Congress’ Lok Sabha Election Manifesto: Rahul Gandhi Outlines Five Main Themes Of Congress’ Poll Pitch

Congress President Rahul Gandhi said that the party’s manifesto for the upcoming elections revolves around five key ideas.

1. NYAY (Nyuntam Aay Yojana, a minimum income plan): Under this scheme, India’s poorest will receive money directly in their bank account to ensure they have a minimum monthly income of Rs 12,000.
2. Jobs: The Congress will fill 22 lakh job vacancies within the government in an effort to boost employment. Entrepreneurs won't need any permissions for the first three years of starting a business. Raise guaranteed days of employment under MGNREGA (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarentee Act) up to 150 days. Angel tax will be withdrawn.
3. Farmers: There will be a separate budget for farmers. If farmers default on loans, it will be considered a civil offense and not a criminal offence. Congress also promised to extend a farm loan waiver to all states.
4. Education: Double government expenditure on education to 6 percent of GDP by financial year 2023-24.
5. Health: Will strengthen government hospitals and the public health service. Double government expenditure on healthcare to 3 percent of GDP by financial year 2023-24.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday tore into the Congress, terming its manifesto as a "hypocrisy document" which was "full of lies".

Addressing his second rally in Arunachal Pradesh within a week, the prime minister cited the Congress manifesto for the 2004 Lok Sabha elections, and said it had promised that every house would have electricity by 2009.

"However, till 2014 around 18,000 houses were unelectrified... Just like them (the Congress), their manifesto is corrupt and full of lies. Therefore, it should be called hypocrisy document, not a manifesto," Modi said.

The prime minister also charged that the Congress was fooling farmer in the name of votes, whereas the BJP government has always been with them.

"We never committed the sin of betraying farmers but we introduced the mechanism from seed to market," the PM said.

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said Congress’ promises were "unimplementable." He told a press conference in New Delhi the Congress manifesto indicates some costs of the income support program will be borne by the states and the rest will be generated by rationalizing some subsidy schemes.

The Congress will introduce a bill to amend the Constitution to make the Supreme Court a Constitutional Court, according to its manifesto released today.

Under that bill, the apex court will hear and decide cases involving the interpretation of the Constitution and other cases of legal significance or national importance.

Here are the other changes the party plans on making in India’s judiciary:

• To introduce bill to establish a Court of Appeal between the High Courts and the Supreme Court, to hear appeals from judgments and orders of High Courts.The Court of Appeal will sit in multiple benches of three judges each in six locations.
• Retirement age of judges of Supreme Court and High Court as well as judicial members of tribunals will be fixed at 65 to prevent post retirement assignment for sitting judges.
• To establish a National Judicial Commission for selection of judges for appointment to the High Courts and the Supreme Court. The NJC will be comprised of judges, jurists and parliamentarians.
• An independent Judicial Complaints Commission to investigate complaints of misconduct against judges and recommend suitable action to Parliament

In the last five years, the BJP government has spread hate and divisiveness, Gandhi said in response to a question. “Congress will work towards uniting India and bringing its people together.”

He further said that South India can feel the hostility from PM Modi. “I wanted to send message, 'I am standing with you',” he said, replying to a question on why he is contesting the Lok Sabha Elections from Wayanad, Kerala.

The party president is also contesting the elections from Amethi.

The policies of demonetisation and Goods and Services Tax carried out by Prime Minister Narendra Modi have stalled India’s economic growth.

The money we plan on transferring to India’s poorest through the NYAY scheme will help jump-start the economy and lead to growth with jobs, Gandhi said today.

The Congress is tasked with bringing back India’s narrative to “the real issues facing the people,” said Congress Manifesto Committee Chairman P Chidambaram. He highlighted unemployment, farmers’ distress and women’s securities as some of the biggest issues facing the country.

Here are the key highlights:

• The BJP's trying to take the narrative back to the old push of polarisation, divisiveness & hyper nationalism.
• We have to bring narrative back to the real issues facing the people
• The real issues are: First, unemployment; over 4 crore jobs have been lost
• Second issue is farmers' distress; average farmer has a loan burden of just over Rs 1 lakh
• Third issue is women's security
• Wealth and welfare are the two themes that bind the manifesto together
• We will create wealth and guarantee welfare

Rajeev Gowda, Convener, Congress Manifesto Committee said that the party manifesto was made after considering over 1.6 lakh inputs that came in online.

Non-Residential Indians from 12 countries participated in the manifesto, which was finalised after 121 public consultations and 53 closed door sessions, he said.

“The manifesto reflects the concerns, ideas, hopes of the people of India,” Gowda said. “Look forward to using the manifesto as a blueprint for governance in the year ahead.”

Apart from the speeches on the campaign trail, Congress President Rahul Gandhi has also been tweeting some of the key initiatives that the party is focussing on, this election season. Here are some policies he has promised voters:

The Congress beat the BJP to announce a minimum income guarantee scheme on March 25.

The party pledged to guarantee a minimum income of Rs 12,000 a month if voted to power in the Lok Sabha elections due in less than two months. The party estimates that five crore families earn less than that, and the scheme will make up the difference.

Dubbing it “the world’s largest minimum income scheme”, party President Rahul Gandhi said the Nyunatam Aay Yojana, or NYAY, is aimed at covering close to 25 crore individuals. The scheme will transfer up to Rs 72,000 into the accounts of poor households annually, he said after a party meeting to give final shape to the Congress manifesto.

Making a distinction between the Universal Basic Income and the Minimum Guarantee Scheme, former Finance Minister P Chidambaram said the Congress’ proposal is progressive in terms of the fund transfer. He did stop short of discussing the financial implications in detail. “All I can say is that it is doable”, said Chidambaram in an interaction with BloombergQuint.

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More on NYAY:

• ‘NYAY Is The Smartest Thing The Congress Has Done So Far’, Says Prannoy Roy
• Identifying Beneficiaries For NYAY Feasible With Big Data, Says Congress
• Dear Rahul, You’ve Done NYAY (Justice), Now Give UMMEED (Hope)
• Will Congress’ NYAY Change The Narrative For 2019 Polls?
• Income Guarantee Scheme Will Be Rolled Out In Phases, Says Chidambaram

India’s main opposition Congress party will scrap the current structure of goods and services tax and adopt a single rate if it wins next month’s federal election, people with knowledge of the matter told Bloomberg News.

The Congress party, led by Rahul Gandhi, will pledge in its manifesto to merge five different GST rates into one pegged at 18 percent as it prepares for polls slated to run from April 11 to May 19, the people said, asking not to be identified citing rules for speaking with the media. The Congress has been critical of the multiple tax rates in the current GST regime adopted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration.

Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party-led coalition government launched the country’s biggest tax reform since independence on July 1, 2017, replacing more than a dozen levies to create a single market with 1.3 billion consumers. The government has been cutting tax rates on some goods and services in a move to revive consumption and boost the economy. Sushmita Dev, a spokeswoman for the Congress party declined to comment.

Congress’ Likely Pledges In Its Manifesto

• Minimum income guarantee to poor Unemployment allowance
• One-time farm loan waiver
• One tax rate for GST
• Employment guarantee plan for urban youth
• Schemes benefiting landless farmers
• Five hundred square feet house to poor
• Measures to spur startup companies
• Thirty three percent reservation for women in government jobs
• New data protection and privacy law
• New bill focusing on LGBTQ rights
• Stand alone women empowerment and justice department

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