Deprivation and disparities: Poverty

Could India's mock war on poverty ever turn real?

India became independent 63 years ago. Since Independence the country has implemented 10 Five Year Plans and a few Annual Plans. Currently the 11th Plan is being executed. Efforts made during the last six decades have resulted in the modernisation of a stagnant economy and India's emergence as a major industrial power. This period also witnessed remarkable progress in agricultural production.

But India has failed miserably in its efforts to alleviate poverty and create a more equal society. The Arjun Sengupta Committee concluded that some 77 per cent of Indians live on less than Rs.20 a day. According to the Global Hunger Index compiled by the International Food Policy Research Institute, India ranks 67 among 88 developing countries. In the course of economic growth the disparities have widened. The hope held out by the distinguished economist Simon Kuznets decades ago that economic growth under enlightened capitalism would have a favourable impact on income distribution has not materialised in India's case. It is high time India introduced effective measures to abolish extreme forms of deprivation, reduce gross disparities and provide a level playing field to the wretched of the land.

Mock war

In the first two decades of planning it was hoped that the implementation of land reform measures would transform the agrarian structure, release the productive energies of the long-suffering peasantry and usher in an egalitarian social order. Primarily because of the absence of political will, land reform failed to achieve the objectives set out in the Five Year Plans. The experience of the East Asian countries in the post-Second World War period demonstrated that land reform could indeed play a significant role in reducing rural poverty. The extent of redistribution was 43 per cent in the People's Republic of China, 37 per cent in Taiwan, 33 per cent in Japan and 32 per cent in South Korea. Against these, the extent of redistribution in India was a negligible six per cent.

As part of the Second Five Year Plan, India launched a well-thought-out Community Development Programme aimed at the all-round development of villages. It laid emphasis on agricultural extension, minor irrigation, education, comprehensive health care and other developmental activities. After making steady progress for a while the programme collapsed because of the failure to induct suitable personnel and owing to thoughtless mismanagement. To cite one instance, the Chief Minister of a major State in his wisdom, or rather the lack of it, passed an order allowing each MLA to seek the transfer of two Block Development Officers. In course of time, the Community Development Programme collapsed.

After the historic split in the Congress in the late-1960s, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi came out with the catchy slogan of “Garibi Hatao.” In the war on poverty, emphasis was laid on revising land reform laws and implementing them efficiently. Simultaneously, a number of other schemes were launched with fanfare. From a vantage point as the Central Land Reforms Commissioner during the 1970s, this writer had an insider's view of the phoney war on poverty. It was really an exercise in hypocrisy aimed at bamboozling the people. Though several token efforts were made, there was no significant reduction in poverty.

The framers of the Sixth Plan correctly identified three cardinal failures of Indian planning. These were: the failure to achieve full employment, the failure to eradicate poverty and the failure to create a more equal society. Then the planners proceeded to spell out a strategy for the drastic reduction of poverty. The essential elements of that strategy were enlarged employment opportunities in industry and agriculture, a minimum-needs programme aimed to improve the living conditions of the poor and a few measures aimed to reduce disparities in income and wealth. After a detailed analysis of the proposals in the draft plan, I came to the conclusion that the Sixth Plan was not likely to make a dent on poverty in India. That critique was published in Kurukshetra on May 1, 1979. As expected, the measures suggested to solve the problem proved to be inadequate. With the liberalisation of the economy in the mid-1990s there has, of course, been a marked increase in the annual rate of growth of GDP but without any impact on the incidence of poverty. If anything, economic disparities have widened.

11th Plan initiatives

In the context of the political conditions prevailing in India, it is unrealistic to expect any radical measures being adopted. The only feasible approach is to augment employment opportunities, provide easy access to quality school education and healthcare, and operate a universal public distribution system guaranteeing monthly supply of foodgrains at subsidised prices to the poor. And this is what the recent initiatives offer.

Here, a word of caution will be in order. The government often speaks with a forked tongue. Among those who operate the levers of power, there are many who subscribe to the Washington Consensus and neoliberal shibboleths that constitute an antagonistic contradiction to the Indian Constitution, particularly the noble sentiments enshrined in the Preamble and Part IV on Directive Principles of State Policy.

Consider the Prime Minister's announcement regarding the opening of 6,000 Navodaya-type schools. Without losing time the Planning Commission announced that 3,500 of them would be in the public sector and 2,500 in the private sector — without bothering to note that in recent years school education has become a commercial activity. It should be squarely the responsibility of governments at the Central, State and lower levels to provide schooling to the poor. Similarly, in healthcare there is the mistaken emphasis on providing health insurance for the poor. These insidious attempts have to be identified and nipped in the bud to ensure that the governance of this country is in accordance with the Constitution.

The three new measures capable of making a dent on poverty are the NREGA (now rechristened MGNREGA), the Right to Education Act and the proposed right to food legislation. If some glaring inadequacies in these schemes are rectified and they are properly implemented, the poor will get considerable relief. In an article published in The Hindu on September 15, 2009, I made certain suggestions to improve access to the disadvantaged sections of the population to quality school education. In an article published on October 14, 2009, I made suggestions to expand and re-orient the NREGA. Regarding the recent recommendation of the National Advisory Committee on the Food Security Bill, I support the suggestion made in an editorial in The Hindu (October 26, 2010) that the Bill should provide for universal entitlement to cereals and other components of a food basket. Recast on these lines, the three legal guarantees could turn out to be a veritable Magna Carta for the poor.

It is difficult to answer the question whether the phoney war would ever turn real. If the laws are suitably modified and efficiently implemented, it may become possible to make a dent on India's abysmal poverty. But considering that India's administration has become dysfunctional, the panchayati raj system is a shambles, pervasive corruption is eating into the country's vitals, and governance has evaporated, there is not much room for optimism.

Writing about conditions in France on the eve of the Revolution, Hilaire Belloc famously observed: “Government is a thing that guides, and if need be, compels. Visible in France there is not such a thing.” Regrettably, India is heading towards that kind of situation.

(P.S. Appu is a former Chief Secretary of Bihar and a former Director of the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration in Mussoorie. He can be reached at psappu@hotmail.com)

Eleventh Plan and health care

The Eleventh Plan, whose central theme is ‘Inclusive Growth,’ has substantially stepped up the allocation for health. The public health care system in many States is in [a] shambles. Extreme inequalities and disparities persist both in terms of access to health care as well as health outcome, bemoans the Plan document.

The role of health care in economic development has received increasing attention in recent years. There is a general agreement that economic growth is not merely a function of incremental capital-output ratio. Investment in man -- enhanced allocation for education, imparting skills and health care -- plays a significant role in fostering economic growth. It is, therefore, in the fitness of things that the Eleventh Five-Year Plan, whose central theme is ‘Inclusive Growth,’ has substantially stepped up the allocation for health. The Plan document presents a well-conceived, comprehensive programme for the sector. According to the Prime Minister, the aim is to provide broad-based health care in rural areas through the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM).

Health care in a shambles

While the proposed structure for providing health care is adequate and commendable, what is in place at present is thoroughly disappointing. The Plan document itself bemoans: “The public health care system in many States is in [a] shambles. Extreme inequalities and disparities persist both in terms of access to health care as well as health outcome.” (The Eleventh Plan: Vol. II, page 61, para 3.1.16.) The Plan deplores the critical shortage of health personnel, particularly doctors and nurses, poor working conditions and inadequate incentives, and the low utilisation of the meagre facilities in government hospitals. Government hospitals at all levels present a picture of neglect and decline.

I shall deal with two major problems: shortage of doctors for rural service; and the desperate state of medical education.

Health care after independence

Before independence, medical facilities in rural India were rudimentary. The Community Development Block pattern of rural development launched in the 1950s was the harbinger of modern health care in rural areas. According to the approved model, every block was to have a Primary Health Centre (PHC) with 10 beds at the block headquarters and three sub-centres at carefully selected locations. The sanctioned staff for a PHC consisted of two doctors, one Lady Health Visitor and two Sanitary Inspectors. One post of Auxiliary Health Worker and two posts of Auxiliary Nurse-Midwives were sanctioned for each sub-centre. A doctor was required to visit each sub-centre twice a week. I was the Collector of Darbhanga in north Bihar from mid-1958 to the end of 1960. During my tenure, out of the 44 blocks sanctioned for the district, only 37 had become operational. Some 25 blocks had one doctor each and the rest none. Most posts of Lady Health Visitors and Auxiliary Nurse Midwives were vacant.

As chance would have it, I became Bihar’s Health Secretary in July 1962 and stayed on in the post for nearly five years. The total number of blocks in Bihar was about 600. In spite of my best efforts, very few blocks had the full complement of doctors and paramedical staff. During the severe drought of 1965-66, it was only by resorting to draconian measures that we could ensure that all blocks had at least one doctor. Most doctors had an urban background and were reluctant to go to rural areas lacking in modern amenities. There has been no significant improvement in the situation during the last four decades. According to the data given in the Eleventh Plan, there is a shortage of 5,801 doctors in PHCs and a shortfall of 4,681 specialists in Community Health Centres (CHCs).

The Eleventh Plan presents a well thought-out and comprehensive structure for health care in rural areas. The important features of the set-up are:

— 1.75 lakh sub-centres each with two Auxiliary Nurse Midwives at one sub-centre for each panchayat (five or six villages).

— 30,000 PHCs at one for a group of four or five sub-centres. Each PHC will have one Lady Health Visitor and three staff nurses. There will also be an AYUSH physician. (AYUSH is acronym for Ayurveda, Yoga and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy).

— 6500 CHCs each with 30-50 beds. The staff will include seven specialists and nine staff nurses.

— 1800 taluk or sub-divisional hospitals and 600 district hospitals will be fully equipped to provide quality health service.

When this structure is in position, and if it functions reasonably well, we can expect a significant improvement in the quality of medical care in rural India. There will, of course, be an enormous increase in the number of medical graduates, postgraduates and nurses needed to operate the system. The baffling question is how to find the number of personnel needed to fill the vacancies and new posts.

It should be possible to recruit adequate number of doctors and persuade them to stay in the field if the three suggestions given below are adopted and strictly enforced.

— After internship, every medical graduate should be required to work for a minimum of two years in rural areas before he is granted the MBBS degree.

— Only those who have completed three years of rural service should be admitted to any postgraduate course, including the Diplomate of the National Board.

— Every postgraduate student should serve for one year as a specialist in a CHC or sub-divisional hospital before he is awarded the degree or a diploma.

These proposals are not entirely new. Assam has already made rural service compulsory for medical graduates. Some medical colleges have been encouraging fresh graduates to opt for rural service for short periods. The implementation of the proposals, of course, calls for resolute political will. The rationale for making these seemingly harsh suggestions is this. Despite the recent increase in fee, medical education is heavily subsidised by the state. It is manifestly just and fair to stipulate that those who receive medical education should serve the rural society for a short period. Incidentally, the young graduates will benefit a great deal by getting an opportunity to improve their clinical skill. There should, of course, be substantial improvement in the salary of doctors and the amenities available to them.

Shameful state

The proliferation of sub-standard, under-staffed and ill-equipped private medical colleges in recent years is an unmitigated menace. A few institutions like the CMC, Vellore; St. John’s, Bangalore; and the Kasturba Medical College, Manipal, are among the country’s best. But many private colleges lack basic facilities and are run as profit centres for garnering huge amounts as capitation fee. I hear that the present capitation fee for an MBBS seat is Rs. 35 lakh-50 lakh and for a postgraduate seat above Rs.60 lakh. For a discipline like Radiology, the amount could exceed Rs. 1 crore!

Some 15 years ago, a relative of mine had to pay only Rs. 2 lakh through a bank draft and Rs. 2 lakh in cash to get his son admitted to a postgraduate course. The Indian Medical Council has laid down arduous norms in respect of faculty, hospital beds, equipment and so on. Apparently, there is some laxity in the enforcement of the norms. I have heard that while a well-equipped college may run into difficulties, substandard institutions manage to pass muster. I have also heard of cases in which retired teachers and other doctors with postgraduate qualification are shown as visiting faculty for short periods during an inspection by Medical Council teams. No civilised country, not even a soft state like India, can allow such a scandalous state of affairs to continue. It is time the government took resolute action to stem the rot.

Some reservations

The Prime Minister in the Foreword and the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission in the Preface have highlighted the positive role the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana will play in providing health care to the population below the poverty line. I have serious doubts about the benefits that will actually accrue to the rural poor from health insurance and the option to go to private hospitals. As I have not personally observed the working of the scheme, I would leave it to experts familiar with field conditions to evaluate the Yojana.

Another controversial matter is Public Private Partnership (PPP) in providing health care. I do not share the optimism expressed in the Plan document about the role of private institutions in providing health care in rural India. Nor do I agree with the Commission’s enthusiasm about the role of corporate health care and the benefits flowing from the expansion of medical tourism. These issues deserve to be dealt with by more knowledgeable persons.

I shall conclude reiterating that health care in rural India and school education throughout the country should squarely be the concern of the government. Private initiative can certainly supplement the government’s efforts in these fields, but that will benefit only the affluent.

(P.S. Appu is a former Chief Secretary of Bihar and former Director of the Lal Bahadur Shastri National Academy of Administration, Mussoorie. He can be reached at: psappu@hotmail.com)

Expand and re-orient NREGA

The recession is a promising moment to expand NREGA with greater emphasis on building social capital in a big way.

Soon after assuming office, the first UPA government took an impressive step for the alleviation of rural poverty by launching the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. It was, indeed, a wise move to insulate the programme from the vicissitudes of electoral politics by enacting the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). The implementation of the programme has been uneven. A large number of articles have appeared in the press pointing out the defects in implementation. On September 19, The Hindu published an article by Professor Jean Drèze, “Employment guarantee or slave labour?” It reveals a sorry state of affairs. Every effort should be made to remove the shortcomings and ensure better implementation. Despite all its failings, the NREGA has proved to be a boon to the rural poor. It is now necessary to expand and re-orient the NREGA. That is the theme of this article.

The NREGA evolved into its present shape by building on past experience in designing and executing schemes for providing employment. The new programme is an improvement on its predecessors. There is greater flexibility and the implementing agencies have freedom to start new works according to necessity. Though the main emphasis is on providing employment, the law also aims at the creation of durable productive assets. The present recession is a promising moment to expand the programme with greater emphasis on the second objective of building social capital in a big way.

Great scope for building social capital on a massive scale. More than half a century ago, Ragnar Nurkse, the distinguished Cambridge economist, had pointed out that capital starved over-populated countries could build social capital in a big way by employing the surplus labour on a variety of projects. He had listed schemes concerning irrigation, drainage, roads, railways, housing, etc. In his view, the only danger was the onset of inflation caused by the increased demand for food and other wage goods. Though the Indian planners were aware of Nurkse’s prescription, they could not have implemented the idea in the pre-Green Revolution era of precarious food supply. Now we have ample stocks of food grains. And our industry will welcome the enhanced demand for consumer goods. We can, therefore, employ the surplus labour for building social capital in a big way without incurring any risk.

National Rural Development Board. There is considerable scope for absorbing vast quantities of human labour in well planned projects of soil and water conservation, rain water harvesting, irrigation and drainage works, flood control, watershed development, de-silting and maintenance of numerous water bodies, both manmade and natural, and an ambitious programme of afforestation aimed at restoring green cover throughout the country. In that enormous programme, governments’ efforts should be supplemented by suitable NGOs, co-operative societies, joint stock companies and so on. The present ad hoc approach aimed at providing immediate employment should yield place to a systematic, well planned, well co-ordinated effort.

Such an ambitious programme would necessitate the setting up of a National Rural Development Board clothed with adequate statutory powers. It should be a lean organisation responsible for policy and overall guidance. Under the Board there should be a well staffed regional office for each major river basin to handle planning, formulation of projects, co-ordination between major watersheds, technical guidance and supervision, maintenance of the assets created and so on. The valley of a big river will naturally include a number of major watersheds. Every major watershed should have a small office for coordinating and supervising the work within that watershed. The Panchayati Raj set up should handle the work within the district. The expanded programme will generate employment on a large scale, both for skilled and unskilled hands. The afforestation project will absorb a large number of rural workers, many on a permanent basis.

Two basic suggestions for better implementation: The fatal weakness of NREGA is poor implementation. The main reasons for shoddy execution are the decline and degeneration of the administration at all levels, particularly at the block level, and the lukewarm, half-hearted approach to democratic decentralisation. As I am out of touch with field conditions, I am unable to present a comprehensive proposal for setting things right. However, as a Collector in North Bihar five decades ago I had closely observed the robust functioning of the block administration. In 1981-82, I had occasion to see the sorry state of the block set up in several States that I visited as Director of the National Academy. As far as the Panchayati Raj is concerned, I had the privilege of serving on the review committees set up by two States, Karnataka and Kerala. Relying on these slight exposures I have mustered the courage to make the following radical suggestions.

Induct Block Development Officers of a higher calibre. The responsibility of the BDO is so onerous that it should be held by an officer of a much higher calibre. I suggest that after the completion of their training, all IAS officers should serve as BDOs for at least three years. The implementation of this suggestion will provide only about 300 officers. The country would need some 6000 bright young men and women to work as BDOs.

I put forward three suggestions for getting the required number of officers. The annual recruitment to the All India and Central Services may be stepped up by 50 per cent. After six months’ training, the new recruits should serve as BDOs for two years. Thereafter the required number may be allotted to the different services on the basis of their performance, aptitude and choice. The rest may continue as BDOs. A two-year stint as BDO will prove to be an invaluable experience even for those joining the foreign service.

The second suggestion is that short term contracts may be offered to the products of IITs, Regional Engineering Colleges, national law schools and so on. They could be posted as BDOs after being trained for six months. At the end of the contract some may be absorbed in government service and the others may move on to jobs of their choice elsewhere. Companies in the public and private sectors may be persuaded to offer them suitable employment giving credit for their service in the Block.

A third possibility is to depute young officers from the State services and public sector banks to work as BDOs for fixed periods after a short orientation course. The matter, of course, calls for a more thorough consideration.

The District Officer to be the Chief Executive of the District Panchayat. Thoroughgoing democratic decentralisation is the only way in which this sprawling country of great diversity can be governed efficiently. The Seventy Third Amendment to the Constitution providing for the creation of panchayats at the district, intermediate and village levels was a giant step forward. The State governments have, however, been reluctant to empower the panchayats. Their approach has been half-hearted and lukewarm. Even so, in the larger public interest, the States should be persuaded to delegate adequate powers to the panchayats.

After considerable introspection, I have come to the conclusion that the District Officer, variously designated as Collector, Collector and District Magistrate, or Deputy Commissioner, should be the Chief Executive of the district panchayat. This single step will go a long way in strengthening the Panchayati Raj. The District Officer should, of course, have under him at least four senior officers to handle work relating to law and order, land revenue, development and Panchayati Raj. Initially there will be many hitches and irritants. A sub-clause should be added in Article 243-C of the Constitution spelling out the powers of the Chairperson and the Chief Executive.

Such a clear demarcation of powers and responsibilities will hopefully reduce friction and promote mutual respect, understanding and cooperation between the two functionaries. Furthermore, hand-picked officers of 10-12 years of service should be appointed District Officers and the Chairmen should be seasoned public persons. I hope that in due course, the relationship between the Chairperson and the Chief Executive will settle down to resemble that between the Chief Minister and the Chief Secretary. In the initial stages, however, the relationship could be like that between the non- executive chairman and the managing director of a large company. I know that this proposal is highly controversial. It will be opposed both by politicians and bureaucrats. However, in my considered view, this radical step will facilitate the better implementation of the re-oriented NREGA.

The massive effort in building social capital outlined in this essay could trigger higher productivity of land and labour, diversification of agriculture and faster industrial growth. It would also mitigate the suffering inflicted by chronic drought and flash floods.

What I have presented is not an action plan or a project report for reorienting NREGA. It is only the rough outline of a fond vision I have been nursing for a long time. I shall be happy if this article provokes purposeful discussion.

The road to inclusive growth: Education

Why the provision of a good school education is the key first step.

The twin goals of Indian economic planning have been rapid all-round economic growth and equitable sharing of the fruits of development. The country has made significant progress in realising the first objective. But the second goal has remained elusive. After six decades of planned economic development, the disparities have widened and some three-quarters of the population are mired in poverty. The world financial crisis offers an opportunity to make a course correction and advance towards inclusive growth.

It is generally agreed that the Keynesian prescription of stepping up public spending for the management of aggregate demand is the most potent weapon to fight a recession. The Indian government has already initiated action on the right lines by enhancing outlay on infrastructure, particularly on highways, power and other public works, the NREGA, supply of foodgrains to the poor at subsidised rates and so on. But more needs to be done. Here are some specific suggestions to help the disadvantaged by giving them access to quality school education.

The main reasons for India’s failure to achieve inclusive growth and distributive justice are the failure of land reform, the wrecking of the well-designed community development programme that aimed at the all-round development of the village, the lack of success in providing adequate employment opportunities at living wages to a rising population, the neglect of school education and the absence of special measures designed to help children of the poor to get a good school education.

Crux of the problem

The significant weakness of the Indian economy is the continued dependence of some 60 per cent of the workforce on low-productivity agriculture and allied occupations for employment and living. The efforts made since Independence have led to only a small decline in the percentage of the population dependent on agriculture. In that period, the share of agriculture in the gross domestic product declined by more than one half, resulting in great distress. Even if we achieve an annual growth of 10 per cent or 12 per cent in industry, there will be no substantial decrease in the dependence on agriculture.

Furthermore, it is high time we took note of the tectonic shift that has taken place in the nature of industrial employment. In the early stages of industrialisation, rural workers could migrate to the cities and seek employment in the textile mills of Bombay, Ahmedabad or Coimbatore, or the Tata Iron and Steel mill at Jamshedpur, for instance. That is no longer possible. The doors of modern industry will open only to those with good schooling and the relevant skills. This is equally true of the service sector which has grown fast in recent years. With the onset of the IT revolution it has become obligatory for new entrants to acquire even higher levels of skills. Hence it is a matter of urgency to provide adequate facilities for quality school education and impart relevant skills to the disadvantaged.

The policymakers who introduced reservation for the disadvantaged in institutions such as the Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian Institutes of Management without ever bothering to give them access to high-quality school education put the cart before the horse. What the politicians really did was to invite the disadvantaged to a veritable Barmicide’s feast! Only the so-called creamy layer benefit from reservation. The most effective affirmative action in the field of education would have been to provide adequate facilities for quality school education to children of the weaker sections.

In any purposeful programme to achieve inclusive growth, the pride of place should go to education, particularly quality school education. In this context, the Prime Minister’s announcement about opening 6,000 Navodaya-type schools is welcome. Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi took a laudable initiative by opening the Navodaya schools. Unfortunately those schools ended up catering to the elite. What is now needed is to reserve 50 per cent seats in existing and future Navodaya schools for children of the disadvantaged. This simple, inexpensive step will be a boon to the poor.

Expand and modernise facilities

Apart from opening schools, the working of existing government schools should be improved as a matter of priority. Some six decades ago, government schools were among the best institutions in the country. But today most of them are in bad shape. While there are numerous expensive private schools to cater to the needs of the affluent, the poor mostly depend on government schools.

Hence the need to improve the functioning of government schools without losing more time. There is also a need to expand and modernise teacher-training facilities. In order to attract better talent, it is necessary to improve the emoluments of teachers. A society that compensates clerks in government offices and banks more liberally than teachers cannot expect the talented to opt for teaching.

Opening of schools and improving the functioning of government schools will not automatically confer great benefits on the poor. Special steps are needed to enable students to make use of the facilities. The greatest handicap that poor children face is that at home they do not have an ambience conducive to the pursuit of studies. This drawback can be overcome to a large extent if they are lodged in hostels equipped with good tutors to guide them.

A new initiative

The establishment of schools and the improvement of government schools will take time. The provision of quality school education to children of the poor is crucial and we cannot afford to wait. A practical solution is to reserve seats in existing good schools and provide hostel accommodation and special tuition. It should be possible to reserve at least 10 per cent of seats in each class in all Central schools, Sainik schools and good government schools. Additionally, good private schools, including those run by Christian missionaries and others, should be persuaded to join the endeavour. The government should, of course, give the institution ample grants to cover capital and recurring expenditure. Each student should be given a scholarship sufficient to meet all legitimate expenses. Public schools such as the Doon School, the Rishi Valley School and so on, good missionary schools like St. Columba’s and Jesus and Mary in Delhi, and others like the Delhi Public School, should become a part of this.

There should be a caveat added here. Great care should be taken in selecting the schools. There is the danger of unsuitable institutions trying to gatecrash to avail themselves of the generous financial assistance. Recent years have witnessed a mushrooming of so-called English medium schools of poor quality started for commercial reasons. Such schools should be left out. In each State, a small committee consisting of knowledgeable persons of integrity should be set up to select the schools. If serious efforts are made it should be possible to admit at least one lakh poor students in good schools over the next few years. If successfully implemented, this may turn out to be the most effective affirmative action attempted so far.

Though we have succeeded in modernising the economy and the country has registered remarkable industrial and agricultural growth, we have failed to ensure that a fair share of the growth accrues to the poor. The present recession is an opportunity to reverse the trend and implement programmes aimed to achieve inclusive growth. Investment in school education should be stepped up in order to help the poor get quality schooling. The other areas that cry out for attention and enhanced allocations are an enlarged and revamped NREGA, public health and medical care, a reorganised public distribution system targeting the poor and augmented housing facilities for the poor, both urban and rural. There is also a dire need to revamp the delivery mechanism, making it more efficient and accountable.

All these measures will necessitate a substantial additional outlay pushing the fiscal deficit a little above the projected 6.8 per cent. Considering that these steps are needed to make a course correction and ensure inclusive growth, the risk is a justified one to take. A polity that incurs colossal wasteful expenditure on a bloated government machinery, some avoidable subsidies, the supply of free electricity to prosperous farmers, distribution of free colour television sets, the installation of statues of megalomaniac politicians and so on should not grudge a large outlay on projects targeted to benefit the weaker sections. If an amendment to the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act 2003 becomes necessary, the Government of India should amend it without hesitation.

(P.S. Appu is a former Central Land Reforms Commissioner and a former Chief Secretary of Bihar. He can be reached at psappu@hotmail.com)

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Learning from 3G Auction

The government may have taken inordinately long to actually auction 3G spectrum, but there’s little to doubt the success of the auction once it took place, both in terms of transparency of conduct and revenues raised for the exchequer. Now, according to a report in The Financial Express published on Monday, the government is keen to replicate the “clock auction” model used for 3G in the auctioning of a third set of FM radio licences. What is special about the clock auction model? For one, its operation is completely electronic and involves no human element. Unsurprisingly, therefore, it is more transparent than the conventional auction method where bidders hand their bids over in sealed envelopes; the possibility of human tampering in the latter system makes it more vulnerable to misuse.

Second, the clock auction method will yield more revenue for the government than a conventional auction. In a conventional auction, the bidders put in their bids once and the highest bid wins straight away. A clock auction is a long, continuous bidding process, where the auctioneer starts with a reserve price and continues to raise it upwards until the number of bidders (who name their price without knowing what other bidders are doing) are reduced to the exact number of slots available to be given out. The clock auction for 3G spectrum and broadband and wireless access earned the government Rs 1.06 lakh crore in revenue, three times the budget estimate of Rs 35,000 crore. The massive revenues have even made a significant dent on the fiscal deficit in the first five months of the year.

The stakes in the FM auction may not be as high as in 3G, but are significant nonetheless for a government that needs to trim its deficit down further. The government is planning to allocate 806 stations across 283 towns in this latest round. Obviously, there will be different bid categories, with the largest metro cities in the top tier likely to command the highest prices. Interestingly though, the ministry of information and broadcasting, which is responsible for handing out the FM licences, had earlier turned down the clock auction method in favour of a conventional auction. But the government, in the interest of maximising its own revenues, has fortunately succeeded in persuading the ministry to reverse its earlier stance.

Climate Change Management in Asia

Climate change management and environmental protection are the way forward in India's outreach plans for the subcontinent and beyond.

External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna shows his wry sense of humour every once in a while. Asked about seeming differences between him and Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh on dealing with China recently, he answered “Well, environment knows no boundaries and our Environment Ministry similarly transcends boundaries.”

Mr. Krishna may have meant the comment in a lighter vein, but what he said has serious, even exciting, possibilities for India, and must be looked at more closely by his own Ministry as it makes its moves in the subcontinental ‘great game'.

Last week, British consultancy Maplecroft listed India as second in the group of countries most at risk from climate change. Bangladesh came first, facing the loss of a large part of its coastal landmass to rising waters. Also prominent, apart from the African nations, were Nepal, Afghanistan and Myanmar, and a little further down the line, Pakistan. Maldives, though not studied for the list, is of course, at the top of the list of islands likely to disappear under water. In short, it is South Asia that will bear the brunt of climate change in the coming decades. While every study these days is received with a certain scepticism, the focus is really not on whether or not this is true but on whether India can turn its plans for climate management into a game-changer for subcontinental relations. To paraphrase Mr. Krishna, can environmental diplomacy transcend political boundaries and help India forge closer ties in the region?

At the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) summit in Thimphu, Bhutan, this year, South Asia nations agreed on a 16-point action plan, including measures like planting 10 million trees in the next five years and setting up inter-governmental marine, mountain and monsoon initiatives. Unfortunately, given the SAARC's track record of allowing subcontinental rivalries (primarily India-Pakistan) to overshadow their implementation of decisions, those initiatives are unlikely to see quick action. However, the urgency of the situation, particularly the prospect of thousands of ‘climate refugees' being forced out of their homes, requires India to lead the way as the subcontinent comes to grips with global warming.

Two recent projects may serve as role models — the first is an initiative to save the Sunderbans. Earlier this year, India and Bangladesh decided to set up the Sundarbans Eco-System Forum to protect the 10,000 sq.km of mangroves that span both countries. According to a study at Jadavpur University, global warming is causing the sea to rise 3.14 mm a year — far higher than the global average. The study, undertaken by oceanographers in 2009, estimated that about 10,000 inhabitants have already been forced out of their villages and 70,000 more would have their homes inundated in the next 30 years — not to mention the impact on the fast-disappearing Bengal tiger. While India and Bangladesh have spent much of this year ironing out their differences over terror groups, trade barriers and border fencing, they can and must take quicker strides on an issue like joint management of the mangroves before 75 per cent of them disappear, as is predicted by the university survey.

A similar concern led India to join hands with China and Nepal this year to agree on a framework, the Kailash Sacred Landscape initiative, to conserve the ecosystem of Mount Kailash. “India must see climate change management as a strategic investment,” says Mr. Jairam Ramesh, proposing a series of such engagements with other countries on our land and sea borders.

India has much to learn as well as impart to the SAARC region, whether it is about coastal zone management from Maldives or forestry management from Bhutan, a country whose Constitution mandates 60 per cent forest cover, and it actually manages about 70 per cent. On the other hand, Afghanistan could benefit from the Indian experience of managing the degradation caused by the plunder of its mining and mineral resources that is bound to follow any degree of peace and stability in that country, and Sri Lanka from Indian technologies on harnessing its wind energy of an estimated 20,000 MW.

The melting Siachen glacier is another border-transcending issue. After the devastating floods in Pakistan this year, there is much that India and Pakistan can share on managing river systems. In fact, in a year when dialogue on all other bilateral issues floundered, the discussions of the Indus Water Commission in the Pakistani Parliament this month shone by comparison. Water Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf acknowledged that India had addressed all Pakistan's concerns like the Nimmo Bazgo and Chutak hydel projects on the Indus and Uri-II on the Jhelum, even as the third dispute, over the Kishanganga project was headed for international arbitration. The message is clear. While talks break down frequently on terror and strategic issues, dialogue on environment can ‘flow' more naturally to a resolution. To that end, South Block must look at ways of collaborating on research, encourage scientist exchanges and build capacity for decades to come, opening new avenues of engagement with each of India's neighbours.

Climate change studies, though, are only part of the race against nature's anger at industrialisation — the future will quite clearly belong to countries and regions that are able to harness renewable energies best. It's disappointing that India, which practically pioneered solar technology, has lagged behind in that race. In the 1980s everyone who had access to Doordarshan heard of indigenous solar cookers and waterheaters. Today it is China that leads the world in manufacturing capacity of solar, wind and biogas energy, investing close to $35-billion in renewable energies last year, a figure that put it ahead of the U.S.

Interestingly, India does fairly well on the renewables index: according to the latest Ernst and Young survey, it ranked fourth behind China, the U.S. and Germany, though none of its South Asian neighbours figures anywhere in the top 25. In the past year while India has looked to spend more than $1 billion on infrastructure projects in Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Myanmar, it may well consider substantial investments in renewable energies in each of these countries.

Finally, environmental negotiations give India and China another opportunity to work on their otherwise tricky relationship. With every indication that this year's climate change conference in Mexico will again see an equally tough fight between the developed world and the developing world, India and China are once again working together on their strategy for 2010 — carrying the spirit of Copenhagen to Cancun, as it were. This despite all the bad blood over China's aggression on visa issues, and Indian ire over the border.

The changing environment offers India new avenues to forge ties within the neighbourhood and beyond, as it claims its position both as a subcontinental leader and Asian power. Perhaps the big push will come with the Environment and External Affairs Ministries working in tandem: because climate change, like terror, cyber warfare and other 21st Century threats to the world, knows no boundaries.

Japan India Relations: A strategic corrective

From a donor-recipient relationship centred on Overseas Development Assistance (ODA), India's trade and economic ties with Japan are set to embark on a new phase of wide-ranging bilateral cooperation. Last week, Prime Ministers Manmohan Singh and Naoto Kan concluded negotiations and exchanged documents in Tokyo on a bilateral Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement. The India-Japan Strategic and Global Partnership, launched in 2006 as part of India's ‘Look East' policy, prepared the ground for this. CEPA, once it comes into force in the first half of 2011 after ratification by the Japanese Diet, is expected to deepen mutual engagement in trade in goods and services, investment, technology, and cooperation. It will also open up new avenues. From the stage of cautious joint venture collaboration in Maruti Udyog in the 1980s, economic ties with Japanese companies have come a long way. Nevertheless, India's trade with the world's second largest economic and technological powerhouse has remained virtually stagnant over the past two decades. Japan is ranked tenth among India's export destinations and sixth among the country's major investors. Perhaps owing to a system of over-cautious decision-making, Japanese companies seemed to lose out to their South Korean counterparts in major sectors such as electronics and automobiles — areas in which Japan once dominated on a global scale.

CEPA should be seen as part of a strategic corrective aimed at strengthening the capabilities of both Asian giants, especially in the aftermath of the global financial crisis and the consequent slowdown and rise of protectionism in the west. India's success in the auto sector has shown that its manufacturing capabilities are up to world standards, as are the capabilities of its software and IT-enabled services. CEPA can help catalyse the advantages of Japanese technology and India's labour cost advantage to emerge as major partners in a slew of sectors such as auto, healthcare and drugs, apparel, farm products and allied machinery on top of increased trade in goods as a result of reduced tariffs on more than 8,000 products. The real stumbling block is India's lack of quality infrastructure across the country. Perhaps aware of this drawback, Japan has been channelling its ODA to development of infrastructure in a major way. Japanese investments already have a major share in the development of freight corridors, apart from Delhi Metro which is regarded as an unqualified success in urban transportation. Tokyo has wisely shown special interest in developing freight corridors in the southern States and building other infrastructure to exploit the hitherto untapped potential for cooperation.

India Japan China Relations

China is most important for India, Japan

The deepening relationship between India and Japan is driven by a combination of economic and strategic considerations. Japan, with its large but stagnating economy, is keen on the rapidly growing Indian economy. India, too, is interested in boosting trade with Japan and attracting investment. The recently concluded Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement sets the stage for closer economic relations. At the strategic level, New Delhi and Tokyo are concerned about China’s swagger and assertiveness on a range of bilateral and regional issues. For India, closer ties with Japan are not only important in their own terms but also provide strategic pay-offs with respect to China. At a minimum, it will indicate to China that India has an important role in the emerging Asian security landscape. This, in turn, will strengthen India’s hand in dealing with China on bilateral matters. Nevertheless, India should not overestimate the importance of that aspect. Nor should we underestimate the negative fallouts. Managing ties with China is the most important challenge for Indian foreign policy. While there are major outstanding disputes, there are important areas of cooperation —such as climate change. China is India’s largest trading partner. New Delhi is concerned about trade imbalances, but let us not forget that the volume of trade with China is nearly six times that of Japan. From a strategic standpoint, it would be unwise to convey an impression to China that our relationship with Japan is primarily directed against it. We have to cope with the rise of China without stoking its insecurity. Japan too has much at stake with China. Japan’s trade with China in 2009-10 was $232 billion compared with $10.3 billion with India. Tokyo also seeks Beijing’s cooperation in dealing with key security challenges in East Asia. For both India and Japan, then, their relationships with China will remain more important than their own bilateral ties.

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Indo-Japanese ties can keep China in check

For both India and Japan, China is a challenge as well as an opportunity. Challenge because China’s assertive posture does not augur well for peace and stability in Asia. China’s exclusive claim over the whole of the south China Sea and territorial disputes over Senkaku/Diaoyu islands makes the security environment in the East Asian region fragile. China’s military modernisation and enhancement of power projection capability cause considerable disquiet in that part of the world. Similarly, Chinese stance over Arunachal Pradesh, Tibet and the Dalai Lama issue are irritants in India-China relations. The issue of stapled visas and denial of visa to a senior army official do not please India as well. China’s port development ventures in Sri Lanka (Hambantota) and Gawadar (Pakistan) with the suspected objective of increasing its naval presence raise uncomfortable questions in India. Both India and Japan as well as other nations in Asia would certainly rejoice if China’s economic rise is peaceful. There is no guarantee, however, that this is the case. Such an environment propels both India and Japan to share commonality of interests. Engaging China, rather than infuriating it by designing a strategy of containment, would be in the larger interests of securing peace and stability in Asia. The opportunity is clearly demonstrated in the burgeoning ties in the economic realm. Despite tensions between India and China, and Japan and China, their bilateral economic relations have been flourishing. Japan cannot afford to derail the process of deepening economic ties with China. Similarly, the irritants between India and China in the political domain have not deterred strengthening of economic ties between the two. Both India and Japan have a huge stake in the Chinese market and they cannot afford to undo this advantage. For India, Japan as a partner in development vis-à-vis China, would serve a twin purpose: to help engage China, and also keep China under check.

universal social security

Times of adversity call for a larger role by states to protect the vulnerable. One far-reaching outcome of the recent global economic downturn is the reiteration of the continued importance of the state as a protector of the labour force. The proposal by the International Labour Organisation and the World Health Organisation for a United Nations Social Protection Floor (SPF) Initiative, which has been in the making for over a year, is a vital intervention. The global social security floor comprises four elements: “universal child benefits; universal access to essential health services; modest financial relief for the working poor unable to earn enough for their families to escape poverty as a result of underemployment or low productivity; and basic tax-financed pensions for the old, the disabled and those who have lost the main breadwinner in a family.” Today's shocking reality is that a mere 20 per cent of the world's population has adequate social security protection, with the advanced economies having the lion's share of this coverage. Europe, at 25 per cent of GDP, has the highest level of social security expenditure, and Africa a meagre 4.3 per cent. Even within successful models, the Nordic states, which base their welfare systems on the principle of entitlements, have the more effective systems. A condition precedent for a global social security floor is direct state involvement, both economic and institutional.

Experience from the developing world reflects two massive failures. One is reliance on the ‘trickle-down' effect. The other is that social security measures in these countries, mainly colonial in origin, were until recently designed to cater largely to the formal workforce. The changeover to universal social security in their case demands three things. First, ensure universal provision of a set of basic services. Secondly, see to it that those who are economically active but fall into adversity are cushioned from slipping into poverty. Thirdly, support — through social transfers — those who are not at an economically productive stage. There have been some recent signs of change, although piecemeal, across the developing world. Schemes such as India's National Old-Age Pension Scheme, Brazil's Bolsa Familia, and Mexico's Oportunidades are examples of building blocks that can be used to create effective social protection systems. The challenge now is for states to re-configure their public finances and win political support to put in place a basic floor below which their residents do not fall.

Water Law and Resource Management

It covers a vast range of water-related issues with legal ramifications not only in the context of large dams and irrigation canals but in the groundwater and tank irrigation settings as well.

With the institutional and governance issues getting greater importance in the policy discourse in recent years, the relevance of legal aspects, which are an integral part of the governance system, is also increasing in many fields. Understandably, one of these fields relates to water — a resource the scarcity or mismanagement of which could be a major constraint for food security and economic development.

What are the legal dimensions of water resource management? How law can provide solutions to water-related conflicts and allocations issues? Are the existing legal systems capable of addressing these challenges? What changes are needed in the legal system? What are the prospects for water law reform now and in the foreseeable future? This book seeks to address these and related questions from a theoretical as well as a practical perspective.

As many as 25 eminent scholars with a lot of research and administrative experience to their credit have contributed to this volume. It testifies to the scholarship and practical insights of the authors as well as the editor. The chapters are arranged in seven parts, each part dealing with different dimensions of the nexus between water and law. They are well sequenced, ensuring a logical flow of the themes discussed.

Notably, the book provides an index that lists the important water-related statutes operating both at the Central and State levels. The subject-indexing system is excellent and it should enable the reader to pursue with ease the subject or theme of his interest.

Range of issues

The book covers a vast range of water-related issues with legal ramifications not only in the context of large dams and irrigation canals but in the groundwater and tank irrigation settings as well. Issues at both macro and micro levels are dealt with. For instance, some of the chapters discuss the legal issues affecting Centre-State relations in the matter of water resource development, allocation, and management.

Some others dwell upon jurisprudential issues in the specific context of water rights and entitlements as well as in the general context of water institution and governance. Conceptual issues involved in the fundamental question of rights vs. duties are also covered in one of the chapters.

In two different chapters, the legal issues involved in one of the least-studied areas, namely floods, and in one of the most-studied areas, namely water pollution, are discussed at length. Sensitive aspects of water resource development, such as environmental impact, population displacement, and resettlement, are analysed in quite a few chapters.

Although the general focus of the book is on water issues from a national perspective, the final chapter highlights the international dimensions of water law, especially in the context of trans-boundary river basins.

Meticulous

Overall, it is a well-conceived and well-written volume, for which both the editor and the contributorsdeserve full appreciation. Their painstaking effort and the thoroughness of their work are remarkable.

What is unique about the book is that it does not deal with water law per se but with water law as it relates to various physical, economic, institutional, and policy aspects affecting water resource management in India. In short, this is not a book on water law but a book on the implications of water law for water resource management in India. Despite the legalistic nature of the subject, the language used in most of the chapters is easy to follow even by the lay people.

Undoubtedly a major addition to existing literature, the book fills a gap in one of the less-researched areas of water resource management. It will be useful to students of water resource management and connected areas. It should serve as a valuable source for senior researchers working in the water-law interface. I am happy to commend the book to everyone, academic and non-academic, interested in the study of water and its sustainable management.

WATER AND THE LAWS IN INDIA: Edited by Ramaswamy R. Iyer; Sage Publications India Pvt. Ltd., B1/I-1, Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area, Mathura Road, New Delhi-110044. Rs. 995.

Towards sustainable water management

An international private-social group foresees India’s water demand exceeding availability by a factor of two by 2030. Time is now for India to take on the daunting task of formulating a unifying national water policy.

The 2030 Water Resources Group is a consortium of private-social sector organisations formed in 2008 to provide insights into emerging world-wide water issues. In a report, “Charting our water future” issued in 2009, the group provides a candid, fact-based integrated assessment of the global water situation over the next two decades.

Globally, current withdrawals of about 4,500 cubic km exceed the availability of about 4,200 cubic km. By 2030, the demand is expected to increase to about 6,900 cubic km, with a slight drop in availability to 4,100 cubic km. Thus, by 2030, a global deficit of 40 per cent is forecast. For India, the annual demand is expected to increase to almost 1,500 cubic km, against a projected availability of 744 cubic km; a deficit of 50 per cent. The report admits unavoidable uncertainties in these estimates. As an independent check, an alternative perspective merits consideration.

India’s average annual precipitation is about 1,170 mm, and the land area is 3.28 million sq. km. Thus, the volume of annual precipitation input is 3,840 cubic km. The projected availability of 744 cubic km constitutes about 19 per cent of this amount. In comparison, California, known for its spectacular hydraulic-engineering structures, diverts about 18 per cent of its annual rainfall. For a variety of reasons, California is already contemplating a 20 per cent reduction in water use over the coming decade. Conservatively, if we assume that India may harness 15 per cent of rainfall with careful management, an annual availability of about 600 cubic km is perhaps a reasonable figure to comprehend the scope of India’s water crisis.

Looking to the future, the report stresses that closing the gap between supply and demand will be very difficult. Rather than claiming to provide solutions to all water problems, the authors cautiously consider the report a starting point for meaningful dialogue among all stakeholders for action towards credible solutions. In this spirit, we may examine the implications of their findings to India’s water situation.

In the broadest sense, two questions arise: What do the findings portend for India’s economic growth? How should India respond to the impending crisis?

Concerning economic growth, even a modest 6 per cent annual growth implies a real tripling of the economy by 2030. Is this achievable, if the annual availability is limited to about 600 cubic km? What rate of economic growth should India reasonably plan for?

The question how India should respond is of fundamental importance. India’s greatest challenge is to set in place an equitable, efficient system of governance for sharing a finite resource among all segments of society, simultaneously preserving the integrity of the resource for future generations.

At the time of independence, the annual availability of water in abundant quantities was taken for granted, and India’s Constitution declared water to be a State subject, with the Union government playing a role in inter-State issues. The Constitution does not explicitly recognise water’s unique attributes as a finite resource, widely variable in space and time, and vital for the sustenance of all living things.

At the beginning of the 21st century, when confronted with the imperative of sharing this vital resource among all segments of society according to the values of justice and equality assured in the preamble, one finds a conspicuous lack of philosophical authority necessary to make decisions on the allocation, prioritisation, protection, regulation, and management of water resources. This want of a philosophical basis is manifest in a lack of a national water policy. If so, what might be an appropriate philosophical approach?

India is about as large as Europe without Russia. Both have long histories of human habitation. India comprises 28 States and 7 Union Territories. Europe is a union of 27 independent nations. In 2000, the European Union issued the far-reaching Water Framework Directive with the goal of achieving sustainable management of water. The Directive requires all member-states to establish water laws conforming to common hydrological principles applied over river basins, with the active participation of citizens. The Directive’s philosophical foundation is set forth in the preamble: “Water is not a commercial product like any other but, rather, a heritage which must be protected, defended and treated as such.”

In 1976, a committee on Earth Resources, Time, and Man of the International Union of Geological Sciences observed: “Mankind is on the threshold of a transition from a brief interlude of exponential growth to a much longer period characterised by rates of change so slow as to be regarded essentially as a period of non-growth. Although the impending period of transition to very low growth rates poses no insuperable physical or biological difficulties, those aspects of our current economic and social thinking which are based on the premise that current rates of growth can be sustained indefinitely must be revised. Failing to respond promptly and rationally to these impending changes could lead to a global ecological crisis in which human beings will be the main victims.” This observation clearly anticipates the findings of the 2030 Water Resources Group.

Even with the best available technologies, the finiteness and unpredictable variability of water resource systems place severe limits on human aspirations for prosperity. At present, India is in a difficult position of not only accepting this reality but also having to take concrete steps to adapting to the reality.

A related development. A November 2009 report, “A framework for India’s water policy” of the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore, discusses India’s water endowments and the human challenges confronting sustainable water management.

National Water Policy

The Union Ministry of Water Resources has undertaken a review and revision of the National Water Policy (NWP) 2002. The present article is intended as a contribution to that process. It will not offer a detailed critique of the Ministry's discussion paper, but will outline an approach for its consideration.

Need for radical overhaul

Ideally, a review at this stage should take climate change into account, but while we know that climate change may mean increased precipitation in some areas, increased drought in some others, and increased variability of precipitation, we do not yet know in detail precisely what will happen, when and where. Studies on these matters are still going on. A policy response will have to wait for some reasonably definitive findings on them.

However, an overhaul of the NWP is necessary even without reference to the issue of climate change. The reason for saying so is that there has been a gross mismanagement of water, as evidenced by the following selective list:

• intermittent, unreliable, unsafe and inequitable water supply in urban areas;

• rivers turned into sewers or poison, and aquifers contaminated;

• intractable water-related conflicts between uses, sectors, areas, States;

• major and medium irrigation systems in disarray, rendering poor and unreliable service, and characterised by inequities of various kinds;

• alarming depletion of aquifers in many parts of the country;

• inefficiency and waste in every kind of water-use;

• the environmental/ecological impacts of big water-resource projects, poor EIAs, the displacement of people by such projects and the general failure to resettle and rehabilitate project-affected persons; and so on.

The need for a radical reform of water policy is evident.

Not revision but new start

If so, the kind of transformation that is needed will not be achieved by incremental changes in the NWP 2002. If we start from NWP 2002, our thinking will quickly fall into well-worn grooves, and getting out of them will be difficult. It is necessary to put aside the NWP 2002, and start from scratch.

Reversals of past approaches

Such an exercise will involve many reversals of past approaches. For instance, reversing the usual approach of projecting a future demand and bringing about a supply-side response to meet that demand, we must start from the fact that the availability of fresh water in nature is finite, and learn to manage our water needs within that availability. This will mean a stringent restraint on the growth of ‘demand' for water (other than basic needs) which will be difficult and will involve painful adjustments; but the effort is inescapable.

A second reversal will have to be on the supply side. Primacy will have to shift from large, centralised, capital-intensive ‘water resource development' (WRD) projects with big dams and reservoirs and canal systems, to small, decentralised, local, community-led, water-harvesting and watershed-development programmes, with the big projects being regarded as projects of the last resort; and the exploitation of groundwater will have to be severely restrained in the interest of resource-conservation as well as equity.

A third reversal will have to be in relation to rivers, from massive interventions in flows and maximal abstraction of waters to letting the rivers flow and keeping interventions to the minimum. Instead of killing rivers and then trying to revive them, we must learn to keep rivers alive, flowing and healthy. A fourth reversal will have to be in the relative roles of the state and the community (from ‘eminent domain' or sovereign powers of the state to the state as trustee holding natural resources in public trust for the community). There may have to be other reversals. The intention is not to discuss these matters in detail but to indicate the kind of changes that will be needed.

Multiple perspectives

The changes cannot be piecemeal and fragmented. They need to be integral parts of a holistic vision. One difficulty in this regard is the multiplicity of perspectives on water that need to be taken into account. For instance, consider the following:

• the rights perspective, focussing on the fundamental or human right to water, traditional rights of access of communities (tribal or other) to rivers, lakes, forests, and other sources of sustenance and livelihoods, and so on;

• the social justice/ equity perspective, concerned with issues of inequity in urban and rural water and sanitation services, injustices to the poor and to the Scheduled Castes or Tribes, forced displacement by major projects and deficiencies or failures in resettlement /rehabilitation, inequities in access to irrigation water in the command areas of projects, etc;

• the women's perspective stressing the burden on women of fetching water from long distances as well as managing water in the home, with no voice in water-planning or water-management institutions;

• the community perspective urging the right relationship between state and civil society, the empowerment of people vis-à-vis the state (or the corporates), the community management of common pool resources, mobilisation of people for local water augmentation and management, social control of water use and sanctions against misuse, voice in water policy formulation and water management, etc;

• the state perspective, concerned with legislation, policy formulation, planning, administration, ‘governance' at all three levels, ensuring/enforcing rights, providing or facilitating or regulating water supply and sanitation services, preventing or resolving or adjudicating inter-state/inter-sector/inter-use/inter-area water disputes, prescribing and enforcing quality standards, managing water relations with other countries, ensuring compliance with international law, and so on;

• the engineering perspective (which needs no explanation);

• the water quality perspective concerned with the enforcement of water quality standards, and the prevention and control of pollution and contamination of water;

• the citizen/ water-user perspectives tending to assert requirements for various uses (drinking, domestic, commercial, industrial, agricultural, etc) quite strongly, but showing poor recognition of the obligations of economical and efficient use, avoidance of waste and conflict, conservation of the resource, and protection of the environment;

• the economic perspective that sees water as economic good subject to market forces, and argues for water markets, the full economic pricing of water, the privatisation of water services, private sector participation in water resource projects, etc;

• the ‘growth' perspective focussing on economic growth at a certain desired rate, and tending to be impatient with social, community, rights, equity, environmental or other perspectives;

• the business perspective, concerned with a supply response to demand, the objective being profits, professing ‘corporate social responsibility' but tending to subordinate it to the imperative of profits;

• the legal perspective, which is not really a separate perspective, as legal issues arise in all perspectives; but specifically concerned among other things with the constitutional division of legislative powers, Centre-State and inter-State relations on water, inter-State river-water disputes, riparian law, international water law, questions of ownership and/or control of water, etc. (all these being not merely legal but also socio-political questions); and

• the environmental/ecological perspective, concerned with the protection of the environmental/ecological system from the impacts of ‘developmental' activity, and the prescription/monitoring of remedial measures.

The foregoing enumeration of perspectives will immediately show that a multiplicity of disciplines is involved. The formulation of a national water policy must necessarily be an inter-disciplinary exercise.

Overarching perspective

If these perspectives are to be integrated and harmonised into a coherent whole, some will have to be regarded as the overarching, governing perspectives, and all others subsumed under them. In the author's view, the ecological and social justice perspectives will have to be the overarching perspectives, and all other perspectives subordinated to them. In particular, engineering and economics, which have so far been the dominant disciplines, must be firmly kept under check by ecology and by the idea of social justice.

Dharma perspective

Keeping in mind Gandhiji's firm conviction that rights flow from responsibilities, we can consider combining the ecological and social justice perspectives into a moral responsibility perspective or, in other words, an ethical or dharma perspective. Let us think in terms of our responsibility or dharma in relation to:

• the poor, deprived, disadvantaged, or disempowered;

• other humans sharing the resource with us, including those in our State or other States, our country or other countries, our generation or future generations;

• other species or forms of life;

• rivers, lakes, aquifers, forests, nature in general, Planet Earth itself.

That is the overarching perspective that this writer would like to propose. In place of the current slogan of Integrated Water Resource Management or IWRM about which he has strong reservations, he would like to offer the alternative formulation of Responsible, Harmonious, Just and Wise Use of Water.

Alas, RHJWUW is not a catchy term like IWRM. The latter term has come to stay, but it should really be understood to mean the former.

The Arctic's strategic value for Russia

Russia and the United States have made headway in improving their relations on arms control, Afghanistan and Iran but there is one area where their “reset” may yet run aground — the Arctic.

The U.S. military top brass recently warned of a new Cold War in the Arctic and called for stepping up American military presence in the energy-rich region.

Earlier this month, U.S. Admiral James G. Stavridis, supreme NATO commander for Europe, said global warming and a race for resources could lead to a conflict in the Arctic because “it has the potential to alter the geopolitical balance in the Arctic heretofore frozen in time.”

Echoing similar views, Coast Guard Rear Admiral Christopher C. Colvin, who is in charge of Alaska's coastline, said Russian shipping activity in the Arctic Ocean was of particular concern for the U.S. He called for more military facilities in the region. “We have to have a presence up there to protect our claims for the future, sovereignty claims, extended continental shelf claims,” the Rear Admiral told the Associated Press aboard a C-130 flight over the Arctic Ocean.

The statements are in line with the U.S. policy laid down in a National Security Presidential Directive George W. Bush signed in January 2009. It calls for “deployment of sea and air systems for strategic sealift, strategic deterrence, maritime presence, and maritime security” in order to “preserve the global mobility of the United States military and civilian vessels and aircraft throughout the Arctic region” including the North Sea Route along Russia's Arctic coast, which Moscow regards as its national waterway.

Russia is the prime target of the U.S. expansionist strategy. Two months ago, the first Russian supertanker sailed from Europe to Asia along the North Sea route. Next year, Russia plans to send more ships across the Arctic route, 9,000 km off the traditional route via the Suez Canal.

The U.S. Geological Service believes that the Arctic contains up to a quarter of the world's unexplored deposits of oil and gas, 60 per cent of them in the Russian sector of the region.

Washington also disputes Moscow's effort to enlarge its Exclusive Economic Zone in the Arctic Ocean. Under the 1982 United Nations Law of the Sea Convention, a coastal state is entitled to a 200-nautical mile EEZ and can claim a further 150 miles if it proves that the seabed is a continuation of its continental shelf. Russia was the first to apply for an additional EEZ in 2001 but the U.N. Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf asked for harder scientific evidence to back the claim. Moscow said it would resubmit its claim in 2013 and the other littoral states plan to file theirs. However, the U.S. has not ratified the U.N. Convention as many Congressmen fear it would restrict their Navy's “global mobility.”

Despite the end of the Cold War, the potential for conflict in the Arctic has increased recently the scramble of the five Arctic littoral states — Russia, the U.S., Canada, Norway and Denmark (through its control of Greenland) —for chalking out claims to the energy-rich Arctic as the receding Polar ice makes its resources more accessible and opens the region to round-the-year shipping. All claims are overlapping and the five states are locked in a multitude of other bilateral disputes. But, at the end of the day, it is Russia against the others, all NATO members.

The U.S. and Canada have agreed to put aside, for the time being, their dispute over navigation rights off the Canadian coast to stand up jointly to Russia.

Last year NATO, for the first time, officially claimed a role in the Arctic, when Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told member-states to sort out their differences within the alliance so that it could move on to set up “military activity in the region.”

“Clearly, the High North is a region that is of strategic interest to the Alliance,” he said at a NATO seminar in Reykjavik, Iceland, in January 2009.

Since then, NATO has held several major war games focussing on the Arctic region. In March this year, 14,000 NATO troops took part in the “Cold Response 2010” military exercise held in Norway under a patently provocative legend: the alliance came to the defence of a fictitious small democratic state, Midland, whose oilfield is claimed by a big undemocratic state, Nordland. In August, Canada hosted its largest yet drill in the Arctic, Operation Nanook 2010, in which the U.S. and Denmark took part for the first time.

Russia registered its firm opposition to the NATO foray, with President Dmitry Medvedev saying the region would be best without NATO. “Russia is keeping a close eye on this activity,” he said in September. “The Arctic can manage fine without NATO.” The western media portrayed the NATO build-up in the region as a reaction to Russia's “aggressive” assertiveness, citing the resumption of Arctic Ocean patrols by Russian warships and long-range bombers and the planting of a Russian flag in the North Pole seabed three years ago.

It is conveniently forgotten that the U.S. Navy and Air Force have not stopped Arctic patrolling for a single day since the end of the Cold War. Russia, on the other hand, drastically scaled back its presence in the region after the break-up of the Soviet Union. It cut most of its Northern Fleet warships, dismantled air defences along its Arctic coast and saw its other military infrastructure in the region fall into decay.

The Arctic has enormous strategic value for Russia. Its nuclear submarine fleet is based in the Kola Peninsula. Russia's land territory beyond the Arctic Circle is almost the size of India — 3.1 million sq km. It accounts for 80 per cent of the country's natural gas production, 60 per cent of oil, and the bulk of rare and precious metals. By 2030, Russia's Arctic shelf, which measures 4 million sq km, is expected to yield 30 million tonnes of oil and 130 billion cubic metres of gas. If Russia's claim for a 350-mile EEZ is granted, it will add another 1.2 million sq km to its possessions.

A strategy paper Mr. Medvedev signed in 2008 said the polar region would become Russia's “main strategic resource base” by 2020. Russia has devised a multivector strategy to achieve this goal. First, it works to restore its military capability in the region to ward off potential threats. Russia is building a new class of nuclear submarines, Borei (Northern Wind) that will be armed with a new long-range missile, Bulava. Navy Chief Admiral Vladimir Vysotsky said recently he had also drawn up a plan to deploy warships in Russia's Arctic ports to protect polar sea routes.

A second strategy is to try and resolve bilateral disputes with other Arctic nations. In September, Russia and Norway signed a border pact settling their 40-year feud over 175,000 sq.km in the Barents Sea and agreeing to jointly develop seabed oil and gas in the region. Even as Russia continues to gather geological proof of its territorial claims in the Arctic, it is ready for compromises. Canadian Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon did not rule out, after his recent talks in Moscow, that Canada and Russia could submit a joint application to the U.N. for the Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater mountain stretching from Siberia to Canada, which both countries claim as an extension of their continental shelves.

A third direction of Russia's policy is to promote broad international cooperation in the region. Addressing Russia's first international Arctic conference in Moscow in September, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin called for joint efforts to protect the fragile ecosystem, attract foreign investment in the region's economy and promote clean environment-friendly technologies. He admitted that the interests of the Arctic countries “indeed clash,” but said all disputes could be resolved through international law.

Interestingly, Russia has recently sought to alert its neighbours to China's Arctic ambitions. The rising Asian giant is building large ice-breakers, sending warships in the Arctic Ocean and wants to play “an indispensable role” in the region, according to Chinese Rear Admiral Yin Zhuo. Commenting on China's growing presence in the Arctic, Admiral Vysotsky said last month that notwithstanding differences among countries in the region, “most problematic relations may emerge with nations that are not members of the Arctic Council.”

This is a direct invitation to the U.S. and other Arctic nations to overcome Cold War stereotypes, abandon their brawl and face the challenges from new claimants.

Census of Marine Life (CoML)

The first-ever Census of Marine Life (CoML), a mammoth decade-long exercise involving more than 2,700 scientists from over 80 countries, has been successfully completed. The painstaking research has unearthed nearly 250,000 marine species of an estimated one million. About 6,000 new species have also been discovered. The landmark exercise marks a remarkable beginning in identifying and mapping the diversity, distribution, and abundance of marine organisms. Though long-distance migration of many predators like tuna and sharks was tracked, large areas of the oceans, mainly the Indian Ocean, have not been fully explored. While ten marine hotspots were identified, including one in the Indian Ocean, many biodiversity hotspots await detailed investigation. This is because the oceans cover 75 per cent of the earth’s surface, and investigating their surface and depths requires tremendous scientific expertise and huge investments. The good news is that even though the census has been completed, several national and regional initiatives started during the CoML programme will continue to operate with support from government and non-government agencies. Unlike other major projects such as the mapping of the human genome, the scope of this study is undefined. Thus the CoML provides an ideal platform for incorporating diverse inputs from future studies to help us understand the big picture. It will also serve as the baseline for evaluating the future impact of human intervention on sea animals.

The CoML facilitated the use of diverse technologies on a large scale, technologies that are of continuing use. For instance, there are special sonar devices which allow us to see how marine life assemble in schools and move both vertically and laterally over thousands of square kilometres. Thanks to the use of modern techniques, scientists were also able to have a glimpse of the hitherto unknown world of marine animals. One finding of the study which is a cause for concern is that the fate of many animals living in easily accessible habitats appears gloomy. Large fishes and marine mammals like sea turtles and tuna have declined by 90 per cent on an average due to over-fishing and/or pollution. Apart from being an invaluable source of food, the oceans produce 70 per cent of oxygen present in the atmosphere, and also absorb one-third of global carbon dioxide emissions. All these are warning signs that oceans, the lifeline for all things living on earth, may well turn into a watery grave if damage to marine life continues unabated.

Sedition versus free speech

It is deplorable that three sentences uttered at a seminar relating to the status of Kashmir within India should have evoked such zealous hyper-patriotic anger and resulted in demands for invoking harsh sedition laws. Writer and social activist Arundhati Roy has strong views on the strife-torn and troubled Valley, which many may disagree with, or regard as extremely contentious. But what possible justification can there be — as the Bharatiya Janata Party has outrageously demanded — for slapping a case against her under Section 124 (A) of the Indian Penal Code, for exciting “disaffection” towards or bringing “hatred or contempt” against the government? Do we lock up or threaten to silence our writers and thinkers with an archaic section of the law that carries a maximum penalty of life imprisonment, merely because they speak their minds? Why is it criminal to suggest that Kashmir's status in India is not settled despite the accession? Aren't so many others in Jammu and Kashmir saying as much? Didn't Chief Minister Omar Abdullah recently remark that the State had only acceded to, and not merged with, the Indian Union? The central government would do well publicly to make a stand and deny reports that it is considering pressing sedition charges against Ms Roy and Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani, who addressed the same seminar. Courts too must apply their mind and refuse to entertain frivolous and vexatious petitions that make such outrageous allegations.

In his classic defence of free speech, On Liberty, John Stuart Mill laid down what is known as the ‘harm principle.' It postulates that the only justification for silencing a person against his will is to prevent him from causing harm to others. It is to this powerful libertarian mid-19th century principle that we owe the idea that free speech cannot be proscribed merely because we find it disagreeable, and that curbs may be imposed only if such expression constitutes a direct, explicit, and unequivocal incitement to violence. There is no such nexus in Ms Roy's statements on Kashmir, which are shaped around the theme of gross human rights violations and (as she points out in a statement: "Pity the Nation that has to silence its writers" ) “fundamentally a call for justice.” It is tragi-comic that there is talk of ‘sedition' at a time when it is regarded as obsolete in many countries. Courts have ruled that laws that aim to punish people for bringing a government into hatred or contempt are frighteningly broad and risk being used to suppress radical political views. In Britain, the last completed trial in a sedition case dates back to 1947. In the United States, Supreme Court rulings have rendered toothless the most recent sedition law, the Smith Act enacted in 1940. The controversy over Ms Roy's remarks is essentially much ado about nothing.

UID

The UID project has both ‘security' and ‘developmental' dimensions. The former leads to an invasive state; the latter leaves us with a retreating state.

Is identity the “missing link” in India's efforts to rise as an “inclusive” economic superpower? Can an identity-linked and technology-based solution change the face of governance in India? Given the euphoria around the Unique Identification (UID) project, one is tempted to believe so. However, a careful look at the project would show that the euphoria is just hyperbole; only the politically naïve can afford to ignore the far-reaching implications of this Orwellian project.

One can summarise the criticisms of the UID project under four heads. First, the project would necessarily entail the violation of privacy and civil liberties of people. Second, it remains unclear whether biometric technology — the cornerstone of the project – is capable of the gigantic task of de-duplication. The Unique Identification Authority of India's (UIDAI) “Biometrics Standards Committee” has noted that retaining biometric efficiency for a database of more than one billion persons “has not been adequately analysed” and the problem of fingerprint quality in India “has not been studied in depth”. Third, there has been no cost-benefit analysis or feasibility report for the project till now. Finally, the purported benefits of the project in the social sector, such as in the Public Distribution System (PDS), are largely illusive. The problem of duplicate ration cards is often hugely exaggerated. Even so, some States have largely eliminated duplicate ration cards using “lower” technologies like hologram-enabled ration cards.

In this larger context, the UID project has two distinct political dimensions. The first dimension is that the project is fundamentally linked to “national security” concerns rather than “developmental” concerns. In fact, the marketing team of the UIDAI has always been on an overdrive to hush up the security angle, and play up the developmental angle, to render it more appealing.

The first phase of today's UID project was initiated in 1999 by the NDA government in the wake of the Kargil War. Following the reports of the “Kargil Review Committee” in 2000, and a Group of Ministers in 2001, the NDA government decided to compulsorily register all citizens into a “National Population Register” (NPR) and issue a Multi-purpose National Identity Card (MNIC) to each citizen. To ease this process, clauses related to individual privacy in the Citizenship Act of 1955 were weakened through an amendment in 2003. In sum, the ground work for a national ID project was completed by 2003 itself.

The parallels between the UPA's UID and the NDA's MNIC are too evident to be missed, even as the UPA sells UID as a purely “developmental” initiative. The former chief of the Intelligence Bureau, A.K. Doval, almost gave it away recently, when he said that UID, originally, “was intended to wash out the aliens and unauthorised people. But the focus appears to be shifting. Now, it is being projected as more development-oriented, lest it ruffle any feathers”.

The potential of the project to unleash a security frenzy is the reason why privacy concerns have to be taken seriously. The government and the UIDAI have made it appear as if the purported, and unsubstantiated, benefits of “good governance” from the project eclipse the concerns regarding privacy and civil liberties. This is where the problem lies. A foundational understanding in the study of individual freedoms, pioneered by scholars like Amartya Sen, is that consequence-independent absolute rights are rather hard to defend. Hence, the demand to trade-off one freedom for another (here, the “invasive loss” of privacy for “development”) is an untenable demand. Each freedom, independently, has an instrumental value, and the loss of one freedom undermines the individual's overall capability to expand up on other freedoms. No wonder then that Sen himself has voiced the privacy concern regarding the UID project.

There is a related concern: police and security forces, if allowed access to the biometric database, could extensively use it for regular surveillance and investigative purposes, leading to a number of human rights violations. As Amartya Sen has argued elsewhere, forced disclosure and loss of privacy always entailed “the social costs of the associated programmes of investigation and policing”. According to him, “some of these investigations can be particularly nasty, treating each applicant as a potential criminal.”

The second dimension of the UID project is the following: it would qualitatively restructure the role of the state in the social sector. Contrary to claims, the UID project is not an instrument to expand India's social security system, for whatever it is worth. Instead, the aim is to keep benefits restricted to the so-called “targeted” sections, ensure targeting with precision and thereby, limit the government's expenditure commitments. None other than the Prime Minister has made this amply clear. Addressing the National Development Council (NDC) on July 24, 2010, he noted: “to reduce our fiscal deficit in the coming years, … we must [be] … reducing the scale of untargeted subsidies. The operationalisation of the Unique Identification Number Scheme … provides an opportunity to target subsidies effectively.”

The UIDAI claims that UID would help the government shift from a number of indirect benefits into direct benefits. In reality, such a shift would represent the opposite: a transformation of the role of the state from a direct provider to an indirect provider. For the UIDAI, the UID is a tool of empowerment. In reality, the UID would be an alibi for the state to leave the citizen unmarked in the market for social services. Nowhere is the illustration more telling than in the case of the PDS.

Let me state the argument upfront. The UID project is part of a larger effort to dismantle the PDS in India. The aim is to ensure a back-door entry of food stamps in the place of PDS, and later graduate it to a cash transfer scheme, thereby completing the state's withdrawal from the sphere of food procurement and distribution.

According to the UIDAI, the most important benefit from the UID could be that you could have a “portable” PDS. In other words, you could have a system where you (say, a migrant worker) could buy your PDS quota from anywhere in India. The claim, of course, has a deceptive appeal. One would have to dig deeper to grasp the real intent.

If we take the present fair price shop (FPS) system, each FPS has a specified number of households registered to it. The FPS stores grains only for the registered households. The FPS owner would not know how many migrants, and for what periods, would come in and demand their quota. Hence, for lack of stock, he would turn away migrant workers who demand grains. Hence, the FPS system is incompatible with the UID-linked portability of PDS. There is only one way out: do away with the FPS system, accredit grocery shops to sell grains, allow them to compete with each other and allow the shop owners to get the subsidy reimbursed. This is precisely what food stamps are all about; no FPS, you get food stamps worth an amount, go to any shop and buy grains (on why food stamps are deeply problematic, see Madhura Swaminathan, “Targeted Food Stamps”, The Hindu, August 3, 2004).

What is interesting is that everyone, except those enamoured by the UID glitter, appears to know this. On its part, UIDAI officially accepts that food stamps become easier to implement with the UID. So does the Planning Commission, which sees the UID as the fulcrum around which its plans to “reform” the PDS revolve. It turns out that an opposition to the dismantling of PDS, and to food stamps, also involves an opposition to the UID.

On his part, Nandan Nilekani has been showcasing his extraordinarily poor understanding of India's developmental priorities. According to him, “in the Indira years, the slogan was garibi hatao. Then it was roti, kapda, makaan. In the last few years, it was bijli, sadak, pani.” However, these slogans are “passé”; the in-thing is the slogan “UID number, bank account, mobile phone.” Such an inverted world view, totally divorced from the grim realities of poverty, has prompted critics to call AADHAAR as just NIRAADHAAR!

In conclusion, the UID project is marked by both “security” and “developmental” dimensions. The former leads to an invasive state; the latter leaves us with a retreating state. Either way, the “citizen” is worse off.