New Delhi:
In a significant move with several social and political overtones, Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday launched the Vishwakarma Yojana. Anyone who works with hands and tools is a vishwakarma and the government will do everything possible to uplift people who have toiled hard to promote traditional skills, he said.
The occasion was also symbolic. It was the Prime Minister’s 73rd birthday and also Vishwakarma Jayanti. Prime Minister Modi first offered prayers to Lord Vishwakarma. He then launched the program at the newly built Yashobhoomi Convention Center in Dwarka and also met people from 18 traditional professions who were among the beneficiaries of the nationwide programme.
The Cabinet recently approved the scheme with a budget of Rs 13,000 crore for the next five years. It aims to support traditional artisans, craftsmen and workers such as carpenters, blacksmiths, locksmiths, goldsmiths, potters, sculptors, shoemakers, toy makers, laundrymen, tailors and others who generally carry on a family business.
The program promises training, technology, tools, loans at subsidized interest rates and facilities to market their products nationally and internationally.
There is also a strong Swadeshi element to it, an attempt by the RSS and the larger Sangh Parivar to make Bharat, and especially the villages of India, self-reliant, and to support those who are about to develop their skills, craftsmanship and lose skills. livelihood.
The political message in motion today is important as this is a mega move by the Center to consolidate the voter base of the BJP’s Other Backward Classes (OBC). OBC communities, over 45 percent of the country’s population, have strongly supported the party since 2014.
Prime Minister Modi himself comes from the community, and the party is particularly focused on consolidating the dispossessed, non-feudal, numerically important OBC communities that have been left out by regional parties focused on identity politics with one or two communities as their mainstay.
The BJP has continued the steps it has taken for the OBCs, including giving constitutional status to the OBC Commission, increasing community representation in the Cabinet to nearly 27 now, decisions like 27 percent reservation in NEET and also the G Rohini committee to sub-category the OBCs.
With states like Bihar trying to conduct a caste survey and the case reaching the Supreme Court, the issue has also taken a political turn. The opposition parties under the umbrella of INDIA have demanded that a caste census be conducted before a general census and have also asked for the ceiling on reservations to be lifted.
The issue of a caste census is sensitive in certain quarters as some OBCs suspect that their numbers may exceed the 52 percent enumerated in the 1931 census, making them greater beneficiaries of political power and economic gain. In that regard, this mega outreach by the BJP to OBC communities in the form of Vishwakarma Yojana is not only an attempt to balance Mandal and Kamandal politics but also to strengthen its welfare plank in the run-up to the 2024 elections.