The Congress party’s manifesto for the 16th Lok Sabha election, released Wednesday, has Rahul Gandhi’s stamp on it with its stress on 70 crore Indians who are above the poverty line but are yet to reach middle class status and need to be assisted in skill enhancement through a 15-point push. This, indeed, is at the heart of the Congress’ new thinking unveiled by Mr Gandhi when he was officially named his party’s campaign chief, and has now been given the formal status of a pledge through the election charter.
Whether this avatar of the “aam aadmi”, whom the Congress had foregrounded, supports the party in this election will become clear soon enough (Narendra Modi’s BJP is also wooing this segment), it is evident where the Congress’ focus for the foreseeable future lies. Enhancing this group’s skills for employment in industry, and helping it with finance for self-employment, is not a woolly way to raise employment and economic output, provided there is an enabling investment climate — an aspect not helped in UPA’s second spell through retrospective taxation highlighted in the Vodafone case and in slowing down of decision-making due to delayed environmental clearances.
Taking on board the criticism that the Congress allowed its tenure in government, especially of late, to dwell on welfarism at the expense of industry (this sense persists despite the delivery of near eight per cent rate growth in UPA’s 10 years), Mr Gandhi underlined his outreach to industry and business as the manifesto was being released without giving up on the mission to take people out of poverty.
There’s a ring of truth in what he said that “the country cannot grow by neglecting business or the poor”. To help business and industry, the Congress’ accent this time is on creating transparency in the system during the allocation of natural resources (such as coal or spectrum, which had proved the bane of UPA-2’s existence) through smooth functioning of regulatory bodies. For the poor, the philosophy of entitlement continues to permeate the Congress’ thinking — and evidence of this is the stress on the Congress’ right to health initiative and its emphasis on homestead support for the landless. In that sense, the Congress’ basic political philosophy, within the larger framework of promoting “secularism” and combating “communal” and other divides, remains fundamentally unaltered, although changes have been made in the light of current realities.
While probing the idea of expanding caste-based reservations to private industry, the Congress has for the first time also factored in quotas based on economic criteria. The difficulties of implementation will lie in the practical sphere. As no other major party has come up with a manifesto, comparisons cannot yet be made.
