Yet another compulsion of the Finance Minister cannot be ruled out. The corporate lobby and the upcoming billionaire's club had vociferously hailed the victory of the Congress with Dr Manmohan Singh as the Prime Minister for the second term. The lobby had benefited immensely from the policy of liberalisation, privatisation and globalised market economy; it was considered the mainstay for achieving higher growth rates even if without the growth of employment. Therefore, this lobby too has to be humoured by the Finance Minister's budget exercise.

Has the Budget achieved this feat of riding on two boats moving apart?

Only some steps can be mentioned here which seem to respond to the middle-class voters' expectations such as raising income tax exemption limits in case of senior citizens, women and common tax payers.

The Budget talks of “empowerment of weaker sections” of the society. It mentions restructuring of the Swarna Jayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojna (SGSY) as National Rural Livelihood Mission “to make it universal in application, focussed in approach and time-bound for poverty eradication by 2014-15,” It has been mentioned earlier that the SGSY had been mismanaged and had led to lot of corruption. But there is no indication how this scheme would deliver better by merely being turned into a “Mission”. Also included under this caption is the proposal to widen enrolment of at least 50 per cent of all rural women and members of self-help groups (SHGs) linked with banks. Also, corpus of the Rashtriya Mahila Kosh is to be raised from Rs 100 crore to Rs 500 crore “over the next five years”.

As for agriculture, the Budget fixed a target of Agriculture Credit flow at only 3,25,000 crore - an increase of only Rs 38 crore over 2008-09. It also talks of Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme. This, at a time when the Economic Survey had painted a bleak picture of the agriculture sector, recoding a drop in its growth rate to 1.6 per cent in 2008-09.

A redeeming feature is the higher allocation under the NREGA, registering a rise by 144 per cent to Rs 39,000 crore over 2009-10. An appreciable aspect is the proposal to raise the daily wage of NREGA participants to Rs 100. This may eventually help raise the minimum wages of all agricultural workers in the country. Schemes, even constitutional ones, worked top down, always suffer during implementation. Despite this shortcoming, NREGA enforcement has brought relief to impoverished rural areas, reduced migration of families where panchayats have played an active role in implementation.

The Budget seems to be unaware of the existence of the Social Security for Unorganised Workers Act which had been severely criticised by trade unions because there were no schemes attached to it for implementation nor was given any estimation of the needed funds. The Budget talks only of “welfare of workers in the Unorganised Sector” and says that action was initiated “for occupations like weavers, fishermen and women, toddy-tappers, leather and handicraft workers, bidi workers and rickshaw pullers. Necessary financial allocations will be made for these schemes,” it says. This sort of announcement hardly amounts to any commitment. The Labour Ministry is required to take care of implementation of these schemes and not the Finance Ministry.

How has the Budget responded to the corporate lobby's vociferous welcome to the new UPA Government? Two issues deserve mention. One, there is no change in the corporate tax against all expectations. Two, the Budget says people's participation in the disinvestment programme is to be encouraged while retaining at least 51 per cent government equity in Public Sector Undertakings. And yet another provision says that public sector enterprises “such as banks and insurance companies are to remain in the public sector and will be given full support including capital infusion to grow and remain competitive.”

The Budget also proposes to set up a sub-committee of State-Level Bankers Committee (SLBC) to identify and formulate an action plan for providing banking facilities in under-banked/unbanked areas in the next three years. Rs 100 crore has been set aside “to ensure provision of at least one centre for banking services in each of the unbanked blocks”.

This frame of financial reform was obviously not in accordance with the corporate expectations. The sensex - some indication of the corporate mind — crashed down by 870 points on the Budget day, which, according to knowledgeable sources, was unprecedented in Budget Day's history. The importance of this sensex crash was not lost on the Government and the Finance Minister.

Managed or otherwise, there was an interaction between the Finance Minister and various chambers including FICCI, CII and Assocham on July 8, 2009, where Pranab Mukherjee explained the Government's disinvestment policy, apparently to assuage the hurt feelings of the corporate kings. He told the Chambers that equity sell-off in PSUs would be on the Government's economic policy agenda. He explained that a “calculated” risk had been taken in opting for higher fiscal deficit in anticipation of disinvestment of PSUs, only details were yet to be worked out.

Mukherjee made yet another loaded point, saying that the Budget was not the only document and perhaps not the right place to outline micro-details of the disinvestment programme. Its roadmap “should come out after deliberations with all the stake-holders.” He did not identify the stake-holders who obviously include concerned ministries, even state governments, PSU managements and last but not the least, the PSU workers.

This interaction has left the corporate kings in a “wait and watch”” mind. So far, they seemed to believe that under the LPG regime the PSUs will come under their thumb. Not so easy, it is obvious, under the post-poll scenario, absence of left pressure notwithstanding.

According to reports, during the Budget consultations, Mukherjee had agreed to meet the Central Trade Union Organisation (CTUOs) representatives after presentation of the Budget in Parliament. They should now be waiting for such an interaction after the FM had met the Chambers. Working people, the organised ones in particular, should know that now there would be build-up of pressure from inside and outside the Government for economic reforms to meet the needs of the LPG regime and therefore they cannot rest on their oars.

Understandably, the all-inclusive Bank Employees Forum has been actively campaigning against merger of public sector banks not so much because it will reduce employment but more so because it will alienate PSBs from the people and kill the very purpose for which the banks were nationalised under Indira Gandhi. PSB mergers are planned to enable them to meet global competition.

Five coalmen's federations, affiliated to the INTUC, AITUC, HMS, CITU and BMS in their meeting on July 1, 2009 in Kolkata decided to launch a joint movement to oppose the disinvestment policy in coal industry. In a joint resolution, they recalled nationalisation of coalmines under Indira Gandhi and said, “we are opposed to allotment of virgin coal blocks in general and allotment of coal blocks within the command of area of CIL, to private sector companies which are mercilessly exploiting mine workers. We demand that all the blocks should be handed over to Coal India for further production.” They also opposed contractorisation and outsourcing of coal industry jobs to private parties.

Meanwhile, the Central Public Sector Trade Unions (CPSTU) in its extended meeting held on June 27, 2009 at Kochi “expressed grave concern at the renewed move on the part of the Central Government for disinvestment of shares in CPSUs in order to set in motion the process of creeping privatisation of profit-making CPSUs.” It said the Government has prepared a list of 40 companies in which it is planning to divest part of its share-holding through the share market. It was also seriously concerned over “the alarming spate of contractorisation and casualisation of workforce”. In a long resolution, while opposing the disinvestment policy, it formulated a 7-point charter of demands for a nationwide campaign which is to include observance of “Anti-Disinvestment Day”, joint protest through demonstrations and sending of telegrams to the Prime Minister; joint agitation at the PSU level on wage negotiations both for regular and contract workers; joint conventions in State capitals followed by a national convention. This campaign may lead to various forms of struggle including nationwide strike in defence of PSUs and the right of workers.

The organised labour, including PSU workers, have to understand the urgency of reaching the urban and rural unorganised working people whom the LPG policy-makers are using to alienate the former vocal strategic force. There is no other short-cut to victory. (IPA Service)