Sometimes it seems, with good reason, that India doesn’t really need an enemy to hurt it from the outside so long as it has the Modi administration to force it to implode from within. For most of the steps he has taken, especially with regard to the economy, have backfired. His latest smart idea that failed was feeding the agriculture sector, which engages about 70 percent of the population and accounts for 15 percent of India’s economy, to the open market. Farmers, henceforth, would have to sell all their produce to corporations instead of state agencies that at least guaranteed reasonable prices. Remember this is a country prone to farmer suicides because of cases of bad harvests which leave farmers helpless and unable to cover their debts. More than 300,000 Indian farmers have killed themselves for just such reasons in the last three decades alone and they are now certain that Modi’s latest so-called reforms are going to be the last nail in their coffin. That is why they have set up camps in and around New Delhi, blocking roads and chanting slogans in protest. Surely all this is very embarrassing for the BJP government since these protests threaten to unravel the country’s food basket. And since poverty, especially in the periphery, is one of India’s biggest problems, any bottlenecks in the agriculture supply chain can make the difference between life and death for a very large number of Indians. If Modi thought these protests would just evaporate on their own he was clearly wrong. If anything they are growing quite fast and gaining momentum. A crueler way of dealing with them, which is what the Indian government seems to be considering very seriously, is what is called ‘starving them out’. They are poor farmers, after all, and there’s only so long that they can afford to sit and block roads in the capital for. Soon enough their pockets, and pressing needs at home, will force them to tear down their tents and go back to where they came from. But even if it comes to that it would hardly be the end of the matter. Policy after landmark policy of the BJP is being resoundingly rejected by the people of India. There are grave omens in this for the ruling party in New Delhi. *