the goan I network
PANAJI
The Congress is banking on the big, populist promises it has made in its national manifesto, including the Rs 72,000 per annual payout to the country’s poor under its Nyay scheme, to deliver it electoral dividends and a shot at power in the current Lok Sabha elections.
Nyay will be implemented without any additional tax burden and by rationalising the existing subsidies, Rajya Sabha MP from Karnataka Rajiv Gowda, who was also co-chair of the Congress manifesto drafting committee, told the media at a press conference in Panaji.
Gowda poked fun at Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s criticism that Nyay would impose a further burden and be injustice (anyay) on the tax-paying neo-middle class. He said, “I don’t expect the Prime Minister, who unleashed pain through demonetization on the poor and middle class of India, to understand the nuances of Nyay.”
Gowda said the Congress had worked hard while working out the scheme and it will be a major financial liberation for the underprivileged.
Gowda also listed several other measures included in the Congress manifesto, including the promise to allow new entrepreneurs to set up their own businesses without having to bother about the paperwork and licencing for the first three years.
In the context of Goa, he spoke about the Congress promise to set up a separate ministry for fisheries, a sector important to the State and which hitherto was being administered through the Agriculture Ministry.
Gowda was also highly critical of the Modi government’s performance on the economic front saying despite a massive deep in the international prices of crude, the Centre failed to pass on the benefit to the consumer and also did not improve the government’s financial position.
He argued that even the growth story was much better in the UPA terms than in the five years of Modi
raj.
On the question of ‘special status’ for Goa, Gowda said while the BJP is against granting the status to any state, the Congress has promised it to Andhra Pradesh as it was one of the assurances at the time of bifurcation of the State and formation of separate Telengana.
As as far as Goa’s demand is concerned, he said, the issue would have to be considered in detail before making any commitment.
