Health

By the year 2010, all of India must reach the quality of life indicators already achieved in some southern states of the country. It will be the objective to reach Kerala’s level of infant mortality especially by the end of the next decade for the country as a whole.

Morbidity due to communicable diseases continues to be high. One of the main reasons for this is the absence of proper urban and rural sanitation and poor liquid and solid waste management. India’s public health problems are largely hygiene and sanitation-linked. A new national movement for sanitation and hygiene, along the lines launched by Gandhiji during the Freedom movement, will now be started and spearheaded by the Congress. Effective technologies for sanitation and waste disposal will be deployed in towns and cities. The panchayats and nagarpalikas will be fully involved in this exercise. This is a scheme that will receive the highest priority.

The national programmes for the containment and control of communicable diseases, particularly malaria, tuberculosis, leprosy, AIDS and kala azar will be completely reinvigorated. Other national programmes like for the control of blindness and diarrhoea through simple, cost-effective techniques will also be given renewed investment and management focus. In keeping with Shri Rajiv Gandhi’s commitment to eradicate polio, the Congress will ensure that polio is fully eradicated in the first decade of the 21st century.

An epidemiological surveillance system will be set up all over the country to facilitate early detection and prompt response for the rapid containment and control of the outbreak of disease. A network of super-speciality hospitals will be set up all over the country with the assistance of all sectors. Every district hospital will be upgraded to a minimum level of standards and facilities.

While the existing health infrastructure comprising of sub-centres, primary health centres and community health centres will be expanded, strengthened and made more effective, new and more innovative delivery mechanisms like mobile health services will also be deployed. Health for All is feasible only with the total involvement of the panchayats and nagarpalikas.

An Education Commission in Health Sciences along the lines of the UGC will be set up to provide the requisite financial and technical support for professional and para-professional education in health sciences. One University for Health Sciences will be set up in each state to be the implementing arm of the Education Commission. Indigenous systems of medicine will be encouraged in every respect.

Drinking Water

Top priority will be given to supplying drinking water to the people in the villages, towns and cities. In the next five years, universal coverage of drinking water supply will be assured in villages and habitations that presently have no safe sources, or are only partially covered or face special water quality problems. The approach will be habitation-driven.

A safe water source within a kilometer of each habitation will be provided. All technologies to locate and develop new water sources and improve the quality of water supplied will be mobilised and put into use. The mission mode for this purpose, deployed in conjunction with Panchayati Raj institutions, which has yielded impressive results in Madhya Pradesh, will be replicated elsewhere. In order to supplement water availability and recharge the country’s groundwater reserves, a local community based National Rainwater Harvesting Programme will be launched with the objective of capturing at least an additional 15 of India’s rain resources or about 4 million hectare-metres of water every year.

Housing

The Indira Awas Yojana launched by earlier Congress governments to build houses for the poor and the disadvantaged has been a great success. This scheme will be expanded and consolidated. The scheme to provide free house sites to the rural poor will be continued.

High priority will be accorded to innovative schemes for the housing of the urban poor and the slum dwellers. Social housing schemes will be launched. Technologies to promote low-cost housing and effective shelter to the urban poor, like prefab will be deployed. Slums will be converted into livable habitations with access to basic facilities of water supply and sanitation. Further fiscal incentives to promote house-building and rental housing will be considered. Mortgage foreclosure laws will be enacted and all legal hurdles that stand in the way of accelerating housing and construction activity will be removed.

Public Distribution System

Price stability, especially in regard to items of consumption of the poor, is a major Congress priority. The congress is deeply committed to insuring the poor from the ravages of increases in the prices of essential consumer requirements. To this end, the Public Distribution System will be substantially strengthened and deficiencies in its functioning removed so as to ensure that essential commodities reach families below the poverty line at the subsidised prices. This is in keeping with the Congress view that subsidies should be focussed on the really poor and truly needy.

The PDS is particularly weak in the north Indian states. A special effort will be made in these states through the involvement of the respective state governments, local bodies, and women’s organisations. a beginning will be made to hand over the PDS to elected panchayats and nagarpalikas. The efficiency of FCI’s procurement, storage and distribution operations will be enhanced substantially.

Social Security

In August 1995, the Congress government had launched a comprehensive National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP), with focus on the aged, the elderly, and the disabled and for those in the unorganised sector. NSAP has three components-a National Old Age Pension Scheme, a National Family Benefit Scheme and a National Maternity Benefit Scheme, all of which are targeted at people living below the poverty line.

The funding for NSAP is now at about one-third the needed level. In the next two to three years, the Congress will make the NSAP fully funded. A health insurance policy for the poor will be instituted. Social insurance schemes for workers and producers in the informal sector will be introduced and implemented in close collaboration with non-governmental organisations and co-operatives. Special schemes for providing economic security in old age will be launched.

A National Senior Citizens Fund will be set up to encourage catalyse and complement all private sector efforts for the betterment of life of senior citizens of the country. The initial corpus for this fund will be provided by the government. Existing provident fund schemes will be expanded both in terms of coverage as well as revamped to deliver better yields consistent with the need for ensuring secure returns and assuring a steady stream of adequate annuities after retirement. A new fully funded contributory pension scheme for workers in the unorganised and self-employed sector will be started.

Dalits, Adivasis and OBCs

A separate, statutory National Commission for Scheduled Tribes will be set up. This Commission and the National Commission for Scheduled Castes will be equipped with administrative, judicial and financial powers. State governments will be urged to make legislation for conferring ownership rights in respect of minor forest produce on dalits, adivasis and OBCs who work in the forests.

The policy of reservations in public employment for dalits, adivasis and OBCs will continue and be implemented vigorously. All reservation quotas, including those relating to promotions, will be sought to be filled on a time-bound basis.

Special recruitment drives particularly in relation to Class I and Class II vacancies will be launched. Special coaching facilities for SC/ST/OBC students at all levels will be expanded. Educational facilities for these students will be expanded. The implementation of existing reservations for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes is subject to numerous administrative circulars and interpretations. This has caused both unease and confusion. Clarity will be provided by having a separate Reservation Act. Special courts will be set up under the scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act to ensure quick justice to victims of atrocities. Land reforms in areas where dalits are in confrontation with other sections of society will be expedited. A comprehensive national programme for minor irrigation of all lands held by dalits and adivasis will be launched. This will have a major impact both on the economic and social status of these communities. Landless rural dalit and adivasi family will be endowed with some land through the proper implementation of land ceiling and land redistribution legislation.

The finance and development corporations set up for scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, and backward classes, as also for safai karamcharis, will be strengthened and made more effective instruments of providing financial and technical assistance. The Congress will strictly implement the identification, release and rehabilitation programme for bonded labour.

Minorities

The Congress will vigorously pursue the seven-point Intensified Programme for the Protection and Promotion of the Minorities announced on Martyrs’ Day 1999 by the Congress President, Smt. Sonia Gandhi, to ensure the reinvigoration of Indiraji’s historic 15-point programme and the monitoring mechanism devised by Shri Rajiv Gandhi. Measures will be taken to increase the representation of minorities in all public, police and para-military services both in the central and in state governments. The Congress commits itself to constitute a Commission to examine, consistent with the relevant provision of the Constitution. relating to the minorities, the question of the backwardness of the minorities. It will implement the recommendations of this Commission in the context of the various relevant provisions of the Constitution, in particular Articles 15 (4) and 16(4).

The Constitution will be amended to establish a Commission for Minority Educational Institutions and to provide direct affiliation for minority professional institutions to central universities. New middle-level technical institutes in clusters where, for example, weavers and artisans are concentrated will be started. The National Minorities Development Corporation and the State Minorities Development Corporations will be made direct-lending institutions.

The corpus of the Maulana Azad Education Foundation will be immediately doubled to spread education and literacy among the minorities. The spread of modern and technical education among the minorities, especially amongst women, is the most important step that any government can take to integrate the minorities into the national mainstream. A Central Madarsa Education Board will be established to promote modern and scientific eduction, along with the traditional curriculum in all madarsas.

Consistent with Article 347 of the Constitution, the Congress will examine demands to declare Urdu as an official language in states where a substantial proportion of the population speaks that language. The Maulana Azad National urdu University in Hyderabad will be given all support to emerge as a centre of excellence. Special social security and insurance schemes for weavers, handloom workers, fishermen, toddy tappers, leather workers and plantation labour will be introduced. The Protection of Places Worship Act of 1991 will be strictly enforced. Substantial legislation will be introduced for the effective implementation of the rights conferred on minorities under Articles 29 and 30 of the Constitution.

All pending litigation involving wakf boards and properties will be resolved on a time-bound basis. The practice of superseding elected wakf boards and keeping them under indefinite suspension will be actively discouraged. The Wakf Act, 1995 will be reviewed for its effective implementation and where necessary, will be amended to protect Wakf properties. The Congress will not initiate and support amendments in the personal laws of the minorities. Special courts will be established to expeditiously try cases arising out of communal disturbances.