Covid economic proposal stokes controversy
NEWDELHI:A group of economists, intellectuals and activists on Saturday redrafted their seven-point ‘Mission Jai Hind’ proposal to deal with the Covid-19 crisis after one of their suggestions of treating all resources of the nation and its citizens -- cash, real estate, property and bonds -- as national resources triggered a controversy. Some of the plan’s signatories also opposed the idea.
The controversial part was changed to say the government “must explore emergency ways of raising resources going beyond the usual set of taxes and levies to cope with the problem of funding large relief packages”.
The group has also proposed universal access to ration, free health care, employment guarantee, compensation for job losses, a moratorium on interest payments, and transportation of stranded migrants to their homes.Swaraj India national president Yogendra Yadav, who is one of the signatories of the plan, said the contentious clause 7.1 has attracted undue attention and interpreted to mean a call for nationalisation/expropriation of private property.
He called this far from their intention while hoping the focus will remain on the plan outlined to “address health, economic & humanitarian crisis”.
In a series of tweets, historian Ramachandra Guha, another signatory, said he did not endorse the clause 7.1. “The Mission Jai Hind Statement that was sent to me had this broad statement of principle as clause 7.1, which I approved, namely: ‘All resources within the nation are national resources, available for this mission’,” he tweeted.
“The published version had a radically different clause 7.1: ‘All the resources (cash, real estate, property, bonds, etc) with the citizens or within the nation must be treated as national resources available during this crisis.’ I have not and do not endorse this.”
“This clause, that has become deeply tendentious with the major changes made without the consent of some signatories, has taken attention away from the many sensible suggestions made in the Statement,” Guha added.