2 months in office, AAP grapples with security, revenue challenges
CHANDIGARH: When Bhagwant Mann took oath as the chief minister of Punjab on March 16 and named his team of cabinet ministers three days later, skeptics pointed out that the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) will struggle to measure up to the sky-high expectations and govern the border state despite the stunning electoral showing. The reason — inexperience.
The AAP government, which won 92 of the 117 assembly seats, was keen to prove the skeptics wrong and got down to the task of fulfilling the election “guarantees” (read promises) right away.
The government swiftly set the ball rolling on free power up to 300 units a month for all domestic consumers from July 1, recruitment drive to fill 26,454 posts in government departments, ₹1,500 per acre incentive to farmers for direct seeding of rice for saving underground water, minimum support price for moongi (lentil) to promote crop diversification and doorstep delivery of atta (wheat flour) to 1.54 crore beneficiaries from October 1.
These policy and welfare announcements are in addition to the governance reform initiatives, such as the anti-corruption action line and one legislatorone pension, and frequent politically correct assertions from party national convener Arvind Kejriwal and Mann about accountability and transparency, in line with the promise of badlav (change).
Ashutosh Kumar, a professor of political science at Panjab University, Chandigarh, said the (AAP) government has not made any major blunder so far. “They have been making the right noises and announcements. The actual impact of these decisions will be known only after their implementation,” he said.
No road map out of debt trap
However, two issues are being seen as posing the most acute governance challenges for the Mann administration: Revenue generation and law and order.
Its major announcements, particularly free electricity and wheat flour delivery, entail hefty financial liability running into thousands of crore, but the state government is silent on their funding.
Punjab is among the most indebted state with the worst debt-gross state domestic product (GSDP) ratio of 53% in the country. The state’s outstanding debt has more than trebled in 10 years, rising from ₹92,282 crore in 2012-13 to ₹2.93 lakh crore in 2021-22.
AAP’ state chief spokesperson Malwinder Singh Kang said the state’s financial health is not in a very good condition but this does not mean that there is dearth of resources. He said the problem is that money meant for the state exchequer was going into private pockets earlier and Manpreet Badal, the finance minister during the previous Congress government, had stated this on record regarding excise revenue.
“Our government is streamlining things to plug revenue leakages. When this money flows into the state kitty, the state finance will improve. The government will also raise additional resources from mining and transport sectors, by promoting industry and making agriculture profitable through diversification. These things take time,” he said, blaming successive Congress and Akali governments for the present state of finances.
A retired bureaucrat said that Punjab was in a debt trap situation, borrowing for debt servicing, and not creation of incomegenerating capital assets. With 62% of revenue receipts going into meeting committed liabilities, including salaries, pensions and interest payments, there appears to be little financial wiggle room for more freebies and additional subsidies.
Though AAP had talked about
raising funds for free power and ₹1,000 a month to women, a key guarantee which is still to be fulfilled, by eliminating illegal sand mining and plugging revenue leakages, no roadmap has been revealed by its government so far.
Security alarm in border state
Another test for the new government is law and order with clashes between members of a right-wing group and Sikh radicals in Patiala, recovery of integrated explosive devices (IEDs) packed with RDX from Tarn Taran and Karnal and last week’s rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) attack at the Punjab Police’s intelligence wing headquarters in Mohali heightening security concerns in Punjab.
The incidents in Patiala and Mohali exposed intelligence shortfalls, besides providing ready ammunition to the opposition parties that were already gunning for the AAP government for misusing Punjab Police to settle scores with rivals and critics like Delhi BJP leader Tajinder Pal Singh Bagga.
Kang said the government was swift and effective in its response and caught the accused in the Mohali attack and the masterminds behind the attempt to incite violence in Patiala. “They (opposition parties) have no moral right to question us. In the last 60 days, our government has worked to establish the rule of law in the state by giving employment to people on merit, getting vacated the land encroached upon during their (previous) governments and putting an end to illegal mining. We are running a clean government, and none of our ministers and MLAs is associated with any kind of mafia,” he said.
Before its bid to arrest Bagga from Delhi ended in a fiasco, the state police had also registered cases against poet Kumar Vishwas and Congress leader Alka Lamba, who were in the AAP earlier, for promoting enmity by allegedly making false statements against Kejriwal.
Leader of opposition Partap Singh Bajwa said they (AAP govt) have exposed themselves in only a few days in the government. “There is a vast difference between controlling Delhi and Punjab. In the national capital, the central government manages law and order and maintains much of the infrastructure,” the Congress leader said, calling the law and order situation in the border state as “alarming”.