NEW DELHI Four years of soaring growth is a record most governments would trumpet from the rooftops at election time, but India`s ruling party is giving the subject a wide berth ahead of this week`s polls.

Instead, populist promises of education, agricultural loan waivers, food subsidies and job programmes are rolling off Congress party leaders` tongues as they aim their campaign squarely at India`s “aam admi” — the common man.

The very poor who make up the bulk of voters are just “concerned about meeting day-to-day costs of electricity, transport, food,” said Sanjay Kumar, a fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies. “Talk about growth doesn`t mean much to them,” he said.

Some 80 per cent of India`s 1.1 billion-strong population still live on less than two dollars a day, according to the World Bank — proof of the selective nature of a boom which saw India post annual growth of close to nine percent after the Congress-led government took power in 2004.

The loser in that election, the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), had campaigned on an “India Shining” slogan touting high growth. Many voters who felt bypassed by the economic upturn ended up casting their ballots for the Congress or its allies.

Congress is keen to avoid the same mistake as its rival and has kept relatively mute about its economic successes while painting the BJP as the “party of the rich.”

“Congress sees people from the `common man point of view, the BJP talks the language of the rich,” Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, part of the Gandhi dynasty and tipped as a future premier, told a rally to roars of approval.

The BJP, arch reformers while in office, are also steering clear of talk of further liberalisation to open up India`s still-inward looking economy. It is stressing schemes to generate jobs through public spending on infrastructure projects and competing with Congress on food subsidies. It is promising rice and wheat to poor families at two rupees (three cents) a kilogram, undercutting a Congress pledge of three rupees a kilo.

In fact, the BJP — which ardently embraced opening up India`s economy to the world when in power — is proposing a ban on direct foreign investment in the retail sector to promote domestic trade.

Whatever the make-up of the coalition government that is expected to emerge from the upcoming polls, the problems it will face are already clear and acute.

A raft of data has shown the economy fast losing altitude with most analysts reckoning it will grow a maximum of 6.5 per cent for the most recent fiscal year to March 31, 2009, down from nine percent the previous year. “It`s very clear now there`s been no decoupling from the troubles of the rest of the world,” said D.K. Joshi, economist at Crisil ratings agency.

India has seen a big drop in domestic demand for manufactured goods, vehicles and property, and exports have slumped as global markets have dried up.

This year most economists expect growth to drop to around 5.5 per cent — and some see it slowing to as low as three percent.

Even that would be strong by current world standards but it`s far below levels needed to raise the living standards of India`s impoverished millions who live without proper food, housing, schools or medical care.

There are also concerns that an unwieldy coalition of disparate, ill-fitting allies would cause policy paralysis at a time when strong, directional leadership is most needed.

The new government`s room to fix problems will be sharply curbed by lavish spending in the past on a national jobs scheme, farm loan waivers, civil service wages hikes, tax cuts to spur growth and other steps.

India`s fiscal deficit for the last financial year was six percent of GDP — more than double the target — and 11 per cent if the states` deficits are included, making it among the world`s highest. “India`s fiscal position has deteriorated to a level that is unsustainable in the medium term,” Standard and Poor`s credit analyst Takahira Ogawa said.

Premier Manmohan Singh has acknowledged the need for fiscal prudence but also argued that more stimulus measures may be needed to see India through the global downturn. His finance minister, Pranab Mukherjee, was more blunt. “Let us spend,” Mukherjee said. “Extraordinary economic circumstances merit extraordinary measures.”—AFP