No Takers for Congress NYAY: Here’s why Rahul Gandhi’s Rs 72,000 Nyay bait impressed almost no one
'Ab hoga Nyay' sounded like nyay was denied during the nearly 70 years of Congress rule. Why would the slogan be trusted now?
The Lok Sabha elections in India went on for about two months.
The build-up started months before that.
Everything, from the Samajwadi Party-Bahujan Samaj Party-Rashtriya Lok Dal (SP-BSP-RLD) alliance to Priyanka Gandhi’s so-called ‘formal entry’ into politics, was called 'a game-changer'.
So, on March 25, when Congress president Rahul Gandhi took to the stage, rolling up his white kurta sleeves, promising five crore poor people of this country Rs 72,000 annually, many thought the tables have turned again — with yet another game-changer — after the Balakot airstrikes, this time, in favour of the Opposition, more so in favour of the Congress.
The amount would be given till a family earns Rs 12,000 per month, he reportedly said.
But the election results thus far have shown the poor of this country have rejected that bait in totality.
Why did the poor turn their backs on this scheme?
The answer, perhaps, lies in the name of the scheme — NYAY or Nyunatam Aay Yojana. The Congress tried to sell this scheme to the voters with the tag line — 'Ab Hoga Nyay'. For a party that stayed in power for close to 70 years, this sounded like an admission, saying, ‘Ab tak nahi hua nyay’.
How could the voters then have trusted the Congress to deliver nyay?
Rahul Gandhi's grandmother and India’s former PM Indira Gandhi had fought the 1971 General Election on the slogan of “Wo kehte hain Indira hatao, mai kehti hun garibi hatao. (They say remove Indira, I say remove poverty).”
If the advertisements were trying to say that the injustice to the poor happened in the five years of Narendra Modi's rule, that message was firmly rejected by the voters.
Another factor that led to people not buying the bait was that the benefits promised in Budget 2019-20 by the Narendra Modi government under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme had begun reaching the bank accounts of farmers in March itself. The scheme promised an annual Rs 6,000-payout to farmers in three equal instalments of Rs 2,000 each to all farmers cultivating up to two hectares (5 acres).
A bird in hand is worth two in the bush, they say.
The poor found it better to trust someone who had begun delivering on his promises — rather than trying someone who, after nearly 70 years of rule, was asking for another term to deliver on some more promises.
Justice (Nyay), people seem to believe, delayed is justice denied.