How Modi has hijacked Congress legacy

Congress had kept the ingredients of a welfare structure ready. The Prime Minister mixed them together and added the Modi ‘tadka’ to sell them as his.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has slowly, but with sharp focus and political craftiness, appropriated much of the Congress-led governments’ welfare legacy. From Aadhaar to the Direct Benefit Transfer scheme, and from MGNREGS to rural housing — the Modi government has made several of the Congress’ marquee initiatives its own, helping the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) project itself as the great saviour of rural India, as against its predominantly Brahmin Bania image earlier.

With Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s  rural booster through an additional Rs 40,000 crore under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) — a rural job programme conceptualised and introduced by the UPA 1 government — Modi’s dispensation has underscored its commitment to the scheme and to use it to the hilt at the time of an unprecedented crisis.

A hold over rural India was the strength of the Congress as a national party, which has gradually eroded with it ceding space to the earlier more urban-centric BJP. But more significant than the electoral and political implications of this is the symbolism of it all — Modi using Congress’ initiatives to lay the ground of his pro-welfare image.

And how has this been possible? Simply because somewhere down the line, the Congress was foolish enough to abandon its own creations, or not market them as a substantive legacy. Modi, on the other hand, has been clever enough to know the importance of slyly using his rival’s initiatives and then, going on to make them seem like his babies.

Govt’s stimulus package a glorified loan mela

If you are not a politician, you will look at the Modi government’s economic stimulus package with dismay. What was meant to be a massive economic stimulus package has turned out to be a glorified loan mela.

The government could have announced big projects and given contracts to private companies. It could have subsidised inputs such as power, coal, steel and cement. It could have tied tax incentives to job creation. Companies could have been given financial aid to pay salaries, like several governments across the world have done. Income tax holidays could have been given to people in the middle-income group, so that they had more money to spend on goods and services.

It is true that liquidity has been a problem in some parts of the economy. One big reason for that is the government’s own move to tackle India’s huge bad-loan problem. This has scared banks, who now think twice before lending to businesses or individuals. That’s why people with dicey credit records are finding it tough to get car and housing loans. Small businesses, whose margins have shrunk due to the economic slowdown are not getting loans from banks. Real estate and power are two sectors where most of the bad loans are concentrated and are starved of credit. Most businesses in India run through a web of patronage. Government policies are tweaked to help big companies with political capital. Corporates with close ties to state governments and influential politicians get government contracts. These companies, in turn, subcontract work to smaller companies which are close to politicians who need to be kept happy. These companies get easy loans, especially from public sector banks.

Ground reality - In an economy where the future seems uncertain, neither businesses nor consumers are likely to borrow...

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मध्यम वर्ग देश की विकास प्रक्रिया के लिए अत्यंत महत्वपूर्ण है। उदाहरण के लिए:

एक मजबूत मध्यम वर्ग सुशिक्षित होने के कारण मानव पूँजी के विकास को प्रोत्साहित करता है।

यह माँग का एक स्थायी आधार निर्मित करता है और उद्योगों के विकास में सहायता करता है।

इस वर्ग द्वारा की गई बचत का प्रयोग निवेश के एक स्रोत के रूप में किया जा सकता है जो भारतीय अर्थव्यवस्था की संवृद्धि को आगे बढ़ा सकता है।

कर संग्रहण में इनका महत्वपूर्ण योगदान रहता है, जिसका प्रयोग आगे चलकर आय के पुनर्वितरण और सार्वजनिक वस्तुओं व अवसंरचना के विकास में किया जाता है।

मध्यम वर्ग के उभार के साथ-साथ राजनीतिक संस्थाओं की गुणवत्ता भी सुधरती है क्योंकि यह वर्ग अपेक्षाकृत अधिक जागरूक व अपने अधिकारों के लिए संघर्ष को लेकर अधिक प्रतिबद्ध होता है।

मध्यम वर्ग समाज के आधुनिकीकरण में अग्रणी भूमिका निभाता है और इस प्रकार वह समाज को अधिक गतिशील व लचीला बनाता है।

और यह भी सत्य है की इस सरकार की नितियो का पुरज़ोर विरोध नहीं किया गया तो मध्यम वर्ग विलुप्त हो जाएगा.. आगे आप सब विद्वान और शिक्षित है... या तो आप ग़रीबों की तरह वोट बैंक बनिए या फिर अमीरों की तरह बैंक..