Since 1991, prompted by the World Bank and IMF, we have been following the policy of liberalization. There has been a general trend in the direction of Lean Government. For the manufacture of a variety of products and provision of a variety of services, people are no longer required to run to the Government for Licenses; in short the License-Quota-Permit Raj is dead in many cases. To get a telephone connection we had to wait for several months, and some times even years, but now we can have a mobile connection over the counter. A concomitant of Liberalization has been Globalization and there has been a free movement of goods and services from country to country. Anything that is available abroad is available in India. The country has moved from a Hindu Rate of Growth of 3.5% to over 8%. Our foreign exchange balances have soared and India is clearly on the Growth Path. Government is no longer a doer but only an enabler. It has undertaken the construction of roads (the Golden Quadrilateral for instance) and launched many programmes like the JNNURM.
But certain doubts remain. Discussion here should deal only with the following Questions. Please refer to the question by number and in a short paragraph not exceeding 100 words deal with only that question. Express your opinions freely. You can deal with other’s posts as often as you please. This is an exercise to promote inter-action among the students. The discussion will take place only among the 2012 and 2013 Batch students.
Question 1. Growth has undoubtedly taken place but not always equally nor equitably. Questions like Growth for What and Growth for whom remain. Agriculture remains neglected.
Question 2. The number of scams have increased and while one read formerly of Ministers making crores of rupees illegally , we now hear of lakhs of crores. Officials are in league with them. What shoud be done to deal with this problem?
Question 3. Monstrous cities have come into existence and there has been an encroachment on agricultural lands and on forests and there has been environmental degradation.
Question 4. The number of billionaires has increased but poverty levels have also increased. There has ndver been so many farmer suicides as now.
For the present we shall confine ourselves to these questions but shall continue the Blog in Liberalization Pros and Cons – II.
Prof.B.R.A.Rao
Anwser 1. Growth has been made in lot of areas but still improvement is required. In remote villages people are unaware of the liberties being given by the government, still people has a fear inside to raise voice for their rights which generally being exploited by few wealthy or educated people acting as mediator between the government and farmers.This is the result of illiteracy.A QUALITY education system must be established to raise the literacy rate of the country.
Literacy level if raised will certainly help. People must protest against black money creation and demand that money hoarded abroad must be brought back. With the return of Swiss money and stopping tax evasion much more dvelopment can take place..
Answer 2. Corruption is a parasite which is eating the roots of the country since a long time. It can be dealt by not blaming the person who takes the bribe,it is we who gives the bribe if we stop giving it, no questions of taking it.It is the need of the hour that people should stand against it unanimously.The officials and the ministers are no aliens from other planet, they are one among us.
People may be helpless and compelled to pay bribes. What I am trying to explain is the collusion between the political class and the bureaucracy. We need a strong Lok Pal for this. I want you to study the concept of Lok Pal and Lok Ayukta.. They are there in the notes.
Answer 3. As the country is developing and the GDP highly dependent on the service and the manufacture sector, ample amount of foreign investors are looking India as the major hub of investment due to the cheap labour and the manpower.An alarming rate of increase in the migration of the people from the remote areas to the cities. As a result the cities are expanding and agriculture land and forests are depleting day by day. Trees are being cut ,vehicles are increasing , emission of pollutants increasing,weather is unpredictable the temperature is rising and the rain is reducing.
Answer 4.Farming is considered to be the most disrespectful job in our country, though it constitutes 70% of the employment of the country. Farmers goes through a lot to grow and harvest the crop the very first requirement is seed if he gets that ,he has to fight for water to irrigate that, if monsoons is in his favour then comes urea. After all this the cost of labour to harvest it which is increasing day by day.Once he has the production does not has the liberty to sell it at his own rate the prices are being decided by the Lala’s or the government recognized shops or the multinational companies like reliance etc. To grow 1 kg of wheat he has spent Rs 8 and getting Rs 6 how can he expect to support his livelihood.He is going under debt with the interest rate of 24 loan taken from the nuclear banks in the villages(Sarpanch) , expecting to get good price in the next season and clear it wheres the people who purchase it from farmer are selling flour at Rs 24 per KG. The farmer is left with no option then to end his life.
Answer 1: Since 1991 Liberalization has been adopted as key policy, we have seen significant growth with GDP increasing multi-fold, increasing per capita income, and becoming one of the largest economies (top 5) of world. However the growth has also increased the inequality and poverty gap in the society as evident from Human Development Index (ranked below 100 in HDI) and Gini-index of > 0.6 (inequality measurement index) – which shows growing poverty, malnutrition (HUNGAMA Report) and low health indicators like (IMR, MMR etc). We had seen growth of manufacturing industry and service industry (52% of GDP) in this period but unfortunately Agriculture which now constitute only 17% of GDP but still employs more than 50% of working force clearly shows a lot to be done to raise the economic status of farmers, laborers who constitute a large number of poor people of India.
Answer 2: Due to liberalization reforms were introduced not our terms but on terms of World Bank and IMF, it helped already establishments and corporates to collude with Decision makers, officials and politicians for their benefit giving rise to corruption and given the potential of market (Mining, FMCG market, Defense Market etc) in India benefits for such collusion were huge giving rise to multi-lakh-crore scams. Following steps should be taken to bring check – 1. Increase Transparency and Accountability (Promote RTI, compulsory disclosure of all large project documents, procurement documents etc) –2. Use of Technology (UID, E-governance) – 3. Imminent reforms in key legislation (MDMR, Land acquisition) – 4. collaborative decision making bodies to be formed with participation of all stake holders like Govt., local political unit (gram sabha, panchayat) and private companies, – 5. Strict Anti-Corruption laws.
Answer 3: Due to poverty stricken villages, seasonal work availability there is pull factor for better livelihood, employment and other benefits – education, entertainment etc, which is responsible for migration of rural and town people to cities hence increasing the large cities like Delhi, Mumbai. This gives rise to setting up various industry clusters due to availability of material, labour and other depended industries, hence expansion of city. Also due to economic boom in cities, emergence of upper middle class and rich class in cities gave rise to reality sector boom, requirement of integrated townships, villas etc which encroach the neighboring agricultural land and forests to satisfy the demands of industry, reality sector and allied service sector. The industry cluster discharges various pollutants, effluents unchecked, improper regulation and failure of government to provide essential infrastructure (like common treatment plants).
Answer 4: There have been increasing farmer suicides in the recent times. It could be attributed to various reasons among which one is – rising poverty in rural India, rising input cost for agriculture due to use of fertilizers, insecticides after ‘Green Revolution’ to imitate the growth of previous decades and other regions such as Punjab, western UP etc, but due to lack of proper guidance, neglect of Agriculture, lack of education among rural India, lack of low cost and proper credit facility, lack of scientific intervention and unchecked operation of profit making intermediaries resulted in farmers finding themselves in debt trap and not knowing the consequences of unsustainable farming practices. Education and Health should have been our primary goals since the beginning even before industrialization and giving impetus to public sector so that we could have made rural society strong which is fundamental requirement of inclusive development.
You are correct and on track. Keep it up
Answer to question 1:
We would have to look at the question from the perspective of the words mentioned therein- equally and equitably. To ponder over the former leads us to look at how the services sector has grown manifold while health care and as sir mentioned, agriculture have hardly made any progress, if not stagnant. To answer the latter, how is it that Ambani is able to build a 4000 crore residence with slums around him- an example of inequitable distribution of wealth screaming at you.
Excellent. He must be ashamed to exhibit his opulence and that too near a slum. Businessmen must have social responsibility and sensitivity.
Answer to question 2:
The nexus and the value of scams is getting bigger by the minute- examples of an IAS couple in Bhopal possessing wealth worth 300 crore while another senior IAS officer in AP being arrested in connection with EMAAR group scandal has failed to raise any eyebrows from the public-looks like thousands of crores will. People have given up hope and it is not too long before the ticking bomb explodes- we might witness not an Arab Spring, but a Japanese tsunami. The problem can only be addressed by a more open government- RTI should be given more teeth with security to the whistleblower, a pragmatic right to recall and lastly article 311 should be amended by including a clause which fixes the location and tenure of posting of a civil servant.
Which is the very reason why we need a strong Lok Pal
Development need not come at the cost of environmental degradation. Not at all. It is shocking no SEZs are set up in Hubli, Bellary, Belgaum,Gulbarga, Ramanathapuram, Rayalseema, etc. Not having infrastructure is not an excuse. If 35 lakhs can be spent to construct 2 toilets, then I dont think it is very difficult to build expressways to connect hinterland towns to ports all along peninsular India-bring back the black money. Water can be recycled. The excuse of not finding educated or talented people to construct SEZs in such areas will become a paradox because in that case influx into urban cities will become a myth.
I never imagined that Montek would have agreed to this!
My understanding of liberalization is that it was aimed to bring in FDI in various sectors and thereby increase the productivity and overall growth. Agriculture for that matter was never under license raj.
Infact there is a political establishment in the country which do not want agriculture to shed its older avatar and transform. The entry of walmart which would have brought dollars as well as technology would have been a great step towards improvement in agriculture. Agriculture is also more of a socio-political problem . As majority of people in india depend on farming and simulataenously belong to rural background and are illiterate, they are a potential big vote bank. The political establishment might be seeing a great danger in the awakening of this class.A time when IPL matches have live telecast in all parts of the country, we have quite 3rd grade television shows apparently to increase the awareness of agricultural farmers. When farmer get a loan, he is encourage not to repay the loan and hence the initiative to work hard for better output and to ask for the facilities like irrigation, awareness, and better price for crops.etc, . die down.
Until and unless the farmer community as a whole is given a sense of what is happening around the world, unless farming in brought under the purview of globalization, it is unfair to expect the sector to grow.
Corruption is the major problem in our country. To understand the problem of corruption we need to dive deep into it and identify the root cause.
In my view the out-dated laws prevalent in our country are a major cause of this issue. To add salt to the wound, almost no one knows what the laws are. There are instances where laws defy logic and this are time when the politicians , bureaucrats or who ever is in power starts to abuse the law.
Simple laws without any scope of loop holes would do great to reduce the corruption. Some of our cabinet ministers are top lawyers of our country and it does not take them much time to hide behind the laws by giving some obnoxious excuse because most the laws allows them to do that.
I will give a simple example. When travelling in roads of bangalore after 11 traffic police stops you and have a check if you are drinking and driving. What should be a logical end to this encounter is that if you are not drunk then you should be left alone. But the police keeps on asking for documents after documents and it is quite possible that you might not be carrying certain documents and this gives the police to pocket a few bucks. This I would say is the most elementary form of corruption which is replicated and practiced in different form and sadly it runs till the highest office in the country.
4. The famous saying of economist: There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch is apt to this scenario.Some one has got to pay the price of the mode of development we as a country have adopted. The capitalist mode of development inherently promotes only those aspects of development which it sees profitable. Most of the industries in our country are primarily funded by foreign investor. This make them more negligent about the ecological consequence.
The absence of proper land acquisition protocols aggravate the situation further. The confusion regarding the proper usage of land has created a terrible situation. People not policies dictate the usage of land.
This is a reply to 3rd discussion. I put number 4 by mistake.
1. Our Politicians makes laws. Since independence or since 1991, how many are still on paper? And How many are implemented?. To accept yes there is a growth, but why North-East not well connected and developed compared to rest of India? The reason is the schemes not equally applied in entire country, one of the reasons could be due to non-ruling party in the states. Such reasons not acceptable.
In Naxal affected districts of a state some schemes cannot be equitably implemented compared to other districts.
Increase in GDP (Growth) will help rich to become richer. If government encourage agriculture will they get unaccountable commission compared to FDI?
2. My suggestions to tackle scams are,
A> Legalise giving bribe, as betting is legal in some countries. Otherwise common man cannot get his work done.
B> Whichever the agency (like Lokpal) may come, without the speedy judiciary, culprit remains accused. Many of our great leaders case running in court for several years, is an injustice to “we the people of India”.
C> Thanks to RTI for really unearthing many scams.
D> In our country a culprit for serious crime can get bail even before entering jail. According to me not taking decision at the right time is also a big crime (I hope you got it).
3. Monstrous cities are boon to country like India, which provides lot of jobs, global goods and technologies, transportation to rest of the country and world, best of the medical emergency services, educational institutions and many more.
Growing cities encroaches on surrounding agricultural land, which in inevitable. Unless we reach the efficiency of productivity in Agriculture compared to Israel and other best agricultural productive countries, we have to compromise to a very limited level with agricultural land.
But Forest land can never be compromised for any kind of growth, because the forest ecology and biodiversity is not 100 per cent replenishable.
4. We Indians should be proud of increase in billionaires. They are doing business and they are excelling in their work which is laudable (even from the point of constitution).
According to me increase in poverty in India is due to,
A> Couple can have N number of children even though they cannot feed good food and give good education.
B> Due to non-accessible to education majority of rural population remains illiterate. Poor people being cheated by literate, officers, and others especially in documenting properties and lending loan.
Farmer suicide is due to financial loss because of crop failure. Government must help farmers in providing proper expertise guidance and infrastructure like irrigation and power supply.
Mr. Gnanamurthy, I ask you as to how many of these billionaires have really paid tax as they should have. How is it they have not added to the growth of industry. How many of them have discharged their social responsibility? How is it that poverty levels have increased?
I agree that population control is a must and that government policies have not been good. The RTE is a good measure but needs to be strictly enforced.
I also agree that corruption is a cancer in Indian polity.
I agree that very little is done for the development of agriculture.
1.The Growth has been beneficial for the middle class.Liberalisation has ensured services sector like telephone,banking are no longer the slouch they once used to be.But the effect may be argued as a trickle down effect,the rich got richer,some of it percolated down and middle class burgeoned.The poor got poorer.However,some section of poor mainly the urban poor,also benefited from this trickle down.The number of plutocrats increased,the urban populace got richer,the rural populace got poorer.Liberalisation and globalisation benefited those who were at the right place and time.Those who weren’t,were left behind.Thus,low tech,economically inefficient sectors like agriculture was neglected .
Dear Hirak, you have hit the nail on the head. Keep it up.
2.Let us look at the scams involved in percent of the economic clout the rich have in the economy today.The richer they got,the scams increased in size.Rajiv Gandhi’s govt was bought down by a scam of no more than 70 crores.But the 2G scam involving lakhs of crores of rupees hasn’t bought down a govt.The capacity of public to tolerate scams is increasing,and why shouldn’t it?More and more people are having purchasing power their forefathers could only dream of.As long as luxury and livelihood of people are not threatened,they will tolerate the scams. The need of the hour is unbiased,ethical people’s ombudsman,that is,a Lokpal.But will the established politico-economic setup allow it?
It will not. There is none so blind that will not see. It is amazing that the PM at whose doors the buck stops, refuses to see corruption. He may be honest but believe me that those who keep quiet when all around them are corrupt should be regarded as abetting dishonesty. I am sure that more and more enlightened persons will join the Anna Movement and then Revolution will hit the ruling classes in their face.
Did you read the Comments by S and P. Who will end the dual centres of power in India and who will end the Vote Bank politics?
India is not the only country in the world to have coalition governments. The diversity of our population is such that there will always be coalition governments. Buy they must work honestly and the Coalition partners should not try to get all for themselves.
3.As the benefits of economic boom is apparent only in the cities and rural areas are not seen as aspirational,migration makes the cities grow bigger.The faster an economy grows,the more wealth is apparent in the cities,the more people flock to take their share in the pie.Cities grow at an uncontrollable,unplanned way.It is more profitable now to grease the palms of a few connected persons and encroach forest land.Economic growth is there for everyone to see.But the benefits of environmental capital are slow in bearing fruit,long lasting though it might be.Green Movement in India is mainly a social movement and unlike Germany and France,has not graduated into a political movement.
Cities have become cancerous. Montrosities, in fact. Environment has gone to the dogs. Pakistan i ruining itself through terrorism and fundamentalism. India is ruining itself through colossal neglect of the environment. and corruption.
4.Liberalisation and its adjunct globalisation,is dependent on channels of communication.If the industry is located near a highway or a port,it is more economical to transport goods and services.Rural areas traditionally functioned as ‘little republics’ due to lack of communication.This was their strength during independence,now after 1991,became their undoing.The rich got richer,the poor got poorer.Also,Agriculture does not contribute as much to the economy as it once did.There is an institutional neglect and apathy in this area.Farmer suicides are now brushed under the carpet.Middlemen ensure that spoils do not reach the farmers.Agriculture as a profession has lost its importance.
Prepre a note on Government programmes to develop ports since land for industrial development is difficultto get.
How are industries classified?
They are primary,secondary and tertiary.Primary industry mainly deals with extraction of resources like mining,agriculture.Secondary industry are those which process the products of primary Industry like steel industry,textile manufacturing industry.Tertiary Industry are those which innovatively use the products of both primary and secondary industries like electronics manufacture.All these industries are facilitated and wrapped by the services industry.Banking,accounting,infrastructure development like roads,railways etc fall under this category.
Primary Industries are easier for institutions to set up.Secondary industries require a lot of capital investment but can be set up if the primary industry is developed/products ensured.Tertiary Industries though depend upon innovation and general education,social and economic conditions of the target population/market.This market is neither flourished by throwing money at it or by issuing edicts.A change over a longer period of time in which growth in human development index should take place for tertiary industry to take off.
Now let us take the case of Odisha.The state is rich in minerals.Mining in the region has been taking place for quite some time now.But the development of the region i.e. the people of state of Odisha has not taken place.The roads are in bad repair,the means and modes of communication bad.No literacy levels to boast of and no health care.Earlier,the govt was merely happy to export the resources.Now,when the rest of India is developing,Tertiary industries are coming up,Odisha decided to play catch up by starting secondary Industries.It tied up with the Korean giant POSCO for building an Aluminium Plant.But when the people saw that no development came their way when primary industry was there,the opposition to secondary industry grew.The people had no trust in the Govt.Hence,taking this case,the secondary industry development was stymed.But the govt has to get the money if only to keep its books balanced.No tertiary industry,no market.No secondary industry,no land.What is the recourse left?Export.In addition to the port of Paradip which catered mainly to Japanese industry,and then Chinese Economy, The demand grew to develop furthur ports.
Hence,to arm wrangle the Central Govt,the state govt refused permission for the crucial strategic missile test of Agni V.What was the demand of the state govt?Develop Dhamra Port and Gahirmatha ports.Dhamra port,if developed means missile testing days are over.Gahirmatha port,if developed will ensure that Olive Ridley turtles are on their surest path to extinction.Here we can see that for industrial development land is required.It is difficult to get.The govt goes the short cut route and wants to export.Hence,development of ports take primary priority.
This is not the case of Odisha alone.All mineral rich states with access to the seaboard are in a mad rush to develop ports.Mangalore and Goa for Bellary ores,Paradip and Haldia for Odisha and West Bengal ores.
In the neighbouring state of West Bengal,anti development rhetoric has reached such a pace that crucial,economic development facilitating infrastructure like power plants,roads etc are seen as political deathwish because of land acquisition.Indeed,all the secondary industry in the country have become risk averse.
Govt insistence on developing ports are also then a facilitator of mineral looters.No wonder that Obalipuram Mining Company was allowed to grow big even when it did not meet many laws and regulations.Even the hue and cry follows the logic “this company has done wrong by fraud in its operation” but nobody questions the logic of its operation i.e. exporting minerals in the first place.
An economy is not dependent on primary industry for economic development.Japan is a tertiary economy.Its per capita income is very high.Russia is now mainly a petro-fuelled economy.Its per capita income is low.Japan after the war came up after nearly 20-25 years i.e. during late 70’s.Russia after collapse of USSR,came up within 10-12 yrs.This shows that while exporting minerals and resources are sure to get the economic growth high,the long term growth remains in doubt.
Hence,it can be seen that exporting minerals and not developing industries is a short term gain,but a long term loss.
4. People with good higher education and skilled labourers were only among the common people who were able to cash in on the post liberlisation period. The capitalist model did have an encouragement to increase the number of billionaires and as expected it did happen.
When a rich business man opens up an industry, he would definitely prefer to employ skilled labourer. Now the responsibility of imparting the skills was not clearly defined. A farmer from a drought prone area should not be encouraged to take loans. There has to be proper mechanism by which such farmers be moved to other sectors of economy and are trained. Government need to understand that it has run of money to provide any more freebies. It should concentrate on ways by which it should make more and more people able enough to access the development.
I agree. But I would point out that India is not so much a waste land as it is a wasted land. Can’t we do something to develop drought prone lands by undertaking a study of what can be grown on drylands. Should we not promote oppoertunties for employment in such areas like fodder cultivation, cultivation of oil palms etc., poultry keeping, outsourcing work like recycling rtc., Think and uou will find ways of keepng the people in such areas nusy and earning something.
Incidentally why are you not taking CSAT tests?
Answer 1: Edward Abbey said “Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.” and I think that statement holds true for Indian growth story. The 1991 liberalization policilies has increased private investment and has benefitted the certain sectors and sections of the society. Liberalisation was supposed to improve the living conditions of the people by helping us tackle issues like inflation and improving socio-economic conditions but unfortunately that doesn’t seem to be true. The per-captia food availability in 1991 was about 510gms but in 2010, it was about 440gms. Our malnutrition rate has increased where our neighbouring countries like Bangladesh and Srilanka are doing better than us. Liberalisation is leading to increasing corportisation of agriculture in which small and marginal farmers and traders are getting affected. This has also ready to massive industralization of countryside with the establishment of Special Economic Zones (SEZ) taking away the fertile land from the farmers and displacing them.
Answer 2: The problem of corruption is very rampant in India. Setting up businesses in India has a lot of red tape. There is corruption at every level. To deal with this problem, processes need to made simplified to decrease red tape. The Indian judicial process is evidently slow in dealing with such issues and judiciary needs to be empowered to take up these cases faster and punish the guilty. There should be strict mechanism in place to monitor the funds of the political parties and the individual wealth of our elected representatives. Right to Information (RTI) has been effective in dealing with some of these cases and it is important that the whistleblowers and RTI petitioners are protected which will boost the confidence of the public in taking up initiatives. When the elected representatives themsevles are corrupt, more laws in place has not helped. It only goes on to prove that the democractic system in place is weak. Only the people electing those representatives can fix the problem. People have to make a concious decision to vote for only the non-corrupt.
Answer 3: Liberalisation has indirectly led to rapid urbanisation of our countryside. Government has facilitated private corporations large tracts of agriculural land at subsidised rates for them to set up their units. Special Economic Zones (SEZ) are being setup in remote corners of the country to facilitate induslisation and thereby bringing investments into the country which has resulted in large number of poor farmers bring displaced and also taking over the prisitne forests in this country. Farmers are forced to quit their occupation of agriculture and are forced into unskilled labour. Natually wherever the industrial zones are setup, it will also call for upgradation of infrastrucuture demnading for roads, electricty and other amenities. According to census 2011, the percentage of urban population has increased from 27.81% to 31.16% which only tells us how urbanisation is increasing with the cities expanding and more villages becoming towns. Urbanisations also brings its own set of problems with its dense population. The waste generated in the urban areas are dumped in the outskirts where mostly the villages are located along the periphery creating a lot of health hazards and also polluting the ground water and other primary water resources for these villages.
I appreciate your answer to the first queston very much. That is the way to write. Keep it up.
Qn.2. There is no question of empowering the Judiciary. It has the power but no will. Our lawyers are experts ib delaying decisions and courts give adjournments at the drop of a hat. Please read my note on the Indian Judiciary (ask me in the class and I shall give it to you. It is on the desktop of my Del) ) Some judges have shown the way but many are either conservative or downright corrupt.
The Election Commission has been demanding greater trasnparency and accountability in the functioning of the Polkitical Parties. Coalition Dharma does not mean being histage to splinter parties like the Mamta outfir. (Read my materials on Electoral refroms (you can copy it from my Del desktop)
Dear MS Vidya: You are really top class. I am happy with you.
Rao
Answer 4: Liberalisation has only benefitted only certain sections of the society but it has also led to agrarian crisis which has inturn resulted in the collapse of the rural economy. About 60% of our population still depends on agriculture. Before liberalisation, farmers procured seeds locally which was cheaper but with liberalisation it was opened to global agribusinesses like Monsanto and others who promised higher yields. The local seeds production centers were shut down. With the usage of import variety seeds, the agricultural produce didn’t increase . The new imported seeds were expensive and it increased overall cost of farming. Most of our poor and marginal farmers were pushed into debt trap because of this. Liberalisation policies reduced pesticide
subsidy and farmers were encouraged to shift from growing a mixture of traditional crops to export oriented cash crops which demanded more of pesticide, fertiliser and water. With the withdrawal of tariffs and duties on imports which protected domestic industry, cheap imports flooded the Indian market pushing the prices of the domestic produce down. The farmers entagled in huge debt end up in a lot of mental strees and resort to suicides.
The first three questions are omitted. Please do take part in the discussions fully. You are good. either you are hard up for time or are lazy. in which case I am sad since you have rich potential and can really think.
Rao
Question 1 :- My view is : We read many a times in day to day newpaper that our Country is Growing, Shining, but irony is this claimed “Growth” has not reached nearly 40% of population who still rely on single meal per day (below BPL) even after 20 years of liberalisation. Liberalisation has only helped in creating the divide of wealth in such a way that currently 90% of the wealth of nation has been in the hands of 10% of people of the country. Affairs of the state can’t be decided just becuase richer became more richer. It has to take inclusive effect and the fact is Agriculture is still growing at a meagre rate 3-4% being inefficient to handle our food needs and farmers are stil committing suicide. In a country where 40 % of the GDP depends on the agriculture and 3-4th of the population relies on agriculture for subsistence, its saddening to see where the focus of real development is? Is this Growth meant for only businessman and upper middle class, who with excess FDI earned, tried their best with all intellectual capacity to amass their earned wealth in tax-havens ? Does this Growth mean more number of cars on road and more sky scrapper buildings in cities ? We also need to take into account below the flyover roofs, millions of people sleep without a single meal in these city who have come from vilages in search of something good but rather live in miseries in this competitive city.We can say for sure, this liberalisation has drifted us quite far from the Gandhian dream of “strong and self-sufficient villages”. Till rural economy does not strong, every child does not get proper education, so that he can earn for himself with pride, India can’t be said to have Grown. Till then any double digit growth to me would be a SINGLE DOUBLE ZERO.
1. In the developed sectors liberalization is beneficial and it reflected in growth.As agriculture is the main occupation, this sectors was not concentrated much since there was poor class. The rich are given more opportunity than the poor because they are in the right place to grab that opportunity rather than the poor who are not completely aware of that. In general, liberalization refers to a relaxation of previous government restrictions, usually in areas of social or economic policy, but this was not real thing which happen through liberalisation. Roughly 70% of the world’s poor (in developing countries) are engaged in agriculture and more importantly the benefits from agricultural reforms are found to be larger for the developed than for the developing countries. Benefits from the liberalization would depend on the extent by which domestic reforms can reduce the marketing and transaction costs. The recent economic success is because of the opening up of their foreign trade and investment policies. But, while significant progresses was made since the economic reform in liberalizing the industrial trade regime, but trade in agriculture remained a state monopoly for a long.
Dear MS Kamakshi
Good but you can be a lot better. You should answer each question instead of making generalized comment. Please buck up and you can do really well. The blog site is your main door to success.
3. There is tremendous Opportunities in the cities for any kind of people, because of this there are lot many migrations from the rural to the urban areas. The city is growing and more concentrated by government in all the sectors including corruption and also each and every space is occupied and there comes where the space is not available and hence the agricultural lands are encroached. Also forest are getting destroyed because of the scarcity of land and one more reason because of the pollution.
There should be lot of importance given to the agricultural sector and also forest. The land which is left out barren can be occupied. Government needs to take up strict actions on implementing the already existing programmes for improvement on agriculture sector and avoid degradation of forest.
2. Corruption is always there in form or the other. The basic inception of corruption started with our opportunistic leaders who have already done greater damage to our nation. People who work on right principles are unrecognized and considered to be foolish in the modern society. Corruption in India is a result of the connection between bureaucrats, politicians and criminals. Earlier, bribes were paid for getting wrong things done, but now bribe is paid for getting right things done at right time. Further, corruption has become something respectable in India, because respectable people are involved in it. Some measures where in corruption can be dealt through
– The Right to Information Act (RTI) gives one all the required information about the Government, such as what the Government is doing with our tax payments.
– Establishment of special courts for speedy justice can be a huge positive aspect. Much time should not elapse between the registration of a case and the delivery of judgment.
– Strong and stringent laws need to be enacted which gives no room for the guilty to escape.
1. Liberalization led to growth but not in all sectors. The growth is not equal because more of the importance was given to service sectors by facilitating entry of FDI into these sectors namely, insurance, telephone etc. The primary sector i.e. the agriculture sector was neglected or deprived of the benefits of liberalization because as hirak said the trickle down effect which was intended to happen did not take place.
2. The increase of officials’ involvement in scams is due to too much concentration of discretionary power with an individual officer and non existence of clear cut laws and very less transparency of decision making. In most cases the beauracrats are afraid to take rightly decision in spite of being vested with discretionary powers. The need of the hour is to decentralize of power and decision making process should be more transparent.
4. Billionaire’s number in India has increased in recent times. The sizeable numbers of billionaires are the individuals who have resorted to amassing of wealth by overly exploiting the permission to enter resource sectors (Ex. Gali Janardhan Reddy). The farmer suicides are also on rise. The efforts of government to improve agriculture sector by its numerous schemes always don’t reach or benefit the poorest of poor for whom it was actually intended to help at first hand because they are unaware of the schemes which benefit them and the returns are very low that they are debt-ridden and repayment of loan is almost impossible.
Q1: Liberalization, like any other change, has its trickle down effects. It has had its effects in all sectors of our economy especially in the tertiary or service sector. The agricultural sector has always been part of every budget and 5-year plan of India. But what has remained neglected is the condition of India’s industrial output. During the process of liberalization and globalization, our economy seems to have skipped the economic secondary stage of industrial production. Planning and encouraging investment to the untapped industrial sector could lead to multitudes of growth.
Q2: Liberalization also implies efficiency and effectiveness. Indian bureaucratic system is yet to instill these concepts into its processes. The age of License-Raj has definitely taken a toll on the corruption scenario. The very fact that any process, for example at the RTO, taken a much longer to get through the numerous ‘officials’ is plain ineffective. This prompts people to take the ‘easier’ path and thus corruption breeds. We must bring more transparency into our processes and breed a culture of efficiency. Bringing into effect an effective lokpal may curb corruption in the higher echelons in the political structures but not at the grass-root levels.
Q3: A powerful land acquisition, rehabilitation and resettlement act can change the state of affairs. The allocation of the SEZs must be stringently regulated to ensure that our common- pool resources arent misused. Our cities seem to become uglier by the day due to unregulated building constructions. Officials must plan the cities better to preserve the heritage and promulgate the beauty of the city.
Q4: Instead of being proud of the number of billionaires who are of Indian-origin, we must celebrate those who are striving to bring a nation of people from the clutches of poverty. The very fact that the 27 floor ‘Antilia’ of the Ambani is right next to the slums gives us a rather bleak picture of the our millionaires and billionaires. Indian entrepreneurs have contributed immensely to the Indian economy, but the number of them who have contributed to effective poverty reduction is a number we must reckon with.
1. Liberalisation came as a solution for the economic crisis in 90s. It was successful in pulling the nation out of stagnancy and embarrassment. In the process, it has created sorrowful state for vulnerable sections of society. The well-off upper and middle class, who already held greater access and control over the resources, took Liberalisation as an opportunity to grow more stronger. Disadvantaged sections like Agriculture were left helpless. Marketisation which involved shift from food-crops to cash-crops, desubsidising, removal of MSP, change in farm-credit policies were infact stood against Agriculture for small and marginal farmers, who form majority of Agricultural population in India. Removal of import barriers and linking our crop culture to global market added to their distress.
Not bad. But you need to answer all questions and note the comments by others. You have not done this
Rao
2. We are in that age where corruption has become an unsaid norm. The very feature of Liberalisation, ‘market-led’ can be understood as ‘Money-led’. Money makes one blind towards Dharma. There goes a Sanskrit verse: “Tena vinah trunamapi na chalati “. It can easily be adopted to modern age as – ‘Money vinah trunamapi na chalati’. Corruption of, be it small scale (like bribe for a peon in panchayat office) or large scale(2G scam) is equally hurting the common man. While effective JanLokpal (bringing bureaucrats of all grades, MLAs, MPs under purview) can come as a mighty whip, election reforms to control the spendings on election campaigns are of urgent need. This can help in two ways, one by regulating flow of black money and the other by avoiding ‘Money taking Power’. Also, use of plastic money in place of hard cash should be promoted in deeper and wider networks to control illicit flow of cash.
3. Privatisation and Foreign investments has undoubtedly created more opportunities in urban areas, leading to drastic rural-to-urban migration. To accommodate increasing urban population and to provide them with sustained life opportunities urban expansion is inevitable. But, the need of the day is, in the process, the very lifeline Agriculture, should not be neglected. Fertile lands should never be considered for urbanization. Non-irrigated, infertile lands can be used based on well designed plan and rehabilitation and resettlement plans for displaced farmers. Environment protection should make the priority while licensing the mining and irrigation projects. Striking the balance to achieve sustained development should be the motto.
Monstruos cities, this situation of imbalace in Rural urban populace is the result of improper planning of developmental activities both by union and states.
While Union government is busy by adding more and more privilages and freebies to the business houses of FDI’s And FII’s.
Our states are busy getting foriegn investors ( Advantage Karnataka, AP, Vibrant Gujrat..) to invest in the state at the cost of Tribals,Farmers, Rural household.
This actually sounds good as we will be getting more Business, Inflow of money which leads to more jobs… But whats the percentage these companies helping our agrairian nation, Yes, still we are a agrarian nation. Majority of our rural population depends on production of indian crops and urban on consuming “INDIAN FOOD”.
As the result of More and more cities being converted into Monstrous cities, We will one day become completely dependent on “Foriegn Food” and “Foriegn People”.
Environmetal Degradation and encraochment of agricultural land is mainly due to ” fall of farmer to easy money” and “Farmer’s Forgetting the land and love for the city” due to lack of selective(Farmer/tribal oriented) support by government.
Monstrous cities, this situation of imbalance in demography is the result of improper planning of developmental activities both by union and states.
While Union government is busy by adding more and more privileges and freebies to the business houses of FDI’s And FII’s.
Our states are busy getting foreign investors ( Advantage Karnataka, AP, Vibrant Gujarat..) to invest in the state at the cost of Tribals,Farmers, Rural household.
This actually sounds good as we will be getting more Business, Inflow of money which leads to more jobs… But what’s the percentage these companies helping our agrarian nation, Yes, still we are a agrarian nation. Majority of our rural population depends on production of Indian crops and urban on consuming “INDIAN FOOD”.
As the result of More and more cities being converted into Monstrous cities, We will one day become completely dependent on “Foreign Food” and “Foreign People”.
Environmental Degradation and encroachment of agricultural land is mainly due to ” fall of farmer to easy money” and “Farmer’s Forgetting the land and love for the city” due to lack of selective(Farmer/tribal oriented) support by government.
1. Liberalization led to growth but not in all sectors. The growth is not equal because more of the importance was given to service sectors by facilitating entry of FDI into these sectors namely, insurance, telephone etc. The primary sector i.e. the agriculture sector was neglected or deprived of the benefits of liberalization because as hirak said the trickle down effect which was intended to happen did not take place.
2. The increase of officials’ involvement in scams is due to too much concentration of discretionary power with an individual officer and non existence of clear cut laws and very less transparency of decision making. In most cases the beauracrats are afraid to take rightly decision in spite of being vested with discretionary powers. The need of the hour is to decentralize of power and decision making process should be more transparent.
4. Billionaire’s number in India has increased in recent times. The sizeable numbers of billionaires are the individuals who have resorted to amassing of wealth by overly exploiting the permission to enter resource sectors (Ex. Gali Janardhan Reddy). The farmer suicides are also on rise. The efforts of government to improve agriculture sector by its numerous schemes always don’t reach or benefit the poorest of poor for whom it was actually intended to help at first hand because they are unaware of the schemes which benefit them and the returns are very low that they are debt-ridden and repayment of loan is almost impossible.
Major benefit of liberalization has been the emergence of a strong middle class, a huge talent pool of qualified professionals and the shift in the pattern of exports to automobiles, steel, IT etc. However, most of the labor laws in the country are outdated and have not kept pace with economic reforms. Thus, the exploitation of the working class becomes much easier. The huge socio-economical disparities show that the economic reforms have rarely percolated to the lowest strata of society.
Liberalization policies deregulated the seed market, desubsidized fertilizer prices and increased electricity tariffs. Thus the agricultural sector has also seen this disproportionate growth, as it is a field that has been left high and dry in the pursuit of agricultural reforms. A case in point is the spate of farmer suicides that our country has witnessed in the past few years.
I fully agree with you. Labour laws ought to be friendly to the workers but tyhey are not. Also your point on agriculture is well taken. Keep it up,
Rao
Wherever there is a vacuum of a well defined process, it would be prudent to study the international practices on the new subjects like 2G and arrive at a fool proof solution to ensure there are no procedural faults. When major projects involving huge capital, ex: mining are exploited, it poses great threat to economy. Hence a greater magnitude of importance must be associated with these projects to be reviewed as it progresses. In any govt office oblivious checks are to be placed that are effective in catching officials deviating from the norms. The whistleblower must be rewarded considerably so that people are encouraged to tip off any suspicion, guilty must be punished. The Lokpal Bill, seeking to check corruption in high public offices must be implemented. E-governance in India is still at its infancy. Computerizing and streamlining procedures will bring in transparency, accountability and reduce scope for corruption.
Answer 3: Indian cities have grown far beyond what it was planned to accommodate. Today there is shortage of resources like water, land, electricity and dense population in the cities. Traffic has become a menace coupled with high carbon emission. Improper disposal of garbage, overflow of sewage and flooding of roads during torrential rains are the problems being faced. Broadening of roads, real estate and construction boom have resulted in indiscriminate tree felling. Encroaching agricultural land and deforestation has been practiced to create space for villas, residential layouts and industries as the city is expanding in all directions. Need of the hour is greenpeace activism, newer green technologies and green solutions to tackle environment degradation.
I think that people should take the initiative to keep their cities and parks clean. This morning I read how a judge could not get the Palike to clean a a blocked drain, So he put on his shorts , went to the drain and started cleaning it. The Palike officials heard about and rushed and requested the Judge to stop and then cleaned the drain. Kudos to the Judge for showing the people the way to shame the Palike. May God bless him. I am proud of the Judge. Let us do things ourselves. Let us show our indifference to the Government by doing things ourselves. This is one way of shaming the Government.
Rao .
Socio-economic disparities are high, on one side, world’s majority of new billionaires are in India – successful corporate holdings invest-grow and reinvest amassing wealth, and on the another side, India has majority of poor people. In most cases, due to corruption development funds diminishes several times before it reaches the beneficiary, thus distributing the wealth on par with the office they hold. The small and marginal farmers were pushed into debts because of various factors such as deregulation of seed market, desubsidizing, lack of agricultural reforms and devaluation of the Rupee. Unable to even reap the cost incurred, let alone the profits disappointed the farmers which left them hapless enough to commit suicide. Improving awareness of the basic rights and improving the living conditions of the poorest of the poor through focused commitment will boost the economy and foster inclusive growth in the long run.
Excellent response. Keep it up.
Since 1991, there are number of private organisation which is based huge profits and less attention to the country’s development, and since all the IT sectors or other private sectors are put up in the main cities or urban areas, given more privileges like good infrastructure and other facilities etc. Hence there are more number of billionaires.
Whereas people in rural areas, first and foremost not aware what is happening around with their own basic rights and other and not given much importance by the higher officer or government to make them aware of things and give them privileges same as what they are enjoying for themselves. The agriculture sector overall in India is doing poorly, with several states reporting suicides by indebted farmers in the last 15 years or so. There was a huge gap between income earned from agriculture and the input costs incurred by farmers. Farmer suicides is due to various Socio economic factors like debt, the difficulty of farming semi-arid regions, poor agricultural income, absence of alternative income opportunities, the downturn in the urban economy forcing non-farmers into farming, and the absence of suitable counselling services. The problems of the farmers were quite comprehensive. There was little credit available. What was available was very costly. There was no advice on how best to conduct agriculture operations. Income through farming was not enough to meet even the minimum needs of a farming family. Support systems like free health facilities from the government were virtually non-existent.
We all know that growth has been taken place becuase of liberalization or gloablization.There is vast improvement in the insfrastucture.
One side,inda is leading to economic prosperity and glory, the other side to social inequality.Presently, as India is one of the fastest growing economies
in the world, the social aspects have been ridden roughshod by the economic benefits. What has been conveniently forgotten or suppressed till date
have been the disparities, mainly the socio-economical issues. This has led to growing discontent among the population and it has gathered momentum
since the reforms began 15 years ago. It will very soon reach a critical point wherein the very purpose for which the reforms were started,
will start to lose their significance rapidly and throw the country back into the ‘license raj’ and ‘unionist’ era.The chasm between the rich and the
poor has increased so vastly that the rich are just getting richer and the poor are just getting poorer. The real benefits of the economic reforms
have rarely percolated to the lowest strata of society.
The agricultural sector has also seen this disproportionate growth, as it is a field that has been left high and dry in the pursuit of
agricultural reforms. The sector has been opened up to the multi-nationals, without having evolved a comprehensive cover for our farmers,
most of who are poor and own very little land of their own. A case in point is the spate of farmer suicides that our country has witnessed
in the past few years. The developed countries, which clamour for open-ended policies, have, in fact, some of the fiercest protection policies
when it comes to their agricultural sector.
Place take few tests so that you could improve your English. With a bit of effort you will do well. Your points are all relevant.
Rao
2.Corruption is one of the most important concerns in India. More than 50% of people in India have experience of paying bribes to make their work to be done. Gone are the days when people who joined politics were imbued with the spirit of serving the nation. Now Politics in India become worst and political leaders have spoiled the society. They lead to luxurious life and do not even care about the society. Moral values are not given utmost importance. In some cases, salary paid to employees is very less and as a result they are forced to earn money in illegal ways. In order to avoid all these, there must be establishment of strong and strict laws which gives no room for the guilty to escape. There should be establishment of special courts for speedy justice. People should aware of RTI (Right to information Act)and CVC(Central vigilance Commission).Passing the Lok pal bill is utmost important at this point of time.
India has done so many reforms for industrial development and globalization also a well success. Because of this, industiries could widen the business and new industries have also come up, so many industrialists became billionaires.
But, what happened to the formaers in India. Other than first 5 year plan, there were no significant plan for agriculture even though India is with 70% agricultural land. Most of the farmers have very less land, no irrigation facilities (they could not afford borewells), could not able to grow unless rainy season, they are becoming more poors. Not ony the farmers, but also BPL population is very much in Metro cities also, which could be because of migration, illitaracy, very less wages, etc. Govt, should act upon this, make sure real BPl people should get the benefits like free eduction, hospitals, subsidised houses, etc by which we poverty can be eradicated.
1.We are constantly improving our growth rate since we started following the reforms. But reforms are not equally applied in all the areas which are applicable nor they are equally considered for the implementation of developmental plans by the government. Consider an example of Karnataka state during the period of S.M.Krishna. He gave most of his attention to the growth of industrial sector and the IT boomed in the state like never before. Eventhough he gave some attention towards other areas, the very little developments which were planned for the agricultural sector didn’t even reach the needy completely. Along with the government attention it is the responsibility of the individual in each sector to understand the complete developmental plan and make the people to participate and utilise in the right way. The more and more growth in IT sector attracting people from different sector especially the agriculture. People started migrating to the urban area in the believe of getting better constant earnings than agriculture leaving behind their land in the villages. Lack of the knowledge of modern technology and techniques of farming in the farmers is another reason for lagging behind of the agriculture.
2.Our constitution is considerably slow and weak in dealing with the corruption. In such scenarios we should have strong laws to handle them. Like, if any official or representative found to be corrupted, the case should be filed immediately and should be resolved or concluded as soon as possible may be then and there. When representatives are elected from the people, there should be some power to the people to take action against corrupted representative. We should have very strong protective law at international level such that any inflow and outflow of the money from the country must be transperant (atlease within the country). The power should be given to each individual to question their higher officer irrespective of their levels.
3.The industrial revolution has both advantages as well as disadvantages. As the result of industrialization urbans started enlarging in space with more opputunity of employment and also good life support factors for human living. So people of villages started migrating towards the urbans for their jobs and better liveliwood. When the farmers with land migrated, their land became unused for agriculture and when the labours migrated, the owners found difficulty in farming with insufficient labours and they started looking for alternatives. With availability of the labours and other requirements in the urban, more industries evolved and lead to more pollution. In villages, due to decreasing farming rate the lands are becoming infertile and soil errosion is incresing. As a result the total environment is getting spoiled.
4. Growing urbans and industrialization made people (labour class) to work in the situation where they get paid less than the work they do. So the investors are getting more profits. With the less availability of the food and other resources, they are getting priced heavily such that entire earnings of the labours is still insufficient to kope with the cost of living in city. Even in the supply and distribution of resources only the capitalist getting the more money than the actual worker. This is making the rich more richer and poor becomes poorer.