Elections season in India, is one that every Indian waits for. This is simply due to two reasons. Either to support the political party that one voted for the last season or to change one's vote to another seemingly promising political party, due to dissatisfaction with the previous political party or if one is lured away by the sweet promises that are made pre-elections by all political parties. This is a tradition which has been growing since the very first time our great nation held its independent elections in 1951-
1952. However, with time we can see that this tradition is being merely used in order to appease voters just for this “pre-election” season and then post-elections all these promises are gone for good.
Examples of such promises can be seen throughout election history in India. Talking about something in recent history, the 2014 general elections prove to be a viable example. The two most anticipated political parties, the Indian National Congress and the Bhartiya Janta Party, organized massive campaigns and made many such “promises” along with their election manifesto which clearly stated many of these promises on printed paper, to appease the voters. As the BJP’s four year term reaches its end, I fell now is a good time to evaluate how many of their promises have the BJP upheld. The most disputed BJP promise, which almost all opponent political parties have brought up is about fighting the issue of unemployment and creating jobs. Now, this is a promise that the BJP made, to create jobs for those who were unemployed, but we need to realize that the unemployment in India is huge. To deal with it entirely is not merely possible. The BJP government has also been making this very clear that all 125 crore Indians cannot get jobs. Also the BJP government has created more job opportunities through government schemes like the Mudra scheme, Stand Up India, StartUp India etc. However, no exact figure is available and all that there is claims by both sides. Like the BJP says that at least 9 crore people got employment through self-employment and as the INC President Rahul Gandhi claims, that as compared to China which gives 50,000 jobs per day(24 hours), the Modi government only gives 450. Adding onto the controversy, the BJP government has been blocking all official unemployment count or relevant data. This move has given opponent parties a strong criticizing front. Another strong issue is of farmers and agriculture. Farmers prove to be real game-changers in terms of elections and in 2014, the BJP got this sect’s support by claiming to provide minimum of 50 per cent profits over the cost of production for the farmers, reforming Agriculture Produce Market Committee (APMC) Act 2003, implementing farm insurance and starting an Agri-Rail network. The 50 percent profit over production costs has not been implemented. Nor has the Agri-Rail network been established.More importantly, India has seen a nearly eight fold rise in “agrarian riots” after the BJP got into power. The farmer community, however, reacted, giving the BJP a loss in three assembly elections- Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. Realizing this increasing agitation between the rural India, the Modi government was quick enough in its action to “promise” doubling farmer income, ”ByaajMaafi”, pension for poor and also providing housing for all in the BJP’s 2019 elections manifesto. But again, “promises”. Similarly, The Indian National Congress has made many promises. One being, the much disputed promise for farmer loans waiving if voted to power in 2019. Adding onto this promise is the claim to implement their
promise within 10 days of attaining power. Loan waiving for farmers has been a serious topic, because the number of suicides committed by farmers due to pressure of loans has increased drastically and to appease the farmer’s community, no promise works better than one of loan waiving. Now loan waiving is not an easy decision. It requires a lot of courage to make this decision and let alone deal with the strain it is going to cause on banks and on the nation’s economy. A similar promise was made by the BJP
party when fighting for elections in Uttar Pradesh (2017) saying that a decision on farmer loan waiving would be taken by the official cabinet meeting. The result as we know it is that the first cabinet meeting was in itself delayed for a period over two weeks and that no elaboration on the issue was observed even after the cabinet meeting was held. So, we can understand two things from here. Firstly, that loan waiving is not just a simple decision to make. Governments, when in power try to avoid it, because it is a
decision involving courage and also the bearing of possible criticism from other sects of society like the banks whose loans are not being repaid. Secondly, on a bigger canvass, trends can be observed in such “promises” which political parties keep on making in rotation. In a sense that in 2017, the BJP government used this promise in UP and now for the 2019 general elections, the INC is using it.
On the other hand many might argue that these promises are not actual promises but rather policies which a political party may want to introduce if they get in power, but may not be able to so due to several reasons, like a bill not getting passed in either the Lok Sabha or the Rajya Sabha for example. This might be a possibility, and due to many such possibilities it is hard to judge whether political parties such as INC for example in 2014, made many campaigning promises such as Functional toilets in every school and every household. Now this might be a false promise or a true policy nobody knows. Which is why by only comparing a political party’s promises and what it does in its reign, can we truly conclude what one promised only to appease voters or what one promised and worked on those lines as well. And only after comparing such political reins of power can we conclude that political parties make false promises. Now this might seem simple to judge parties with hindsight, but the tricky part comes in when we need to predict what is going to happen the next time? Is the political party again going to make fake promises? Also the bigger issue is which party to choose because every political party makes some promises which they are not able to uphold. Moreover, we, as the common people have no other way but to listen and believe such promises to be able to judge each political party. And as I mentioned earlier, every party has been at fault in upholding promises, so the only way to make sure that one does not get caught in these webs of lies is nothing but to have faith and hope that such a future does not come. This very trust and the absolute absence of any other alternative that I am talking about here, is the driving force of politicians who make these false promises, to make such false promises. Identifying this as our weakness, these politicians go on to make promises of greater magnitudes such as the INC, which has promised giving Rs 72,000 per year as minimum income to poor families if the party is voted to power in Lok Sabha polls. Now, with past experiences, I along with a lot of Indians are forced to believe that this is a fake promise which is why even if the intention might be genuine, the party’s image is spoiled and the only thing that can clean the image is if the party comes to power and actually does this huge task. Now we need to understand that both; us-the common people are trapped into this web of lies and are skeptical to vote for a party and them- the politicians as well as their party image is spoiled just by a mere speculation that whatever promise they make is false or not. Hence, all that the
world’s biggest democracy is relying upon is trust. Trust that the politicians are not making a fake promise, trust that the voters do not consider our genuine policies as fake promises and it is my sincere appeal, on behalf of all the people of India who trust various political leaders and parties, to not break this trust. Because if they do, and continue doing so, it shall not be long before the people of India come together against this, and India’s democratic system will break from its very roots and fall.
