Open Forum

New Delhi, 18 July 2008

Political Confusion in Delhi

HAS CONGRESS WRITTEN OF FUTURE?

By T.D. Jagadesan

As the Communist Party (M)-led Left drives the knife deeper and deeper into the Congress-led UPA Government at the Centre, especially after the Karnataka electorate gave no quarter to any Left Party and foiled the Congress’s ambition to ride back to power in that State, Congressmen are stated to be in a penitent and retrospective mood.

The confusion in the ruling party at the Centre is magnified by the crisis of inflation that has already hit growth in the last two quarters and is all set to intensify if experts are to be believed.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, being an economist of repute, should know in depth what growth and inflation mean. He assures the country that his Government would ride both the horses at the same time. He told a recent business chamber (Assocham) meeting: “our Government is focused on reversing the recent surge in headline inflation rates. It has been our endeavour to tame inflationary expectations without hurting the rhythm of the growth process and also to protect the weaker sections against rising prices.”

Even as Dr. Singh was announcing this “endeavour” the inflation rate crossed the 8% barrier and manufacturing growth slumped once again. His reply to this situation is: “I am confident that the mix of policies we have adopted will yield results once the impact of a normal monsoon is felt.” That of course is a clever political statement as it leaves a door open if the policy mix does not work: a bad monsoon.

For the time being, let us give Manmohan Singh full marks for his policy mix. What is the policy mix he has in mind? He says it would be growth-oriented. He rules out going back to the era of blind controls. At the same time, we have to have the fiscal means to protect the poor from the adverse impact of inflation.

All right, agreed. We need not even dispute his contention that on oil prices, the “protection” offered to the people by raising the prices only marginally “cannot continue for ever.”

The question should be: What prevents the Centre from implementing this “policy mix”? Regarding the “key priority areas” (in his own words) “of infrastructure, agriculture and education,” his Minister in charge of road building is busy changing the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) Chief every six months because, according to reports, the official selected each time fails to satisfy the Minister’s demands.

Meanwhile, the rollout of the great projects that the NDA launched like the Golden Quadrilateral has decelerated. The Indian Express reported on May 30: “Last year, the national highway projects crawled the slowest ever.” The Minister concerned at the same time is very much concerned with pushing the “infrastructure” for an industrial unit set up by his son as was revealed in the last days of the last session of Parliament.

As for education, the Minister in charge is all focused not so much on expansion etc., but on pushing his idea of quotas. Among those who are chafing over the politicization of inclusive growth are his own colleagues who think that he is targeting the Prime Minister. All reports on recent Cabinet meetings and on the Congress leadership consultations have revealed this attempt to politicize the quota issue.

The higher educational institutions are groaning under the Arjun Singh effect as the senior Congressman from Madhya Pradesh is trying to hijack the OBC quota issue to preen his own nest and promote the Prime Ministerial candidate-in-waiting in the Congress Party. It appears that only the Prime Minister and his Finance Minister are talking of what Manmohan Singh described as “open economies and open societies functioning within consensually arrived at rules of the game.”

Nobody else in their Party was ever heard of pushing the envelope on economic reforms that are pending for several years now. For instance, the ones on banking, insurance and power. Even the attempt to disinvest Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) without losing Government control over them is blocked by some within the UPA and mostly by the Left that till yesterday had the final say on economic reforms.

Interestingly, the Left is no wiser. It is riven with dissensions as reality hits it on both sides. In the Left-ruled West Bengal the recent upsets the Marxists suffered in the panchayat elections have hit the “reformist” Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya hard. He had to announce that there was no going back on industrialization after several of his Partymen questioned the wisdom of the industrialization policy he has been pushing through against much opposition from within and without.

No Party in the past has written out its own death warrant as the Congress is apparently doing now with the Left achieving its political objective of breaking the Congress hold on the country and the latter kowtowing to it. ---INFA

(Copyright, India News and Feature Alliance)