On this day of 7th April 2014, we would yet
again create history as the world’s largest democratic process will kick start
from Assam and Tripura while nearly 815 billion voters are ready to cast their
vote. If news channels, their opinion polls and BJP’s Prime Ministerial nominee
Mr. Narendra Modi’s claims are to be taken into consideration, then they’ve
already won the elections. Oh no, I was not referring to the tampering of EVM
machines in Assam recently where even if you vote for the Congress, the vote automatically
goes to the BJP. Probably it is this sheer confidence of Mr. Modi and his party
that they thought that releasing a manifesto and shelling out their vision and
policies on issues of prime importance too mainstream. They finally decided to
have some mercy on the voters of this country and finally released it today.
Yes, on a day when polling begins.
But even after taking so long to release a manifesto
and being attacked severely by the opposition, the BJP manifesto appears to be
too bleak and shallow when it comes to suggesting strong economic reforms or
even welfare schemes for the poor. Despite huge sections of it being
shamelessly picked up from the Congress manifesto, so much so that even the
date appears to be 26th March 2014 (the same day when Congress
released its manifesto), the manifesto hardly finds any mention addressing key
problems faced by the farmers and labourers which constitute the majority of
Indian population. While the manifesto gives huge descriptions when it comes to
corporates for obvious reasons, sections such as agriculture, labour, water,
energy, science and technology and environment are hugely neglected with mere
token mentions. Let us now look at some of the key highlights of the BJP
manifesto and the kind of policies they want to implement and their past stand
on that. After all, it has had a history coloured with hypocrisy and double
standards.
The manifesto which starts with the tagline ‘Ek Bharat,
Shresta Bharat’ though have nothing to resonate with its history both in its
current capacity and its earlier avatar as the Janata Party or Jana Sangh, goes
ahead promising to strengthen Panchayati Raj institutions, the passage of the
very same bill which it opposed earlier saying that it was a conspiracy by the
Centre, an attack to the federal structure and an overburden to the state
expenditure. It further goes ahead promising to promote north-eastern states
and its growth while it deprives the people of this region from their policies
as they go for polls without even knowing what vision they have to run the country.
Nothing can be more insulting then this to the voters of this region where the
voter turnout today reached almost over 80%. Another shallow and disturbing
point in their manifesto is about Article 370 which merely says that a
discussion with stakeholders committed to its abrogation shall be held in Jammu
and Kashmir. In what context and in which capacity, no one really knows. It
also promises to send all Kashmiri Pandits back with dignity, a point which is
nothing but laughable given their track record of handling refugees during the
ugly riots of 2002.
As we move ahead, we come across a tiny line which
promises to setup strong Lokpal institutions in the country. We all know how
cunningly Mr. Modi fought tooth and nail to avoid the setup of an independent Lokayukta
in the state of Gujarat and how BJP initially didn’t let the Lokpal Bill pass
in the Rajya Sabha after it got passed in the Lok Sabha. It also promises to
reduce the number of cases where government is a litigant. This coming from a
party whose Prime Ministerial candidate, in the capacity of being the Chief
Minister of Gujarat probably has the highest number of petitions in the courts
than any other state government in the country, thereby wasting huge amounts of
exchequers money. The manifesto also sets to introduce specialised universities
in non-conventional fields like forensics and international law. The last time they
tried to introduce non-conventional fields of study, they ended up introducing
astrology as an important subject in the universities by Murli Manohar Joshi as
the HRD minister. Now with Mr. Joshi being also the Chairman of BJP’s manifesto
committee, atleast I’m not very optimistic.
But what is more laughable is the party promising to
implement schemes which are the pet projects of the UPA and primarily the
Congress, that let me remind you were until the last few weeks poll gimmicks for
them. They lashed out session after session to oppose these bills right from
Right to Education to the MNREGA to the Food Security Act and now shamelessly
ended up promising the same things in their manifesto. So much so that it eve
promised expedition of freight corridors and attendant of industrial corridors
started primarily by the Congress. Its foreign policy being limited to only expansion
and empowerment of pool of diplomats just reflects their lack of global vision.
Let alone handle crucial international crisis and their position to tackle neighbouring
countries.
The BJP in this election has again brought back the
issue of interlinking of rivers which it tried to implement decades back under
the NDA rule but couldn’t due to huge opposition from various quarters. A group
of concerned experts argue that the idea of transferring flood waters to arid
or drought-prone areas is flawed because there will be hardly any
flood-moderation and the project would not benefit drylands in any case.
Arguing that water from 'surplus' basins needs to be transferred to 'deficit'
ones is unscientific. 'Rivers are not pipelines' - the group says while arguing
against creation of a national water grid.
However what is most disturbing is the return of the
building of the Ram temple in Ayodhya which clearly marks the end of the
Vajpayee era and has been clearly done to polarise the voters. We all know
about the infamous demolition of the Babri Masjid in the wake of the Ram Janmabhoomi
movement being executed by the BJP and the latest Cobrapost sting further
reiterates the point. The party also promises to implement a Uniform Civil Code
for gender equality. With the RSS mainly running the show from behind, it’s not
difficult to guess which way the wind will flow as far as the uniform civil
code is concerned. Another scary point suggested in the manifesto is to build a
consensus to hold the assembly and general elections together. It is
particularly scary after Modi protégé Mr. Amit Shah’s statement in an election
rally in UP’s riot affected villages where he said that it’s time to take
revenge and that once Modi comes to power, he’ll overthrow ‘Mullah-Mulayam’s
sarkaar’.
Among other issues in the manifesto that clearly shows
their double standards and hypocrisy is their promise to introduce the Goods
and Services Tax or the GST by all states which is though the need of the hour
but was not being able to be implemented by the UPA primarily because of Mr.
Narendra Modi’s opposition to it. And when it says that it would eradicate
untouchability and manual scavenging, Mr. Modi should look at his own state of
Gujarat where even after 12 years of rule and huge uproar by human right
activists, it has failed to protect the rights of Dalits and recently a huge
number of them converted to Buddhism which again was stopped by Modi by using
the draconian and unconstitutional anti-conversion laws. They say that they’ll
reduce anaemia among women in the country. How will they when the highest percentages
of anaemic women are in Gujarat?
It is rather unfortunate when BJP talks about the
minorities in their manifesto putting special emphasis on Muslims given the
fact that their Prime Ministerial candidate never apologised or even showed
remorse about the 2002 riots and always endorsed the action-reaction theory.
Morever his calling of the refugee camps as baby producing centres and phrases
like ‘Hum paanch, Humaare Pacchis’ are still fresh in people’s minds. And even
now when their UP-incharge goes into riot affected areas and says that it’s
time for revenge, there is little that the community can expect from them.
Other minorities like Christians, Sikhs, Parsees, Jains etc. don’t even find a
token mention in the manifesto. To remind you, it also failed to come up with a
vision document for the minorities which it itself promised a few months back.
Probably the bosses sitting in Nagpur didn’t quite like and support the idea.
To conclude I would say that apart from the fact that
the BJP was hugely ignorant and rather apprehensive from releasing a manifesto
and deferring it till the polling day, its overall a huge disappointment. The
very fact that issues related to women safety, LGBT rights and welfare schemes
for the poor doesn’t even find a mention their manifesto tells a lot about
their vision and thought process. The BJP manifesto is like an empty pandora’s
box which unlike the legend though has a lot of hype but in reality is very shallow
from the very core of its establishment. While the supporter of Mr. Modi hail
him as a Vikas Purush and calls his main opponent Mr. Rahul Gandhi too timid, I
would like to end this piece by quoting Prof
JS Bandukwala as what he told me while I met him to shoot the
documentary ‘The Gujarat Promise’. He said ‘I would rather have a timid person,
than a prejudiced person as the Prime Minister of this country’. I think that
kind of sums it all.
For all sorts of bouquets and brickbats feel free to
leave a comment below or mail me at author.vish94@gmail.com
