More austere than thou

In an article titled “Austerity is a good idea. But the Congress is faking it” in the latest issue of Organiser, R Balashankar writes: “Austerity is a good idea in economics. But the Congress is faking it. The brazen ostentation of two Congress ministers in enjoying their first hundred days in five-star hotel suites has exposed the ruling party’s soft underbelly. This was followed by another expose in The Indian Express that UPA ministers want Spanish tiles in office rooms and Italian porcelain in their toilets. The CPWD, the report said, was flooded with requests from ministers for urgent renovation of houses and offices. Perhaps, these ministers were under the impression that India has to play its role in European recovery.

Sonia Gandhi was not impressed by her ministers’ elitist ways. And the party’s kneejerk response at austerity has made it a laughing stock. In the wake of recession, the economists suggested spending as the new mantra, though there was nothing new as the West has all the time promoted it. India too joined the bandwagon by announcing three stimulus packages. Without changing their basic nature of saving, the Asian economies have made an astonishing rebound. In a market economy, they say, consumption is the engine of growth. The first step in austerity is to avoid needless spending. The Congress has made the whole debate into a political stunt by reducing it to a few icons of the party ostentatiously travelling economy class. The question the Congress has to answer is if the party leadership is satisfied by enacting such tamasha in a year of world recession”.

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