The newly elected Narendra Modi-led NDA Government appears to prefer wordplay and election slogans to a “concrete roadmap” on what it plans to do in the months ahead, was the verdict of Opposition parties commenting on President Pranab Mukherjee's address to Parliament on Monday.
The address, Congress spokesperson and the party’s Deputy Leader in the Rajya Sabha Anand Sharma said, was replete with slogans that Mr. Modi had used in the election campaign during the last six months.
Mocking the Prime Minister’s promise of “minimum government, maximum governance," the Congress leader asked, “Does it mean minimising the role of the Ministers and maximising the role of the Prime Minister in the government?”
Truncated world view
He also criticised the speech for its “truncated world view” as it had failed to mention the Look East policy, BRICS, IBSA, West Asia and India's policy towards African nations.
Expressing surprise at the NDA government’s intention of passing the Goods and Services Tax, Mr. Sharma recalled that BJP-ruled States, led byGujarat – then ruled by Mr Modi -- had vociferously opposed it when the previous UPA Government had proposed it.
A rehash of manifesto
Meanwhile, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) described the President’s address to both Houses of Parliament as a ``compendium of all the election slogans of the Modi campaign and a rehash of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) manifesto’’.
The President’s address was ``more a declaration of intent than a blueprint for the government for the coming year’’, CPI(M) politburo member Sitaram Yechury told journalists, adding, “We will have to wait for the Budget to see the policy formulation.”
Mr. Yechury also pointed out that the Special Investigation Team (SIT) the Union Cabinet announced after its first Cabinet meeting was the result of a Supreme Court directive, while the government’s announcement that it will open Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) in every State contradicts the 12th Plan that talks of only consolidating existing institutes. ``Do they plan to revisit the 12th Plan which has already been adopted?” he asked, stressing, “This would be unprecedented.’’
Drawing attention to the reference to realising India’s ``softpower potential’’, Mr. Yechury said this ought to have been spelt out, especially as the BJP had criticised the Manmohan Singh Government for turning India into a soft State.
Earlier in the day, senior Congress leader and former Union Minister M Veerappa Moily said the BJP-led Government did not appear to be focussed on governance, creation of jobs or containing inflation: “There is no concrete roadmap. How are they going to achieve all this?” he said.
Another senior Congress leader Kamal Nath said that the “the President's speech is the enunciation of dreams and hopes which we have seen in the market place for last three months…The next couple of months will determine how much on course the Government is in making these dreams and hopes into a reality,” he said.
