Numerous Muslim women in Lucknow lined up outside a Congress office to request the ‘guarantee cards’ promised during the campaign after the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) bloc unexpectedly triumphed in many seats in Uttar Pradesh during the Lok Sabha elections. During the election campaigns, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said the new government would transfer Rs. 1 lakh annually into accounts of women in SC, ST, and backward categories. Some women went to the Congress office in Lucknow on the morning of June 6 but weren’t allowed entry.

Many women also submitted the Congress guarantee card they had already received, filling in their name, address, and number in the party office. Some women claimed they had also received a receipt from the Congress office after filling out and submitting the guarantee card. The women said that during the election campaign, Congress had promised to give money, and now that ‘INDIA’ had performed well, “so we have come to submit the guarantee card”. 

The Congress launched the ‘Ghar Ghar Guarantee’ programme, under which leaders were tasked with reaching out to nearly 80 million households and making them aware of its 25 guarantees. Among these guarantees was the ‘Mahalakshmi’ scheme, under which the party promised that Rs 8,500 per month would be directly credited to women heads of families belonging to the Below Poverty Line (BPL) category.

Recently, the General Post Office in Bengaluru saw several women rushing to open accounts, anticipating a monthly deposit of Rs 8,500 into their accounts if the ‘INDIA’ bloc came to power at the Centre.

Zareena Beg, 52, a resident of the Chowk area in Lucknow – recounted how Congress leaders had distributed forms during the campaign, instructing recipients to fill them out and submit them to the Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee (UPCC) office to receive their guarantee cards. “Some women went to the office yesterday to get the guarantee card but were denied the same,” she said. “Some women had submitted the form and were told they would receive the card within a week.”

Congress officials in Lucknow, however, denied that such forms had been accepted at the party office. Maroof Khan, a senior Congress leader, told Money Control that some “illiterate” Muslim women mistakenly believed they would receive the promised money after the election. “We have told them we can give that money only if we come to power. As we have failed to form the government, the Congress cannot give any monetary support,” he clarified.

Nujhat, one of the women seeking the guarantee card, accused Congress of reneging on its promise. “I saw Rahul Gandhi saying on TV that we have won and Modi has lost. Now, they are saying Congress lost the election,” she remarked. He had said that women would get money khatakhat, khatakhat. Now, where is the money?”

Apart from Uttar Pradesh, reports have come from other locations, including Delhi, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, etc., where Muslim women demanded the said promised benefits at the Congress offices.

The disastrous effects of freebie culture need serious attention

The situation highlights the freebie culture being promoted by Congress, which can potentially have disastrous repercussions on the Bharatiya economy. Such short-sighted freebie-based electoral campaigns and the huge chunk of the vulnerable population of Bharat to such allurements is a downside of the democratic framework in a diverse and developing economy like Bharat. This culture needs to be tackled with a principled standpoint by the aware citizens of Bharat. Otherwise, our country may also take the route of countries like Sri Lanka, where the freebie culture destroyed their fiscal and debt sustainability, leading to a serious economic crisis.

(Featured Image Source: India Today)