Culture of “Freebies” in electoral politics.

Context

In recent weeks, several arms of our polity have expressed concern over the culture of “freebies” in electoral politics. 

Views on Freebies 

• The prime minister, in a thinly disguised attempt to delegitimize welfare announcements by political opponents, has called for an end to the “revdi” culture. 
  • The prime minister invoked the “revdi culture” to alert young voters of a “dangerous” political development that is trying to “buy the people by distributing freebies to them”. 
• The Reserve Bank of India linked the precarious state of state finances to “freebies”, particularly power subsidies
•  the Supreme Court, waded into the debate, recommending the creation of an expert body to examine the matter.

Arguments Against Freebies 

• There are some important issues in the case of freebies where India is concerned and perhaps in other relatively poor countries too.
• The issue of freebies is a fascinatingly complex intellectual issue with important international and historic political and economic dimensions as well. 
• The cost of financing freebies and social welfare programmes is becoming an issue in many states, threatening bankruptcy to Punjab, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh and also appears to portend serious budgetary crises in others.
  • Such revenue expenditure reduces capital allocations essential for long-term growth and has a negative impact on industry. 

• Freebies and subsidies impact budgetary allocations and the most problematic is the resulting sacrifice through current consumption of capital investment for future growth
• The grave danger is the use of freebies by treacherous politicians, who are being promoted by India’s foreign adversaries, to help them seize political power within India. They can seriously undermine its national interest.
• populist freebies distort the informed decision-making of the voter”.

Arguments In Favour 

• India’s structural transformation, particularly since 1991, has been slow and unique. 
• Despite abundant low-skilled labour, our growth trajectory has mostly skipped manufacturing, growing instead on the back of a far smaller, high-skilled services sector. 
• Under-employment and low intergenerational mobility have been persistent features of the Indian economy resulting in deep inequalities. 
• Most of India continues to live in extremely precarious economic conditions with limited opportunity.
•  It is in this context that the demand for so-called freebies has found a legitimate place in our democracy. 
• The failure of the parties and governments to deliver development to the ordinary people has led to the increased phenomenon of “freebies” and the parties have to resort to it to win over the voters.

Supreme Court’s Observations 

• The Supreme Court, in S. Subramaniam Balaji vs Government of Tamil Nadu (2013) upheld the distribution of television sets or consumer goods on the ground that schemes targeted at women, farmers and the poorer sections were in furtherance of Directive Principles; and as long as public funds were spent based on appropriations cleared by the legislature, they could neither be declared illegal, nor the promise of such items be termed a ‘corrupt practice’. 
• It had directed the ECI to frame guidelines to regulate the content of manifestos.
  • The ECI subsequently included in its Model Code of Conduct a stipulation that parties should avoid promises “that vitiate the purity of the election process or exert undue influence on the voters”. 
  • It added that only promises which were possible to be fulfilled should be made and that manifestos should contain the rationale for a promised welfare measure and indicate the means of funding it.
• Recently ,The Supreme Court said the Parliament may not be able to effectively debate the issue of doing away with “irrational freebies” offered to voters during elections, saying the “reality” is that not a single political party wants to take away freebies.
  • The court suggested setting up a specialised body composed of persons who can “dispassionately” examine the problem

Way Ahead 

• In a democracy, political choices can and must be questioned. In that spirit, a debate on the merits and demerits of freebies is important .
• If some rationality is to be introduced into the disbursement of freebies and subsidies, Indian politicians will first need to improve their credibility with voters. 
• They will need to address the huge trust deficit that understandably exists in the Indian polity owing to rampant wrongdoing and corruption. 
• The Finance Commission, when it makes allocations to various states, can take into account the debt of the state and in the context of that find out whether the state’s economy will be sustainable over the years in the context of the freebies.