Omkar Dattatray
Will Rahul Gandhi’s minimum income guarantee scheme for poorest of the poor in the country alleviate poverty in the country and will it be a final assault on India’s poverty or an assault on the poor itself is a million dollar question? Is Rahul Gandhi trying to implement and execute the unfinished agenda of his grandmother the then Prime Minister of India’s slogan and agenda of Garibi Hatao. But there is a big question mark on the efficacy and implementation of the minimum income scheme announced by Rahul Gandhi. How can it eliminate poverty from Indian masses? The sops, doles and subsidies cannot change the ground situation about poverty and thus Rahul Gandhi’s scheme is muddled with confusion about its modalities and way of implementation.
He has announced his scheme of minimum income guarantee in childish manner leaving details and intricacies as well as modalities of his scheme to his poll managers. Some rightly likened his minimum income scheme to the Garibi Hatho slogan of the Iron lady of India. It was in 1971 that the then PM of India gave the slogan of Garibi Hatao and it became Congress election campaign then and after.
This slogan and theme of ‘Garibi Hatao’ of Indra Gandhi had become very famous those days and altered whole narrative of political arithmetic in the past. But in spite of the sincere efforts of the successive centre governments headed by congress since 1971, the poverty alleviation schemes could not be translated into practice neither by Indra Gandhi nor by the successive Prime Ministers of India. Now the moot question is can the scion of Gandhi-Nehru dynasty kill the monster of poverty by his minimum income guarantee which he spelt recently. It seems that this is another wishful thinking of Rahul Gandhi and an election gimmick just to lure and entice voters in the general election. Once the election will be over and the election dust is settled, the poor will remain poor.
It will lead to inflation, less saving, less investment and will add to the already unemployment problem particularly in rural India. Minimum income guarantee scheme of Rahul is not economically viable. It will encourage monotony and fatalism and the poor will shun work as they will get minimum income in their bank accounts if the scheme is translated into practice. ‘Garibi Hatao’ was the theme and slogan of Indra Gandhi in the election campaign of 1971 and this slogan was used later on by his son Rajeev Gandhi and now it is used by the congress’s Prime Ministerial candidate and grandson of Indra Gandhi-Rahul Gandhi. Now it is to be seen how will the theme and slogan of geeribi hathao win the hearts and minds of the poor electors and how will it translate into votes in the tough election battle of 2019 which is the battle between the BJP and others Vs Congress and others. But the basic minimum income scheme of Rahul Gandhi is fallacious, misleading, and ridiculous and the details of this scheme have not been given by Rahul Gandhi.
Under the scheme it is provided that poorest of the poor will be guaranteed monthly income of Rs. 6000 and it will be credited direct into the bank accounts of the poor. So far so good but the BJP criticizes the minimum income guarantee scheme of Rahul Gandhi on the basis that the poorest of poor do not possess bank accounts and how will minimum income be credited in the absence of bank accounts and therefore it is impractical scheme and a cruel joke with the electorate.
The minimum income scheme of Rahul will work as an disincentive for the poorest of the poor as they will not be inclined and interested to work in order to eke out an honorable living and thus it will badly affect economy, savings, investment, production et al and therefore there are a few takers of this minimum income scheme. So it is fraught with the dangers of affecting economic development of the country. It is neither desirable nor practicable to guarantee any kind of basic income to the poor people without doing any work.
It is better if Rahul and his Congress party guarantees an employment package to the poor or that here too it is immature to guarantee government jobs which too is impracticable and thus theoretical and devoid of any practical meaning. One wonders where from the congress party or its government will arrange funds and finances for the implementation of the minimum income guarantee for the poor.
On this issue Rahul Gandhi and Congress is silent. If by chance Congress comes to power which is least possibility and for the sake of argument let us suppose that Congress comes to power, it will have to find ways and means of getting huge amounts of money for paying monthly doles to the poorest of the poor. It will have to tax the people and burden them with the increase in taxes and this will be akin to Rob Petter to Pay Paul and thus the minimum income scheme is fallacious on the touch stone of practicability and therefore is impractical and is only an election gimmick. There is every possibility that the people who are paid cash doles will stop to engage themselves in productive works and thus this scheme will work as a disincentive to the poor and will further increase the gap between the few rich and vast number of poor instead of bridging the gap.
So it will not eliminate poverty from India but will be an assault on the poor itself. Even Indra Gandhi or for that matter his son Rajiv Gandhi could not purge the country from poverty in spite of implementing programmes and scheme of poverty alleviation and garibi hatao. How can the grandson of the iron lady – Rahul Gandhi eliminate poverty and will it be the final assault on poverty or will it be garib hatao as the anti-congress opposition in those good olden days were labeling the congress slogan of garibi hatao. Instead of guaranteeing minimum income, it is better and practical if congress party announces programmes and schemes of employment guarantee which will change the ground situation and will in fact be a real assault on poverty?
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