Budget session reveals political alignments in state

Naveen S Garewal

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 25

The Budget session has brought out a true picture of political alignments in Haryana.

Though the INLD is the largest opposition party, it is the Congress that has emerged as the real opposition with the former aligning with the ruling BJP on most issues against the Congress. A majority of the issues were raised by the Congress, with the INLD choosing to remain quiet or support the BJP.

Most new BJP legislators could hardly make their presence felt in the House. They supported ministers, but did not provide any substantial backup, except for adding to the slanging matches. CLP leader Kiran Choudhry made her presence felt by taking on the BJP leadership.

Though a longish session this time, the BJP clearly established that it was pursuing the RSS agenda by brining the anti-Cow slaughter Bill and numerous schemes in the Budget. PM Modi’s signature was apparent in social schemes for the girl child and cleaning of the villages under the Swachh Haryana,Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan.

The Vidhayak Aadarsh Gram Yojana, too, is nothing but a replica of the modified MPLAD fund scheme.

The Budget came in for appreciation for higher allocations for education, skill development, job creation and power and is expected to give a fillip to the “Make-in-Haryana” slogan.

Finance Minister Abhimanyu has hoped to get the state’s economy moving by the additional allocation by way of central taxes. However, if this does not happen, the state’s outstanding debt will touch Rs98,848 crore in 2015-16.

In the absence of much action from the Jat-supported INLD, the BJP made extra efforts to project itself as pro-farmer. The CM announced waiver of their electricity bills, rescheduling of crop loans and loans to farmers for the next crop at zero per cent interest.

The concessions are also seen as a measure of sensitivity the CM has for the farmers. He also showed statesmanship by intervening to resolve the row over “Nehru” and “Gandhi” comments made by ministers OP Dhankar and Anil Vij.

The Session saw the Congress put up a united face with all legislators speaking in one voice. The Congress chose English for their addresses so that the Hindi-speaking legislators could not interrupt them. However, Capt Abhimanyu and Vij countered by offering appropriate rebuttals. The latter also provided several light moments in an otherwise serious House.

Throughout the session, one could sense that Khattar was aware that the people were getting frustrated over the delay in fulfilling poll promises by the BJP government.