The White Paper put out by the government is a hatchet job. It is a white-lie paper. Even the authors will not claim that it is an academic, well-researched or scholarly paper. It is a political exercise intended to damn the previous government and hide the present government’s broken promises, monumental failures and betrayal of the poor. A fair and unbiased assessment of any period will not start arbitrarily with 2004 and end abruptly in 2014. It would have assessed a reasonable period before 2004 and included a reasonable period after 2014. The paper released today is not a white paper; it is a paper that is intended to whitewash the many sins and commissions of the NDA government in the last 10 years. The appropriate answer to the so-called white paper is the hard-hitting document titled ‘10 Saal, Anyay Kaal, 2014-2024’. I urge you to read that document.

No government on assuming office had made wild promises as the Narendra Modi government and broken them without an expression of regret. In fact, the government laughed them away as election jumlas. Here are some:

• 2 crore jobs a year
• Bring back black money stashed abroad in 100 days
• Rs 15 lakh to every citizen in his/her bank account
• Petrol, diesel at Rs 35 a litre
• Farmers’ incomes will be doubled
• Achieve USD 5 trillion economy by 2023-24
• House to every family by 2022
• 100 smart cities by 2022

In 2004, the UPA government had inherited an economy that had performed at a below-average rate in the previous 6 years. Yet, the Vajpayee government called the moment ‘India Shining’. The slogan recoiled on the government. The BJP-government suffered an ignominious defeat. The authors of the white-lie paper may realize that history has a way of repeating itself.

Every government stands on the shoulders of the previous government(s). For example, but for Jawaharlal Nehru and his colleagues, India would not be a parliamentary democracy. Every government builds on the work of the predecessor governments. This fundamental truth has escaped the authors of the white-lie paper. Let us begin with the comparative performance of the UPA and the NDA to put an end to the lie that everything during the UPA government was black and everything during the NDA government was shining white:

UPA	NDA

GDP growth rate 7.46% (old series) 5.9% 6.7% (new series) Fiscal Deficit (in terminal year) 4.5% 5.8% National Debt (in terminal year) Rs.58.6 lakh crore Rs.173.3 lakh crore Debt to GDP 52% 58% Households saving (% of GDP) 23% 19% Farm wages growth 4.1% 1.3% Gross NPAs of PSBs Rs.8 lakh crore (2004-05 to 2013-14) Rs.55.5 lakh crore (2014-15 to 2022-23) Bank Loans written off Rs.2.2 lakh crore Rs.14.56 lakh crore End of tenure Expenditure as % of total expenditure On Health 1.7% 1.7% On Education 4.6% 2.9%

Total exports as % of GDP 17% 13% Trade balance Rs. 8.1 lakh crore Rs. 21.13 lakh crore US Dollar exchange rate Rs. 61 Rs. 83 Share of manufacturing (as % of GVA) 17% 14% Production of crude oil 36 million tonnes 28 million tonnes Cost overrun of central sector projects Rs.1,00,943 crore Rs. 4,70,663 crore Price of petrol Rs. 71.51 Rs. 96.72 Price of diesel Rs. 57.28 Rs. 89.62 Price of LPG cylinder Rs. 414 Rs. 1,103 Number of Anganwadis 13.4 lakhs 13.9 lakhs Number of Anganwadi Workers 12.9 lakhs 13.1 lakhs Number of Anganwadi Helpers 11.7 lakhs 11.7 lakhs Number of ASHA workers 8.5 lakhs 10 lakhs Central government employees 33,28,027 31,67,143

The one number that sums up the state of the economy is the GDP growth rate. Never before in a period of 5 years had India achieved a growth rate of 8 per cent as it did in 2004-2009. Never before in a period of 10 years had India achieved a growth rate of 7.5 per cent as it did in 2004-2014.

The Indian economy recorded the ‘golden period of growth’ in the three years between 2005-06 and 2007-08 when the GDP grew at 9 per cent or more at an average of 9.5 per cent. The Indian economy achieved its best fiscal performance in 2007-08 when the fiscal deficit was 2.5 per cent and the revenue deficit was 1.1 per cent. We have more to say in the White-lie Paper. We shall stop here for today and promise to come back in the days to come.

Statement issued by Shri P. Chidambaram, MP and Member, CWC on February 9, 2024