Gold bridal gifts bid for votes

An India state will give gold worth about $530 (R7,220) to every bride from a poor family, the latest budget giveaway ahead of a general election that must be held by May.

The northeastern state of Assam is run by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, which is facing a battle for reelection because of low farm incomes and a lack of jobs that have turned off some of those who backed it in the last polls, in 2014.

The federal government announced cash handouts to farmers and tax cuts for the lower middle class last week.

On Thursday, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) cut interest rates for the first time since 2017, in line with a government demand as it attempts to stimulate the economy.

The opposition Congress party has also been forgiving farmers’ loans and announcing it would provide the unemployed with cash handouts in some of the states it controls. But handing out gold to brides is new.

The tea-growing state’s finance minister, Himanta Biswa Sarma, allocated 3bn rupees (R572m) for the next fiscal year, from April 1, for the gold programme. That would buy 875kg of gold, enough for about 80,000 brides.

“A customary ritual is to gift a set of gold ornaments to one’s daughter as a blessing as she leaves her father’s home to start a new life,” Sarma said.

He said the programme should stop families falling into debt to pay for daughters’ weddings.

The Assam government would buy the gold from the RBI and give it to the beneficiaries directly, Sarma said.

The programme would be limited to two women from each family with an income of less than 500,000 rupees ($7,000) a year. Each bride would get a “tola“, or 11.66 grams, of gold.

The programme should stop families falling into debt