Eeeeks ! Samajwadi Party's manifesto

The Samajwadi Party has vowed to work against the use of English in education and computers in new projects. While these are pitched as populist measures — abolition of ‘‘expensive education in English’’ would allegedly create a level playing field for all and less use of computers would generate jobs — the steps are being viewed with alarm as they have the potential to drag back the country by years. Releasing the party manifesto here on Saturday, SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav dwelt on his pet anti-English theme. The manifesto says that if a new government were to be formed with SP’s support, it would work to abolish schools providing expensive education in English — in other words, virtually every public school regarded among the country’s top schools. Interestingly, Mulayam Singh’s two sons have gone to such schools. While speaking to reporters, Mulayam Singh said he was against ‘‘the compulsory use of English language in education, administration and judiciary’’. He said SP favoured the national language, Hindi, and regional languages. To give his anti-top grade education a populist spin, he said his party was in favour of free education for girls until graduation. On computers, Mulayam said their use was leading to unemployment. He added that wherever work can be done by hand, computers would be abolished. As everything was done by hand until the advent of computers, the step, if taken to its logical conclusion, could lead to the scrapping of almost all computers. Later, it was clarified that less use of computers would be enforced only in new projects — again, something that could put new projects at a disadvantage vis-a-vis older ones. Not just these, the SP has also come out against mechanized farming, arguing against agricultural machines. Harvesters, Mulayam said, would snatch jobs from poor labourers during the harvesting season which, he claimed, gave employment for six months. The manifesto adds that after tractors were introduced, the bovine population has been coming down. Instead of ploughing land, bullocks and calves were going to slaughter houses. Although SP has had close ties with the corporate world, its manifesto advocates bringing corporate salaries on par with government pay. Taking a leaf from the Left, Mulayam said at present, the economy was benefiting just a handful who had control over capital. He also opposed forward trading and said if a government was formed with SP’s support, it would work to cut back if not abolish stock trading and mall culture.