Statement of the Central Committee of the Communist Ghadar Party of India,
February 16, 2011
The Central Committee of the Communist Ghadar Party of India condemns the Manmohan Singh government for political persecution of Indians resident abroad, and for attacking the rights of Indian workers to visit their motherland.
Statement of the Central Committee of the Communist Ghadar Party of India,
February 16, 2011
The Central Committee of the Communist Ghadar Party of India condemns the Manmohan Singh government for political persecution of Indians resident abroad, and for attacking the rights of Indian workers to visit their motherland.
India belongs to all Indians, particularly her workers, peasants and progressive intelligentsia. Millions of our people have migrated over the decades to foreign lands in search of livelihood. They have been forced to leave their beloved homeland and go to far away places because of lack of opportunities for work in our country. However, our people have retained their patriotic spirit and love for the homeland, and they have taught their children the same love, through generations. From the time of the Hindustani Ghadar Party to today, countless men and women of Indian origin in North America, Britain, Australia and other countries have gone back to the motherland to fight against exploitation, oppression and injustice, for a bright future for our people. Indian workers abroad send back their hard earned remittances to their families back home. Many of them invest time and money in community work to uplift the conditions of people in their villages back home. Many of them have invested huge amount of funds for the development of their schools, colleges and universities back home in India. This is the case with migrants from all regions of our country. The economic contribution of migrants, especially workers has been the main reason for the foreign exchange surplus of the government, as admitted by the government itself.
Indians who have migrated to other countries have had to fight racist discrimination by the governments of these countries. In the countries of West Asia, they are treated as second class citizens with no rights. The Indian government not only turns a blind eye to attacks on rights of Indian workers in other countries, it carries out savage political persecution of our people.
The government is denying visas to people who have political views opposed to itself. It denies visas to Indians because they denounce the human rights violations by the Indian state. It denies visas to people who uphold the view that only communism can save India. It denies visas to people who have a different vision of how India should be organized so that prosperity and progress is assured for all peoples and communities. The Central Committee of the CGPI considers this a fascist attack on the rights of Indians abroad as Indians, and completely unacceptable. Our party upholds that all Indians, no matter what citizenship they formally have, have the right and duty to work for the progress and prosperity of India and they have the right to exercise their conscience. The Indian state is violating the right to conscience by denying visas to people on the basis of their views which may not be to the liking of the state. CGPI condemns this attack on human rights of Indians resident abroad by the Indian state.
The Indian state is using the issue of visas as a vehicle to exploit Indian workers abroad. It has demanded that Indians resident abroad surrender their former Indian passports and pay huge fines if they are unable to do so. Lakhs of Indians who migrated in earlier decades and took up citizenship of other countries have lost their former passports. It makes no sense for the state to demand these passports, except to harass Indians resident abroad, and to make money through bribes and fines.
The CC of the CGPI calls upon all Indians to unite and condemn the Indian state for its persecution of Indians abroad. We call up upon the government of India to immediately stop the political persecution of our people resident abroad!
Lal Singh, General Secretary
Communist Ghadar Party of India