conservative government against immigrants, but Labour’s own election manifesto calls for managed immigration on the bogus pretext of protecting jobs, embracing the central claims of the far-right that immigration contributes to unemployment and “pressure” on social services. “Let’s not stop until these Tory policies are defeated,” her message concluded.

Serwotka, general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union, declared that “in fighting racism we also need to fight austerity and for jobs and homes.” Yet just four months ago, when PCS members voted by 85.6 percent for strike action to defend jobs, wages and conditions, Serwotka and his fellow PCS officials enforced the Tory government’s anti-strike laws, declaring that strike action would not go ahead because members had failed to reach the 50 percent ballot threshold.

Saturday’s rally was ended by Labour Party national executive member Claudia Webbe, who told demonstrators, “We need a Jeremy Corbyn-led Labour government as soon as possible.”

The event was sponsored by Stand Up To Racism (SUTR), Unite against Fascism and LoveMusic HateRacism. All three organisations are supported by the Trades Union Congress, the Socialist Workers Party and its offshoot, Counterfire. In August, McDonnell had declared, “It’s time for an Anti-Nazi League-type cultural and political campaign to resist” because “we can no longer ignore the rise of far-right politics in our society.”

The bankrupt politics of the SWP-led Anti-Nazi League, and the UAF and Stand Up To Racism provide no way forward. Counterfire, a splinter group from the SWP, most accurately defines the pro-capitalist perspective of Stand Up To Racism, based on appeals to the institutions of the state and its political representatives: “The central job for everyone anxious about the rise of the far right is to call out Robinson and his core supporters as the Nazis they are, to drive them out of mainstream politics and off our streets” (emphasis added). “Of course there are different approaches to tackling the far right and those need to be respected and discussed. But on the 17 November we need to be marching together.”

It is precisely the politics of the “mainstream” parties and the media—their continual promotion of anti-migrant chauvinism amid the constantly escalating attacks on the working class—from which the far right gains strength. Political figures such as former UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage and Robinson have been afforded blanket media coverage, while last week, the US fascist Steve Bannon spoke at the Oxford Union and was interviewed by BBC Scotland at the News Xchange conference in Edinburgh.

By contrast, not a single national newspaper reported Saturday’s demonstration, focusing instead on a much smaller protest of around 6,000 people organised by the Extinction Rebellion environmental group. The group organised a peaceful sit-in on five of London’s bridges—Southwark, Blackfriars, Waterloo, Westminster and Lambeth—that lasted for most of the day. The media reported with barely disguised glee the 85 arrests made by police, under the provisions of the Highway Act.

The only way to halt the growth of the far-right is by breaking with all the pro-capitalist parties and trade unions whose betrayals over decades have allowed the fascists to channel social discontent in a reactionary course. In the UK, this means opposing the suppression of the class struggle by the trade unions and Corbyn’s Labour Party. It demands the building of a genuinely independent socialist movement based on the mobilisation of the working class across Europe and internationally.

France shaken by mass protests

Alex Lantier

On Saturday, protests against French President Emmanuel Macron’s fuel tax hike saw an elemental outpouring of pent-up anger against social inequality. After a series of calls for protests and road blockades in social media in recent weeks, 287,710 people wearing yellow vests joined 2,034 blockades and go-slow operations across France. Last night, tens of thousands were still protesting a measure that would break the monthly budgets of workers commuting to their jobs.

They are part of an international wave of protests spreading across Europe. In Belgium, protesters are blockading oil refineries in solidarity with the French protests, while fuel tax protests have also erupted in Bulgaria and Serbia. Amid an upsurge of the class struggle in Europe, there are ferry strikes and a public sector strike against the pro-austerity Syriza government in Greece; the Bucharest metro strike; and Amazon and Ryanair strikes in Germany and across the continent.

Broad opposition to existing social conditions is mounting. “For the average Frenchman who works and gets a wage, it is getting really hard. … We are proud to pay our taxes, but this is too much,” one protester told BFM TV. He added that he is opposing problems that accumulated “over decades,” to cries of “Macron resign” from protesters holding signs saying “No to the president of the rich.”

Three-quarters of French people support the protests, amid anger at austerity, Macron’s cuts to pensions, and his decision to tax workers while slashing the Tax on Wealth (ISF) on millionaires.

“The fuel tax was the feather that broke the camel’s back, but it goes far beyond that,” protesters near Marseille told the WSWS. “We are sure there are other solutions, we are tired of being led by private interests. We would like a return to democracy, wage increases, cuts in taxes paid by working people, the right to cast blank votes and to decide on all important laws via referendums. We are sure there are many solutions. The population must take back political power.”

The movement is socially heterogeneous, drawing in workers, independent truck drivers and small businessmen. While there are undoubtedly politically reactionary elements among the demonstrators, they constitute a small minority. The attempts by the union bureaucracy to blackguard these protests as a far-right provocation are politically slanderous. The real purpose of lying misrepresentations of the mass demonstration is to justify the efforts of the reactionary trade unions to suppress and discredit opposition to the government.

The Stalinist General Confederation of Labor (CGT) union distributed leaflets at workplaces calling on workers not to join blockades; CGT boss Philippe Martinez said he would not join the protests, claiming they are led by the far right: “The CGT cannot march alongside such parties and individuals. … They are not our model, we will not march alongside them.”

Insofar as there is a danger of right-wing or far-right forces profiting from the protests, this is above all because the organizations presenting themselves as “left” support Macron. This allows the right to posture as the sole opposition to a French president who is seen as a symbol of austerity and militarism across Europe. Just this spring, the CGT effectively isolated and strangled the rail workers’ strike against the privatization of the National Railways (SNCF), calling for an end to the strike despite 95 percent opposition among rail workers to Macron’s attack on the SNCF.

Now, as mass opposition erupts outside the usual trade union channels, the entire ruling elite, both right and supposedly “left,” is in shock and fears that the movement will take on an ever more working-class character. Macron, who only last week lavished praise on the fascist Marshal Pétain, who ruled France between 1940 and 1942 on behalf of Hitler, is hostile and impervious to protesters’ demands. Traveling to Berlin to meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel and discuss plans for a European army, at a cost of €300 billion to French taxpayers by 2023, Macron took no questions on the protests.

Speaking on the protests in a France2 TV interview yesterday evening, Prime Minister Édouard Philippe pledged to maintain the fuel tax hike: “The course we have set, we will continue to follow it. It is not when the wind starts blowing that you change course.” He denounced the Yellow Vests, saying that they produced “scenes that look like anarchy.”

Macron’s opponent in the 2017 elections, neo-fascist Marine Le Pen, did not seek to whip up more protests but called on him to back down, so that the protest can be rapidly brought to a close: “75 percent of Frenchmen supported and support this movement, which should encourage the government to be modest and take rapid decisions. … I encourage the government to show it gets the message and take decisions that bring back peace.”

As for the various political allies of the CGT, who initially reacted with disinterest and hostility to the protest calls on social media, they are only trying to arrange a political mechanism to get the eruption of social opposition back under control.

Jean-Luc Mélenchon called for the “success” of the protests on his blog only after his Unsubmissive France (LFI) party held an internal debate over whether to back fuel taxes on ecological grounds, and LFI official Clémentine Autain announced that she would not attend the protests. The Pabloite New Anticapitalist Party (NPA), for its part, called on “trade unions, NGOs and political parties to continue the struggle” launched by the Yellow Vests.

In fact, the central lesson from Saturday’s protest is that, amid growing social anger across Europe, genuine opposition can only emerge outside of the stranglehold of the union bureaucracies and their political allies, such as LFI and the NPA in France. Now that such opposition has emerged, it is critical that it not be suppressed. The questions of building workers’ organizations of struggle independent of the unions, and building a vanguard in the working class raising the question of political power, are decisive.

Much can be learned from the struggles of the 1930s. In his article “Committees Of Action—Not People’s Front,” written less than a year before the eruption of the 1936 French general strike, Leon Trotsky stressed the critical question of the independent organization of the struggles of the working class:

The greatest danger in France lies in the fact that the revolutionary energy of the masses will be dissipated in spurts, in isolated explosions … and give way to apathy. Only conscious traitors or hopeless muddle-heads are capable of thinking that in the present situation it is possible to hold the masses immobilized up to the moment when they will be blessed from above by the government ... The task of the proletarian party consists not in checking and paralyzing these movements but in unifying them and investing them with the greatest possible force.

Amid a renewed upsurge of the international class struggle, this appeal acquires intense political relevance.

But the most critical issue of all is the construction of a Marxist leadership in the French and European working class. Only in this way will it be possible for the growing mass movement to assume a politically conscious socialist character and unify the European working class in struggle against the capitalist system.

India-Japan Relations: Proximity to the Indo-Pacific Strategy

Sandip Kumar Mishra

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made his third visit to Japan on 28-29 October 2018 to attend 13th Annual Summit with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Both countries reiterated their commitment to the Special Strategic and Global Partnership and issued a vision statement that reviewed past achievements since the last meeting, and laid out a new plan for the future. An important developments was the agreement to upgrade their 2+2 dialogue involving the defence and foreign ministers of the two countries. Earlier, these dialogues were held at the junior ministerial levels. Japan also agreed to release the next installment of the Official Development Assistance (ODA) for the high-speed train project linking Mumbai and Ahmadabad. However, the most reported achievement was the raising of the existing bilateral currency swap agreement to US$ 75 billion from the previous US$ 50 billion to provide greater stability to the Indian Rupee.

India-Japan relations have been consistently good, except for the temporary period of Japanese disappointment with India's 1998 nuclear tests. The historical and cultural connect between both countries provide the foundation for these good relations, along with Japan’s generous economic help to India under its ODA programme for decades. Modi and Abe's strong personal chemistry. which adds further mutual trust between the two countries, is also well known. Overall, bilateral relations have been placed in a of win-win framework.

The goodwill demonstrated in bilateral exchanges is considered an important element of forging a common stand on the regional order by both India and Japan. However, many argue that it is in fact the other way round, on the basis of both countries needing each other to deal with regional and global issues, which has allowed an expansion of the bilateral relationship. Whatever be the case, the general perception is that similar to the bilateral, Japan and India are also similar in their approaches and orientation towards regional issues. 

Why is this assertion significant? India and Japan both share common concerns in the rise of an ‘assertive’ China that wants to ‘revise’ Asia's economic and security order. They also share a friendship with the US, which has been committed to maintaining the status quo by countering China. The US has been trying to do so bilaterally as well as through the partnerships with allies and friends in the region. The US push, support and encouragement for the Indo-Pacific, which was initially largely articulated by Japan and Australia, is symbolic of the US' willingness to create a network of countries to deal with China’s ‘assertiveness’. The US would definitely like two of its close friends in Asia - Japan and India - to work along with an eager Australia to take lead in the Indo-Pacific strategy. 

Clearly, the push-and-pull factors of regional politics bring India and Japan close to each other. However, there are nuanced divergences in the Indian and Japanese stands vis-à-vis the Indo-Pacific strategy. Japan apparently wants China excluded from the Indo-Pacific strategy and indirectly identifies China as a threat to a ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’. Thus, for Japan, the Indo-Pacific strategy is the first choice to deal with China. India has slightly different position. India still hopes that China can be persuaded to the 'right' track and to play by the rules of the game. It is for this reason that Modi sought a ‘reset’ of India-China relations after his informal summit with the Chinese President Xi Jinping in Wuhan in April 2018. Modi further discussed this new approach towards China in his speech at the Shangri La Dialogue in June 2018, where, while talking about the Indo-Pacific, he used the word ‘inclusiveness’ multiple times. He did not name China directly at any point, but it was clear that he was alluding to China and its inclusion in the Indo-Pacific. More recently, on 16 November, he said that a "great wall of trust and cooperation" must be build between India and China. To be sure, India does not appear to be against the Indo-Pacific strategy as a means to counter-balance China, but is reluctant to make this its first choice. India has still not moved to a fundamentally realist understanding of the region and believes that concessions must be made for constructive neutrality.

For the same reason, there have been murmurings in Japan, Australia and the US about India’s slow, insufficient and less vocal participation in the Indo-Pacific strategy, for which India has its own valid explanations. India-Japan relations must have the space to allow for India’s constructive reluctance, while also making progress on in-depth and wide-ranging cooperation on the bilateral front.