Congress Election Manifesto: Back to some fifty years ago

The congress has always stood for the Indian people. In the past it offered a plateform to all sections of the community who aspired for national Independence. As the national independence deepened, it succedded in unifying different sections and their conflicting interests in the common fight against Britain. When independence was won, there was considerable speculation about the future of Congress ( Indian National Congress) and the role it could play in a free India. Political freedom had been the rallying point. Would the congress be able to maintain its hold on the people after its major task had been accomplished? The question was relevent and natural, but it did not become urgent or insistent enough not to brook any delay. For political freedom came with partition, the ravages of which had immediatly to be repaired. There was also question of native stated which had be integrated with the british administrative services under the aegis of Mr. Mountbetton ( then governer general of India) . As power was transferred to Congress it automatically bacame the depository of the nations trust, its hands were full with pressing and urgent problems which demanded immediate attention.

The first Government formed at the center was consciously made into a Government of the best talents then available in the country, and though it was the congress party which formed it, pains were taken to give it a national character. Then came the consitituion and the first general elections which the Congress fought as a party and won. Since then, Congress has functioned as party but is has nevertheless continued to claim abd retain the allegiance of nearly all sections of the people. In the next five years instead of opinions being crystallised on party lines and other parties gaining in strenght and organising themselves effectively in order to bring about a different alignment of political forces, oposition has not ceased but it has failed to get politically organised.

On the eve of the second general elections that the Congress will fight, therefore, its election manifesto cannot be and should not be judged as the programme of a single party which the voter is free to accept or reject. It is useless to ask today is it that Congress is the only party that contends for political power. The election manifesto has to be judged by other standards. The Congress has to satisfy the people from whom it draws its strenght that it is responsive to their aims and aspirations and that it can give the fittest expression to them and that even in the implementation of its various policies, it will win the active support of the people and uphold the faith of those who put their trust in.


EPW.