TRS sweeps Telangana MLC Elections

 

The following article was written for MyInd Makers. Pasting it here for reference:

Amidst the election fever gripping the country, there was yet another important election that happened in Telangana in this month. On March 14th, elections were held for two seats for the Graduate constituencies of the Telangana Legislative Council. When elections for these seats were held in 2015, the BJP and TRS had won one seat each. With the recent setbacks that TRS received in some elections, this election was also keenly watched by many to see if the BJP can retain its lone seat in the Legislative Council or will TRS retain its seat and also usurp BJP’s seat.

Seat#1: The Hyderabad-Rangareddy-Mahbubnagar Graduates Constituency

In 2015, BJP’s N. Ramchander Rao defeated the TRS party in this Graduate constituency elections for the MLC seat. Predictably, he was given the ticket for contesting again this time. However, KCR’s unpredictable surprise move started tilting the tables in favour of the TRS. KCR chose to field P.V.Narasimha Rao’s daughter, Ms. Surabhi Vani as TRS’s candidate for these polls.

Ms. Surabhi Vani is not merely P.V.Narasimha Rao’s daughter. She has been running a group of educational institutions from many decades. She is actually quite well known in the educational circles because of her involvement in this field from many decades. She has also never taken political stances nor was she a member of any political party. Her candidature came as a whiff of fresh air for people who were vexed with the same old politicians. Plus, her candidature made perfect sense for a constituency that consists of only graduate voters.

KCR then went on an advertising spree, telling the voters how electing Ms. Surabhi Vani is actually a sign of respect for P.V. Narasimha Rao, the son of Telangana. He was extremely successful in weaning away P.V.Narasimha Rao from the Congress party and having his pictures put up on TRS posters! Given the recent setbacks, the TRS went all out in deploying many ministers and MLAs for the election campaign. TRS’s campaign was therefore focused on three aspects – the qualification of the candidate herself, the lineage of the candidate, and criticism of the BJP on multiple fronts (not enough given to Telangana; increasing fuel prices etc). The success of the strategy is evident from the fact that nearly 40,000 (out of the ~1.5 lakh who voted for BJP) chose Ms. Surabhi Vani as their second preference. This wouldn’t have been possible if TRS put up some other candidate.

This episode is also a stark reminder of how pathetic the Congress party is. In their egotistic quest to satisfy the Gandhi family, the Congress party has ditched every single icon of their party, both at the national and at the states level. There are hundreds of leaders from the Congress who have made yeomen contributions to the party and country, but Congress party’s conscious attempts to ensure they remove all these leaders from public memory is finally showing up in electoral results too. This trend of other parties choosing to fete icons of the country who belonged to the Congress party is really a welcome move.

The BJP candidate Mr. Ramachandra Rao put up a spirited fight but fell short by ~11,000 votes. There were two key drawbacks in this campaign strategy. There was less focus on what Mr. Ramchandra Rao did as an MLC for the past 6 years and more focus on what the TRS didn’t do. There was less focus on what Mr. Ramchandra Rao did as an MLC and more focus on what the BJP leadership has been doing all along. There was also the election fatigue that set in – it was only just a couple of months ago that the elections to the GHMC were held – the TRS succeeded in bringing in more graduates to the booth than the BJP was. Mr. Ramchandra Rao also does command a good standing in the constituency and the party. But he was outsmarted this time by the TRS through the choice of candidate and campaign strategy.

Seat#2: The Khammam-Warangal-Nalgonda Graduates Constituency

This seat was already held by the TRS as it won the seat in 2015. TRS’s candidate Palla Rajeshwar Reddy was already seen as a sure shot winner of this election. However, the most surprising aspect of this seat was not the winner but the runner-up. A journalist Naveen who is popularly known as Teenmaar Mallanna (after the character of the person he plays in his satirical weekly show Teenmar) had entered the fray as an independent candidate for the second time. He lost the 2015 elections too (after taking Congress’s support at that time). However, this time, Teenmaar Mallanna came second, garnering nearly 1 lakh votes for himself as an independent! This seat was however never seen as a danger to the TRS. For those of you who are keen, the BJP came fourth in this constituency.

The swinging electoral results since 2018!

The results of the latest MLC elections are indicative of the swinging electoral results since 2018 in Telangana. The TRS won big in 2018 assembly elections; received a huge setback in 2019 Lok Sabha elections; won a assembly bypoll and also swept local body polls later in 2019; received two huge setbacks in an assembly bypoll and the GHMC elections in 2020; has won two MLC seats in 2021!

It’s been a see-saw battle ever since the 2018 victory in the Assembly polls. These electoral results are a reminder of a few things – though the BJP is rising as the main opposition party it still has an arduous road ahead to put up a stiff fight continuously; the Congress is no more a viable option for people; the TRS will have to sweat it out for all elections and will not have it easy like in the 2014-2018 phase.

For now, this round goes to the TRS.

TDP decimated; Jagan Reddy’s YSRCP sweeps Andhra Pradesh local body polls

 

The following article was written for MyInd Makers. Pasting it here for reference:

At the beginning of March 2020, the state of Andhra Pradesh was gearing up to have the elections for rural local bodies. The State Election Commission announced dates starting from March 21 for polls to MPTC, ZPTC, gram panchayats etc. By mid-March, opposition parties were beginning to demand that these elections be put on hold because of the onset of COVID. The ruling party folks took strong exception to this demand and wanted the polls to be held at any cost.

The State Election Commissioner, Mr. Nimmagadda Ramesh Kumar, decided to postpone the polls keeping in mind the onset of COVIID. This was before there was even talk of a lockdown or Janata Curfew. The ruling party folks went verbally berserk. They bought in the caste angle of the SEC and attributed his decision to him being from the same caste as Chandrababu Naidu. They said COVID doesn’t exist and therefore this move by SEC is nothing but political in nature.

The ruling party, YSRCP, took the fight to lengthy extremes. A new GO was bought in, so that Mr. Ramesh Kumar could be removed from his post. The HC stepped in to reinstate Mr. Ramesh. While the SEC was getting ready to conduct elections in early 2021, the YSRCP government tried to put more spokes by approaching HC and SC despite receiving continuous setbacks.

This behaviour by Jagan’s party was very surprising given how it was clear even last year that the YSRCP party will win the local body polls. The ego clash with SEC, especially when the going was very good for YSRCP, was totally unwarranted. But even Jagan would not have expected the results that were out on March 14th.

The YSRCP won all 11 Municipal Corporations and 73 out of the 75 municipalities! And the victory everywhere was not by some thin margins – the opposition was simply decimated. In the total 532 divisions in 11 corporations, YSRCP won 427 of them. Of the 1632 wards in municipalities that went to elections, the YSRCP won 1269 of them! The numbers are proof enough of the decimation the TDP had to go through. Given such massive support that YSRCP enjoys, it is really strange why Jagan Mohan Reddy went to such extreme lengths to either get rid of SEC or have elections held under a different SEC!

Predictably the opposition cried foul. They said money power won. They said that YSRCP won because they threatened the voters. No party has money power to the scale of literally sweeping everywhere they have contested from. So, what explains this unprecedented victory?

In my view, it is a combination of two factors. The first one being the obvious – good delivery on the promises made in the 2019 manifesto. Many schemes of the Jagan government are basically transferring money to accounts of beneficiaries (For example: 15000 per year into the mother’s account if she sends her child to school; 5000 per month to “Village volunteers”; increase in pension etc). The “village volunteers” was especially a big hit with the unemployed youth in the villages – the volunteers are responsible for ensuring government schemes reach all people in the village.

The second factor, I believe, is that the massive anger against Chandrababu hasn’t subsided. In fact, it looks like the anger against Chandrababu Naidu has increased manifold after the 2019 debacle. CBN and the TDP was largely not accessible during the immediate period after the lifting of the lockdown. They were not hitting the streets and meeting people to make the right noises. Chandrababu Naidu, believe it or not, even scolded the people attending his own rallies that they come to the rally but go vote for YSRCP! Despite repeated jokes about CBN brags about his past work, CBN didn’t learn any lesson from it. He continued to talk more about himself, ignored the next generation of leaders, refused to give exposure to many leaders of the party and most importantly – stays in Hyderabad, Telangana and not in Andhra Pradesh! CBN thinks he is awesome, and it is the voter that doesn’t understand him and therefore it is the voters’ fault! With such an egotistical attitude, it is really difficult to endear yourself to the people.

The TDP cadre is thus tired. The handful of MLAs seem to be in two minds as to whether to stay in the party or not. The cadre surely wants a leader who will enthuse them; fight with them; listen to them. Neither CBN nor his son Lokesh are doing this today. If they continue on this path, TDP may even plunge to deeper depths in the 2024 elections.

For those of you keen on BJP’s performance (it was in alliance with Jana Sena party), here are the combined numbers of the two parties – they won 8/532 divisions in 11 Municipal corporations and 25/1632 wards in town municipalities. Those of you trying to make comparisons to how BJP was a nobody in Karnataka, Odisha, West Bengal etc, need to understand one crucial point – the BJP in those states was trying to make space for itself in an already bi-polar arena. There was never an anger against the BJP in these states. The anger against BJP in AP is quite high (perhaps just a notch below the Congress party). It will take a lot of efforts and stupendous communication from the party for this anger to subside. Hence the abysmal numbers for the BJP alliance are not at all surprising.

If Elections aren’t True Reflection of the Democratic Will of People, then what is?

 

The following article was written for MyInd Makers. Pasting it here for reference:

Democracy basically means there will be elections periodically and people will speak their mind. It is democracy if those who lose play the role of opposition to those who won. It is democracy if those who won implement what they promised. It is not democracy if those who lose don’t call the election itself to be a fraud. It is definitely not democracy if those who lost the elections think that democracy is not and should not be about elections in the first place! These weird arguments are not being made by some random people. These arguments are being made by prominent media personnel, prominent political leaders and today India’s former National Security Advisor, Mr. M.K.Narayanan.

It was very sad to read this article today in The Hindu where he says that “elections could well degenerate into a ritualistic exercise, without truly reflecting the democratic will of the people.” Maybe I am not intelligent enough to understand this mesmerizing logic, so it would really help if someone can simplify this for laymen like me! How are elections not a true reflection of democracy? How?

He doesn’t stop there. “Of serious concern is that elections could hereafter become an instrument to traduce democracy.” The word traduce means the following – “speak badly of or tell lies about (someone) so as to damage their reputation” So India’s former National Security Advisor thinks that elections actually damage the reputation of democracy. Shouldn’t it bother us to the core that such a man was once responsible for India’s security apparatus? Or is this a mere reflection of the attitude of the government he had served under? Because we clearly know Rahul Gandhi’s party doesn’t care about elections in the first place.

After telling us that elections are not democracy, he goes on to analyse how the upcoming elections in states where BJP is not strong are going to be much better than in those where the BJP is strong. Here is how he begins the analysis on how BJP will try to achieve through “proxy means” – “In the southern States that will be going to the elections, there could be one significant variant, viz. , the objective of achieving power would be through proxy means.” BJP is in alliance with AIADMK. Obviously AIADMK is the larger party in the alliance in Tamil Nadu. Would the former NSA now call every minority partner in alliances as those who will “achieve power through proxy means”? Is our former NSA really that clueless on electoral alliances and the math behind them? What exactly is wrong if the people of TN end up voting for the AIADMK alliance? Oh wait, I know the answer to that question – the people are themselves wrong if they choose the BJP!

Their favorite Kerala can do nothing wrong. This is evident when he starts that analysis with “The election scene in Kerala is markedly different.” Why? Because apparently “Kerala has, however, not seen any communal violence as elections approach,”. This is staggering analysis really! Did Tamil Nadu see any communal violence? Did Puducherry see any communal violence? Did Bihar see any communal violence? West Bengal is seeing the worst political violence witnessed in recent times but let’s celebrate that Kerala did not see communal violence!

Assam also is going to elections, so what does our former National Security Advisor have to say about that? “In the Northeast, Assam is already a BJP bailiwick, and the attempt here would be to strengthen Central authority in contrast to regional autonomy.” The meaning of the word “bailiwick” is “one's sphere of operations or area of interest.” I don’t get the choice of these words because by this logic, the entire North East is BJP “bailiwick”! What “regional autonomy” gets disturbed if BJP wins to power has been explained by the former NSA. It is left to us to figure out what he meant by that comment.

The former NSA is also the former governor of West Bengal. So naturally he spares significant space for analyzing West Bengal. We are enlightened that “rallying slogans ‘Vande Mataram and Jai Sri Ram’ by rival groups are being projected as the battle cry of the Forward versus the Subaltern classes.”. Did you ever imagine that a former NSA would see Vande Mataram as a slogan that divides the people of our country? Should we be worried that such people were once holding very powerful positions in the government of India?

But what about the violence that’s going on in the state? He has an answer for that – “The BJP and the TMC are equally to be blamed for the aggravated communal violence, but the real ‘fall-guy’ has been democracy.” Whatever happens anywhere, the BJP must be at fault! This is a state ruled by the TMC. The killings happening in the state are of BJP workers, but yeah sure the BJP is equally at fault as the TMC is!

The former NSA ends his article with the most predictable byline ever – “The danger to democracy”! There is a lot of verbose that predicts violent uprisings in the country. Does it behoove the former NSA to go about creating imaginary fears like this? Does it behoove the former NSA of the country to actually the question the electoral democracy? What other form can a democracy take if not the electoral one? It’s ok to be biased towards the political party that has given you exalted positions in the power structure. But is it ok to convert your hatred of a political party to undermining the very process of elections in India? Apparently, it is!

Why ‘climate activists’ criticize PM Modi for everything else, other than what he is doing for the climate

 

The following article was written for OpIndia. Pasting it here for reference:

“Climate activist” seems to be the new buzzword in the industry today. And invariably all those classified as “climate activists” are very loud in their criticism of Prime Minister Modi and that too for reasons outside of climate change! I couldn’t help but wonder though – is it because “climate activists” have nothing to criticize Narendra Modi on this topic?  

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India has already provided clean cooking gas for nearly 15 crore families in the country, under the Ujjwala scheme. The scheme continues to expand and will cover more families in the years to come. 

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, under the Ujala scheme India has already distributed and installed a whopping 36,70,00,000 LED bulbs saving nearly 48,000 million kWh of energy per year and nearly 19,000 crores (till date). If you are in India and are travelling on its roads, you can see this change for yourself.

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India is progressing fast in implementing the Jal Jeevan Mission – to provide clean drinking water to every household in the country by 2022. When PM Modi will announce the completion of the scheme on the occasion of India’s 75th year of Independence, I would really like to see the reactions of these alleged “climate activists”. 

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India has taken the world’s largest cleanliness program under Swacch Bharat. Many “climate activists” are seen posing for photographs while cleaning out garbage that is thrown out on our streets and roads. For every such alleged activist, there were at least 10 selfless volunteers who took it upon themselves to make their surroundings clean and ensure they remain clean too. 

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India built nearly 10 crore toilets for its citizens. I think I don’t have to explain the positive impact to the environment when crores of citizens don’t have to openly defecate. Studies have also indicated that lakhs of lives have also been saved because of the lesser spread of diseases. 

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India has ‘voluntarily committed itself’ to meet targets that are unprecedented for a developing country. We have targeted to reduce emissions by 33-35% by the year 2030, as compared to 2005 (2030 is not too far away, dear “climate activist”). In the words of MEA, this “means that for every additional dollar of GDP India will be using progressively and a significantly lesser amount of energy.” What role are all of our “climate activists” playing in achieving this unprecedented target? Chances are that we will never know! 

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India has spearheaded the formation of the International Solar Alliance, a coalition of nearly 120 countries that lie between the Tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, thereby committing to lead a global effort to make the best use of the sunlight these countries receive. Prime Minister Modi’s stress on using more Solar energy as a major source of renewable energy is nothing new. He has been implementing this right from his Chief Ministerial days too.

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India’s Solar power capacity has increased by more than 11 times in the last five years. Recently, India achieved 5th global position in solar power deployment by surpassing Italy. You can look around for yourself and see how rooftop solar panels are becoming popular by the day. You can visit villages and see how solar energy-based generators are being installed. You can see for yourself the vast number of solar parks being opened – we are not just well on our way to meet our targets for 2030 but also beat them!

Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, a clarion call was made from the ramparts of the Red Fort on August 15th, 2019, to end the use of single-use plastic. Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India is the first to leapfrog from Euro IV-equivalent emission standards directly to Euro VI-equivalent standards. Because under Narendra Modi’s leadership, India has increased its forest cover by ~1.4% in just 4 years. 

If these “climate activists” think all of this is not good enough, then why can’t they write in detail about better solutions? Instead of constantly whining about topics outside of climate, why cannot these alleged activists conduct debates on what is further needed for “climate change”? Amusingly enough, in a 2019 article published in The Hindu, one of the suggestions that the author gave for mitigating climate change in Agriculture was that “It is high time we restrict these” (Minimum Support Price etc). Don’t believe me, see for yourself. 

“Climate change” cannot be achieved by a magic wand. It will take long years of behavioural change, sustainable policies, and strong implementation to achieve the stringent targets. “We are not doing enough” is an oft-repeated argument of “climate activists”. Prime Minister Modi has himself acknowledged that the world is not doing enough and we must step up our efforts. He is doing everything he can to step up. It is time for “climate activists” to participate rather than whine. 

Rahul Gandhi was touted to ‘spearhead’ the Congress attack during the budget session but this is what we got instead

 

The following article was written for OpIndia. Pasting it here for reference:

On February 6th, Rahul Gandhi tweeted a table with weird statistics (You may wonder what’s new!). Stating that “Cowardice runs deep in GOI”, he attached the following image.

It is natural for you to wonder why India’s budget speech would have a mention of China. However, by now we are used to such juvenile interpretations from the former and future President of the mighty Indian National Congress. There are other not-so-juvenile and baffling conclusions to be drawn from that table.

Here is a pdf link to the 2021 Budget speech. You can open it and search (Ctrl+F) for the word “Corporates”. A net total of 0 results turn up. Zero. The word “corporate” comes up 17 times though – 7 times as part of the word “incorporate”! Search for “Companies” – 15 results come up. Given Rahul Gandhi’s penchant for Ambani and Adani, you would think he is referring to them. The speech talks about Insurance companies, Power distribution companies, Companies Act, Public sector companies etc!

Is it Rahul Gandhi’s contention that India’s Budget speech should not talk about companies at all? Let’s leave the logical questions aside for a while. Don’t you feel sorry as to how the former and future President of the might Congress party does not have a team that can even get basic searches right in an electronic document?

His obsession with Prime Minister Modi is scary. Budgets presented during UPA time also had the “word” “Prime Minister” in the them. Budget speeches, even from the 1950s always referred to the Prime Minister. He/she is the captain of the ship, so why would the “word” Prime Minister not be used in the budget speech Rahul Gandhi?!

His reference to the absence of the word “defence” in the speech is further embarrassing. The annexure documents clearly mention the allocations to the defence sector. In another tweet on Feb 1st, immediately after the budget, he asked the Prime Minister “Why hasn’t he increased the Defence Budget for them?”

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has given an awesome reply highlighting the increases in the budget of the Defence ministry over the years. Defense minister Rajnath Singh had already tweeted about the “highest ever increase in capital outlay”.

The Budget document, available to all MPs, clearly shows the increase in defence allocations and spending (Page 47, “Allocations for Major Ministries/Departments” here). Why doesn’t the former and future President of the might Congress party read before writing such juvenile stuff? In addition, I cannot help but wonder how does he feel when he sees the increase in budget of pensions from 40,000 crores in 2013 to nearly 1 lakh crores in 2020?

Another tweet reads “Forget putting cash in the hands of people…”. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman mentioned about nearly 1.15 lakh crore rupees has been transferred to nearly 10 crore families of farmers in the country in the past 3 years! In her reply, she also mentions about how MNREGS will be spending nearly 1.1 lakh crore in this year alone. Lakhs of crores directly being transferred to people actually amounts to “putting cash in the hands of people” but how does this simple logic elude the former and future President of the mighty Congress party?

Let’s move away from his tweets and move on to this participation in the Budget debate. The build-up to his participation was unreal. “Rahul Gandhi to spearhead Congress’ attack during Budget debate in Lok Sabha”, we were told.

We were told so by Financial Express,  Business World, NDTV (ofcourse!), Times Now etc. Now, you would assume that Rahul Gandhi will have notes ready from the Budget document. You would assume that Rahul Gandhi will hold the Budget document in his hands, sift through various sections and make specific points. Because that’s what 76 of the remaining MPs who spoke on the budget did.

Defying all expectations, Rahul Gandhi refused to speak about the Budget. He pointedly said that he is protesting the farm laws and therefore he will not speak about the Budget but speak about the farm laws. There was a nearly ~15-hour debate on the Farm laws just 2-3 days back in the Lok Sabha.

The Lok Sabha sat till midnight to debate the same. Rahul Gandhi was absent during this time. And because he thinks he is the King of the universe; he chose to speak about Farm laws during a debate on the Budget!

MPs vie for an opportunity to speak about the Budget and put forth their specific points. Instead of resorting to such a colossal waste of time, Rahul Gandhi should have given opportunity to any one of the other 50 MPs from his party to speak some sense instead of the juvenile blabber he did. How can the former and future President of the mighty Congress party end up wasting such precious legislative time of the Lok Sabha?

However, none of these are as disturbing as the fact that the leaders of Congress party took strong objection to Ms. Nirmala Sitharaman taking Rahul Gandhi’s name in his absence (56:22 to 56:56 here). This astonishing sense of princely entitlement is simply baffling.

It is common practice for ministers to take members names to clarify on points raised during debates, whether they are present in the house or not. What special privilege does the former and future President of the Congress party have, that his name should not be taken when he isn’t present in the house?

Rahul Gandhi’s impatience in sitting through the budget speech, intolerance towards hearing the opposing argument, and impairment to comprehend basic documents is now beyond embarrassing. One can understand Congress party placing some faith in him pre-2019. Why the mighty Congress party wants to stick with him is beyond any reasoning now.

Nirmala Sitharaman’s underappreciated legendary endeavors in Indian economy’s rebound in a Pandemic Year

 

The following article was written for MyInd Makers. Pasting it here for reference:

In a country as vast and diverse as ours, even on a sunny day, it is not easy being the Finance minister. Perhaps the toughest job after the Prime Minister of India is being the Finance minister of India. Every Finance minister of India therefore deserves a special place in India’s history (including P. Chidambaram!).

People often term the years 1990-1991 as the most challenging year for India’s finances. The 1991 budget is often referred to as the budget that changed the course of India. Be that as it may, I am now of the strong belief that the worst year so far for India’s economy has been the year 2020. A full lockdown for nearly a month, followed by a partial lifting of the lockdown over the course of the next 3-5 months only meant that the economy will dip to levels not seen before. Revenue of course will come down but more importantly the sentiment that guides the economy also takes a big hit.

Imagine being the Finance minister of the country in times like this! Imagine the pressure she has been subjected to, day in and day out, to announce something or the other to “revive” the economy. Imagine the ridicule she had to put up with (“India’s worst Finance minister” screamed even the supporters, after the 2020 budget). Imagine people slicing and dicing your speeches and twisting them out of context (Remember the twisting of the “I don’t eat onion” comment?). Imagine being constantly accused and heckled that the country is in doldrums because of you. Imagine being Nirmala Sitharaman in times like this!

People like Rahul Gandhi wanted the country to burn. The English media waited for food riots to break out in the country because of the lockdown. The media pounced on any report from anywhere in the world that predicted a long recovery for India and any Tom, Dick and Harry who forecasted low growth numbers for many years to come was given prime time space to amplify those views.

Come 2021, India had rebounded and how! These same analysts are baffled as to how we rebounded so well. For you to get an answer to that question, you must listen to Finance minister, Ms. Nirmala Sitharaman’s reply to the 2021 budget (in both the Rajya Sabha and the Lok Sabha). While some statistics will blow your mind, it is the attitude of the government that needs to be discussed here.

From ~30 min in the video here, Nirmala Sitharaman explains how they had instructed banks to either call or SMS and keep in touch with every single MSME entrepreneur and inform them that they are more than welcome to take a security free loan to start reviving their unit (pay pending bills, pay salaries, buy/repair equipment). And when feedback came that there is confusion if such an offer is only for MSME’s, clarifications were issued that this scheme was not just for MSME’s but even for other small businesses. The option to reject the loan was given to the customer and not to the bank. A new PM SVANIDHI scheme was announced for street vendors and nearly 50 lakhs of them availed this scheme.

While replying on MNREGA, Nirmala Sitharaman revealed some very interesting statistics. She told us how the UPA government didn’t even spend what was allotted to the scheme in the years that they were in power (Watch from ~26th minute here, for some astounding truths). Of course, Sonia Gandhi was never questioned about this low utilization. She was only deified for bringing in such a scheme in the first place. Most importantly, Nirmala Sitharaman explained, at ~29th minute here, how the spending on this scheme for this pandemic year is at an all time high of ~1 lakh crore! On MyInd Makers, we had earlier analysed how Sonia Gandhi (Congress) and Brinda Karat (Communist) were in full praise of the MNREGA version being implemented by this government.

Another extremely important argument that Nirmala Sitharaman made was how the entire Atmanirbhar package was designed to tailor the needs of the Indian who needs it. It was not a copy-paste effort of other countries. It was not announced as a knee-jerk reaction to grab meaningless headlines. A total of INR 29 lakh crore worth of package was announced during the course of the year (notice how she also clarifies, at ~47th minute here, on a member’s question on whether the number is 27 lakh crore or 29 lakh crore). She explains how feedback was gathered right from the level of the Prime Minister and then tailored to meet the needs of Indians. She explained how changes were made when certain shortcomings were bought to their notice.

So, it turned out that the Finance Ministry of the Modi government ensured unprecedented availability of funds to provide rural employment to a tune never seen before; provided the best possible structural support for revival of MSMEs and street vendors; ensured that direct cash transfers continue to happen for farmers – and we have to witness the spectacle of alleged experts wondering how come the Indian economy is reviving so fast! If we have such a dynamic leadership, why would we not rebound like how we did? Who would not like to have leadership that looks for avenues to ease the lives of Indians like this?

India’s revival is a revival that has been engineered by the joint stupendous efforts of both the government of India and citizens of India. The role of the Finance Ministry and the leadership of Nirmala Sitharaman during the year 2020 will go down into the history books as legendary. I reiterate – 2020 was the toughest year Indian economy faced, even worse than 1991. We are indeed lucky to have Prime Minister Modi and Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman be at the helm in these challenging times. “India’s worst finance minister” may actually end up becoming India’s best Finance minister. Without exaggeration!

What’s cooking between AP CM and the State Election Commissioner?

The following article was written for The Commune Magazine. Pasting it here for reference:

At the beginning of March 2020, the state of Andhra Pradesh was gearing up to have the elections for rural local bodies. The State Election Commission announced dates starting from March 21 for polls to MPTC, ZPTC, gram panchayats etc. By mid-March, opposition parties were beginning to demand that these elections be put on hold because of the onset of COVID. The ruling party folks took strong exception to this demand and wanted the polls to be held at any cost.

The State Election Commissioner (SEC), Mr. Nimmagadda Ramesh Kumar, decided to postpone the polls keeping in mind the onset of COVIID. This was before there was even talk of a lockdown or Janata Curfew. The ruling party folks went verbally berserk. They questioned the intention of the SEC in siding with Chandrababu Naidu. They bought in the caste angle of the SEC and attributed his decision to him being from the same caste as Chandrababu Naidu. They said COVID doesn’t exist and therefore this move by SEC is nothing but political in nature.

While these verbal attacks were happening, the lockdown was announced. This put a full stop to all plans surrounding these elections. But this did not put a full stop to the machinations of the Chief Minister, Mr. Jagan Mohan Reddy. In April 2020, he brought in a Government Order that changed the term of the SEC, through which he was able to replace N. Ramesh Kumar with an SEC of his choice. Both the High Court and the Supreme Court intervened and reinstated Mr. Ramesh Kumar in July 2020, in what was a major blow to the Chief Minister.

With the number of COVID cases decreasing and also elections being held to state assemblies, the State Election Commissioner got ready to conduct the Gram Panchayat elections. He started seeking opinions of various parties in October 2020. The ruling party’s verbal attackers were activated again. The same people who argued that COVID is not a big deal in March went on and on about how COVID hasn’t subsided fully and the elections must be postponed.

January 2021 has been an eventful month. Sensing that this logic was not flying through, they came up with the logic that the government has to focus its energies on vaccine deployment and therefore cannot help in conduct of the polls. With the SEC being adamant, the employees then came out and said that they are not ready to participate in this exercise until they all get vaccinated. Employee unions started drafting and releasing statements against the SEC, Mr. N. Ramesh Kumar too! With employee unions refusing to participate and the SEC releasing the notification for the polls, the matter went to the High Court.

The Chief Minister received two major setbacks in the courts. First, the High Court ruled in favour of the SEC. The state government immediately filed a case in SC and till SC heard the case, everyone starting from the Chief Secretary and the DGP to the VRO refused to participate in any meeting the SEC conducted. In yet another slap to the Chief Minister, the Supreme Court also ruled in favour of the SEC.

It is routine for our Delhi based English media to cover every small skirmish Arvind Kejriwal has. It is routine for our South based English media to hype every small statement that can bolster “Kerala model”. Therefore, it is but natural that they did not want to cover the constitutional crisis brewing up in AP in the past one month. The crisis was precipitating only because the egotistical Chief Minister did not want the SEC to gain an upper hand. In hindsight, there was no way the polls would have been conducted in the third and fourth weeks of March 2020. The irresponsible and reckless statements of ministers in March 2020 haven’t yet been forgotten by the people of the state.

Is Jagan Reddy’s ego so much more important than winning the elections? Clearly, he is well poised to win majority seats in this election so what exactly is this noise about? Shouldn’t our media be more robust in questioning these undemocratic actions of an elected Chief Minister? Shouldn’t his arrogance and contempt towards a person holding the post of SEC be called out? Shouldn’t multiple judgments by the High Court and Supreme Court not instill a sense of responsibility in him? Is Jagan Mohan Reddy getting blindsided by the massive mandate he has received?

All these questions would have been debated if such a thing happened in a BJP ruled state. Or if Arvind Kejriwal did the same thing. Sadly, the machinations of the Chief Minsiter of AP haven’t received the due coverage they deserve.

KTR's Coronation on Cards in Telangana?

 

The following article was written for MyInd Makers. Pasting it here for reference:

Ever since KCR appointed his son KTR as the working president of the party in 2018, rumours were strong that it is just a matter of time before KTR becomes the Chief Minister too. KCR began speaking about a Federal Front before the 2019 elections and was envisioning a national role for himself. As is his wont, he made strong statements against the BJP and the Congress at that time. Many people viewed his utterances and desire for a larger national role as the stage setting for making his son the CM.

The mandate of the people in 2019 though bought all these plans to a grinding halt. KCR had to refocus on Telangana and the governance here. The rumour mills were again abuzz a few months after the 2019 elections. They were so strong then that KCR himself had to clarify in the Assembly that he will remain the Chief Minister and has no plans to make KTR the CM!

An unprecedented crisis in the form of COVID then attacked the country, so every other thing was put on the side burner. The exclusive focus was on combating this crisis. As the crisis went on month after month, KCR became less visible and KTR more. Infact, KTR even conducted the cabinet meeting one day (Apparently, that meeting went on for 8 hours!). When criticism was mounting, KTR had to clarify that this meeting was conducted by him because all topics up for discussion were coming under the ambit of the ministerial portfolios he holds (He is IT, Municipal Administration, Urban Development and Industries minister – that’s a pretty rich profile!)

When BJP won the Dubbaka by-poll, the reason for TRS loss was sought to be pinned onto Harish Rao (Finance Minister, nephew of KCR and a very powerful TRS leader). Rumour mills again began circulating that KTR would be made CM after TRS wins the GHMC polls - KTR was in charge of these polls and a victory here meant he is better than Harish Rao! KTR was asked this question in the runup to the polls and he emphatically replied that there is no plan to replace KCR as the Chief Minister. The mandate of the people again put a stop to the rumour mills because TRS suffered a significant defeat in the GHMC elections.

But this time, the rumour mills were silent only for a few days. And when they became active again, certain sections were even getting bored of the same thing surfacing again and again. However, this time the rumours were circulated by senior ministers of the government. We were told that KTR would be made CM and the party would have two working Presidents – Harish Rao and Eetala Rajender (current Health minister, floor leader of TRS from 2004 to 2014, Finance minister from 2014 to 2018) so that all sections of the party are happy with the new responsibilities.

Senior minister after senior minister kept leaking this information to various media outlets. As of today, we even have dates being circulated – this change can happen as soon as February it seems! Taking up the cue, party leaders have even started introducing KTR as future CM, in various programs that he is Chief Guest of! And this time KTR isn’t even trying to squash these rumours. Neither has he made attempts to tell his leaders not to introduce him as the future CM!

All this also begs the question – what would KCR do? As of now, no one knows! Maybe his health isn’t permitting to bear the stress and burden of this post. Maybe he actually will start talking to other state parties and try to build a Federal Front. Or maybe he will just retire!

KTR as CM would definitely not have the same standing that his father has. Failures at recent electoral outings (after he became Working President of the party) would definitely be seen as him not yet having a complete grip. Harish Rao’s seniority and also a mass base within the party would definitely be a problem that KTR will continue to face, if more electoral setbacks happen under KTR’s leadership.

We now have to wait for the day these rumours become the reality, because with senior ministers now joining the bandwagon, this event doesn’t look unlikely anymore. It’s just a matter of time indeed!