Introduction:
We are nearing to
celebrate our 71st INDEPENDENCE DAY shortly. Again we have reached near time
for reappraisal of ourselves as well as our country as a whole for that we
could achieve in last 70 years. I know, we are all viral tigers and try to post
our feelings in social media and will try to put all that we have achieved into
the bag of present ruling government and that we could not into the bag of
previous government on the pretext that all that wrong doing were their motto.
In this essay I will impartially try to year mark the nation as a whole from
1950 to 2017.
At the very outset, we
will try to analyse the strength of our country. Our strength is that we speak
more work less. This is bitter truth for our nation. We promise many, our
leaders promise/promised up to any extent (because promise does not cost
anything) but to fulfil the promise it becomes a mountain to them. I will
first start with growth of our economy as a whole. Incidentally we have two close
neighbours of whom one is Pakistan, where we lost most of our energy and money
to show them what they deserve and other neighbour is China who also started
growing from the same point of time when we started. Now let us make a
comparative study of our economy and growth right from 1950 vis a vis our
neighbour China so that we can gauge our achievements as well as where we are
legging behind:
01. Economy and Development:
Friends, India gained
independence in 1947 and became a republic in 1950; the Chinese revolution
occurred in 1949. Thus, 1950 is an appropriate starting point for comparative study:
v Both were primarily rural societies with
agriculture the predominant form of employment and production. Their
agricultural sectors were characterised by small farms, unequal land ownership,
and a large labour force. "Agricultural output per person in China was
higher than the level in India, but China was closer to limits of its
cultivable land and of yields per hectare given the technology of that
time" (Malenbaum 1982, pg. 47).
v The
industrial sectors were small and employed less than 15 percent of the
respective work forces in 1950. In both countries, industry was dominated by
small-scale and traditional forms of enterprise, but "... India's
industrial output was more modem and diverse and, judged on the whole, greater
per person than China's" (Malenbaum 1982, pg. 47).
v K. N.
Raj estimated that 2.6 percent of the Indian labour force comparing to 1.3
percent of the Chinese labour force were employed in large-scale factories and
mines in the early 1950s)
v Their per capita GNP's were roughly equal in
1950: $50--60 ranges in 1952 U.S. prices according to Malenbaum (1982, pg. 47);
v It was $65
in China and $62 in India at 1960 U.S. prices according to Weiss Kopf (1980,
81).
v Both societies were characterised by low
literacy rates, life expectancy of close to thirty-five years, and sharp
regional and class inequalities. Their economies and cultures were traditional,
rural, and static.
This trend continued
up to 80's of last century. Then I think everyone remembers two major incidents
of last century that changed the economic structure of both countries. 1) Tiananmen Square in China that changed
China to come out from close social economy towards open economy and 2) The
shift of Indian economy from Nehruvian social economy to LPG (Liberalisation,
Privatisation and Globalisation and after that period more precisely from
1991.let us compare again both economy and we find:
v
GDP of China is 5.06
and 2.39 times more than India at nominal and PPP terms, respectively.
v
China crossed $1
trillion mark in 1998 while India in 2007 at exchange rate basis. Now in 2014,
India crossed 2 trillion marks and China crossed 10 trillion. Whereas, in 1980,
size of economy of China and India were $309 and $181, respectively.
v
GDP of China at PPP
terms is 1.7 times more than compare to nominal basis. This ratio of India is
3.60.
v
In nominal terms, per
capita GDP of China is $7,589, 80th position in world and 19th in Asia. India's
GDP per capita is around of $1,627. India's rank in world and Asia is 145 and
33, respectively. On PPP basis, GDP per capita of China is $12,880 and of India
is $5,855.
v
China is 4.66 times
richer than India in nominal method and 2.20 times richer in PPP method.
v
Out of 35 years from
1980 to 2014, China grew by more than 10% in 16 years while India in only one. India
reached an all-time high of 10.26% in 2010 and a record low of 1.06% in 1991. India's
growth rate was 9-10% in 4 years, while China in 7 years. And lastly
v
Indian rupee was at
4.23 INR per Chinese Yuan (CNY) on 2 Jan 1996.
v
Value of Indian rupees
has fallen to 10.18 INR per 1 CNY in 1 Jan 2015.
So we lost in race
chronologically with them in the mid-way somewhere. Our military might is now
much less than that the People’s Republic of China has.
02. Education:
India has made
progress in terms of increasing the primary education attendance rate and
expanding literacy to approximately three-quarters of the population in the
7–10 age groups, by 2011. India's improved education system is often cited as
one of the main contributors to its e Much of the progress, especially in
higher education and scientific research, has been credited to various public
institutions. While enrolment in higher economic development induction has
increased steadily over the past decade, reaching a Gross Enrolment Ratio of
24% in 2013, there still remains a significant distance to catch up with
tertiary education enrolment levels of developed nations, a challenge that will
be necessary to overcome in order to continue to reap a demographic dividend
from India's comparatively young population. However we have to keep a track on
school dropouts in primary level and if we take the present data we see that
the enrolment in primary level is although 93% but enrolment at secondary level
is only 69% which means the drop out at this level is 24%. The picture in post-secondary
level is really gloomy and is only 25% thus dropout in school level is totally
68% which really alarming. Although the total allotted budget for education
from 2005 to 2012 (the available data with me) is Rs 99100 crores equivalent to
US $ 15 Mn. Meanwhile, India should not forget the theory of Amartya Sen’s ‘Welfare
Economy’ where it is said that a nation cannot develop until its citizens are
given basic education to all.
3. Health care:
India’s current health
policy originated in the nation-building activities that occurred during
independence in 1947 and in the philosophy embodied in the government of
India’s 1946 Report on the Health Survey and Development Committee, commonly
referred to as the Bhore Committee Report (Gupte, Ramachandran, and Mutatkar,
2001; Peters et al., 2002). The report concluded that India’s poor health
conditions could be attributed to unsanitary conditions, defective nutrition,
the inadequacy of the existing medical and preventive health organisation, and
a lack of health education. The committee provided comprehensive
recommendations that included placing health workers on the public payroll and
limiting the need for private practitioners.
But, since the 1980s,
multiple forces have driven changes in the health system in India. As Qadeer
(2000) argues, the emerging middle class and private practitioners worked with
international donors to push Privatisation in the health care system. The
middle class lobbied for “high-tech hospitals” that provide international
standards of health care; the private practitioners benefited from government
subsidies for medical education and put pressure on the authorities to loosen
regulations over medical care. International donors, such as the International
Monetary Fund and the World Bank, played a crucial role in supporting reforms,
including cutting health sector investments, encouraging the private sector,
and introducing user fees and private investments in public hospitals. There
was an increase in the total direct investment in health as well as related
investments in water supply and sanitation. The specific investment in family
planning rose from less than 1 percent to 26 percent of the total. At the same
time, spending on the control of communicable diseases dropped from 17 to 4
percent. - But, overall if we look upon the health indicator of our country we
have miles to go still now. If we again compare with China (since both countries
started their journey in same time) we will see people in China live longer and
are healthier than people in India (see Table 3.1). According to WHO’s
statistics, a woman born in India in 2004 has a life expectancy of 63 years,
whereas a woman born in China at the same time has a life expectancy of 74
years. A man born in India has a life expectancy of 61 years, whereas a man
born in China has a life expectancy of 70 years. The disparity in life
expectancy between the two countries is greater for women than for men, which
is partly a result of the ten-fold greater maternal death rate during
childbirth for women in India compared with women in China. Additionally,
residents of India suffer higher mortality rates in both childhood and
adulthood than do residents of China.
Health status at birth
in India is poor. It is estimated that 30 percent of infants in India were born
with low birth weight (LBW, less than 2,500 grams at birth), whereas only 6
percent of newborns in China were born with LBW. Fifty-eight out of every 1,000
infants in India died before their first birthday, whereas only 27 out of every
1,000 infants in China died before their first birthday.
4. Present Scenario
Meanwhile, our country
democratically elected a man in 2014 who started showing dream to us Let us try to remember some of his promises
he made from the podium of Lal Quilla on INDEPENDENCE DAY of 2015 after
unfurling of our national flag. The tempo of his speech made us jubilant and we
felt triumphant to believe that we are going to achieve this time. Days of
false promise will fade away and our dream would come into reality. I will call
you all to analyse and find what we received and what is left behind:
i). Pradhan Mantri
Jana Dhan Joyona
What Modi said
|
What actually happened
|
“I had announced
'Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojna' on the last 15th of August. Even after
60 years of Independence; even when the banks were nationalised for the poor,
40 percent people of the country were without a bank account till the last
15th of August; the doors of the banks were not open for the poor. My
countrymen, today I can proudly say that we achieved that target within the
time frame. 17 crore people opened their bank accounts under Pradhan Mantri
Jan Dhan Yojna. With a view to extend opportunities to the poor, we had said
that these bank accounts could be opened with zero balance.”
|
As
many as 228.1 million new bank accounts have been opened as on August 3,
2016, an increase of 31 percent from 174 million in 2015–24 percent of these
accounts (“zero-balance accounts”, in official term) had no money, a
reduction of 22 percent from 2015. The balance in the accounts increased 85
percent over one year, from Rs 22,033 crore to Rs 40,795 crore.
The previous United
Progressive Alliance (UPA) government had opened more than 50 million
“no-frills” accounts–as they called them–for the poor over five years, but
most were never used,( India Spend reported in October 2014.
|
ii). Swacch
Vidyalay Abhijan: 100% separate toilets for boys and girls
What Modi said
|
What actually happened
|
"It just came into my heart
and I had announced that we would build separate toilets for boys and girls
in all of our schools till the next 15th August. But later on, when we
started work, the “Team India” figured out its responsibilities, we realised
that there were 2 lakh and 62 thousand such schools where more than 4.25 lakh
toilets were required to be built. I compliment all the state governments,
government officers of the districts, policy framers and implementer of
educational institutions, who were involved in realising this achievement.”
|
A nationwide Fact Checker
check revealed the claim that 100 percent of India’s schools were not true.
Random checks across seven states revealed widespread infirmities, such as: Many
schools, from urban New Delhi to backward, often remote, areas, such as
Chatra district (Jharkhand) and SedamTaluka, Gulbarga district (Karnataka),
did not have toilets. The specific claim that every school now has separate
toilets for boys and girls in all schools was not true. Existing toilets in
schools in areas such as Delhi, Sitapur (Uttar Pradesh), Tumkur (Karnataka),
Dantewada (Chhattisgarh) and Wanaparthy (Telangana)–either already built or
new–do not have water or are not maintained. That makes them useless. Without
water, and after a few students used them, they became unusable.
|
iii) Give it up: 10.4 million have given up LPG
subsidy voluntarily; 1.76 million women get free gas connections
What
Modi said
|
What
actually happened
|
“My
brothers and sisters, I had made a request to my countrymen that if you are
economically sound, then why do you avail subsidy on LPG? Why do you need
this paltry amount of rupees five to seven hundred which you usually spend on
petty snacks? I had just started giving message about this; I didn’t launch
any campaign as yet, because I have faith in “Team India’. As the message
spreads the result would come, but today I can tell with pride that
ever-since I had launched movement of “give it up” subsidy of LPG gas
cylinder, till date 20 lakh (2 million) consumers have already given it up.”
|
As
many as 10.4 million people gave up their LPG subsidy voluntarily, according
to recent official data from the ministry of oil and petroleum. The Centre
launched “Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana” to provide LPG connections to 50
million women from families who live below the poverty line over a period of
three years, starting from financial year 2016-17.
As
many as 1.76 million connections have been given under the program as on 25
July 2016, according to data tabled in Parliament.
|
iv). Electricity to villages: Govt says 98.1 percent
electrified, but electricity supply suspect
What
Modi said
|
What
actually happened
|
“Brothers
and sisters, in the coming days I wish to concentrate on an issue. Even
today, there are about eighteen thousand, five hundred such villages in our
country where electric wires and poles are yet to reach. Eighteen thousand
five hundred villages are deprived of the sun of independence, deprived of
the light of independence; they are deprived of the rays of development of
independence. But it is now the solemn pledge of the “Team India” of 1.25
billion countrymen that the target of providing electric poles, electric
wires and electricity to these 18,500 villages would be achieved within the
next 1000 days.”
|
As
many as 587,569 of 597,464 villages (98.1 percent) in India were
“electrified” as on June 30, 2016, which means only 9,895 do not have
electricity, according to a recent report by the Central Electricity
Authority (CEA).
A
village being declared “electrified” does not mean a household will get
electricity, Fact Checker reported in November 2015. The ministry of power
defines a village (from 2004-05) as electrified if:
Basic
power infrastructure, such as a transformer and distribution lines, is provided
in the inhabited locality as well as associated Dalit settlements, which are
often excluded from village facilities, where they exist. Many villages
classified as un-electrified are counted as electrified on an app “GARV”
(launched by the power ministry to track electrification).
Uninhabited
villages have been marked as electrified. Villages like Panalomali,
Kusadangar and Patyetapali in Odisha and Sunwara in Madhya Pradesh — all
counted as electrified villages — have no people residing there.
|
v). Social security:
127 million people enrolled for three major programmes
What
Modi said
|
What
actually happened
|
“We
have laid great stress upon social security and also the welfare of the poor
– and thus Prime Minister’s Suraksha Bima Yojana (PMSBY), Atal Pension Yojana
(APY) and Prime Minister’s Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana (PMJJBY) have been
launched. Crores of people of our country have no social security cover.”
|
APY
has been given to 2.7 million, PMSBY to 94.5 million and PMJJBY to 29.7
million citizens as on 14 June 2016, according to official data.
More
recent data tabled in Parliament indicates that 3.04 million Indians have
registered under APY as on July 20, 2016.
|
vi). Rural India:
Agriculture budget increased by 44 percent, several rural programmes launched
What
Modi said
|
What
actually happened
|
“We
need drastic changes in the agriculture sector. The cultivable land is
shrinking; it is getting divided between families and pieces of land are
getting smaller. The fertility and productivity of our agricultural land must
increase. The farmers need water and electricity and we are working towards
their availability. We have decided to pump in fifty thousand crore rupees in
‘Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchaai Yojna’. How will the water reach the farms?
Water will have to be saved. We have to launch a movement in our agricultural
sector with the mantra of “Save Water, Save Energy, and Save Fertilisers”.
|
Modi
is right about the divide in farming land–5 percent of farmers control 32
percent of India’s farmland and a “large” farmer in India has 45 times more
land than a “marginal” farmer, India Spend reported in May 2016.
The
land that can be farmed has marginally declined, from 182.5 million hectares
in 2008-09 to 182 million hectares in 2012-13, mainly for non-agricultural
purposes, such as urbanisation, roads, industries and housing, according to
data tabled in Parliament.
The
agriculture budget rose 44 percent, from Rs 24,909 crore ($4 billion) in
2015-16 to Rs 35,984 crore ($5 billion) in 2016-17, to address growing
distress in rural areas from successive monsoon failures.
|
vii). One Rank One Pension for service personnel:
Approved
What
Modi said
|
What
actually happened
|
“The
issue of “One Rank One Pension (OROP)” has come before every government, each
one has considered its proposal, and each and every government has made
promises on it, but the problem is still pending to be resolved. I say to
service personnel, we have accepted “One Rank One Pension” in principal but
talks are going on with its organisations. Talks have reached at the final
stage and we want that all get justice keeping in view the development of
whole country. How it is implemented in view of its nitty-gritty situation,
we are taking the talks forward by engaging with its stakeholders”
|
Modi approved the OROP proposal in April
2016. It will cost the government an additional Rs 7,488 in annual pensions
and Rs 10,925 crore in arrears.
As
many as 1.6 million pensioners were paid their first pensions through the
OROP program; Rs 2,861 crore was spent until March 31, 2016. Certain issues
and anomalies have been raised by servicemen, which a government panel is
considering.
|
5. Miscellaneous achievements:
a) Learned to respect Indian Army or I will be
proved anti national.
b) Enhanced my lexicon with few words like bovine, bigotry,
dhimmitude etc.
c) A new brigade of civil army introduced in country
name “Gauraksaks’
d) A new segment of police introduced called ‘Anti-Romeo
squad’
e) A new definition of neo-religious faith came into
force.
f) NCERT course will be redefined where names of old
gourds of literature may be removed.
g) Words like ‘Cow’, ‘Gujrat’ ‘Hindu’ etc are
prohibited to be spelt in public domain in certain circumstances.
h) A new chapter of Biology is introduced where I
learned afresh that cow exhale oxygen, Peacock’s tears contains seminal fluid.
Etc.
Conclusion:
I, as a common man had some vision, a dream for my
country. I am the democracy; I am the preamble of constitution.But
unfortunately now, I
lie down from length to breadth of the country like Da Vinci’s ‘Vitruvian Man’
naked with my hands and legs spread but
I saw, they have butchered me into small pieces, they minced my soft flesh in
ideal pieces, comfortable for them to cook and at last they fall upon like
hungry beast to taste the cuisine! What cannibalism! Alas, tiger's flesh is not
tigers prey, but MEN IS THE COMMON FOE OF MEN.
I carried my own corpse in the vicarage, it is me
only who tore into pieces at morgue and I bade farewell to my mortal remains in
misty eyes, because I am the common men.
Still, I dream, for a true democratic free India out
of evils of all draconian misdeed by a few and hope for this on the eve of our
71st Independence Day, only the hope that prevails.
HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY!!!
Reference:
‘Fast post’ dated
13.08.16
RAND: Center for Asia pacific policy: an
international specific paper on A Comparison of the Health Systems in China and
India Sai Ma& Neeraj Sood
Education India –Wikipedia
Statisticstimes.com
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