The truth behind the BJP Manifesto in MP | N.D.Sharma

Published on 20-11-2008 In General

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The truth behind the BJP Manifesto in MP

It is election time in Madhya Pradesh. It is also the time to tell lies. The party in power invents bigger lies in proportion to the public money it has swindled. The Bharatiya Janata Party, which is the ruling party in the State, has encased its lies neatly in a 100-page, coloured book(let), like the ones occasionally brought out by the State government's Public Relations Department on the government's "achievements". It is the party's election manifesto.

Its biggest lie is the claim that the schemes for supplying 40 litres of water per head per day are being implemented in the rural areas while 11 urban water supply schemes have been completed. The government has not been able to ensure regular water supply even in the cities. The capital city of Bhopal is facing acute water scarcity, mainly because of the bungling and mismanagement which includes misappropriation of hundreds of crores of rupees received by the State from the Central government and foreign funding agencies in the name of ensuring water supply.

As late as November 17, the angry women in Ujjain placed empty vessels in front of the Public Health Engineering department (the fancy name given to the water supply department) and blocked the roads in protest against the authorities' failure to supply adequate water. Ujjain is scheduled to receive water supply on third day. Even on the third day, that is on November 17, the pressure was so low that the residents hardly got any water. The drinking water (or the lack of it) has been a major factor behind clashes in the Gwalior-Chambal region, which recorded over 100 such clashes in the past one year. The problem has been there for years and no government has made an honest attempt to tackle it.

But then the people should have patience for five years more, as they have shown it in the past six decades. The BJP promises in its manifesto that it will ensure potable drinking water supply to "each family in each locality in each village of the State". That is, if it is voted to power once again. The party does not say how much money it has spent in the name of providing drinking water to the people and how much it plans to raise for the same purpose if it gets another term.

The party claims that the irrigation capacity in the State has been doubled during the BJP regime and the budget allocation for irrigation was raised from Rs 1000 crore to Rs 2000 crore. This is a bit of a complicated lie because the manifesto does not say what was the irrigated area which the BJP government has doubled. This is given in one of the advertisements released by the party as part of its campaign. It says the irrigated area in the previous 50 years was 21 lakh hectares and the BJP government raised it to 34 lakh hectares in five years. Is it double? But wait.

According to the annual report of the Water Resources Department for the year 2007-2008, the total irrigation capacity in the State till March 2007 was 19.

693 lakh hectares. With the "partial completion" of some schemes, irrigation capacity of 4.95 lakh hectares was added. The total, till March 2007, makes it 24.643 lakh hectares. Creation of irrigation capacity of 1.289 lakh hectares was proposed during 2007-2008. All that does not make it 34 lakh hectares.

Power generation capacity (this "capacity" is a mischievous word and does not have relation to the actual availability) has been raised from 2990 MW to 6137 MW. Then why are the people of the State, particularly in the suburban and rural areas, not getting power? The farmers consider themselves lucky if they can get uninterrupted power supply for four to six hours in a day. Besides, the party manifesto is silent on its efforts to recover the dues (which amounted to nearly Rs 4000 crore at the last count) from the big and influential consumers and reduce the theft of power (that goes in the name of transmission and distribution losses), which is as high as 45 per cent.

Someone in the party's manifesto panel must be having a wry sense of humour to make the claim that the government has been taking effective action against the criminals and the rule of law has been established by pulling the State out of anarchy. The Supreme Court ordering the trial of the Sabharwal murder case out of the State and the Madhya Pradesh High Court expressing its dissatisfaction with the police investigation and directing the CBI to investigate the abduction and murder charges against the son of a minister and the arrest of a minister under orders of the Election Commission for insulting and intimidating a woman officer on poll duty are just a few instances of the type of rule of law that Shivraj Singh Chauhan's government has established in the State.

"Efforts (were made) to provide drinking water to the (MiC) gas affected people", the manifesto claims. How? The Supreme Court directed the State government on May 5,2004 to ensure drinking water supply to the gas affected localities. An amount of Rs 14 crore was specifically earmarked for providing drinking water to the gas affected localities in the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNURM) of the Central government about three years ago. Now the authorities say they are stuck because of the model code of conduct.

The party claims an "expert" financial management during the five years. It does not tell how? The figures do. The public debt was to the tune of Rs 30,000 crore when the BJP formed the government in 2003. In March this year it had crossed 58,000 crore.

The only point on which the party does not lie is its admission of five-year BJP rule. Earlier, the party had always been talking of one hundred days of the Chauhan government, one year of the Chauhan government, two years of the Chauhan government, et cetera, and had been refusing to accept that nine months of Uma Bharati's and 15 months of Babulal Gaur's period were also part of the BJP regime.

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