In the run-up to Budget 2009, there was a demand to increase the allocation of funds for Dalits in the country under the Special Component Plan. Whether these demands have reached him or not, the Finance Minister promptly submitted a budget which reduced the SCP allocation for Dalits by 18 per cent.

Special Central Assistance to the Scheduled Caste Sub-Plan is the single most important scheme for the Dalits, and the lion’s share of the budget of the Ministry for Social Justice is generally set aside and it is used exclusively for the economic upliftment of Dalits. What is inexplicable is that the SCA budget fell from Rs 577.71 crores in 2008-09 to Rs 469 crores in the 2009-10 budget.

Ironically, few weeks before the budget exercise, the Congress party, in its new found love for Dalits, visited and dined with Dalits in their basties in Uttar Pradesh. Probably in return, the budget launched a new scheme called Pradhan Mantri Adarsh Gram Yojana (PMAGY) with a gap funding of just ten lakh rupees per village for a thousand villages. This budget is pittance to what Uttar Pradesh spends under Ambedkar Gram Vikas Yojana started in 1991 with more than ten thousand villages, from which the PMAGY is inspired. The budget set aside this year is a mere Rs 100 crores for PMAGY. While this scheme claims that there are 44,000 villages with more than 50 percent SC population in India, the 2001 census shows only 28,672.

The love for Dalits of the Congress party is not evident from the allocations in the 2009 budget. The Rajiv Gandhi National Fellowship supports Dalits who pursue M.Phil and Ph.D degrees. The fellowship allocation fell by 10 per cent — contrary to the increased demand for the scheme; the same scholarship increased by Rs 13 crores with regard to tribals.

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