From wealth redistribution to guarantees to corruption under UPA- the key themes that dominated this election

Unemployment and job creation were central themes this election.

Election season is typically a time for big promises and several narratives. Elections 2024 witnessed a high decibel campaign with political parties promising jobs, loan waivers, direct cash transfers.  The audaciousness of the guarantees included a promise by a regional party, Rashtriya Janta Dal of one crore government jobs to the youth of the country.

Another being a promise by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in April when he said the party will take up the historic assignment to distribute the wealth of India, jobs and other welfare schemes to backward castes, SCs, STs, minorities and other castes based on their population.

Arvind Kejriwal of the Aam Aadmi Party promised free electricity up to 200 units to all the poor.

The BJP has made a promise of doubling the Mudra Yojana loan amount from Rs 10 lakh to Rs 20 lakh, after the scheme has seen a good uptake in the past five years among the youth.

Inflation featured prominently on the agenda of opposition political parties. But India’s headline retail inflation rate eased to a 10-month low of 4.85 percent in March, according to data released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation on April 12. It barely budged to 4.83 percent in April, according to data released on May 13.

On the opposition’s criticism over inflation, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on April 16 said, “From 2014 till today, except for one or two months in 10 years, inflation has remained below the tolerance band of 6 percent.” Rejecting the opposition’s criticism over rising prices, she said the Centre’s record is clear as it has taken continuous steps to reduce inflation and efforts are being made to reduce it further.

The BJP has taken on the issue of corruption under the previous United Progressive Alliance (UPA) regime, which was a coalition of parties opposed to the BJP and its allies.

Modi on March 20 said that India was at one point losing its credibility in the world and its citizens had lost confidence since the government of the day was defending all its scams, before the 2014 election that swept the BJP to power.

Home Minister Amit Shah on February 25 said, “In Indian politics, the Congress party is synonymous with corruption. Congress means corruption and corruption means Congress. In 10 years, they did scams worth Rs 12 lakh crore.”

Sitharaman took to X on May 27, saying, "Our budgets are characterised by fiscal prudence, transparency, and inclusiveness, ensuring investments in social development and infrastructure."  The post underscored the UPA government’s practice of off-budget borrowing and ‘oil bonds’, which she said "somewhat covertly shifted the fiscal burden to future generations".

"Under UPA, standard fiscal practices were routinely changed to make Budget numbers look favourable", the post went on to add.