The Week in Parliament
CPI(M) Parliamentary Office
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THE budget session of parliament concluded on February 10, with the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha being adjourned sine die. This was the last session of parliament before the Lok Sabha elections, due in April-May. This was a Lok Sabha of many dubious firsts: in terms of the number of workdays, this was the least productive Lok Sabha since 1952. No deputy speaker was appointed during its entire five-year tenure. As many as 146 MPs from the opposition parties were suspended for demanding a discussion about the parliament security breach. During this period in the Rajya Sabha, almost all criticism and questions against the government by opposition MPs were deleted.
In the Lok Sabha, A M Ariff participated in a general discussion on the interim budget. He said the government claims that India will become the third largest economy of the world soon and that the economic growth will be 7.5 per cent in 2023-24 surpassing expectations. Why is this vibrant growth not reflected in the lives of the common people of this country? The common people are made to suffer due to increase in prices of cooking gas as well as essential commodities. What was the price of subsidised domestic LPG cylinder in 2014 when the BJP came to power and what is the situation now? It was Rs 414 per cylinder in 2014 and now it is Rs 1,000. Similar is the story of petroleum products. They said they will halve petrol prices, but it is the highest in the world. By imposing crazy reforms in registering attendance and job allocation, etc, the government is slowly killing the rural job scheme MGNREGA. I wish to bring to the kind attention of the finance minister the report of Oxfam published last year. The report said that while five per cent own more than 60 per cent of the country’s wealth, the bottom 50 per cent possess only three per cent. The Budget does not propose any measure to address this issue. I would like to raise a pertinent issue. It is neglect towards the non-BJP-ruled states, including Kerala, who are forced to protest here in Delhi. If Karnataka is protesting today, it is Kerala’s turn tomorrow and followed by Telangana and Tamil Nadu. It shows that all the states are suffering at the hands of the central government. Ours is a federal country and states are the backbone of our economy. The government talks about inclusive growth but, in practice, it is killing the states inch by inch. Unfortunately, instead of supporting state governments by giving their due share, the BJP government is squeezing them as if they are enemies. An important revelation was made by none other than NITI Aayog CEO BVR Subramanyam that the prime minister has tried “off-record parley” to influence the chairman of the 14th Finance Commission, Y V Reddy. Had he succeeded in influencing the Finance Commission, what would have been the fate of the states? Undoubtedly, their share of central taxes would have come down from 42 per cent, as recommended by the Commission. It is heartening that we have officials like Y V Reddy who showed courage by not yielding to such unconstitutional demands. It is crystal clear that this government has been nurturing the idea of destroying the economy of states over the past 10 years. It is interesting that even after two weeks, the prime minister has not even responded to such a grave allegation.
In the Rajya Sabha, Elamaram Kareem said the interim budget presented by the finance minister is an attempt to conceal the harsh realities faced by the nation behind a veil of false claims. There is no concrete plan in the Budget to overcome the challenges faced by our nation. People have realised that the tall claims made in the budget are simply false statements. The finance minister claimed that the BJP government, which has been ruling the country for the past 10 years, has taken India forward, but the reality is just the contrary. In the budget, there is the minister's rhetorical exercise to hide the collapse of the economy despite claims of a 50 per cent increase in average income and moderate inflation; the ground truth reveals a different narrative characterised by soaring prices of essential goods and widespread unemployment. If the size of the economy is the criteria, Pakistan and Bangladesh are better than Finland and New Zealand but when we look at the Human Development Index, Finland ranks 11th and Pakistan at 161. According to the parameters of the BJP government, it has to be said that Pakistan is better than Finland. That is the difference between the claims. The finance minister said in her speech that they would bring the full budget in July. It would remain a dream. It is never going to happen, as the BJP will not come back to power. In this Budget, there is not a single mention about workers. The 60 crore strong workforce of India did not find a place in this budget. They are the real wealth-makers. This is a pro-corporate Budget and all our public sector undertakings are to be handed over to the corporates. That is the recommendation, that is the proposal in this budget. The finance minister claims that this is a pro-farmer and pro-poor budget. In the budget allocation, the allocation for the farming sector has drastically reduced. The allocation for the agriculture sector in 2022-23 was Rs 4,68,290 crore. In 2024-25, it is Rs 3,63,944 crore. The total subsidy in 2022-23 was Rs 5.7 lakh crore. In 2024-25, it is Rs 4.09 lakh crore. Food subsidy in 2022-23 was Rs 2.72 lakh crore. In 2024-25, it is Rs 2.05 lakh crores. This is the real picture. So, only with Ayodhya they cannot win the next election.
In the Lok Sabha, P R Natarajan said the finance minister’s budget speech sounded like an election campaign speech. In 2014, the Modi government promised that it will provide two crore Jobs every year but not even one crore people got jobs. Today they have assured they will give 55 lakh jobs. No step has been taken to reduce inflation. Despite the tall claims made by the finance minister about the state of India’s economy, the interim Budget for 2024-25 reveals the grim economic situation confronting the working people and the vicious face of the Modi government’s conception of ‘development’ which is designed to make the rich richer and the poor poorer. Though the revenue receipts in 2023-24 exceeded the budget estimates and grew by 13.3 per cent compared to the previous year, the central government’s expenditures have been squeezed below budget estimates in order to reduce the fiscal deficit. These expenditures have grown by only 7 per cent, less than even the nominal growth of GDP, which is officially expected to be 8.9 per cent. This shortfall in expenditure has taken place despite the establishment expenditure of the government being higher than budgeted. The axe has, therefore, fallen on expenditures on welfare schemes as well as on capital expenditure. This will negatively impact future growth and economic fundamentals. The squeezing of central government expenditure and the relative ‘improvement’ of revenues has taken place in the background of extremely poor growth. The estimated ‘real’ growth of 7.3 per cent in 2023-24 is pure fiction, among other things, being based on the absurd proposition that the inflation rate has come down to barely 1.6 per cent in 2023-24. This is completely at odds with the inflation rates based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which is around 6 per cent with food inflation at around 10 per cent. That the RBI has been holding its repo rate at 6.5 per cent since February 2023 in order to contain price rise reveals the real story of inflation in India. Despite the poor growth, the government has given the benefit of tilting the distribution of that slow growing income sharply in favour of big business, the rich and the wealthy. Revenues from corporate taxes and income taxes have jumped up significantly compared to the pre-Covid-19 period, not because rates of taxation have gone up but because the share of the rich in total income has increased. This is the K-shaped recovery, the ‘development’ in which the working people are squeezed to accept less while working more. This interim budget totally exposes the hollowness of the bombastic claims of the Modi propaganda machine of “real social justice” incorporating working people as “partners in growth”, etc. This budget carries forward the vicious “development model” of the Modi government which squeezes the livelihood of the vast majority of India’s working people to favour the maximisation of profits of a few.
Speaking on the Constitution (Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes) Orders (Amendment) Bill in the Rajya Sabha, V Sivadasan said this government is introducing a lot of bills, but what is their purpose? If they are interested in the development of SC/ST communities, they should provide facilities for education, health and employment. But they are not ready to provide these facilities for the downtrodden sections of society. The government has established universities and says these are for SC/ST communities. But what is the reality? The reality is there is no faculty. Students are there, but there is no faculty! A majority of SC/ST communities are working in the agricultural sector as agricultural workers. They are not getting pension because the government is not providing pension to agricultural workers. The Government of Kerala is providing pension to agricultural workers. But a majority of the state governments where the BJP is in power are not providing pensions. In the employment sector, SC/ST people used to get jobs earlier because of reservation. Now reservation is there, but no employment opportunities. Look at the situation in BSNL. After 2017, not even a single appointment has taken place in BSNL! As many as 2.26 lakh posts are lying vacant in the railways! If so many posts are lying vacant, how will SC/ST communities get reservation? In principle, we are saying that there is reservation and there are also other facilities. But they are not ready to provide education and employment facilities for the downtrodden and SC/ST communities in our country.
The Rajya Sabha took up a short duration discussion on the white paper on the economy and its impact on the lives of people. Speaking on this subject, John Brittas said this is not a white paper, but an election paper. The finance minister has said that 2004-2009 was a good period but she gives the credit to the previous government. Strange enough! Is it not a fact that the Left was supporting the UPA-I which made important decisions and drastic changes like education being made a fundamental right, Right to Information, employment being made a right through MGNREGA and Right to Food Security. The other day the prime minister was praising his predecessor, Manmohan Singh, whom he ridiculed earlier by calling him ”maun-mohan”. The following day the finance ministry is slapping a black paper on Manmohan Singh. I won't be surprised if tomorrow, this government would be giving a Bharat Ratna to Manmohan Singh saying that he was denied Bharat Ratna by Sonia Gandhi. This can also happen. The other day, the finance minister spoke about her abundance to Kerala. There were partial truths to confuse the people. She says that the crisis being faced by Kerala, getting its shares reduced from 3.8 per cent to 1.92 per cent, was due to the Finance Commission. In the same breath, she says that she provided so much of the revenue deficit grant. Was it not the Finance Commission's grant? The eighth Finance Commission made the 1971 Census population figures as the basis. But this government insisted on making the 2011 Census as the basis for the Fifteenth Finance Commission. Kerala’s revenue expenditure is 78.7 per cent whereas it is 54 per cent in Uttar Pradesh and 51 per cent in Madhya Pradesh.
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