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Manmohan reveals his political colours

Amberish K Diwanji in New Delhi

Dr Manmohan Singh, former finance minister and one of India's more respected political leaders, has revealed his political colours when he addressed the media in New Delhi.

He sang paeans about the work done by the Congress during its five-year rule from 1991-96 while making promises galore even as he blasted Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha. This from a person who once stated that being a finance minister is the most difficult job since very often the party you belong to is against you.

Dr Singh called the Congress manifesto a blueprint for the first few years of the 21st century, saying it contained a vision of India for the next 10 to 15 years. "It will be an India that will record 7 to 8 per cent growth with agricultural growth pegged at 4 to 5 per cent, industrial growth at 10-12 per cent and exports at 15 per cent. It will be an India rid of poverty, disease, illiteracy and full of economic dynamism and fourth among the world's five greatest economic powers," he declared.

The former finance minister is credited as the architect of India's liberalisation policies but which policies are also held responsible for alienating the poorer sections from the Congress since liberalisation initially hurt them. Not surprisingly, he emphasised throughout his speech that growth alone was not sufficient, it would have to be backed by special strategies to help the poor and underprivileged. "The poor must share in this economic growth and development through better education, healthcare, reduction of infant mortality and the creation of 10 million jobs every year," he stated.

He added that further economic reforms were necessary to achieve these objectives, but which must walk on the two legs of economic growth and social sector activity. "To improve our social sectors will require huge amount of funds. The Congress party proposes to get these funds by introducing fiscal discipline. We will ensure that the fiscal deficit is less than four per cent and current deficit reduced to zero in three years," he added.

He refused to give any credit to Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha for bringing the inflation rate to its lowest ever last week. "First, the inflation rate has risen from 1.67 per cent to 1.73 per cent already. And it did not happen because of the government's policies but because there was a good monsoon, ensuring bumper harvest," he said.

He also pointed out that the average consumer had little to do with the wholesale price index, which the government was highlighting. "The consumer is concerned with the consumer price index, which is still pegged at around 10 per cent," he said.

He also made a list of promises of things a Congress government would do if voted to power. "We will reform the banking sector, the insurance sector, the agriculture sector, improve tax collection which both the BJP and the previous United Front governments have neglected, strengthen the public sector, and bring about land reforms which where still needed to improve productivity," he said.

However, to Dr Singh's credit, he did not hesitate from declaring that subsidies would be reduced and that loss-making public sectors would be sold off. He also said that the insurance sector would be opened up to foreign companies while the banking sector would be reformed to give bank managements 'genuine autonomy'.

Nevertheless, the former finance minister also played it safe. At the very outset he insisted that all employees would be protected even if certain public sector units are shut down, though he did not spell out how.

He assured that while subsidies would be cut, subsidies which directly benefited the poor would not be touched. He was silent about the fertiliser subsidies but insisted that state governments that gave farmers free electricity must repay the electricity boards for the loss suffered.

"There can be no more free commodities. Anything given free must be compensated for by the state governments concerned," he stated.

Taking a fig out of the BJP's swadeshi line, he said the Congress believed in a self-reliant India built mostly by Indians.

He dismissed a suggestion that since the beginning of liberalisation, most of the foreign investment had gone into the consumer sector to the loss of the capital sector. "First, there is no statistic that shows that more investment has gone into the consumer goods rather than capital goods. In fact, it is clearly the other way round," he said emphatically, and added with equal vigour, "investment into any sector, consumer goods, intermediate goods or capital goods, benefits the nation as a whole and aids overall growth. There is no such thing as good investment and bad investment."

He blasted Sinha saying the present economic situation was a mess. "The BJP promised to keep fiscal deficit low, it is at 7 per cent. Moreover, there is a vast increase in money supply, which will soon cause a massive inflation unless interest rates are raised," he warned, adding, "Sinha is happy with an industrial growth rate of 8 per cent whereas in 1995-96 it was 12 per cent!"

Singh insisted that a Congress government would take sufficient care of India's defence needs and denied that his government had ignored India's security concern. "The BJP has presented two budgets and the UF had presented two before them. If India did face a threat, why did they not increase the defence allocation in their earlier budgets? Why blame the Congress that went out of power in 1996?" he asked.

He also said that the Kargil conflict was not caused by low defence budgets but by the complacency of the BJP government that was enamoured by the Lahore bus ride.

Asked why he was standing for a Lok Sabha election even though he was a member of the Rajya Sabha, he smiled disarmingly and replied, "For better or worse, I introduced the liberalisation policies in India. Now I am giving the voters of South Delhi, a huge cosmopolitan constituency, to judge me for it."

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