Unsolved Puzzle of Poverty Part --2

Since independence, many schemes had implemented to alleviate poverty. Among them Swarnjayanti Grameen Swarozgaar Yozna (SGSY) for rural poor and Swarnjayanti Shahari Swarozgaar Yozna for urban poors, Valmiki Ambedkar Awwas Yozna and NAREGS are the flagship programs in recent times. The SGSY and SSSY both are intend to provide credit and easy loans to the BPL people for self-employment or for durable assets that can help them to raise their income and finally to brought them above the poverty line.

The major draw back in execution of all above poverty reduction programs is, the half of the  BPL population do not obtain a BPL card, which is an essential document for getting benefits of those schemes.  The banks play a major role for the selection of beneficiaries and distribution of loans and credits, thus the identification documents becomes very much necessary. In rural areas, where landless peasant and jobless people, used to migrate from one place to another to find work, their identification as BPL and allotment of BPL card has proven a tough task. In urban areas, situation is not different, slums and such other habitats that are not legal, usually remained out of BPL list. Hence, a needy person failed to get loan  or credit because he do not have any identification proof of his residence, income, cast and such other documents, e.g. ration card, voter Id card etc. the problem is not limited towards only BPL cards but not also extant to other documents such as voter ID card, ration card etc.

 Even during the census, those habitats that do not exist on government papers, left behind/excluded from counting and later on, they become unable to prove their status as BPL.

This is the turning point, where room for all kind of corruption and misconduct find place in poverty reduction schemes. Fake BPL cards, fake muster roles, fake payments, fake entries in distribution system are some example that shows how the local authorities who are responsible for the execution of schemes take illegal benefit from the power they have and unawareness of common people.

The local power structure at panchayat level is a key factor in this regard; sarpanch and gram sevak who plays a major role in the identification of BPL families in their area and later on help the people to access the benefits of various welfare schemes should be brought under tight scrutiny. As the monetary allotment is increasing for the panchayats, the level of corruption is also increasing; MNREGS and SSA are the biggest examples of such misconducts. Infect it’s the money factor that has increased the interest of political parties and local people in panchayats.

The another problem is illiteracy, that make people unable to demand for their rights further more they  are not aware about the laws and  regulations which are made for their betterment. Therefore, capacity-building measures for strengthening the voice of people such as effective and hurdle less implication of RTI, a sharp oversight of civil society organizations and administrative authorities etc are required. Beside that the social audit clause of NREGS can be consider to check the execution of all poverty reduction schemes. The outcome budget kind of system can also be helpful to assess the performance and result of those schemes and related ministries, departments, officials etc.

The issue of APLs is another angle of this puzzle that cannot be neglect when we are talking about poverty alleviation. According to a study of AIDWA (all India democratic women association), Many people are recommended as APL because they have a small piece of land or sending their children school, accessing some sort of health facilities. No need to say that, this issue is directly related with the wrong estimation of poverty that demands a broader perspective of policy making. Poverty reduction schemes are mainly BPL oriented, there are hardly any schemes, which is specifically designed for the APLs.

While talking about poverty eradication we cannot neglect hunger and malnutrition that are the expected consequences of poverty. Food is the primary concern of every living creature and poverty makes people unable to access adequate and nutrient food. Where people are eating grass chapattis, where the grass chapatti is also a happy meal, in that country is it worth to say that India is running biggest number of food schemes in world. Poverty leads all kind of social-economic-cultural evils, migration from rural to urban areas, spread of slums in cities, increasing crime rate, child Labor all are the consequences of poverty. Hence, a composite approach is needed to tackle the poverty issue.

Here one more thing I would like to mention, we are tending to talk about a complete alleviation of poverty. But is it possible? Until some kind of economic system exist on this earth, until unless, someone is selling, another is buying, some are more intelligent then others and some are not even average ones, the difference between rich and poor will continue. A total alleviation is a kind of utopia, which cannot be obtain, any welfare government, social or communist state can not claim that it has fully alleviate poverty from its territory. The social security net schemes, poverty and unemployment allowances can only provide some relief and cover against complete starvation or living under inhuman conditions, but those can not be a long term solution neither they are intend to do so nor they could do it. With a limited availability of economic resources, no government can bare the burden of highly subsidized schemes for infinite time.

So what can be done to solve this puzzle? As I mentioned above, capacity building is the key word. Government should aim to make people self depend and not on government allowances. The micro finance, skill training, creating durable assets such as, watershed on farms, land conservation and providing aggro equipments or craft equipments on easy conditions etc. and legal entitles say land rights, wage rights, ration cards, voter ID cards and the recent UID numbers etc. to the poor people. While talking about easy loans and credits we should not forget that spread of banking services in rural areas is a precondition for this purpose. It has seen that many times banks do not have cover the whole district, they try to limit themselves towards the block level or in townships, far and remote village are not covered by any banks. That makes banking services costly for a common villager.

But the main issue is corruption. Everyday we read the news of frauds, malfunctioning in several welfare schemes, from higher-level administration to local authorities, no one is spared from this evil. However, it is not possible to eliminate corruption, because it lies in human nature, but it could be control over to some extant, smart card technology, UId card, effective execution of E-governance, and more active role of civil society organizations. Last week central government announced a biometric smart card base TPDS pilot project in Hariyana and Chandigadh, which will certainly help to minimize the misconducts and malfunctioning in the poverty reduction schemes

Besides, one more thing to be kept in mind that India is a large country, a single policy or scheme cannot be universally implement in whole country. A flexibility and variation according to geographic and economic diversity is necessary.

Poverty in India An Unsolved Puzzle : Part 1

At the time of independence over 47% of our population was under the below poverty line (BPL). After sixty-four years of experience with a range of schemes for poverty alleviation including the two phases of economic reforms and nearly a double-digit growth rate of the GDP for the past about a decade, we are still the second poorest nation of the Asia. As per the Planning Commission’s latest estimates, the official figure of poverty is 28.3%. This official rate is much lower than the various national and international findings.

It has been termed as official rate of poverty, as there has been no consensus on the enumeration technique, methodology and the percentage of people to be under the poverty category in our population. However, before we study those different data and various opinions about poverty and poor people, we should know what poverty is. Poverty is a condition where a person is unable to maintain a healthy physical and mental standard of life. In other words, it is a situation where people are compelled to live under sub- human conditions that are obviously not chosen by them.

The reasons behind poverty are many. The long colonial rule sucked our economic resources and stifled economic development. The social stratification has forced the people to live at the lower strata of the society. Thus, depriving them access to educational and economic opportunities. Moreover, the large size of population demands lots of economic resources to provide for a healthy and productive life. Consequently, it has been a big handicap in our efforts to eradicate poverty. The trickle- down theory of planning era too did not help much to reduce poverty, because it did not bring equal development across the country. Many geographic regions, economic and social groups remain untouched by the wave of development. Despite the two decades of economic reforms, the fruits of progress and prosperity have not been evenly distributed; the differences between rural and urban, upper and lower class and other socio-economic gaps have remained unaltered. However, it would not be fair to say that so far no progress has been achieved on the poverty reduction front. With the spread of literacy, public distribution system (PDS), and welfare programs for the empowerment of women and other weaker sections, a noticeable reduction has been witnessed in the number of poor.

There are different methods to measure poverty and to estimate the number of poor people in the total population. The World Bank and various international agencies use the PPP based assessment of monthly consumption expenditure. The PPP method convert the local currency into an internationally accepted currency, say dollar, to calculate the expense on essentialtial commodities. The calorie intake method, is used by the Planning Commission of India, and the Asian poverty line has been used by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

In India, poverty is measured by per day calorie intake of a person that is 2100 calorie in urban areas and 2400 calorie in rural areas. The 28.3% poverty rate estimated in 2004-2005 is based on the survey of NSSO with the criterion of monthly expenditure of below Rs.356.35, in rural areas and Rs. 538.60 in urban areas. Based on which over 300million people in India are under the BPL. For the same year, the WB estimated poverty at 41.6% taking 1.25$ dollar income per day. The Asian Development Bank went even further, estimating it at 54.8% using the 1.35$ per day income, which bring 622 million people under poverty line.

While analyzing the above data, one obvious question comes to mind that why there is so much of difference between India’s official poverty rate and figures from other international agencies. This is because, our poverty line indicates a mere existence of life expressed through one’s capability to spend on food. This implies minimum amount a person needs to buy food for his living (that is Rs.12 in rural areas and Rs.19 in urban areas). It does not include other necessities of life such as, pure drinking water, health and sanitation, cloth, education etc.

The Tendulkar committee appointed by the Planning Commission has included various indicators to measure poverty. The committee has estimated 37.2% people under the poverty line. It has recommended to do away with the practice of using different criteria for rural and urban India. This will help in using a uniform definition of poverty for the entire nation. However, it did not make any revolutionary changes in the Planning Commission’s estimates, and has only increased per day expenditure from Rs.12 to Rs.15 in rural area and did not make any changes in urban expenditure. However, this minor increment in consumption expenditure has increased the rural poverty to 42% from 28% bringing nearly ten crore people under the line of poverty.

Moreover, these estimates do not present the complete picture because they are based on 2004-05 prices. In addition, in last couple of years inflation has entered into double-digit, especially in food items. This has affected rural and urban people equally. Therefore, the criterion of the Planning Commission and NSSO of minimum monthly expenditure per person per month is no more relevant. The Saxena committee has taken a lead in this regard and fixed the monthly expenditure at Rs.650 in rural areas and Rs.1000 in urban areas. This can be considered a bit satisfactory. But at the same time it has simply added 10.87 crore more people into the BPL category.

Hence, it is understandable that why poverty has become an unsolved puzzle in India. The official rate of poverty is set at a low level to hide the intensity of the issue. Besides, it does not recognize the minor differences between those so-called BPL and APL people. Because, it only includes the expenditure on food items and not the income that makes a man capable to access a healthy, productive and dignified life. Furthermore, such an incomplete definition and data used in planning and policy formulation has made the whole exercise inefficient and ineffective as it always remains far from the target of total eradication of poverty.

Rajasthan : Emerging as solar Energy Hub

Rajasthan has a huge potential of solar energy, the climatic conditions of state, makes it ideal for capturing the solar rays in abundance.

The climate of Rajasthan is arid and semi arid, the desert of Thar is spreaded on the 2/3rd part of state. These climatic specialties makes it able to receive almost 300-325 sunny days in a year and 6-6.4kwh/m2/day of sun radiation, which is second highest amount of sun radiation all over the world. The average temperature of western cities of Rajasthan like Jodhpur, Jaisalmer, Barmer, Bikaner and Churu is between 35-40 degree, and in summer, it used to reach above 45degree. The availability of solar energy in Rajasthan is 6 to 7KW/sqkm, that provide the potential of one lakh MW energy for commercial production capacity every year, out of which only 883 MW is currently being produced. Certainly, it is not a satisfactory situation; the potential of solar energy is not being fully exploited yet.

At present, India is depend on fossil fuel energy resourses for its 70% energy necessities, total installed energy capacity of India is 156909 MW, out of which 64% comes form thermal plants. Renewable resourses account only 10% share (13,242MW) and solar energy stands at a meager fraction of 9.84MW. (Source: Ministry of Energy)

What is Solar Energy

Solar energy can be generated through two methods, solar thermal power plants and solar photovoltaic cells. The solar thermal power plants used mainly for MW level energy projects and SPVs are meant for small KW scale projects. The solar rays contains photons, when these photons fell upon SPVs, it start an action of absorbing photons and producing voltage, that meant to store in those cells as energy packets.

The government of India has launched, The Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNSM) on fifth march 2010, with the target of 20,000 MW energy installation capacities until 2020. The mission has a special focus on Rajasthan, which aims to make Rajasthan, a solar hub. The 11solar energy projects of 66MW capacity of state government will be included in the first phase (2009-13) of JNSM. The first phase is aimed to establish the solar energy units’ of1000MW capacity. The state government of Rajasthan has already marked-up 20,000-hactyar land for solar energy projects in above-mentioned cities.

Previous Initiatives in Solar Energy Field in Rajasthan

Solar energy industry is still in its initial stage. However, the government of Rajasthan is encouraging private sector investment through various fiscal and promotional incentives these incentives given for both solar thermal and SPV projects. The state government has made a project to develop Jodhpur, Jaisalmer and Barmer as Solar Energy Enterprises Zone (SEEZ). The Mathania solar power project (140MW) is a milestone in this field, as it is the first solar/thermal hybrid power plant of country. This project is based on integrated solar combined cycle (ISCC) technology, it will use parabolic trough mirrors to focus sun heat and further drive the turbine to generate power. This plant will produce 40MW energy, which will cost 1 million/MW and still cheaper then other methods like SPV. Besides these steps, few more small solar power based projects are working successfully, such as, 100KW capacity power plant in Gourir ( jhunjhunu), which is first of its kind in country, a solar energy driven refrigerator in Balesar (Jodhpur), state’s first totally solar energy electrified village in Jaipur etc.

In private sector, many companies are taking interest in solar energy. Reliance and Moser Bear both are developing solar power plants of 1 to 5 MW each. In which Moser Bear’s project will be the largest grid connected solar farm in India. The Rajasthan government has signed a memorandum with Clinton foundation on january2010. According to which the foundation will provide technical assistance and other necessary help to establish solar parks of 3,000 MW to 5,000 MW capacities in the state.



Centre of Excellence in Solar Energy

IIT-Jodhpur would be developed as the centre of excellence for the R&D purpose in solar energy and renewable energy field. The major area of research will be focused on storage of renewable energy, to minimize its cost, problems in grid interface, transition and up gradation etc. IIT will work with the collaboration of the government of France; its campus will be a green campus to promote awareness about environment and its conservation. In this context, it will set an example about the commercial capability of solar energy for various usages.

Under the JNSM, the central government has decided to start a project, named “Rooftop PV and small scale generation program”, that is intended to create awareness about solar energy among the common people and to let the investors know about its commercial possibilities. This project is in first phase of JNSM, under which small SPV based solar energy plants of maximum 20MW capacity will be setup in every state. In rajasthan, these plants will carry one to three MW power capacities and the state government has already marked up the land of 10 acre each in various cities, including SEEZ. Here one more fact is in favor of Rajasthan, as there is ample of barren land is available, which can be easily used to construct the power plants, this would not only raise employment opportunities in state, but will also attract the private investment and trade.

The central government has made a target of 100 MW power generations in the first phase of JNSM and according to speculations; half of that (500MW) can be produced in Rajasthan.

Draw backs of solar energy

The overall picture raises lofty hopes for the future of solar energy, but still there are many set back on the way towards green and clean energy.

Primarily problem is high cost, installation cost of a solar thermal power plant is two to 3 times higher then the traditional thermal plants.

Cost of per unit energy production is also higher then conventional energy production. Another issue is the lack of awareness about solar energy, its uses, viability and reliability. Solar energy cannot be produced in daytime, so it raises questions in a common person’s mind about its all time availability. Solar heaters, solar cookers and other solar equipments still costlier and quite complicated in use then conventional equipments, these tings used to keep the common away from solar energy. Solar equipments, such as cookers, water heater and solar panels used to occupy a lots of space, which is not suitable according to modern housing where space shortage is already a huge problem.

However, above issue are not such problematic that could not be solved. The JNNSM has a special attention on cost efficiency issue. the GOI is working on a roadmap to bring down import duty and custom duty exemption on capital equipments and other materials, low interest loan for solar plant installation etc. apart from these initiatives, some kind of subsidies or incentives can also be given to the consumers to encourage them. We can hope that these steps will help to promote the use of solar energy and make it consumer friendly.

The Flourishing World of Social Networking Sites

Twitter, Facebook, Orkut, My space blogger, wordpress etc, and many such names has become a part of our life. Those are called internet based social networking sites. Chatting, scraping and messaging on those sites is a part of daily schedule for many of us. Its craze and addiction could be understood from this fact that Shashi Tharoor got a name of twitter minister and finally lost his post in ministry of external affairs due to his frequent expressions of personal views on twitter about government policy matters. Craze of social network sites is not limited towards only young generation; the oldies are also liking to be a part of this new socio-techno phenomenon. Social network sites has provided a new sphere to express our selves, to meet with people across the globe and to transmit our thoughts and views. Off course, it is all limited towards only cyber space; still it has a huge impact on our life.

The celebrities and famous personalities are also finding it a very effective and easy way to communicate with their fans all over the world. Every day a new celebrity, from politics to bollywood, sports persons and many other public figures are joining twitter, Facebook etc. Shahrukh Khan posted his tweets at every half an hour during the release of his new film, “my name is khan”. But at the same time, complaints of fake celeb accounts of celebrities specially female celebrities is increasing, hacking of their accounts and steeling of their personal information has become a common trouble, Anushka shankar’s case when her photographs were stolen from her PC is a genuine example of such incidents. However, such incidents or uncomfortable acts do not stop people to use social networking sites.

Every day we are sharing lots of information about our personal, professional and social life through our profile statements, games, applications and pictures. Important events of our life, things happening in day-to-day life and what we are thinking at a specific moment of time; every thing we are sharing on the virtual world. Without thinking a moment that such information,  we are providing in small-small pieces can become a huge source of information or can be used to make our whole public and private profile in real world as well. It is a kind of stage where everyone has something to say, where everyone wants to express him/herself, without caring of the fact that whether there is someone who is listening or not? Everyone wants to speak more and more, wants to share more and more of his/her life.

These sites have created a virtual identity or say, it is very easy to make fake profiles on those sites. Fake names, fake occupations, profiles pictures of whatever we like, can be added. No one will come to us to ask or verify about that information. E.G. if a girl see a man some where in market or on road, she may not like to talk him or even do not bother to give him a look, but if she receives a friend request on Facebook or Orkut with a nice profile photo and some interesting information given on profile, she could easily add him in her friends network. The same thing can be told about the male users, who merely care about whom they are adding in their friend network, no matter if later on, any of that profile with a fake female name proved a hacker, and the victim has to pay the cost. Recently a couple of friends of mine faced same situation, they added female profiles as friend who not only hacked their account but also filled their profile with a lots of vulgar and obscene stuff and the worst sent such content to their friends also. When I asked them, why you added such profile that is already containing some objectionable stuff? The answer I got “well…men are always men”. It shows the carelessness of people, a negligence, it happens or let it be kind of tendency. Because people take it as a source of entertainment, a time pass where they can full fill their hidden desires without much risk. Because once you signed out from your account and shut down the PC, whole game is ended there, at least for a while it seems to be ended up.

Nevertheless, in spite of such incidents the popularity of social networking is increasing at a faster pace. People, who are not on these sites, considered as old fashioned by those who are actively participating on these sites. At the other side, many people consider these sites as useless and a total wastage of time and energy. So there are mixed opinion about these sites. However, what makes these sites so popular that people cannot imagine their life without login and logout?

It is because here is a wide platform that is not bounded by any strict laws, rules and regulations, a complete freedom of speech and expression. Say what ever you like, do whatever you want. Be a part of various political and social activities such as being supporter of saving girl child campaign, saving tiger campaign, join Indian army and so on… all at a click of mouse. These sites give us a feeling of individualism. It fulfills our hunger of separate identity…a space of my own. Even the friendship on Facebook and Orkut is not so instant, continuous messaging, chatting creates a kind of attachment and bonding among the unknown people, whom we never met in real life but would certainly like to meet and communicate further. It is the charm of these sites that always attract us to use them and to become a part of this virtual world, some times with a real identity and some times with a fake identity.

Right to Food Draft Bill : Some Concerns

“We gave our people Right to Know , we gave our people Right to work , we gave our people Right to education & now we are going to give our people Right to food “.

Above lines are the part of the budget speech of finance minister Pranab mukherjee on Right to food draft bill. An empowered group of ministers, headed by mukherjee, prepares the draft bill.

A universal food security is one of the congress party’s election manifesto2009 promises. Which particularly address the most deprived & marginalized section of society & promise for 25 k.g. food grains per month at Rs.3 for BPL. However, the bill still has to get clearance of parliament & will take further more time to be implemented. But the right of food indirectly comes under article 21 of our constitution, where Supreme Court has regarded it an essential necessity for a dignified human life. Let us look at the provisions of this proposed bill.

The draft bill guarantees a legal security against hunger by providing 25 k.g. food grains per month at Rs.3 per k.g. to the BPL families. The BPL families will be identify as per the norms of planning commission . The central government will supply food grains to state government through the central pool . The bill has provisions of food security allowance that will be given in case of not availability of food grains to the beneficiaries. It is a kind of cash subsidy for poor people .The bill have an exclusive provision of establishing food tribunals at taluka & district level & an apex food security tribunal for the adjudication of violation or malfunctioning of the bill. Certainly, this is a very useful provision, which will help to fight with corruption that has become a comman feature in government food schemes in most states.

Here a significant question arises, that what is food security? Food security means a social, economic & physical capability & access of a person towards necessary & adequate food In that context this bill could be seen as a positive vision against poverty & hunger . specially when India stand at 65th rank in global hunger index 2009 , which is merely better then Bangladesh & worse then Sudan & Nigeria . The percentage of underweight children below 5 years is 42.5 in India .

But still the drat bill is totally rejected by the activist of right for food campaign & regarded as anti –poor by left parties & faced a huge criticism from various organizations of civil society . So let’s examine some important features of the proposed bill.

The first objection on the bill is, that it does not talk about universal food security, instead of that its focused only on BPL families . Therefore, in one sense it is like any other government scheme for poors not a particular right, like right to information, right to work or education. As national council for applied economic research has already pointed out that inclusion of non –poors in subsidized food schemes is a much severe task.
The second issue is the identification of beneficiaries or the BPL people. The bill for this purpose depends on planning commission data. However, there are different data is available on BPL population. . The data released by planning commission in 2004-05 was 30 core, the saxena committee estimated 9.5 crore & DP wadhwa committee estimate is 20 crore.
The problem of different data of BPL population lies in definition of poverty line. Which is defined as calorie intake of per person. ( that is 2100 cal for urban India & 2400 cal in rural India). As Abhijit Sen, member of planning commission indicated , that if above definition taken then 80% of rural India & 64% urban India will come under poverty line. Tendulkar committee covered 38% of population under poverty line

In short, the poverty measurement should be based on income rather then calorie intake.

The another concern is about the quantity of food grains. At present, 35 k.g. food grains are being distributed under Antyoday Ann Yozna , at Rs. 2 per k.g. the Supreme Court also mandated 35 k.g. food grains as the essential requirement for food security , in its decision on Right to food PIL . Therefore, in one sense, whatever the bill is giving is lesser then, what is already been given.

The provision of cash subsidy is also not much attractive one. Because since last couple of years India has seen a sever inflation or rapid prise rise in food items. In case of hyperinflation, how much the fixed amount of subsidy could help is doubtful. Then the distribution of cash subsidy is the responsibility of state governments. Here the effective execution of law would be very much depend on the food tribunals that will be setup on taluka & district level In India , we have largest number of food base schemes in world , at one side our grain stock is rising ( in 2008-09 we had record production of grains 228 million approx.)
But at the other side half of the undernourished person(252 million) are in our country. Obviously, we need to get rid of this situation.

Right to food if executed well, then can add another landmark achievement for UPA 2nd term government. As NAREGS did for UPA 1st term government. It will make our democratic structure more equitable, more right base & more just. However, it need to meet with above concerns. The exclusion of APLs from security net is another concerned issue. the policy maker should keep this in mind that food security just do not limit only to a mare economic access of food , but it should make the lives of our people dignified , productive & healthy.