Tag: Food Security Bill

Beyond ‘Growth-ism’ : unearthing a narrative beyond the bottom line

There is a world beyond the Shenton Way, Bandra-Kurla Complexes and DLF Cyber City’s of the world. There is a peri-urban India and a rural India that might be influenced by its urban cousins due to the dominant, hegemonic discourse crafted by the elite but their world is still rooted in tradition and Asian values.  As ‘Metros have been transformed in to financial products’ in the words the authors of the mightily influential treatise on development sociology in India: ‘Churning the Earth: The Making of Global India’, the role of the City as an overpowering entity is articulated as the village cedes control to the city and farmers lose agency in the process. A farmer with limited resources but most importantly dignity denigrates himself into a commodity in the market when the government or a private developer acquires his land hopefully for a fair compensation package.  The new land acquisition bill makes robust Relief & Rehabilitation provisions for the Project Affected Families. The farmer does not have any other skill set apart from farming and money management is not one of them. It might be a barely literate famer moving from his second hand motor-bike to an Audi the next day, it will not be far way that, he will be a security guard at a shopping mall built on his land holding that he sold off (remember the Bollywood Film Shanghai?).  This might be Jairam’s single largest contribution to the policy landscape of the country.  Might delay projects and escalate costs, but the farmer is at the heart of the story and not the developer. The vulnerable and the marginalised should be the ones protected by the legislative architecture of the State and not act as an agent of the Capitalist classes. The line is often blurred beyond recognition with Industrialists populating both houses of parliament and siting on JPC’s with severe conflicts of interest. Great in one way as they have the ability of project execution but in another fashion take away the essence of grassroots commoner.

The semantics of the rhetoric of Mint Street unfortunately influences corporatized media boardrooms and sometimes North Block.  Umair Haque, who writes a popular column in the HBS Blogs website recently wrote a hard hitting post on the ills of American Capitalism in what he captures as ‘Capitalist-Stan’. American Capitalism was known for its ability as a power social escalator for the mobility it used to provide for all irrespective of ones birth. Opportunity equality was the byword. In the present times, the cliques of the ‘Lords of Finance’ on Wall Street rule the finance arena, influencing public policy that a former Goldman Sachs CEO becomes the treasury secretary under Bush ’43.  No wonder they are the highest campaign contributors to Presidential/Senate contests in the USA. Obama is no exception too.  The decrease in social mobility in hyper charged globalised capitalism is not surprising as ‘only the folks with the correct connections and skill sets’ are able to crack the ivory towers oops the glass tinted buildings of Central Business Districts of Global Econohubs.  It’s the same situation in India, as only 20% of engineering graduates being potentially employable. Many of the younger engineers I know cannot compose a proper mail in business English. English is the Lingua Franca is the Modern World of commerce. This is a pre-requisite as problem solving is in engineering. If you cannot communicate, then you do not know your stuff, if you cannot express.

‘Market-ism’ being the central ideological construct of the bankers and the capitalist classes has led to ‘Growth-ism’. This Growth-ism has led to the culture of the bottom-line and ‘Quarter se Quarter Tak’ (from one quarterly results reporting to the other) ethos.

Take the long term view, because concrete value cannot be created overnight. Mohenjadaro as Rome was not built in a day. Capitalism includes economic growth, and market is a vehicle for channelize the ‘animal spirits’ to create wealth.  But capitalism is also about meritocracy and wealth creation. More importantly its about pursuing ones calling in the sentiments of Weber.

 Growth-ism stands for parochial wealth creation unfortunately now days. When wealth is created, it is distributed for welfare of the poor, so that they can a more playing field can be created. This element is sadly missing from the conversation. I was on an Al Jazeera International’s show – ‘The Stream’ on the 9th of October 2013, speaking on an esteemed panel on the Food Security Bill. I spoke in favour of the bill that a welfare legislation is a public policy innovation and is a start, might be flawed but is a start.  A policy pundit, a very knowledgeable Think Tank honcho and friend shouted me down espousing his beliefs in ‘Market-ism’.  Market is a great slave but a terrible master; my friends from Dalal Street should understand.

 

Is Arnab Goswami framing our National Conversation?

Our  ‘Present’- tation State of the Economy is in ‘Slide Show’ mode. With an economy in free fall and governance in a coma, it’s frankly no surprise to ordinary ‘aam aadmi’ that a time would arrive when a PAN Card would have to be furnished to the vegetable vendor to purchase onions which is a staple of the Indian diet. The government is busy engineering a political relief package for itself by ‘friending’ Nitish on the social network of Indian coalition politics. Creation of Telengana as a separate state has ensured that the UPA will have a landslide in 21 seats of the region in 2014. As I had written in my previous post supporting the passage of the revolutionary welfare legislation the Food Security Bill, it will be a Killer App along with Direct Cash Transfer to bring in votes for the present dispensation.  The Food Security Bill has widespread support across the political spectrum with opposing voices only suggesting minor amendments. Even the BJP is engaging in a regressive competitive populism by supporting the legislation in order to save face as a pro poor party. As a right wing opposition party it should technically speak is opposing legislations which distribute such largesse from an ideological standpoint.  No political actor seems to be also interested in running the business of governance which is policy making on the floor of the house. A majority of MP’s it seems want to head home after a 1pm adjournment, so as to grab subsidized biryani from the parliament canteen for lunch and subsequently have a proverbial snooze.

A major reason for policy paralysis is a dysfunctional parliament and a severe paucity of democratic debate.  The locus of our national conversation seems to be shaped by the media and a social anthropologist named Arnab Goswami is its torch bearer.  When mainstream democratic channels of expression are stifled, then alternative platforms emerge such as the primetime TV debate with armchair intellectuals and Rajya Sabha MP’s who are either media tycoons or Industrial honchos (read leaders with no mass base). Having a technocrat Prime Minister who prefers silence to debate does not really alleviate the matter.  Strong Leaders in times of crisis,  require political capital and the promoter-professional management divide does not work.

There is a significant disconnect between the policy discourse in the media led by policy wonks and in general intelligentsia and the grass roots strongmen who fight elections with money and muscle power in Anantapur, Sangli or Saharsa.  It is ultimately these strongmen with mass voter base in shanties and below poverty line villages that enter parliament. I will be very surprised if they have even come across the word ‘discourse’ leave alone engage in an intellectually stimulating debate over issues such as Secularism or the Food Security Legislation.  The wonks in the Planning Commission/Think Tanks would do the research for them. Politicians such as Jay Panda are a rarity as they represent rural poor constituencies such as Kendrapada in Odisha and be equally innovative as hiring Swaniti/PRS LAMP Legislative Fellows to help him with their research.

As important policy debates are outsourced to Arnab to act as a ‘Speaker’; the educated class atleast have an opportunity to engage the political class via twitter. Arnab’s anger resonates with the outrage of the masses albeit with popcorn and coke in an Airconditioned living room.  But sadly Tweets do not equal votes and the indelible ink on your finger.

The realpolitik of politics is fought in the dust bowls of Bundelkhand and not in the tony cafes of South Bombay where the LSE-Ivy League educated intelligentsia frequent.  Let us take some of the brilliant minds on prime time debate TV such as Swapan Dasgupta or a Dr. Swamy into the hallowed alleys of Parliament.

Or even Arnab, although I am skeptical that he would win a Lok Sabha poll even from his native Guhawati.

Why India’s Food Security Bill is needed

We are in the midst of an ideological battle over a legislation which is a rare welcome initiative in our complicated national discourse usually muddled within the finite contours of caste and religion.   It’s a battle between greatest Indian Economist of our generation Nobel Laureate Dr. Amartya Sen and equally formidable duo of Dr. Jagdish Bhagwati and Dr. Arvind Panagariya on the Food Security Legislation. It is a social sector legislation of unprecedented magnitude. 800 million people will get subsidized access to grains.

In this cruel globalized world of inter-connected commodity markets where some incident a world away can lead to a borderline BPL family skipping a meal due to a spike in prices; subsidized grains can save lives.

According to Dr. Sen, this legislation will add one percent more to our expenditure while subsidized fuel and power to the middle classes which cost a lot more to our expenditure and do not raise a hue & cry with the right wing intelligentsia as their air-conditioned glitzy office spaces are itself subsidized by the State. If the price of LPG cylinders is increased, then the first people to cry wolf are the right wing as their appeal is mainly to the urban voter base. It can be deducted that as the BJP is an upper caste, urbane voter base, any positive rural social policy move which is a political killer app for the Congress will be discredited. Modi Evangelists have even started to discredit a national icon such as Dr. Sen in their petty politicking. My humble request to my friends who believe in the Modi Doctrine will be to excuse Dr. Sen of their rant. We fundamentally need to respect our Gurus. It is our Culture.

I do not discredit the Gujarat Model of Development totally, as an ideologically heterodox man; I understand that the space required for different economic development models the Indian social rubric. Rather, Mr. Modi has done a great job in creating World Class Physical Infrastructure in his state and has good ideas for the Nation as his Fergusson College address has shown.

It is indeed a bold move by Dr. Sen to stick his neck out and support radical social sector legislation such as the food security bill which is a political minefield just before the 2014 polls. As an academic, he could have played safe and lived out his twilight years at Harvard churning out research papers. He is a man who was offered the Finance Minister’s post during the United Front dispensation by Jyoti Basu of the Left, but he declined. As a man who lived through the Bengal Famine of the early 1940’s and saw the brutal partition we need to respect his perspective on development issues. A chartered accountant named Piyush Goyal who happens to be a BJP Rajya Sabha MP in his economic times editorial dated 24.7.13 has just succeeded in demonstrating his shallow thought process by maligning Dr. Sen.  The BJP should attack the chinks of the food bill and not attack intellectuals.

But, the Food Bill is not without legitimate concerns which my friends from the right churn out in an acerbic fashion. The Checks & Balances are woefully inadequate in our Public Distribution System and pilferages have lead to have massive corruption in the process. We do not have good cold storage infrastructure which has resulted in millions of tones of food grains rotting in Food Corporation of India godowns. India is urbanizing at a blistering pace, and has resulted in internal migration on an unimaginable magnitude. Agricultural spends have been stagnant and we are currently an importer of food grains. All these above elements, add to the question of the overall effectiveness of this social legislation.

The Practice of Power called Electoral Politics drives all discourse in our country. State Governments such as in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka have already introduced subsidized grains schemes which have historically reaped positive rewards for the political dispensation in place.  The pioneering social sector act; Mahatma Gandhi National Employment Guarantee Legislation brought back UPA to power in 2009.  A combination of Aadhar, Direct Cash Transfer and Food Bill will be the 2014 electoral plank as envisaged by the Congress Strategists. Social Policies are critical to Inclusive Economic Growth and Nation Building.

Legislation is not cast in stone and has an iterative feedback loop of learning and thus progressive alterations can be made as the cracks in the implementation program will surface and eventually be plugged by amendments.

But to deny the poor food to eat, because legislation is not theoretically full proof is just callus.  Often, welfare is the option of the last resort of the poorest of the poor. The poor are not just statistics but are souls with agency.

The wonks at Takshashila and American Enterprise Institute just won’t understand as they are blinded by cold statistical logic. Sometimes empathy is the most needed ingredient in policy formulation.