Cong’s LS polls manifesto focuses on Nyay for all, raising reservation limit

New Delhi, Apr 7 (PTI) Seeking to revive its fortunes after two successive Lok Sabha elections drubbings, the Congress manifesto this time focuses on the emotive issue of reservation and the party’s repackaged theme of ‘nyay” or justice to different strata of society. The party’s manifesto for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections is slimmer in volume than the previous one but copious in promises, listed under “five nyay” and 25 guarantees under them. It has christened its 48-page election manifesto as ‘Nyay Patra” this time as compared to the 55-page “Congress will Deliver” document in 2019 and the 28-page “Your voice, Our pledge” in 2014, when the party lost power after 10 years.

“I urge everyone to have a close look at our manifesto and you will see a ‘shandaar tasveer’ (beautiful picture) of our country in it,” Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said after its release.

Rahul Gandhi, who has described the party manifesto as “revolutionary”, has said the document represents the voice of the people as it has been prepared taking into account their views and suggestions. The party has this time promised to provide Rs one lakh to one woman of the poorest household in the country, unlike in 2019 when it assured Rs 72,000 to the poorest 20 per cent households under its Nyuntam Aay Yojana (NYAY). The party has, however, not made any mention of the Citizenship Amendment Act and the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, which it promised to withdraw and amend in the 2019 manifesto. The Congress’ emphasis in 2024 poll manifesto is on the five “pillars of justice” and 25 guarantees under the theme of “Nyay” (justice) for all – youth, women, farmers, workers and the downtrodden.

With focus also on jobs, the party has in its manifesto promised the Right to Apprenticeship to youth and assuring them a job with minimum Rs one lakh per year, a legal guarantee for MSP to farmers, passing a constitutional amendment to raise the 50 per cent cap on reservations for SCs, STs and OBCs to the downtrodden, a nation-wide caste census and scrapping of the Agnipath scheme, and 10 per cent quota for economically weaker sections irrespective of caste.

The Congress has said that in the last 10 years, we have seen that several measures taken by the BJP/NDA government were actually “a cloak for corruption” and said some examples are demonetisation, the Rafale deal, Pegasus spyware and the Electoral Bonds scheme, which the party will probe and bring to law against those who made illegal gains through them. The centerpiece of the 2024 Nyay Patra is the “Paanch Nyay: Yuva Nyay, Nari Nyay, Kisan Nyay, Shramik Nyay and Hissedari Nyay” and the Congress saying that “Indians will vote decisively for ‘mukti’ from the ‘Das Saal Anyay Kaal’.” The Congress this time has focused on giving the guarantee of a national minimum wage of Rs 400 per day, besides a new MGNREGA-like scheme for providing employment to urban poor, unlike in 2019 when it promised to raise the maximum wages under MGNREGA from 100 days to 150.

The Congress has in its manifesto this time promised one-third reservation for women will be applied to the state assemblies that will be elected in the next round of assembly elections in 2025.The Congress said it will pass a constitutional amendment to raise the 50 per cent cap on reservations for SC, ST and OBC if it comes to power. Reservation has been a key element of the country’s politics and the BJP had lost the crucial 2015 Bihar Assembly polls after RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat called for review of the reservation system.

Caste politics has played a dominant role in the country that go momentum with the advent of Mandal movement in the 1990s. This is the first time, however, that the opposition party is talking about taking the reservation above 50 per cent and on the basis of the total population by calling for a caste-based census. The Congress has also this time promised full statehood to Jammu and Kashmir, besides giving special status to Andhra Pradesh, full statehood to Puducherry, and to amend the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi Act, 1991 to declare that Lt Governor shall act on the aid and advice of Council of Ministers of NCT, Delhi.

Rejecting the ‘one nation, one election’ idea, the Congress promised that elections to the Lok Sabha and the state assemblies be held as and when they are due in accordance with the Constitution and the traditions of a parliamentary democracy.

The Congress has also assured to bring a new GST 2.0, heralding a new GST regime based on universally accepted principle that GST shall be a single, moderate rate (with a few exceptions) that will not burden the poor. For farmers, the party in 2024 has assured a legal guarantee for minimum support price (MSP) for their produce.

The Congress also guaranteed to “revitalise” institutions like the Reserve Bank of India, Election Commission, CBI and CIC. Though nationalism featured prominently in its 2014 document, when the Congress projected the election as a fight between its “secular liberal nationalism versus BJP’s narrow-minded communalism”. In 2019, it made it a choice between “freedom and fear”.

Contrary to this, in 2014 when the UPA was in power its chairperson Sonia Gandhi while launching the manifesto had in a veiled reference to the BJP said its manifesto was a “sacred document” for the Congress and idealism is something to be practiced rather than flaunted.