The First 100 Days Of Yogi Adityanath’s Karmayoga In Uttar Pradesh

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister (CM) Yogi Adityanath completed 100 days in office recently. It has become fashionable to examine and evaluate the first few days of an incumbent government. But this exercise is ridiculous because it is based on only 5 per cent of the total number of days mandated to a government. However, an early performance appraisal puts a government on tenterhooks, not allowing it any laxity. But the substantive question is – do people take this exercise seriously?

American President John F Kennedy said this about achieving his targets while assuming office on 20 January 1961:

So, the real question is: has CM Adityanath started?

No government can take an absolutely new trajectory detached from the policies, programmes and decisions of previous regimes, which too had the people’s mandate. People expect the new CM to not do entirely new things, but do things in a better manner.

Governance has two facets – security and welfare of people. The Akhilesh Yadav government was voted out of power in 2017 because it failed on the law and order front and operationalised people’s welfare in a manner that looked biased. People’s expectation from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government remains the same – better law and order and development for all.

However, if we must, then we have to examine what the BJP promised for the first 100 days in its manifesto, called the sankalp-patr; and, how that compares with the previous governments of Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati.

If we were to scan the BJP’s sankalp-patr issued during the campaign for assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh, we find only five time-bound commitments to people:

(i) all absconding criminals on parole to be arrested in 45 days;

(ii) process to fill all vacancies in government departments through a transparent process to start in 45 days;

(iii) employment problems of shiksha-mitras to be solved in 90 days;

(iv) full payment of cane growers would be made through cooperation of banks and sugar mills in 120 days, and

(v) honorarium of aanganwadi workers would be increased after a committee report in 120 days.

Unfortunately, only the second promise seems to have been met; rest of the four still remain unfulfilled. However, Adityanath has initiated actions to fulfil many other promises in the sankalp-patr.

Unlike him, Mayawati celebrated her first 100 days in 2007 lavishly. All newspapers carried full-page advertisements of her government’s “unparalleled achievements”. At a function in Lucknow, such praises were sung for her by bureaucrats that it reminded one of Shree Lal Shukla’s Raga Darbari. Mayawati ‘read’ a 17-page long list of her achievements that listed eliminating the dreaded dacoit ‘Dadua’ by the STF, allocating Rs 322 crore for statues of BSP founder Kanshiram, envisaging farm policy by eliminating middlemen and claiming all was well on law-and-order front.

Ironically, Mayawati’s ‘revolutionary farm-policy’ was rolled back the next day – forcing closure of all Reliance Fresh stores in Lucknow that had registered record sales in a day – ‘in the interest’ of law and order! Also, the government of the first Dalit chief minister saw Brahmins harassing Dalits. One Chakrasen Gautam, a Dalit, was killed by Brahmins over a fair price shop-related dispute in in Bhadebra village (Pratapgarh), leading to protest by Dalits by hoisting black flag on 15 August 2007 as they could not even register an FIR against the culprits.

Akhilesh Yadav’s first 100 days were marked by a rising crime graph, acute power crisis triggering violent protests and hooliganism by SP workers. However, Akhilesh tried to put up a clean image by declaring assets of his own, family and of ministers and boasted of taking decision for the Lucknow-Agra expressway, installing CCTV cameras in state, reviving student unions in colleges, raising age limit for state civil service examination from 35 to 40 years, abolishing reservation in promotions, making Rs 1,100 crore budgetary allocation for unemployment allowance of Rs 1,000 to one million youths and Rs 2700 crore for free laptops to students and waiver of farmers’ loans of up to Rs 50,000.

Akhilesh had started the janata darshan that turned to be a huge affair, but had to be abandoned as that created law and order problems. His efforts to woo industrialists suffered a setback due to power shortage and he had to order shops to be closed by 7 pm though the order had to be withdrawn in a day owing to protests by traders and people.

The first few days of Adityanath as CM saw him building his image in sync with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The way he conducted himself belied many apprehensions, especially among minorities. Unfortunately, there has been a sharp rise in official crime figures which has been attributed to easy lodging of FIRs by police. But, people seem to be not happy because the CM is giving signals of being lax on erring party legislators who are bullying police and bureaucracy though he himself insists that he has given the police a free hand to take strong action against anyone taking law into their own hands.

The BJP government is witnessing the emergence of multiple power centres within and without the party that reminds one of Akhilesh Yadav, who used to be touted as running a government of multiple CMs. Adityanath’s ministers are alleged to be back into corruption mode and this is spreading like wildfire. The Chief Minister, after the initial euphoria, is losing grip over both administration and governance in spite of making several transfers of high officials.

CM Adityanath and BJP must remember that both the governments of Mayawati and Akhilesh were voted out of power in spite of making tall claims on governance. They must keep in mind that people of UP can live without development, but not without security. Any recount of initial development and welfare activities by the government may be fine, but laxity on the law and order front would prove to be its undoing. BJP could only hope that Adityanath’s karmayoga may not damage Prime Minister Modi’s poll prospects in UP in 2019.