How the Congress is using cash transfer in UP

By Alka Pande

Lucknow: With its local stalwarts lackluster, state heavyweights ineffectual and organisation in tatters, the Congress has clutched on to the direct cash subsidy transfer scheme for its revival in Uttar Pradesh. Desperate to find an issue to go to the public with before the next general elections, the party is making efforts to popularise the recently announced cash transfer scheme among target groups in the state.

According to indications, the party is going to utilise the scheme to woo back the minority communities, especially the Muslims, in the state. The party has lost the community to the Samajwadi Party. However, it’s sensing its chance now as the Muslims are disenchanted with the state government for several reasons. The situation has created a vacuum which the Congress is aiming to cash in on.

[caption id=“attachment_589487” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  File photo of Sonia Gandhi, Manmohan Singh launching the Aadhaar scheme in Uttar Pradesh. PTI[/caption]

At a national conference on 12th Five Year Plan and Minorities held in Lucknow recently, the party dwelt at length on the condition of the Muslims and blamed the state government for failing to take the benefits of the central government schemes to the minorities.

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“The niyat (intention) of Congress and the UPA government, especially Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and party president Sonia Gandhi, is good. They are keen on welfare of the poor, down trodden and specially the Muslims. But the state governments do not let the schemes reach the right beneficiaries. The bureaucracy is also to be blamed for depriving the needy from getting the benefit of these schemes,” said several Congress leaders present at the event.

And the solution, according to the Congress, is direct cash subsidy transfer. Incidentally, Amar Habibullah, son of the National Minorities Commission Chairman Wajahat Habibullah, has been made the in-charge of Banking Correspondents, who have been given targets to open zero balance accounts for the Cash Transfer Scheme.

Meanwhile, the party has been busy mobilising the community, which constitutes 25 percent of the electorate in the state. To win back the community, UPCC president Nirmal Khatri has constituted the Minority Welfare Review Cell. It’s now headed by Arshad Azmi, the former general secretary of All India Muslim Forum, founded by firebrand union leader Nihaluddin Ahmad - a known Muslim crowd puller. The AIMF merged with the Congress in 2008.

In order to disseminate the Congress message forcefully, the party has brought forward Mohammed Fazalurrahim Mujaddidi, a member of Planning Commission Steering Committee. He has compiled a set of about dozen books, which elaborate upon the schemes specifically meant for the minorities under the 12th Five Year Plan. Under the party’s strategy, the book originally written in English will be translated in various Indian languages, including Urdu.

“There were teething problems in the implementation of welfare schemes. Lack of transparency, lousy procedure and guidelines, corruption and lack of initiative by the community are few stumbling blocks which restrict the needy people from getting the benefits of the welfare schemes”, Mujaddidi observed.

Another observation is that the benefits of all welfare schemes always get diverted to either Dalits or the Backwards - the voters of Bahujan Samaj Party and the Samajwadi Party, respectively, whereas Muslims fail to get what is due to them. The Congress has called upon Mujaddidi to lead in driving this message down within the community besides convincing the community about the Congress’ ‘pure intentions’ and ‘sincere efforts’ to improve the status of the Muslims.

There is a feeling among the Muslim leaders in the Congress that the cash subsidy transfer would upturn the status of poor. “Imagine a poor person getting his children’s fee back in his bank account or a child getting his scholarship in his account! Don’t you think it would make a difference?” said IH Farooqui from the UPCC Legal Cell.

“The effort is to gain at least 17 per cent of Muslim vote pan India and also increase the minority vote all across the state of Uttar Pradesh,” says Hilal Naqvi, the Coordinator Research and Development Cell UPCC.

The event held in Lucknow was attended by Union Minister Sri Prakash Jaiswal, the present and former president of UPCC Nirmal Khatri and Rita Bahuguna Joshi, MP Zafar Ali Naqvi and many other Congress leaders besides over 1,500 guests from the minority community.