Manifestos by political parties are usually released a few weeks before the start of elections so that the voters, media and analysts have ample time to study them and draw their conclusions.
It’s another matter that the voters hardly bother to read the manifestos in detail and would, in most cases, have already decided on whom to cast their votes.
But with barely a week to go for the first phase of elections to start, it’s surprising that the ruling party is yet to release its manifesto.
The Congress party too left it a little late as it released its manifesto only earlier this week. The manifesto has been commented upon extensively in the media. Running to more than 50 pages was prepared after 121 consultations with public organisations and 53 consultations with various experts including farmers, lawyers and economists, says the foreword of the document.
It has six sections, ranging from the economy to national security and governance.
Jobs, income support
The manifesto starts with jobs and promises that the four lakh vacancies in all “Central Public Sector Enterprises, Judiciary and Parliament will be filled before the end of March 2020”. It also promises to “link the definition of MSME to employment”, perhaps an acknowledgement of the sector’s potential to create jobs.
The ‘big bang’ income support NYAY (Nyuntam Aay Yojana) scheme, announced just a few days before the release of the manifesto, is perhaps its most important feature. The Congress has promised a ₹6,000 per month direct cash transfer to 20 per cent of the poorest families. The cash will be transferred directly to the bank accounts of the families and, to the extent possible, to women. According to the manifesto, this scheme will cost less than one per cent of GDP in the first year, less than 2 per cent in the second and less than three per cent in the third year.
The manifesto is, however, silent on two important aspects of the NYAY proposal — its funding and the identification of the 20 per cent poorest families in the absence of any credible income data. These two aspects have attracted a lot of comment in the media. All that the manifesto says is that the “scheme will be funded through new revenues and rationalisation of expenditure. Current merit subsidy schemes that are intended to achieve specific objectives will be continued,” without going into details. The party will also appoint an independent panel of experts comprising economists, social scientists and statisticians “to oversee the design, testing, rollout and implementation of the programme”.
Crucially, will the poorest 20 per cent families get this income support forever? The manifesto is, not surprisingly, silent on that.
Farm concerns, AFSPA
On agriculture, the Congress promises to present a separate ‘Kisan Budget’. It plans to set up a National Commission on Agriculture Development and Planning, and a Commission on Marginal Farmers and Agricultural Labour. Interestingly it says it will repeal the Agriculture Produce Market Committees Act, a legislation that has tied the Indian farmer to the trader for all these years.
Some of the Congress’ most surprising proposals are in the realm of governance and security. It commits to repealing the sedition law (a relic of the colonial era and a long-standing demand of the media), and says it will scrap criminal defamation, amend the AFSPA and do away with the electoral bond scheme. These proposals have already raised the hackles of the BJP, which is running a high-decibel campaign on “national security”. Some BJP leaders have gone to the extent of saying that the Congress proposals will lead to the ‘Balkanisation’ of the country.
As Yogendra Yadav, National President of Swaraj India and political analyst, reminds us in a recent column in The Print , the BJP, way back in December 2014 in the run-up to the J&K elections, had said that the ASFPA was not needed in Manipur.
Kashmir issue
The Congress has promised to talk, with an open mind, to all sections of the J&K political spectrum to bring peace and normalcy to the State. This is also something the BJP had attempted, under AB Vajpayee’s Prime Ministership, way back in 2000.
The glaring absence of any mention of the ‘cow’, which formed such an important part of the Congress manifesto in the Madhya Pradesh elections, is interesting. The Congress perhaps feels that its ‘soft Hindutva’ plank, which helped it win the recent Assembly elections in the Hindi heartland, has blunted the BJP edge on this issue. So it is probably more confident now about projecting a ‘liberal’, ‘secular’ face.
While the manifesto has many interesting proposals, it lacks crucial details. As Yadav rightly says, it is a right document at the wrong time.