In November 2021, the Uttar Pradesh Government lit a record 12 lakh diyas in Ayodhya to mark Diwali, praised by PM Modi as “Ayodhya getting back its glory.” What followed, however, shed light on the economic reality of the poor in India – as children and their families were captured on video, collecting mustard oil from these diyas in cans and taking them home to use – as even something as basic as cooking oil had gone beyond the reach of India’s poor.
The price of mustard oil rose from Rs. 70 per litre in 2017, when the Yogi Aditynath led BJP Government came to power, to Rs 200-265 per litre in 2021. Regardless of the numbers the Central Government may conjure, underneath the facade of monumental statues and mega highways – this is the irrefutable human face of economic devastation in India under the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Uttar Pradesh serves as a crucial reminder of how the economy does not solely run on economics – politics has a crucial role to play too. Over the past five years, the UP model of governance has demonstrated how politics of hate inevitably undermines economic growth and development. Even before the pandemic in 2019-20, UP’s per capita income was half the national average, and second-lowest in India.
The state consistently performs abysmally on most development indicators, whether public health, education, rural development, or employment. As per data from NHRC, Uttar Pradesh tops the list in terms of human rights violations cases now for the third consecutive year and has consistently recorded high rates of gender violence, especially caste-based.
Despite efforts of the UP Government to conceal the devastating reality, the scale of COVID mismanagement was in the open for everyone to see – police confiscating oxygen cylinders from desperate citizens, booking youth for appealing for medical help online, overflowing crematoriums and dead bodies floating in River Ganga.
While these gory sights shook the moral conscience of the country, and the world, it was perhaps only natural for a government that has failed to prioritize public welfare from the get-go. At the end of five years of a ruthlessly divisive regime – unemployment, lawlessness and collapsed public infrastructure have come to characterize the UP Government, which has deprived its constituents of dignity both in life and in death.
Unfortunately, Assam is closely following in the direction of this divisive regime, and if unchecked, a similar fate awaits other states in the North East too. One cannot help but observe striking parallels in the modus operandi of UP’s Yogi Adityanath and Assam’s Himanta Biswa Sarma.
Both leaders pursue a model of ‘development’ based on polarizing communities on religious lines and furthering the ‘Hindutva’ ideology – fundamentally at odds with the inclusive and secular social fabric envisioned by our Constitution framers. Whether the rising trend of fake encounters, decision to rename places, rampant and violent evictions or increasing rate of crimes against women and minorities – the similarities are stark.
Divisive politics premised on brewing hatred, while a harmful end in itself, also has spillover effects on the economy. It erodes trust, creates an atmosphere of insecurity and instability, ultimately hurting investment and any scope for economic growth.
Under the BJP rule, Hindutva or religious nationalism has become a smokescreen, disguising poor development and abysmal job creation, and thereby masking widening inequalities. The effect of the UP regime’s divisive agenda on the state’s economic activity is evident in the resentment brewing on the streets, for instance in the case of protests by youth aspiring for railway employment.
This must serve as a wake-up call for all those who care about the North East and are concerned about the direction in which we are headed. Especially in light of the Budget 2022 announcement of Rs. 1500 crore under the PM-DevINE (Prime Minister’s Development Initiative for North East Region) scheme, we must ask some crucial questions.
How many jobs has previous capital expenditure translated into under the BJP regime? Why has the North East Industrial Development Scheme (NIEDS) introduced in 2017 (replacing the far more effective NEIIPP 2007) failed to bring in any substantial investment? Why has there been no tangible improvement in flood control in the Brahmaputra valley following the discontinuation of the erstwhile Flood Management programme in 2014?
Examine the case of Assam itself, which is entering its seventh year under the BJP leadership. As per the Economic Survey 2022, Assam ranks third last in the NITI Aayog Sustainable Development Goal Index, and has one of the highest proportions of multidimensional poor households, as per the NITI Aayog Multidimensional Poverty Index. Whether in terms of sanitation facilities or household access to clean cooking fuel, Assam remains well below the national average.
Although PMKVY, the BJP’s flagship skill training scheme, has failed nationally in terms of missing training and placement targets, it has been a particular failure in Assam with the state recording the lowest placement rate (of trained people) among large states as of January 2022 – simply because there are not enough jobs being created. Even pre-pandemic, as per the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS), Assam saw the sharpest rise in unemployment between June 2018 and June 2019.
For the North East, it is not just the region’s economy and delicate social fabric that needs protection from the BJP’s political agenda, but the environment and ecological balance. The region is particularly vulnerable to the BJP’s crony capitalist model of governance, as a biodiversity hotspot that is witnessing a worrying decline in forest cover and increasing vulnerability to climate change. Whether deliberate weakening of environmental regulation, rampant illegal coal mining and oil exploration in forest reserve area or the proposed Oil palm expansion which threatens biodiverse forest and jhum lands – it is clear that the Government is pursuing ‘development’ projects that are fundamentally anti-people as they fail to recognise the intrinsic relationship between communities, wildlife, and natural habitats.
We must pay heed to the Uttar Pradesh Model, for the warning signs it provides of how politics of hate and self-serving gains adversely affect social harmony and economic development, including ecological balance especially in the North East. There is a need to preserve the delicate but crucial relationship between society, economy, and the environment – the three pillars of sustainable development – something that is clearly beyond the BJP’s narrow imagination of politics and governance.
Pradyut Bordoloi is a Congress Lok Sabha MP from Nowgong, Assam and a three-time Cabinet minister.
Evita Rodrigues is a LAMP fellow.
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