Apart from making a mockery of the promises to cut subsidies, the recourse to the concept of mai-baap sarkar shows that the government has bade farewell to the neo-liberal policies of Manmohan Singh and has embraced the “socialism” of Sonia Gandhi ~ AMULYA GANGULI

In an extravagant display of sympathy for the poor, which confirms that the government no longer banks on economic reforms but on paternalistic populism to win votes, the ruling alliance at the Centre has decided to provide foodgrains at throwaway prices to 67 per cent of India&’s 1.2 billion population at an estimated cost to the exchequer of Rs 1,24,724 crore per year. Apart from making a mockery of the promises to cut subsidies, the recourse to the concept of mai-baap sarkar shows that the government has bade farewell to the neo-liberal policies of Manmohan Singh and has embraced the “socialism” of Sonia Gandhi.
Moreover, the fact that it was in a tearing hurry to do so was evident from its decision to introduce the welfare measure via an ordinance instead of placing it before Parliament although the monsoon session was only a few weeks away. What the unseemly haste highlighted was, first, that the government had realized that it had nothing to show for its last four years and a half in power. Secondly, it knew that the finance minister&’s recent attempts to talk up the economy will have no effect. The economy will continue to decline, inflation will rise and foreign investors will give the country a wide berth. Hence, the desperate need for doles and sops to win votes.
There is little doubt, of course that the hasty move has been necessitated by the fear that Parliament may not be able to pass the Bill before the end of the session just as several other enactments, such as the Lokpal Bill, have been held up from one session to another while a number of others, like the insurance or the pension fund bills, haven’t been introduced at all. It goes without saying that the BJP&’s obstructionist tactics are responsible for the stalling of legislative business. At least two sessions were washed out because the BJP did not allow the House to function as it wanted the Prime Minister to resign, a demand which it knew the government would not accept.
Given this kind of a logjam, the government evidently considered it best to push through an ordinance. Moreover, it was aware that even if a bill was placed before Parliament, there were enough defects in it for the members to shoot it down or at least force substantial changes. And, it wouldn’t only be the government&’s opponents who would gun for it, but also its allies, as was evident from the argument by Mulayam Singh Yadav of the Samajwadi Party (which offers outside support to the government) that the move was anti-farmer.
The main argument against the step is that the government has sacrificed economics at the altar of politics. It isn’t only that it has turned away from the concept of fiscal discipline, it is unlikely that it has adequately considered the logistics of procuring such a massive amount of grains, storing them, transporting them across the length and breadth of the country and then distributing them to the needy, who will first have to be identified.
As is known, since there aren’t enough warehouses in the country, much of the procured grain are kept out in the open under tarpaulins, which cannot protect them from the rains or save them from the rats. It is anybody&’s guess, therefore, where the extra grains that will be procured will be stored.
However, it is not unlikely that Sonia Gandhi is less than interested in the nitty-gritty of how the gargantuan task will be accomplished than in showing how the Congress&’s heart bleeds for the poor. Since her politics is based on populism and not economics, it is not surprising that this is her second major initiative marked by profligacy.
The first was the equally wasteful rural employment scheme ~ “how many ditches will you dig ? how many ponds will you rebuild ?” as the rural development minister Jairam Ramesh asked recently ~  although it was hailed by a member of her left-of-centre National Advisory Council as the reason for the Congress&’s victory in 2009. Now, the food security ordinance is being touted as the game-changer for the 2014 elections.
Not only that, it is possible that the government will bring the elections forward to the end of this year in order to exploit the hype about the pro-poor ordinance which is bound to be created by the government&’s and the party&’s publicity machinery. There is another reason why the government may want to advance the dates of the elections. It is that it believes that the BJP is not yet ready because of the differences within the party on Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi&’s ambitious bid to be the prime ministerial candidate. Among his main opponents in the BJP is the veteran L.K.  Advani who seems to have the support of the leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Sushma Swaraj, who is the Shiv Sena&’s choice for the post.
The Congress, on the other hand, has no dissenters in the party as its first family holds the whip hand. Moreover, it has lately been able to attract two new allies, the DMK of Tamil Nadu (which had withdrawn support from the government on the issue of the maltreatment of Sri Lankan Tamils in the island) and the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, with which the Congress will form a coalition government in Jharkhand. The Congress&’s acquisition of new allies stands in contrast to the BJP&’s loss of the Janata Dal (United), which broke away from the BJP after 17 years in the wake of Modi&’s ascent in the party.
It is also entirely possible that the Janata Dal (United) will reach some kind of an understanding with the Congress ~ probably a covert one because the Congress has long been friendly with the Janata Dal (United)&’s arch enemy in Bihar, Lalu Prasad Yadav&’s Rashtriya Janata Dal. Since the Congress has more allies than the BJP, which has only two (Akali Dal and Shiv Sena), the Congress can be considered slightly better placed at least where helping hands are concerned.
The writer is a former Assistant Editor, The Statesman