Congress manifesto

A political party out to regain power invariably promises the moon to the voters. And the Congress is no exception. Its 2019 election manifesto, twice as long as the 2014 document, caters to almost every section of the electorate. There is special focus on farmers, the vital vote bank that helped the Congress make a dramatic comeback in the Hindi heartland states of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh late last year. The promise of loan waiver, duly implemented soon after the party took charge in these states, had proved to be the game-changer; in 2017, it had done the trick in Punjab as well. Taking its pro-farmer policy to the next level, the Congress foresees a transition from ‘karz maafi’ (loan waiver) to ‘karz mukti’ (freedom from loans) through remunerative prices, lower input costs, and assured access to institutional credit. The innovative idea of presenting a separate Kisan Budget every year could give the farm sector another reason to support Rahul Gandhi and Co.

Apparently bitten by the BJP’s acronym bug, the grand old party has come up with NYAY (Nyuntam Aay Yojana), an ambitious minimum income guarantee scheme that promises Rs 72,000 per year to the poorest 20 per cent households in India. The scheme, a throwback to Indira Gandhi’s Garibi Hatao campaign of 1971, is likely to cost a whopping Rs 3.6 lakh crore annually. With the tagline, ‘Congress will deliver’ (Hum Nibhayenge), the manifesto aims to upstage the ruling BJP by offering a single ‘moderate’ rate of GST, scrapping the sedition law and amending the contentious Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act.

Though there is nothing sacrosanct or legally binding about poll manifestos, the Congress has stolen a march on the BJP by unveiling its document first, even as the roadmap for implementation leaves a lot to be desired. The saffron party, which is busy writing off the rival’s manifesto as a bundle of lies, would have to come up with something special to make the voters sit up and take notice.