Is negative politics ruining India’s chances of doing anything worthwhile for her underprivileged?
Most Indians felt that key policy initiatives are stuck in the bog of chaotic coalition politics as the administration struggles to deal with popular regional political leadership who loses no opportunity to flex their muscles at the federal government. But, are the national parties any better? The general notion is that the quality of Indian politicians, with a few notable exceptions, has declined in the past several years. Many of the people’s representatives, single-mindedly engaged in dogged pursuit of power, have lost that vital habit of impulsively keeping a finger on the pulse of the unlettered and voiceless electorate, who forms the majority in this country. Hence, India has been unable to keep out the elitist bias in her policy that the father of the nation Mahatma Gandhi has derided in the strongest possible terms.
In a strikingly unequal society with disproportionate distribution of national wealth, evolving symmetrical programs for the rich and the poor depends on the ability as well as sincerity of the political class to build a general consensus. Unfortunately, a glaring shortfall in the number of such visionary leaders — blessed with wisdom and honest desire — in both the ruling and opposition benches, makes social consensus and political unanimity harder to come by. It should therefore come as no surprise to anyone that a pioneering legislation seeking to end hunger in this vast nation, where millions goes without food everyday, has become a casualty of the political tug-of-war.
Even as accusations are flying thick and fast, the country’s principal opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has openly declared its preference for dissecting the ruling Congress’ hunger for ill-gotten money than passing an ambitious statute. The very fact of the BJP giving little importance to this bill, which envisages legalization of hunger alleviation for 810 million poor, clearly reflects the party’s inclination to over-politicize matters of social importance. It is an irony of sort that the same organization, which remained immersed in neck deep corruption during their tenure in power has all of a sudden discovered the danger of this evil lust for the control of money, described by Karl Marx as an object of eminent possession. True, this alarming trend has permeated from the head to all the functional organs. But the fault lies within our existing political system, which longed for controlling the fate of the masses through unaccounted money power.
Notwithstanding the bitter political acrimony that has resulted in the stalling of the conversion of national food security bill into a law, this long awaited effort to empower the subaltern class is indeed laudable. Such endeavor attains more credence especially because the aim of the legislation is to provide nutritional security in human life cycle by allocating adequate quantity of quality food at affordable prices. Apart from enabling a substantial segment of the population to live a dignified life, the concept of food security is an effective instrument for rejuvenating a sluggish economy. Empirical evidences suggest that socially beneficial steps like offering assured availability of food grains on a regular basis enhance labor productivity, a critical component of high GDP growth.
As per the provisions enshrined in the food security bill placed by the Food Minister KV Thomas before the lawmakers in Parliament, the state remains committed to the monthly entitlement of 5 kilograms of food grains per head for priority households and 35 kilograms for below poverty line or eligible families. More importantly, the draft legislation proposes to extend subsidized food to pregnant women and children below 16 years of age. On the whole, the government is expected to distribute a whopping 62 million tons of food a year in tune with its undertaking and the subsidy size is pegged at 24 billion US dollar approximately. The most positive aspect of the entire exercise is its significant outreach — covering 75 percent of rural and 50 percent of the urban population. This will in turn leave the rural and urban poor with additional savings to spend on health, education, consumables and protein rich food — a fact substantiated by global analytical and credit rating company CRISIL. However, the pledge to eliminate hunger and malnutrition from the country will take a hit unless the leakages in the distribution system are plugged adequately and transparency restored, agricultural production is enhanced through ingenious reforms to cope with the rising demand in addition to rationalizing subsidy for balancing the fiscal scenario.
There are unjustified fear about the affordability and sustainability of the present program. It has to be kept in mind that the government presently foregoes billions of dollars in revenue to certain sectors, which no longer require such doles. A food bill that is going to benefit nearly 70 percent of the populace at an additional cost of 3,00,000 million Indian rupees will surely not make the heavens fall. Particularly when the World Bank has come out with a report that says, one in three of the world’s poorest people is resident of India and a Food and Agriculture Organization document highlights the distressing scenario of nearly 17.5 percent of the total populations living in severely malnourished conditions. As the political slugfest continues, the government should quietly put its mind to sort out certain shortcomings of the food security bill for yielding optimal return. Ambiguity in maternal entitlement guidelines, lack of a robust grievance redressal mechanism, scope of exclusion errors, quality assurance norms deficiency and absence of agriculture production related incentives are some of the glaring anomalies requiring urgent attention.
