DailyPost 3045
THE BENEFICIARIES REPUBLIC
While we are celebrating our 76th Republic Day, we stand proud for what we have as a republic and a country thus far. A time to remember the country’s milestones, the ones who contributed to it and also make aware all Indians of journey / achievements, currently where we positioned and the country’s trajectory as we move forward. Festivities, euphoria and grandstanding, and big state ceremonies, mark this national festival in a similar manner as it happens in other countries too. There has been silent mass transformation that has been all over these decades, to reach our current situation, where the nation we have built can be termed as “The Beneficiaries Republic.”
In an extremely puritan manner, we restrict ourselves to only talking about our achievement on these days, and rightly so, but can we move ahead without any stocktaking on any of these days, and yet try and achieve the goals we had set right to achieve. The preamble of the constitution, if referred to on a regular basis for all our acts, can have a sobering impact on the powers that be, on the chest beating which keeps on happening on a regular basis. This would give us a fair idea as to how far we are from the social security cover of the developed countries, if that is the goal we intend to achieve.
Support for the poor and the underprivileged has not been a recent discovery, the governments have been doing since they came into being. It provided the necessary help and helped people trying to manage at the subsistence level or even lower. In recent times there has been a mercenary approach to welfare schemes, both at the centre and the states, for an ulterior gain. You have guessed it right, the gain is political. Earlier, though not spoken of, the final goal seemed to be providing good education and healthcare. Employment opportunities, equitable growth, creation of heathy institutions etc kept on happening at the subterranean level, was not much talked of, but the results were visible.
Now it seems that the effort is to concretise these schemes to eternity. From electioneering to government advertisement, which have been corporatised of late, it is the packaging and camouflage which keeps on happening on a regular basis. Cash transfer was expected to catch every receiver’s fancy and it has. The child’s yearning for pocket money. The free ration which started as a Covid measure, seems to have moved on to the infinite mode. The total number of beneficiaries may range, with the risk of being wrong, around 100 crores. They are dealt differently during elections, till the level of home to home canvassing, to solidify the nebulous quid pro quo relationship. Known as guarantees, freebies and what not, it has turned out to be the political lifeline of the nation. Taxpayers are taxed for getting nothing, fiscal discipline is in tatters, committed expenditure of governments have to be foregone and we are still to find a reachable social security regimen.
THE BENEFICIARIES REPUBLIC IS A MAKE BELIEVE POLITICAL REPUBLIC HANGING IN MID-AIR.
Sanjay Sahay
Happy Republic Day