The Hindu Business Line : UPA's Common Minimum Programme

The Common Minimum Programme has done a good job of delineating the "human face" of economic reforms. It contains a "solemn pledge" to provide a Government that will not only be accountable, transparent, responsible and responsive "at all times" but also "corruption-free". But a purposeful implementation of the CMP will be possible only if Dr Manmohan Singh does not end up as a pawn in the hands of political manipulators, says B. S. Raghavan.

THE United Progressive Alliance (UPA) has crossed one big a hurdle with the ceremonious release of the Common Minimum Programme (CMP). The punch line at the end playing with the letters of the acronym holds out the tantalising promise of Collective Maximum Performance. It starts off with a resounding introduction enunciating six sonorous principles that would be the hallmark of the alliance. They look no more than pious and jaded platitudes. For the record, the CMP contains a "solemn pledge" to provide a government that will not only be accountable, transparent, responsible and responsive "at all times" but also "corruption-free".

But the miasma surrounding the government formation reduces the otherwise luminous preamble to a mere rhetorical flourish. Respect for propriety and probity seems stymied right at the start by the disregard of the imperative and age-old canon of good governance that Caesar's wife should be above suspicion.

Inclusion in the Cabinet of persons charge-sheeted by courts for serious criminal offences only shows that even a person of the stature of Dr Manmohan Singh, enjoying the highest public esteem for professional eminence and personal integrity, is unable to resist political compulsions.

Purposeful implementation of the CMP will be possible only if Dr Manmohan Singh does not end up as a pawn in the hands of political manipulators. What are his chances of keeping them at bay?

More to the point, how long will it be before the political crowd besieging him soils his own reputation and renders him helpless in the face of the vagaries of a soft state in the vice-like grip of an inept and corrupt political system? These are indeed deeply perturbing questions casting a dark shadow on the CMP itself.

Smorgasbord

Compared to the version of 1996, the current one is no doubt more comprehensive and exhaustive, but it suffers from some avoidable drawbacks. For many important courses of action promised, there is no mention of specific time-frames and modalities. This will make monitoring of implementation problematic.

Having had to accommodate within its purview the susceptibilities and preferences of dauntingly diverse political goals and interests, the CMP could not but be a smorgasbord meant to tickle every taste.

Apparently, the alliance partners and the Left do not want the CMP to be a binding agenda, but a set of guidelines and approaches to be improvised in the light of experience before being adopted as policies.

That is not such a bad idea, as it will allow for the mellowing of postures which now seem outwardly rigid and implacable. The opposition of the Left to labour reforms and disinvestment instantly comes to mind.

The Left is fully aware these are intimately linked to competitiveness and economic resurgence. They also have been closely following the happenings in China where the Communist regime has given the euphemistic label of market socialism to reforms that go farther than India's.

The Left Front Government of West Bengal has not also been lagging in luring foreign investment. It has not hesitated to hire a team of consultants from the American firm, McKinsey & Company, to help attract foreign investors.

It has seen to it that the nearly constant strikes that used to paralyse Kolkata are a thing of the past. It has encouraged the sprouting of glistening American-style malls, where young middle-class Indians buy Levi's jeans and Nike sneakers.

The Chief Minister, Mr Budhdhadeb Bhattacharjee, recently said, "China could not have eradicated poverty without the help of multinational corporations and foreign agencies." This is why The New York Times, in a commentary on the Leftist stance, said, "Do not worry about what the Left says, watch what they actually do!"

A similar change of heart is possible in regard to the stand taken by the Left on the demand for carving out a separate Telangana State out of the present Andhra Pradesh. Its aversion to the proposal has not come in the way of its willingness to let it be part of the CMP, in the hope, perhaps, of talking the Telengana Rashtra Samithi out of it when the time comes.

A noticeable and positive feature of the CMP is that it has made a good job of delineating the "human face" of economic reforms. Prof. Richard Jolly in his book, Poverty and Adjustment, pointed out as long ago as 1990, that economic reforms and the consequent structural adjustment can become a noose round the necks of the poor, if they cannot be tempered suitably.

The loud and clear message of the voter in the recent election also was that reforms, in whatever sector, are not ends in themselves, nor are they to be allowed to be exploited by business, commercial and consumerist interests to their advantage.

From this perspective, the substance and direction of the measures contained in the CMP are in tune with the current situation.

From whichever side of the political spectrum it might come, there is great force in the demand to tailor the reforms to serve their primary purpose of raising the quality of life of the poor and the downtrodden.

It is the failure to grasp this essential truth on the part of those who are pre-occupied with stocks and shares and view the world through the blinkers of the bottomlines of balance-sheets that has been at the root of the turbulence at the bourses.

The Finance Minister and, on a suitable occasion, the Prime Minister himself, should do some plain-speaking to domestic and foreign economic players to drive home the point that they cannot be like spoilt children thinking only of themselves, forgetting their social responsibility to take a hand in dovetailing the reforms process into a dynamic strategy for the regeneration and prosperity of a predominantly agricultural society living in villages.

They should actively join hands with the Government in implementing the goals of the CMP for massive investments in agriculture, infrastructure and rural development.

Indeed, it will be a great idea if one or two representatives from the business and industry are included in the proposed National Commission for Farmers to be headed by Dr M. S. Swaminathan.

One size cannot fit all

Any headlong rush towards exotic prescriptions, unmindful of the country-specific ethos and genius, in any one front, will eventually nullify the gains on all fronts.

Copious literature — including the seminal book by the Nobel Laureate, Dr Joseph Stiglitz — exists from which the flip side of globalisation must be evident to the worldwide community of businesspersons, foreign investors, academic scholars, media pundits, Bretton Woods denizens and government officials. It ought to know that one size cannot fit all in the matter of resolving socio-economic issues.

And, yet, improvident solutions are thrust down the throats of gullible or pliant governments badly in need of capital and technology by whatever means and from whatever source.

In their eagerness to attract them, they ignore the following crucial factors bearing on the success of reforms: Careful preparation of the ground in advance; participatory and consensual decision-making involving all stake-holders, especially the people affected; holistic vision; resource mobilisation and utilisation based on realistic calculation of investment and return, input and output, cost and time and cost and benefits; moving forward in a phalanx in line with priorities; and regular monitoring, evaluation and review.

Power sector and disinvestment are cases in point illustrating how failure on all these counts has vitiated such worthwhile efforts as had been made.

As regards power, the Dabhol project in Maharashtra has turned out to be a catastrophe, while submission to the World Bank's unthinking imposition of its judgment has led to the electoral debacle in Andhra Pradesh.

Further, in the absence of a National Electricity Policy, each State was entering into tie-ups widely differing in scope, cost, return, rate structure, debt-equity component and the like. Altogether it is a sickening mess.

There is certainly the need to give an once-over to the Indian Electricity Act, 2003, to determine whether the provisions relating, for instance, to delicensing of generation, induction of private licensees in transmission and distribution, open access in transmission from the outset and in distribution by phases, and the unbundling and winding up the State Electricity Boards have in any way contributed to the present predicament.

The CMP's call for a review of the Act is, therefore, not only unexceptionable but ineluctable.

(To be concluded)