It’s cacophony all the way: Bipin Sharma
While the skeptics will have their own critical views about Financé Minister ArunJaitley’s Union Budget for financial year 2015-16, the general view is that it is a well crafted, well balanced budget which is reasonably pro poor, pro farmer, pro senior citizens, and also offers a great deal of incentives to infrastructural development and the manufacturing segment. The very fact that GDP is poised at 8.1-8.5 growth speaks volumes about the state of affairs of the economy of the country. The cous is on tax realization.
Besides, the Budget is investor friendly for the good number of investors aspiring to invest in the Indian market. The 10% increase in the state’s share of revenue from 32% to 42% proves that Modi has lived up to his promise of strengthening the federal structure. The corporate tax has been slashed by 5%. The wealth tax has been abolished, and instead 2% surcharge is going to be there on the super rich class. There are no retrospective tax deductions. Rather than being a populist budget, it is a more realistic and futuristic budget.
As regards the flip side, the rise in the service tax by 2 percent is some sought of concern for the middle class especially. Travelling, eating out, Petrol, diesel has become somewhat costly. But even then, one must not forget that the government of the day has earmarked a whopping 70,000 crores for infrastructural development. Besides, the budget promises a humungous rise in the number of job creation.
As far as the land acquisition bill goes, though the NDA government has already given an assurance that it is ready to make the necessary alterations as suggested by the other opposition parties, the going will be tough. While the Land acquisition Bill will scrape through the LokSabha, the real test will be in the RajyaSabha where the NDA does not have the numbers.
While the intent of NDA seems good, the stoic silence of PM on certain utterances made by hardliners is deafening, and will do more harm if immediete action is not initiated against those striving to vilify the political atmosphere.
If the NDA wishes and aspires to keep the Modi wave alive, it has to issue a stern diktat to all the fringe elements and the ally partners who are habituated with creating an atmosphere of mayhem and turbulence in the country. The country remains on the boil due to the nonsensical attitude of these fundamentalists whose only mission seems to be pushing their agendas for their self-vested gains.
On the other hand, social activist Anna Hazare’s two-day stir in the capital to register his angst against the Centre’s Land Acquisition Bill seemed misplaced. This because Anna contradicted himself on two fronts, one by giving space to political outfits on his stage, and secondly by undertaking another Mission when his first Mission namely the “Jan Lokpal Bill” was still to bme fructified.Rightly so, the response he evoked from the capital city denizens too was lukewarm unlike the earlier times.
Anti corruption crusader Anna Hazare’s silence on Shardha scam is baffling which has several TMC leaders indicted in the scam.
Meanwhile heir apparent Rahul Gandhi’s mystic sabbatical or disappearance made more noise than what was ideally expected of him during the country’s Union Budget Session in the Parliament as the imminent Congress President.
Then there was our very own Azam Khan hijacking a bus to prove a point or so to the opponents.
Thus when one gets to summarize the state of affairs in the country today, it would not be wrong to say that it is cacophony all the way from Anna Hazare’s digressions to Rahul Gandhi’s vanishing acts in the middle of a crucial Budget session to AamAadmi Party’s unending interal feud, the needless rantins and controversy stirred by RSS leaders at a time when the country needs to be thinking of big ticket reforms.
Linking the name of Mother Teressa with the issue of conversion will
only make matters worse for BJP that has recently been decimated in the state assembly elections. Raking up gratuitous issues by BJP and its allies will only add fuel to the fireand make matters all the more daunting for Modi and hisTeam.
Needles to say, it will only be providing the much needed ammo to the political opponents on theplate to attack the PM.
Rather than pondering over their past and present mistakes, both the BJP and the Congress are not going about doing their jobs responsibly.
The focus should remain on development, and not on useless issues and mud slinging.
Regional satraps too are no better be it SP or the BSP, who simply look for opportunities to lash out at the BJP.
Amidst all this, it is interesting to draw an analogy between two personalities named Nitish Kumar and ArvindKejriwal who tendered their resignation when the going got tough
However realizing that they were on the path of becoming politically irrelevant, they made herculean efforts to regain power. As luck would have it, they were soon at the helm of affairs when they became CM of their states.
Starting from projecting KiranBedi as the BJP nominee for CM, it has been a spate of downfalls for BJP. The rout in Delhi had its own ramifications. Beginning with PDP which took advantage of BJP’s position, and went back on their giving BJP’s CM nominee in J&K a three year period as CM.
In Bihar too, BJPs Delhi debacle proved to be a shot in the arm for Nitish Kumar as he was successful in planting himself on the CMs chair.
The outcome of the Delhi assembly elections will have a far greater bearing when the elections held in Bihar later.
Citizens of Bihar will be circumspective about Nitish Kumar joining hands with the scam tainted LalooYadav.
Meanwhile, the Delhi election results are bound to be create a ripple effect in the West Bengal elections.
The stage has come when the centre and state governments need to work unison. There should be no room and time for agitationaland ludicrous politics. There should be real politiks, and no mere populism.
The like minded citizens need to stand united for ridding the country and the capital city of all the existent cacophony.
