Polls make Chautala undo ‘positive’ work

Amongst the first to be shown the door were the administrative reforms under which the government had retrenched the employees of boards and corporations besides stopping recruitments. Post-LS poll Chautala was quick to make an announcement recruiting 50,000. The application price too was slashed drastically from the existing Rs 500. Retrenched employees who had chased him to UP to protest, were also given hope. This is not all. The DA was given a push-up as was the pension for the elderly, handicapped and widows.

Questioning this largesse, Capt Ajay Singh Yadav, Leader of the Opposition, remarked: ‘‘Chautala didn’t remember to announce all these concessions in the last five years. Now when his defeat is imminent, he is trying to fool the public.’’

Farmers too got a taste of the state’s empathy after having faced bullets during the Kandela agitation. The changed Chautala introduced a uniform power tariff for agriculture pumpsets, making a dent of Rs 138 crore in the treasury. The interest rate on cooperative loans was also reduced, thus causing a loss of Rs 500 crore to Co-op banks.

As the CM continued his Santa Claus act, many like Bhupinder Singh Hooda, former president of Haryana Congress, wondered who would foot the bill. ‘‘These decisions are criminal … the government is taking them without taking account of its funds position,’’ said Hooda. Chautala even extended some warmth to urban voters, never his traditional vote-bank, by reducing the rates of house tax and fire tax. The government also reserved three per cent quota for sportsmen in boards and corporations, and brought recruitment under this category out of the purview of the Staff Selection Commission, to allegedly help a few favourites.