Chandigarh: The Akali Dal on Tuesday released its manifesto for the forthcoming Punjab elections – the last major political party to do so – at Ludhiana. Released by Deputy CM Sukhbir Badal, the document aims to present a development-oriented and modernistic face of the Akali party. It does not suggest very many out of the box solutions to the problems of the state, but promises to strengthen the existing schemes along with introduction of new ones on similar lines.
It promises 20 lakh jobs for youth in the coming five years. These jobs are proposed to be generated from the public sector along with creation of multiple industrial hubs such as Mohali IT hub, New Chandigarh Medical Tourism hub, Bathinda Textile hub, Ludhiana hosiery hub, and Amritsar Tourism hub.
It prmises to draw out programs for skill-development of youth with a target of imparting training to 10 lakh youths through 2500 skill centers, one each in a cluster of five villages, to be set up across the state. After training, the party promises loans upto Rs 10 lakhs to the youth for setting up their own ventures.
The Akali manifesto proposes free gas connections to be given to all blue card holders, marginal farmers, construction workers and farm labour. Along with this, desi ghee and sugar would be provided to the card holders at the rate of Rs 25 and Rs 10 under the Atta-Dal schemes.
Under another major promise, the manifesto proposes to provide pucca houses to five lakh people at a cost of Rs 2000 crore. It assures all town-like facilities to be provided to the villages with implementation of sewerage, solar and water schemes in 12000 villages. Wi-fi and CCTV coverage is promised for every town and village in the state with a gaushala in every constituency segment.
On the road infrastructure front, the party promises to convert all roads in the state to four lanes or six lanes, depending on the present condition of a road. The smaller, connecting roads are to have a width of at least 18 feet.
For the core farming constituency, the Akali Dal promises to give a bonus of Rs 100 over and above the MSP, Rs two lakh annual interest-free loan for purchase of farm implements to those having less than five acres of land, and waiver of loans taken by poor farmers having landholding less than 2.5 acres. It promises to provide tube well connection to every farmer irrespective of the land holding.
The manifesto promises reservation of 33 per cent seats for women in Panchayati Raj and Municipal institutions, a two wheeler for all graduate, senior secondary school girls, and free sewing machines for all tenth pass girls.
The party promises to further extend the free electricity scheme to economically weaker sections of the society. It promises to increase old-age and widow monthly pension from the current Rs 500 to Rs 2000, Shagun scheme to Rs 51,000 from present Rs 500 and Bhagat Puran Singh Insurance Scheme to Rs 1 lakh from present Rs 50,000.
Traditionally, party manifestos have not had much significance in Punjab politics. Even in the elections in post-militancy period, roughly 1996 onwards, manifestos were hardly a point of discussion with the general populace. This time around, the manifesto politics of Aam Aadmi Party in the run up to the elections has put the spotlight on these documents like never before. While the AAP has released multiple manifestos for various segments of the society, the Congress party has come up with a 120-page document that had been in the making for over six months. In contrast, the Shiromani Akali Dal, spearheaded by its main political strategist Sukhbir Badal, has presented a comparatively short document of 52 pages very close to the elections.
On the whole, the Akali manifesto symbolizes the party efforts to retain its core support base while taking steps to broaden its appeal among other segments, so as to lessen its need for a coalition partner in the years to come. Whether the party gets the chance to implement it this time around will be known soon.