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UP polls: Congress manifesto promises farm loan waiver within 10 days of coming to power
The promises in the Congress manifesto for the UP polls include subquota for most backward classes, appointment of dalit home minister in the state, free education from KG to PG for scheduled caste and scheduled tribe students
The Congress manifesto for the UP polls promises waiver of farm loans within 10 days of coming to power and a subquota for the most backward classes (MBCs) within the other backward classes (OBC) quota to ensure maximum benefits, if voted to office Uttar Pradesh.
The Congress manifesto, Unnati Vidhan- the Jan Ghoshna Patra, has many promises for every section of the society. Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra released the manifesto at the Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee (UPCC) headquarters in Lucknow.
Senior party leader and former Union minister Salman Khurshid, who chaired the manifesto committee, said the Congress manifesto was drafted after holding discussions with different sections and reaching out to nearly one lakh people across the state.
Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, too, said the Congress manifesto for the UP polls was based on people’s suggestions.
“We reached out to people in the past one- and-a-half years. Whatever has been incorporated in the manifesto is directly from the people. We have struggled in the past two years… the struggle of the people is greater than us,” she said.
Priyanka also said this was the party’s third manifesto meant for the common man and separate manifestos have been released for women and youths earlier. The manifesto promises a minimum support price (MSP) of ₹2500 per quintal for wheat and paddy, ₹400 per quintal price for sugarcane in the farm sector, cutting the power bill to half and waiver of power dues for the Covid-19 period.
The manifesto also assures free education from kindergarten to the post-graduate level for scheduled caste and scheduled tribe students.
It further promises that the state’s home minister would be appointed from among the Dalits and efforts would be made to end atrocities perpetrated on the scheduled castes if the Congress forms the next government after the 2022 polls in Uttar Pradesh.
It also assures reservation in promotion for scheduled caste employees and OBC survey for reservation in promotion.
It promises to set up Police Lok Pal to keep an eye on irregularities in closure reports, charge sheets and investigations.
The manifesto proposes to develop western UP, where the first phase of polling will be held on Thursday, as a world-class urban mining and recycling centre. It notes Meerut already is an automobile recycling centre while Moradabad was recycling 80% of all categories of e-waste.
The Congress manifesto promises to develop parallel roads for use by those taking kanwars or going for urs.
It promises to restore the autonomy of minority institutions .
The Congress manifesto promises to increase five seats in the upper house of the state legislature for artisans, weavers, farmers and soldiers. Priyanka said she would also like to include journalists in this category for nomination.
It promises to withdraw cases against journalists and permission to CBI to investigate only in limited number of cases, besides a compensation board to give compensation to victims in criminal cases.
Police women will be allowed posting in home districts, according to the Congress manifesto.
The promises also include holiday on Parshuram Jayanti, pasmanda commission for welfare of Muslims, besides scheduled tribe status to the Kol community.
The Congress manifesto also promises to increase percentage of mixing ethanol in petrol to 15% and later to 20% to increase the income of sugarcane growers. It also proposes an increase in the number of electric buses.
There are about 12 lakh stray animals in the state and the state government has failed to resolve the issue, the manifesto says.
The Congress has promised compensation of ₹3000 per acre for any damage caused to crops by stray animals. It has given the assurance that the Chhattisgarh model will be implemented to deal with the problem. Cow dung will be bought for ₹2 per kg to ensure that the animals are not left stray and a sum of ₹500 per animal will be paid for their maintenance in cow shelters, it said.
The Congress manifesto assures an increase of 5% in the health department’s budget and free treatment of up to ₹10 lakh for every patient, who gets admitted to a hospital. It promises to increase the honorarioum paid to the village head to ₹6000 per month, for chowkidar to ₹5000 per month and to cooks of the mid-day meal scheme to ₹5000 per month.
Besides filling two lakh vacant posts of teachers, it promises regularisation of the services of ad hoc teachers.
The Congress manifesto proposes to connect the proposed Ganga Expressway with the Yamunu Expressway and Agra-Lucknow Expressway at least at four points.
A political analyst said the Congress needed to strengthen the organization for the manifesto to be effective
“Every party releases poll manifesto. But the Congress needs to strengthen the organisation or else its manifesto will only remain on paper,” said professor SK Dwivedi, former head of the department, political science at Lucknow University.
The BJP said the Congress should keep the national perspective in mind.
“The Congress is a national party and it should come out with promises keeping national perspective in mind. It has promised 40 percent reservation to women in UP but what about Goa or other states,” said Uttar Pradesh BJP vice-president Vijay Bahadur Pathak.
