GROWTH OR DEVELOPMENT
Ticks of Politics
Sray Agarwal, Deputy Editor, The IIPM Think Tank New Delhi 5/18/2011 1:45:18 PM
The word ‘development’ in recent times has become more politicised than being agenda-centric. Development or shall I say ‘Inclusive Growth’ is a term that can be seen that is reused, abused and misused widely during election campaigns and budget sessions. In last six decades, we’ve seen our government rolling out numerous developmental programmes aiming towards refurbishment of tainted socio-economic fabric.
Even after six long decades of developmental plans, India’s dream of being a developed and equitable society by all virtues remains a distant dream. Given the multifarious and sullied rivalry among political satraps, the proper implementation of development agenda in all likelihood looks infeasible.
The issue here is not much about the futility of the schemes but more about how these are implemented. Surprisingly, most of tried and tested developmental schemes fail to reap benefit in India. Be it SEZs (Special Economic Zones) or NREGA (National Rural Employment Guarantee Act) — that have done wonders in other nations — none of these plans have shown a desirable and impressive outcome despite huge fund and resource allocations. Despite huge budgetary allocations year after year, the developmental plans fail to deliver. Either they fall short of funds or funds are returned to the central government at the end of the fiscal year. Most of our schemes suffer from huge political interferences and non-uniform modus operandi (mode of operating), so that they show different results in different states. Take for instance, NREGA. On the one hand where it failed in states like UP and Bihar, on the other hand it proved to be blessing in southern part of India. It’s no hidden fact that huge sums of money is directed and channelised towards middlemen and into the coffers of politicians. A brief glance through Comptrollers and Auditor General’s (CAG) report would be enough to gauge the rampant theft of funds. From money meant for Mid-day Meal Scheme to funds allocated for teachers’ recruitment, a huge fraction of money is seen being engulfed away in the delivery process by the middlemen and corrupt politicians.
Beside this, political interferences and ego-clashes also lead to delays and disturbances during implementations. The implementation of TATA Singur plant or Women’s Reservation Bill are case in point. Even DDA flats allocation a few years back, CWG flats sale and Adarsh colony scam speak volume about the menace political interferences cause in developmental plans. Plans like Common Minimum Programme or the much touted Millennium Development Goals that were launched with huge pomp not only failed to keep up to its promise but also became an avenue for corrupt officials to steal and embezzle funds. Recently, the Telangana issue rocked the nation to an extent that it paralysed the entire functioning of the state and made it unattractive for foreign investors. Development is so discreet and non-uniform that states like Kerala enjoy high literacy rate but in states like UP and Bihar, political parties keep the access to education low for their own political mileage. The ego clashes between right wing and left wing kept West Bengal in Jurassic age for decades and other northern states experienced steep competition between political parties in looting state resources. So much so that sector like railways, that is said to be the backbone of economy, found itself being ping-ponged between political leaders. When Laloo headed the ministry, all trains started from Bihar. But with Mamta becoming the new head, all new railway services departure point shifted to Bengal. Riots and religious discrimination, shutting down projects initiated by the previous government and creating turmoil in parliament even for issues of national concern are not only rampant but lead to a huge cost and time overrun.
Endangering Employment
The success and opportunity to earn a living that NREGA provides are based on two principal prerogatives. First, the work is of 100 days. And second, compensation is in minimum wage. These two entitlements in union form the minimum level of income for a rural household. The wage rate can be fixed either by Central Government or by State Government. However, it is the prerogative of Central Government to fix it and if they fail — the minimum wage rate of State Government will be implemented. One of the most conspicuous example of flouting State Government’s minimum wage rates happened in Tonk district of Rajasthan, where 99 workers were paid a mere Re. 1 per day for 11 days of work! There was also rampant delay of payments before it was fixed at 15 days. As consequence to that “Mazdoor Haq Satyagraha” had staged a protest rally in Jaipur for 47 days to demand proper enforcement of the legalities of NREGA by the state government; so that they have the right to earn the minimum wages. In case of districts like Tonk, Dungarpur, Dausa and Hanumangarh, NREGA funds were used for purchase of desktops and laptops worth Rs. 3.83 crores. Still, the matter after initial euphoria has gone to the back burner. A few years back, the CAG report also indicted the government for making available only 37.05 man-days of work against the promised 100 man-days. For the year 2007-08, the more shocking revelation that was made by CAG was that while the government had allocated more than Rs 51,000 crores to NGOs for implementing welfare schemes, the government literally doesn’t have any record about where or whether that money has at all been spent. These cases are politically motivated with interest to fudge NREGA funds.
Wandering Women Empowerment
What can be worse than political intervention in women’s empowerment? A nation that is suffering from female feticide, honour killing, high mortality rate, low women literacy and huge gender divide — an act of politicising women empowerment is nothing less than a criminal offence. The latest one being the women reservation bill that promises one-third seats being reserved for women in parliament. However, when one compares the ratio of the nation’s total women population to that of women in the parliament, the statistics reveals a different picture altogether. In the case of India where women population is around 50 crore, a mere 61 women in parliament depicts a poor picture of the status of women in India. The ratio boils down to one woman representative for every 81 lakh women. Going by the researches, most of the women MPs had got ticket because of their political lineage. Ironically, the very parties that are in favour of women reservation have low women representation at party level. Political parties had only 6.88% women candidates. The CPI had only 7% of total contesting candidates as women. Likewise, Congress Party’s had 10% women candidate while the BJP and Samajwadi Party had 11% and 6% respectively! As per researches, in 2009, the following was the share of their women contestants — BSP had 28; SP had 15; JD(U) had 3 and RJD had 2. This is in spite of huge hue and cry for women reservation bill in parliament. Women do play a major role in economy of a nation. For the matter of fact, if we were to add the contributions made by housewives to their respective households — to the National Income — then Indian GDP would go up by a staggering four folds! Shamefully, neither do we give space to women in politics and not in economy, but yes, when it comes to appointing them as puppets at different positions, our politicians don’t even think twice.
Humiliating the Health
NRHM (National Rural Health Mission), which was established in 2005, implemented in 18 states, with primary goals of greater access to public health services, reducing infant and maternal mortality rates, avoidance and control of diseases and encouraging different lifestyle and medicine systems. The implementation on NRHM has been a failure in most of the states, as is indicated by the figures of Uttar Pradesh with highest neo natal mortality rate with 96 deaths in 1000 births, followed by Madhya Pradesh with 94, Orissa with 91, and Rajasthan with 85 deaths. Government has been largely nonchalant with this disturbing statistics, as Union Women and Child Development Minister Krishna Teerath simply intoned “We will take this up with the Health Ministry.” The above figures are nowhere near the NRHM target to bring down the infant mortality rate to 30 per 1,000 births by the end of 2012. But there is no answer from Union Government to reprimand this sorry state. While allocating funds for NRHM, the government has allotted lesser funds to states where health infrastructure is almost in ruins. States like Bihar and Assam got very little allocation compared to Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and Kerala. Then there is arguments and blame-game among political parties in implementation of NRHM. In another case in MP, more than Rs 1.37 crores meant for improving medical facilities was siphoned off. Since last four years, the state government has been depositing Rs 10, 000 in the bank account of the village health committee but then there is no account of where the money has disappeared. It comes as no surprise that 40% of people are pushed below the poverty line due to out-of-pocket expenditure in healthcare and why not when the money meant for these poor people goes into pocket of a few ‘power that be.’
Erasing Education
India has made progress in terms of increasing primary education attendance rate and expanding literacy to approximately two-thirds of the population. India’s improved education system is often cited as one of the main contributors to the economic ascent of India. But the paradox gets unearthed as soon as one goes through our budgetary allocations for education. India is amongst the lowest spenders on education. Couple this with the fact that India also houses the maximum number of illiterates in the world! Putting the numbers into perspective, if the total allocated money (Rs 31,036 crores as per the budget 2010-11) were to be disbursed directly to 192 million children (or 19.2 crores children) who officially come under the ambit of SSA (Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan), then each student would receive more than Rs 1600 each this year. Considering that a student generally has to pay an average monthly fee of Rs 100 (actually ranges from Rs 70-150 in rural areas) at rural elementary schools in India, giving Rs 1600 annually to students directly would enable them to pay the annual fees. In addition to that one more prominent setback of Indian education system is corruption. The UNESCO’s International Institute of Educational Planning study on corruption in education revealed that at 25% teacher absenteeism in India is among the highest in the world (global average of teacher absenteeism is about 20%), second only to Uganda. All the elucidations to these problems come to focus only during election campaigning. In their latest manifesto, BJP has made promises to strengthen SSA besides ensuring universalisation of secondary education. Congress camp vows for the deprived communities. The party said education at primary, secondary and university level will be free in all respects for boys and girls belonging to Dalit and Adivasi communities. But the irony is that these promises are forgotten even before election results are out. Of course, what else can be expected in a nation where one can find 2.4 million temples but only 1.5 million places of education (62.5% of place of worship)!
Development agenda in current times has got confined to the definition of growth. Mere numbers and statistics are used to represent development in terms of rosy growth figures without taking into consideration the perforated delivery mechanism and output to real beneficiaries. In simple words, outlays are given priority than outcomes, which is more like misrepresenting development through numbers! High time India stops pretending that the trickle-down theory works in India, that 8-9% growth in GDP annually will remove poverty and attendant ills of the economy and the society. Need we remind ourselves that the menace of naxalism is spreading further in India, forcing even the PM to acknowledge that it is the single biggest problem India is currently facing.
In essence, politics in development is strengthening its presence where as developmental politics is losing its ground. Well, this is the true manifestation of development deficit.
(With reserach assistance from Sayan Ghosh, Research Associate, The IIPM Think Tank)
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