Congress manifesto shifts focus from Hindutva to livelihood

rahul-congress-manifesto-arvind Congress president Rahul Gandhi answers questions on the manifesto at the AICC headquarters in New Delhi | Arvind Jain

If 'Congress will Deliver' is the theme on which the party's manifesto for the coming Lok Sabha polls is based, 'Garibi par vaar, bahatar hazaar' will be its war cry for the elections. The political intent behind this is to set a narrative that emphasises upon Prime Minister Narendra Modi's perceived inability to deliver on his promises and focusses on bread and butter issues at a time when the ruling dispensation is playing up issues of nationalism and Hindutva.

“My instruction to the manifesto committee was that whatever we put in it has to be truthful. Not a single thing that is a lie can be in it. We are anyway hearing a large number of lies being spoken by the prime minister himself,” Congress president Rahul Gandhi said at the function held at the AICC headquarters to release the manifesto, whose cover carries the slogan 'Congress will Deliver'.

The Congress' effort in these elections is to focus on Modi's 'unkept' promises, especially with regard to jobs, addressing farmers' issues and fighting corruption. The party, in its manifesto, has made a conscious effort to emphasise upon the doability of its promises.

It is evident, for example, in the big bang proposal of Nyuntam Aay Yojana (NYAY), which Rahul has described as the “final assault on poverty”, and under which the party has promised to put Rs 72,000 per annum into the accounts of five crore poorest families of the country.

“Congress believes that the size of India's GDP and the level of total expenditure (Central and state governments) allow us to undertake an ambitious programme of cash transfer to the poorest sections of the people without in anyway affecting the goal of fiscal prudence,” states the manifesto.

Rahul Gandhi took a dig at Modi's promise of providing two crore jobs a year, saying it was now clear that he had lied, and said that his party's pledge, in contrast, is to fill all four lakh central government and institutional vacancies before March, 2020. He also emphasised that his party had fulfilled its promise of waiving loans of farmers in the states of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Punjab and Karnataka.

The Congress' effort of shifting the narrative of the elections to livelihood matters is also made apparent by the manifesto, with the highlight of the pre-poll document being NYAY, which promises to eliminate poverty by the year 2030, and which lays special emphasis on the issues of unemployment and agrarian distress.

Asked how his party intended to change the narrative of the election from issues of nationalism and Hindutva, which form the mainstay of the election campaign of the ruling BJP, Rahul said the narrative was set, remarking that it worked on the contrast between the prime minister, who he accused of helping his crony capitalist friends, and the Congress, which wanted to help the poor through schemes such as NYAY.

“The narrative for these elections is based on employment, farmers' issues and NYAY. The BJP is trying to shift the narrative. But that cannot happen,” he said.