Oh PC! How predictable you are!

We love your budget, dear PC, but if you ever get a chance to do this again, make sure you use some imagination. For instance, you could exchange that demure shawl for a bright red coat (no pun intended), perhaps even wear a flowing white beard and punctuate your speech with the words “Ho! Ho! Ho!”. Or perhaps you could bring the budget papers in a cloth bag slung over your shoulder and crawl into Parliament through a chimney or something? We all love a friendly finance minister but we also love new ideas; you could borrow some from your mate in the Railway Ministry: if you want to bring freshness to your regime, befriend the environment and give a fillip to cottage industry by replacing plastic cups with earthen ‘kulhars’; or befriend the poor by giving jobs to railway coolies. Do not turn the Finance Ministry into Missionaries of Charity.

Some years ago, when the Congress happened to find that they were actually ahead of the BJP, they had to climb onto the Left’s shoulder to rise to the seat of power. The latter were largely relieved to become relevant in Parliament once again and glad to offer support. What with the Soviet Union crashing to the ground and Communism getting stamped out across the world, the frustrated comrades put the bitter taste of their sixty year long fruitless struggle in India behind them and believed that they had scored a point over all their bogeymen, from Narendrabhai Modi to Mukesh Ambani, all the way up to President Bush! As such, the markets and industry greeted the news of the 2004 election with a deafening stock market crash. Even so, people took heart when the Communists ate crow and agreed to Dr. Singh as Prime Minister (of all people). With the “Dream Team” of Manmohan and Chidambaram in saddle, there was reason to hope. If the stock market drop of 900 points is anything to go by, India Inc. has just told Mr. Chidambaram how it feels about the Budget.

I am no economist, but I do understand some basic rules of give and take. For instance, now that Government Banks can no longer collect their debts, their profit margins will suffer, thereby impeding their competitive edge against the private sector. Incidentally, the same Congress accused the BJP of trying to deliberately hold down public sector companies and unfairly advantage the private sector. Or, now that there is a tax on small capital gains, the small investors will be dissuaded from trying their luck in entrepreneurship, leaving the field to big players in Corporate India. Handouts from the Government also hurt the nation in a deeper, more insidious manner: they are the real reason behind the politics of quotas and reservations. These handouts foster a political culture that makes people believe that they are entitled to free stuff from their government without deserving it; hence the mad scramble for SC/ST/OBC status, which in turn sustains and deepens the caste divides in society.

Furthermore, the budget is so obvious an electoral gimmick that it is somewhat banal to even mention that. When was the last time a ruling government announced sops in the last year of its rule and won an election based on it? These last minute populist tactics have never worked before and there is no reason to believe otherwise this time round. There are reasons why sops do not work: one; because people see right through the gambit and two; because it costs the opposition nothing to promise even more.

A “feel good” budget will not allow the ruling party to tide over its failings. If the Congress wants to find favour with the urban middle class (which shifted to the party in 2004) once again, the Government will have to produce concrete results over a sustained period. The day to day concerns over price rise and hike in fuel costs will wear out the effects of a one time friendly budget. The National Rural Employment Guarantee (NREG) scheme remains on paper. The promise of “reforms with a human face” has remained a political refrain. Therefore, on economic issues, the Congress will be hard put to distinguish themselves from the BJP. Furthermore, they will have to explain the actions of the Left, which is widely viewed as negative baggage. The aura that Sonia Gandhi had acquired after her “sacrifice” is now just as useless as the “foreign origin” issue. And Rahul Gandhi is much too unintelligent to be molded into a mass leader. Although Dr. Singh is held in high regard by most people, it is impossible to build an election effort around this Prime Minister. If the BJP could not do that with Atal Behari Vajpayee, can the uninspiring Manmohan Singh perform any better?

Election-2004 was about India’s apprehensions about becoming a true capitalist democracy. Four years hence, India is looking towards the future with confidence; working towards success with a sense of destiny. There is no paranoia to exploit as in 2004. What is the Congress supposed to do now: promise the voter that they will stick to the policies of the erstwhile BJP Government? Or will they promise to re-enact POTA? Perhaps they should go back to the drawing board with the caste map of India on it. Perhaps they should stick to basics such as Muslim appeasement, the promise of smaller states and Rahul Gandhi’s descent.

I must say that I have nothing against the farmers of Vidarbha who have been relieved of debt. Perhaps if the Union Agriculture Minister, who hails from the same state, had some time to spare from his BCCI commitments, he could have moved his rear end and done something so that the farmers would not have been living in desperate poverty in the first place. If Dr. Singh had not spent his time in office blaming his friends in the CPI(M) (why did he take their support at all?) and bemoaning the loss of his nuclear deal, the farmers would have had the water and electricity they needed … as they do in Modi’s Gujarat. A word for Chidambaram: perhaps you could reschedule the budget so that it is announced at midnight on December 24 every year, so that people could wake up on Christmas morning to open their gifts. Or, if you really want to give debt relief, why don’t you write off the millions that Pratibha Patil’s family owes to the Government? A note to Dr. Singh as well: If you must give sops, give those that are politically profitable: for instance, you could have the law minister announce that the Centre will “write off” all the criminal records as well (just like the debt records!); this would give you lots of volunteers for the next election, particularly in states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh where your party is on a sticky wicket. See what I am saying about new ideas?