India's main opposition promises universal basic income for poor. Ruling party dismisses Congress leader’s election pledge as unaffordable.

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A homeless woman helps her son with his homework in New Delhi, India. Photograph: Altaf Qadri/AP
▼ India’s main opposition Congress party has said it will implement a variation of a universal basic income (UBI) targeted at the poor if it wins the country’s upcoming national election.
The announcement, dismissed by the ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) as financially irresponsible, is the first major shot in an election battle likely to be replete with populist giveaways to voters.
“We have decided that every poor person in India would be guaranteed a minimum income after the Congress forms the government in 2019,” the Congress leader, Rahul Gandhi, told a farmers’ rally in the central state of Chhattisgarh on Monday. “No one will go hungry in India, no one will remain poor,” he said.
Congress won Chhattisgarh’s statehouse and two others in local elections in December thanks largely to anger among farmers at the persistent low prices being fetched by crops. More than 49% of Indians are employed in agriculture and their distress could be a decisive factor when people begin voting in April.
Congress’s former finance minister P Chidambaram said more details of what he called “a turning point in the lives of the poor” would be revealed in the party’s manifesto.

Rahul Gandhi, the Congress party leader: ‘No one will go hungry in India, no will remain poor.’ Photograph: Anushree Fadnavis/Reuters
It is unclear whether the minimum income guarantee,  (▪ ▪ ▪)

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Srinivas1939

We have come a long way from the Garibi Hatao slogan coined by Indira Gandhi.Loan melas for the urban poor and loan waivers in favour of farmers  along with the free distrbution of colour TVs,laptops,grinders in states like Tamilnadu have tossed fiscal discipline out of the window and corroded the credit culture and the stability of the cooperative movement.Affordabilty has never been a concern for our politicians especially those out of power and RG can make promises with reckless abandon.