Congress Manifesto - A view

The following is an Editorial from the Sentinal, a paper published from Assam, on 30.03.2009
It says what I have been trying to say, very well. I couldn't beat it.

Jairam Ramesh, who has recently quit Union Cabinet to devote full-time to the Congress’ election strategy team, says that election manifestos are not a ‘‘vote-catcher’’ but have ‘‘a certain value attached to them’’.
But what he has forgotten is that in the Indian scheme of things, election manifestos are an excellent design to catch votes — and only to catch votes — and, therefore, are bereft of any value whatsoever.
Our post-independence history is a standing testimony to that fact of life.
Talking to a newspaper after the release of the Congress’ manifesto for the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections, Ramesh refuted allegations that the manifesto is populist: ‘‘Don’t call it populism, it is people-oriented. If money is given for fat cats, it is bailouts/stimulus, and if it is for the aam aadmi, it is dubbed populism. If being pro-poor is populism, then we plead guilty.’’
Well put, that. But why does it fail Ramesh that his party is indeed guilty of playing with poverty and perpetuating it just because that fetches the votes of the politically unconscious and gullible among the electorate, who form the vast majority of voters in the country?
Why does it fail him that it is the Congress that has ruled the country for the best part of the last six decades, and that if the party had been really sincere in alleviating poverty, by this time the face of rural India would have looked so incredibly different?
Why does it fail him that in the name of aam aadmi the Congress has all along been insulting them by politicizing poverty?
As columnist Tavleen Singh says in her piece today, the Congress’ much-hyped ‘pro-poor’ manifesto only goes on to reflect on the abysmally poor track record of India’s oldest but perversely dynasty-centric party in countering the vicious cycle of poverty and backwardness and in the matter of inclusive development that the party would otherwise showcase as its greatest achievement to hoodwink a well-targeted constituency.
Populism is in full play when it comes especially to the quota regime that the Congress has promised in its manifesto.
Hear what Ramesh says: ‘‘Ours is a quota society. Reservation has become a permanent feature even if (our) founding fathers did not see it last beyond a few years... Ultimately, the baggage of 3,000 years can’t go away with 60 years of development.’’ How wrong — and populist!
What does the Congress mean by a ‘‘quota society’’?
Does it not militate against talent in a progressive society that the party talks about?
The Congress should realize that if today we are a ‘‘quota society’’ it is because of its expert perpetuation of backwardness and consolidation of a casteist constituency for the sheer greed for power. And does not the Congress contradict itself when it talks of quota society on the one hand and progressive society on the other?
In fact, on this count every single political party in the country is guilty of perpetuating backwardness in the name of caste-based quotas and of treading a path so retrogressive that we can never imagine of effecting a truly egalitarian society marching ahead in accordance with the principles of meritocracy.
If development is real and tangible, and if the society is free from the scourge of corruption and the brand of populist politics in vogue, ‘‘the baggage of 3,000 years’’ — of discrimination as Ramesh means — can be undone in just 10 years.
But for that you need leaders who mean business.
The Congress cannot fool all of the people all of the time as it seems to be trying at its populist best.
Meanwhile, how will the party save Asom from a Bangladeshi takeover?
Is Sonia Gandhi even aware of the threat?