WELFARE MAGICIAN
It was meant to be a historical budget, but a bit of history crept in by mistake. Between the sixth and seventh minutes, Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot read out a few announcements from last year’s address before he, his staff and the chief whip noticed it and he stopped abruptly, apologising. The embarrassment was compounded by the fact that Gehlot, on the advice of Rahul Gandhi, had arranged for a live telecast of his speech to many schools, colleges and panchayats. The CM, who also holds the finance portfolio, attributed it to clerical error—a page from last year’s budget document being accidentally included during binding, a minor blemish in a document otherwise exuding the warm glow of welfarism. The opposition BJP didn’t let him escape so easily. Prime Minister Narendra Modi at his rally in Dausa on February 12, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in Parliament and ex-chief minister Vasundhara Raje in the assembly on February 10 all took a dig at Gehlot—calling it a reflection of the Congress, its vision and the CM’s callousness. Yet, Gehlot bore it manfully and described the criticism as a sign of the strength of his budget— with some rather sweeping proposals.
“Do not call it an election budget. This is the fifth time in a row that I have presented a tax-free budget and it’s an extension of my effort to help the masses by building capacity and infrastructure,” he told india today. And then he let go a bravura note: “Of course, my budget in 2028 will be an election budget!” In his two earlier tenures, Gehlot had waited till election year to have a proper populist budget—but they went in vain. Neither liberal drought relief nor old age pen
sion saved his government, coming as they did at the last minute (though his second tenure had seen the innovative free generic medicines scheme being rolled out). This time, Gehlot’s messaging is unambiguous: he’s going to town as a welfare magician who started waving his wand from the very first year. An effective broadcasting of that image is a must for him if he wants to undo some of the damage his infighting with Sachin Pilot has caused party and governance.
In a first-ever post-budget move, chief secretary Usha Sharma issued a letter to all bureaucrats at the level of secretary and above on February 13 asking them to start working on the budget announcements, immediately where only administrative orders were needed, within a fortnight where the concurrence of finance or personnel department was required, and to submit proposals within 15 days where specific financial approvals were mandatory.
The sense of urgency is understandable. There are some massive rollouts: inflation relief, an ambitious medical insurance coverage, major relief on electricity charges, compensation to cattle owners who suffered losses with the lumpy cow disease, a softer cushion on the Centre’s Ujjwala scheme, a minimum income guarantee scheme, a Rs 200 crore gig workers relief fund, regularisation of all contractual employees, and extension of free education to boys. But he has to prove his administrative skills in bringing them to life given that the state’s record on execution has been patchy. That his dearness/ inflation relief alone will cost Rs 19,000-odd crore in a state with one of India’s worst debt-to-GSDP ratios, touching 40 per cent, is secondary for now. What matters to Gehlot is that his largesse wins him a return gift in the shape of a popular vote—or at least that he goes down as a well-meaning, caring chief minister.
Chiranjeevi, his flagship universal insurance policy, has got a major boost, extending floating coverage from Rs 10 lakh to up to Rs 25 lakh, free for all BPL and APL families and for just Rs 850 a year for everyone else. Many private hospitals have been included in the scheme, besides all state-owned ones. Theoretically, this means the state bears almost the entire cost of indoor treatment for everyone almost for free, and that government hospitals provide most medicines and tests—including MRI and high-resolution CT scans where available—for free. The scheme also includes an accidental death coverage of Rs 10 lakh. State hospitals have so far failed to evolve a good mechanism to offer services on par with private hospitals, with numerous complaints of patients being pushed from one window to the other, long queues and lack of medicines. And in private hospitals, patients are often slapped with charges on the grounds that certain treatments are excluded under the scheme. Still, it covers a major part of expensive private treatment. So what if the fisc lands in the trauma ward?
Power is another major area of outreach that will dim the treasury’s wattage considerably—100 units per household free, up from 50 units, which translates into savings of approximately Rs 750 a month. In a state where electricity tariffs are among the highest in India, it’s a big relief to consumers. About 10 million of them will be getting no bill. Another 1.1 million farmers consuming up to 2,000 units won’t be charged either—the earlier limit was 1,000 units. The hitch? The state has yet to release Rs 17,000 crore dues to its power companies, who owed Rs 11,000 crore to the Centre in 2022.
One piece of largesse seems
almost meant as a rhetorical answer to the Centre, whose Ujjwala scheme has faced criticism for the fact that prohibitive LPG costs make subsequent refills impossible for targeted families. So Gehlot has decided to offer cylinders at just Rs 500 per unit to 7.6 million families. In a move that will mitigate rural distress on another front, the state will pay Rs 40,000 as compensation for each cow that perished to lumpy cow disease, besides an insurance cover of Rs 40,000 to cover two milch cows—this is estimated to benefit close to two million farmers. Gehlot’s budget also lightens the burden on the state’s hefty road tax and vehicle registration costs, providing Rs 2,500 relief for a 100cc scooter, Rs 8,000 for an 800cc car and up to Rs 20,000 for a diesel vehicle.
The minimum social security pension has been doubled to a thousand. Gehlot will also roll out Rahul Gandhi’s 2019 election promise of a minimum guaranteed income scheme, most likely by merging various state employment guarantees and related schemes to introduce a comprehensive social security-linked monthly income. Amid BJP criticism that his schemes will remain on paper, he said he was setting an example for the Centre to implement all over the country. “The Centre gives us Rs 300 crore, but we spend Rs 9,000 crore on pension to the needy. Each state does it as per its capacity. Let the Centre bring a law to have a uniform level of assistance,” Gehlot says.
Late on the night of February 13, Gehlot issued transfer orders for 75 IPS officers; a similar IAS reshuffle is also expected soon. Perhaps the penultimate reshuffle of top officers, with another expected closer to elections, it seems a last-ditch effort to improve governance while also accommodating the recommendations of the party leaders. How much will all of this help Gehlot? It’s anybody’s guess. “I do my best,” is all the chief minister says. That’s better than what his party sometimes does. ■