CONG-NCP POLL SOPS FOR LOCALS
Alliance flags unemployment as big focus, announces ₹5K monthly allowance
The opposition alliance of the Congress, the Nationalist Congress Party and a few other smaller parties on Monday promised up to 80% reservation in jobs for locals in their joint manifesto for the October 21 assembly polls.
Mumbai:flagging unemployment as one of the major issues facing Maharashtra, the opposition alliance of the Congress, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) and a few other smaller parties on Monday promised up to 80% reservation in jobs in industries for locals in their joint manifesto for the October 21 assembly polls.
The 51-page document called “Shapathnama” has also promised an unemployment allowance of ~5,000 to jobless youth and a blanket loan waiver for farmers.
The “sons of soil agenda”, especially in jobs, has been the central poll plank of the Shiv Sena, so far. Maharashtra already has a rule that 80% of jobs in industries must be kept aside for domiciled residents of the state but the Opposition has claimed that it has not been implemented on ground. The Andhra Pradesh government recently passed a bill to impose 75% quota for locals in industrial units.
“To tackle unemployment, we plan to reserve 80% jobs in industries for locals. This will be implemented by bringing a legislation and a separate policy to ensure it gets implemented on ground,’’ said Balasaheb Thorat, state Congress president, while releasing the poll manifesto on Monday.
State NCP chief Jayant Patil pointed out that recent government job advertisements were an indicator of rising unemployment in the state. “For 32,000 vacancies, the state government has received 32 lakh applications. This reflects actual position of unemployment, the state is facing. To deal with the situation, we will provide unemployment allowance to the jobless youths,” he said.
The manifesto also stressed on the agriculture sector. “To make it a prestigious profession, certain measures are required to be taken. To start with, farm loans will be waived in the first four months of the government. Priority will be given to increase agricultural productivity and proper remuneration to farm produce,” says the manifesto.
It further promised to bring ‘Bhavantar Bhugtan Yojana’ for the farmers on the lines of the Madhya Pradesh government, which ensures the state government will pay farmers the difference between official Minimum Support Price (MSP) and the rate at which they sell their crops in the market. Paddy growers from eastern Vidarbha will get ~3000 per quintal MSP for their produce.
In the light of public outcry over cutting of trees for the Metro car shed at Aarey, the parties have declared to focus on environmentally sustainable development if comes to power. The manifesto also promised a zerotolerance policy on environment protection.
The manifesto has sops for every section of the society. Senior citizens have been promised a monthly pension of ~1,500, labourers would get minimum monthly wage of ~21,000 ( to be implemented in phases) and employees of Ola, Uber, Zomato, Swiggy have been promised a welfare policy. One million girls, who have cleared their secondary school certificate (SSC) exams have been promised laptops in the first year if their government comes to power.
“All the citizens of the state will be covered under health insurance and a super speciality hospital will be constructed in all the districts of the state. Property tax of all the houses up to 500 square feet will be waived that are situated in municipal corporation limits,’’ states the manifesto.
The opposition alliance wants to make education free from KG (kindergarten) to PG (postgraduation). In the first phase, education in all the government and aided schools and colleges will be made free up to graduation,” the document says.
For Mumbai, the opposition has promised to complete all the pending development projects within three years after coming to power and 50% grants for constructing toilets for women at suburban railway stations.
The opposition parties said they would take stern measures in order to prevent encroachments in ecologically sensitive areas and mangrove land. Further, it promises to restore all the open spaces that were removed from Mumbai Development Plan 2034 prepared by the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC). They promised to set up a “Centre for Excellence” for entertainment sector to create skilled labour for the industry.
Political experts are of the view Congress has to raise such issues as an attempt to revive its prospects. “As the rate of unemployment is rising across the country, all the regional parties are hopping on to the issue of reservation in jobs to locals. Congress is also compelled to take such a stand otherwise it may not be able to revive its position,” said Prakash Bal, political analyst.