Multi-talented Yogendra Yadav’s 7-point action plan to revive the economy after the Chinese coronavirus pandemic is nothing short of a Bollywood potboiler. When the plan was unveiled on Friday evening, most people, including some of the people who had endorsed the action plan which even 14-year-olds could’ve written, were appalled. Hours after it started getting public backlash, Ramachandra Guha distanced himself from the so-called ‘action plan’ claiming he never agreed to it to begin with.
“All resources (cash, real estate, property, bonds, etc) with the citizens or within the nation must be treated as national resources available during the crisis,” the document stated, which drew a lot of flak, with people calling it authoritarian.
The ‘Historian’ Ramachandra Guha, wearing his ‘economist’ hat had signed the document. However, following the outrage, Guha chickened out initially to say that he did not approve the final contents of the document, creating more confusion over the real intention behind such intellectual dishonesty.
Ram Guha’s now deleted tweet 
Ram Guha’s now deleted tweet
Ramchandra Guha took to Twitter to announce that the clause that was presented to him during the discussion and the clause that was finally printed were vastly different, referring to clause 7.1.
Guha further said that this version did not have the approval of many signatories and has a “taken the attention away from the many sensible suggestions made in the Statement”.
Following his rejection of the original content, social media users began to mock the intellectual dishonesty of the ‘historian’, leading Guha to delete his series of tweets all together.
Ashutosh Varshney does ‘social distancing’ with Yogendra Yadav’s idea of nationalising private properties
Another intellectual Professor Ashutosh Varshney, echoing similar sentiments as Ramachandra Guha, took to Twitter to make a flip-flop over his earlier endorsement to the draconian idea nationalising private property.
As celebrated leftist trolls, journalists raised apprehensions about his endorsement to nationalising private properties in the country, Varshney brought in his academic rhetoric to clarify that the original idea presented to him was different to the one which was released in the public and indirectly rejected making any endorsement to the idea of snatching resources from the public.
Varshney responding to tweet by Journalist Shekhar Gupta said that “the writers of the statement are returning to the original draft.”
Another flip flop by Varshney and Ramchandra Guha
After facing severe wrath from the public for coming up with so-called ‘action plan’, Yogendra Yadav came up with a new ‘reformulated’ version of the original document.
Taking to Twitter, Yogendra Yadav said that “Pt 7.1 has attracted undue attention & interpreted to mean a call for nationalisation/expropriation of private property. This was far from our intention.”
He added that now, the clause has been reformulated to state, “The government must explore emergency ways of raising resources going beyond the usual set of taxes and levies to cope with the problem of funding large relief packages”
Guha, who had earlier, distanced himself from the clause in the plan, said that the new point in the statement is now appropriate and that the controversy over this should be put at rest. Interestingly, Guha who had deleted his earlier tweet, jumped back into the scene to indirectly push the same idea, but with a different tone and tenor.
“The new pt 7.1 in the Mission Jai Hind Statement is extremely appropriate and all controversy should now be set at rest. I trust that fellow citizens shall focus on the many important recommendations in our plan and will urge Central and State Governments to implement it,” he said.
Intellectual Varshney, who had earlier rejected of endorsing the plan, returned back with much vigour to make a u-turn and claim that raising revenue to address mass suffering is the basic issue and the idea was not to expropriate. He too endorsed the new clause, which more or less endorsed the original idea of snatching away the hard-earned wealth of common masses, but now with a different approach.
The controversial ‘seven-point action plan’ was endorsed by ‘intellectuals’ like Abhijit Sen, Yogendra Yadav, Ramchandra Guha, Deepak Nayyar, Harsh Mander, Ashutosh Varshney, Bezwada Wilson and Amit Basole among others.
With Prof Varshney and Ram Guha on the same page as Yadav, we look forward to other signees to wake up and let us know about the latest twist.
