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LETTERS

Issn 0012-9976
Ever since the first issue in 1966,
EPW has been Indias premier journal for
comment on current affairs
and research in the social sciences.
It succeeded Economic Weekly (1949-1965),
which was launched and shepherded
by Sachin Chaudhuri,
who was also the founder-editor of EPW.
As editor for thirty-five years (1969-2004)
Krishna Raj
gave EPW the reputation it now enjoys.

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Economic and Political Weekly


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Editor: Paranjoy Guha Thakurta.

Struggle for Democratic Rights

n 4 April, the Supreme Court of India


granted me bail, and I have finally
returned home, after spending more
than three and a half months in prison,
pursuant to the cancellation of the interim bail granted to me by the Bombay
High Court. This last stint in jail has adversely affected my health and I have to
resume medical treatment immediately,
to try and restore basic mobility of some
of my limbs and muscles.
At the outset, I wish to thank all my
lawyers in Delhi, Mumbai, Nagpur and
Gadchiroli, who appeared for me, and
defended me in the strongest manner in
court, to secure my bail and while conducting the trial of my case in Gadchiroli.
Without them, I would still be languishing
in jail. My fight for justice is far from over
and I foresee many more legal challenges
in the case but I am confident that my
lawyers will deal with those challenges
with professional skill and dedication.
I would specially like to thank the
teachers, students and activists who
formed a defence committee and conducted several programmes in the last
two years demanding that I be released
forthwith. I thank G Haragopal, Nandita
Narain, Karen Gabriel, Hany Babu and all
other members of the defence committee
who relentlessly fought for my release. I
thank the Delhi University Teachers
Association (DUTA) and various teachers
unions of different universities that stood
up for my rights and release.
In prison, I got news about various
programmes that were being held across
the world demanding that I be released
from prison. That gave me the mental
strength and willpower to combat and
endure the hostile and inhuman conditions that I was exposed to in prison. I do
not personally know many of the people
who stood in my support and who came
out to protest against the violation of my
democratic rights. I feel humbled.
We now, more than ever before in our
history, face an unprecedented assault
on all forms of democratic rights and
freedoms. Our campaigns, therefore, must
not end with the release of a few individuals but must oppose all forms of injustice,

oppression and exploitation. Hundreds


of thousands of Adivasis are being displaced from their homes and forests as
they face brutal repression at the hands
of the state and so many of them remain
in jail, without proper legal representation and on very flimsy charges.
We must come out in support of the
poorest and most vulnerable sections of
our population. We must also aim to break
free from the larger prison that forces us
to live under the shackles of Brahmanical
feudalism and fascism. We must remain
vigilant, so that the rights of minorities,
both ethnic and religious, are not violated
by the state.
G N Saibaba
University of Delhi

Importance of
Crop Diversification

Mahendra Devs article Water Management and Resilience in Agriculture (EPW, 20 February 2016) was very
interesting and informative as it dwelt
on the water management issue complete
with facts and figures. I agree with the
author while he writes, Water use efficiency can be increased significantly in
Indian agriculture.
However, its judicious use is also imperative. From my experience I wish to make
some suggestions. First, in the Bankura
District of West Bengal (this is a very backward district) under the Mahatma Gandhi
National Rural Employment Guarantee
Scheme (MGNREGS), a large number of
tanks were dug on the agricultural land
of marginal and small farmers locally
known as hapa. Each hapa is 604012
feet on an average. The farmers as per
their choice (participatory approach) select the site on their agricultural land
where the hapa is to be excavated absolutely free of cost. The soil on the four
sides adjoining it is used to grow seasonal
vegetables and the water of the hapa is
used for fish-rearing as well as irrigation.
According to my study, hundreds of
poor farmers have benefited from this.
Second, at the Annavasal village in the
Kodavasal block in Thiruvarur District of
Tamil Nadu, the waterbodies of the village had salinity and to neutralise it, 12

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

LETTERS

water recharge shafts were constructed


in the waterbodies each costing Rs 7,500
so that rainwater could be recharged and
percolated down to the pond. The shaft
is a simple recharge structure to puncture
the top clay layer and allows water to
flow to the sand layer at the bottom. It
has been installed in many waterbodies
and is fetching good results since salinity
has been reduced to a great extent. The
villages were also aware of the importance of the project. They united to support the project. Third, when I was teaching in Eritrea (North-east Africa), I observed that people grew a crop called teff
out of which injeera (staple food of the
people there) is made (which looks like
the south Indian dosa). I was told that teff
was nutritious and could be grown with
little water and even in dry areas. This is
something that should be emulated in India. Fourth, while I was in Peru I observed
small farmers cultivating high value
crops like artichoke, avocado and asparagus which can be grown with little
water and can fetch good returns.
I suggest that crop diversification as well
as cultivation of millet crops and creation
of waterbodies/recharging, etc, should
be taken up in Indias rural areas based
on the local climate and soil type so that
water can be saved and managed well.
Shankar Chatterjee
Centre for Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation,
Hyderabad

Students Fight Discrimination

e, the Students Union of the University of Hyderabad, believe that


Rohith Vemulas decision to take his own
life is a symptom of a larger problem that
plagues institutions of higher education in
India. The University of Hyderabad (UoH),
considered a premier institution of India,
has not taken adequate steps to support
and protect students from socially underprivileged castes.
To address caste-based, and other
forms of discrimination in higher educational institutions, the institutions must
accept that discrimination on the basis
of caste and other identities, in overt and
covert ways, is a reality on our campuses.
The Students Union of UoH would like
to suggest an institutional mechanism
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

that shall ensure that these deep-seated


social practices are addressed head-on.
We demand that higher educational
institutions establish a Committee Against
Prejudice and Discrimination (CAPD). It
must be in keeping with Articles 15 and 21
of the Constitution of India. The main
focus of the CAPD must be to look into
complaints regarding acts of prejudice
and/or discrimination against Scheduled
Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs),
Other Backward Classes (OBCs), religious
minorities, sexual minorities, women,
transgenders, racial, and ethnic minorities. The CAPD must be structured on
the lines of the Gender Sensitisation
Committee Against Sexual Harassment
(GS-CASH). It must be widely representative (women, OBCs, religious, sexual,
racial, and ethnic minorities, etc), while
ensuring that at least half the committee
comprises SC and ST members and it is
headed by a person from SC/ST background. Student representatives must be
part of the committee.
Higher educational institutions must
collectively constitute a high-level committee to formulate rules for the CAPD immediately. And the committee must be
given a clear briefing, and a deadline to
submit its report.
A course should be introduced for all
students in universities and colleges to
increase their knowledge and understanding of the problems of caste, ethnicity, gender and other issues. This course
should be compulsory. Many countries
such as the US, Scotland and the UK have
introduced courses on civic learning or
Citizenship Education for students.
A module and administrative guidelines should be prepared to sensitise
administrators and teachers in universities and colleges. The present remedial
coaching schemes of UGC should be

reformed to make them effective with


increased funding.
An ombudsman must be appointed for
each university for redressal of grievances
of students as per the University Grants
Commission (Grievance Redressal) Regulations, 2012.
We believe that this will help the campus
communities and institutions address
issues of prejudice and discrimination,
which otherwise have no dedicated forum
to redress these kinds of grievances. It is,
we hope, understood that creating awareness about prejudiced practices, and acts
of discrimination will be one of the main
roles of the CAPD. This is the only way
that a dialogue about prejudice and discrimination can be brought about in our
educational institutions.
We hope that the heads of the higher
educational institutions will act immediately on our proposal, and help build
prejudice- and discrimination-free campuses and institutions.
Students Union, University of Hyderabad.

Errata
In Beyond Fiscal Prudence and Consolidation
by Pinaki Chakraborty and Lekha Chakraborty,
on page 29 of this issue in third column below
the equation, it should have been pd denotes
primary deficit. On the same page, the following is the correct sentence, During this entire
period, i consistently remained lower than
g. It was printed erroneously as higher.
In Evolving CentreState Financial Relations:
Role of the New Framework for Grants by
Pinaki Chakraborty and Manish Gupta, on
page 44 in third column second para, the reduced total number of Centrally Sponsored
Schemes was printed as 29, it should have
been 28. In the same article, on page 45 in column one first para, As a percentage of divisible pool should have read as As a percentage
of pool of grants.
The corrected version is on the EPW website.

Web Exclusives
The following articles have been published in the past week in the Web Exclusives section of the EPW website.
They have not been published in the print edition.
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)

Innovating Waste ManagementBhavya Dore


Tales of BhiwandiShirin Dalvi
Is India a Secular Nation?Madhav Godbole
Should the Stilwell Road be Reopened?Jajati K Pattnaik
Dhar on TenterhooksAnshu Saluja

Articles posted before 9 April 2016 remain available in the Web Exclusives section.

vol lI no 16

LETTERS

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Economic & Political Weekly
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Economic & Political Weekly


320-321, A to Z Industrial Estate
Ganpatrao Kadam Marg,
Lower Parel, Mumbai 400 013, India
Email: edit@epw.in, epw.mumbai@gmail.com

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

EDITORIALS

A Disastrous Indifference
The apathy of citizens and officials towards fire safety norms must be tackled.

he fire at the Puttingal Devi Temple at Kollam in Kerala on


10 April that claimed 106 lives and injured over 300 people is
yet another affirmation of our apathy and indifference to the
need for obeying rules. Whether it is in the flouting of safety regulations that led up to the disastrous event or handling of its consequences and aftermath, there is utter contempt for the rule of law in
the knowledge that no accountability will be demanded, that political overlords will do their utmost to shift blame to protect their own
and that the media will lose interest in what happened in a short
while. And yet, it is not only the authorities and managements that
deserve censure, it is also society at large and the patrons of superspeciality hospitals, cinema theatres, high-rise residential buildings
and religious places who (with a few honourable exceptions) do
not insist on the culprits facing action and the rules being enforced.
The Kollam temple case is a clear-cut one of how all these
factors culminated. Safety norms about storage of explosive
materials were simply ignored; the local politicians had no doubt
that they had to please their constituents and the temple
authorities knew that when it came to an event tied up with religion, they could count on public sentiments to support them. A
Member of Parliament (MP) who visited the site has said that
even the much-touted district administrations denial of permission for the fireworks show that led to the accident actually prohibited only the competitive part of the show and the police
remained mere spectators, not daring to take action against an
event that was in direct contravention of a Supreme Court ban
on fireworks display between 10 pm and 6 am. Nor does the long
list of failures stop here. The makers of the firecrackers had used
banned chemicals and the organisers had turned a blind eye to
the precaution of keeping a 100-metre distance between the display and the viewers. Residents around the temple who have
been complaining for years were intimidated and even the notices banning the fireworks competition issued by the additional district magistrate and district collector were attributed
to their being Muslims and therefore a vengeful act.
Earlier this week, a building in Bhiwandi near Mumbai caught
fire which was brought under control by seven fire tenders fighting it for over an hour. The builder-owners had built two floors
above an existing powerloom factory without permission or no
safety measures. There was only one narrow staircase in the entire
building which was also not compliant with safety standards.

Surely, a four-storey residential building above a factory could not


have escaped official attention. A horrific fire charred the bodies of
eight young people in Mumbai on 16 October last year in a hotel.
Despite the hotel management violating every safety and building
rule, the authorities feigned ignorance, and a few of the residents
around it claimed that they had complained but did not follow up
because they knew it would yield nothing. In Mumbai again, in
May last year four fire brigade officials, including the chief and
deputy chief fire officer died in a blaze that spread due to the combustible materials stored in the garment godowns and gold workshops in an old building, followed by a fire in a 21-storey building
in Mumbais posh Powai area that took seven lives. The Uphaar
Cinema theatre fire in Delhi in 1997 that took 59 lives and injured
over 100 and the AMRI Hospital fire in Kolkata in 2011 that claimed
95 lives are among the worst accidents caused by the neglect of
basic safety regulations for commercial advantage.
Most staff and residents of high-rises in India have no clue
about fire safety and emergency measures, let alone knowledge
of fire auditing. Incidentally, Part 4 of the National Building Code
of India (2005) deals exclusively with fire and life safety and
runs into nearly 88 pages of detailed specifications. It is common
to hear managements of commercial establishments referring to
harassment from the authorities in the form of notices for violating safety norms. The byzantine rules are seen as opportunities
to demand bribes rather than as norms which must be followed.
The India Risk Survey 2015 by the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) and Pinkerton has rated
fire at number nine in the risk positions. Shockingly, as against
the 70,868 fire stations mandated by the Standing Fire Advisory
Council norms only 1,705 exist and the shortages are: 97.59% in
fire stations, 96.28% in terms of firemen and 80.04% in fire tenders and rescue vehicles.
But apart from stricter compliance of disaster prevention
rules, it is also important to fast-track litigation. The Association
of the Victims of Uphaar Tragedy (AVUT) fought bravely for over
18 years but after the apex court ruling last year said that they
felt cheated by the judiciary and the government that did not
punish officials who allowed the flouting of all rules by the theatre owners. Above all, however, it is the awareness and vigilance
of citizens and the involvement of the community that will force
the costly wall of indifference to come down.

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

april 16, 2016

Scarcity of Good Governance


It is water management, not water scarcity that is the real problem.

ven if all cricket pitches in the country remain unwatered


for the next month, nothing would change for the millions
of people who struggle each day for a drop of water. The
Bombay High Courts judgment on 13 April, in response to a public
interest litigation (PIL), ordering Indian Premier League (IPL)
cricket matches to shift out of drought-stricken Maharashtra
from next month might be good for optics but does precious little
to address the root of the problem of water scarcity. The crisis that
Maharashtra and nine other states in the country are facing is not
just scarcity of water but also an acute scarcity of good governance.
The water crisis is not just the result of two consecutive failed
monsoons, it is a direct outcome of the inability of the governments over decades to manage sensibly, sensitively and sustainably Indias water resources. Typically, when water becomes
scarce, the discussion swings between two binariesemergency
water supply and checking wasteful use. Thus, trains with water
are rushed to Latur and the court orders a stop to wasteful use
of water for cricket pitches. But once the rains come, and this
time a good monsoon is predicted, it will be business as usual.
Maharashtra has 1,845 dams, more than any other state in
India, and yet only around 18% of its farmland is irrigated. The
recent dam scam exposed the extent to which public funds have
been used to build dams without yielding irrigation benefits. Of
the 70,000 minor irrigation projects in the state, only 12% are
working today. Politics, specifically the power of the so-called
sugar lobby, rather than prudence, has dictated the allocation of
surface water for irrigation. Cutting across party lines, no state
government will contemplate placing any limits on water-intensive sugar cane cultivation, even in water-scarce regions like
Marathwada, or on sugar factories that need thousands of litres
of water everyday. In fact, 80 of the states 205 sugar factories are
located in Marathwada and despite the failure of the monsoon in
the last two seasons, the area under sugar cane cultivation has
increased. Also, while there is no check on such unsustainable use
of water for agriculture, the Madhav Chitale Committee report on
irrigation revealed a massive diversion of public funds in the name
of providing irrigation. Despite an expenditure of `70,000 crore,
the increase in irrigated area over a decade was a mere 0.1%.
Clearly, the promise of water is a lucrative business.
However, the real reason for the water crisis is the mismanagement of groundwater sources. Despite the dams, most of

Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

Maharashtras agricultural land is rain-fed and dependent on


groundwater. The wilful overuse of groundwater resources, combined with the absence of measures to replenish these resources,
has led to the state being in a constant state of crisis in the months
preceding the monsoon. Maharashtra should have learned some
lessons from the 1972 drought that resulted in millions of people
suffering. That crisis gave birth to the pioneering Employment
Guarantee Scheme (EGS), which not only guaranteed the rural poor
work but also used the available labour to take steps that would
conserve surface water and replenish groundwater. Many important interventions in ways to replenish underground aquifers, such
as desilting ponds and tanks, contour bunding, percolation tanks,
recharging shallow wells, etc, were demonstrated through the EGS
works. The EGS was the role model for the Mahatma Gandhi
National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). Unfortunately, at a time when 10 states are struggling to cope with
drought conditions, the central government is holding back funds
for MGNREGS. Last week, the Supreme Court asked the governments representative why it was dragging its feet. While the
states have reportedly asked for funds to cover 3.15 billion person days, the centre has agreed to only 980 million person days.
This is not just cruel, given the desperation in rural areas, it is
short-sighted in the extreme as MGNREGS could be instrumental
for undertaking long-term water conservation works.
Whenever drought strikes, we look up at the skies and hope for
the best. Meanwhile, everything that can conserve and replenish
existing water sources is ignored, or addressed half-heartedly.
Compounding the crisis is the situation in our urban areas. As in the
rural areas, there has to be a drastic change in urban water management. Urban built forms in India have slavishly followed patterns
in the industrialised North without considering the scarcity of a
basic resource like potable water. Unless rules are set in place for
water use and conservation in our urban spaces, water will remain
scarce and its availability inequitable. As for groundwater, urban
India has withdrawn at such a pace that perennial deep underground aquifers have been permanently depleted. Surface sources
such as lakes and streams have been filled up, often deliberately, to
generate more land. Given this, clashes over scarce resources like
water will intensify in urban India. There is no magic wand to
produce water out of air; only long-term prudence and planning
to use this important resource will address the crisis.
7

EDITORIALS

Colonial Hangover of the Moral Police


Maharashtras new act on bar dancers has nothing to improve their working conditions.

he moral police is on the prowl, working its confounding ways on dance bars yet again. While grudgingly
giving up on the ban of dance bars, legislators in Maharashtra have succeeded in creating yet another legislation
and how! The labels of obscene and immoral being

applied to the performances of bar dancers again impose


on the dancer the moral onus of not performing acts that
arouse or are viewed as sexual. This was to be expected
in the current atmosphere of conservatism endorsed by the
ruling power.
april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

EDITORIALS

The Supreme Court in October 2015 had ruled that the ban on
dance bars cannot be upheld in law. On 2 March, the Court
rapped the state government, ordering it to grant licences to dance
bars by 15 March. It is more than a decade since the ban on
dance bars was first put in place in 2005. The Maharashtra legislature has since, and only at the behest of the judiciary, progressed to lifting the ban, and has now put in place the Maharashtra Prohibition of Obscene Dance in Hotels, Restaurants
and Bar Rooms and Protection of Dignity of Women (Working
Therein) Act, 2016. The act was passed by both houses of the
Maharashtra legislature on consecutive days, 11 and 12 April,
unanimously and without any debate whatsoever.
As reported by the news media, the Association of Hotels and
Restaurants (AHAR) is planning to challenge the impractical
conditions of the act at the Supreme Court hearing scheduled
on 18 April, claiming that the government did not consult them,
the stakeholders, before tabling the bill, which, having been
passed unexamined, is now an act. The rules and regulations
mandatory installation of CCTV cameras in the performing area,
clearance of performances to be obtained from the censor
board, the dance floor to be 5 ft from the audience with the
dancers enclosed by a 3 ft tall fence, liquor not allowed to be
served in the performing areas, dance bars not allowed within 1
km of educational and residential establishments, restricted operational timingshave the stakeholders in a bind over their
impracticality. Keeping in mind the experience of law enforcement in India, there is, after all, no guarantee that they will not
be harassed by the state machinery any less than they are now.
What is lost in more than a decade of back and forth between
the legislature and the judiciary is the very rationale behind the ban
and this grudging attempt by the legislature to comply with judicial orders: the pandering to and satisfaction of the moral appetite
of the nations collective conscience. The very terminology used
in the naming of the actprohibition, obscene, protection, dignityevokes the obscurantist 19th century colonial
idea of morality, which was appropriated by the upper castes/
classes, the sole members of the aforementioned collective.
There are interesting insights that can be drawn from the early
20th centurys anti-nautch movement and formulation of laws
regarding the devadasi tradition. Though the early devadasi laws
the Bombay (Protection) and Madras (Prevention of Dedication)
Actsdeemed the tradition unlawful stating prostitution as the

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april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

reason, they did not moralise. The language of the later Andhra
Pradesh and Karnataka (Prohibition of Dedication) Acts was,
however, morality-laden. If its religious linkages could not help the
well-established and accepted devadasi dance tradition survive
the colonial, and later the Indian upper caste/class morality, bar
dancing would surely rank way below it on the morality scale.
The present act takes it up a notch with its Section 2.8, which,
apart from including the vaguely worded obscenity clauses of
Section 294 of the Indian Penal Code, defines obscene dance
as a dance (i) which is designed only to arouse the prurient interest of the audience; and (ii) which consists of a sexual act,
lascivious movements, gestures for the purpose of sexual propositioning or indicating the availability of sexual access to the
dancer, or in the course of which, the dancer exposes his or her
genitals or, if a female, is topless.
It is then the linking of prostitution, on the one hand, and the
linking of the idea that womens sexual autonomy, agency, desires
and sexual expression manifested by way of dancing (or any other
way, for that matter) is inherently immoral, on the other hand,
which is at the root of both, the anti-nautch movement that culminated in the elimination of much more than a dance tradition,
and the hankering for doing away with vulgar and obscene
dance by banning dance bars. In fact, the term immoral purpose has been mentioned in Section 8.2 of the act. Immoral is a
category that is open to interpretation, whereas illegal is a definite category. Why was illegal purpose not used here instead?
Instead of regularising the working conditions of bar dancers
for which just the enforcement of the extant labour laws and
regulations would suffice, why does the legislature insist on
passing yet another act? Especially when the act is one thatinstead of legislating about the Protection of Dignity of Women
who work as bar dancers, as it claims toends up conflating
morality with legality, as is the usual practice. If the state were
truly concerned about the welfare of bar dancers, how is it that
licences to operate were given to these bars in the first place, without ensuring that they adhere to labour laws and regulations? Are
dance bars not places of employment, and the dancers employees?
What some of our legislators consider Indian tradition and
nationalism is archaic and anachronistic, to say the least.
The chosen representatives of our collective conscience have
become a morally intoxicated lot passing bills as if they were
salt shakers being passed across the table.

EDITORIALS

First Published in 1966

To mark 50 years of EPW, each week in 2016 will


present an extract from our archives.

Vol XVII, Nos 14, 15 and 16

april 1982

Crisis-Maker in Crisis

Romesh Thapar
Who told Indira Gandhi to hold a snap press
conference at Palam airport to denounce her
daughter-in-law? The same advice prevailed in
the hysterical activity at the house when the
daughter-in-law was told to get out. Surely,
Indira Gandhi could not have become so oblivious of her position as Prime Minister.
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

... Maneka can play havoc with the family.


Anything and everything she says will be believed widely. Every story, real or manufactured, will be chased by magazines which flourish on such stuff. Maneka is no innocent. She is
backed by the lumpen leaders of the Emergency,
who rose to prominence as Sanjays elite corps.
These fellows know how to exploit situations,
to muck-rake, to blackmail, to terroriseand
they always have the money to operate.
The story will not die. It will emergise [sic] itself in explosive political gossip and scandal. It will
thresh around telling tales about one personality
or another. It will provide enormous material for
backgrounders. Then the deals of the family
will come into focus, the whole murky area of kickbacks and funding, of local accounts and external accounts, of untraced deposits, of conduits.

vol lI no 16

... Indira Gandhi has developed all kinds of


absurd theories about the Maneka business, the
most absurd being that it is an RSS conspiracy.
Yes, the BJP has been dipping its fingers in the
goo, but only to the extent that Maneka has
sought it out to build a feeling of security. Even
individual editors have been told of her fears.
This is all part of a careful attempt to canalise
discontent within the Congress(I). What the
Opposition elements fail to understand is that
they are getting mixed up with the dregs of the
Congress(I). They will see it soon enough. Indira
Gandhi might then get over her conspiracy theories and realise that her planning of a dynasty
has intoxicated her family.
The levelling down that has resulted from the
sas-bahu tangle has certainly taken another
layer of charisma off Indira Gandhi.

LAW & SOCIETY

Who Will Bell the Cop?


Police Reforms and Law Enforcement
Alok Prasanna Kumar

Merely enacting laws, however


well-intentioned, to overcome
social evils in a society will fail if
these laws are not implemented.
Two instances are legislation
relating to prenatal diagnostics
and the prevention of atrocities
against Dalits. The failure in
implementation can be
attributed to the police forces
lacking the capability to be
modern law enforcement
agencies. Wide-ranging and
in-depth police reforms are
therefore necessary to ensure that
laws are actually implemented
and effective.

Alok Prasanna Kumar (alok.prasanna@


vidhilegalpolicy.in) is Senior Resident Fellow at
Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy, New Delhi.

10

hen a social problem of some


sort is brought to the public
eye in an effort to address it,
one of the first cries in response is to
seek to criminalise it, to outlaw on pain
of criminal prosecution. These are not
cries in the wilderness. In the history of
social reform legislation in Indiastarting with outlawing of Sati under Company Rule,1 all the way to the Criminal
Law (Amendment) Act, 2013 enacted
consequent on the Report of the Committee on Amendments to Criminal Law,
headed by Justice J S Vermawhen a
certain social evil is sought to be put an
end to, criminal law has been used as a
response to it.
The response has been either to make
such activity punishable as an offence
or, if it is already punishable, to enhance
the punishment and make it more stringent. We see one of these approaches in
a wide variety of laws such as the Dowry
Prohibition Act, 1961, the Scheduled
Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 (henceforth,
atrocities act), and even the Narcotic
Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act,
1985. Such legislative responses have
been seen at the state level as well with
respect to superstitious practices,2 witchhunting,3 etc. The thinking seems to be
that using criminal law and the threat of
prosecution of the perpetrators by the
state acts as some sort of deterrent against
the commission of these social evils.
What has happened after such laws
were passed is an altogether different
matter. Almost uniformly the effects of
these laws on tackling the social evil in
question have been marginal at best.
They have had no impact on addressing
the social evil they were supposed to
counter, and, in some instances (notably
Section 498A of the Indian Penal Code,
1860), such laws have proved to be

counterproductive, becoming a handy


tool for extortion through abuse of the
process of law.
The poster child for laws that have
completely failed at the implementation
stage has to be the Pre-conception and
Pre-natal Diagnostic Techniques (Prohibition of Sex Selection) Act, 1994, intended to impose harsh punishments on prenatal diagnostics usually used to abort
female foetuses. Indias perilous child
sex-ratio is a testament to the widespread failure of this legislation.4 With
only about 600 cases being registered
and only 20 persons being prosecuted in
the first decade of its operation, it is perhaps not surprising that one study found
that even knowledge of the law and its
penalties did not deter women and their
families from seeking abortions of
female foetuses (Kumar et al 2014).
While the atrocities act was passed to
provide for enhanced criminal punishment for offences against members of
Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes,
a study of cases under the atrocities act
conducted a few years ago, found that in
three southern states of India, the conviction rate for offences under the atrocities act was as little as 5% with the bulk
of acquittals being a result of witnesses
turning hostile (CSCCL 2011). This, at a
time when the number of atrocities
against Dalits in the country has been on
the increase, the large number of acquittals suggests that the law has failed in its
deterrent role and allowed perpetrators
to act with near impunity. Even though
the atrocities act provides for criminal
penalties against police officers who fail to
carry out their duties properly in respect
of atrocities that they are supposed to investigate and prosecute, it has clearly
not had the intended effect in ensuring
proper investigation and prosecution.
Although only two instances have
been cited above, any number of laws
can be pointed to as an example of the
common malaise of weak and ineffective enforcement. This commonality is
attributable to the state of the police
forces at the state level, each dysfunctional in its own manner. Inherited from
the colonial state, police forces in India

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LAW & SOCIETY

have not been updated and professionalised to become modern law enforcement agencies. Rather, they still seem to
see their primary task as one of maintaining order among a colonised populace,
rather than enforcing laws in a modern,
liberal democracy (Shahane 2015).
Belling the Cat
The issue of police reforms is one which
suffers from the belling the cat problemeveryone wants it to be done, but
no one is willing to do so on their own.
Public order and police being within
the lawmaking power of the state governments as mandated under the Constitution, the primary responsibility for
carrying out any police reform would lie
with the state governments. However,
despite multiple commissions and reports
suggesting such reforms, no serious
movement towards any police reform
was seen for a long time. The Supreme
Court of India stepped into the picture in
2006 with its order in a public interest
litigation filed by retired Indian Police
Services officer, Prakash Singh (Prakash
Singh and Others v Union of India and
Others 2006). Drawing upon various
report and studies by commissions set
up to suggest police reforms in India, the
Supreme Court distilled these into seven
binding directions to state governments
as measures to be undertaken to reform
the police at the state level. These directions relate to:
(i) Creation of a State Security Commission that would reduce the influence of
the state government on the police;
(ii) Minimum tenure of two years for the
director general of police, inspector
general and the other senior ranked
officers, to keep their tenure free from
government interference;
(iii) Separation of investigating police
from those tasked with maintaining law
and order;
(iv) Creation of a Police Establishment
Board, which will take decisions on all
service issues, such as for policemen;
(v) Creation of a police complaints authority to look into complaints against
police officers.
While these reforms are basic and just
about scratch the surface in addressing
the problems plaguing the police forces
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april 16, 2016

in India, these have not been implemented at all. Ten years after these directions
were issued by the Supreme Court, most
state governments have not implemented
them, seeking, on the other hand, modifications to these to suit their needs.
With contempt petitions and modification applications currently pending in
the Supreme Court, the enforcement of
even these limited directions looks like a
long and hard slog ahead.

the implementation of the law. There is


no systematic study of the capabilities
and capacity of existing law enforcement
mechanisms, such as the police or the
courts, to handle new obligations under
a new law. In the hurry to be seen to be
doing something it is quite likely that
taking the easy legislative route, far
from addressing existing problems, only
adds new ones, even exacerbating the
existing problems.

Long-term Changes

Notes

What the directions in the Prakash Singh


case do not address are the long term,
institutional changes that are needed to
make the police in India professional,
responsible, and accountable to the public at large. Reforms have to start from
the kind of training given to police officers at all levels in India, sensitising them
to the need to respond to the concerns of
citizens and uphold laws.
In addition, the composition of police
forces, along the lines of caste, religion
and gender, needs to be seriously examined. A police force that does not adequately understand or empathise with
the concerns of the weaker sections of
society and carries prejudiced notions
will, far from addressing the oppression
faced by these sections, only add to
them. What is needed perhaps is an allround restructuring of the manner of
recruitment in the police forces at all
levels to see if they can be made more
inclusive and representative of the general
population of that state. These reforms
will take a generation to undertake and
implement fully, but a start has to be
made now for any real effects to be felt
in the near future. The aim of all these
reforms should be to reorient the police
towards becoming a body that takes
upholding law as seriously as it takes
maintaining order as its primary task.
Given the costs and procedure involved, passing a law outlawing or enhancing criminal penalties for social evils
and practices may actually be the easier
part of addressing a social problem. The
difficult part rests in the implementation
of the law in a large and diverse country
such as India. In enacting laws there is
little, if any, attention paid to the existing
institutions that have been tasked with
vol lI no 16

1
2

3
4

Bengal Sati Regulation, 1829.


Maharashtra Prevention and Eradication of
Human Sacrifice and Other Inhuman, Evil and
Aghori Practices and Black Magic Act, 2013.
Odisha Prevention of Witch-hunting Act, 2013.
It has declined from 927 in 2001 to 919 in 2011
(Press Information Bureau 2014).

References
CSCCL (2011): Study on Performance of Special
Courts Set Up under the SC ST Prevention of
Atrocity Act, Centre for Study of Casteism,
Communalism and Law, National Law School,
Bangalore, viewed on 11 April 2016, http://
idsn.org/wp-content/uploads/user_folder/pdf
/New_files/India/Performan_of_courts_SC
ST_act-_Study.pdf.
Kumar, Nithin et al (2014): Awareness and Attitudes Regarding Prenatal Sex Determination,
Pre-Conception and Pre-Natal Diagnostic Techniques Act (PCPNDTA) among Pregnant Women
in Southern India, Journal of Clinical & Diagnostic Research, Vol 8, No 10, pp JC09JC11,
viewed on 11 April 2016, http://www.ncbi.nlm.
nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4253190/.
Prakash Singh and Others v Union of India and
Others (2006): SCC, SC, 8, p 1.
Press Information Bureau (2014): Decline in Child
Sex Ratio, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India, viewed on 11 April
2016, http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease.
aspx?relid=103437.
Shahane, Girish (2015): Why Police in India Focus
on Maintaining Order and Not Upholding the
Law, 12 August, viewed on 11 April 2016,
http://scroll.in/article/747992/why-police-inindia-focus-on-maintaining-order-and-not-upholding-the-law.

Obituaries
The EPW has started a monthly section,
Obituaries, which will note the passing of
teachers and researchers in the social sciences and humanities, as also in other areas
of work.
The announcements will be in the nature of
short notices of approximately a hundred
words about the work and careers of those
who have passed away.
Readers could send brief obituaries to
edit@epw.in.
11

COMMENTARY

Stooping to Conquer
Jats and Reservations in Haryana
Radhika Kumar

The demand for reservation


by Jats has grown stronger in
the past four months. Does this
demand reflect the changing
political economy of rural
Haryana? A historical analysis.

ffirmative action policies have


been typical to nations and institutions aiming to provide greater
representation to marginalised groups and
communities in various spheres of life.
India has had a long tradition of affirmative action or reservation policy for the
socially and educationally backward communities, a policy deeply resented and
opposed by the elite/forward communities. While these policies have only been
marginally successful in ameliorating the
condition of the backwards, it is the
socially forward communities which are
now aggressively demanding reservation.
This shift in the elite discourse has
threefold implications. First, it challenges
the logic of reservation policy, which is
now vulnerable to elite capture. Second,
it also flexes its muscle in the electoral
arena revitalising identity politics and
patronclient relations. Third, the elite
demand resurrects the idea of a welfare
state in an economy which is rapidly
liberalising. This article attempts to flesh
out the policy and politics that drives the
contemporary demand for reservation
from the Jat community in Haryana.
Why and When

Radhika Kumar (radhikaku@hotmail.com)


teaches Political Science in Motilal Nehru
College, University of Delhi.
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

Affirmative action policies are related


to concerns of social justice while
they also aim at enriching the social
pool with suppressed talents and
social assets. The purpose is to create
a set of resemblances such that
vol lI no 16

all can acquire skill sets which are


considered socially valuable in the
given institutional set-up. However,
resemblances by themselves do not
imply sameness. The reference is
instead to a threshold level beyond
which all are capable of exercising their
agency without being burdened with
ascriptive identities that lead to various
forms of discrimination.
The question, when reservations is
much more complicated. Reservations for
the educationally and socially backward
classes were envisaged in the Constitution. However, criteria for determining
them remain disputed. While economic
backwardness may be objectively ascertained, social backwardness is a matter of
interpretation. Caste and traditional occupations have often been used as determinants of social backwardness.1 Exercises
in self-identification of backward castes
based on studies by the National Sample
Survey (NSS) reveal that in 19992000,
36% of the respondents considered themselves as members of the Other Backward Classes (OBC). However, by 2011
12 this number had grown to 44% (Desai
2016). Given the decadal increase in
number of self-identified OBCs there is
quite clearly a mismatch between official policies of reservation and popular
perceptions of backwardness.
As the politics of reservation takes
over the policy of reservation, identification takes precedence over formal/official categorisation. Given that identities
are fluid and malleable, self-identification is also a dynamic process moving up
and down the varna hierarchy.
Fluidity of Caste Identity
The contested nature of Jat identity
feeds into the fluidity which gained
15

COMMENTARY

specific contours in the early 20th century.


This evolution is also remarkable. Settling
along the banks of the Yamuna, the Jat
communities transformed from being
plunderers and bandits preying on the
imperial lines of communication (Bayly
in Datta 1999a: 10) to being warrior
cultivators and semi-pastoralists (Datta
1999a: 11). It is instructive to mention
here the practice of bhaichara amongst
the Jats in Punjab. The concept implied
observing certain customary practices
amongst the community linked particularly to the characteristic of hard work
and industriousness.
Jat clan egalitarianism, which included
an emphasis on HinduMuslim unity
and extended to the Gujjars as well was
extremely hierarchical with regard to
women and the agricultural labour
communities.2 However, more interesting
is the oscillating relationship between
the Jat community and various Hindu
identity-based dispensations. It is argued
that the Shuddhi movement initiated
by the Arya Samajists included inducting
the Jats into the Varna of the Kshatriyas.
Their flirtation with the Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP), particularly during
the Ayodhya movement in the late 1980s,
including display of militant Hinduism
was driven by a need to anchor themselves in the category of the upper
castes (Jaffrelot 2010: 444).
Under Jat leaders during the first
decade of the 20th century there was an
attempt to assert the Kisanness of the
Jat community and in doing this Jat
leader Chhotu Ram positioned himself
in opposition to the Arya Samajists criticising them for being dominated by the
Banyas (Jaffrelot 2010: 43233).3 As
Datta (1999a: 190) argues,
...Jat identity was formed through the creation of an imagined past; through myths of
kingship, kinship, warrior origin; through
parables of social exclusiveness, through a
recognition of the need for education, economic and social improvement...

Jat identity was based on a strong


process of othering, namely, distinguishing them from both the upper castes and
the lower castes. The social identity so
constructed was underscored by the
possession of land as an indicator of
economic prosperity.
16

The concept of the dominant caste as


described by M N Srinivas is one which is
positioned in the middle of the ritualistic
hierarchy, is numerically larger than other
castes and exercises control over local
socio-economic resources (Jeffrey 2001:
221). Traditionally, Jats have been known
to associate social status and honour to
zamin and zamindari (Mooney 2011:
180). However, the emergence of the
Jats as an economically dominant rural
caste became possible with the Green
Revolution which was particularly successful in Haryana.
Economic Foundation
For instance, Jaffrelot (2010: 434) traces
the evolution of Jat identity under the
leadership of Charan Singh in western
Uttar Pradesh. He writes that he tried to
promote the idea of a kisan. In doing so,
he was defending a way of life (Jaffrelot
2010: 436) quite typically that of the Jats.
As Jaffrelot argues, while both Chhotu
Ram and Charan Singh developed Kisancentred narratives, the latter was more
tuned to the political realities and therefore adeptly prodded this identity in
the direction of backwardness (Jaffrelot
2010: 436).4
In Haryana, given the predominance
of the peasantcultivator mode of production, around 57% of landholdings in
the state were classified as small or
marginal (less than 2 acres) while the all
India figures for small and marginal
landholdings was 75% of the total. Also,
the average size of an operational landholding in Haryana was 2.76 hectares
while the all India average was only 1.69
hectares. Yet, Haryana also saw rapid
decline in the size of average landholding
which fell by 21% between the early 1980s
and the mid-1980s which was the highest
in the country; the national average
decline was only 9% (Sethi 2011: 120).5
While the subdivision of land within
families has contributed to reduced individual holdings, land acquisition by the
government in parts of Haryana that are
close to the national capital has also
changed economic equations in the rural
belt. The owner cultivator castes including Jats and Gujjars were forced to sell
their lands and the consequent monetisation of assets encouraged consumerist

trends, especially amongst the young.


On the other hand, this also resulted in
loss of livelihood options and resulted in
an increase in crime rates.
Closing of Ranks
Tracing the historicity of the Jat demand
for reservation, Datta (1999b: 3172) writes
that the All India Jat Mahasabha, founded
in 1905 forcefully expressed the twin
demands for recognition as a Kshatriyas
caste through the Arya Samaj and the
demand for reservation by way of claiming
the status of an agricultural caste. These
demands were however rejected by both
the colonial authorities as well as the upper castes. The Mandalisation of politics
in the 1990s led to the Jats relegating
the demand for Kshatriyas status to the
private sphere (Datta 1999b: 3172) while
they raised the pitch for reservations.
In Haryana, the first Backward Classes
Commission, the Gurnam Singh Commission, was set up in 199091. The
commission recommended 26% reservation for the OBC category in Haryana and
inclusion of Jats, Jat Sikhs, Ahir, Bishnoi,
Meo, Rajput, Gujjar, Rode, Saini and Tyagi
communities within the category of the
OBCs. The then Hukum Singh government
notified the inclusion of Jats within the
OBC category but this was later withdrawn by the Bhajan Lal government in
May 1991. Two subsequent commissions
in the state did not recommend inclusion of Jats in the OBC category. Referring to the recommendations of the
Mandal Commission the All India Jat
Aarakshan Samiti noted that the commission viewed Jats as a community
which were politically well represented
as Charan Singh had become a union
minister in 1952. Also that the Jats did
not see themselves as backward and
that demanding reservation would be
below their dignity.
The samiti members claimed that this
view of the commission was incorrect
and did not reflect the ground reality in
the state (Rajalakshmi 2010).6 The Jats
argued that they shared hukkah-pani or
similar status relations with members of
castes which were already included within the category of the OBCs. Also, they had
extended families in neighbouring states
where Jats had been included in the OBC

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COMMENTARY

category7 and, therefore, the government


should not discriminate against the Jats of
Haryana. However, as has been observed,
status of the same caste is variable across
states. As Rajalakshmi (2010) notes, Kunbi
and Kurmi communities, which are not
listed as backward in Gujarat, are included in the OBC category in Madhya
Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and
Bihar. This gels in well with Andre
Beteilles observation that caste inequalities are not so much cumulative as
they are dispersed. This could be applicable to regionally dispersed intra-caste
inequalities as much as inter-caste variations. The Jats are viewed as an internally differentiated community (Datta
1999b: 3172).8
In December 2012, the Bhupinder Singh
Hooda government in Haryana accepted
the recommendation of the States Backward Classes Commission granting 10%
reservation to five communities9 including the Jats under the category of Special
Backward Classes (SBC). The move by
the government was to forestall the agitation by the Sarvjat Khap Aarakshan
Samiti (representing all Jat Khaps of
Haryana).10 The decision was challenged in the High Court of Punjab and
Haryana which stayed the quota in July
2015. Subsequently on 27 September, the
state government withdrew the 10% SBC
quota and opened the reserved seats in
educational institutions for students
from the general category. In February
2016, the Jats launched a massive agitation in Haryana demanding reservation.
The state government hoped to reach
a compromise by providing a 20% economically backward persons (EBP) quota
with the economic criteria fixed at Rs 6
lakh per annum. However, the offer was
unacceptable to agitators. The quota is
not expected to stand judicial scrutiny
as the 50% quota limit set by the
Supreme Court in the Indira Sawhney
case has already been reached in Haryana. The agitation was withdrawn only
after the central government stepped in
with an assurance that all possible
options for extending reservations to
Jats would be explored. The Jat demand
for reservations has led to a deep castebased polarisation in Haryana. From
being a community of 36 biraderis or
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april 16, 2016

castes, it is now 35 castes versus the one


caste of the Jats.
In Conclusion
Economic liberalisation as adopted by
India in the early 1990s provided an
alternative to the non-backward classes.
A tacit agreement ensued: market
oppor tunities for the forward classes
and state largesse for the backward
classes. However, in the recent past,
the clamour for recognition as backward by the forward classes has been
getting louder. Jeffrey (2010: 466), in his
work in Meerut District in north-western
Uttar Pradesh, looks at the socio-economic
challenges faced by the dominant middleclass Jat farmers in the 1990s. The three
challenges faced by the Jats related to the
rise of the lower castes, impact of liberalisation and demographic shifts. The former
instilled fear of what he calls downward
mobility. Liberalisation had an impact on
the availability of government employment as the state was downsized. State
educational facilities stagnated and the
private sector flourished unregulated.
Therefore, while the Jats increasingly
encouraged their children to get educated,
they did not possess enough cultural
capital or an adequate skill set to be
employable. They were looking for
middle-class jobs which were few and
far between (Jeffrey 2010: 469). Only few
educated children of the Jats were able to
get salaried employment while others
accepted the gap in education and employment as an inevitable period of
waiting. It is this period of compulsory
waiting which becomes pivotal to strategies of mobilisation. While compensatory
discrimination policies need to be revisited and revised, a newer demand by
economically secure groups threatens to
jeopardise the very purpose of compensatory discrimination, reversing as it
were the original intent behind the policy.
Second, the inability of the state to
rethink compensatory discrimination
also prevents it from rejecting these
newer demands which come from vocal
and visible forward classes. Finally, the
changing elite discourse captures the
dilemma of the Indian state which is
pushing ever harder in the direction of
economic liberalisation, yet, on the other

vol lI no 16

hand, is also faced with demands for


state support couched in the language of
justice and moral imperatives and repeatedly bargained for in the electoral arena.
notes
1 The Mandal Commission set up in 1980 identified 3,743 backward castes on the basis of
social, economic and educational criteria.
2 A strong jajmanikamin (patronclient) relationship is said to have existed amongst the
dominant and dynamic castes, including in the
area of the upper-Doab and Haryana. Most of
the castes such as carpenters, blacksmiths,
sweepers, Chamars, water-carriers and others
were dependent on the Jats on account of the
greater agricultural resources that the latter
held. In a study of the Khaps and Sarva-Khaps
(represents all the Jat clans and Khaps of other
castes in the region) in Meerut Division, see
Pradhan (1965: 1822).
3 The colonial government made common cause
with the agriculturalists and passed the Punjab
Alienation of Land Act in 1900. The act placed
a moratorium on all land purchases and mortgages for a period of 15 years. The act aimed to
protect the interests of the zamindars and
sharpened the differences between the agricultural and non-agricultural classes including
the traders, moneylenders and shopkeepers.
The act was opposed by the Indian National
Congress in its Lucknow session held in 1899.
4 Charan Singh is credited for having put together
a coalition of various castes including the Ahirs,
Jats, Gujjars and Rajputs (AJGAR). However by
the mid-1970s, as the Bharatiya Kranti Dal (BKD)
became the Bharatiya Lok Dal (BLD), quota
politics became central to its political agenda.
A clear rupture is therefore visible between quota
politics and kisan politics with the Bharatiya
Kisan Union (BKU) under the leadership of Mahendra Singh Tikait seen as the last bastion of
Jat kisan politics (Jaffrelot 2010: 440).
5 The state became notorious for massive land
acquisition by the government and private
operators under the Change of Land Use (CLU)
policy during 200414 when the Bhupinder
Singh Hooda-led Congress government was in
power in the state.
6 Rajalakshmi (2010) argues that this demand by
the Jats when clubbed with the demand for
amending the Hindu Marriage Act such that same
gotra weddings are prohibited points towards
increasing caste consolidation and assertion.
The other aspect of closing of ranks is to be seen
in growing instances of Jat violence against the
Dalit and other backward caste communities
as witnessed in Gohana in Sonepat, Mirchpur
in Hissar and Dulina in Jajjar District.
7 The Delhi government had included Jats within
the OBC list in 1999, while Uttar Pradesh did so
in 2000. Haryana, Punjab and Jammu and
Kashmir were the only three states where Jats
were not given OBC status.
8 It has been argued that Jats of Punjab and
Haryana are known to have large landholdings
and their economic condition is relatively better
compared to Jats in other states. On the other
hand, Jats in Rajasthan are essentially tenant
farmers who have been socially and economically oppressed by the Rajputs. In a study covering 2,000 households in five districts of western
UP which included ranking of various castes on
the basis of select socio-economic indicators it
was found that the condition of Jats was similar
or worse than that of other backward castes
such as Gujjars and Yadavs (Singh 2011: 21).
9 These included the Jats, Jat Sikhs, Rors, Tyagis
and Bishnois. The HBCC also recommended

17

COMMENTARY
10% reservation for the economically backward.
The Haryana government already provides 27%
reservation to the OBCs as well as 20% to the
Scheduled Castes. Hence, the total would then
amount to 57% attracting the tag of illegality
as the Supreme Court had capped reservation
at 50%.
10 This move by the Hooda government was much
resented by the non-Jats. In an RTI filed by an
NGO, Janhit Social Welfare Society, it was
found that Jats held 61%, 34% and 29% of all
jobs in the police departments of the districts of
Rohtak, Faridabad and Mahendragarh (Dogra
2012). The K C Gupta Commission which was
set up by the Hooda government in April 2011
to look into the question of reservations for Jats
noted 17.82% representation in classes I and II
government jobs and 40%50% reservation in
the lower grades. Jat representation in institutions of higher education was 10.35% while
literacy amongst Jat males was 45%, amongst
females it was 30%. It is argued that average
landholding of Jats is 23 acres while just about
10% Jats are landless (Bhatia 2016).

References
Bhatia, V (2016): Backward March, Who Are the
Jats, What Do They Want? Indian Express,
February 22, Online at: http://indianexpress.
com/article/explained/backward-march-what-the-jats-want/, viewed on 27 February 2016.
Campbell, G (1869): On the Races of India as
Traced in Existing Tribes and Castes, The
Journal of the Ethnological Society of London
(18691870), Vol 1, No 2, pp 12840.
Datta, N (1999a): Forming an Identity: A Social History
of the Jats, New Delhi: Oxford University Press.
(1999b): Jats: Trading Caste Status for Empowerment, Economic & Political Weekly,
Vol 34, No 45, 6 November, p 3172.

Desai, S (2016): Quantifying the Caste Quotas,


Hindu, 26 February.
Dogra, C S (2012): Before the Roadblock Begins,
Jat Quota Gets Green Signal, Hindu, 14 December, Online at: http://www.thehindu.com/
todays-paper/before-the-roadblock-begins-jatquota-gets-green-signal/article4198118.ece,
viewed on 22 February 2016.
Editorial (1999): Reservation: Jats Join the
Party, Economic & Political Weekly, 34(45),
5 November, p 3152, Online at: http://www.
epw.in/journal/1999/45/editorials/reservationjats-join-party.html, viewed on 25 February
2016.
Galanter, M (2004): The Long Half-Life of Reservations, Indias Living Constitution: Ideas,
Practices, Controversies, Z Hasan, E Sridharan
and R Sudharshan (eds), New Delhi: Permanent
Black, pp 30618.
Jaffrelot, C (2010): Religion, Caste and Politics in
India, Delhi: Primus Books.
Jeffrey, C (2001): A Fist Is Stronger Than Five
Fingers: Caste and Dominance in Rural North
India, Royal Geographical Society.
(2010): Youth, Class and Time among Unemployed Young Men in India, American Ethnologist, Vol 37, No 3, August, pp 46581.
Macdonell, A A (1914): The Early History of Caste
in India, The American Historical Review, Vol 19,
No 2, pp 23044.
Mooney, N (2011): Rural Nostalgias and Transnational Dreams: Identity and Modernity
among Jat-Sikhs, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Muralidharan, S (1999): The Politics of Reservations,
Frontline, Vol 16, No 24, November, pp 1326,
Online at: http://www.frontline.in/navigation/?
type=static&page=archive, viewed on 22 February 2016.

Omvedt, G (1997): Jats and Their Union (Review


of Gupta, D (1997): Rivalry and Brotherhood:
Politics in the Life of Farmers in Northern India,
Delhi: Oxford University Press), Economic &
Political Weekly, Vol 32, No 35, 30 August,
p 2197, Online at: http://www.epw.in/journal/1997/35/reviews-uncategorised/jats-andtheir-union.htm, viewed on 25 February 2016.
Parsai, G (2015): Quota: Modi Sees Merit In Jats
Case, Hindu, 28 March, Online at: http://
www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/quota-modi-sees-merit-in-jats-case/article7041742.ece, viewed on 22 February 2016.
Pinto, A (1999): Saffronisation of Affirmative Action,
Economic & Political Weekly, 25 December,
pp 364245.
Pradhan, M C (1965): The Jats of Northern India:
Their Traditional Political System I, Economic
& Political Weekly, Vol 17, No 50, 11 December,
pp 182124.
(1965): The Jats of Northern India: Their Traditional Political System II, Economic & Political
Weekly, Vol 17, No 51, 18 December, pp 185564.
Rajalakshmi, T K (2010): Upping the Ante, Frontline,
Vol 27, No 21, 922 October, online at: http://
www.frontline.in/static/html/fl2721/stories/
20101022272103300.htm, viewed on 22 February 2016.
Sethi, R M (ed) (2011): Socio-Economic Profile of
Rural India (Series II), Volume Five, North and
Central India, New Delhi: Concept Publishing.
Singh, A K (2011): Why Jat Reservations,? Economic & Political Weekly, Vol 46, No 17, 23 April,
pp 2022, Online at: http://www.epw.in/journal/2011/17/commentary/why-jat-reservations.html, viewed on 25 February 2016.
Verma, V (2012): Non-discrimination and Equality
in India: Contesting Boundaries of Social Justice,
Oxon: Routledge.

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18

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COMMENTARY

Contested Spaces,
Democratic Rights
People and Forests Today
Ajay Dandekar

The Maharashtra governments


village forest rules seek to
overturn the rights regime
established in the letter of the
law by the Scheduled Tribes and
Other Traditional Forest Dwellers
(Recognition of Forest Rights) Act
and the Panchayats (Extension to
the Scheduled Areas) Act 1996 in
terms of both community rights,
as well as the rights over minor
forest produce. Moreover, the
rules write away the future rights
of the community over forests
and their management and
control over minor forest produce
in perpetuity. These are also ultra
vires of the rules regime agreed
and enacted by an act
of Parliament.

Ajay Dandekar (ajayd16@gmail.com) is a


faculty member at the School of Humanities
and Social Sciences, Shiv Nadar University,
Greater Noida, Uttar Pradesh.

12

he Maharashtra governments gazette notification begins ironically


enough by citing the Indian Forest
Act 1927 and further reaffirms the resolve to put in place a robust framework
for empowerment of village panchayats
and gram sabhas as informed participants in the forests and natural resource
management; with particular reference
to communities and areas not covered
under PESA or for communities not eligible for rights under The Scheduled Tribes
and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers
(Recognition of Forest Right) Act, 2006
(Government of Maharashtra 2014). The
notification states the rules that pertain
to Indian Forests (Maharashtra) (Regulation of assignment, management and
cancellation of village forests) Rules 2014.
The particular formulation and the earlier citation of the Indian Forest Act 1927
creates a sense of dj vu as it brings
back an almost 90-year old dormant
formulation within the Indian Forest Act
1927 back to life in the most insidious
manner. This one act has seminal ramifications across the entire terrain governed by the Panchayat (Extension to
the Scheduled Areas) Act (PESA) 1996
and the Forest Rights Act (FRA). The
ramifications are not just limited to the
state of Maharashtra alone. At the heart
of all this is the issue of rights of the
communities in the Schedule V regions as
well as the rights of the forest dwellers.
What are these rules then and why
introduce them now?
In the context of Indias past the forests have always loomed large over our
imagination. In a case of twisted irony
emperor Asoka addressed the forest
dwellers stating that even in remorse
due to the carnage in the Kalinga war he
had the might to decisively deal with

them if they did not obey his commands.


His statement is quite revealing. It at
once establishes the claim of the state
over the forest resources and also tacitly
recognises the rights of the forest dwellers. It is more of an invitation to a dialogue rather than a call for decimation.
It also implied that the emperor did not
have decisive control over the forest and
its resources. The state in precolonial
India refused to claim monopoly rights
over forest resources. The precolonial
state also recognised the implicit principle of community control over the forests and was willing to negotiate with
the forest dwellers, thus recognising the
principle of community rights. The precolonial state thus clearly understood its
limitation and was willing to work with
the communities and did not question
the basic foundation of the shared relationship between the forests and the
communities.
The colonial state questioned the very
basis of the rights regime as nurtured by
the communities and accepted by the
polities. This it did by declaring in its
forest policy that the forests belonged to
the state. The colonial imperium by
asserting its right over the forests sought
to completely alter the fundamental
relationship that had governed forests.
The forest policy of the raj was an assertion of an imperial ambition that cared
only to exploit the forest wealth of the
colony to sustain its wealth accumulation process at the cost of the lives of the
people and the livelihoods of communities. This history of the exploitation of
the forests by the colonial state is too
well known to be recounted here.1 However there is certainly one significant context that needs a recall. After the
rebellion in Chhota Nagpur area in the
1830s, the colonial state led by the
company declared the region a Nonregulated Area. Subsequently, the tribal
areas were demarcated as Agency Areas,
and still later they devolved into what is
now called Scheduled Areas; their administration has always been a separate
affair. This demarcation partly was put
in place to acknowledge the fact that
these areas could never be completely

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COMMENTARY

subdued and thus had to be isolated. It is


against this background that we need to
contextualise the Scheduled Tribes and
Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Right) Act 2006 and
understand the genesis of the village
forest rules that are sought to be now
resurrected and the likely impact that
such a resurrection may have. In this
context it is worth recalling the original
forest act here, that is, the 1878 Forest
Act, which is in fact the backbone of the
Indian Forest Act of 1927. The Indian
Forest Act was a culmination of a policy
that was initiated in the late 19th century
by the predator colonial state. The latter
is of course a veritable bible to the governance framework of the forest insofar
as the state is concerned.
Asserting the Rights of the State
The Indian Forest Act completely codified the state control over forest. This in
itself came at the tail end of what was
the final culmination point of the process of asserting the rights of the state
on what was a complex arena of space
over which there existed community
rights regarding the use as well as the
control over the forest resources. The
history of that process now is well
known. Also well known are the struggles before the FRA was finally enacted
and the communities were assured of
their legitimate exercise of the community rights over the forest produce and
control over it as a resource. If one understands this trajectory of praxis and
its torturous route then the context of
the village forest rules and the gazette
notification will be better understood.
The gazette notification of the state government thus begins on a right note. It
states that,
these rules shall not be applicable to such
forest area covered under, or to communities
who have already acquired community forest
rights under the Scheduled Tribes and Other
Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of
Forest Rights) Act 2006 (Act No 2 of 2007)
and to any villages in the Scheduled Areas of
the State of Maharashtra where the provisions
of the Panchayats (Extension to scheduled
Areas) Act 1996 (Act no 40 of 1996) apply.

So ostensibly the village forest rules


as notified seem to exclude the areas
under the PESA and the FRA. However,
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EPW

april 16, 2016

the next few points in the notification


then nullify the issue. The exit clause
from the two seminal acts is creatively
added using the gram sabha in a twisted
irony of the situation. The notification
then says, Provided that, any gram sabha may, sue moto, make a decision, by
resolution, to adopt these rules! The
rules regime that is articulated is of
course clear and precise and it invokes
the colonial act in no uncertain terms
where an unequivocal statement is made
in the definition itself stating that, In
these rules, unless the context requires
otherwise, a Act means the Indian
Forest Act 1927 (Act No XVI of 1927), as
amended in its application to the State of
Maharashtra.
Let us examine the salient features of
these resurrected rules before we turn to
their implications and look at the overall
context in which they are now being
framed. So while rule 1(3) is categorical
that the rules shall not be applicable to
communities who have already acquired
community forest rights under the FRA
and also under the PESA in scheduled
areas, the next proviso reverses this
position and says that gram sabhas suo
motu may make a resolution to adopt
these rules. This suo motu provision as
provided for through rule three introduces a fundamental disconnect between the Scheduled Tribes and Other
Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006 (Act No 2
of the 2007 Panchayats (Extension to
the Scheduled Areas) Act 1996 (Act No
40 of 1996) as it in effect annuls rule 1(3)
and entitles the gram sabhas to sign
away their own rights. The village forest
rules thus seek to overturn the rights regime established in the letter of the law
in terms of both the community rights,
as well as the rights over minor forest
produce. Moreover, the village forest
rules also write away the future rights of
the community over the forests and its
management and its control over the
minor forest produce in perpetuity.
As per the FRA the formulation of the
rules regime that governs the protection, management, preservation and
conservation of the community forest as
a resource lies solely with the gram sabha.
This was a crucial authority vested with

vol lI no 16

it. The village forest rules however contain a provision that the gram sabha can
give away these crucial rights as well as
authority to manage and preserve the
community forest resource. As an act
enacted by the Parliament of the republic the rights recognised under the FRA
are sacrosanct and can only be taken
away by the Parliament and not by an
executive fiat. Thus the act does not provide for a unilateral surrender of rights
by the forest dwellers either voluntarily
or through the rules regime determined
by the executive. The village forest rules
however do provide for precisely such
eventualities that are specified under
certain contexts and conditions. The rules
for instance state that rights over bamboo
can be suspended and that the areas can
be reversed to the forest department for
restoration of normalcy that has to be
certified by the forest department official
as per rule 4(5). This is an obvious violation of both PESA and the FRA as withdrawal of rights is not envisaged in both
the legislations. As such the village
forest rules on this count alone are ultra
vires of the rules regime agreed and
enacted by an act of Parliament.
In other words, it completely overturns the hard-won rights of the communities as enshrined in the Scheduled
Tribes and Other Traditional Forest
Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights)
Act 2006 (Act No 2 of 2007 Panchayats
(Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act
1996 (Act No 40 of 1996) with impunity.
For instance, as per the rules the control
over minor forest produce, exercise of
the community rights over forest and
the reversal of the trajectory as envisaged in both the seminal legislation is
sought to be done away with. The implications of village forest rules are ominous for all the Schedule V areas as it has
the potential to destabilise the rights regime in the Adivasi areas post the FRA.

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COMMENTARY

What then is the overall context of


reintroduction of the village forest
rules? We need to perhaps go back at
least two and a half decades to arrive at
a clearer understanding of the context
which has led to this situation. As is
well known and documented, the oil
wars and the investment in the white
goods industries led to the post-1991
balance of payment crisis, forcing the
Indian economy to open up in a significant manner on adverse terms of relationships without the resultant reciprocity. This, in turn, set two trends in
motion. On one hand, a centralising
trend in the resource mobilisation was
initiated while at the same time in the
arena of polity decentralisation was institutionalised through a constitutional
amendment. Hence the 73rd and the
74th amendments to the Constitution
were passed at the same time when the
centralising tendency in the resources
mobilisation in the economy was the order of the day. The combined impetus of
the contrasting trends has to be contextualised against the looming agrarian
crisis that looms over rural India. Inscribed in this crisis is the phenomenon
of farmers suicides and large-scale migration of the rural to the urban under
the most adverse conditions of subsistence and work as well as an insurgency
in the heartland of tribal India.
A rough estimate indicates that more
than 55 million tribals were displaced
since independence due to the large
developmental projects by the state. It
would appear that land and resource acquisition of individuals and community
and the resultant loss of dignity are perhaps at the heart of the growing insurgency in the central Indian tribal heartland areas. In the context of growing
militarisation the communities seem to
be caught in the vortex of violence and
fear and are at a loss to navigate their
daily existence. The sidelining of the
seminal rights of the people over their
resources in the tribal areas has also resulted in the state completely ignoring,
at times violating, the very acts it is supposed to respect and abide by. This shifting of a slippery balance of power and
the see-saw on display between an
insurgent movement and the resultant
14

response from the state has created a


volatile situation in the tribal areas.
The latest attempt to subvert the little
gain by way of the consent clause in the
Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act makes the
intentions of the state clear that insofar
as the state represents one spectrum of
violence in these areas, it is also emerging as a principal violator of the very laws
meant to protect communities. What of
the state then? Where does it realistically feature in this developmental conundrum? Let us look at the larger picture
as the state visualises it. The watershed
moment of 1991 had a momentous impact
on the manner in which the state was to
engage with the constitutionally mandated welfare positions enjoined on it.
The post-1991 liberal economy was
supposed to create a level playing field
and remove the impediments in order
that market forces would bring in greater
equilibrium and clarity as well as deliver
on growth and development. In effect,
however, it resulted in the greater
centralisation in the resources mobilisation for the corporates. India after 25
years of the reform still largely remains
a primary goods exporting country. On
top of that we have now invited the global players to set up their manufacturing
plants here and take away the profits.
This in turn accelerates the exploitation
of the mineral wealth, depletes the water
resources and creates a class of industrial serfs who would at sub-optimum level
work for the good of the market.
All this is of course in the name of a
free market framework as well as a
liberal economy. Thus we boast of an
informal labour sector that constitutes
almost 93% of our total labour. In other
terms 93% of the total labour would not
enjoy the benefit of a steady job, resultant
social, educational and health benefits
and more importantly would be left to
fend for itself. So while these forces of the
market were unleashed post 1991 in the
sector of the economy, the state at the same
time unveiled a political reform process
in the mid-1990s. This political reform
process was stated in the legislative framework of the 73rd and the 74th amendments
to the Constitution and sought to usher

in the third tier of the government at


the local level with an emphasis on decentralised governance. So when the
logic of the economic policy demanded
centralisation of the mobilisation of
resources, the logic of political reform
ushered in, constitutionally, a process of
decentralised governance.
Governance and Trust Deficits
Within the context of poverty as well as
deprivations, of course, the condition of
the tribals is worse off. The general
trend as is revealed from fieldwork and
various reports of the government of
India as well as the discussion as per the
secondary literature suggests that there
exists a governance and trust deficit in
large tracts of the Schedule V areas.2
One of the reasons for the left wing extremism to emerge in these very areas
may have been this gap between the ideal
and the real. The PESA was enacted after
the Bhuria Committee submitted its
report in 1996. The chairperson of the
committee was categorical in his analysis about the need for PESA. In his letter
to the Prime Minister it was stated that
the most important fact of the proposed
law is that it will remove the dissonance
between tribal tradition of self-governance
and modern formal institutions, which has
been at the root of simmering discontent
and occasional confrontations. We are confident that this will mark the beginning of a
new era in the history of tribal people. After
the new institutional frames become operational, the people will be able to perceive
the state apparatus as an extension of their
own system in the service of the community,
that too, in a crucial phase of modernisation
firmly rooted in tradition (Bhuria 1995).

The challenge of governance has also


been duly recognised by the structure of
government at the highest levels. Thus
the then Prime Minister conceded as
much when he stated that,
We cannot have equitable growth without
guaranteeing the legitimate rights of these
marginalised and isolated sections of our
society. In a broader sense we need to empower our tribal communities with the means
to determine their own destinies, their livelihood, their security and above all their
dignity and self-respect as equal citizens of
our country, as equal participants in the processes of social and economic development.

In a democracy the rights regimes are


supreme, and they are constitutionally
mandated. The sovereignty of the people

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COMMENTARY

is enshrined in those rights regimes. The


state is a guardian of the regime of
rights. This guardianship is bestowed on
the state by the people of the republic. At
the heart of these rights regime is the
inalienable trust between the state and
her people forged through the struggle
for independence. In the context of the
present times it is this trust that has to
be reaffirmed in order that the regime of

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rights of the people reigns and constitutional governance prevails.


Notes
1
2

See Guha and Gadgil, This Fissured Land, New


Delhi: Oxford University Press.
See Ajay Dandekar and Chitrangada Choudhury,
PESA, Left-Wing Extremism and Governance:
Concerns and Challenges in Indias Tribal District, IRMA Report on State of Panchayat Raj
2011; Planning Commission report of the Expert
Group on Development Challenges in Extremist

vol lI no 16

Affected Areas 2006. Also see Mani Shankar


Aiyar Committee Report on Expert Committee
on Leveraging Panchayats for Efficient Delivery of Public Goods and Services. A report
submitted to the Parliament 2013.

References
Bhuria, Dileep Singh (1995): Quoted in Sharma B D
Whither Tribal Areas: Constitutional Amendments and After, Sahyog Pustak Kutir, New
Delhi, p 8.
Government of Maharashtra (2014): Gazette Notification on Revenue and Forests, 13 May.

15

COMMENTARY

Haryanas Panchayati Raj


Excluding the Deprived
Inderjit Singh

The conditions imposed by the


amendment to the panchayati raj
law in Haryana have not only
excluded a large section of the
population from contesting
elections but have also deprived
voters of their right to choose. All
appropriate measures must be
undertaken to ensure that these
exclusionary conditions
are withdrawn.

Inderjit Singh (jitharyana@gmail.com) is vice


president, All India Kisan Sabha, Haryana.
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april 16, 2016

he panchayati raj elections in Haryana were held in January under the


Haryana Panchayati Raj (Amendment) Act, 2015 brought about by the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government.
The amendments impose rather regressive conditions for contesting elections.
The candidates educational qualification
is one such criterion; failure to repay
loans taken from cooperative societies,
electricity bill arrears, not having a pucca
functional toilet at ones residence and
being chargesheeted in criminal cases
that specify imprisonment up to 10 years
are some others. The Rajasthan government also led by the BJP had imposed
similar conditions in 2014 just before the
panchayat elections in that state.
The Supreme Courts upholding of the
amendment in its judgment on 10
December 2015 was criticised by several
legal experts, parliamentarians across
party lines and academicians including
Amartya Sen who commented that the
deprived should not have been further
deprived and that the judgment must be
reviewed by a constitution bench of the
apex court. The National Democratic
Alliance government had to face an
embarrassing situation in the Rajya Sabha
when the opposition managed to pass an
amendment to the Presidents address.
The amendment expressed regret that
the speech did not commit support to
rights of all citizens to contest panchayat
elections. The oppositions move led to a
division of votes in which 94 voted for
the amendment and 61 against it.
An average of 67.52% of the electorate
otherwise eligible to contest was deprived
of its basic right on the educational criteria
alone. The extent of the exclusion in
relation to Scheduled Caste (SC) women
was more than 80% while in a district
like Mewat which is dominated by Meo
Muslims, the exclusion of women was
more than 90%. In Rajasthan the socially
marginalised sections were even more

vol lI no 16

drastically affected. The election outcome


in Haryana revealed a dismal scenario
proving the obvious fears about the
exclusionary amendment right. As many
as 1,905 seats for various posts remained
vacant because there were no candidates with the required qualifications.
The total number of contestants came
down to 87,499 from 1,70,504 in the
2010 elections. About 39,249 candidates,
that is 54.4%, have been elected unopposed mainly because of the shortage of
literate candidates.
Voters Also Deprived
Various voicessupportive of the BJP
governments moveput forth the view
through a section of the media that more
educated, more women and more younger
persons have been elected this time
around than in the previous elections. No
one can be against more educated persons
being elected to panchayats. But the
question that arises is: who was preventing
these educated persons from contesting
and getting elected in any case? By
depriving two-thirds of the state population from contesting, the amendment to
the law has also denied voters the right
to elect persons of their choice.
As far as the number of women candidates is concerned, there has been an
increase in every successive election and
the same would have been the trend in
this round as well, had the conditions
not been imposed. Another factor which
warrants attention in this context is that
traditionally the dominant sections in
villages have taken recourse to devious
means to retain their hegemony over
panchayats. In order to circumvent the
educational qualification, they got their
sons or brothers hurriedly married so that
their matriculate spouses could be put
up for the elections. These newly-wed
women who have been elected as panchayat representatives are mostly unaware
of the socio-economic or demographic
profile of their constituencies. It is obvious that their husbands or fathers-in-law
would work as the de facto representatives. This was exposed in the very first
introductory meeting convened by the
administration. Not a single elected
woman turned up and their male relatives
attended many of the block-level meetings.
19

COMMENTARY

The official claim that more educated


persons have got elected in the latest
elections to the panchayat institutions
is not correct as far as the zilla parishad
members are concerned. According to
the state election commission data, in
the 2010 elections 29.8% zilla parishad
members were graduates and postgraduates while this time around the
figure is 22.8%. The Haryana government has made the ridiculous claim
that `200 crore have been recovered
from defaulters, mainly farmers, as outstanding crop loans. What a pity that
recovery of money is shown as an
achievement at the cost of loss of
democracy at the grass-roots level. The
debt-ridden peasantry reeling under
severe distress were punished for nonpayment of pending loans in spite of the
fact that Haryana government had

20

deferred loan recovery owing to repeated


crop failures.
Body Blow to Democracy
The Supreme Courts judgment upholding the amendment has placed the right
to vote and right to contest on a different
footing in such a way that it makes it
imperative that the whole issue be adjudicated by a constitution bench. It is true
that the power to make amendments in
the Panchayati Raj Act is well within the
domain of the state legislature but it
cannot be in violation of the constitutional scheme of democracy. In the case
of Haryana what has been done is tantamount to taking away the right to contest an election from an overwhelming
majority of people. Apart from other
ambiguities, the Court judgment also
contains certain unfortunate remarks

about those who are not formally


educated. One such remark is that education alone helps a person make a distinction between good and bad, right and
wrong. Such a specious argument can
well be extended in denying even the
right to vote to the people who are not
formally literate. So the extraneous conditions have inflicted a body blow to democracy in general and panchayati raj
in particular. The exclusionary measure
is totally disastrous and anathema to the
spirit behind the 73rd constitutional
amendment as it goes against the interest of those very downtrodden sections
for whose empowerment the landmark
changes were brought about in 1992.
The retrograde conditions imposed on
aspirants who want to contest elections
must be nullified through appropriate
procedures.

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

COMMENTARY

Agrarian Question in India


Indications from NSSOs 70th Round
C R Yadu, Satheesha B

Using the latest National Sample


Survey Office data on land
distribution and use, questions of
agrarian change in India are
revisited. With reducing
landholding size in general, the
increasing unviability of such small
plots, and increasing numbers of
effectively landless households,
the larger questions of employment
and sectoral shifts are flagged.
There is still no clear transition
away from agriculture.

The authors would like to thank the


anonymous referee for comments.
C R Yadu (chandran.yadu@gmail.com) is a
doctoral student at the Centre for Development
Studies, Thiruvananthapuram. Satheesha B
(satheeshababu@gmail.com) is a doctoral student
at the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi.

20

n recent years, Eurocentric constructions of the agrarian question are


being increasingly challenged by a
resurgent scholarship from the global
South. The argument of Western scholarship that the agrarian question is dead
is at best minimalist and deterministic
(Moyo et al 2015). The counterargument
is that capital accumulation whether
linked to Western finance or Chinese industry, remains closely integrated with
agriculture and this is one of the many
dimensions of agrarian question at the
current juncture (Moyo et al 2015). The
contemporary agrarian question, thus,
encompasses a wide variety of land and
peasant questions which are central to
understand the development dynamics
of the countries in the South.
The stunted structural transformation in India has important implications
for its agrarian question. While the share
of agriculture is dramatically reduced in
gross domestic product (GDP), almost
half of the countrys population still

depends on the agricultural sector for


livelihood. In the age of globalisation,
where the peasantry is under assault from
international finance capital, the ways and
means in which they reproduce themselves
remain an important matter. The steadily
increasing wave of land grabs across the
South puts peasants at the receiving
end. With its land and livelihood imperilled, this reserve army of the dispossessed increasingly finds refuge in precarious activities in the informal sector.
Major Trends from NSSO Data
The National Sample Survey Offices
(NSSO) 70th round consists of three
surveys: Land and Livestock Holdings
Survey, All-India Debt and Investment
Survey, and Situation Assessment Survey.
All three are decennial surveys, last conducted in 2002. The tables presented
here are based on the Land and Livestock Survey and Situation Assessment
Survey as these surveys give us important
data that are relevant for the agrarian
question in India. Both these surveys in
the 70th round covered only rural areas
of the country.1
Table 1 (p 21) shows that total estimated
area owned and average area owned has
declined in the latest round. The average
land owned fell from 0.725 in 200203
to 0.592 in 201213. The fall in the

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

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Economic & Political Weekly

COMMENTARY

have to look for alternative employment regular workers in either agricultural


opportunities outside agriculture.
or non-agricultural enterprises. However,
The dominant feature that defines results from the NSSO employment and
present-day farming in India is the pre- unemployment surveys show that it is
ponderance of marginal holdings. Inter- casual labourers who remain predomigenerational subdivision and fragmenta- nant in rural labour. While 35% of housetion of land means that people now have holds earn their livelihood from casual
to cultivate on the tiny pieces of land lead- labour, only 9% of households earn income
ing to a viability crisis as we discussed from regular wage work in the countryearlier. Table 2 shows that the proportion side (NSSO 2013). Therefore, it can be
of marginal holdings has deduced that majority of the wage/salTable 1: Changes in Household Ownership of Land
Item
200203
201213
increased to 75.42% in aried employment category consists of
(59th Round)
(70th Round)
201213 from 69.63% in casual labour households. It is also interEstimated area owned (000 ha)
1,07,228
92,369
200203. Similarly, the esting to note that the lowest share of
Average area owned per household (ha)
0.725
0.592
area under marginal land was owned by households that
Source: NSSO (2014a).
holdings increased by were self-employed in livestock farming.
Table 2: Changes in the Percentage Distribution of Households and
more than 6 percentage
Table 4 shows the distribution of agriArea Owned by Category of Household Ownership Holdings
points
in
this
period.
The
cultural
households as per their major
Category of Holdings
Percentage of
Percentage of
Households
Area Owned
proportion
of
households
source
of
income. NSSO defines agricul200203 201213 200203 201213
in
all
other
categories
of
tural
household
as a household receivLandless ( 0.002 ha)
10.04 7.41
0.01
0.01
holdings
which
has
more
ing
some
value
of
produce from agriculMarginal (> 0.002 but 1.000 ha)
69.63 75.42
23.01 29.75
than
1
hectare
of
land
ture
activities
(for
example, cultivation
Small (>1.000 but 2.000 ha)
10.81
10
20.38 23.54
Semi-medium (> 2.000 but 4.000 ha) 6.03 5.01
21.29 22.07 has witnessed a decline.
of field crops, horticultural crops, fodder
Medium (> 4.000 but 10.000 ha)
2.96 1.93
23.08 18.83 It is also notable that the
crops, plantation, animal husbandry,
Large (> 10.000 ha)
0.53 0.24
11.55
5.81 percentage area owned
poultry, fishery, piggery, beekeeping,
Source: NSSO (2014a).
in the large size holdings vermiculture and sericulture) in the last
A look at Table 2 will show that land- has declined from 11.55% in 200102 to 365 days. However, this definition excludes agricultural labour households. It
lessness has declined in the last decade 5.81% in 201112.
Table 3 shows the distribution of can be seen that the source of income
in the country. However, it must be kept
in mind that NSSOs landlessness figures households on the basis of their major depends on the size of land in possesare actually an underestimation (Rawal source of income and the proportion of sion. In the higher classes of land posse2008). The proportion of households land they own. Around 43% of the rural ssion, the households main source of
which NSSO categorises as landless fell households are self-employed in agri- income is cultivation. In the lower-size
by more than 2.5 percentage points be- culture and they own as high as 81.41% classes, a major part of the households
tween 200203 and 201213. However, of the total land owned. Wage/salaried income is earned from wage/salaried
the definition of landless as owning less employment is the second-most impor- employment. Following from our earlier
than 0.002 hectares of land fails to cap- tant source of income for the rural argument, the major part of this wage/
ture the actual situation. Basole and households. As per NSSOs definition, salaried employment would be casual
Basu (2011: 44) remark that if landless- wage/salaried employment has a broad labour. For example, in the size category
ness is understood as pertaining to land definition. It consists of both casual and of less than 0.1 hectare, more than half
that can be used for cultivation and that Table 3: Distribution of Households and Area of Land Owned
Self-employed
Self-employed Self-employed in Self-employed in
Wages/
Others Total
can generate some income for the famiin Cultivation
in Livestock
Other Agricultural Non-agricultural
Salaried
ly, then a more realistic definition must
Farming
Activities
Enterprises
Employment
consider all households owning less than % of households
42.92
1.75
3.47
11.59
32.36
7.1 100
1 acre [0.40 ha] as effectively landless. % area of land owned
81.41
1.47
1.48
3.28
10.4
1.97 100
If we take effective landlessness as an Source: NSSO (2014a).
important marker, it can be seen that Table 4: Percentage Distribution of Agricultural Households by Principal Source of Income
there is a significant rise in landlessness Size Class of Land Possessed2 Cultivation Livestock Other Agricultural Non-agricultural Wage/Salaried Others All
Activity
Enterprises
Employment
in the countryside in the last decade. In
1.6
22.9
2.7
10.8
56.4
5.5
100
200203, 60.1% of the households were < 0.01
0.010.40
42.1
4.8
1.2
7.5
35.2
9.3
100
effectively landless (Basole and Basu
0.411.00
69.2
2.3
0.9
3.6
20
4.1
100
2011), whereas in the latest period the 1.012.00
83
2.5
0.9
3.2
8.6
1.8
100
figure rose to 66.1%. This means the 2.014.00
85.9
2.4
1.1
1.6
7.1
1.8
100
direct dependency on land for livelihood 4.0110.00
87.9
2.7
0.5
0.9
5.9
2
100
for some section of rural population has 10.00+
89.4
5.5
1.5
1.8
1.7
0.1
100
become no longer viable and now they Source: NSSO (2014b).
average size of land is natural, given the
demographic pressure on land. But, the
falling size of landholdings raises serious
questions about the viability of farming.
The declining size of holdings means that
those households which solely depend
on agriculture will find it increasingly
difficult to sustain their livelihoods.
They have to find subsidiary ways to
support their livelihood.

Economic & Political Weekly

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april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

21

COMMENTARY

of the households (56.4%) find income


from wage employment followed by
livestock. In the next highest-size class
(0.010.40), 35.2% of households earn
income from wage employment. Thus,
Table 4 gives strong credence to the semiproletarianisation thesis as put forward
by Moyo et al (2013) as one of the defining features of the agrarian question of
the South in the 21st century. Rather
than depending solely on cultivation,
people have to seek livelihood from other
sources of employment, most commonly
casual labour in the non-agricultural
sector. Krishnaji (1990) has noted this
phenomenon as the inevitable consequence of demographic change among
poor farmers. Various village studies
also give credence to the fact that semiproletarianisation or multi-occupational
deepening is a dominant feature of
present-day Indian countryside. For
example, Lindberg et al (2014: 351) in their
panel study of six villages in central
Tamil Nadu have the following to say:
About half of all households now live by
working solely in agriculture (as workers
and farmers), while the rest are pluriactive:
combining farm work with various forms
of non-farm work and tiny businesses. The
effect of this change is dramatic: today the
non-farm (often urban) linkage is almost as
important as farming for the livelihood and
social life of agrarian population.

As Shah and Harris-White (2011) rightly


point out, what we witness in India is not
the classic agrarian transition. Rather than
moving from agriculture to become
factory hands in the city, rural livelihoods
have to combine both forms of work,
tilling their small plots of land and now,
dependent on migrant wage labour, on
working in the rural non-farm economy
and on petty commodity production
and trade in the capitalist economy to

reproduce their household (Shah and


Harris-White 2011: 17). This kind of a
labour transformation has made rural
life much more complex.
It can be seen from Table 5 that 92.6%
of agricultural households have homestead and other land. In the lowest sizeclass, less than half of agricultural
households operated any agricultural
land for the last 365 days. This is small
compared to other size classes where
more than 95% of households could
operate any agricultural land. This again
reflects the viability question of the
owners of tiny plots. Another important
trend visible in the table is regarding the
proportion of MGNREGA cardholders
among agricultural households. The
presence of MGNREGA cardholders are
invariably present in all size classes.
However, the number of cardholders
seems to be decreasing from the fourth
highest land class onwards. The proportion of cardholders is the smallest in the
highest-size class (29.3%). Overall, 44.4%
of agricultural households are MGNREGA
cardholders. This gives strength to the
argument that semi-proletarianisation is
the major feature of the contemporary
agrarian question in India.
Table 6 shows the terms of lease and
the proportion of households under each
Table 6: Forms of Tenancy Contracts
Terms of Lease

Percentage of
Households

For fixed money


For share of produce
From relatives under no specified terms
For fixed produce
Under other terms
For share of produce together with other terms
For service contract
Under usufructuary mortgage
Total

32.6
26.2
14.6
14.2
8.2
2
1.6
0.7
100

Source: Authors calculation from Land and Livestock


Survey 201213.

Table 5: Percentage Distribution of Agricultural Households by Type of Land Possessed


Size Class

< 0.01
0.01 0.40
0.411.00
1.012.00
2.014.00
4.0110.00
10.00 +
All sizes

Distribution of Agricultural Households by Type of Land Possessed


Homestead
Homestead and
Other Land
No Land
All
Only
Other Land
Only

70.3
10
2.9
2
1.9
2
0.2
6.7

23.3
89.5
96.5
97.6
97.4
97.2
94.1
92.6

1.1
0.5
5
1
0.6
0.9
5.7
0.5

2.4
0
0
0
0
0
0
0.1

100
100
100
100
100
100
100
100

Operated Any
Agricultural Land
for Last 365 Days
(in %)

Having MGNREGA
Job Card
(in %)

46.6
94.8
99.4
99.6
99.8
99.6
97.5
96.6

38.3
45.3
46.3
43.8
41.4
36.1
29.3
44.4

of them in rural India. Generally speaking, tenancy is on the decline in rural


India over the decades (Basole and Basu
2011). Studies also note the presence of
reverse tenancy in different parts of the
country (Sharma 2005; Shah and HarrisWhite 2011; Yadu 2014). Table 6 shows
that fixed money (32.6%) constitute the
largest terms of leasing followed by share
of produce (26.2%). Sharecropping still
remains an important tenancy arrangement. This provides evidence for the
presence of pre-capitalist agrarian relations in many parts in the country.
Concluding Observations
The agrarian question has serious implications for employment in India. As the
number of effectively landless increased considerably in the last decade, rural
people can no longer depend on agriculture as the sole means of livelihood. The
preponderance of small and marginal
holdings in the agrarian scene tells us
that more and more people will soon be
displaced from agriculture as the fragmentation and subdivision of landholdings will only become acute and the
landholdings, unviable to operate.
With jobless growth in the formal
sector, this problem rises to major proportions. Those who are dispossessed
from the agricultural sector find it hard
to get alternative forms of gainful employment in the formal industrial sector
as this sector stagnated in generating
additional employment in the country.
So, the reserve army of the dispossessed
increasingly find refuge in the growing
informal sector where the possibility of
getting a decent job is highly impossible.
NSSOs 70th round data reasserts the
argument that instead of the classic
transition from peasants to workers,
the dominant phenomenon that characterises rural labour in the contemporary
era is semi-proletarianisation. This is the
hallmark of the contemporary agrarian
question in India.
Notes
1
2

Source: NSSO (2014b).

22

april 16, 2016

Earlier rounds of land and livestock surveys


covered both rural and urban areas.
NSSO defines land possessed as land owned
(including land under owner-like possession)
+ land leased in land leased out + land held
by the household but neither owned nor leased
in (for example, encroached land).
vol lI no 16

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COMMENTARY

References
Basole, Amit and Deepankar Basu (2011): Relations
of Production and Modes of Surplus Extraction
in India: Part IAgriculture, Economic &
Political Weekly, Vol 46, No 14, pp 4158.
Krishnaji (1990): Land and Labour in IndiaThe
Demographic Factor, Economic & Political
Weekly, Vol XXV, Nos 1819, pp 103842.
Lindberg, Staffan, Venkatesh B Athreya, Goran
Djurfeldt, A Rajagopal and R Vidyasagar (2014):
Progress over the Long Haul: Dynamics of
Agrarian Change in Kaveri Delta, Persistence of
Poverty in India, Nandini Gooptu and Jonathan
Parry (eds), New Delhi: Social Science Press.
Moyo, Sam, Praveen Jha and Paris Yeros (2013): The
Classical Agrarian Question: Myth, Reality and

Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

Relevance Today, Agrarian South Jour nal of


Political Economy, Vol 2, No 1, pp 93119.
(2015): The Agrarian Question in the 21st Century, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol 50,
No 37, pp 3541.
NSSO (2013): Key Indicators of Employment and Unemployment in India 201112, National Sample
Survey Office, Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, Government of India.
(2014a): Key Indicators of Land and Livestock
Holdings in India, National Sample Survey
Office, Ministry of Statistics and Programme
Implementation, Government of India.
(2014b): Key Indicators of Situation of Agricultural Households in India, National Sample
Survey Office, Ministry of Statistics and

vol lI no 16

Programme Implementation, Government of


India.
Rawal, Vikas (2008): Ownership Holdings in Rural
India: Putting the Record Straight, Economic
& Political Weekly, Vol 43, No 10, pp 4347.
Shah, Alpa and Barbara Harris-White (2011): Resurrecting Scholarship on Agrarian Transformations, Economic & Political Weekly, Vol 46,
No 39, pp 1318.
Sharma, A N (2005): Agrarian Relations and
Socio-Economic Change in Bihar, Economic &
Political Weekly, Vol 40, No 10, pp 96072.
Yadu, C R (2014): Land Question and Mobility of
the Marginalised: A Study of Land Inequality
in Kerala, MPhil diss submitted to Centre for
Development Studies, Thiruvananthapuram.

23

COMMENTARY

Modis Faux Pas on Ambedkar


Anand Teltumbde

Narendra Modi recently described


himself as an Ambedkar bhakt
and also assured Dalits that he
would never dilute reservations
even if B R Ambedkar himself
were to come back to life and
demand their revocation. The
faux pas reveals the desperation
of the Hindutva forces to woo
Dalits by misrepresenting
Ambedkar and the critical role
reservation plays in the political
schema of the ruling classes.
Reservations, which are assumed
to be a boon for Dalits, have
actually been the tool of their
enslavement.

I am no worshipper of idols. I believe in breaking them.


B R Ambedkar1

rime Minister Narendra Modi while


delivering the sixth Ambedkar
Memorial Lecture on 22 March at
Vigyan Bhavan made many interesting
points. Two of them, however, are particularly important insofar that they expose
him as a representative of the ruling
classes, in deliberately misrepresenting
B R Ambedkar. The first point was his proclamation that he is an Ambedkar bhakt
(devotee). The second was his assertion
that the reservation policy for the Dalits
and the tribals will not be diluted even if
Ambedkar himself were to come back to
life and demand its revocation. Of course,
both these statements, as indeed all his
utterances and displays of Ambedkar-love,
are simply meant to woo Dalits into the
Bharatiya Janata Partys (BJP) fold.
Logic behind Ambedkar-love

Anand Teltumbde (tanandraj@gmail.com) is a


writer, academic and civil rights activist.
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

Dalits constitute an important part of the


Sangh Parivars game plan. Its strategic
apple cart of polarisation of the Indian
population into Hindus versus others
and communists (those who do not
agree with it) can be potentially toppled
by Dalits. With their historical, social,
ideological and cultural profile, Dalits
can indeed be a big spoilsport. It cannot
be taken for granted that Dalits would
identify themselves as Hindus anymore.
Way back in 1909, the issue had naturally surfaced in the wake of the colonial
vol lI no 16

plan to seed Indian politics along


communal lines. During the negotiations
for the MorleyMinto Reforms (Indian
Councils Act, 1909) the Muslim League
had challenged the Congress that the
Dalits and the Adivasis were not part of
Hinduism. The incipient Dalit movement,
which was still focused on the rudimentary right of Dalits to be treated as
humans, had not yet taken the form of
independent political articulation. Nonetheless, the Congress was compelled to
take note of the Dalits after it entered
into the Lucknow Pact with the Muslim
League in the wake of the Montagu
Chelmsford Reforms for promulgation of
the Government of India Act, 1919. This
was the first time in history that the
Hindus took political note of the Dalits.
Symbolically, it was M K Gandhi, who
spoke in Ahmedabad against the evil
practice of untouchability in June 1916,
and showed concern for the Dalits.
The Congress organised at least four
conferences in 1916 to seek the support
of the Dalits in Bombay province alone.
Ambedkar, after his disillusionment with
the Hindus in the Mahad struggle in 1927,
used this space to create an independent
political identity for Dalits. His attacks
on the Hindus and their religion, which
culminated in his renouncing Hinduism
and embracing Buddhism barely two
months before his death, permanently
stamped a separate religiocultural identity
on Dalits. It is this history that comes in
the way of the Sangh Parivar in accomplishing its goal of making India a Hindu
rashtra, the euphemism for restoring the
old Brahminic structural paradigm of
the totalitarian rule of high-bred elites
with a unitary command of a supreme
leader, the equivalent of ein Volk, ein
23

COMMENTARY

Reich, ein Fhrer (one people, one nation,


one leader) of Nazism.
It is for this reason that Ambedkar
assumes critical importance in the Sangh
Parivars strategy. Unless it saffronised
Ambedkar adequately, this history would
haunt them. The new-found love for
Ambedkar stems from this political
expediency. The ideological weakness of
the Dalit movement, the bankruptcy of
Dalit leadership, the self-centred Dalit
middle class and Dalit masses deification
of Ambedkar in place of the Hindu gods,
whom they had discarded at his instance,
makes it so much easier for the Sangh
Parivar to accomplish the seemingly
impossible task of saffronising Ambedkar.
It was actually during the tenure of
Balasaheb Deoras (Madhukar Dattatraya
Deoras), perhaps the most low-profile
sarsanghchalak of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), that many such
strategic moves were initiated. It was
during his tenure that the conscious work
by the Sangh among Dalits had begun
under the non-governmental organisation
Seva Bharati, devoted to uplifting the
Dalits. This included placing Ambedkar
among the Sanghs pratahsmaraniya, and
floating of a special purpose vehicle, the
samrasata manch, to woo middle-class
Dalits who yearned for social recognition
of the upper castes. Until then, Ambedkar
had been an anathema for the Sangh
Parivar, for his vitriolic attack on what
they held sacred. With this strategic shift,
it began projecting him as the friend of
K B Hedgewar, as the greatest benefactor
of the Hindus, admirer of the RSS, one
opposed to Muslims and communists, one
supportive of the ghar wapsi, an advocate
of the saffron flag as the national flag, a
great nationalist, and so on. No doubt,
these were white lies, at best having tenuous links to the issues, but they were
projected as truths with Goebbelsque zeal.
Howsoever one may dismiss these
gimmicks, they cannot be ignored. They
created a solid ground for co-opting Dalit
leaders. In the last couple of elections,
the BJP has been having more reserved
seats in its fold than all parties together.
But, just the reserved seats are not
enough. Their polarisation strategy is
contingent on deradicalising Dalits and
winning them over. It is only then that
24

their strategy of polarisation is viable.


Because its converse is the alienation of
the minoritieswhich with Dalits could
make up to 30% of the votesit would
seriously impede their plans for a Hindu
rashtra. The strategy subsumes isolation
of Dalit radicals like Rohith Vemula; it is
similar to tagging Adivasis as Maoists.
Ambedkar Disliked Bhakts
Modi should know that Ambedkar disliked
bhakts. He disliked being worshipped like
a hero. He was totally against it in the
political life, because it prevented a spirit
of inquiry, a sense of creativity and an
independent attitude of the mind. His
biographer Dhananjay Keer writes,
At another meeting held in Bombay to present him with an address, in the first week of
March 1933, he said, This address is full of
superlatives about my work and qualities. It
means you are deifying a common man like
you. These ideas of hero worship will bring
ruin on you if you do not nip them in the bud.
By deifying an individual, you repose faith
for your safety and salvation in one single individual with the result that you get into the
habit of dependence and grow indifferent to
your duty. If you fall a victim to these ideas,
your fate will be no better than logs of wood
in the national stream of life. Your struggle
will come to naught (2005: 234).

In 1943, in a lecture delivered on the


101st birthday of Mahadev Govind
Ranade, he further explained why he
was against hero-worship. It is said that
in Nagpur on the eve of the conversion
ceremony in 1956, people came to greet
him and began falling on his feet in
reverence. Ambedkar, although not
well, took his stick and hit one of them
and shouted that he did not like their
servile behaviour. If he had been alive,
even Modi would have faced admonition.
Ambedkar would have advised him to
focus on his constitutional duty to
protect Dalits from societal prejudices.
Modi, in curtailing allocation of funds
for development of Dalits, is allowing a
free hand in crushing radical expression
of Dalit students and creating conditions
that lead to the institutional murders of
promising Dalit scholars like Rohith
Vemula. They are being thrashed black
and blue by the police on demanding justiceas what happened on 22 March at
the University of Hyderabad. He is simultaneously singing paeans to Ambedkar.

Modi should know that Ambedkar was


not a petty politician to be pleased
by sycophants. Painting him as one is
insulting him.
Ambedkar would have certainly
detested his deification. Unfortunately,
his so-called followers have also fallen
prey to the machinations of the ruling
classes to iconise him into his antithesis.
Instead of understanding their intrigues,
the Dalits too take pride in the state conferring honours on him and showering
him with praises. Ambedkar would
have never approved of building grand
memorials for politicians or for himself.
He would have rather questioned the
priorities of squandering public resources
over dead men when millions did not
have basic necessities for survival. The
manner in which the BJP government
grabbed the opportunity to build memorials after Ambedkar in an act of oneupmanship over the Congress should
have made Dalits wary. Unfortunately, a
majority of them celebrated it, took
pride in the state honouring their icon
and willingly got into the BJPs trap.
The Trap of Reservations
The second point Modi made is more
intricate as it is important. The reservations for the Dalits have been an
emotional issue and hence were never
viewed objectively by anyone. When
Modi said in a reassuring tone that the
reservations would not be touched even
if Ambedkar came and demanded their
revocation, he inadvertently revealed
their importance to his class.
Ambedkar is singularly responsible
for reservations; initially for political
representation, and later for reservations in public employment and in educational institutions. The intent behind
the former measure was defeated at the
outset. The intent was to send Dalit
representatives to legislative bodies so
as to promote their interests. Ambedkar
conceived of separate electorates for
Dalits in order to ensure they elect their
true representative. He had managed to
secure this in the Round Table Conferences (193032), despite fierce opposition from Gandhi. But, soon after their
announcement, Gandhi blackmailed him
with his fast unto death. Ambedkar gave

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Economic & Political Weekly

COMMENTARY

up separate electorates and accepted joint


electorates instead, through what came
to be known as the Poona Pact (1932).
As against the separate electorates,
which could ensure independent representation of Dalits, the joint electorates
guaranteed the election of such Scheduled
Castes as would be admissible for the
majority of non-Dalits, thereby producing stooges, to use Kanshi Rams (1982)
language. There remained no theoretical
possibility of a true protagonist of Dalit
masses getting elected. The earliest proof
is provided by the fact that none other
than Ambedkar himself could never win
an election in post-independence India
even against non-entities.
Ambedkar was uncomfortable with
these reservations, but could do nothing
when they were incorporated into the
Constitution, except putting a time limit
of 10 years. It is testimony to their utility
to the ruling classes that the 10-year
limit has been extended, every time it
lapsed, without anyone ever asking for
it. These reservations have been clearly
detrimental to the interest of Dalits as
they have decimated the independent
Dalit movement and created a class of
brokers masquerading as Dalit leaders.
The reservations in public employment and educational institutions came
into being initially as a preferential
system and became a quota system in
1943 at the behest of Ambedkar when he
was a member of the viceroys executive
council. They surely proved quite beneficial initially, to the extent that the sizeable Dalit middle class that we see in
urban areas is largely attributable to
them. But, thereafter, their limitation
and adverse effects began surfacing.
Reservations became a powerful alibi to
preserve castes as a weapon in the hands
of the ruling classes to keep the Indian
masses divided perennially.
The entire social justice issue could
have been handled very differently
during the making of the Constitution,
but it was systematically driven towards
not only preserving castes, but fortifying
them. Since reservations, even in its
quota form, had been instituted during
the colonial times, and were provided
for the people with an administrative
identity of Scheduled Caste, snapping
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

their umbilical cord with Hinduism, the


Constitution could have easily done
away with castes too when it pompously
outlawed untouchability.
Moreover, reservations could have been
conceived as an exceptional policy for
exceptional people due to the larger
societys inability to treat them as equals.
With this conception of reservation there
could have been an intrinsic motivation
for society to do away with its inability,
which, besides becoming a terminal condition as desired for the public policy of
such nature, would have been a powerful
force in the annihilation of castes. It is
only the larger society that could annihilate castes. The premise of backwardness implicit in the reservation system,
which unfortunately remains unnoticed,
reinforced the basic notion prevailing in
society of the inferiority of lower castes.
Not an Innocent Act
Missing this crucial conception of policy
was unfortunately not an innocent act or
the imagination deficit of the Constituent
Assembly, but a deliberate plan to forge
reservations into a powerful weapon to
make it impossible for people to threaten
the monopoly of political power of the
ruling classes. In its mechanics, reservations have again ensured that they would
progressively keep benefiting the beneficiaries, creating thereby potential class
of allies from among these masses.
Leave aside the public sector jobs,
which have been consistently reducing
since 1997 under the pressure of neoliberal policies, thereby effectively bringing reservations in public employment
to an end, the reserved seats in our
premier educational institutions have
been supply-starved. The reserved seats
in IITs and IIMs have not been filled for
the past many years because of the
narrow supply base of Dalits and Adivasis.
There are numerous anomalies, moreover,
with serious implications to social amity.
Reservations benefit the family of a
beneficiary, but are given in the name of
caste, making the latter bear the brunt
of prejudice. They could, thus, be seen as
directly responsible for the increasing
atrocities on Dalits in rural areas.
Reservations may be seen as hugely
detrimental to the Dalit masses inasmuch

vol lI no 16

as they are perennially blocked by


their urban counterparts. Reservations
are unquestioningly seen as benefits
without reckoning the huge social and
psychological costs they entail. The biggest cost of reservations is survival of
castes and the decimation of Ambedkars
project of Annihilation of Caste. The
psychological havoc it plays on the
minds of Dalit children early on in
schools, that they belong to some inferior species, reduces them to conform
to the self-fulfilling prophesy of their
inferiority. Reservations also have provided a cover for the ruling classes
neglect of their obligation to provide for
basic needs of the population, namely,
basic public healthcare, education and
employment.
Ambedkar had sensed the shortcomings of his vision, which had created an
island of higher-educated Dalits. He
publicly expressed his displeasure in his
speech in Agra in 1953, saying that the
educated Dalits had cheated him. He
had imagined, from his own example,
that a few well-educated Dalits would
occupy crucial administrative positions
and support the Dalit cause. He saw
during his lifetime that instead of caring
for the Dalit masses, these educated
Dalits were getting disconnected from
them. Unfortunately, he could not fathom
the causal linkage that the class transformation of these higher-educated Dalits
would prevent them from identifying
with the Dalit masses.
If he had been alive today to see the
full unfolding of these policies, Ambedkar
would have certainly demanded their
revocation as Modi insinuated. The real
meaning of reservations should be seen
in terms of who benefits from them and
who pays the cost for them.
note
1

In Ranade, Gandhi & Jinnah, address delivered on the 101st Birthday Celebration
of Mahadev Govind Ranade, held on 18 January 1943 in Gokhale Memorial Hall, Poona.

References
Keer, Dhananjay (2005): Dr Ambedkar: Life and
Mission, Mumbai: Popular Prakashan.
Ram, Kanshi (1982): The Chamcha Age (An Era of
the Stooges), published on 24 September 1982
on the occasion of 50th anniversary of the
Poona Pact, pamphlet, published by Kanshi
Ram, New Delhi.

25

BUDGET 201617

Budget without Heft


Pulapre Balakrishnan

Budget 201617 correctly


recognises that the economy
is facing a demand slowdown
but fails to back this up with
necessary expenditure to boost
aggregate demand. Guided
by its programme of fiscal
consolidation, the government
has almost frozen public
investment in order to achieve
the targeted deficit for 201617.
While its proclamation to improve
ordinary lives is welcome, a
rearrangement of deep-rooted
structures of public expenditure
in India is required to
achieve this.

Pulapre Balakrishnan (pulapre.balakrishnan@


gmail.com) teaches at Ashoka University,
Sonepat, Haryana.

26

wo years into its term, the Narendra


Modi government has presented
an interesting budget. That a
budget is interesting need not, of course,
imply craft. This one is interesting in
large part because it was unexpected.
What had been expected was more
of the by now familiar solicitousness
towards the corporate sector of this government. Instead, we have a budget that
comes across as focused on the rural sector and claiming to transform the lives
of the people. Whether this directional
change has been brought about because
of politics, with an eye on state assembly
elections, or out of panic over the state
of the economy, which has not shown
anything of the vigour that Modi had
promised during his election campaign,
is of interest of course; but an analysis of
the budget need not remain hostage to
this question.
In a dramatic turn, Finance Minister
Arun Jaitley has presented a budget that
is quite long on vision. The highlights
released along with the budget papers by
the finance ministry correctly diagnoses
the present situation as one of sluggish
demand. The allocations in the budget
address this aspect by targeting infrastructure. More importantly, it has focused attention on programmes for the
rural economy where the greater part of
Indians continue to live. Here politics
and economics appear to have combined
to influence the minister.
We have just had two consecutive
years of drought and into the third year
things do not look much brighter for agricultural production. Even though under the circumstances, a course correction would constitute good economics,
political considerations on the part of
the government may be inferred from
the fact that rural India had not figured
much in its policy initiatives thus far.
Among the sectors, it is manufacturing
that has been privileged. On the other

hand, agriculture has performed quite


poorly since 2008.
The impact of this on the economy
may have been as much as that of the
global slowing but, as if oblivious to this,
the Modi government has so far mainly
showcased its overtures to foreign direct
investment and measures to ease the
doing of business, both reaching an
apotheosis in Make in India. However,
in the past two years, manufacturing
has done so badly in relation to expectation that the finance minister appears to
have decided that he should now target
the deeper causes of its indifferent performance, among which are the slow
progress of agriculture and a longstanding infrastructural deficit. We shall
study the character of the budget and its
macroeconomics in that order.
Unchanged Expenditure Pattern
It has been claimed that this budget will
Transform India to have a significant
impact on the lives of people. This, it is
claimed, it does by boosting demand and
continuing with the pace of economic reforms. The emphasis on policy initiatives
to change the lives of our people for the
better is welcome. Even though the
budget does not go into the detail of how
this is to be achieved, it indicates that the
Modi government, which has been somewhat partial to the coining of slogans,
has finally come round to recognising
that its public policy will be judged by its
impact on ordinary lives.
In keeping with this, the allocations
for both health and education have been
increased, though in the case of education, the increase is lower than it was in
the previous year. Also, in keeping with
the objective of improving lives, the
central plan outlay on education has
been tilted a little towards schooling,
but expenditure on higher education yet
outstrips that on schooling by a factor of
five. This is very likely among the greatest divergences in the world, and suggests how analysing a budget purely in
terms of annual changes can mask deep
structural flaws in its design.
But this budget has begun to make
the most tentative of steps towards a

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BUDGET 201617

need to go in rearranging public expenditure in India. Thus, note for instance, that the expenditure on education and agriculture are a mere 5.8%
and 1.6% respectively, of that on subsidies.1 Of course, fertiliser subsidy ostensibly goes to agriculture; but the question is how much of it is accounted for by
the goal of assuring a minimum rate of
return to the fertiliser companies under
the retention price system. Given the
scale of the fertiliser subsidy, there is
surely a case for targeting it better.
Finally, while yet on the topic of the
pattern of public expenditure, it is difficult to accept a postal deficit twice that
of the total expenditure on agriculture
and more than half of that on education.
Why should postal services be subsidised at this stage of the countrys development? The real price of communication has declined very substantially and
mobile networks are being accessed by
every section of the population.

rationalisation of expenditure in order


to correct Indias long-term neglect of
health and education by reducing subsidies marginally. This has perhaps been
made possible by the reduction in the
liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) subsidy.
Rationalisation of the pattern of expenditure is necessary because unless revenues are increased substantially, a significant increase in spending on the social sector is possible only by reducing
subsidies. This is evident from Table 1
which sets out selected items of expenditure under non-plan.
Table 1: Selected Items of Non-plan Expenditure
Item

Allocation (` Crore)

Pensions
Defence
Police
Education
Postal deficit
Agriculture and allied services
Subsidies

1,23,368
2,49,099
59,796
14,551
8,416
4,016
2,50,433

Source: Expenditure Budget, Budget 201617, Ministry


of Finance.

Assuming that defence expenditure


and pensions cannot be reduced, any
increase in spending on health and education can come only from a diversion of
the spending on subsidies. Would this be
such a bad thing? It has long been pointed
out that some part of Indias subsidy
regime is regressive as it subsidises the
consumption of the rich. Subsidy on
diesel going into the running of sport
utility vehicles (SUVs) would qualify
under this heading. Then there is the
subsidy recorded as such, even though it
finances no ones consumption, but is
the result of waste. This is the subsidy
incurred when grain is procured but
allowed to rot in the Food Corporation
of Indias (FCI) godowns. The present
government has been restrained in the
hiking of procurement prices but it is not
clear whether it has managed stocks
optimally. Procurement has exceeded
offtake in the past two years even as
stocks have been piling up since 2008.
Some part of the food subsidy merely
reflects these unsold stocks (Economic
Survey 2016). It is not obvious that welfare is increased as a result.
Much time is spent as soon as a budget
has been presented discussing the
incremental change in allocations even
as its extant pattern shows how far we
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april 16, 2016

No Progress on Subsidies
The Modi government has shown itself
to be no less populist than the other
political parties of this country when it
repeats that it only aims to target subsidies better and not to eliminate them.
Actually, some subsidies need elimination if health and education are to be
better funded. This budget has not made
a move in this direction even as it has
raised hopes of greater social protection.
The scale of the problem of rearranging the pattern of public expenditure
is brought home when we compare
the allocation for subsidies (`2,50,433
crore) with that for capital formation
(`2,47,023 crore). There is something
seriously wrong with a countrys economic policy when subsidies exceed public investment. Clearly, there is a case for
zero-based budgeting when it comes to
non-plan expenditure where the template is not credible.
But the far greater shortcoming of this
budget is that it has not provided anything like the boost necessary to the
sluggish demand that it recognises as a
feature of the present macroeconomic
situation. The total allocation for capital
expenditure in the budget exceeds that
made in the last year by a mere 2.3%. It

vol lI no 16

would be difficult to describe this as


anything other than an insult under the
circumstances!
To place matters in perspective, the
budgetary allocation for 201516 had exceeded the actuals in 201415 by 22.8%.
This is the scale of intervention that
would be expected in a budget commencing with the observation that there is a
demand slowdown, and when private
investment has been depressed for several years. The budget, therefore, amounts to a reasonable vision for the economy but without the wherewithal to it.
In the absence of a productivity leap the
economy can be taken where this government claims to be taking us only via
some serious capital expenditure. This
has not been provided for.
Macroeconomic Straitjacket
The underlying reason for the lack of
heft in the budget is not difficult to
account for. The government has stuck
to the pre-announced path of fiscal consolidation. In fact the finance ministers
subsequent pronouncements reveal that
he draws great satisfaction from this
outcome. The glide path for the fiscal
deficit had targeted 3.5% of gross domestic product (GDP) for 201617 and
the budget has been drawn up accordingly. We can now see that this has been
achieved by squeezing capital expenditure. The difference between the fiscal
deficit and the effective revenue deficitbeing a measure of the borrowing
for capital formationis pegged at 2.3%
for 201617, down from an estimated
2.4% in 201516. The minister has chosen to let his record on fiscal consolidation shine over his commitment to compensate for the sluggish demand growth
that he has correctly identified. There is
reason to believe that in the process the
minister may have overestimated the
growth in income taxes and the receipts
from disinvestment, both of which are
pegged at levels far higher than what
has been achieved over the past year
(Ministry of Finance 2016).
In conclusion, we may devote some
attention to two macroeconomic policies
by which the government sets much at
store in its budget statement. We have
already referred to the consequences of
27

BUDGET 201617

a numerical target for the fiscal deficit.


The government has not troubled itself
too much explaining how the 3.5% figure has been arrived at. It is suspiciously
close to the figure adopted in Europe
since the Maastricht Treaty. But economic woes and internal dissension
have by now taken the shine off the
European Unions economic policies. It is
no longer credible to refer to them as
providing guidance for good governance
elsewhere. As a result, an alternative
tack has been taken up in the Indian discourse; a given fund of household savings in financial assets of the household
sector is available to finance the spending of the private corporate sector and
the government. We are told that after
funding the corporate sectors saving
investment gap, the amount left over from
household savings for the government to
borrow is only 3.5%.
This reflects pre-Keynesian economic
dogma. It may originate from the correct
understanding that ex post savings must
equal investment but does not recognise
that it is investment that governs savings
by generating income. Savings is what
remains after consumption. Moreover,
savings equals investment does not
require that a prior act of saving is necessary. We live in a monetary economy
and private investment can be financed
by credit from the banking sector. This is
in fact revealed by laffaire Vijay Mallya.
Had the gentleman only borrowed from
Indias households we would surely have
had some miserable compatriots but
since he has actually borrowed from the
banks he has endangered all of us, as
non-performing assets (NPAs) threaten
to slow the further flow of credit.
The assertion that a fixed volume of
financial savings by the household sector constrains the fiscal deficit to be
3.5% of GDP is only a variant of the idea
of crowding out, which relies on the
notion of a fixed fund of savings that has
to be allocated across the economy.
Beyond what has already been said here
about this, it makes the mistake of overlooking the fact that the equality between
saving and investment can occur at
varying levels of income. Thus in an
economy with unemployed resources
public investment can drive the economy
28

to a higher level of income. Far from


crowding out private investment it can
actually crowd it in, so to speak. To these
common-sense arguments, rehearsed
within the profession since the 1930s,
has more recently been added the consideration that when an economy is in
the grip of hysteresis, which threatens
to, prolong a period of sluggish output
growth, delaying a fiscal expansion can
contribute to a rise in the debtincome
ratio (Delong and Summers 2012).
Of course, when proposing fiscal expansion as an option we would need to
address the issue of a possible rise in the
interest rate following an increase in
government borrowing to finance the
deficit. However, we know from economic theory both that a rise in the rate
of interest need not prevent the fiscal expansion from bearing fruit and that it is
not inevitable. Investment is at an equilibrium when the rate of interest has been
equated to the internal rate of return of
a project. The latter is fixed, other conditions remaining the same, by long-term
expectation of revenues. Public investment can raise the expectation of longrun income for the private sector thus
neutralising any contemporaneous rise in
the rate of interest. But, as suggested, a
rise in the rate of interest is not inevitable.
The central bank can support the governments borrowing programme to
ensure that no rise in the rate of interest
takes place. In India, this channel is disabled due to the commitment to inflation targeting, now made law via the
Finance Bill 2016. This so-called modern
monetary policy framework is the second

of the two macroeconomic policies dear


to this government alluded to earlier.
Along with fiscal consolidation, inflation
targeting constrains public policy. Dogged
pursuit of an inflation target can leave a
central bank oblivious to vulnerability of
the financial system. The global financial crisis and the rising NPAs of Indian
banks bear testimony to this. In India, in
recent times, the Reserve Bank of Indias
(RBI) contribution to the decline in inflation is questionable, the decline having
been partly due to declining commodity
prices over which the bank is unlikely to
have imparted any influence. On the
other hand, the pathetic pace of progress
indicated by the Index of Industrial Production does suggest that the RBI may
have contributed at least a little to the
repression of aggregate demand via its
interest rate policy.
This budget demonstrates how political calculation combined with economic
dogma can leave an economy going
nowhere in particular.
Note
1

As subsidies are listed under non-plan expenditure, all other items in the table are of expenditure under non-plan. But it is not as if plan outlay on the latter is much higher in relation to
the subsidies bill. For instance, the plan outlay
on health and education amounts to less than
10% of subsidies in each case.

References
Delong, B and L Summers (2012): Fiscal Policy in a
Depressed Economy, Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Spring.
Economic Survey (2016): Economic Survey 201516,
Ministry of Finance, Government of India, New
Delhi.
Ministry of Finance (2016): Budget at a Glance:
Receipts, Ministry of Finance, Government of
India.

Oral History Archives


On behalf of EPW, the Centre for Public History, Srishti School of Design, Bengaluru, has put
together extended interviews of 30 individuals associated with Economic Weekly and EPW.
These are interviews with present and former staff, readers, writers and trustees, all closely
associated with the journal.
The interviews cover both the EW and EPW years, some are of the 1950s, others the 1960s
and some even later. Each interview lasts for at least an hour and a few are multi-session
interviews.
The interviews maintained in audio files (with transcripts) are available at the EPW offices in
Mumbai for consultation by researchers.
Individuals interested in researching those times and the history of EW/EPW may write to edit@
epw.in to explore how the files may be heard and used.

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617

Beyond Fiscal Prudence


and Consolidation
Pinaki Chakraborty, Lekha Chakraborty

Since sustainable deficit could


be different than the numeric
fiscal rule, a review of the Fiscal
Responsibility and Budget
Management Act is timely and
important. However, such a
review should bear in mind that
macro-stabilisation is a central
function and the burden of fiscal
adjustment should squarely
fall on the union government
keeping state debt and deficits
within FRBM limits. Maintaining
the higher tax to gross domestic
product ratio of last year will be
key for fiscal prudence in 201617.

he Union Budget 201617 has been


hailed as fiscally prudent. Many
have argued that this budget has
restored credibility of fiscal policy by
sticking to the targets of deficit reduction
as laid out in the Medium Term Fiscal
Plan of 201516. If the fiscal consolidation
envisaged in Budget 201617 continues, it
would bring the fiscal deficit to the Fiscal
Responsibility and Budget Managements
(FRBM) stipulated target of 3% of gross
domestic product (GDP) by 201718. The
objective of this article is to discuss the
credibility of fiscal policy by examining
in detail the budgetary arithmetic.
Although, adhering to the fiscal rules
and targets has been the only mantra in
India since the enactment of the FRBM
Act, for the first time within the government there were arguments in favour of
relaxing the fiscal consolidation targets
in the mid-year review of Indian economy
(Ministry of Finance 2015) and in the Economic Survey (Ministry of Finance 2016).
The government has adhered to the fiscal
consolidation path of deficit reduction.
We analyse whether adherence to fiscal
deficit targets was fiscal discipline or a
revenue buoyancy-led fiscal adjustment
bonanza received in 201516 due to benign petroleum prices. We also examine
whether revenue-led fiscal consolidation
is possible in 201617. We also examine
the implications of the announcement to
review the functioning of the FRBM Act.
What are the short-term macroeconomic
implications of fiscal consolidation and
the long-run impact on key spending and
fiscal sustainability? Finally, is the Budget
201617 a redistributive budget focused on
the farm sector and agriculture?
Fiscal Consolidation and Trends

Pinaki Chakraborty (pinaki.chakraborty@


nipfp.org.in) and Lekha Chakraborty (lekha.
chakraborty@nipfp.org.in) are with the
National Institute of Public Finance and Policy,
New Delhi.
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

While analysing the fiscal consolidation


framework, we need to bear in mind
that Finance Minister Arun Jaitley has
announced that a committee will be set
up to review the working of the FRBM
vol lI no 16

Act. It has been indicated to have fiscal


deficit as ranges of targets instead of fixed
numbers. Economic Survey 201516 also
highlighted the need to relook at the
impacts of debt and deficits on the macroeconomy and reframe the fiscal consolidation road map. The survey has put forward
two arguments in terms of analysing the
macroeconomic framework of fiscal consolidation. One, does altering fiscal consolidation affect the rate of interest
management? Two, what is the impact
of this revision on the path of debt and
deficit? As is well known, two basic
determinants of medium-term fiscal policy
path would be the level of primary deficit,
and the difference between interest rate
on government debt (i) and the growth
of nominal GDP (g) (multiplied by the
previous years debt ratio). As articulated
in Economic Survey 201516:
d(t) d(t-1) = pd (t) + [i-g]/[1+g]*d(t-1)
where d denotes debt, pd denotes
primary deficits, i denotes interest rate
and g denotes growth rate. Subscript t
denotes time period. As per this equation,
two factorsthe high levels of primary deficit, and/or i>gcan lead to unsustainable
debt position. As per 201617 budget estimates (BE), primary deficit is expected to
be 0.3% of GDP (Table 1, p 30) and i is
not greater than g. It is also to be noted
that primary deficit as a percentage of GDP
has consistently declined between 201112
and 201617 (BE). During this entire
period, i consistently remained lower
than g. In other words, even when the
fiscal deficit target remained above the
FRBM target of 3% of GDP, the fiscal path
remained sustainable. This also reinforces
the point that sustainable level of deficit
could be different than the target set by
the FRBM Act. In this context, a review of
FRBM Act is timely and appropriate.
Going strictly by the numerical target
of deficit reduction, the history of fiscal
consolidation shows that states have
remained fiscally prudent while the centre
continued to borrow more than the FRBM
target. Restraint by the states has actually
provided headroom to borrow more by
the centre, yet combined deficit did not
reach an explosive stage. Thus, when the
review of FRBM is undertaken, it should be
borne in mind that macro-stabilisation
29

BUDGET 201617

revenue-side measures, including tax


structure and reforms, and the size of
the government and expenditure commitments. As evident from Table 1, fiscal
consolidation in 201516 (RE) is achieved through revenue buoyancy than
expenditure compression. At the macroeconomic level, expenditure-to-GDP ratio
Table 1: Overview of Union Government Finances: 201112 to 201617 (BE) is expected to remain
(percent to GDP) flat at around 13% of
201112 201213 201314 201415 201516 RE 201617 BE
GDP between 201516
Revenues and expenditure
(RE) and 201617 (BE)
Gross tax receipts
10.1 10.4
10
9.9
10.8
10.8
Non-tax receipts
1.4
1.4
1.7
1.6
1.9
2.1
(Table 1). But gross tax
Expenditure
14.8 14.1
13.7
13.3
13.2
13.1
receipts-to-GDP ratio is
Revenue expenditure 12.9 12.4
12.0
11.8
11.4
11.5
expected to increase
Capital expenditure
1.8
1.7
1.6
1.6
1.8
1.6
from 9.9% to 10.8% of
Debt servicing
GDP between 201415
Interest payment to
revenue receipts ratio 43.4 42.2
45.9 44.5
46.7
46.7
and 201516 (RE) and
Interest payment to
is expected to remain
GDP ratio
3.07
3.13
3.27 3.23
3.26
3.27
at the same level in
Deficit profile
201617 (BE). What led
Fiscal deficit
5.8
4.9
4.4
4.1
3.9
3.5
to
this improvement
Revenue deficit
4.5
3.6
3.1
2.9
2.5
2.3
in
tax-to-GDP
ratio by
Primary deficit
2.7
1.8
1.1
0.9
0.7
0.3
Source: Budget Document 201617, Budget Division, Ministry of Finance.
almost one percentage
The golden rule of fiscal consolidation point of GDP in 201516 (RE)? Can that
is to finance current expenditure from level of tax-to-GDP ratio be maintained
current revenue, or zero revenue deficits. in 201617? Also, we need to examine
As evident from Table 1, fiscal deficit of the the non-tax revenue profile to underunion government has declined sharply stand its relative role in improving revefrom 5.8% in 201112 to 4.1% in 201415. nues and thereby fiscal consolidation.
The 201516 revised estimates (RE) pegged
fiscal deficit at 3.9% and 201617 (BE) at Revenue and Sustainability
is a central function and the burden of
fiscal adjustments should be central
governments responsibility while keeping state debt and deficits within the statespecific FRBM targets. Since centre and
states are unequal partners in borrowing,
flexibility to centre should not mean implicit control on state borrowing.

3.5%. If the trend of consolidation continues, the union government should


achieve the FRBM mandated target of 3%
fiscal deficit by the end of 201718. The
revenue deficit as a percentage of GDP is
still very high. It declined from 4.5% of
GDP in 201112 to 2.9% in 201415, and is
expected to be 2.3% of GDP in 201617
(BE). Though revenue deficit has declined,
it still remained around 65% of fiscal
deficit implying that two-thirds of the
borrowed resources are being used to
finance current expenditure of the union
government. Measured by fiscal and
revenue deficit, would the government
be able to remain fiscally prudent in
201617 (BE)? In order to understand
this we need to examine what led to
fiscal consolidation in 201516 (RE) and
the measures proposed in 201617 (BE).
While analysing the macro-fiscal
rules for a long-term fiscal consolidation,
two elements need to be examined
against the backdrop of Budget 201617:
30

As evident from Table 2, gross tax revenues


of the central government is expected to
increase at the rate of 11.73% between
201516 (RE) and 201617 (BE). This
growth is heavily dependent on the personal income tax growth of more than 18%
and the growth of union excise duty at
12.15%. Table 2 also reveals that the buoyant tax revenue growth in 201516 (RE)
Table 2: Growth of Different Components of
Revenues
(percent per annum)
201516 (RE) over 201617 (BE) over
201415 (BE)
201516 (RE)

Gross tax revenue


Corporation tax
Taxes on income
Customs
Union excise duties
Service tax
Taxes on union territories
Non-tax revenues
Interest receipts
Dividends and profits
Other non-tax revenues
Total revenues

17.25
5.61
12.54
11.43
49.59
25.02
23.22
30.69
-2.78
31.66
38.99
9.50

Source: Budget at a Glance 201617 (BE).

11.73
9.04
18.10
9.79
12.15
10.00
4.38
24.88
27.99
4.66
46.38
14.17

was primarily due to the 49.59% growth


in union excise duty due to the continuous
increase in taxes on benign petroleum
prices. Since not taxing petroleum has
an adverse impact on environment and
climate change, the pass-through of low
oil prices to the consumers is certainly not
a desirable option. However, the policy
space for higher and higher taxation of
petroleum sector is now limited. Thus, a
12% growth on union excise duty envisaged in 201617 would be heavily dependent on what happens to revenues from
petroleum products and the policy space
to increase the tax rate on these products.
Also when it comes to personal income
tax revenues, an ambitious growth target
of 18% implies a tax buoyancy of more
than 1.5 when the nominal GDP growth
rate is 11% for the fiscal year 201617
assumed in the budget. It is to be noted
that in the fiscal year 201516 (RE),
personal income tax revenue is expected
to have a shortfall of `28,316 crore from
201516 (BE). On the corporate income
tax front a modest growth of 9% is envisaged for 201617 (BE). The finance minister in his last budget announced progressive reduction of corporate income tax
rate to 24% and the phasing out of
exemptions. However, there was no major
announcement in this years budget
related to corporate taxation. It is evident
from Table 3 (p 31) that 60.63% of share
in profit before taxes (PBT) is contributed
by the corporate firms with PBTs above
`500 crore and their total number is just
297, and their effective tax rate is as low
as 22.88%. From Table 3 it is also evident
that benefit of exemption is availed mostly
by the large companies as reflected in
inverse functional relationship between
PBT and effective tax rate. A rationalisation of tax structure without exemption
would also mean effective tax rate going
up for those paying lower than the intended statutory rate of 24% announced
in last years budget. Phasing out exemption can make this tax more buoyant
than what is envisaged to be the performance in fiscal year 201617.
If we consider non-tax revenues, the
share of it in total revenue of the central
government is expected to increase
from 17.96% in 201415 to 23.45% in
201617 (BE). Aggregate non-tax revenue

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Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617
Table 3: Effective Tax Rates of Corporate Sector, 201415
Sl No Profit before Taxes (`)

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

Number of Share in Profits


Share in
Share in Total
Companies before Taxes Total Income Corporate Income
(%)
(%)
Tax Liability (%)

Less than zero


2,54,079
Zero
18,080
01 crore
2,76,531
110 crore
26,983
1050 crore
5,130
50100 crore
894
100500 crore
895
Greater than 500 crore
297
All companies
5,82,889

0
0
2.73
6.76
9.17
5.16
15.55
60.63
100

0.58
6.54
3.38
7.54
9.08
5.01
14.56
53.31
100

Source: Budget Document 201617, Ministry of Finance, Budget Division.

is expected to grow at the rate of 24.88%


in 201617 (BE) as compared to a growth
of 30.69% in 201516 (RE) (Table 2).
Realisation of this growth rate would
depend on the increase in other non-tax
revenue growth at the rate of 46.38% in
201617 (BE) over 201516 (RE). If we
examine the disaggregate profile of nontax revenues, out of budgeted receipts of
`3,22,921 crore, `1,23,780 crore is expected
to be realised as dividends and profits
which is more than 38% of the total
receipts. Within this, dividend from public
sector enterprises and surpluses of
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) are expected
to be `53,883 crore and `69,987 crore,
respectively. The other major contributor
to non-tax revenues would be communication services to the tune of `98,994
crore or 30.65% of the total booked under economic services as one-time spectrum charges. The non-tax revenue to
GDP ratio is expected to increase from
1.6% in 201415 to 2.1% in 201617 (BE)
(Table 1). In other words, if we compare
between 201415 and 201617 (BE), the
improvement in revenue-to-GDP ratio
would be from 11.48% to 12.94%, an
increase of almost 1.5 percentage points
of GDP. The key to fiscal consolidation, in
other words, would be critically dependent
on the government reaching the aggregate revenue-to-GDP ratio of 13% of GDP
in the fiscal year 201617 (BE).
Expenditure Profile
As mentioned earlier, aggregate expenditure-to-GDP ratio is expected to remain
at around 13% of GDP between 201516
(RE) and 201617 (BE). Gradual decline
in revenue expenditure-to-GDP ratio from
12.9% in 201112 to 11.5% in 201617 (BE)
resulted in the reduction in both revenue
and fiscal deficits to GDP ratios during the
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EPW

april 16, 2016

0.47
2.81
3.25
7.4
9.48
5.26
15.12
56.21
100

Ratio of Total
Effective Tax
Income to Profits
Rate (in %)
before Taxes (%) (Profit to Tax Ratio)

95.39
85.44
76.26
74.83
72
67.66
76.94

29.37
26.99
25.52
25.14
23.97
22.88
24.67

Finance minister in his Budget Speech


mentioned that the next financial year
201617 will cast an additional burden on
account of the recommendations of the
Seventh CPC and the implementation of
Defence OROP. The government, therefore, has to prioritise its expenditure.
We wish to enhance expenditure in the
farm and rural sector, the social sector, the
infrastructure sector and provide for recapitalisation of the banks. Among the
expenditure-related announcements, allocation for agriculture deserves a special
mention here. Allocation for agriculture
has increased from `15,809.54 crore in
201516 (RE) to `35,983.69 crore, of which
`15,000 crore is allocated to Agricultural
Financial Institutions earlier booked in
the finance ministrys budget. Thus, the
increase in allocation in agriculture without this adjustment is around `5,000 crore.
It needs to be noted that the challenges
for agricultural sector are multidimensional. This requires a national strategy
for revival. Also it is not only investment
in farm sector that is going to revive the
agricultural sector. A multidimensional
strategy should examine public investment
not only in agriculture but also irrigation,

same period while maintaining capital


expenditure at around 1.6% to 1.8%. It is
also to be noted that debt servicing as a
percentage of GDP continues to be high at
more than 3% of GDP and as a percentage
of revenue receipts, it is around 47%. In
this context we need to examine the changing composition of expenditure to understand the allocation and distribution of
public expenditure across sectors. As
evident from Table 4, the share of interest
payment in total expenditure is on the
rise and is expected to be around 25% of
the total expenditure. While the share of
subsidy and defence expenditure share
in total expenditure is on the decline, the
share of pension is expected to rise to
6.2% of total expenditure. Table 4: Structure of Union Government Expenditure
(in %)
The share of plan ex- Structure of Expenditure 201112 201213 201314 201415 201516 201617
(RE)
(BE)
penditure has declined Interest payment
20.9
22.2
24.0
24.2
24.8
24.9
progressively from 31.6% Defence expenditure 13.1 12.9 13.0 13.1
12.6
12.6
to 27.8% primarily due to Subsidies
16.7
18.2
16.3
15.5
14.4
12.7
4.7
4.9
4.8
5.6
5.4
6.2
the decline in plan trans- Pension
31.6
29.3
29.1
27.8
26.7
27.8
fers to the states. Finance Plan expenditure
12.9
12.4
12.8
13.7
16.1
15.8
minister in his Budget Others
Total expenditure
100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0
Speech has announced Source: Budget Document 201617, Ministry of Finance, Government of India.
that interim provision has
Table 5: Gross Capital Formation: Sectoral Allocation: As a Percent to
been made in the Budget GDP (New Series Data: At Current Prices)
201617 for the Seventh Economic Activity
201112 201213 201314 201415 (AE)
3.14
2.76
2.86
2.52
Central Pay Commission Agriculture, forestry and fishing
0.76
0.82
1.33
1.05
award (Seventh CPC). The Mining and quarrying
7.06
6.46
5.67
5.35
Seventh CPC award is go- Manufacturing
Electricity, gas, water supply and
ing to add to the commit- other utility services
3.53
3.17
2.77
2.90
ted liabilities share in the Construction
2.63
2.72
1.81
1.75
total budget. The down- Trade, repair, hotels and restaurants 2.21
3.67
2.47
2.88
side fiscal risk would be Transport, storage, communication
2.71
2.97
2.89
the inability to adjust and services related to broadcasting 2.96
Financial services
0.49
0.36
0.31
0.40
competing priorities withReal estate, ownership of
out violating the path of dwelling and professional services 9.34
8.52
8.41
7.74
fiscal sustainability within Public administration
2.84
2.71
2.85
3.21
the overall ceiling of and defence
1.73
1.61
1.75
1.86
government expenditure, Other services
Total GCF
36.68 35.51 33.22 32.55
which is pegged at around Source: http://mospi.nic.in/Mospi_New/upload/nad_PR_29jan16.pdf,
AE: Advance estimates.
13% of GDP.

vol lI no 16

31

BUDGET 201617

rural roads, rural development and power


sector. It is important to note here that
allocation for Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak
Yojana (PMGSY) has been increased. As
evident from the budget, total investment
in the road sector, including PMGSY allocation, would be `97,000 crore during
201617. It is also to be noted that gross
capital formation (GCF) in agriculture, forestry and fishing has declined from 3.14%
of GDP to 2.52% of GDP between 201112
and 201415. Investment in other key
sectors, including infrastructure, as a
percentage of GDP declined during this
period with an overall decline in GCF
from 36.68% to 32.55% (Table 5, p 31).
Can central government alone reverse the
fall in investment in agriculture through
higher public investment?
In this context, it needs to be noted that
agriculture is a state subject. Combined

32

expenditure on agriculture taking centre and states together in 201415 was


`2,69,914 crore, of which state spending
was `2,45,628 crore, which accounted
for 91% of total public expenditure on
agriculture (IPFS 2015). Given the distress in the farm sector and falling investment, revival of agricultural sector
would critically depend on the statelevel priority to this sector. Central
public spending can only act as a
catalyst. It is important to examine why
states have not been able to increase
agricultural investment in the past and
corrective actions by the states would
help in this direction.
Conclusions
Based on our analysis, we conclude that
a revenue-led fiscal adjustment will be
the key to fiscal prudence in 201617.

Since there has been an increase in the


tax-to-GDP ratio by almost one percentage point between 201415 and 201516
(RE) there are challenges in maintaining that level of tax effort in 201617.
However, a revenue-led fiscal consolidation is always better than the blanket
cut in expenditure to adhere to fiscal
deficit target. Also the fiscal policy
space for further reduction in government expenditure is limited. Further
contraction in public spending can have
a negative impact on growth and
revenue mobilisation.
References
IPFS (2015): Indian Public Finance Statistics 2014
15, Economic Division, Department of Economic
Affairs, Ministry of Finance.
Ministry of Finance (2015): Mid-year Review of Indian
Economy, Government of India, New Delhi.
(2016): Economic Survey 201516, Government
of India, New Delhi.

april 16, 2016

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BUDGET 201617

Table 3: EducationBudget and Revised


Estimates (201516)
Budget Head

Change (%)

Skill development and entrepreneurship


Ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy,
unani, siddha and homeopathy (AYUSH)
Higher education
School education and literacy

-32.78
-6.84
-5.29
-0.02

of 5%.
Table 4 provides details of the ministries
which we have clubbed under welfare.
The two extremes in Table 4 are housing and poverty alleviation with a fall
of -62% (from 51.7 billion to 19.6 billion)
and women and child development with
an increase of 69% (from 100.8 billion to
170.8 billion).
Finally, Table 5 presents details of ministries concerned with infrastructure.
The Railways have suffered a sharp
fall of -20% mainly on account of the
fact that investments have fallen from
Table 4: Welfare Budget and Revised Estimates
(201516)
Budget Head

Change
(%)

Housing and urban poverty alleviation


Development of north-eastern region
Social justice and empowerment
Tribal affairs
Empowerment of persons with disabilities
Minority affairs
Rural development
Women and child development

-62.16
-19.13
-8.51
-5.09
-4.08
0.26
8.39
69.32

Table 5: InfrastructureBudget and Revised


Estimates (201516)
Budget Head

Change
(%)

Railways
Shipping
Civil aviation
Power
Atomic energy
Road transport and highways

-20.00
-2.28
25.64
19.02
4.32
2.97

Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

(` billion)
the budgeted level of Figure 1: Railways: Budgeted and Revised Expenditure
500
400 billion to 320 bil400
Budgeted
400
320
lion. This is a shocking 300
Revised
260 270 301 301
230 240 242.6
200
underachievement given 200
181.3
146 153.3 158.8
the National Democratic 100
0
Alliance (NDA) govern200910
201011 201112
201213
201314 201415 201516
ments emphasis on infrastructure. This shortfall does make the agriculture and allied activities from
proposed 450 billion capital expendi- 201112 till 201516 and projections
ture for 201617 highly suspect. The sig- beyond 201516.
The compounded annual growth rate
nificance of this shortfall in capital expenditures of the railways should not be of GDP from agriculture and allied actiunderestimated. It is quite unprecedent- vities has been less, 3.5% from 200001 to
201516, with the highest rate of growth
ed as Figure 1 shows.
Figure 1 shows that actual capital ex- being recorded in 201011 of 8.6%. The
penditure in railways has never fallen finance ministers announcement expects
short of the budgeted amount till 2015 the sector to grow 12.25% per year from
16. A question worth pondering over is 201617 till 202122, which is almost
whether capital expenditures on rail- triple the rate that has been achieved in
ways were sacrificed at
Figure 2: GDP from Agriculture and Allied Activities
the altar of fiscal disci340
320
pline, in order to meet the
300
target of gross fiscal defi285
cit to GDP ratio of 3.9%.
254

260

Evaluating Budget
201617

Billion

and education, agriculture, cooperation


and farmers welfare, and urban development have suffered a decline as compared
to the budgeted amount.
Table 3 gives details of items covered
under education.
Given the emphasis on Skill India
(NSDC nd) and the importance attached
to it by Prime Minister Narendra Modi
(2015) it is quite a surprise that skill
development and entrepreneurship has
suffered a massive decline of 32%. The
fall in ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy,
unani, siddha and homeopathy (AYUSH),
and higher education is also in excess

227

220

202
180

180
152
150
Agriculture: At a farm140
ers rally in Uttar Pradesh,
2011 2012
12
13
the Prime Minister announced that incomes of farmers would
be
doubled by 2022 (Indian Express 2016).
The finance minister gave expression to
this announcement of the Prime Minister with what is, essentially, a vacuous
statement in his budget speech. We call
it vacuous because it is not clear what
exactly is meant by farmers income: is it
real income or nominal income? (Desai
2016) Does one obtain it by dividing the
GDP produced in agriculture by the
number of persons employed in agriculture or number of persons dependent on
agriculture? The problem is that we
could not find a source which would give
information on farmers income. In what
we present below, we use GDP from agriculture and allied activities at 201112
prices. (Before the change in methodology
of computing GDP, it was possible to get
GDP from agriculture separately from GDP
from agriculture and allied activities,
but not anymore. See CSO 2016).
Figure 2 shows the data of GDP from

vol lI no 16

159

158

160

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021


14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22

the last 15 years. One caveat to be borne


in mind while considering Figure 2 is
that it is possible that the number of
persons involved with agriculture would
come down over the years and the doubling of per capita incomes might require a slower rate of growth of GDP
from agriculture and allied activities.
Despite this caveat, the proposals spelt
out in the budget do not provide any
confidence that the announcement of
doubling farmers incomes by 2022 is
anything other than wishful thinking or,
worse, it amounts to mere sloganeering,
not unlike the Garibi Hatao slogans
during Indira Gandhis reign.
Infrastructure: The finance minister
states in his budget speech (paragraphs
73 and 74) that
the total investment in the road sector,
including Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak
Yojana (PMGSY) allocation, would be 970
billion during 201617Together with the
capital expenditure of the Railways, the total outlay on roads and railways will be
2,180 billion in 201617.

33

BUDGET 201617

Lacking in Substance

of Budget 201516 hides important differences across the ministries/budgetheads covered under each item. Table 2
gives details of the major items covered
under public goods.

Ajit Karnik, Mala Lalvani

Budget 201617 was presented


after the Economic Survey
recognised weaknesses in the
Indian economy and raised hopes
that the government would usher
in major changes to enthuse the
private sector to invest and grow
once again. The dire situation of
the rural sector was sought to be
addressed through measures to
alleviate suffering. Indeed, the
slew of announcements sound
impressive but, in reality, are
quite modest.

Ajit Karnik (ajit.karnik@gmail.com) teaches at


Middlesex University, Dubai. Mala Lalvani
(mala.lalvani@gmail.com) teaches at the
Department of Economics, University of Mumbai.

32

Table 1: Purpose-wise Expenditures during 201516

udget 201617 has been hailed, not


quite as a game changer, but
certainly as one which deserves
high marks (Anand 2016). Certainly, some
of the announcements relating to agriculture (Bera 2016), rural development
(Choudhury 2016), Mahatma Gandhi
National Rural Employment Guarantee
Act (Deccan Chronicle 2016) and infrastructure (Pandey 2016) have caught the
attention of analysts. We will be evaluating these budgetary provisions in the
course of this article. However, before
we do that, we take a quick look at
what was achieved by Budget 201516.
Looking Back: Budget 201516
We first consider the purpose-wise classification of government expenditures as
announced in Budget 201516 and compare these to what was achieved over
the year. Table 1 provides these details.
While the revised total figures seem
close to the budgeted levels, important discrepancies are noticeable in items listed in
Table 1. Moreover, the overall comparison
between the budget and revised estimates

201516 (BE) 201516 (RE) Change: 201516


( billion)
( billion) (RE) over 201516
(BE) (%)

Public goods
Education
Welfare
Infrastructure
Total

5,372.19
714.34
1,031.09
1,081.29
8,198.91

5,421.40
694.20
1,119.67
1,040.59
8,275.86

0.92
-2.82
8.59
-3.76
0.94

BE = budget estimates; RE = revised estimates.


The ministries covered under the items listed above will be
noted in the tables presented below.

Table 2: Public GoodsBudget and Revised


Estimates (201516)
Budget Head

Change (%)

New and renewable energy


Agriculture research and education
Defence services
Agriculture, cooperation and
farmers welfare
Urban development
Land resources
Law and justice
Culture
Science and technology
Scientific and industrial research
Defence (miscellaneous)
Health and family welfare
Food and public distribution
Water, rivers, Ganga
Drinking water and sanitation
Panchayati raj

april 16, 2016

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EPW

-13.57
-11.61
-8.39
-7.06
-6.33
-3.32
-3.03
-1.75
-0.18
0.14
1.99
6.14
12.26
66.16
74.74
133.77

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617

Table 3: EducationBudget and Revised


Estimates (201516)
Budget Head

Change (%)

Skill development and entrepreneurship


Ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy,
unani, siddha and homeopathy (AYUSH)
Higher education
School education and literacy

-32.78
-6.84
-5.29
-0.02

Given the emphasis on Skill India


(NSDC nd) and the importance attached
to it by Prime Minister Narendra Modi
(2015) it is quite a surprise that skill
development and entrepreneurship has
suffered a massive decline of 32%. The
fall in ayurveda, yoga and naturopathy,
unani, siddha and homeopathy (AYUSH),
and higher education is also in excess
of 5%.
Table 4 provides details of the ministries
which we have clubbed under welfare.
The two extremes in Table 4 are housing and poverty alleviation with a fall
Table 4: Welfare Budget and Revised Estimates
(201516)
Budget Head

Change
(%)

Housing and urban poverty alleviation


Development of north-eastern region
Social justice and empowerment
Tribal affairs
Empowerment of persons with disabilities
Minority affairs
Rural development
Women and child development

-62.16
-19.13
-8.51
-5.09
-4.08
0.26
8.39
69.32

Table 5: InfrastructureBudget and Revised


Estimates (201516)
Budget Head

Change
(%)

Railways
Shipping
Civil aviation
Power
Atomic energy
Road transport and highways

-20.00
-2.28
25.64
19.02
4.32
2.97

Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

(` billion)
of -62% (from 51.7 billion Figure 1: Railways: Budgeted and Revised Expenditure
500
to 19.6 billion) and women
400
Budgeted
400
320
and child development 300
Revised
260 270 301 301
230 240 242.6
200
with an increase of 69% 200
181.3
146 153.3 158.8
(from 100.8 billion to 100
0
170.8 billion).
200910
201011 201112
201213
201314 201415 201516
Finally, Table 5 presents
details of ministries concerned with in- information on farmers income. In what
we present below, we use GDP from agfrastructure.
The Railways have suffered a sharp riculture and allied activities at 201112
fall of -20% mainly on account of the prices. (Before the change in methodology
fact that investments have fallen from of computing GDP, it was possible to get
the budgeted level of 400 billion to GDP from agriculture separately from GDP
320 billion. This is a shocking under- from agriculture and allied activities,
achievement given the National Demo- but not anymore. See CSO 2016).
Figure 2 shows the data of GDP from
cratic Alliance (NDA) governments emphasis on infrastructure. This shortfall agriculture and allied activities from
does make the proposed 450 billion 201112 till 201516 and projections
capital expenditure for 201617 highly beyond 201516.
suspect. The significance
Figure 2: GDP from Agriculture and Allied Activities
of this shortfall in capital
340
320
expenditures of the rail300
ways should not be under285
estimated. It is quite un254
260
precedented as Figure 1
227
shows.
220
202
Figure 1 shows that ac180
180
tual capital expenditure in
160
158
159
152
150
railways has never fallen
140
short of the budgeted
2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
amount till 201516. A
The compounded annual growth rate
question worth pondering over is whether
capital expenditures on railways were of GDP from agriculture and allied actisacrificed at the altar of fiscal discipline, vities has been less, 3.5% from 200001 to
in order to meet the target of gross fiscal 201516, with the highest rate of growth
deficit to GDP ratio of 3.9%.
being recorded in 201011 of 8.6%. The
finance ministers announcement expects
Evaluating Budget 201617
the sector to grow 12.25% per year from
201617 till 202122, which is almost
Agriculture: At a farmers rally in Uttar triple the rate that has been achieved in
Pradesh, the Prime Minister announced the last 15 years. One caveat to be borne
that incomes of farmers would be in mind while considering Figure 2 is
doubled by 2022 (Indian Express 2016). that it is possible that the number of
The finance minister gave expression to persons involved with agriculture would
this announcement of the Prime Minis- come down over the years and the douter with what is, essentially, a vacuous bling of per capita incomes might restatement in his budget speech. We call quire a slower rate of growth of GDP
it vacuous because it is not clear what from agriculture and allied activities.
exactly is meant by farmers income: is it Despite this caveat, the proposals spelt
real income or nominal income? (Desai out in the budget do not provide any
2016) Does one obtain it by dividing the confidence that the announcement of
GDP produced in agriculture by the doubling farmers incomes by 2022 is
number of persons employed in agricul- anything other than wishful thinking or,
ture or number of persons dependent on worse, it amounts to mere sloganeering,
agriculture? The problem is that we not unlike the Garibi Hatao slogans
could not find a source which would give during Indira Gandhis reign.
Billion

Table 2 seems skewed due to the massive percentage increase of expenditure


for panchayati raj institutions. However,
it should be remembered that the actual
amount of expenditure for panchayati
raj institutions is quite small: 0.95 billion
(BE) and 2.22 billion (RE). It is disconcerting that budget heads like new and
renewable energy, agriculture research
and education, agriculture, cooperation
and farmers welfare, and urban development have suffered a decline as compared
to the budgeted amount.
Table 3 gives details of items covered
under education.

vol lI no 16

33

BUDGET 201617

Infrastructure: The finance minister


states in his budget speech (paragraphs
73 and 74) that

The 2,180 billion mentioned above is


inclusive of 450 billion capital expenditure of Indian railways. As we evaluate
the allocations for transport, it is important to keep in mind the shortfall in
capital expenditure of Indian Railways
in 201516 that was pointed out earlier.
Hence, there is no certainty that the
budgeted amount will be spent on
railways for 201617. It should also be
pointed out that the amount allocated
for transport includes allocations for the
National Highways Authority of India
(NHAI) but not all of it is routed through
the budget (Table 6).
Table 6: Allocations to National Highways
Authority of India
( billion)
201516 (BE) 201516 (RE) 201617 (BE)

Budget support
IEBR
Total

294.20
426.95
721.15

294.21
280.00
574.20

196.53
592.79
789.32

IEBR = Internal and Extra-Budgetary Resources.

The Planning Commission describes


Internal and Extra-budgetary Resources
(IEBR) as
IEBR comprises of internal resources, and
extra-budgetary resources. Extra-budgetary resources are the sum of domestic and
foreign loans raised directly by [Public
Sector Organizations].The extra-budgetary
resources consist of receipts from the issue
of bonds, debentures, external commercial
borrowing (ECB), suppliers credit, deposit
receipts and term loans from financial institutions (Planning Commission 2006: 18).

As this description makes clear, how


much IEBR can be raised cannot be
controlled by the budget and, hence,
there is no guarantee that the amounts
allocated to the NHAI (Table 6) will, in
fact, be raised. If the past is any indication, the performance with respect to
raising IEBR has not been very good as
Figure 3 shows.
Over the last three years, performance
in raising IEBR has been under 66%. Once
again, our issue with the budget announcement is that nowhere in the Budget
Speech is this dependence on IEBR
34

80

500
400

57.14%

Actual amount/
budgeted amount (%)
(right-hand side axis)

426.95

60
280

300

40

Budgeted amount ( billion)


200
140

65.58%

33.33%
Actual amount raised ( billion)
80
90

Percentage

the total investment in the road sector,


including Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak
Yojana (PMGSY) allocation, would be 970
billion during 201617Together with the
capital expenditure of the Railways, the total outlay on roads and railways will be
2,180 billion in 201617.

Figure 3: IEBR Performance

for rural development


as a percentage of total
expenditure for 2016
17 has stayed stagnant
at 4.4%.

MGNREGS: The World


Development Report of
30
0
0
the World Bank (2013:
201314
201415
201516
155) accords high praise
made clear. It is only when one reads the to the role that the MGNREGS has played
fine print of the budget documents do in alleviating rural distress:
these details come to light. Another issue
Demand for work [under the MGNREGS] is
massive, mostly from poor and disadvanrelated to this is the tendency to push
taged groups, and at times of the year where
the funding of essential activities to offno other work is available. Not only does the
budget borrowings which may involve
program offer a useful safety net, but it also
government guarantees. Shetty (2016: 17)
helps spread awareness of rights and promotes dignity.
also points towards crowding-out of
private sector borrowers when large
Budget 201617 promises a sum of
infrastructure institutions like the be- 385 billion for MGNREGS (Table 8). The
hemoth Railways enter the market with question, however, is whether enough
huge demands with sovereign backing. has been done to fulfil the critical role
that MGNREGS is expected to play,
Rural Development: The MGNREGS was namely, act as a safety net in times of
the NDAs bte noire. The quote of the rural distress.
Prime Minister regarding the scheme Table 8: MGNREGS Allocation
( billion)
201516 201516 201617
has been repeated often enough now
(BE)
(RE)
(BE)
for all to know the disdain he felt for MGNREGS allocation
347
370
385
it (PTI 2016). And yet, the Ministry of MGNREGS as % of
48.4
47.6
44.7
Rural Development, despite the many rural development
flaws of the scheme, has hailed it as a MGNREGS as % of
1.95
2.0
1.94
success (Tewari 2015). However, the Total expenditure
dire situation in the rural areas has
Expenditure on MGNREGS as a percentcompelled the NDA government to re- age of expenditure on rural development
think its antipathy towards the scheme has fallen from 47.6% in 201516 (RE)
(Mukherjee 2016).
to 44.7% in 201617 while expenditure
The finance minister has allocated a on MGNREGS as a percentage of total
total of 877.65 billion for Rural Deve- expenditure has declined from 2.1% to
lopment of which 385 billion has been 1.95%. Hence, despite much bluster, the
allocated for MGNREGS (Table 7). Does actual response of Budget 201617 to
this represent a serious attempt to rural distress has been very disappointalleviate rural distress?
ing. The grandstanding has not been
Table 7: Allocations for Rural Development ( billion) backed up by meaningful allocations.
100

Demand No (Department)

201516
(BE)

201516
(RE)

201617
(BE)

75 (rural development)
716.95
777.00
860.55
of which
MGNREGS
346.99
369.67
385.00
76 (land records)
16.37
15.78
17.09
Total
733.32
792.78
877.65
Total expenditure
of government
17,774.77 17,853.91 19,780.60
Rural development as
% of total expenditure
4.1
4.4
4.4

Despite much talk regarding enhanced


attention of Budget 201617 for rural
development, the information in Table 4
does not bear this out. Expenditure

20

Fiscal Discipline: The finance minister


has deservedly received praise for maintaining fiscal discipline and keeping
deficits in check. Even though there
were fears that the fiscal deficit target
for 201516 might be missed, such fears
were misplaced. Gross fiscal deficit (GFD)
as a percentage of GDP is expected to
fall to 3.5% in 201617 from 3.9%
which was achieved in 201516; revenue
deficit as a percentage of GDP will be
2.3% as compared to 2.5% in 201516.

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617
Figure 4: Disinvestment Performance

(` billion) targeted at vested interests

are difficult to cut but


Actual amount/budgeted amount (%)
49.43
46.30
those which are targeted
600
at electorates with low bar40
Actual amount
36.42
raised
gaining power or political
400
clout will be sacrificed. In
20
fact, this is exactly what
200
happened in 201516 when
0
0
disinvestment proceeds
201314
201415
201516
were only 36% of the
Table 9: Cutbacks in Expenditures
budgeted level (Table 9).
Budget Head
Reduction in Expenditure as
What is noticeable is that most of
Compared to 201516
the budget heads that have been cut,
Budget (%)
Housing and
though important from a welfare
urban poverty alleviation
-62.16
and growth point of view, do not wield
Tourism
-40.62
any political clout and these have
Skill development and
been sacrificed in order to meet deficit
entrepreneurship
-32.78
targets.
Railways
-20.00
800
Budget amount

60

Development of
north-eastern region
New and renewable energy
Earth sciences
Agriculture research and education
Youth affairs and sports

-19.13
-13.57
-12.45
-11.61
-9.82

Despite this commendable commitment of meeting GFD targets, things


could go wrong. The revenues expected
to be garnered for financing the GFD
include proceeds from disinvestments.
For 201617, disinvestment proceeds
account for almost 4% of non-debt
creating revenues. A worry, however, is
the disappointing performance of disinvestment proceeds over the years as
Figure 4 shows.
Figure 4 makes clear that actual
amount collected from disinvestment
as compared to the budgeted amount
has not crossed 50% in the last three
years. Successful disinvestment requires the stock market to be buoyant in
order to garner the required amount of
revenues. But, with stock markets currently exhibiting substantial volatility
and likely to remain so for much of
2016, the governments disinvestment
target of 565 billion for 201617 may be
too optimistic.
In the event that disinvestment proceeds are below anticipated levels and
the finance minister wishes to adhere to
the fiscal deficit target, then total
expenditures have to be cut. The question is, which expenditures will be cut?
This is where political economy comes
into the picture. Expenditures which are
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

Summing Up
Budget 201617 was presented amid great
anticipation. It was expected that the
budget would boost the reforms process; it
would be path-breaking; and would put
forward a grand idea. We had far more
modest hopes: we were hoping for
a solid workmanlike budget which
would not try to play to the gallery, that
is, the stock market. We were hoping
that the budget would give agriculture
and rural distress the attention that was
so badly required. In the process, what
has emerged is a budget that is not
path-breaking, it does not put forward a
grand idea and it does not address the
crucial issues facing the country. As far
as agriculture, farmers welfare, rural
development and infrastructure are
concerned, the finance minister has
made all the right noises but the result
has been lacklustre. The political party
which came to power with promises of
rejuvenating the economy has, despite
its massive majority in Parliament, continued to exhibit surprising timidity in
economic matters.
References
Anand, K (2016): Game Changer or Not, Analysts
Give 4 Out of 5 to Arun Jaitleys Budget 2016,
Economic Times, 29 February, http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/markets/stocks/news/gamechanger-or-not-analysts-give-4-out-of-5-toarun-jaitleys-budget-2016/articleshow/51195518.
cms.
Bera, S (2016): Budget 2016: Govt Raises Agriculture Spending to 36,000 crore, LiveMint,
30 March, http://www.livemint.com/Politics/
T3pDBIVQPF6Ri6MnyEEeBK/Union-Budget-%20
vol lI no 16

201617-Govt-gives-%E2%82%B936000-cr-tofarm-sector.html.
Choudhury, G (2016): Jaitleys Rural Mural: Budget
2016 Focusses on Agri, Social Sectors, Hindustan
Times, New Delhi, 1 March, http://www.hindustantimes.com/union-budget/arun-jaitleys-budget-2016-focuses-on-agriculture-socialsector/story-sqJUXM9pa0yPiuJc8XtXfJ.html.
CSO (2016): Advance Estimates of National Income
2015-16 and Quarterly Estimates of Gross
Domestic Product for the Third Quarter (Q3) of
201516, Central Statistical Organisation (CSO),
Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, Government of India, 8 February,
http://mospi.nic.in/Mospi_New/upload/nad_
PR_8feb16.pdf
Deccan Chronicle (2016): U-turn: MGNREGA Gets
38,500 Crore in Budget 2016-17, Deccan
Chronicle, 1 March, http://www.deccanchronicle.
com/nation/current-affairs/010316/u-turnmgnrega-gets-rs-38-500-crore-in-budget-2016-17.
html.
Desai, A (2016): Budget 2016: Jaitleys Promise to
Double FarmersIncome in 5 Years Is Next to
Impossible, Firstpost, 2 March, http://www.
firstpost.com/business/budget-2016-jaitleyspromise-of-double-income-for-farmers-in-fiveyears-is-next-to-impossible-2651358.html.
Indian Express (2016): PM Modi: Target to Double
Farmers Income by 2022, 28 February, http://
indianexpress.com/article/india/india-newsindia/farmers-rally-bareilly-target-to-doublefarmers-income-by-2022/.
Modi, Narendra (2015): PMs Remarks at the
Launch of Skill India, narendramodi.in,
15 July, http://www.narendramodi.in/pm-sremarks-at-the-launch-of-skill-india--206106.
Mukherjee, S (2016): 10 Years of MGNREGA: How
the Modi Government Was Forced to Adopt
the Scheme, Business Standard, 2 February,
http://www.business-standard.com/article/
opinion/10-years-of-mgnrega-how-the-modigovernment-was-forced-to-adopt-thescheme-116020200266_1.html.
NSDC (nd): Our Role, National Skill Development Corporation, viewed on 6 April 2016,
http://www.nsdcindia.org/our-role.
Pandey, P (2016): Infrastructure Gets the Much
Needed Push, Hindu, 1 March, http://www.
thehindu.com/business/budget/union-budget-2016-infrastructure-gets-the-much-neededpush/article8297228.ece.
Planning Commission (2006): Report of the Working Group on Centres Financial Resources for
the Eleventh Plan (20072012), Planning Commission, Government of India, http://planningcommission.nic.in/aboutus/committee/
wrkgrp11/wg11_frcg.pdf.
PTI (2016): Modi Government Praises UPAs
MGNREGA as Scheme Completes 10 Years
Tomorrow, Economic Times, 1 February, http://
articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/201602-01/news/70252564_1_mgnrega-wage-payments-workers.
Shetty, S L (2016): Budget 2016: Continuation of
Under-taxation and Under-spending, Economic
& Political Weekly, Vol 51, No 12, pp 1518.
Tewari, R (2015): Despite Narendra Modis Criticism of Scheme, Rural Ministry lists NREGAs
Success Stories, Indian Express, 10 May,
http://indianexpress.com/article/india/indiaothers/despite-narendra-modis-criticism-ofscheme-rural-ministry-lists-nregas-successstories/#sthash.flc3PZmm.dpuf.
World Bank (2013): World Development Report:
Risk and OpportunityManaging Risk for Development, World Bank, Washington DC.

35

BUDGET 201617

Rural Push in Budget 201617


Rhetoric versus Reality
Himanshu

Budget 201617 recognises that


the rural economy is in crisis;
however, it fails to address this
with sufficient targeted rural
spending. A perusal of budget
documents reveals exaggerated
expenditure claims, achieved
through reclassification of
budget heads. There has been an
enduring neglect of agriculture,
which is further exacerbated
by this years reduced subsidies
for fertiliser and food. This will
induce further vulnerabilities in
the rural economy.

he focus on agriculture and rural


economy in Budget 201617 was
not a surprise despite the fact that
this government came with an agenda
against pro-poor expenditures and subsidies. The bias of this government against
rural spending was obvious from the
statement by the Prime Minister in
Parliament mocking the Mahatma Gandhi
National Rural Employment Guarantee
Act (MGNREGA) as a monumental failure
of the previous government. This bias
was also reflected in the governments
delay in implementing the National Food
Security Act (NFSA), due for implementation in July 2014.
It was obvious that the sudden volte-face
by the government hailing the MGNREGA
as a lifeline of the rural economy in February this year, and the push for reviving
the rural economy were early signs of a
government recognising the extent of
crisis in the rural economy. It was also a
recognition of the failure of government
policies in the last two years in reviving
the Indian economy. Despite the Central
Statistics Offices (CSO) claims of a growth
rate of more than 7% of the economy,
fundamental indicators of the economy
on manufacturing, investment and exports continue to raise doubts. But the
biggest failures of the present government has been its inability to gauge the
extent of the crisis in the rural economy.

crops such as basmati rice, cotton and


rubber since August 2014 had already
created a situation of low realisation of
agricultural outputs without a consequent fall in input prices. The low demand
in the international market was already
evident in declining agricultural exports
with agricultural exports declining in
value terms by 4% in 201415 and further falling by 21% from April to November in 201516.
The third factor which added to the
monsoon failure and falling commodity
prices was the decline in rural spending by
the government which had started reducing expenditure on various rural development programmes, notably, MGNREGA.
The decline in rural construction activity which played a crucial role in keeping the rural demand afloat after the
financial crisis of 2008 added to the
crisis in the rural economy.
Some of these were evident even before
this government took over but were
ignored by the present government. The
cutbacks in rural spending, notably on
rural development programmes such as
MGNREGA were initiated by the previous
government. That the stress in the rural
economy was building up was evident
from the trend in growth rate of rural
wages which started decelerating since
November 2013 and are now declining
in real prices. This is perhaps the first
time in the last four decades that rural
wages are declining in real prices. Other
indicators of the rural economy such as
tractor sales and motorcycle sales were
showing negative growth since 201415
confirming the stress in rural economy.
The extent of the distress was also showing up in increase in number of farmer
suicides in many states.

Stress in the Rural Economy

Himanshu (himanshu2@gmail.com) teaches at


the Centre for Economic Studies and Planning,
Jawaharlal Nehru University and is visiting
fellow at Centre de Sciences Humaines,
New Delhi.

36

While this is only the third time after


independence that the rural economy is
suffering due to back-to-back droughts,
the stress in the rural economy was
building up for quite some time. The decline in agricultural value added by 0.2%
in 201415 over 201314 and the growth
of 1.1% in agricultural value added in
201516 is only a partial reflection of the
nature of crisis in the rural economy.
The collapse in international commodity prices, particularly of commercial

Exaggerated Claims
The response of the finance minister in
his Budget Speech bordered on hyperbole of doubling the farm income in
seven years to exaggerated claims of
expenditure commitments. However,
the reality as reflected in budget documents confirmed the fear that the government has once again missed the opportunity to do something for the rural
economy. The claims of increased spending not only involved reclassification of

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617

budget heads of different ministries


to ministries of agriculture and rural
development but also included expenditure provisions for pending payments of
earlier years.
This was clear in the case of the claim
of raising budgeted expenditure on
Ministry of Agriculture to 35,984 crore
in 201617 from revised expenditure of
15,810 crore in 201516 and actual
expenditure of 19,255 crore in 201415;
an increase of 127% over last year. While
this increase was substantial for the
Department of Agriculture and Cooperation (DAC), the overall increase of agricultural sector was a modest 94%, rising
from 22,958 crore in 201516 (revised)
to 44,485 crore in 201617 with budget
for Department of Agricultural Research
and Education (DARE) and Department
of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and
Fisheries (DAHDF) increasing only by
1,350 crore. However, even the increase
of 20,000 crore in the budget of DAC was
achieved by reclassifying the interest
subsidy on short-term credit to farmers
to the extent of 15,000 crore in the
agriculture ministrys budget as against
the earlier practice of this being reflected in the expenditure heads of the Ministry of Finance. The increase even on this
count was a mere 2,000 crore from
13,000 crore in 201516 (revised)
which appeared as a subhead under the
finance ministry. Excluding this expenditure from the Ministry of Agriculture
budget, the actual increase in budget expenditure on agriculture sector is a
modest 27% compared to revised estimates of 201516. What is also worth
noting is that the increase in the budgeted
expenditure of 201617 for the department of agriculture and cooperation is
only 9% higher than the actual expenditure of 201415, the first year of this government. In real terms, the expenditure
of DAC is lower than inflation-adjusted
expenditure of 201415.
The reality as reflected in budget
numbers clearly fails to match the rhetoric
of this being a budget for farmers, and is
nowhere sufficient to realise any claims
of doubling farmers income by 2022.
The nominal increase in 201617 over
last years revised estimates are against
the backdrop of a severe cutback in
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

spending on the agriculture sector in


Budget 201516. This was evident from
the reduction in budgeted expenditure
on Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (RKVY)
and National Food Security Mission
(NFSM), both of which had contributed
significantly to the revival of the agrarian sector after the slump during
19972004.
Similarly, expenditure on irrigation
was nominally lower than the revised
expenditure on irrigation schemes and
has failed to compensate for the reduction in irrigation expenditure made last
year in programmes such as the Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Scheme (AIBS) and
Integrated Watershed Management Programme (IWMP). Some of these cutbacks
were expected to be covered by increased spending by the state governments. Preliminary estimates based on
state government budgets belie any
such hopes.
Increasing Vulnerability
Bulk of the increase in this years budget
on agriculture has been in the Pradhan
Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, the budget for
which has increased by 2,598 crore in
the revamped crop insurance scheme.
While this is consistent with the governments focus on insurance as the solution to problems in agriculture, this can
hardly offer any solution to the longstanding issues that plague the agricultural sector.
Ignoring the twin shocks of weather
and international price fluctuations, the
agricultural sector continues to be vulnerable to issues of technological stagnation and degradation of the natural
resource base. The growth of the agricultural sector during the last 10 years of
the United Progressive Alliance (UPA)
not only gave the resilience to the overall economy by maintaining rural demand
despite the global slowdown, it was also
instrumental in reducing vulnerability
and poverty in rural areas. The neglect
of agriculture in the last two years may
not only erode any gains made in the
last decade but may also induce further
vulnerabilities in rural areas.
The increase in vulnerability in rural
areas was already reflected in the rise in
demand for MGNREGA work which saw
vol lI no 16

increase in spending on the programme


to 41,326 crore in 201516. This does not
include the pending liability of 8,430
crore as wage payments. As against this,
the total budgeted expenditure on
MGNREGA in 201617 is only 38,500 crore,
much less than the actual spending last
year and substantially less than the total
expenditure needed to meet the pending
payments along with maintaining the
expenditure levels seen in 201516. Not
only is the claim of the finance minister
that this is the highest allocation so far,
not true, it is not even sufficient to maintain the expenditure of his own government last year.
The substantial decline during the
period of rural distress is likely to
increase the extent of unpaid wages and
also encourage rationing by the state
governments. While the total budgeted
expenditure of the Ministry of Rural
Development has increased by 10% compared to actual expenditure of last year,
most of the increase is accounted for by
the increase in MGNREGA and expenditure on housing. While the two biggest
programmes of the ministry, Pradhan
Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) and
the social pension schemes have not seen
any increase in spending. These schemes
were not only crucial in maintaining rural demand in the wake of falling rural
incomes but were also essential safety
nets during times of stress.
While these two ministries which are
crucial for reviving rural demand and
providing safety nets for the rural population during times of stress did not see
significant increase in spending, these
were accompanied by reduction in subsidy for fertiliser and food. The reduction in fertiliser subsidy was marginal,
to the extent of 2,438 crore, but the lack
of clear policy on fertilisers meant that
open market fertiliser prices continued
to remain high compared to the administered prices for urea. But even for the
food subsidy, the delay in implementation
of NFSA raises doubt on the intentions
of the government. Not only was food
subsidy cut by 5,000 crore in this years
budget, the flip-flops on procurement
policies and cash transfers have created
confusion on the ground. The failed
attempt at direct benefits transfers and
37

BUDGET 201617

move towards cash transfers in some of


the union territories has neither helped
the government nor has it helped consumers receive due benefits from the expansion of NFSA.
While recent evidence has clearly
established that in-kind transfers are not
only better in terms of their impact on
nutrition, the success of various states in
reducing leakages in the public distribution system (PDS) was also an opportunity for the government to enhance the
reach of the PDS and implement the
NFSA. This was also the opportunity for
the government to strengthen the minimum support price (MSP) for pulses and
oilseeds along with improving the reach
of the procurement machinery.
Revival of Rural Economy
The crisis in the rural economy not only
requires direct spending on schemes of the
ministry of rural development and the
ministry of agriculture but also on the
priorities and policies of the government on channelising the rural demand
for further diversification of the rural
economy into the non-farm sector. The
rural economy after years of stagnation

had started to witness a process of nonfarm diversification, even though in lowproductivity sectors such as construction, since 200405. This process was
aided not only by an above-average
growth of the agricultural sector and the
favourable shift of terms of trade in
favour of agriculture, but also due to increased spending by the government.
Given that the agricultural sector is
suffering from the twin shocks of international price shocks and the monsoon
failure, the revival of the rural economy
depended crucially on government intervention in the form of increased spending,
but also through creation of alternative
employment opportunities elsewhere in
the economy. Given that the manufacturing sector was already suffering from
lack of demand, both domestically as well
as internationally, the increase in spending in rural areas is not just important
for reviving the rural economy but also
for the economy as a whole.
At a time when the stress in the banking sector has further aggravated the
declining private investment in the
economy, prudent fiscal policy required
using public investment and expenditure

as the engine for reviving the economy.


Some of this is evident from the stagnation in demand for credit as well as
public investment in agriculture. The
inability of private expenditure and investment to compensate for the stagnation will not only have an impact on the
rural economy in the short-run but may
also impact the growth of the rural
economy in the long-run.
While the output of the agriculture
sector may rebound on the low base of
back-to-back monsoon failure, the real
challenge is to revive the growth in
incomes of the farmers in the medium- to
long-run. While the budget is certainly not
up to the mark for this challenging task,
the lack of a clear vision raises doubts on
the possibility of revival of the rural
economy in the near future. The revival of
the rural economy is not just a concern for
the rural areas and the agricultural sector, but is also crucial for revival of the
overall economy. The long-term evidence
in this regard is not only consistent as far
as the last 10 years of high growth during
the UPA regime are concerned, but also for
the last four decades when the economy
has moved to a higher growth trajectory.

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38

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617

No Respite for Public Health


T Sundararaman, Indranil Mukhopadhyay, V R Muraleedharan

Health allocations in Budget


201617, which show a modest
increase in nominal terms, must
be viewed against the virtual
stagnation of allocations since
201011, and the major cuts
of 201516. Meanwhile, state
governments investments in
health grew steadily. The centre
has only prioritised initiatives
that stimulate private health
sector growth. This approach will
have immediate adverse effects
on availability and quality of
public health services and will
cause impoverishment due to
healthcare costs, compromising
economic growth in the long run.

he Union Budget 201617 for


health sector disappoints again,
but does not surprise us. Since
2012, the systematic policy incongruence between what government states
as policy, and what it does in terms of
budget allocations, has become an established feature of Indian public health
policy. The major sections of media remain studiously silent on this, either because they endorse it, or because it is no
longer news. To a casual observer, it is
not as obvious as to those who have been
tracking public health expenditures. It is
only the packaging of the bad news that
seems to change.
Centre and State Allocations

In Budget 201617, total allocation on


health through various ministries and
departments is 39,571 crore, as against an
allocation of 32,742 crore for 201516.
This is a 20% increase in nominal terms.
As against 34,956 crore in the revised
estimates it works out to a 14% increase.
Usually, the revised estimates are significantly lower than the allocations in the
budget proposals, so when next years
allocations are compared to the revised
estimates, it makes the increase look
greater than it actually is. But last year,
rather unusually, the revised estimates

had to be increased, not decreased.


The budget proposals were such a sharp
cut, that even routine activities and
commitments could not be pursued,
and a mid-term increase in budgets
became essential.
The real picture emerges only when
we look at changes in actual expenditure in real terms (Table 1 and Figure 1,
p 40) over a longer time period. Prices
have increased faster than health budgets
since 201213. If we factor this in, then
in real terms both allocation and expenditure went down over this period. The actual expenditure for 201415 was lower
than the expenditure during 201112.
We do not know what will be the cuts
into revised estimates or actual expenditures this year, and so we need to compare the current budgetary allocations
with corresponding budgetary allocations made earlier. In such a comparison, this years budget proposal is lower
than what was allocated in 201415. It is
only the sharp decline of the previous
year that makes this years budget look
better than it really is.
The budgetary allocation and expenditure trends since 201213 are in sharp
contrast to the period from 200405 to
201112 when considerable expansion of
union government expenditure took place.
The growth of union government spending in real terms between 200405 and
200910 was 13.85% (Figure 2, p 40). In
the subsequent period, from 201011 to
201415, the growth in public health
expenditure plummeted to -0.31%, a

Table 1: Budget Allocations


Year

T Sundararaman (sundararaman.t@gmail.com)
teaches at the School of Health Systems Studies,
Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai.
Indranil Mukhopadhyay (indranil.m@phfi.org)
is with Public Health Foundation of India, New
Delhi. V R Muraleedharan (vrm@iitm.ac.in) at
the Department of Humanities and Social
Sciences and Centre for Technology and Policy,
Indian Institute of Technology (Madras),
Chennai.
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

200506
200607
200708
200809
200910
201011
201112
201213
201314
201415
201516
201617

Allocations

Current Prices
Revised
Estimate

Actual
Expenditure

% Difference
between
Allocation and
Expenditure

10,687
12,994
15,855
18,123
22,641
25,154
30,456
34,488
37,330
37,930
32,742
39,531

10,040
11,758
14,974
18,476
21,680
25,055
28,353
29,273
30,847
31,038
34,956
-

9,650
10,948
15,048
17,661
20,982
24,450
27,199
27,885
30,135
32,154

9.7
15.7
5.1
2.5
7.3
2.8
10.7
19.1
19.3
15.2

Constant (200405) Prices


Allocations
Revised
Actual
Estimate
Expenditure

10,253
11,675
13,389
14,037
15,600
15,695
17,541
18,016
18,071
17,247
14,068
16,505

9,632
10,564
12,645
14,311
14,938
15,633
16,330
15,291
14,933
14,113
15,019

9,259
9,837
12,707
13,680
14,457
15,256
15,665
14,567
14,588
14,620

Source: Expenditure Budget, Vol 2; Union Budget, various years, www.indiabudget.nic.in, viewed on 25 March 2016;
All India Average Consumer Price Index (industrial workers), Labour Bureau, http://labourbureau.nic.in/indexes.htm,
viewed on 25 March 2016; price base: 2001.

vol lI no 16

39

BUDGET 201617
Figure 1: Allocations and Expenditure on Health by Union Government (Constant 200405 Prices)
20,000
18,000

` crore

16,000
14,000
12,000

Expenditure

Allocation

10,000
8,000
200506 20007
Source: Same as Table 1.

200708 200809 200910 201011

201112

201213

201314 201415 201516 201617

Figure 2: CAGR of Allocation and Expenditure, Current and Constant Prices (200414 prices)
14
12.99
200506 to 200910 Real
12
10.78

9.86

10

8.61

8
201011 to 201415 Real

6
4

3.50

-0.31

0
Union Budget
-2

Union Budget

Union Actual

State Actual

Union Actual

State Actual

Source: Authors calculation based on union and state government data; Expenditure Budget,Vol 2; Union Budget, various years,
www.indiabudget.nic.in; viewed on 25 March 2016; State Finances: A Study of Budgets, Reserve Bank of India; various years.

Figure 3: Union and State Government Expenditure on Health as % of GDP and SGDP
1.10

% of GDP

0.90
0.70
States

Routing via Private Partnership

0.50
Centre

0.30
0.10
200506 20007 200708 200809 200910 201011 201112 201213 201314 201415 201516 201617
Sources: GDP, Government of India (2016): Economic Survey of India 201516, Expenditure Budget, Vol 2; Union Budget,
various years, www.indiabudget.nic.in, viewed on 25 March 2016; State Finances: A Study of Budgets, Reserve Bank of India;
various years.

decline in expenditure in real terms. It


has been argued that since states do not
have the capacity to spend, additional
money allocated remains unutilised and
hence an increase in budgets is unwarranted. The gap between allocations
and expenditures for most of the period
from 200506 to 201011 has been lower
than that for the latter years (Figure 1).
Therefore, we need to examine more
40

what is notable is that during the period


of 201011 to 201415, when union government spending virtually declined,
spending by states actually grew at close
to double-digit rates (9.86%). However
taken together we are still far short and
worsening with respect to the commitment made by the erstwhile Planning
Commission, reiterated in the recent
draft National Health Policy (MHFW
2015; Planning Commission 2011, 2012),
to reach 2.5% of the gross domestic
product (GDP) (Figure 3). The states can
certainly do more, and indeed the state
share of the National Health Mission
(NHM) budget has been increased from
25% to 40%. But it is unrealistic to
expect the states to take the major part
of the burden of reaching the minimal
levels of public health expenditure that
is urgently required.
The union governments spending on
health as percentage of GDP is the lowest
since 200506 (Figure 3). The only explanation for this is the push for fiscal
consolidation, the burden of which is
borne by a reduced investment in health
and education. Public expenditure for
creation of physical capitalwith private
ownership in areas like infrastructure
and defencehas become an acceptable
option and investment for the future,
but increasing investments for the
creation of social capital is perceived or
projected as part of fiscal profligacy
which can be cut back to reach fiscal
consolidation targets.

closely the argument of low absorptive


capacities of the states and see its linkages with the changes in financing
policies being practised.
State balance sheets reveal a different
story. Between 200506 and 201415,
expenditure by states increased by 19.24%;
after adjusting for rise in prices, this
comes to a healthy 9.25%. Fund absorptive
capacity also gradually increased. But

The only context when any pro-poor


public expenditure in social sectors
seems acceptable in this economic
regime is when they are routed through
the private sectorgiving further fillip
to the runaway growth story of the private healthcare industryunmindful of
the serious adverse consequences this
has had in increasing inequity and
impoverishment. Thus, the only three
specific new initiatives mentioned in
this years budget proposals, the National
Dialysis Services Programme, a proposed National Insurance Programme,
and the expansion of Jan Aushadhi
scheme, would all fit snugly into such
an understanding.

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617

No further funds are to be provided


for the National Dialysis Services, but
part of existing NHM funds are to be
rerouted through private partnerships.
Dialysis machines are to be given exemptions from duties. Dialysis services
are a matter of great urgency as many
states report considerable increases in
chronic kidney disease. However, dialysis is only one procedure, in a long chain
of nephrology (kidney-related) services.
A combination of various kind of measures for prevention from kidney disease
which delay the onset of requirement for
dialysis in those affected, alongside
managing the co-morbidities that are invariable, and provisions for renal transplantation where required are essential
for effective management of kidneyrelated conditions.
The Ministry of Healths proposals
have always rooted for a major scheme
to strengthen all services in a district
hospital in an integrated fashion. Within
such an approach, dialysis services, even
if assumed to be outsourced, would be
useful and viable. But there is no such
larger commitment visible, only the eager
leveraging of one more public private
partnership opportunity.
The current proposal for a new insurance scheme is similar. There is no such
scheme ready for launch, and it is unlikely that within a year, the institutional
mechanisms to create a national scheme,
and the complex negotiations that would
be needed with many states that already
have fairly large publicly-funded insurance schemes of their own, would be
completed. Further, a number of studies
have failed to show the effectiveness of
publicly-funded health insurance as a
vehicle of financial protection (Virk and
Atun 2015; Ghosh 2014; Nandi et al 2013;
Selvaraj et al 2015). Rather, most studies
point to concerns with respect to publiclyfinanced insurance: especially supplydriven service utilisation, lack of awareness of entitlements, and out-of-pocket
outpatient care which forms the bulk of
expenses. Raising the cap on sum assured is not the first priority.
Current financial cover under Rashtriya
Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY) is about
30,000, which is proposed to increase
to 1,00,000, with additional benefits
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

for the elderly. This would definitely


shoot the premium significantly upward. Thus, the funds provided, about
1,500 crore, would be inadequate to
cover the current RSBYs requirements
and are nowhere near the minimum
required for such an expansion.
In many states formal or informal ceiling of number of hospitals empanelled has
been one way of rationing services to
curtail the runaway costs that are always
associated with most insurance schemes.
Those hospitals that are already empanelled may have the tendency to charge
more in order to benefit from enhanced
coverage. But it is uncertain whether effective coverage in terms of reduction in
out-of-pocket expenditure, which is the
central problem, would be substantial.
There is yet another side of the insurance schemes, which is much talked
about but much less studied empirically:
what are the mechanisms in place to
control supplier-induced demand? This
is a vexing question and every country
that has adopted the insurance model
(publicly- or privately-financed) has
wrestled with this issue with varying degrees of success. In every closed door
meeting with concerned stakeholders,
the discussion often and soon turns to
this question. We are of the view that
with lack of progress on regulation of
the private sector, insurance per se is not
the right public policy option to pursue
in the current context in India. Government money can and should be spent
more wisely.
The statement on expanding Jan
Aushadhi stores is similar. All official
policy statements, including the Draft
National Health Policy (MHFW 2015)
have been pushing to make free drugs
and diagnostics available through public
health facilities. This provides the most
effective and immediate relief against
the costs of care. Though many states
have already moved in this direction,
the Budget Speech fails to mention or
expand funding for this. Instead it calls
for an expansion of the Jan Aushadhi
scheme, which is the establishment of
government-run pharmacy stores selling
generic drugs against private sector prescriptions. Since private sector has strong
interest in prescribing only branded

vol lI no 16

drugs, this token gesture towards making


care in the private sector more affordable
is likely to have minimal impact.
But the real danger does not lie in all
these aspects. The real danger is that
these powerful signals to the private
sector are accompanied by a squeeze of
the NHMs financing. As per the Budget
Speech, NHM allocation in this years
budget is 20,037 crore. This would
mean a mere 0.3% increase in allocation
in constant prices. But the budget figures
do not add up to 20,037 crore; rather
we calculate it at 19,037 crore. This
would mean a reduction of 4.7% at constant prices.
Another development this year is the
allocation of 400 crore to the department of ayurveda, yoga & naturopathy,
unani, siddha and homeopathy (AYUSH)
under NHM. Subsequently the National
AYUSH Mission has no allocation. Even if
we add this component of AYUSH, the
total budget for NHM is 19,437 crore,
which means a reduction of 2.7% compared to previous year. The turnaround
of many essential public services and
the strengthening of public health systems, which NRHM had triggered in
states, would be halted by these cuts.
Anecdotal reports and newspaper articles suggest that, serious gaps, especially in the already weak situation in human resources for health, have begun to
worsen again.
New Schemes, No Finance
In this period many new schemes have
been launched. For example, the National
Urban Health Mission increases geographic and population coverage greatly;
vaccines in the immunisation system have
been increased; and now the National
Dialysis Services has been announced,
without a corresponding increase in additional financing. The consequent belttightening of core requirements means
more work but with reduced human
resources. Without adding to the workforce at every level the problems of quality of care and availability of services is
only likely to worsen.
Two arguments that are used in different platforms to justify these cuts
need to be examined further. The first
of these relates to poor absorption of
41

BUDGET 201617

funds. In response, one must begin by


noting that poor absorption is first and
foremost an accurate indicator of very
poor governance. Any government must
hold itself accountable for it. Second,
when funding is sub-threshold, with provision for some components but a failure
to fund essential corollariesthe most
important being a well-trained and
skilled workforce, with adequate numbers of capable mid-level managers
funds given for new services and schemes
would necessarily fail to get absorbed.
Unfortunately public policy is driven
by an obsession with keeping public employment low and this combined with
inappropriate human resource management policies and skills leads to less than
optimal value for money. And third,
institutional mechanisms of public financing are so poorly constituted with high
transaction barriers that holding midlevel managers responsible for what is
clearly a governance failure at the highest
levels will not solve the issue. Finally, it
is likely that at least part of the poor
absorption is failure to release budgeted
funds on a number of administrative
technicalities, but essentially driven by
the need to achieve targets for reducing
fiscal deficit.
The second argument is the rationale
advanced for routing public investments
through the private sector, based on a
claim that the latter makes more efficient use of resources. There is little evidence to support such a claim, and much
evidence that contradicts it. But even if it
were to be true, there are many vital
roles that relate to health as a public
gooddisease surveillance and epidemic preparedness, for example, or the
prevention of the rising tide of non-communicable diseasewhere the private
sector cannot substitute for an effective
public health system.
As a result, despite a huge growth in
the private sector-based health services,
age-standardised mortality rates for
non-communicable diseases are now far
higher in India than in any developed
nation and there is still no universal
primary healthcare programme in the
public sector that addresses this rising
tide. Nor is there any effort to expand
the very selective packages of care that
42

fund-constrained district health systems


are providing currently. The National
Health Policy draft admits that current
district and sub-district health services
address less than 15% of all morbidities,
and this, more than any other single
factor, forces the public to seek care either
in the private sector or in the overcrowded
mega public health hospitals.
One of the lessons that nations need
to learn from the Ebola crisis of Western
Africa is that when nations fail to invest
in public health systems, they lay themselves open to deadly epidemics that
could threaten the health security and
economy of a nation. The Ebola crisis
ravaged precisely those nations in Africa
which had seen a decade of structural
adjustment-driven reforms which had
left their public systems understaffed
and dysfunctional.
The damage to industry and growth
rates that such an epidemic would do is
mind-boggling. The finance ministry is
apparently responsive only to the needs
of the industry, defence and economic
growth rates. Without sounding alarmist,
it would be useful to remind the ministry
that chronic and sustained under-financing of public health systems over the
last four years has now reached such
critical levels, that there is a serious
threat to health security of the nation as

well as to its economic growthnot


only in the long run, but also in the
immediatenot only for the poor, but
for everyone.
REFERENCES
Ghosh, Soumitra (2014): Publicly-financed Health
Insurance for the Poor: Understanding RSBY in
Maharashtra, Economic & Political Weekly,
Vol 49, Nos 4344, pp 9399.
GoI (2016): Expenditure Budget, Vol 2, Union
Budget, Government of India, New Delhi,
viewed on 25 March 2016, http://www.indiabudget.nic.in/.
MHFW (2015): National Health Policy, 2015,
draft, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare,
Government of India, New Delhi, viewed on
5 December 2015, http://mohfw.nic.in/WriteReadData/l892s/35367973441419937754.pdf.
Nandi, A, A Ashok and R Laxminarayan (2013):
The Socioeconomic and Institutional Determinants of Participation in Indias Health Insurance Scheme for the Poor, PLoS ONE, Vol 8,
No 6, e66296, doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0066296.
Planning Commission (2011): High Level Expert
Group Report on Universal Health Coverage in
India, submitted to Planning Commission,
Government of India, New Delhi.
(2012): XII Five Year Plan (201217): Faster,
More Inclusive and Sustainable Growth, Vol 3,
Government of India, New Delhi.
Reserve Bank of India (2015): State Finances: A
Study of Budgets, various years.
Selvaraj, S, A Karan and I Mukhopadhyay (2015):
Publicly-financed Health Insurance Schemes
in India: How Effective Are They in Providing
Financial Risk Protection? Social Development Report, 2014, Council for Social Development, New Delhi.
Virk, A K and R Atun (2015): Towards Universal
Health Coverage in India: A Historical Examination of the Genesis of Rashtriya Swasthya Bima
YojanaThe Health Insurance Scheme for Lowincome Groups, Public Health, 129, pp 81017.

Journal Rank of EPW


Economic & Political Weekly is indexed on Scopus, the largest abstract and citation database
of peer-reviewed literature, which is prepared by Elsevier NV (http://tinyurl.com/o44sh7a).
Scopus has indexed research papers that have been published in EPW from 2008 onwards.
The Scopus database journal ranks country-wise and journal-wise. It provides three broad sets
of rankings: (i) Number of Citations, (ii) H-Index and (iii) SCImago Journal and Country Rank.
Presented below are EPWs ranks in 2014 in India, Asia and globally, according to the total
cites (3 years) indicator.
Highest among 36 Indian social science journals and highest among 159 social science
journals ranked in Asia.
Highest among 36 journals in the category, Economics, Econometrics and Finance in the
Asia region, and 36th among 835 journals globally.
Highest among 23 journals in the category, Sociology and Political Science in the Asia
region, and 15th among 928 journals globally.
Between 2008 and 2014, EPWs citations in three categories (Economics, Econometrics,
and Finance; Political Science and International Relations; and Sociology and Political
Science) were always in the second quartile of all citations recorded globally in the
Scopus database.
For a summary of statistics on EPW on Scopus, including of the other journal rank indicators,
please see http://tinyurl.com/qe949dj
EPW consults referees from a database of 200+ academicians in different fields of the social
sciences on papers that are published in the Special Article and Notes sections.
april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617

Evolving CentreState
Financial Relations
Role of the New Framework for Grants

subgroup, grants were further rationalised. The NFG is incorporated in Budget


201617. We examine the implications of
enhanced tax devolution and NFG on the
transfers to states and on the evolving
centrestate financial relations.
Tax Devolution and Grants

Pinaki Chakraborty, Manish Gupta

After the Fourteenth Finance


Commission award, aggregate
transfers as a percentage of gross
domestic product has increased,
while grants as a percentage of
GDP has declined. The centre is
resorting to cess and surcharges
that are not shared with the
states. This would mean denial of
revenue to states, which goes
against the spirit of the
Constitution. Further, the states
have a reduced untied fiscal
space, with the unions share in
Centrally Sponsored Schemes in
201617 (BE) being reduced.
Finally, in the absence of plan
transfers, post 201718, the focus
should be to develop a framework
for non-finance commission
grants to states which is
predictable and certain.

Pinaki Chakraborty (pinaki.chakraborty@nipfp.


org.in) and Manish Gupta (manish.gupta@
nipfp.org.in) are with the National Institute of
Public Finance and Policy, New Delhi.
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

udget 201617 has made three important observations relating to


central transfers to states. The
first relates to the quantum jump in the
devolution of taxes post the Fourteenth
Finance Commission (FFC) award and
resultant fiscal autonomy to states. The
second relates to restructuring of grants
based on the revised funding pattern
proposed by the Sub-group of Chief
Ministers on the rationalisation of Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS). The third
relates to effective outcome-based monitoring of implementation of schemes and
doing away with the plan and non-plan
expenditure distinction in the budget
after the completion of the Twelfth Five
Year Plan. This article analyses the likely
implications of some of these proposals
on the transfer of resources to states and
on centrestate financial relations especially in the context of what we call the
new framework for grants (NFG).
A brief overview of the changes in the
system of transfer post the FFC award is
critical to understand recent changes in
centrestate transfers. The FFC recommended an increase in tax devolution to
42% of the divisible pool of taxes from
32% recommended by the Thirteenth
Finance Commission (THFC). In order to
accommodate this large increase in tax
devolution, the union government in
Budget 201516 restructured the flow of
grants to states. This restructuring had
three components: (i) for a set of schemes
central support was withdrawn, (ii) for
another set of schemes the union government changed the funding pattern, and
(iii) for some schemes it continued with
the existing arrangement of grants.1 The
process of restructuring continued during 201516 and a subgroup of chief ministers was set up by the NITI Aayog to
examine the rationalisation of CSS.
Based on the recommendations of this
vol lI no 16

As evident, since 201516, tax devolution


has witnessed a major jump in the total
resource transfers to states due to the
increase in tax devolution to 42% of
the divisible pool. Aggregate transfer to
states2 in 201617 (budget estimates or
BE) is 9,18,093 crore as compared to
8,18,034 crore in 201516 (revised estimates or RE), an increase of 1,00,059
crore (Table 1, p 44). The states share
in taxes and duties increased from
5,06,193 crore in 201516 (RE) to
5,70,337 crore in 201617 (BE) while
grants (both plan and non-plan) increased
from 3,11,841 crore to 3,47,756 crore
during the same period. However, if we
compare with 201415, the terminal
year of the THFC award, tax devolution
had increased from 3,37,808 crore to
5,70,337 crore and non-finance commission grants had declined in nominal
terms from 2,58,890 crore in 201415
to 2,29,400 crore in 201617 (BE).
Though, the FFC award has been considered a game changer in providing fiscal
autonomy to the states through higher
tax devolution, it has also been argued
that restructuring of non-finance commission grants have reduced untied fiscal
space to states (Chakraborty 2015, 2016;
Kotasthane and Ramachandra 2015;
Odisha Budget and Accountability Centre
2015; Reddy 2015a). In this context, the
approach of Budget 201617 relating to
central transfers to states needs to be
seen in terms of both quantum and the
nature of transfers.
If we consider quantum of transfers,
total transfers as a percentage of gross
domestic product (GDP) increased from
5.4% in 201415 to 6.09% in 201617 (BE).
Tax devolution as a percentage of GDP has
increased from 2.71% in 201415 to
3.79% in 201617 (BE) while grants-to-GDP
ratio declined from 2.69% to 2.31% during the same period. In fact, the decline in
grants as percentage of GDP is from 3.25%
in 201112 to 2.31% in 201617 (BE).
43

BUDGET 201617

Post the FFC award, the share of tax


devolution in total transfers increased
from 47.1% in 201112 to 62.1% in 201617
(BE), while that of grants declined from
52.9% to 37.9%. The share of non-plan
grants including those recommended
by finance commissions has increased
from 9.5% in 201112 to 12.9% in 201617
(BE). Non-plan grants added with tax
devolution show a sharp increase in
untied flow of resources to the states post
the FFC award (Table 1) and the untied
flow is expected to be around 75% of the
total resource flow to the states as per
201617 (BE).
Aggregate transfer to states as a percentage of the divisible pool of taxes has
increased from 63.8% in 201415, the

final year of the award of the THFC, to


about 67.6% in 201617 (BE) mainly on
account of the increase in tax devolution to 42% by the FFC. However, the
share of grants, especially the plan
grants, has declined during this period.
As more than two-thirds of the divisible
pool is shared with the states, the scope
of further increasing the share of transfers from the divisible pool is limited,
given the resource requirement of the
union government to finance its own
expenditure commitments.
New Framework for Grants
Apart from the restructuring of grants
proposed in Budget 201516, in March
2015, the Government of India through

Table 1: Central Transfers to States


201112

( crore)
201213

201314

201415

201516 BE

201516 RE

201617 BE

1 States' share of taxes


and duties
2,55,414 2,91,547 3,18,230
3,37,808 5,23,958 5,06,193
5,70,337
2 States' share of grants
2,86,994 2,85,427
3,11,612
3,36,015 3,15,699 3,11,841
3,47,756
(a) Non-plan grants
51,523
47,995
60,551
77,125 1,08,552 1,08,233
1,18,356
(b) Central assistance to
state and UT plans # 2,35,471 2,37,432 2,51,061 2,58,890 2,07,147 2,03,608
2,29,400
3 Total transfers
5,42,408 5,76,974 6,29,842
6,73,823 8,39,657 8,18,034
9,18,093
4 GDP
88,32,012 99,88,540 1,13,45,056 1,24,88,205 1,35,67,192 1,35,67,192 1,50,65,010
5 Divisible pool (DP)
7,98,169 9,11,084 9,94,469 10,55,650 12,47,519 12,05,221 13,57,945
Total transfers as % of GDP
6.14
5.78
5.55
5.40
6.19
6.03
6.09
Tax devolution as % of GDP
2.89
2.92
2.81
2.71
3.86
3.73
3.79
Grants as % of GDP
3.25
2.86
2.75
2.69
2.33
2.30
2.31
Total transfers as % of DP
67.96
63.33
63.33
63.83
67.31
67.87
67.61
Tax devolution as % of DP
32.00
32.00
32.00
32.00
42.00
42.00
42.00
Grants as % of DP
35.96
31.33
31.33
31.83
25.31
25.87
25.61
(a) Non-plan grants as % of DP 6.46
5.27
6.09
7.31
8.70
8.98
8.72
(b) Plan grants as % of DP
29.50
26.06
25.25
24.52
16.60
16.89
16.89
Composition of transfers
Share of tax devolution
47.1
50.5
50.5
50.1
62.4
61.9
62.1
Share of grants to states
52.9
49.5
49.5
49.9
37.6
38.1
37.9
(a) Non-plan grants
9.5
8.3
9.6
11.4
12.9
13.2
12.9
(b) Central assistance to
state and UT plans #
43.4
41.2
39.9
38.4
24.7
24.9
25.0
Total transfers
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
100.0
(i) # Includes assistance to CSS; (ii) GDP is at market prices (201112 series).
Source: Union Budget Documents 201314 to 201617.

Table 2: New Scheme of Central Grants to States


A
B
C
D

Core of the Core Schemes (6 schemes)


Core Schemes (19 schemes)
Optional Schemes (3 schemes)
Total (A + B + C)
As % of GDP
As % of total transfers
Shares (in %)
Core of the Core Schemes
Core Schemes
Optional Schemes
Total

( crore)
201415 Actuals

201516 BE

201516 RE

201617 BE

44,193.86
1,37,567.04
872.80
1,82,633.70
1.45
27.10

50,261.61
1,17,113.83
990.00
1,68,365.44
1.23
20.05

50,222.42
1,21,159.36
1008.64
1,72,390.42
1.26
21.07

54,636.76
1,46,810.74
1282.75
2,02,730.25
1.34
22.08

24.20
75.32
0.48
100.00

29.85
69.56
0.59
100.00

29.13
70.28
0.59
100.00

26.95
72.42
0.63
100.00

Source: Authors compilation from Union Budget 201617.

44

NITI Aayog constituted a subgroup of


chief ministers for rationalising and
restructuring the CSS. The subgroup recommended that the focus of the CSS
should be on the schemes that comprise
the National Development Agenda3
where the Centre and the States will
work together in the spirit of Team
India (NITI Aayog 2015). It further recommended that the schemes be divided
into Core and Optional schemes and
amongst the Core Schemes those for
social protection and inclusion should
be called Core of the Core. The subgroup further recommended that the
investment levels in the Core Schemes
should be maintained so as to ensure
that the optimum size of the programme
does not shrink. For the Core of the
Core Schemes, it recommended continuation of the existing sharing pattern
between the state and the union. However, for the Core Schemes the sharing
pattern between states and union would
be in the ratio of 90:10 in case of northeastern and Himalayan states, and
60:40 for all other states.4 For Optional
Schemes, the sharing pattern would be
80:20 for North-Eastern and Himalayan
states and 50:50 for other states.
The government on the recommendation of the subgroup of chief ministers
restructured the grants. From the Union
Budget 201617 it can be observed that
the total number of CSS has been brought
down to 28.5 However, if one were to
consider the various sub-schemes within
each of the 28 schemes, the total number of schemes would be much larger.
Central allocation to states under the 28
restructured CSS was budgeted to be
2,02,730.25 crore in 201617 of which
54,636.76 crore was for Core of the
Core Schemes, 1,46,810.74 crore for Core
Schemes and the remaining 1,282.75
crore for Optional Schemes (Table 2).
Although it may be difficult to draw oneto-one correspondence between the newly
rationalised schemes with earlier ones,
we have nevertheless tried to do so to get
an estimate of comparable central transfers to states during 201415, 201516
and 201617 as per the new classification
(Table 2).
Central allocation to states under these
schemes works out to 1,82,633.70 crore

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617

in 201415 and 1,72,390.42 crore in


201516 (RE). The share of comparable
scheme-based transfers from the union
government in total transfers to states
was 27.1% in 201415. It is budgeted to
decline to 22.08% in 201617. Core and
Optional Schemes together accounted
for about 73% of the allocated expenditure under CSS in 201617 (BE), while the
share of Core of the Core Schemes was
27%. As a percentage of pool of grants,
the share of Core of the Core Schemes
is expected to increase from 24.2% in
201415 to 27% in 201617 (BE), mainly
due to the increase in allocations for
Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS). As
defined, the Core of the Core Schemes
comprise schemes of social protection
and inclusion. In this MGNREGS alone
accounts for about 70.5% of the allocation
as per 201617 (BE).
Classification of schemes as Core of
the Core, and Core has implications for
finances. Since for Core of the Core
Schemes the existing pattern of funding
has been retained, schemes classified in
this category are budget neutral for the
states as they do not have to make additional resources available for funding
such schemes. Since only 27% of the total
grants have been classified as Core of
the Core and for the rest, states share
has been enhanced, it would result in
reduction in untied fiscal space of states.
Second, it is always subjective as to
what is Core of the Core. If a social
protection programme like MGNREGS
for livelihood security is categorised as
Core of the Core, why not access to
health and education? Considering a
multidimensional approach to poverty
reduction and human development it
would have been more appropriate
to classify key national priorities including health and education as Core of the
Core with larger central support. This
would have preserved states fiscal autonomy, yet supporting national priority
of poverty reduction and human development through larger conditional
central transfers.
The reduction of unions share in Core
and Optional schemes, which account
for about 73% of total CSS, means that
the states have to contribute more funds
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

(by way of higher state shares) for such


schemes, thereby having an adverse
effect on states untied fiscal space.
Moreover, the restructuring was done by
clubbing a number of existing CSS into
one large scheme and not by redesigning
or reworking CSS for sectors. Most of the
existing schemes were amalgamated
into larger schemes.
In this context it also needs to be highlighted that much of these transfers are
part of the central assistance to state
plan. Budget 201617 announced the
discontinuation of the practice of plan
and non-plan distinction of expenditure
after the completion of the Twelfth Five
Year Plan in 201718. It is certainly an
important development. But it raises
questions on the predictability and certainty of transfers under these schemes
in the absence of a five-year plan. That
requires detailed deliberations on a
framework of transfers of grants in the
absence of a plan. Unfortunately, this has
not been addressed by the NFG proposed
by the subgroup.
Doing away with the plan and nonplan distinction received serious consideration in the past (Government of India
2011). It is expected that elimination of
this distinction would reprioritise expenditure between new schemes and
maintenance, and remove unintended
distortion in budgetary allocations towards higher plan expenditure and complete neglect of maintenance expenditure that are booked under non-plan. As
observed by Reddy (2015b: 36):
the debate in the context of the demise of the
Planning Commission has concentrated on
disaggregating the current functions of the
Planning Commission and assigning them
to different institutions. The disaggregation
of functions suggested is (a) transfer of resources to state governments; (b) allocation
of investments among union ministries;
(c) providing a medium-term perspective;

and (d) operating as a think tank. However,


the main focus of the debate seems to be the
issue of transfer of resources to state governments and process of approvals of state
plans by the Planning Commission.

As it happened in India, the planning


process and the Planning Commission
had become an instrument of transfer.
Even after the dissolution of the Planning Commission more than three lakh
crore of resources are being transferred
to states in the form of Central Assistance
to State Plans. In the absence of the plan,
there is a need to rework on a new framework which would provide a road map
for transfers of non-finance commission
grants to states. This calls for a careful
deliberation involving all the relevant
stakeholders.
Reducing the Divisible Pool
It is observed that over the years there
has been a proliferation of cess and surcharges in union tax revenues. As these
levies are not shareable with the states,
this has resulted in effective reduction
in the divisible pool of resources available for transfers to states. While the
THFC had recommended a review of this
trend to reduce the share of such levies
in the gross tax revenues, the FFC argued
that there are two ways to address this
concern: by amending the Constitution
to include these items in the divisible
pool; or by increasing the share of the
divisible pool to compensate states on
this account.
As evident from Table 3, the increase
in tax devolution to states as a percentage of gross tax revenue net of cost of
collection is estimated to be 35.23% in
201617 (BE). In 201415 it was 27.35%.
In calculating the tax devolution to states,
the cost of collection of cess and surcharges levied by the union government
has to be netted out from the gross tax

Table 3: Cess and Surcharge

( crore)
201112

Gross tax revenue (GTR)


States' share of taxes and duties
As % of (GTR-cost of collection)
Divisible pool (DP)
Cost of collection
Cess and surcharge
(GTRDPcost of collection)
As % of GTR

201213

201314

201415

201516 BE

201516 RE

201617 BE

8,89,177 10,36,235 11,38,733 12,44,886 14,49,491 14,59,611 163,0,889


2,55,414 2,91,547 3,18,230 3,37,808 5,23,958 5,06,193 5,70,337
28.96
28.35
28.16
27.35
36.43
34.94
35.23
7,98,169 9,11,084 9,94,469 10,55,650 12,47,519 12,05,221 13,57,945
7139
7752
8464
9593
11,288
10663
12,017
83,869
9.43

1,17,399 1,35,800
11.33
11.93

1,79,643
14.43

1,90,684
13.16

2,43,727
16.70

2,60,927
16.00

Source: Authors calculation using Union Budget documents 201314 to 201617.

vol lI no 16

45

BUDGET 201617

revenues. As the information on cess


and surcharges levied by the union government is not readily available, we
have estimated the non-divisible cess
and surcharge in the gross tax revenues.
The process of estimation involves two
steps: estimation of aggregate divisible
pool of taxes from tax devolution reported in the budget;6 and estimating
cess and surcharges based on the following equation:
Cess & Surcharge = [Gross tax revenue
(GTR) Divisible Pool (DP) Cost of collection]
Table 3 shows that the share of cess and
surcharge in the gross tax revenues of
the union government has been rising
over the years. It increased from 9.43%
in 201112 to 16.7% in 201516 (RE).
While the Union Budget 201617 abolished 13 cesses levied by various ministries, some new cesses were introduced
(Krishi Kalyan Cess and Infrastructure
Cess) and the rate of the Clean Environment Cess (earlier Clear Energy Cess)
has also been increased. In 201617, the
cess and surcharge is budgeted to be
16% of the gross tax revenues. Although
the process of rationalisation of cess and
surcharge is noteworthy, the aggregate
share of these levies in the gross tax revenues of the union government continues
to remain very high. Also, earmarked
taxation is not a good tax policy and it
complicates the tax system. At a time
when India is trying to reform its federal
tax system through an integrated Goods
and Services Tax (GST), dependence on
such levies should be reduced over
time for a smooth transition to the new
tax regime.
Conclusions
On the basis of this analysis, it can be
concluded that post the FFC award, aggregate transfers as a percentage of GDP has
increased due to the increase in tax devolution, while grants as a percentage of GDP
declined. Aggregate transfer to states for
201617 (BE) is more than 67% of the
divisible pool of taxes. Scope for further
increase in the share of transfers from
divisible pool is limited given the resource
requirement of the union government to
finance its own expenditure commitments.
46

However, increasing recourse to cess


and surcharge by the union government,
which are not shareable with the states,
has become a permanent instrument
of resource mobilisation. Though this
budget abolished 13 cesses,7 the share of
cess and surcharge in gross tax revenues continues to be high. Continuing
with this practice would mean denial of
national revenue to the states, which is
against the spirit of the Constitution.
Also when the country is moving towards
an integrated GST, it is time these levies
are discontinued for a smooth transition
to the new tax system.
The NFG for schemes based on the
recommendations of the subgroup of
chief ministers and reported in the Union
Budget 201617 is a vast improvement
from the plethora of CSS in operation
earlier. However, the subgroup has considered central intervention in states
through the existing prism of CSS. Post
the FFC award, restructuring of CSS
should have been limited to the programmes that are national priorities
with significant positive externalities.
Reduction in the unions share in the
Core and Optional schemes, which
together account for about 73% of total
CSS in 201617 (BE) implies larger contribution by the states (by way of higher
state shares) thereby reducing states
fiscal autonomy and fiscal space. Since
the NFG is still evolving, it is desirable
that these schemes are further rationalised to truly reflect convergence of
national priorities, while the design,
funding and implementation preserves
fiscal autonomy of the states. Finally, in
the absence of plan transfers, the post201718 reform agenda should concentrate on developing a framework of transfer of non-finance commission grants
focusing on predictability and certainty
of transfers to states.

5
6

The following sectors form the national development agenda: poverty eliminationlivelihoods, jobs and skill development; drinking
water and swachh bharat mission; rural
connectivity: electricity; access roads and communication; agriculture, including animal husbandry, fisheries integrated watershed management and irrigation; education, including
mid-day meal; health, nutrition, women and
children; housing for all: rural and urban; urban
transformation; law and order, justice delivery;
and others which may include wildlife conservation and greening. Schemes in these sectors
would be given priority.
In case a scheme/sub-scheme has a central
funding pattern of less than 60:40, the existing
funding pattern will continue.
There are six Core of the Core schemes, 19 Core
schemes and three Optional schemes.
Tax devolution was 32% of the divisible pool
(DP) for the period 201112 to 201415 and 42%
for 201526 and 201617. For 201112 to 2014
15, DP was calculated as DP = [States share of
taxes & duties*100/32], and for 201516 and
201617 it was calculated as DP = [States
share of taxes & duties*100/42].
Thirteen cesses levied by various ministries/
departments and administered by the Department of Revenue, where the revenue collection
from each of them is less than 50 crore in
a year has been abolished (Budget Speech,
Budget 201617).

References
Chakraborty, Pinaki (2015): Finance Commissions
Recommendations and Restructured Fiscal
Space, Economic & Political Weekly, Vol 50,
No 12, pp 3335.
(2016): Restructuring of Central Grants:
Balancing Fiscal Autonomy and Fiscal Space,
Economic & Political Weekly, Vol 51, No 6,
pp 1519.
Government of India (2011): Report of the High
Level Expert Committee on Efficient Management
of Public Expenditure, Planning Commission,
New Delhi, July.
Kotasthane, P and V K Ramachandra (2015): Impact
of Fourteenth Finance Commission: Karnataka
Budget, 201516, Economic & Political Weekly,
Vol 50, No 4647, pp 1620.
NITI Aayog (2015): Report of the Sub-Group of Chief
Ministers on Rationalisation of Centrally Sponsored Schemes, New Delhi, October.
Odisha Budget and Accountability Centre (2015):
Implication of 14th Finance Commission on
Social Sector Budgeting in India, http://www.
obac.in/Implication%20%20of%2014%20Finance%20Commission%20on%20Social%20
Sector%20Budgeting%20in%20Odisha.pdf.
Reddy, G R (2015a): Finance Commission Proposes,
the Union Disposes, Economic & Political
Weekly, Vol 50, No 2627, pp 2730.
Reddy, Y V (2015b): A Tale of Two Commissions
and the Missing Links, Economic & Political
Weekly, Vol 50, No 4, pp 3238.

Notes
1

For 39 schemes the central funding was


stopped. The union government changed the
pattern of funding for 20 schemes. Such
schemes would now require larger contribution from the states. If the various sub-schemes
under this category of schemes were to be considered these schemes would number 54. For
34 schemes the union government continued
with the existing pattern of funding.
This includes tax devolution, plan and nonplan grants, and releases of grants under CSS.
april 16, 2016

available at

Gyan Deep
Near Firayalal, H. B. Road
Ranchi 834 001
Jharkhand
Ph: 0651-2205640
vol lI no 16

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From LPG Connections to Use


Realising Smokeless Kitchens for All
Ashwini Dabadge, Ann Josey, Ashok Sreenivas

The Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala


Yojana, to provide concessional
LPG connections, is a step in the
right direction but much more
needs to be done by 2019 and
beyond to ensure homes in India
cook using modern fuels. This
article explores the issues of
providing connections, subsidy
provisioning and ensuring
sustained use of LPG and other
modern fuels, so as to displace
solid fuels from Indian kitchens.
It also highlights the need for
planning for increased demand
and addressing institutional gaps
to ensure that the benefits of
modern fuel adoption, especially
health benefits, are realised.

This is a longer version of an op-ed that has


been accepted for publication in the Hindu.
The authors would like to thank Shrinivas
Darak and Ritu Parchure for their inputs and
comments.
Ashwini Dabadge (ashwini.dabadge@
prayaspune.org), Ann Josey (ann@prayaspune.
org) and Ashok Sreenivas (ashok@prayaspune.
org) are with Prayas (Energy Group), Pune.
Economic & Political Weekly

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april 16, 2016

s part of the Budget Speech,


Finance Minister Arun Jaitley
announced that he was setting
aside `2,000 crore to subsidise the cost
of acquiring liquefied petroleum gas (LPG)
connections for 1.5 crore below poverty
line (BPL) households. This was followed
by the announcement of a more ambitious `8,000 crore scheme called the
Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY),
which aims to provide subsidised connections to five crore BPL households by 2019
(PIB 2016a). PMUY is part of a larger programme of adding 10 crore new LPG connections by 2019 to achieve near-universal
connection coverage in Indian households
(PTI 2016).
According to Census 2011, solid fuels
such as firewood, crop residue, coal, and
dung-cakes are used by about 17 crore
Indian households as their primary fuel
for cooking, with 88% of rural households reliant on such fuels. Burning such
fuels results in severe household air pollution which is identified as the second
leading contributor to Indias disease
burden (Ministry of Health and Family
Welfare 2015). In comparison, poor sanitation, that has received much needed
attention lately, ranks 15th.
According to Global Burden of Disease
data published by the World Health
Organization (WHO), solid fuel use is
responsible for about 13% of all mortality
and morbidity in India (measured as
disability-adjusted life years), and causes
about 40% of all pulmonary disorders,
nearly 30% of cataract incidences, and
over 20% each of ischemic heart disease,
lung cancer, and lower respiratory infection (IHME 2015). This deprivation is
gendered to a large extent as women
and children are the most exposed to the
harmful effects of smoke from burning
these fuels. Studies estimate that 88% of
rural women in the working-age are
engaged in the drudgery of fuelwood
collection and spend an average of four
vol lI no 16

hours every week on it, depriving them


of the opportunity to use this time
more fruitfully in leisure or productive
activities (Desai and Vanneman 2011). In
the past, governments have attempted
exploring alternatives such as promoting improved biomass cook-stoves which
have largely been unsuccessful (Kishore
and Ramana 2002). Moreover, research
shows that even so-called clean stoves
can have significant health impacts
(Smith and Sagar 2014). Therefore, this
ambitious programme announcement by
the government is timely and significant.
PMUY Scheme
PMUY proposes to provide `1,600 per
household to cover the security deposit
for a 14.2 kilogram (kg) cylinder as well
as the regulator. This builds upon the
Give It Up and Give Back campaigns
that respectively urge the well-off to give
up their LPG subsidies and provide one
subsidised LPG connection to a BPL
household in turn (Jindal 2016). State
government grants and corporate social
responsibility (CSR) funds of the oil
marketing companiesunder the Rajiv
Gandhi Gramin LPG Vitaran Yojana
(RGGLVY)have been used earlier to subsidise the initial cost of acquiring LPG
connections for BPL households. However,
PMUY is much larger in its scale of ambition. In comparison with claims of about
75 lakh BPL households being given subsidised LPG connections until September
2012 (PIB 2012) and 55 lakh being covered under the Give Back programme,
PMUY targets five crore connections over
three years.
If the problems arising out of usage of
solid fuels for cooking need to be truly
resolved, then all households should not
only obtain a connection but also use a
clean fuel such as LPG on a sustained basis.
Therefore concerted long-term efforts
are needed to ensure that households
want to use sufficient quantity of LPG or
other modern fuels, there is reliable
supply of these fuels and there are institutions and processes to help achieve
these goals. Unless the issues described
in subsequent sections are addressed,
PMUY runs the risk of failure similar to
Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vidyutikaran
Yojana. This programme was expected
47

BUDGET 201617

to deliver universal electricity access but


due to design, planning and implementation weaknesses it could, at best, be
said to have delivered physical infrastructure to most of the country but not
universal access or affordable and reliable
electricity supply (Sreekumar and Dixit
2011; Josey and Sreekumar 2015).
Sustained Use of Modern Fuels
Affordability: An important driver in
the decision to switch from solid fuels to
modern fuels is affordability and merely
subsidised connections provided under
PMUY will not be adequate for this. Households will have to bear other upfront
costs to get a connection over and above
the `1,600 subsidy. These costs could
range between `1,800 and `2,500 for
administration, inspection and demonstration charges, and a stove and tube,
and could be up to 50% of a typical poor
rural households monthly expenditure.1
One way to address this could be for
state governments to pitch in with additional support, as they have done in
the past (PIB 2012).
Past experience shows that providing
subsidised connections alone does not
translate to regular LPG use, particularly
if solid fuels are available free of cost
(Jain, Agarwal and Ganesan 2014). The
Deepam scheme of the Andhra Pradesh
government provided about 17 lakh subsidised connections in two years, but most
beneficiaries continued to use biomass as
the primary cooking fuel for affordability
reasons (Rajakutty and Kojima 2002).
The 2012 Kerosene Free Delhi scheme
was similar, with about half the beneficiaries continuing to use firewood,
kerosene or illegally procured LPG though
the scheme resulted in 3.5 lakh new
connections in two years (IRADE 2014).
It is estimated that an average household would need about 13 cylinders of
14.2 kg each per year to meet all its cooking needs.2 At todays subsidised LPG
prices, a typical family would spend about
`5,500 per year for the 13 cylinders it
would use. This would be a significant
10% of a BPL familys average annual
expenditure. Therefore, additional LPG
subsidy to BPL households beyond the
current subsidy is required to ensure
48

sustained use of LPG. Currently, LPG subsidies are around `95 per cylinder. If
this has to be increased to, say, `350 per
cylinder for the first seven cylinders in a
year, the additional annual subsidy for
the five crore BPL consumers would be a
maximum of about `9,000 crore. The
decision to stop subsidies for all those
reporting incomes over `10 lakh per
annum can help in reducing this subsidy
burden. It can be further reduced through
other subsidy-exclusion methods based
on factors such as asset ownership3 and
providing graded subsidies to consumers
in the intermediate income bracket (say,
incomes between `6 lakh and `10 lakh
per annum).
Cash flow is also an issue which affects
affordability, given the lumpy nature of
payments for 14.2 kg cylinders, unlike for
biomass or kerosene (Nayak, Werthmann
and Aggarwal 2015). In this regard, proposals to use smaller (5 kg) cylinders
and accepting payments for connections
in instalments are welcome measures.
Effective Subsidy Transfer: With PAHAL
(Direct Benefit Transfer for LPG) scheme,
LPG fuel subsidies are being directly
transferred to the bank accounts of beneficiaries to reduce leakages and inefficiencies. For this to extend to rural (BPL)
households, much deeper financial inclusion and effective provision of banking services is critical to enable smooth
transfer of subsidies to beneficiaries in
rural areas. Beneficiaries should be able
to access the subsidy easily once a bank
account is opened. Though the penetration of financial services has been improving of late, reports have shown that
awareness of financial services and use
of bank accounts, especially in rural
areas, is dismal (Yadav 2015). The acute
gender disparity with respect to access
and use of financial services as shown by
the committee on financial inclusion
chaired by Deepak Mohanty can be
detrimental to the scheme as the LPG
connection and subsidy provision would
be in the womans name (RBI 2015). These
problems need to be addressed to ensure
that the uptake of LPG is sustained.
Going beyond BPL: There are known
problems of exclusion in identifying BPL

households. There is a suggestion that


PMUY will use the Socio-Economic Caste
Census data of 2011 to identify beneficiaries (PIB 2016b). However, this data is
not publicly available and is controversial,
and hence may not be appropriate for use
in this programme (EPW 2015). Moreover, the data will also be outdated for
use by 2019. Affordability of LPG is relevant even for non-BPL households, as
unsubsidised connection costs can be
more than 50% of an average rural
households monthly expenditure. LPG
costs at current prices can be a nontrivial 6% of average annual expenditure.4 Therefore, to meet the goal of
making LPG access near-universal, PMUY
should broaden the set of target households, perhaps through measures such
as inclusion based on assessment of
household assets and characteristics,
and recommendation by community
representatives. These additional households should also qualify for some added
subsidy on the LPG cylinders to ensure
continued usage of LPG.
Going beyond LPG: While PMUY focuses
on LPG, it need not be the only option to
ensure smokeless kitchens in India. In a
country as diverse as India, other options
such as biogas, electricity and even
piped natural gas (PNG) will probably be
more suitable in some areas. Family- and
community-size biogas plants may be an
environmentally sounder option if they
are well integrated with the sanitation
programmes, particularly in areas with
high livestock densities, though technological and business-model challenges
would have to be addressed. Electric induction-based cooking is highly energy
efficient though current inefficiencies in
the electricity supply and resultant high
cost of supply may render it viable only
in limited areas. Currently, the cost of
PNG supply is 5% 7% cheaper than subsidised LPG in some cities, though initial
connection costs are higher.5 PNG could
also be an attractive option in cities as
PNG networks spread, and uptake of
unsubsidised PNG in cities can free up
resources to encourage the use of LPG in
rural areas. So, there is a need to move
away from a one-size-fits-all approach to
a more integrated approach with greater

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BUDGET 201617

flexibility at the state and district levels


in promoting locally suitable options.
Ensuring Reliable Supply
Moving away from solid fuels will be a
gradual process with multiple fuels being used in the transition period. Affordability is the first step towards the transition and it may be easier in regions
where the National Sample Survey Office
(NSSO) data indicates that firewood is
being purchased (NSSO 2012).6 However,
parameters such as convenience and
reliability of supply are also important
for complete transition. Ensuring continuous supply of LPG (or other modern
fuels) is hence important to ensure that
the advantages of obtaining a connection are achieved.
Viable Supply Networks: Last-mile
supply poses a challenge in rural areas
as distribution costs are typically higher
and consumption is likely to be lower.
There were only 1,340 rural connections
released per RGGLVY distributor on an
average in 2012, whereas at least 1,800
connections with regular demand are
required to make them financially viable
(PIB 2012). Rural households currently
consume less than two cylinders of LPG
per annum as against an assumption of
four cylinders made in RGGLVY (MoPNG
2009; NSSO 2012). Therefore, there is a
need to develop models that promote
viable rural distributorships through
exploring ideas such as smaller cylinders
(to ease cash flow) and co-locating distributorships with other businesses such
as retail or public distribution system
stores. Community groups, such as selfhelp groups, can also take on the role of
distribution and/or act as peer-pressure
groups to ensure timely payments of
instalments.
Imports: There may be a concern about
increased imports with improved uptake
of LPG. However, this need not be so.
Even if all the five crore BPL households
shifted completely to LPG and all the
incremental LPG demand were met by
imports, in 2019, it would only amount
to an additional import of 10 million
tonnes of petroleum which would be just
5% of the total petroleum imports. In
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

comparison, 69 million tonnes of diesel,


18 million tonnes of petrol and seven
million tonnes of kerosene were consumed in 2014. Suitable policies to
rapidly enhance electricity access and
quality of supply will result in near elimination of kerosene use and reduction of
diesel use for generators. Effective policies to promote public transport and improving efficiency of railways and vehicles can greatly reduce diesel and petrol
consumption. These reductions can more
than offset any extra imports of LPG.
Infrastructure: Infrastructure such as
transport and logistics, refineries, import
terminals, and bottling plants may need
to be strengthened as LPG demand picks
up. Regular monitoring of the schemes
progress can help in appropriate planning of such infrastructure.
Institutional Aspects
Effective design and implementation of
programmes requires institutions and
processes that work cohesively to
achieve the programme goals.
Ensuring Fuel Switching: In order to
encourage families to switch to modern
fuels, there is a need for a concerted
communication and awareness campaign
similar to those for the Swachh Bharat
Mission or the Stop Tuberculosis Campaign. This campaign should not only
explain the programme and the means
to obtain clean cooking fuels, but should
also build awareness regarding the
health hazards of solid fuel use and the
importance of freeing women from the
drudgery of fuel collection and dangers
of exposure to smoke. This is particularly
important given that the decision to
switch may be driven not only by economic but also social and cultural norms
which undervalue the effort and health
of women and reduce her bargaining
power in the household (Kishore and
Spears 2014).
In order to ensure sustained use of
modern fuels like LPG, there is also a
need for a robust system of monitoring
the distribution services to ensure fair
service to all households. Such a monitoring system could perhaps be best
driven by local community groups,
vol lI no 16

which should have adequate representation of women, minority, and backward


castes and classes. This should be augmented by a well-functioning grievance
redressal mechanism to address problems
of service quality to consumers, which
could arise due to the challenges of rural
distribution networks. Publicly available
information about progress of the
scheme including data about connections,
dealerships, consumption, complaints and
their redressal can be further measures
to promote good quality of service for
consumers.
Integrated Approach: Given the diversity of India in terms of cooking traditions, infrastructure and affordability,
and the multidimensional nature of the
cooking problem, it is unlikely that a
one-size-fits-all solution would work.
Therefore, an integrated approach involving multiple stakeholders would be
appropriate rather than it being spearheaded by one ministry. This would ensure that all relevant stakeholders become partners and work towards achieving a common objective.
Given regional differences, states should
play a greater role in the programme to
customise it, identify beneficiaries, choose
delivery channels, and decide the appropriate fuel mix to promote in different
regions of the state. The ministries of
Health and Family Welfare and Women
and Child Development should be partners in the programme given the strong
linkages to health and gender aspects.
The Ministry of New and Renewable
Energy can bring in its biogas expertise
to the programme, and the Ministry of
Power could play a role in ensuring that
electricity access is sufficiently reliable
and affordable for households to consider electric induction-based cooking
where appropriate. In other words,
a well-thought-out multi-stakeholder,
integrated programme on the lines of
Swachh Bharat and Make in India
is required to address the cooking
problem effectively.7
Concluding Remarks
To paraphrase the well-known Chinese
proverb, a journey of a thousand miles
begins with the first step. PMUY definitely
49

BUDGET 201617

marks a good first step, but it should be


remembered that there are many more
steps to be taken before the destination
is reached. This requires concerted follow-up, a comprehensive and integrated
strategy, and careful planning and
implementation. We hope the government walks the remaining distance to
achieve the objective of smokeless
kitchens in India.
Notes
1 Estimated from average household size and
average monthly per capita expenditure of a
poor rural person as per the expert group chaired
by C Rangarajan (Planning Commission 2014).
2 This is estimated based on an assumption that
useful cooking energy required is about 1,046
MJ per capita per year (Sanga and Jannuzzi
2005) and stove efficiency is 60%. Typically,
householdsparticularly poorer households
do not use LPG for all their cooking needs and
hence use fewer cylinders.
3 Declaration of assets owned by consumers and
periodic inspection of the premises by distri
butors or community representatives are possibilities. Factors for exclusion can include fourwheeler ownership, ownership of air-conditioners,
type of house, etc.
4 Estimates based on average household size and
average monthly rural per capita expenditure
as reported by NSSO (2012).
5 Based on PNG prices published by service providers in 10 cities.
6 In fact, LPG will currently prove to be a cheaper
source of energy in areas and in seasons where
households are forced to pay more than `3 per
kg for biomass.
7 On a lighter note, such a programme could be
christened Smokeless Kitchens Yojana or SKY,
given the fondness of the current regime for
acronyms.

Kishore, V V N and P V Ramana (2002): Improved


Cookstoves in Rural India: How Improved Are
They? A Critique of the Perceived Benefits from
the National Programme on Improved Chulhas
(NPIC), Energy, Vol 27, No 1, pp 4763.
Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (2015):
Report of the Steering Committee on Air
Pollution and Health Related Issues, Government of India.
MoPNG (2009): Rajiv Gandhi Grameen LPG Vitrak,
No.P-20020/22/2009-Mkt, New Delhi, 6 August.
Nayak, Bibhu, Christine Werthmann and Veena
Aggarwal (2015): Trust and Cooperation
among Urban Poor for Transition to Cleaner
and Modern Cooking Fuel, Environmental
Innovation and Societal Transitions, Vol 14,
March, pp 11627.
NSSO (2012): Level and Pattern of Consumer Expenditure, National Sample Survey Office, Ministry
of Statistics and Programme Implementation,
Government of India.
PIB (2012): 419.22 lakh LPG Customers in Rural
Areas, Press Information Bureau, 30 November,
viewed on 29 March 2016, http://pib.nic.in/
newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=89760.
(2012): OMCs Have Released 75.1 Lakh LPG
Connections to BPL Families under Various State
Government Schemes: Dr Moily, PIB, 11 December, viewed on 25 March 2016, http://pib.
nic.in/newsite/erelcontent.aspx?relid=90377.
(2016a): Cabinet Approves Pradhan Mantri
Ujjwala YojanaScheme for Providing Free
LPG Connections to Women from BPL Households, PIB, 10 March, viewed on 28 March
2016, http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease.
aspx?relid=137647.
(2016b) Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister
Takes Stock of Preparedness of Implementation
of Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yoajna, PIB, 22 March,

viewed on 29 March 2016, http://pib.nic.in/


newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=138255.
Planning Commission (2014): Report of the Expert
Group to Review the Methodology for Measurement of Poverty, New Delhi: Government of
India.
PTI (2016): Govt to Make LPG Available to All in 3
Years: Dharmendra Pradhan, Business Standard,
2 January, viewed on 27 March 2016, http://
www.business-standard.com/article/economy
-policy/govt-to-make-lpg-available-to-all-in-3
-years-dharmendra-pradhan-116010100450_1.
html.
Rajakutty, S and M Kojima (2002): Indoor Air
Pollution: Impact of Deepam-a State-Sponsored Scheme in Andhra Pradesh, Journal of
Environmental Studies and Policy, 11326.
RBI (2015): Report of the Committee on Mediumterm Path on Financial Inclusion, Reserve Bank
of India.
Sanga, Godrey Alois and Gilberto D M Jannuzzi
(2005): Impacts of Efficient Stoves and Cooking
Fuel Substitution in Family Expenditures of
Urban Households in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania,
International Energy Initiative.
Smith, K R and A D Sagar (2014): Making the
Clean Available: Escaping Indias Chulha Trap,
Energy Policy, pp 41014.
Sreekumar, N and Shantanu Dixit (2011): Rajiv
Gandhi Rural Electrification Program: Urgent
Need for Mid-course Correction, Discussion
Paper by Prayas Energy Group, Pune.
Yadav, Anumeha (2015): Jan Dhan Yojana: On Paper,
a Radical Scheme: On the Ground, a Catalyst
for Confusion and Coercion, Scroll.in, 24 November, viewed on 29 March 2016, http://
www.scroll.in/article/769613/jan-dhan-yojana-on-paper-a-radical-scheme-on-the-grounda-catalyst-for-confusion-and-coercion.

Subscribe to the Print edition

References
Desai, Sonalde and Reeve Vanneman (2011): India
Human Development Survey-I (IHDS-I), 2004-05,
Ann Arbor, MI: Inter-university Consortium for
Political and Social Research: ICPSR36151-v2.
EPW (2015): Limits of the SECC Data, Economic &
Political Weekly, Vol 50, No 29, 28 July.
IHME (2015): GBD Compare, Institute for Health
Metrics and Evaluation, University of Washington, viewed on 28 March 2016, http://vizhub.
healthdata.org/gbd-compare/.
IRADE (2014): Report on Evaluation of the Scheme
for Kerosene Free Delhi, Integrated Research
and Action for Development, New Delhi: International Institute for Sustainable Development.
Jain, Abhishek, Shalu Agarwal and Karthik Ganesan
(2014): Rationalising Subsidies, Reaching the
Underserved, New Delhi: Council on Energy,
Environment and Water.
Jindal, Ashutosh (2016): Pradhan Mantri UJJWALA
Yojana and Other LPG Initiatives, March,
viewed on 24 March 2016, http://petroleum.nic.
in/docs/PM_UJJAWALA_AND_OTHER.pdf.
Josey, A and N Sreekumar (2015): Power for All: Is
Anything Being Learnt from Past Programmes?,
Economic & Political Weekly, Vol 50, No 41.
Kishore, Avinash and Dean Spears (2014): Having
a Son Promotes Clean Cooking Fuel Use in
Urban India: Womens Status and Son Preference,
Economic Development and Cultural Change,
Vol 62, No 4, pp 67399.

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april 16, 2016 vol lI no 16 EPW Economic & Political Weekly

Missed Goals
Prasenjit Bose

ince the fall of the Left Front


government in West Bengal in
2011 and the concomitant decline
of the parliamentary strength of the left
parties in India, there has been a profusion of academic studies that try
to understand the slump in the fortunes
of an once-influential political force.
Dwaipayan Bhattacharyyas book has
come at a time when the Communist
Party of India (Marxist)CPI(M)-led Left
Front is making a desperate attempt
to stage a comeback in the state where it
had ruled uninterruptedly for more
than three decades. Going by the messy
electoral alignment opted by the front,
one doubts whether the serious questions raised by many, even those sympathetic to the Left Front, have had
much impact on its judgment or modus
operandi.
While studying the left, primarily the
CPI(M), Bhattacharyya has kept his
focus on West Bengal, delving into
the making and unmaking of the Left
Front government. In the process he has
traversed the history of six decades of
Bengal, especially the last three decades. This understanding has been condensed within five chapters. Chapter 1
on inception, outlines the post-independence history of the Indian left
through its experiences in Bengal and
traces the emergence of the CPI(M) as
the most significant left force and
leader of the Left Front, which finally
wrested power in 1977. The chapter
then goes on to discuss the consolidation of the fronts rule through its
policies of land reforms and democratic
decentralisation, laying down the theoretical framework of government as
practice. The following two chapters
contain an elaborate and critical analysis of land reforms and panchayati raj,
the two most crucial and innovative
policy interventions under the front.
Bhattacharyya notes the successes as

Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

book reviewS
Government as Practice: Democratic Left in a
Transforming India by Dwaipayan Bhattacharyya,
Delhi: Cambridge University Press, 2016; pp xx+273, `750,
hardback.

well as limitations of the Left Fronts


endeavour in bringing about agrarian
change and social reform.
Chapter 4 introduces the concept of
party society and deploys it through
field-based village studies to analyse
political change in the rural areas during the various phases of Left Front rule.
The fifth and final chapter is on the implosion of government as practice,
through the historic blunders of Singur
and Nandigram. The book ends with two
appendices, the first of which looks at
data from the Loknitis National Election
Survey (pre- and post-poll surveys) as
well as poll data for assembly and Lok
Sabha elections in West Bengal between
2001 and 2011. The second appendix
analyses primary governance-related
data from 162 gram panchayats in the
state collected in 200506 and places it
vis--vis the panchayat election results
of 2003 and 2008.
Government as Practice
Bhattacharyya puts forward his theoretical framework of government as practice vis--vis three other critiques of
Left Front rule, which he describes as
functionalist, structuralist and ideological. According to him, these critiques
see the rise and fall of the Left Front
regime in terms of binaries, like a shift
from good to bad governance, political clientelism unravelling over time
because of the corruption and overinterference of the local leaders or the
shift in the programmatic orientation of
the Left Front government away from
the project of transcending capitalism
towards empiricisation. In contrast to

vol lI no 16

these critiques, Bhattacharyya posits


that a government needs to be looked as
a process that evolves with practice and
that defies any functional, structural or
ideological bipolarity between attributes
that are positive or negative (p 28). He
draws upon Ernesto Laclaus logic of
populism to argue that a government
has to work its way through the heterogeneous and fluctuating terrain of
social reality, ridden with myriad contradictions (2007).
He then goes on to identify the contradictions vis--vis the Left Front regime.
First, he argues that the ubiquitous
nature of the party organisation of the
CPI(M) led to a governmentalisation of
the locality rather than a localisation of
the government. The mediation of the
party enabled the local governments to
work smoothly but it also undermined
the autonomy of the village communities and eventually distorted democracy.
Second, benefits of land redistribution
and tenancy reform did accrue to the
socially marginalised groups like the
Dalits and Adivasis, but that did not
create avenues for social mobility. The
Left Fronts one-sided emphasis on
class-based redistribution led to neglect
on other axes of discrimination and
exclusion, like caste and gender. This
restricted reforms to societys surface
and pre-empted political empowerment
of socially marginalised groups, which
could be seen in their gross underrepresentation in Left Front leadership
and ministries.
Third, despite its radical programme,
the practice of the CPI(M) had to be
conducted within constitutional-legal
limits. These limits led to the evolution
of a reformist practice which tried to
pragmatically balance programmatic
aims with everyday compulsions and
contingencies. Bhattacharyya has studied
this balancing closely in the second and
third chapters, through a critical analysis
of the Left Fronts land and tenancy
reforms and panchayati raj and social
sector initiatives, especially in school
education. The strength of the analysis
lies in combining the study of the changing political economy and legal regime
51

BOOK REVIEW

with an examination of the workings of


two key mass organisations associated
with the CPI(M), the Kisan Sabha and the
Primary Teachers Association, which
played crucial roles in the implementation of the Left Fronts policies. The interesting conclusion that Bhattacharyya
draws relates to the failure of the left in
evolving a programmatic understanding
in tune with its practice, rather holding
on to an orthodox version of Marxism,
for which Bhattacharyya has little sympathy. That helped the CPI(M) in maintaining a coherent, disciplined party organisation for a fairly long period, but it
eventually created fissures between its
theory and practice.
The infeasibility of the Left Fronts
original programme and a practice increasingly uninformed by any coherent
programme eventually had perverse
outcomes. While approving the progressive nature of the transformation ushered
in the rural areas in the first decade of
fronts rule, Bhattacharyya notes the
discernibly regressive trends that set in
during the later phasesthe gradual
displacement of the interests as well as

representation of the poorer classes by


that of the middle and entrepreneurial
classes (traders, promoters) within the
Left Fronts scheme of things. This rendered the enormous party organisation,
built through decades of popular mass
movements charged with a radical
transformative vision, into a depoliticised electoral machine with the sole
aim of holding on to power.
The inner life of this party society
in rural Bengal is sketched in Chapter 4
through some informative ethnographic
studies conducted in North 24 Parganas
and Bardhaman Districts. The opening
of the cracks within the party society
under Left Front rule is also described
in the final chapter through the events
surrounding land acquisition in Singur
and Nandigram (200607), as also in
a section on the rural revolts against
ration dealers in the latter half of
2007 in Chapter 4. The nature of
poriborton (change) in rural Bengal,
with the rise of the Trinamool Congress
(TMC) phenomenon, has also been outlined. With the dominant and self-seeking sections in rural society shifting

their allegiance from the Left Front


to the TMC, the latter emerged as the
new hegemon, attempting to cleanse
rural localities of all other oppositional
forces. The coercive structure of party
society has thus continued under the
TMC regime, with some changes in the
modes of organisation vis--vis the
Left Front.
Bhattacharyyas appraisal of the Left
Front regime in Bengal is a major contribution, both in terms of the ground it
has covered in political history as well as
the gamut of theoretical issues it raises
vis--vis the left. One can argue that the
entire geography of urban/semi-urban
Bengal has been neglected in the analysis
or criticise the absence of any engagement
with the trade union movement, which
continues to play an important role in
the politics of the state. There are other
significant issues related to the Left
Front rule that have either remained
untouched, like the experiences of the
movement for Gorkhaland, the Adivasi
question in Jangalmahal or North Bengal,
or have been dealt in passing, like the
Muslim question or gender-related

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vol lI no 16

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BOOK REVIEW

issues. All this, however, does not


detract from the importance of the analysis, because the focus is on the core of
the Left Fronts strategy agrarian/
rural transformation.
Industrialisation
Bhattacharyyas analysis of the industrialisation dilemma of the Left Front,
though, is somewhat ambivalent. His
narrative of industrial decline in West
Bengal since the 1960s, while factually
precise, remains simplistic, especially
when compared to his rigorous analysis
of the agrarian scene. This simplistic
logic makes Bhattacharyya stop short of
engaging with the argument that the
Left Front did not have any alternative
to the industrialisation strategies, that
were adopted first under Jyoti Basu and
then Buddhadeb Bhattacharya have not
been sufficiently problematised.
Bhattacharyyas lengthy and factuallyrich critique of the Left Front regime on
Singur and Nandigram episodes is based
on two counts. He argues that the government departed from its time-tested
methods of mediation at the local level
and took recourse to high-handedness
and coercion, which wrong-footed it
politically. This is of course unexceptionable. However, his second point based on
abstract discussions on primitive accumulation of capital, the preponderance
of the informal sector, jobless growth,
the imperative to join the race among
states in attracting investments by outbidding others and the inevitability of
acquiring farmland does not come out
clearly. He critiques the Left Front for
getting seduced by the hegemony of
neo-liberal capitalism, but also cites the
Singur and Nandigram episodes as
compelling evidence of how a flawed
analysis leading to a strategic miscalculation can transfer an otherwise wellintended initiative to the side of its
political adversaries (p 209). Can an
initiative be well-intended yet strategically miscalculated at the same time?
The onset of neo-liberalism and Indias
integration into the globalised economy
since 1990s has indeed changed the
rules of the game fundamentally, as far
as economic development strategies are
concerned. Even for an avowedly left-wing
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

april 16, 2016

government, it is difficult to pursue a


completely autonomous trajectory of
development, particularly at the statelevel. Yet, the Left Front governments in
Tripura and Kerala (200611) have been
able to pursue some alternative policies
and enhance the welfare of the people
during this period and retain popular
support. The problem with the Left Front
government in Bengal, particularly under Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, was that
it abandoned the pursuit of any kind of
alternative policies and decided to swim
with the neo-liberal tide. This is the
crux of the strategic miscalculation,
which Bhattacharyya refers to.
The debate is not on whether to industrialise, but how to industrialise. The
neo-liberal option suggests that the state
government has nothing else to do but
court private corporations, compete with
other governments for cheap resources
and concessions and expect private investment-led growth to trickle down. An
alternative strategy has to be based on
enhancing the role of the state in economic activity, through expansion of
public enterprises and redistributive
policies on the one hand, and driving a
hard bargain with private corporations
on the other, in the interests of labour
and nature. The Left Front government
faltered on this, partly because it gave
up on the public enterprises and landed
itself into a fiscal quagmire. Part of the
failure can also be ascribed to the lefts
inability to leverage its parliamentary
clout at the centre during the United
Progressive Alliance first stint to get
more public resources for Bengal.
The Left Fronts land acquisition
policies were driven by an uncanny
anxiety to somehow get a few corporate
projects off the block, rather than be
grounded in the popular concerns of
fair and adequate compensation, rehabilitation and livelihood security. Moreover, retrieving the enormous amount
of thoroughly underutilised land locked
inside the closed industries of Bengal
should have been prioritised before
the acquisition of fertile farmland.
Some of these questions were raised
within the front or by its friendly critics,
but they were all steamrolled by the
powers that be, amidst a neo-liberal

vol lI no 16

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53

BOOK REVIEW

euphoria created through the corporate


media after the Left Fronts assembly
election victory in 2006 (AM 2006;
Patnaik 2006).
Conclusions
Bhattacharyya too has underlined the
need for the left to manage the adverse
consequences of neo-liberal capitalism
and stand in solidarity with popular
movements against corporate encroachments on livelihood and habitats. But he
could have theoretically probed into the
developmental alternatives and scrutinised the debate within the Left Front on

54

the issues related to industrialisation in


a more rigorous manner. These issues
continue to remain relevant, not only
because the post-Left Front dispensation
led by the TMC has unabashedly presided over a chronic, multidimensional retrogression of West Bengals economy
and polity, but also because the left
whether inside or outside the Left
Frontis yet to resolve these issues in a
wholesome manner. Bhattacharyyas
book is certainly a constructive, thoughtprovoking intervention in the ongoing
debate. One hopes that the dialogue
between the programmatic goals and

pragmatic conduct of the left that he


passionately advocates, leads to the
emergence of a new government as
practice, sooner rather than later.
Prasenjit Bose (boseprasenjit@gmail.com) is an
economist and activist.

References
AM (2006): Suffrage in West Bengal, Economic &
Political Weekly, Vol 41, Issue No 21, 27 May.
Laclau, Ernesto (2007): On Populist Reason, London:
Verso.
Patnaik, Prabhat (2006): Left in Government,
Frontline, Vol 23, Issue 10, 20 May2 June;
available at: http://www.frontline.in/static/html/fl2310/stories/20060602002702300.htm.

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BOOK REVIEW

Mediterranean Graveyard
Disgrace of Clandestine Migration
Suraj Yengde

omain Puertolass The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir Who


Got Trapped in an Ikea Wardrobe
is about a journey of Ajatshatru Ogash
Rathod. He is a man of many parts: a
magician, conman, dedicated customer,
liar, performer, celibate Hindu, aspiring
writer, charmer of snakes and women.
The novel is set in Europe and North
Africa. The narrative begins in Paris,
moves to London, Barcelona, Venice,
Tripoli and finally back to Paris. Ajatshatrus name is often misspelled by the
non-Hindi/Sanskrit speakers, who address him in ways according to their
lingual comfort.
Ajatshatru, also known as Aja, is from
Rajasthan. He is a professional entertainer
and performs tricks and often deceives
people. Gullible rural Indians see godly
powers in his tricks. He swallows retractable swords, eating broken glass made
from zero-calorie sugar, stabbing his
arms with fake needles, and a heap of
other conjuring tricks (p 10).
Accidentally Trafficked
So how did this Rajasthani fakir end up
in Paris asking for an Ikea bed embedded with a few hundred nails? To perform a trick, Ajatshatru required a bed

54

The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir Who Got


Trapped in an Ikea Wardrobe by Romain Puertolas,
translated by Sam Taylor, New York: Alfred A Knopf, 2015;
pp 320, `1,387, hardcover.

with numerous nails which he would


then lie down on. He has no extra
money and employs his tricks to get
away from difficult situations in
Europe. He begins by fooling a gypsy
taxi driver with a fake 100 note that
is printed only on one side. When he
realises that he has been duped, the taxi
driver takes the act as an offence on
gypsy pride and vows to take revenge
on this turban-headed Indian. The
adventure begins.
As the story moves forward from one
location to another, the reader is introduced to the harsh realities of immigrants who are trying to escape border
policing in Europe. Puertolas is aware of
the insidious border policing in European
countries. He was employed in border
policing and patrolling agencies in France
until early 2014. Puertolas wrote the
book in three weeks on his cell phone
while working as a deputy inspector in
the French border agency, where he witnessed gruesome realities of undocumented migrants trying to cross borders.

Puertolas draws heavily from participant observation and provides an onthe-ground view of everyday border
scenes in Europe and North Africa. He
offers an adventurous critique of the
conditions of migrants like the North
Africans who are trying to enter the
United Kingdom (UK), the land of prosperity, via the Spanish and French borders, while hiding inside transport
trucks. Ajatshatru finds his way into one
of these trucks trapped in an Ikea wardrobe, which is being transported to
the UK.
Trafficking as Trade
As one continues to read about border
policing, the narration shifts to exploitation by monstrous traffickers, who for a
petty sum of 2,000 to 10,000, go to
the extent of trafficking migrants in fuel
trucks or on boatsall life-threatening
journeys. Assefa, a Sudanese, who continues to attempt to enter the promised
landEnglanddescribes an incident
where police had found Chinese people
piled ten high in the seven-square-foot false
ceiling of a bus, all of them wearing incontinence nappies to piss in. And some Eritreans who had been forced to call the police
themselves with a mobile phone because
they were suffocating inside a truck, having
been locked in there by a human trafficker
(p 258).

Incidents like this happen in the Mediterranean almost every day. The idea
of a border is that of increasingly a
failed apparatus of state protection. Outdated border protection mechanisms

april 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

BOOK REVIEW

impositions, while free mobility is natural


for human survival. Draconian measures invented by the countries of the
North, are being replicated by the South
under the guise of preserving cultural
tradition and sovereignty. Hegemony
articulated this way continues to be
challenged by the flow of migrants, which
is by no means a new phenomenon.

are something that are failing the human rights ideals of the Northern states.
North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO) invasions into Southern spaces
have put sovereign countries economic
and social condition into disarray, forcing citizens to find an alternative life for
their children and themselves.
Host of People, Fears and Hopes
Aseefa perseveres in his attempts to
enter England; making him a burden on
the host state that keeps packing him off
to various countries in Europe. Ajatshatru is struck by the regularity of such
clandestine journeys in the African
migrants life. The struggle of the Africans keeps haunting him through his
journey in Europe. Puertolas, in thinking
through Ajatshatru, wants to offer critical notes on the overwhelmingly insensitive system of border policing.
One has to only imagine Aseefas desperation to cross through Libya; to make
it through the seathe graveyardto the
prosperous side. Border protection has
defied the norms of interaction of similar species. Borders are human-made

Puertolas Ponders through Aja


One day while relaxing in his star-rated
hotel room in Rome, Ajatshatru looks at
the painting on the wall that is set in the
19th century countryside. Peasants reap
their farms, finding delight in their work
away from the industrial lifestyle. It
resonates the quirky charm and beauty
of the world, celebrated by the Romantics. It almost appears as the Proustian
narration of a lifestyle where comfort is
outside the materialistic imagery around
us. This narrative fits Ajatshatru, who
despite being in a comfortable hotel
room surrounded by pleasures, tries to
find comfort outside this worldin the
world of peasants. Ajatshatrus escape is
an ideal lifestyle for a fakir coming from

a humble background, where he had


limited needs.
To conclude, this book is based on
popular stereotypes that may not be
acceptable to a racially sensitive audience. The French deal with this quite
well. They laugh at the outdated societal
norms that inform one about a persons/
cultures identity. Yet, they continue to
instil the idea of looking outward
through their lens. At least, this is what
comes across in this book. Ajatshatru becomes a stereotypical Indian character
who has full grown beard, a shiny dress,
turban, and a mischievous love for
white skin.
The debutant authors success has
brought attention to migration-related
issues. His next work hopes to be a biographical account of dealing with people
on the border. This might help reveal
many untold truths of border policing in
France and Europe in general.
Suraj Yengde (suraj.yengde@gmail.com) is
with the Centre for Indian Studies in Africa,
University of the Witwatersrand,
Johannesburg, South Africa.

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vol lI no 16

55

PERSPECTIVES

Dreaming in English
Challenges of Nationhood and Democracy
Gyanendra Pandey

With the resurgence of


nationalism in this age of
aggressive globalisation, the
call to dream in English is
often a demand for conformity
with what are declared to be
national mainstreams. The
demand for unilingualism and
conformity is complicated by the
idea of dreaming in English
as articulated by colonised and
subordinated groups in other
contexts. What should give us
pause, however, is any easy
equation of the English language,
or Western democracy, with fixed
notions of science, rationality,
progress and modernity. How
might we think through these
conundrums and challenges?

Gyanendra Pandey (gpande2@emory.edu) is


Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor at
the Department of History, Emory University,
the US and a founding member of the
Subaltern Studies Collective.

56

here is something paradoxical


about the rising crescendo of nationalism in an age of aggressive
globalisation, with its dramatically increased movement and transmission of
goods, ideas and people across the
globe. The upsurge of nationalism is accompanied not by talk of the new conditions of citizenship and democracy, but
by an emphasis on preservation. Keep
America great. Build high walls. Stop
outside influences. Parallels abound:
Fortress Europe, Fortress Israel, Fortress
Malaysia. What this raises are fundamental questions about nationhood, democracy and the good society. How much
do we know about dreams that people
share, dreams realised and unrealised?
Or, to put it in terms of my title, what
does it mean to dream in English?

The idea of dreaming in English refers


here to more than the language in which
people dream, or for that matter, speak,
read or write. It is a demand for conformity with the purported national mainstream: the Anglo-Protestant society,
also described, in this and other similar
statements, as we the people of the United States. Mexican Americans, Hispanics
more generally, and other recent immigrants may share in the American Dream
and American society only if they dream
in English, that is to say, only if they give
up their non-White ways, abandon other
languages, and their inherited religious
and cultural practices, not to mention any
alternative visions of the good society.
There are parallels in countries across
the globe. India has seen a particularly
belligerent version of the demand with
the resurgence of a militant right-wing
Hindu political movement since the 1980s.
One commonly recited slogan will suffice to illustrate the point:
Hindustan mein rehna hai, to hamse milkar
rehna hoga;
Hindustan mein rehna hai, to Vande Mataram kehna hoga.

Literally, and unpoetically, that translates as follows:

Demand for Conformity


I take the phrase dreaming in English
from the Harvard political scientist
Samuel Huntingtons 2004 book, Who
Are We? The Challenges to Americas National Identity. In it, he focused fears of a
United States (US) in danger of being
overwhelmed by a flood of Hispanic immigration: a country on its way to having
a non-White majority, becoming a
non-White nation. We the people of
the United States have established a
common ethnicity, race, culture, language, and religion, he wrote, on the
basis of which we established the American Creed, articulated in the constitution. The Creed is unlikely to retain its
salience if Americans abandon the
A nglo-Protestant culture in which it is
rooted. There is no Americano dream,
Huntington declared: There is only the
American dream created by an AngloProtestant society. Mexican-Americans
will share in that dream and in that
society only if they dream in English.1

If you wish to live in Hindustan [India], you


will have to live with us;
If you wish to live in Hindustan, you will
have to say Vande Mataram.

The force of the statement you will


have to live with us lies in the undertone, live like us. The us is unspecified, yet axiomatic; in this instance, the
supposed Hindu majority of the Indian
nation. The second line makes the proposition plain, in the demand that Muslims (and other religious minorities)
learn to say Vande Mataram (Victory
to the Mother, that is Mother India in
the form of a Hindu goddess, in what has
become a Hindu nationalist anthem).
In India, as in the US, the injunction is
to dream in English, be like us, if you
wish to be accepted as full, equal, modern citizens.
English as a Demand for Equality
The demand for unilingualism and conformity is complicated, however, by the

APRIL 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

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Economic & Political Weekly

PERSPECTIVES

idea of dreaming in English as it has


been articulated by colonised and subordinated groups in other contexts. In
the South Asian subcontinent, to continue
with the Indian example, the English
language has an unusual aura and power,
simply as a medium of speech and writingsince it was, and to a great extent
continues to be, the language of the
rulers. In consequence, its recent history
provides several dramatic, not to say incredible, examples of insistence on English: the English language and, with it,
English dress and the culture. Let me
provide two illustrations, one from the
19th century and one from the 21st.
The first is the childhood experience
of the well-known nationalist leader, intellectual and mystic, Aurobindo Ghose.
Though this is less well known, his
father also gave him an unexpected
middle name, Ackroyd. The father, Krishnadhan, was a medical practitioner
trained in England who worked for the
colonial government in India. Militant in
his advocacy of English, he insisted his
children speak, dress and eat like the
English, forbidding them even to learn
or speak Bengali. In 1879, when Aurobindo was seven, he and two of his
brothers were shipped off to England.
The Anglican priest and his wife in
whose charge they were placed were to
teach them English ways, and had
strict instructions not to let the children
make the acquaintance of any Indian or
undergo any Indian influence [sic].2
Dalit Espousal of English
Consider alongside the Ghose example
the somewhat quixotic move of a young
Dalit intellectual in the first decade of
the 21st century, to install English as the
Dalit mother-goddess. Dalits, the 200
million people formerly known as Untouchables who occupy the bottom end
of the Indian caste order, should not be
deprived of the gifts of modernity, he
and his associates argue. In their view,
Lord Macaulay gave India the gift of
English education, refusing, as a believer in universal freedom, to keep
Indians from modern knowledge just to
maintain their subject position. That
gift enabled India to move quickly to
independence, and even to its current
Economic & Political Weekly

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APRIL 16, 2016

leadership of the information technology revolution.


There is something mysterious about
English, the Dalit activist writes: English produces the best symmetry between Brain and the mind.. Hence, the
tiny minority[of] English nations are
the greatest producers of modern knowledge. Therefore, To make non-English
nations as productive as the English
nations are, Goddess English must replace
regional languages all over the World
[sic]. Let us plan things in such a manner that all regional languagesfrom
French to Hindi, German to Tamil, Chinese
to Kannadaturn into a Greek, and Greek
into Sanskrit [that is, archaic languages]
before withering away completely3
It goes without saying that there is
more to these dramatic moves than simple veneration of English language or
dress alone, in the 19th century as well
as in the 21st. These are statements that
recognise the power and the possibilities
flowing from access to particular kinds
of resources, knowledge and culture. In
them, the English language and culture,
a rational world view, science, progress
and world dominion, all go together.
To put it differently, the Dalit votaries
of English, like the openly anglicised
predecessors and contemporaries of
Krishnadhan Ghose, are anything but
meek Anglophiles.
Take the small band of Derozians (or
followers of Young Bengal), active in
Calcutta in the 1830s, usually counted
foremost among the English lovers
Hindu by birth, yet European by education and its concomitants.4 For all their
ostentatious writing of English poetry
and adoption of a whole variety of
English practices and fads and foods,
these young students and teachers were
centrally concerned with promoting
rationality, science, trade and independence, to dissipate the mists of ignorance
and superstition, challenge the caste
order and promote the emancipation of
women.5 Derozio who lived all of 22
years, from 180931, urged his pupils,
many of them only a little younger than
himself, to question all authority, think
for themselves and live and die for the
truth. In the last year of his life, his
followers started two journals, the

vol lI no 16

Enquirer aimed at combating Hindu


obscurantism, and Jnananveshan, published in English and Bengali to disseminate knowledge of the science of
government and jurisprudence. As
Susobhan Sarkar, the historian of Young
Bengal, notes,
From Derozio [onwards], patriotism stirred
Young Bengal minds; Krishnamohan, even
as a Christian missionary since 1837, studied Hindu philosophy and sastric literature;
Tarachand translated Manu; the Jnananveshan was conducted partly in Bengali;
Pearychand and Radhanath, two intimate
friends, brought out the Masik Patrika, a
monthly magazine in simple colloquial Bengali, understandable to ordinary literate
housewives6

Much the same kind of political impulse lies behind the Dalit espousal of
English in colonial and postcolonial
India. The rewards that came with
knowledge of the English language were
applauded by Dalit spokespersons in the
late 19th and the 20th centuries. The advocates of the English mother-goddess
idea cite a poem by Savitribai Phule, an
early advocate of education and advancement for the lower castes, and
especially lower-caste women: Come
Mother English, this is your hour./ Throw
off the yoke of redundant belief/Break
open the door, walk out in relief. Babasaheb Ambedkar, the outstanding Dalit
leader of the 20th century, is said to have
compared knowledge of the language to
the milk of a lioness. If your child learns
English, the activist Chandrabhan Prasad
declares in 2010, its as if he or she has
inherited 100 acres of land. He makes
the point more strongly: the same privileged people who snigger at this move to
claim English as a Dalit mother-goddess
have in their own cases move[d] heaven
and earth to ensure that their children
go to the best English schools.7
If humanity needs English, subordinated, marginalised and stigmatised
groups like the Dalits need it all the
more. This is why, says Chandrabhan
Prasad, Macaulays birthday, 25 October,
should be celebrated as English Day, and
temples erected to [the] Dalit Goddess
English, symbol of a Dalit renaissance.
Images of the new mother-goddess will
be modelled after the statue of liberty.
Here is Prasads summary of the main
57

PERSPECTIVES

features: She is dressed well and sports


a huge hat, symbolising a defiance and
rejection of traditional dress codes,
which were particularly humiliating for
the lowest castes. She holds a pen in her
right hand, and in her left the constitution of India, which promised Dalits full
and equal rights. She stands on a computer, rather than the flower (lotus) or
animal-vehicle that is the pedestal of
traditional Hindu goddesses. And the
temple walls will be adorned with scientific formulae, famous quotes and
gems of knowledge [on] a variety of subjects. Thus, we will use English to rise
up the ladder and become free for ever.8
Equality and Difference
To come to grips more fully with these
complex dreams, however, it is necessary to consider one other dimension of
the question of mainstream and margin:
that is to say, the norm of modernity (or
what is routinely thought of as a uniformly modern, scientific, rational and
democratic civilisation), and its necessary counterpointthe matter of difference. It is this assumed standard that undergirds the us and the culture of
mainstream demands to be like us, the
equation of Englishness with enlightenment, science and progress in the Bengal
Renaissance, as well as the Dalit assertion
of humanitys need for English, in which
the latter refers back once more to rationality, science and modern civilisation.
There are several questions we might
ask about this widespread, not to say
common sense, assumption. What makes
for the universal, the mainstream, the
self-same, the norm? What is the place
of difference in this understanding of
the human condition and human rights?
Again, is there any room for transcendence, mobility or fluidity in this accounting of mainstream and minority, sameness and difference? I will deal briefly
with the first two of these questions,
before turning to the third, which is perhaps engaged less often.
The proposition about the universal
language, English, that we must all embrace, as against regional languages
(Hindi, Tamil, Kannada, French, German and even Chinese) that will inevitably wither away, illustrates the problem
58

very well. The claim of the universality,


modernity and scientificity of English,
as opposed to the unscientific and regional character of all the other languages of the world, underlines the
point that not all languages are equal,
yet skirts the important matter of how
political power determines which count
as world languages, which as regional:
more, which qualify only as dialects, or
not even that.9 In other contexts, we
may easily substitute English with
French, or German, or Chinese, or Hindi
or Bengali, and fill the regional or
local box with other languagesor
dialects.
The point is applicable to the matter of
sameness and difference writ large. For,
clearly, only some differences count as
difference. Others become the universal,
the unmarked. The procedure is ubiquitous, and almost unnoticed. Consider
the proclaimed difference between
woman and man, black and white, African or Oriental against European, Muslim versus Hindu, Jew against Christian,
lesbians, gays, bisexuals, transsexuals
as against heterosexuals. Even in these
declarations of fundamental difference,
deep-rooted and supposedly obvious,
there is a startling asymmetry. Men are
not described as different, it is women
who are. Foreign colonisers are not different, the colonised are. Caste Hindus
are not different in India; it is Muslims,
and tribals, and Dalits who are. White
Anglo-Saxon Protestant heterosexual
males are not different in the Us; at one
time or another, everybody else is.
White Australians are not different;
Vietnamese boat people, and Fijian
migrants to Australia, and, astonishingly,
Australian Aboriginals are.
Simone de Beauvoir drew attention to
the matter as long ago as 1949. In relations between the sexes, she noted, it is
not reciprocity or mutuality that is recognised: rather, one of the terms has
been asserted as the only essential one,
denying any relativity to its correlative,
defining the latter as pure alterity.10
Difference, here as elsewhere, becomes
a mark of the subordinated and the marginalised, measured against the purported mainstream, the standard, the
normal.

A prominent theme in the history of


the world since the 18th century has
been the promise of emancipation, including the emancipation of societies
and groups marked out as backward,
archaic, or in other ways adrift from
the main course of human history and
progress, as it is conceived after the
Enlightenment. The deployment of difference by the state and the dominant
classes of the modern era became a way
of legitimising and reinforcing existing
relations of power. It is in this way that
differences of gender, sexuality, caste,
race, etc, were foregrounded by the
state, and by dominant groups and
classes, in order to justify particular
arrangements of power and privilege
across the world.
For an extended period of time
through the 19th and 20th centuries,
colonised peoples, working class organisations, womens groups and others
stressed their individuality and special
circumstances as grounds for a demand
for changes in social and political regulation and order. It was the rhetorical
power of the discourse of equality that
bolstered their claims. The history of
such struggles appeared as a history of
sameness, and the right to sameness:
one man, one vote, universal access to
work and education, the need to end inherited structures of discrimination and
denial, and gain an equal share in public resources and state power. It is this
kind of impulse that is undeniably at
play in the struggles of Bengali intellectuals in the 19th and 20th centuries, as
in those of Dalits today.
In more recent times, however, the
disadvantaged, the marginalised and the
subordinatedwomen, Blacks, Dalits,
sexual minorities, conquered indigenous
peoples, migrants and dislocated populationshave also invoked the category
of difference in a somewhat different
way. By the later 20th century, the battle
for reordering if not overturning prevailing structures of access and privilege
had been self-consciously extended to
encompass the demand for an acknowledgement of the vitality and productiveness of difference. Thus, a great deal of
feminist work refused to accept any simple dichotomy between claims to equality

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and claims to difference, and argued


instead that equality requires the recognition and inclusion of differences.
The force of the revised argument
flowed from a recognition that differences of gender, of communal practices
and ways of being, even of incommensurable languages and beliefs, have provided the ground for the diversity, density and richness of human experience.
The altered stance followed also from an
analysis of how ideas of difference had
been deployed by dominant classes and
groups, and how the pronouncement of
categorical difference marked out only
particular differences as relevant to the
making of broader social and political
arrangements.11
Such oppositional, subaltern scholarship mounts a critique of a politics that
insidiously privileges certain kinds of
differenceas not different. It leads
directly to the question of how discourses
of dominance and subordination, normalcy and marginality, come to be constructed. It goes further, in its interrogation of ideas of unchanging difference
accompanied, as these often are, by unhistorical claims of timeless identity and
unitariness. In a word, the new oppositional idea of differencea claim to difference and sameness (a different sameness?) at one and the same timecontests any claim to an already existing
universality, identity or truth. In all of
this, it underlines the need to challenge
the easy assumption of the male, white,
English universal: the unmarked citizen
and the unmarked subject of modern
history, as well as the assigned values,
and assigned positions, of supposedly
eternal verities.
It is in this regard that the easy equation of the English language, or the
American creed, with fixed notions of science, rationality, progress and democracy might give us pause. The matter of
dreaming in English, which one might
also describe as the dream of modernity
and justice, requires greater historicisation and reflexivity, and fuller appreciation of the fact that the project of human
freedom is premised on constant struggle,
negotiation, creativity, rethinking and
recreation. Critical thinkers have long
fought for precisely such transcendence
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APRIL 16, 2016

of received historical conditions, contexts and beliefs. Every subjectaccomplishes its freedom only by perpetual surpassing toward other freedoms, as de
Beauvoir put it. Every time transcendence lapses into immanence, there is
degradation of existence into in-itself, of
freedom into facticity12
With that critique in place, let me turn
to two other significant examples of
dreaming in Englishdreams of equal
rights, which take the form of a struggle
over sameness and differencein India
and the US.
In Search of a National Language
I begin with Mohandas Karamchand
Gandhis thoughts on the use of English
in colonial India. When he returned to
the country in 1915, after his long sojourn in South Africa, he found that all
the proceedings of the most advanced
political gatherings, including the leading nationalist association, the Indian
National Congress, were conducted in
English. The language of the rulers had
attained such a dominant position that it
had become the medium not only of
higher education, but of social intercourse among the educated classes, who
considered it a mark of honour and distinction to speak in English only on all
occasions.13 Gandhis autobiography records the shame he felt at the response to
his intervention at a World War I recruitment meeting called by the Viceroy in
1917. He agreed to attend the meeting on
condition that he be allowed to speak in
Hindi-Hindustani. The Viceroy consented, provided Gandhi translated what he
said into English as well. Gandhi made
no speech; he spoke one sentence in
support of the recruitment resolution.
However:
Many congratulated me. That was, they
said, the first instance within living memory
of anyone having spoken in Hindustani at
such a meeting. The congratulationshurt
my national pride. I felt like shrinking into
myself. What a tragedy that the language
of the country should be taboo in meetings
held in the country, for work relating to the
country, and that a speech in Hindustani by
a stray individual like myself should be a
matter for congratulation!14

Two years later, when he turned towards non-cooperation with the British

vol lI no 16

and had already led a countrywide agitation against the Rowlatt Act that
extended war-time regulations in India
after the war, Gandhi delivered another
significant speech in Hindi-Urdu-Hindustani at a meeting of Hindu and Muslim
political leaders called to discuss the
question of British treatment of the
Turkish Khalifa (Caliph) after the Allied
victory. Among the resolutions at the
conference was one that called for an
oath of commitment to swadeshi (Indian
manufactures) and the boycott of foreign goods. The militant Muslim leaders
present supported the resolution, but
said it did not go far enough. Maulana
Hasrat Mohani, who addressed the gathering immediately before Gandhi, declared that the country needed action
that would have more immediate effect.
His speech drew thunderous applause.
Even as he wondered how he would follow in the wake of such oratory, Gandhi
was persuaded that something new,
over and above boycott of foreign cloth,
was needed. But he was still unclear
what that might be.
Gandhi writes of his anxiety, when it
came to his turn to speak, that his inadequate knowledge of Hindi/Urdu would
seriously handicap his ability to make a
persuasive speech on such a difficult
matter. He had spoken in Urdu at a Muslim League meeting in Calcutta some
time before this, but only for a few minutes, and only to make an emotional
appeal to the audience. In Delhi, the assembly included many learned scholars
who expressed themselves in the chaste
tongue of the North Indian elite. As he
recalls it, Gandhi had to cast aside his
shyness: I was not there to deliver and
address in the faultless, polished Urdu of
the Delhi Muslims, but to place before
the gathering my views in such broken
Hindi as I could command. And in this I
was successful.15
The Mahatma proposed a new idea
and programme, one for which he could
not readily identify a suitable Hindi or
Urdu word. In the end, he says, he used
the word non-cooperation (asahyog),
arguing that in the event that the peace
terms were unacceptable to the Muslims,
they should withdraw all cooperation
from the government. If Government
59

PERSPECTIVES

should betray us in a great cause like the


Khilafat, we could not do otherwise
than non-co-operate. The speech in
broken Hindi-Hindustani had great effect. Speaker after speaker rose after
Gandhi had finished, and supported his
views. This meeting afforded me a direct proof of the fact that Hindi-Urdu
alone could become the lingua franca of
India. Had I spoken in English, I could
not have produced the impression I did
on the audience16
Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Indias
first education minister, great national
leader and renowned scholar of Urdu,
Persian and Arabic, and of the Quran,
recalled in 1946 how Gandhis decision
to speak in Hindustani at the War Conference in 1917 had caused a stir in the
press, and wrote of the revolution on
the language question brought by Gandhis entry into the Indian political field:
To speak in the national tongue ceased
to be regarded as a shame.17 During the
post-war years, Gandhi spoke in HindiHindustani in hundreds of meetings
across the country. In all his speeches
and writings from then to his death, he
advocated the necessity of building up
Hindustani as the national language,
rather than relying on a foreign
tongue, English, as the means of communicating with the masses and of
giving them the fullest opportunity to
participate in national life.18
The determined campaign on behalf
of a national language was in line with
the mainstream of nationalist thought
across the world in the early 20th century.
It flowed from a fundamental commitment to mass education and mass involvement in the politics of the nation.
Gandhi was aware that Hindi-UrduHindustani, the language of the North
Indian elite, would not be readily acceptedor quite so easy to learnfor people who spoke the very different languages, and wrote in the very different
scripts, of Southern India. There could
be some reluctance and difficulty even
for speakers of Bengali, Marathi, Assamese and other regional languages in
Northern India, although these languages, along with Hindi-Hindustani, derived their vocabulary, grammar and
script from Sanskrit roots.
60

New Language for a New Nation


What Gandhi stressed was that in a
large (we might say, multinational)
nation like India, all the major regional
languages would be state languages,
and the medium of mass education in
the different regions. What was needed
in addition was a language for interregional communication. In his view, this
could only be Hindi-Urdu-Hindustani,
already spoken in some form by nearly
40% of the people of India. It could
not be English, though English would
continue to be used for international
communication.
There was more. The national languagelike the nation itselfhad to be
forged anew, even as it derived from
existing inheritances. Hence the new
name, Hindustani, for what Gandhi described as a wise mixture of Urdu and
Hindi. He took up the cudgels for the
new language in response to criticism
from upholders of more orthodox versions of Hindi and Urdu. If newspapers
and other critics will exercise a little
forbearance, he wrote in 1946,
they will presently see that it is not difficult to understand what is Hindustani
as distinguished from Hindi and Urdu.
Readers must bear kindly with what may
today seem a hotch-potch of the two forms.
If God spares my life, I hope to prove to the
readers of Harijansevak [his journal] that
Hindustani can be as sweet as either Urdu
or Hindi.

And again, Hindustani existed at one


time. The present effort is directed to revive it through a wise mixture of Hindi
and Urdu and let it grow thereby.19
There were times when Gandhi had to
answer charges of narrowness and parochialism even from close allies and wellwishers like the Nobel Prize winning
poet, Rabindranath Tagore. The latter
expressed outrage in 1921 at Gandhis
reported advice to Indian women to stop
studying English. Gandhi responded to
him with some sadness. As a supporter
of the fullest liberty, for women and
men, he noted, he could hardly have
advocated a cramping of minds by the
rejection of English. He was concerned,
rather, about the reasons why people
learned English: boys and young men as
a means of obtaining government jobs,
girls as a passport to marriage.

I know husbands who are sorry that their


wives cannot talk to them and their friends
in English. I know families in which English
is being made the mother tongue. The
canker has so eaten into the society that, in
many cases, the only meaning of education
is a knowledge of English. All these are for
me signs of our slavery and degradation20

Gandhi expressed the hope that


Tagore would recognise their shared
cosmopolitanism and desire to learn
from every possible quarter. He recognised the importance of English, he
wrote on other occasions, as a window
on the world, for international communication and for the development of
modern science and thought. But he
thought it a sin and an unnatural condition to burden Indias children and
sap their youthful energy by expecting
the expansion of their brains through
the medium of a foreign language. He
freely acknowledged his own debt to
Western culture, yet believed that
whatever he had been able to do for
India was entirely due to his retention
of strong roots in the native culture.21
What was critical, in his view, was
cultural rootedness, alongside the necessity, and beauty, of widespread interaction, adaptability and growth.
I want the cultures of all the lands to be
blown about my house as freely as possible.
But I refuse to be blown off my feet by any.
I would have our young men and young
women with literary tastes to learn as much
of English and other world-languages as
they like, and then expect them to give the
benefits of their learning to India and to the
world. But I would not have a single Indian
forget, neglect or be ashamed of his mothertongue, or to feel that he or she cannot think
or express the best thoughts in his or her
own vernacular.22

Interrogating the American


Dream
From Gandhis resolute questioning of a
uniform dream of modernity, and his
campaign to establish Indias distinctiveness, along with her sameness, as part of
the struggle for self-respect and independence in the first half the 20th century, I want to turn to a rather different
interrogation of the dreamthis time
with the capital D of the American
Dream. Ta-Nehisi Coates inhabits a
wholly different world from Gandhis,
and follows a very different intellectual

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journey. He arrives at a more radical


questioning of all dreams, all inherited
cultures and promises, in the course of
his ruminations on the issue of African
American self-education in the late 20th
and early 21st century America. Yet there
is an interesting convergence with Gandhi
in the emphasis on the struggle necessary for the preservation of a people and
the enhancement of their culture.
In his moving and extended letter to
his teenage son, entitled Between the
World and Me, Ta-Nehisi writes of the
country he came to know as he grew up,
in which everyday life was so different
from the standard tales that were told
not only about the endless possibilities of
America, but also about the epic romance
of the African American movement, and
the Freedom Riders and Freedom Summers of the Civil Rights era. He underlines the need to interrogate all such stories unceasingly: The Dream is the enemy of all art, courageous thinking, and
honest writing. And it became clear that
this was not just for the dreams concocted by [white] Americans to justify themselves but also for the dreams that I had
conjured to replace them.23
Coates writes of the denial, indeed the
impossibility, of the Dream for anyone
with a black body. The question of how
one should live within a black body,
within a country lost in the Dream, is
the question of my life (p 12). When I
was about your age, he says to his son,
each day fully one-third of my brain
was concerned with who I was walking
to school with, our precise number, the
manner of our walk, the number of
times I smiled, who or what I smiled
at (24). This need to be perpetually
on guard constituted an enormous drain
of energy, the slow siphoning of the essence. All his life he heard black boys
and black girls being told to be twice as
good, which is to say accept half as
much. No one told those little white
children, with their tricycles [commanding entire sidewalks], to be twice
as good. I imagined their parents telling
them to take twice as much (pp 9091).
Up against these forces, he recalls his
and his parents search for the truth of
black history. That search led them/him
to the Mecca, that is, Howard University,
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APRIL 16, 2016

with its legions of luminous poets and


writers and teachers, truth-tellers and
creators of black pride and black aspiration. In response to his endless questions, his father and mother had referred
him to books about the black struggle
one book followed by another, and another. At Howard, Ta-Nehisi discovered
and embraced Chancellor Williamss
Destruction of Black Civilization, with its
forceful statement of millennia long
European plunder. My working theory
then held all black people as kings in exile, a nation of original men severed
from our original names and our majestic Nubian culture (pp 4546). The initial enthusiasm notwithstanding, however, he could discern no unified, coherent narrative of the black experience,
endeavour and achievement. What he
encountered, instead, were eddies and
flows, and forces and arguments, that
contradicted and even destroyed each
other: Hurston versus Hughes, Du Bois
versus Garvey (or Washington), integration versus black nationalism.
Ultimately, Ta-Nehisi Coates found
freedom in the library: The classroom
was a jail of other peoples interests [and
narratives]. The library was open, unending, free (p 48). Both the streets and
the schools shackled the mind; or rather,
while streets shackled the body, schools
shackled the mind, which was worse. It
was only in the library that the mind
was free. To enhance the experience,
Coates began a practice of requisitioning
three texts at a time every day in the
Howard library, reading between and
betwixt them, as it were, working
through the intersections and the interstices, developing a new ethics of reading, questioning not just the distribution
but the very mechanics of power.24
That is how he rediscovered Malcolm
X, whom he had idolised for some time;
or, more precisely, the best parts of
Malcolm. Malcolm, always changing,
always evolving toward some truth that
was ultimately outside the boundaries of
his life, of his body (p 48). That, Coates
realised, was the point of education: a
constant questioning, a break from all
dreams, not the creation of ones own
special myth or dream, a carbon copy of
white claims to civilization (pp 50, 52).

vol lI no 16

There is a sense of loss. The break


from received dreams, overgeneralised
statements of black or white conditions
and aspirations, the smashing of all the
comforting myths of Africa, of America,
and everywhere, leaves Coates only
with humanity in all its terribleness.
This is a humanity that is shared, that
cannot be parcelled out; sadly, the terribleness is also shared (p 52).
That bottom lineof humanityis
one Coates insists on for every single individual, in all her individuality, and for
every nation. History is written on the
bodies of living, thinking individuals:
Slavery is not an indefinable mass of
flesh, and we must respect every
human being as singular (p 69). Nevertheless, the history of black oppressionthrough slavery, segregation,
lynching, rape, statutory and social discrimination and denialstill makes
African Americans a nation, a people.
We speak a common languagemy
people; we feel a common feeling: We
made that feeling, though it was forged
in the shadow of the murdered, the
raped, the disembodied, we made it all
the same (p 120). And so: still and all I
knew that we were something, that we
were a tribeon one hand, invented,
and on the other, no less real (p 56;
cf 149).
The same, yet different: in search of a
different sameness. Let me conclude on
that note with a final thought.
A Third Space
Gloria Anzaldua might have the last
word, writing from her (dis)advantaged
location on the US/Mexican border of a
third space still to be born. As a mestiza, she writes in her path-breaking
book, Borderlands/La Frontera: The New
Mestiza, I have no country, my homeland cast me out.
(As a lesbian I have no race, my own people
disclaim me; but I am all races because there
is the queer of me in all races.) I am cultureless because, as a feminist, I challenge the
collective cultural/religious male-derived
beliefs of Indo-Hispanics and Anglos; yet I
am cultured because I am participating in
the creation of yet another culture, a new
story to explain the world and our participation in it, a new value system with images
and symbols that connect us to each other
and to the planet.25

61

PERSPECTIVES

The dilemmas faced by the most outstanding of Indias national leaders in


the 20th century and by an African
American intellectual today parallel
A nzalduas position in many ways. In a
significant sense, we are all inhabitants of
borderlands. We share criss-crossing,
intermingling, contradictory, evolving
cultures: those of us who live on recognised political (or, for that matter, cultural or sexual) borders, as well as those
who have been captured and transported from distant continents, and those
who assume they have lived on the same
piece of earth for two, or three, or five
thousand years.
That is the reason why Gandhi must
search for new languages, welcoming the
winds of all cultures blowing through his
house, even as he seeks to preserve his
own inheritance. It is also why Coates is
left only with questioning and struggle.
If my life ended today, he tells his son, I
would tell you it was a happy lifethat I
drew great joy from the study, from the
struggle toward which I now urge you.
Perhaps struggle is all we have because
the god of history is an atheist, and nothing about this world is meant to be. You
must struggle to truly remember [the]
past in all its nuance, error, and humanity. You must resist the common urge toward the comforting narrative of divine
law, toward fairy tales that imply some
irrepressible justice.26
In the end, Mohandas Gandhi and
Ta-Nehisi Coates may speak the same
language as the theorist of the mestiza,
even if their vocabulary is a little different: Soy un amasamiento, I am an act of
kneading, of uniting and joining that not
only has produced both a creature of
darkness and a creature of light, but also
a creature that questions the definitions
of light and dark and gives them new
meanings.27
And, while ruling classes and their
apologists will scarcely admit it, perhaps
that is what the better part of dreaming
in Englishthe dream of freedom and
democracy in the 20th and 21st centurieshas always been about.
Notes
1 Samuel P Huntington, Who Are We? The Challenges
to Americas National Identity (Simon and Schuster,
New York, 2004), 256 (emphasis added).

62

2 See Ashis Nandy, The Intimate Enemy: Loss and


Recovery of Self under Colonialism (Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1983), 87 and 89.
3 Chandrabhan Prasad, The English Day, October 25 (2006), Chandrabhanprasad.com/party/English_Day.pdf.
4 See Andrew Sartori, Bengal in Global Concept
History: Culturalism in the Age of Capital (University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2008), 93.
5 Sumit Sarkar, The Complexities of Young Bengal, in his A Critique of Colonial India (Calcutta, Papyrus, 1985), 36 and passim.
6 Susobhan Sarkar, On the Bengal Renaissance
(Calcutta, Papyrus, 1979), 103, 108, 110 and
passim.
7 Maseeh Rahman, Indias Outcasts Put Faith
in English, Guardian, 11 January 2011; Archana Maseeh, This Is Indian Hypocrisy (22
April 2011), http://www.rediff.com/news/slide
-show-1-interview-a-temple-to-english-in-india/20101103.htm.
8 Prasad, The English Day; Geeta Pandey, An
English Goddess for Indias Down-trodden,
15 February 2011, http://www.bbc.com/news/
world-south-asia-12355740; Archana Maseeh,
This Is Indian Hypocrisy (22 April 2011).
9 British officials in India provided an interesting
counter-example, in their effort to show that
India lacked any possible unity as a nation,
when the number of separate languages they
counted in India grew from 147 in the 1901 census to 222 in 1921, over a period when the total
population expanded quite slowly from 292
million to 316 million. As R P Dutt pointed out,
134 of the 222 languages listed in 1921 belonged to what the census called the TibetoBurman sub-family; and the languages listed
for 1909 included Kabui with 4 speakers, Nora
with 2, and Andro with only 1defying the
very conception of language as a means of
communication; R P Dutt, India Today (1940;
reprint, Manisha, Calcutta, 1979), 29596.
10 Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex (1949;
trans Constance Borde and Sheila MalovanyChevallier, Vintage Books, New York, 2011), 7.

NE

11 Joan W Scott, Deconstructing Equality-versus-Difference, Feminist Studies, 14, 1 (1988),


passim.
12 de Beauvoir, Second Sex, 16.
13 Abul Kalam Azad, National Language of
India, from Harijansevak, 26 May 1946, in
M K Gandhi, Thoughts on National Language
(Navajivan Publishing House, Ahmedabad,
1956), 156.
14 M K Gandhi, An Autobiography or The Story of
My Experiments with Truth (trans Mahadev Desai, 1927; reprint, Navajivan Publishing House,
Ahmedabad, 1966), 336.
15 Ibid, 365.
16 Ibid, 365 and 366.
17 Azad, National Language of India, 15657.
18 Gandhi, Thoughts on National Language, 1517,
20, 23, 189, 205 and passim.
19 Gandhi, Thoughts on National Language, 158,
160.
20 Gandhi, Young India, 19191922 (B W Huebsch,
New York, 1924), 460 (emphasis in original);
see also Gandhi, Thoughts on National Language, 978.
21 Harijan, 1 February 1942 in Thoughts on National Language, 98; and Young India, 5 July
1928 in Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi,
Volume 42 (Publications Division, Government
of India, New Delhi, 2000), 207.
22 Gandhi, Young India, 19191922, 46061.
23 Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me
(Spiegel and Grau, New York, 2015), 50. Page
references for subsequent quotations are provided in the text.
24 I owe thanks to Judith Levy for directing my
attention to the importance of Coates requisitioning and reading of three books at one time;
see Coates, Between the World and Me, 46; and
2526 for schools that shackle.
25 Gloria Anzaldua, Borderlands/La Frontera: The
New Mestiza (1987; Aunt Lute Books, San Francisco, 2012), 1023.
26 Coates, Between the World and Me, 115, 71, 70.
27 Anzaldua, Borderlands/La Frontera, 103.

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SPECIAL ARTICLE

Formula Does Matter


Finding the Right Prices
Amit Verma

Amid the chaos around the new gross domestic product


figures put out by the Central Statistics Office, profound
improvements made in another prominent statistical
markerthe Consumer Price Indexalso compiled by
the CSO, went unnoticed. The CPI series was revised to a
more recent base year, 2012. This alone probably
deserves commendation as base years of other national
price indices have grown significantly remote. It is
indeed a tectonic shift in estimation procedure and
conforms to international best practice concerning CPI.
Here we discuss the decision of CSO to replace the
arithmetic mean with the geometric mean in the
updated CPI indices by going through each of the
established approaches to index number theory used
to identify the appropriate formulation to calculate
basic indices.

here is a little bit of a price index in everybodys life. In a


country like ours, where a vast number of people live on
a subsistence level, fluctuations in prices of items/commodities they consume may affect their day-to-day life. In
these circumstances, the measurement of prices through a statistical device like the Consumer Price Index (CPI) assumes a
very important role. Consumer price indices released at the
national level are CPI (Rural/Urban/Combined), and CPI for
Industrial Workers (IW) and Agricultural Labourers (AL)/Rural
Labourers (RL). The first series is compiled and released by the
Central Statistics Office (CSO), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MOSPI), while the Labour Bureau,
Ministry of Labour and Employment brings out the CPI-IW and
AL/RL. The prominent uses of various national consumer price
indices are illustrated in Table 1.
Table 1: National Price Indices and Their Primary Usage
Sr No Price Index

Compiled by Base Year

CSO

Views expressed are personal.


Amit Verma (samudra4@gmail.com) is Deputy Director, Data Processing
Centre, National Sample Survey Office, Giridih, Jharkhand.
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CPI (Urban/Rural/
Combined)
CPI
(Industrial Workers)

Labour
Bureau

CPI (Agricultural
Labour
Labour/Rural Labour) Bureau

Uses

2012

Measurement of inflation,
national accounts deflator, etc
2001
Determination of dearness
allowance for organised sector,
fixation and revision of
minimum wages in schedule
employment, etc
198687 Revision and fixation of
minimum wages in agriculture
occupations under Minimum
Wages Act, 1948; revision of
wages under MNREGA; rural
poverty estimation; updation
of cooking cost under mid-day
meal scheme; fixation of
procurement/support prices
of agricultural crops by
Commission for Agricultural
Costs and Prices, etc

Price indices are constructed in a hierarchical or pyramidal


manner. The typical aggregation structure is depicted as in
Figure 1 (p 64).
At the top is the all-item CPI which is the overall summary
measure of the change in consumer prices from month to
month (Figure 1). Next comes a small number of commodity
groups such as food and beverages, pan, tobacco and intoxicants, fuel and light, housing, clothing, bedding and footwear, and miscellaneous. Each of these categories consists of
subcategories. For instance, the food group comprises subgroups such as cereals and products, pulses and products, edible
oils, etc. Each of these subcategories are divided further
down to the item level for which reliable weights based on
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Figure 1: Typical Aggregation Structure
Overall Index

Group Index

Elementary Indices
Individual Price
Observations

Weights

index from these state price relatives is worked out by using the
Laspeyres base weighted formula and the all-India index is
worked out as a weighted average of the indices of 20 states,
weights being the estimated consumption expenditure of all
rural and agricultural labour households in each state as a proportion of corresponding expenditure for all India. All-India
group indices are also compiled by using the state weights in the
particular group, derived as a proportion of corresponding
expenditure at the all-India level.
The debate on the best formula for estimating an item index
concerning CPI is classic and dates back to Fisher (1922:
2930) who seems to have been the first to establish the
upward bias of the Carli price index and made the following
observations on its use:

consumer expenditure are available. These items serve as


strata for the sampling of prices of specific products. It is worth
noting here that the Housing group consists of a single component: house rent and thus house rent index is an item index as
In fields other than index numbers it is often the best form of average
well as group index. Within each item stratum individual price
to use. But we shall see that the simple arithmetic average produces
one of the very worst of index numbers. And if this book has no other
quotes on specific goods and services are combined in order to
effect than to lead to the total abandonment of the simple arithmetic
arrive at elementary indices. In the present CPI framework it is
type of index number, it will have served a useful purpose.
not possible to pull the Laspeyres formula down to the item
level. Therefore, for computation of item indices of CPI, the
Since then to resolve the problem of appropriate functional
three most commonly employed methods in practice are:
form in a CPI, the price index literature has identified primarily
(i) Ratio of average prices (RAP), often referred to as Dutot index. the following approaches:
(ii) Average of price relatives (APR), often referred to as Carli (i) Test/Axiomatic approach, (ii) Economic approach, and
index. (iii) Geometric mean of price relatives, often referred to (iii) Statistical/Stochastic approach.
as Jevons index.
To advance the discussion it may not be necessary to use Test Approach: This approach to index number theory essenmathematical notations/algebraic expressions. The Dutot index tially sets out some commonsensical criterion and then sees
is the ratio of average (arithmetic mean) prices for matched which indices satisfy them. This approach does not assume
observations in the base and current periods. Table 2: Axiomatic Performance of Each of the Functional Forms
Description
Jevons
Dutot
Carli
The Carli index is an average of changes of Test
Whether Satisfies the Test (Yes/No)
individual price quotations. Finally the Jevons Continuity
The price index should be continuous
Yes
Yes
Yes
index, which is the geometric mean of the price Identity
If no prices change between two periods
Yes
Yes
Yes
then the price index is equal to unity
relatives (or price changes), that is, taking the
Yes
Yes
Yes
nth root of the product of all n prices or price Monotonicity in current If any current period price increases,
period prices
then the price index increases
ratios. All three computation methods are unMonotonicity in base
If any base period price increases, then the
Yes
Yes
Yes
weighted (or equally) weighted because de- period prices
price index decreases
tailed weight data are not available within Proportionality in
If all current period prices are multiplied by the
Yes
Yes
Yes
current period prices
positive number a, then the initial price index
elementary indices.
is also multiplied by a
In the context of existing CPI-IW series
Inverse proportionality If all base period prices are multiplied by the
Yes
Yes
Yes
(2001=100) comprising 78 centres at the all- in base period prices
positive number a, then the initial price index
is multiplied by 1/a
India level, Dutot method is used in all centres
The price index lies between the smallest and
except Himachal Pradesh where Carli method Mean value test
largest price relatives
Yes
Yes
Yes
is used for calculation of item indices. LikeSymmetric treatment
If we change the ordering of the outlets
Yes
Yes
Yes
wise, in the compilation of the CPI (AL/RL), the of outlets
(or households) from which we obtain the price
quotations for the two periods, then the
Carli method is used: the village-wise price
elementary index remains unchanged.
relative of each item is worked out by expressPrice bouncing test
If the ordering of the price quotes for both
Yes
Yes
No
ing the current price as a percentage of base
periods is changed in possibly different ways,
year prices. A simple average of village-wise
then the elementary index remains unchanged
If the data for periods base and current period are
Yes
Yes
No
price relatives is worked out to arrive at regional Time reversal
interchanged, then the resulting price index should
price relative in the state. Regional price relaequal the reciprocal of the original price index
tives, thus derived, are weighted to arrive at Circularity/transitivity The product of chain of indices over successive
Yes
Yes
No
the state-level price relatives, the weights beperiods should equal the total price change
over the whole period
ing the estimated expenditure of all rural/
If the units of measurement for each commodity
Yes
No
Yes
agricultural labour households in a region as a Commensurability
are changed, then the elementary index remains
proportion to expenditure of all the concerned
unchanged
households of all regions in the state. The state Source: CPI Manual (ILO 2004: Chapter 20).
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any kind of relation between price and quantity data and


focuses on the statistical properties of the index. It ranks the
different formulations in accordance with their overall performance in respect of desirable set of requirements (or axioms)
imposed. Table 2 (p 64) describes each of the prominent tests
in brief and reports the performance of each of the functional
forms with respect to each of the tests.
It may be of interest to note that not all tests are logically
independent. For instance, continuity, identity, monotonicity
and proportionality in current period prices imply mean value
test whereas commensurability test is a consequence of proportionality in current period prices and inverse proportionality in base period prices. Further there is no universal agreement on the relative importance of each/combination of the
tests. For instance some authors (Fisher 1922; Diewert 2012)
have argued that all reasonably constructed indices should
pass time reversibility whereas some (Eichhorn and Voeller
1976) do not include the test as an incontestable condition for a
price index to satisfy. Nevertheless in whatever way the axioms are
weighed up, it follows from Table 2 that Jevons index possesses
all the desirable axiomatic properties, Dutot index performs
reasonably well while Carli index emerges as the weakest.
Because of its axiomatic flaws Carli index has been widely
criticised. In particular, its failure to satisfy time reversibility
(with an upward bias) has been viewed seriously since if the
prices go up and then return to their previous level, the Carli
index would report an increase in the prices unless all prices
rise in the same proportion which is clearly counter-intuitive
in sense and may be prone to distortions in such situations.
The Dutot index performs reasonably well with respect to
axiomatic properties except for when it is not in general invariant to changes in the units in which individual goods are sold
because of its failure to satisfy the commensurability test. This
means that the Dutot index will not be appropriate for elementary aggregates where there is a large amount of heterogeneity
and items are measured in different units, as in these situations, the index can be changed simply by changing the units
of measurement for some of the items. Further, with the exception of the Dutot formula, the remaining elementary indices
Carli and Jevonsare functions of the price changes (or relative prices) of the items being aggregated. The Dutot index
price-weights all the price changes (that is, function of the
initial price level) and thus can be dominated by the price
movements of a single good, if that good is much more expensive than others included in the calculation. For illustration
purpose behavioural aspects of different formulas have been
summarised through various panels of Table 3 using some
hypothetical data. It may be noted that (Panels 1 and 2 of Table 3)
elementary index for a hypothetical item stratum consisting
of three specifications say A, B, C is clearly dominated by the
relatively highest priced product C in the Dutot formulation.
It clearly seems undesirable to allow indices for elementary
aggregates to be dominated by the price movements of high
priced items. Therefore relevance of the Dutot index for computation of elementary aggregate in the context of a CPI would
depend on the goods included in the elementary aggregate. If
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each item class (for which expenditure weights can be obtained) has only one representative specification in it where
prices are collected, then the Dutot index will work in a satisfactory manner.
Table 3: Behavioural Aspects of Different Formulas
Panel 1: Dutot Formula Depends on the Price Level in the Price Reference Period
Description

Product A
Product B
Product C
Average
Dutot index
Carli index
Jevons index

Base Prices #

Current Prices

Price Relative #

50
45
60
60
200
240
103.3
115.0
(115/103.3)*100 =
(0.9+1+1.2/3)*100 =
Geomean (50+60+200)/
Geomean (45+60+240)*100 =

Index

0.9
1
1.2
1.033
111.3
103.3
97.5

Panel 2: Dutot Formula Price-weights All the Price Changes


Description

Product A
Product B
Product C
Sum
Dutot index-->

Base Prices #

Price Weight

50
60
200
310
(Price Weight *
Price Relative)-->

Price Relative #

16.13
0.9
19.35
1
64.52
1.2
100.00
(16.13*.9 + 19.35*1 +
64.52*1.2) =

Index

111.3

Panel 3: Upward Bias in Carli (Prices in Base and Current Period Are Reversed,
However Carli Reports an Increase)
Description

Product A
Product B
Product C
Carli index
Dutot index
Jevons index

Base Prices

Current Prices

Price Relative

50
60
40

40
60
50

0.8
1.0
1.3

Index

101.7
100
100

50 to 40 is a 20% decrease whereas 40 to 50 is a 25% increase; Carli gives more weight to


price increases.

Panel 4: Substitution Effect in Jevons Index


Description

Product A
Product B
Carli index
Dutot index
Jevons index

Base Prices

Current Prices

Price Relative

100
100

120
80

1.2
0.8

Index

100
100
102.1

Carli and Dutot keeps the implicit quantities constant. Jevons allows some substitution
households consume more of B and less of A.

The test approach clearly approves of the Jevons index. Unlike the Carli index which gives more weight to price increases
than to decreases (see Panel 3 of Table 3), the Jevons index
gives equal weight to upward and downward movements
within the elementary aggregate. For example, in an aggregate with five prices doubling and five prices halving, the geometric mean will equal 100. Thus the Jevons index being a
function of price changes overcomes the limitation of Carli
index which can be sensitive to situations where individual
goods see large price changes such as when a sale on an item
ends. To conclude, since Jevons index satisfies more desirable
properties than competing elementary indices, it seems to be a
reasonable choice as an elementary index.
Economic Approach: The conceptual starting point for measuring consumer prices, in many countries, is the Laspeyres
index (not the cost-of-living index). In the economic approach,
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SPECIAL ARTICLE

the objective is to estimate an economic index, that is, a costof-living index for the elementary aggregate. A cost-of-living
index measures the minimum amount by which consumers
would have to change their expenditures in order to keep their
utility level unchanged, allowing consumers to make substitutions between the items in response to changes in the relative
prices of items. It is reasonable to expect that behavioural
hypothesis of item substitution for a representative/typical
consumer does hold since when we move down the product
hierarchy to more detailed levels we find closer substitutes at
the lower levels than at the higher.
There are two special cases of some interest. The first case
is when consumers continue to consume the same relative
quantities whatever the relative prices. Consumers prefer not
to make any substitutions in response to changes in relative
prices. The cross-elasticities of demand are zero. The underlying preferences are described in the economics literature as
Leontief. With these preferences, a Laspeyres index would
provide an exact measure of the cost-of-living index. In this
first case, the Carli index calculated for a random sample
would provide an estimate of the cost-of-living index provided
that the items are selected with probabilities proportional to
the population expenditure shares. If the items were selected
with probabilities proportional to the population quantity
shares (assuming the quantities are additive, that is, all items
in the elementary stratum are homogeneous/have the same
units), the sample Dutot would provide an estimate of the
population Laspeyres.
The second case occurs when consumers are assumed to
vary the quantities they consume in inverse proportion to the
changes in relative prices. The cross-elasticities of demand
between the different items are all unity, the expenditure
shares being the same in both periods. The underlying preferences are described as Cobb-Douglas. With these preferences,
the geometric Laspeyres would provide an exact measure of
the cost-of-living index. The geometric Laspeyres is a weighted
geometric average of the price relatives, using the expenditure
shares in the earlier period as weights (the expenditure shares
in the second period would be the same in the particular case
under consideration). In this second case, the Jevons index
calculated for a random sample would provide an unbiased
estimate of the cost-of-living index, provided that the items
are selected with probabilities proportional to the population
expenditure shares.
Thus, the choice of formula apparently rests on the degree
of substitutability that exists between items within an elementary aggregate. In practice, the cross-elasticities could
take on any value often above unity for brands in competitive
product areas and may also range up to plus infinity for an
elementary aggregate consisting of a set of strictly homogeneous items, that is, perfect substitutes. Therefore, unitary price
elasticity seems the best approximation and most reasonable
for items within an elementary stratum, because it at least
acknowledges that change in prices such as special promotion
or sales prices are intended to change (increase) the quantity
sold. It follows that in contrast to Carli and Dutot which keep
66

the quantities fixed while the expenditure shares vary in


response to changes in relative prices, the Jevons index
involving the implicit assumption that expenditure shares
remain constantis intuitively more appealing (see Panel 4
of Table 3, p 65).
Chapter 20 of the CPI Manual (ILO 2004) has a section that
provides an authoritative discussion on the economic approach
to elementary indices. The analysis spelt out therein and
reiterated in preceding paragraphs herein above is most
often advanced to justify the use of Jevons index by various
national statistical offices and researchers. For instance, in
December 1996, the much celebrated Advisory Commission
to Study the Consumer Price Index in the United States,
commonly known as the Boskin Commission, recommended
the use of the geometric mean formula for the aggregation of
prices within all categories of items in the CPI (Boskin et al
1996). This recommendation was based upon the belief
that a geometric mean formula would help to correct what
the commission called substitution bias. For details, see the
article by Dalton et al (1998) which introduced the change.
Similar justifications could be found for either full or
predominant usage of Jevons index at the elementary level
in the national CPIs of France, New Zealand, Sweden, Italy,
Australia, Japan, etc.
However, the economic approach is not only based on
assumptions about consumer behaviour but also depends on
market conditions and the representativity of the sample (the
way prices are sampled) as described in Chapter 20 of ILO CPI
Manual. All of these assumptions often do not hold in reality.
These conditions will be true under random sampling in the
base period provided that information on item quantities purchased or item expenditure is available. With purposive sampling these conditions are impossible to verify. Thus, using an
unweighted Dutot, Carli or Jevons index (without the appropriate sampling scheme) cannot really be justified from the
viewpoint of the economic approach. A common view in the
literature also conforms to the same. For instance, Diewert
(2012) while reviewing United Kingdoms Retail Price Index
emphatically concludes that the economic approach cannot be
applied at the elementary level unless both the price and quantity information are available.
This author, however, would differ a little. The reasons are
plain and simple. Even if the quantity or expenditure information is available and appropriate probability weights could be
derived then too each of the elementary indices would not be
invariant to the factors such as sample size, items included in
the basket, the choice of base period, etc. This suggests that
the results found in one context need not necessarily generalise to others. Alternatively, appropriately weighted Jevons index over the other weighted indices derives considerable support from the economic perspective, since cross-item elasticities of substitution are much more likely to be close to unity
(this corresponds to the case of CobbDouglas preferences)
than to zero (this corresponds to the case of Leontief preferences). Therefore, in the absence of additional information
and given everything else being similar, it may be inferred
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economy and thus the transitory noises


in the indices may further contribute
2010
2007
2011
to inflation.
220
2006
2012
The all-India average group-wise indi200
ces for the year 2006 to 2012 have been
shown in Figure 2. There has been a
180
steady rise in indices across all groups
160
over the period. The highest rise reported
ever among groups was in housing in
140
2010 which can be attributed to the revi120
sion in pay scales following the recommendations of sixth Central Pay Com100
General
Food
Pan,supari, etc Fuel and light
Housing
Clothing,
Miscellaneous
mission. This along with a rise of 20
bedding and
points in the food group has contributed
footwear
Source: Labour Bureau.
to the maximum rise in all-India index
during the period. From 2010 onwards other groups also witFigure 3: Contribution of Constituent Groups of CPI-IW in All-India Index
20
nessed relatively rising trends in their indices and contributed
1.69
towards rise in the national average. This has been presented
0.45
2.95
16
more clearly in Figure 3.
1.02
2.02
2.56
0.33
6.26
2.60
The food group, with the highest weight, has been the largest
1.16
12
2.90
1.77
3.44
contributor
to overall change in all-India index consistently.
0.43
0.75
2.11
0.24
0.38
0.64
0.24 0.84
Housing
registered
its importance in 2009 and came up in the
8
1.39
1.12
0.58
0.25
0.55
0.30 0.76
forefront in the very next year. In 2011 and 2012, its contribu0.21
0.23
4
tion, though significant, declined. Miscellaneous is another
6.89
9.59
9.36
6.47
8.97
5.27
group which has been contributing to the tune of two to three
0
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
points. Fuel and light, clothing and bedding have also started
Food Intoxicants Fuel and light Housing Clothing and bedding Miscellaneous
registering their importance from 2010 onwards. Therefore, it
Source: Labour Bureau.
is easy to construe that the stochastic approach may not be
that the economic approach may implicitly support the use of conclusively applicable to any of the CPI indices.
the Jevons formula.
Conclusion and the Way Forward
Figure 2: Group-wise All-India Average Indices for the Year 2006 to 2012
240
2008
2009

Stochastic Approach: The stochastic approach to index


numbers suggests that the average of ratios (Carli) index is
more appropriate when price relatives are normally distributed, and the geometric means (Jevons) index is more appropriate when price relatives are log-normally distributed. Data at
the elementary aggregate level can be analysed to see whether
the distribution of price relatives is closer to normal or lognormal and appropriate statistical tests (such as test for normality on linear and log scale) can be performed to deduce
that either of the distribution fits the data well. Apparently
simple! However, there are practical difficulties in exploiting
this approach to index number theory for selecting an appropriate formula.
First, not all elementary aggregates may be closer to a particular distribution and thus prohibiting universal application
of a specific formula at all elementary aggregate. Second, distribution of price relatives can change over time as the indices
are prone to various monetary events such as implementation
of pay commission and non-monetary events such as sampling
errors. Therefore, sudden/persistent upward movement in indices may partially cause and consequence of sudden/persistent upward swings. The trend analysis of CPI-IW data from
2006 to 2012 provides a case in point. The selection of CPI-IW
indices is deliberate as it is used for indexation purpose for
workers/employees engaged in the organised sector of the
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The preceding discussion thus concludes that the Jevons index


is the preferred formulation at the basic level. Arithmetic basic
indices have long fallen out of favour with researchers and
various statistical organisations engaged in CPI compilation at
the international level. It is, therefore, laudable that CSO has
finally brought its CPI into line with international best practice making it much more relevant. It would have been more
transparent for the users if CSO had disclosed the manner of
using Jevons formula in its CPI as prices are combined along
many dimensions such as outlets, markets, time, etc. Use of
geometric mean should be avoided for intra-month price
observations since it can be shown that arithmetic mean provides more credible estimate for the representative price than
the geometric mean for extreme temporal price observations
for the same product.
Further, clarification is also desirable towards the treatment
of items reporting 0 value in any month as geometric mean
obviously cannot be calculated in such cases. Such occurrence
can be of intermittent nature and sometimes of permanent
nature also due to change in policy at any stage of an indexs
life. Such items need careful identification for each of the
centre/town/state. For instance, items country liquor and
primary school books having 0 price cannot be treated
identically as the former may be a banned item while the
latter may be a free good. Therefore, weight of country liquor
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needs imputation to similar items such as refined liquor and


beer, etc, as the case may be, while, there is no need for
weight imputation for a free good as its imputation may contaminate/inflate the change in price level.
Nevertheless, traditional use of a specific arithmetic
formula, Dutot or Carli, in the respective CPI has some rationale
and a direct criticism would be unfair. The foremost reason is
of course the appealing simplicity that an arithmetic meanbased index offers. Historically, it is justified in a sense
because of manual computation of indices in absence of computing devices during the 1980s and supplemented further
with the fact of having disproportionately large number of
goods in the basket instead of services and/or comparatively
fewer varieties of items as are available currently. It follows
that a specific index compilation methodology must have
been chosen a priori for the respective CPI, which might have
caused the need for having fixed sampling structure with regard to prices. Fixed implies having homogeneous set of specifications across item strata for all price quotations (schedules) at appropriate level (centre/town, etc). For instance,
existing CPI-IW series has a fixed set of specifications for all
the markets in a centre except Himachal Pradesh where specifications are fixed market-wise.
It may seem perplexing how requirements of having a fixed
set of specifications and the use of arithmetic mean to calculate price changes of items at the elementary level are closely
related. However, this is exactly the case in all likelihood. It is
well known that computation of arithmetic mean requires two
algebraic operation: addition and division. The former can be
applied only on the prices of items having similar specifications; else simple addition of prices within an item stratum
would not be possible. It is easy to see that like-to-like comparison is obvious with fixed set of specifications and prices
can be added anyway. However, over time precedent seems to
have prevailed over methodology.
Further, the Carli index is used under the implicit assumption that each price quotation collected for an item/commodity
index compilation has equal importance. Whereas, if the Dutot
index is adopted instead, the implicit assumption would be
that importance of each price quotation depends on its price
level in the base period; the costlier goods in base periods have
bigger weights. These two competing assumptions are accommodated in CPI depending upon its structure, and accordingly
an appropriate formula is chosen. For instance, as mentioned
earlier, because of large geographical distance between markets, in existing CPI-IW series Carli formula is used for
Himachal Pradesh centre unlike the rest of the centres where
Dutot formula is used. Likewise, CPI (AL/RL) also uses
Carli formula.
CSOs CPI uses a varying set of specifications in each
price schedule. It follows that the set of item strata obtained
from the weights thrown up by the consumer expenditure
survey gets wider representation as an item stratum may have
multiple specifications from different price schedules. This
enlarges the index sampling manifold, making it more representative. Therefore, not only the use of Jevons formula but
68

also the sample structure is in coherence with current economic realities as it includes more choices as available to all
segments of population.
Important for Other Indices

This decision of CSO holds enormous importance for other


price indices, especially for CPI-IW as the Labour Bureau has
also initiated its base revision exercise. It may be of interest to
note that the Technical Advisory Committee on Statistics of
Prices and Cost of Living (TAC on SPCL) under MOSPI represents the apex advisory body on price indices and has advised
the CSO on changing the index compilation formula. The TAC
on SPCL will also be advising Labour Bureau on technical
details relating to base revision of indices. Therefore, the
same technical body ideally should not recommend different
procedure for index compilation. However, as noted earlier,
the use of appropriate formula may depend on sampling
structure as well. If sample structure with regard to elementary aggregates is kept fairly homogeneous, the application of
Jevons formula may be difficult to explain. Therefore use of
Jevons formula also opens up a debate on how specifications
within each item class can be made more representative.
Drawing up of specifications and units for pricing is to be
done keeping in view its popularity amongst the target population and certain practical considerations such as general
availability of comparable specifications and their likely
availability in the event of the original specification disappearing from the market at a future date. For fixing of specifications the concept of popularity-amongst-the-target-population is in quite an abstract form, largely consultation-based
and prone to abuse and distortion. The reason is straightforward; there is no way a shop owner can reveal the preferences of our target population. The larger the segmentation
of the demographics patronising the market, the greater
would be chances that popular variety of a particular item
is not the representative for pricing.
Furthermore, it is a common perception that the Jevons
formula suppresses the price change in comparison to arithmetic mean-based indices and so the use of geometric mean in
CPI-IW may cause some anxiety in stakeholders. Only time will
tell how the TAC on SPCL and the Labour Bureau deal with the
responses driven by specific formula use. For the time being,
we must applaud the decision of CSO for bringing significant
improvement in the nations price statistics.
References
Boskin, M et al (1996): Toward a More Accurate Measure of the Cost of Living
Final Report to the Senate Finance Committee, Washington DC, http://
www.ssa.gov/history/reports/boskinrpt.html/#cpi5.
Dalton, Kenneth V, John S Greenlees and Kenneth J Stewart (1998): Incorporating a Geometric Mean Formula into the CPI, Monthly Labour Review, October, pp 37, http://www.bls.gov/mlr/1998/10/art1full.pdf.
Diewart, W E (2012): Consumer Price Statistics in the UK, http://www.economics.ubc.ca/files/ 2013/06/pdf_paper_erwin-diewert-consumer-pricestatistics-UK.pdf.
Eichhorn, W and J Voeller (1976): Theory of the Price Index, Berlin: Springer.
Fisher, I (1922): The Making of Index Numbers, Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
ILO (2004): Consumer Price Index Manual: Theory and Practice, International
Labour Organisation, Geneva: International Labour Office.
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Are Trade Unions Relevant in the Indian


Banking Sector?
Bino Paul G D, Pooja Gupta Mahurkar

There are multiple views on the kind of impact trade


unions have on organisations and their employees. The
existing literature, however, is not critical or well
researched. This study examines the effect of trade
unions on job security, training and development,
discrimination as well as the long-term performance of
organisations. It uses multiple units of analysis to absorb
select organisational contexts based on broad themes
and voices of employee collectives and employees. It
shows how unions can play a positive role by ensuring
improved corporate governance and service conditions,
though these organisations have a tendency towards
internal fragmentation, discrimination and a high
degree of political intervention.

This article is available online, in a similar form in the Labour Market


Research Facility Discussion Paper Series, TISS Mumbai at http://www.
atlmri.org/index.php/downloads/cat_view/37-discussion-papers. This
published article has benefited from an anonymous reviewer.
Bino Paul G D (binopaul@gmail.com) is with the Tata Institute of Social
Sciences, Mumbai; and Pooja Gupta Mahurkar (pg.vaidehi@gmail.com)
is a doctoral scholar at the same institute.
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1 Introduction

rade unions are considered important according to


group theories because they further group interests in
the form of class struggle. Marx has reiterated the importance of expansion of trade unions (Olson 1971a). A general
opinion is that individuals with common interests form groups
and attempt to further those common interests. Groups further the common interests of their members much like a single
individual would his personal interests. Dewey and Bentley
(1949: 130) and Truman (1951: 23542), whose works on group
theory are widely accepted, suggest that individuals with common interests would voluntarily further group interests. However, Olson (1965) critiques their work in The Logic of Collective
Action, in which he says that individuals find it difficult to
pursue group interests as compared to self-interest.
The proponents of collective bargaining are however of the
view that the role of such institutions cannot be neglected
because the management would always try to maximise their
share of gains.1 Trade unions are the major institutional representatives of the working class in modern states (Freeman and
Medoff 1984), and workers benefit through unions (Rajan and
Zingales 2014a). Advocates of unions believe that they have
desirable economic and political impacts. There is evidence
that collective action can result in higher efficiencies. Unions
help in employee retention, encourage effective communication, build morale and most importantly initiate meaningful
discussions with the management (as in equal-power theories).
Union office-bearers believe that unions are pivotal in providing workers with not only higher wages but also employment
security. This form of labour protection is good for workers,
society and the economy as a whole (Kaufman 2010: 102).
Some managements also agree with these claims (Freeman
and Medoff 1984).
There are two broad paradigms about engaging people in
corporate work: one deals with non-managerial jobs commonly termed industrial relations and the other, which is more
recent, deals with managerial jobs and is termed human
resource management. These two paradigms mainly differ in
their source of innovation and understanding of conflict. The
old paradigm regarded unions and workers organisations as a
major source of innovations, whereas the new paradigm assigns
a more cooperative role to unions, which has brought in its
own criticism. Many view this model as a mechanism by which
the unions are conveniently used by the management. Also,
according to the new paradigm, workers and management
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work towards mutual gains and there is no scope for conflict,


hence no requirement for collective action and collective
bargaining.2
Stakeholders will benefit if they influence organisations in
decision-making (Buchholz and Rosenthal 2005; Blair 1998)
and stakeholders interests may be balanced by having representatives of all stakeholder groups on board (Guthrie and
Turnbull 1995; Turnbull 1997; Guest and Bryson 2009). The
representation of non-managerial and managerial employees
in the board of directors therefore becomes imperative. Such
co-determination of the corporations strategy by the management and workers can also be encouraged by establishing
work councils (a type of organisational parliament or senate),
steering committees, etc. Employee participation at the workplace facilitates better communication between labour and the
management. It can be an effective tool to resolve differences
and is complementary to collective bargaining (Sen 2012).
From a legal perspective, unions representing the non-managerial class are protected by the Industrial Disputes Act (IDA)
1947, unlike the case for the unions representing the managerial class. The viewpoints of organisations and members on
the advantages and disadvantages of unions are different and
debatable. This study furthers the discussion by citing cases
from the Indian banking industry, which has traditionally
been highly organised. The Indian banking sector is the preferred research setting because it is the fastest growing sector
in India. Nevertheless with respect to services, comprising
mainly banking and telecom, the number of workers in the informal sector3 grew by 25% as compared to 9% in the formal
sector during 200405 (Bhowmik 2009). Also, the growth of
the banking sector is not marked by a proportionate growth in
employment (Paul et al 2008). This is in spite of the fact that
banking is an industry that has traditionally been highly regulated and known for its conservatism, which pertains to employment aspects as well. The sector is known for the highest
unionisation rates for the non-managerial and managerial employees, and it now subscribes to higher levels of informality
within regular employment and informal employment through
various mechanisms such as outsourcing and new forms of
employment contracts. This study gauges the relevance of
unions in ensuring job security, organisational efficiencies and
gender- and caste-based non-discrimination; it captures voices
of organisational representatives, employee collectives and
employees.
The following section provides a review of the related literature while the one after that elaborates on the research methodology followed by four themes, viz, unions and job security,
unions and organisational efficiencies, unions and women,
employee collectives and socially vulnerable groups. The final
section presents the discussion and conclusions.
2 Labour in the Indian Banking Sector

Since nationalisation of the banking sector in 1969, employment has expanded rapidly with the opening of many new
bank branches. However, recruitment of employees was
stopped after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) saw signs of
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overstaffing and declining operational efficiency (Mankidy


1997) made it impose major restrictions in 1986. This forced
banks to use existing staff and not recruit any fresh employees.
The Indian Banks Association (IBA) was started in 1942 to liase
between the government, the RBI and banks, but it is now involved in wage negotiations as a representative of the banks.
Banking employment has witnessed a high level of flexibility,4
subsequent to the Narasimham Committee Report (NCR) and
liberalisation of the sector (Mankidy 1997). This has resulted
in a chronic insecurity for workers. With implementation of
superior technology, more and more work is being outsourced.
This form of skill-biased technology5 reduces the relative
demand for unskilled labour, and suppresses their wages.
Moreover, technology has resulted in deskilling of work such
that the economic cost of replacement is negligible as compared to the retention cost.6
Formal employment in new7 private sector banks and foreign banks is subject to minimum regulation because none of
the banks have clerical staff/workers as per their designations.
Yet as per the National Classification of Occupations (NCO
codes), a large chunk of people with lower designations in new
generation private sector banks are workers by nature. In the
public sector banks (PSBs), some old private sector banks and
old foreign banks, due to the presence of unions, wage settlements are done through bipartite agreements (for workers,
clerks and sub-staff) and joint notes (for officers), whereby
workers rights and interests are preserved. In line with the
characteristics of the Indian labour market, caste, gender, occupation and inter-industry-based discrimination is dominant
(Krishna and Bino Paul 2012) in the banking industry. Castebased discrimination is prevalent despite the affirmative
action taken in the form of the reservation policy (Thorat and
Attewell 2007). India had to defend itself against accusations
on caste-based discrimination at the universal periodic review
at the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in May 2012 (Times
News Network 2012). Although there has not been a discernable increase in the labour market participation rates of women,
the expansion in employment of women appears to be concentrated in the informal low-skilled job segments (Ghosh 2010;
Paul et al 2008). This is further reiterated by the data compiled
by the IBA as on 31 March 2012 for all nationalised banks.8
Further, the employment practices of these new generation
private sector banks and foreign banks are now being implemented by PSBs and old generation private sector banks as
they have become the industry norm.
Restructuring is rendered relatively difficult in the face of
very old and strong collective action in the industry. The State
Bank of India Staff Association (SBISA)9 was established in
1920 and was registered under the Trade Union Act in 1926
(SBISA 2014). It was earlier known as the Imperial Bank of
India, Indian Staff Association and was registered as a proprietary society under the Societies Act. Subsequently, it was registered as a trade union under the Trade Union Act, 1926.10
Today, the United Forum of Bank Unions (UFBU)11 is the joint
representative for banking workers and officers and it negotiates with the IBA to arrive at bipartite settlements and joint
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notes. The constituent unions hold further internal negotiations with the respective bank managements for the remaining aspects of service conditions. Workers negotiate as per Section 2(p) and Section 18(1) of the IDA, 1947 read with Rule 58 of
the Industrial Disputes (Central) Rules, 1957. The job of unions
as institutions is to represent the interests of their members, be
it wages, job profile or mobility. Unions in the banking sector
have also been known to oppose hiring by organisations outside their membership, and hence resist any outsourcing of
work even if it is non-core.
The most important reason for this is the wide disparity in
payments, which results in compromising the interests of their
members in the long run; leading to the conflict of interests of
unions and cost cutting intent of firms while achieving internal and external flexibility. The major cost cutting measures
are technology (Paul et al 2008) and flexibilisation. The latter
is rendered possible due to the lack of choices and reduced
forms of security. Outsourcing serves as a mechanism to maximise flexibility. The income inequality between the regular
and outsourced employees for work of a similar nature is as
high as 4:1; moreover, regulation is nearly nil (Bhowmik
2009). In the process of rendering such rigidities, unions have
been accused of fostering a labour aristocracy (Tzannatos
and Aidt 2006). Yet the concern is that these negotiations
impact fewer and fewer people who are engaged in banking
work because many banks that can opt out of these negotiations
do not send their mandate to the IBA. As such, there is evidence
that bank unions are losing their grounds as managements
have been overriding them in many instances (Khandelwal
2011: 364). In addition, outsourcing is on the rise in the banking sector; this outsourced workforce is seldom represented by
a trade union.
Although the unions claim that there is no political party
affiliation, some linkages are explicit (even today) such as the
Bank Employees Federation of India (BEFI) with the Communist Party of India (Marxist)CPI(M), the Indian National
Bank Employees Congress (INBEC) with the Congress Party
(Mankidy 1997). However, there is no clear indication whether
these political linkages have resulted in sharpening the bargaining power of trade unions; instead, there are cases of splits
within trade unions along political lines (Bhowmik 2009).
Also, given that unions have not got representation in policymaking bodies (Bhowmik 2009), we can broadly say that the
union movement has not been strong.12
Firms have also been increasingly wary of workers rights,
specially the right to collective action because it amounts to
having a parallel power structure and restricts management
decision-making. There is no compulsion for the employers to
enter into collective bargaining. Only 46 of the 89 banks participated in the ninth bipartite settlement (IBA 2010).

subject entails complex social phenomena that are best articulated by using multiple cases, as cases are best suited for
exploratory studies wherein the phenomena being studied are
contemporary and with no control exercised (Yin 2003) as in
that of the present research situation in which there are many
more variables of interest than prefixed data points.
The multiple phenomena being studied are as follows: Trade
unions and their impact on aspects, namely, employment
security, wages, gender and caste-based discrimination, and
organisational efficiencies. For data collection, a triangulation
framework13 was used, as discussed by Creswell (2007) and
reiterated by Tracy (2010) and Denzin (2012). Here, triangulation seeks an in-depth understanding of the facts though
whilst bearing in mind that objective reality is never evident.
Accordingly, multiple people in contrasting positions were
interviewed, and documentary evidence was gathered with
respect to the same aspect/story so as to garner an unbiased
and factual picture of the truth.
Collection and analysis of data were performed in line with
the recommendations of Yin (2003). Data were organised and
categorised based on themes. The validity of the content analysis
was ensured by using the six step process of Neuendorf (2002).
Ethical principles were employed in data collection. Requests were sent to respective people in advance, and their
co-operation for the study was sought. The nature and purpose of study was clearly indicated in all communication.
Meetings were held with prior appointments after assuring the
respondents that all forms of data would be used purely for
academic purposes. Also, the names of individuals and of
organisations were masked to maintain confidentiality wherever the content is not in the public domain. Accordingly, the
transcripts were shown to the respondents for reconfirmation
before arriving at the final compilation.

3 Research Design

4.1 Unions and Job Security

We adopted a research strategy employing multiple units of


analysis that is very common in social studies and in the study
of organisations. The units of analysis here arebank, trade
union, other worker collectives and individual employee. The

Collective actors of an economic concern at times can be more


powerful than the political regime of the state. They confer
security, conformity, liberty and exposure on their members
(Commons 1931). Trade unions provide the platform for equality

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4 Unions and Collectives in Indian Banking

Taking cues from Oswald (1982), the likelihood of a strong union movement or employee collectives in the banking industry
is bleak as the degree of risk aversion for workers and junior
management is high, financial products are now very price
sensitive, there is surplus labour supply and purely technologydriven processes. On the other hand, there has been a long
period of union activism in the banking industry. Olson (1971)
suggests that groups in non-market situations are inclusive
groups whose supply of collective goods would increase with
group expansion. If we consider labour unions as non-market
groups, then it follows that the veteran bank unions which still
exist in the nationalised banks and some old foreign and
Indian private banks, should expand their membership to
maximise collective benefits. This phenomenon was observed
in the following theme.

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in bargaining power to individuals creating rules for fairness


or unfairness (Commons 1931). Today, rising job insecurity is a
major concern for the employed and others seeking employment. The banking trade unions view that their presence is
marked with high job security besides other collective benefits. This theme provides evidence for the perspective shared
by the trade unions as well as evidence of the aversion of management to trade unions.
Xantos Diamond Bank (XDB) is a Belgian bank, with its
headquarters in a major diamond trading city. It is owned by a
Belgium-based DYZ Group with branches in Xantos, New York,
Hong Kong, Singapore, Dubai and Mumbai. The Indian branch
has been in operation since June 2002.
This bank specialises in the financing of the diamond trade.
Belgium, especially the city of Xantos, is known for this and
there are three Indian PSBs there, which also have branches:
State Bank of India, Bank of Baroda and Union Bank of India.
The DYZ has made an agreement with the European Commission under which it has to close the XDB in a gradual and
orderly manner. It is to be absorbed by the DYZ whereby its
loan portfolio would be transferred to DYZ and gradually
terminated.
The New York branch was closed in 2012, because the Yunan
Group, the then prospective buyers of XDB, did not want to do
business in America. Even in Mumbai, credit conditions were
made stringent since 2012. In 2013, large credit accounts comprising 25% of advances were closed. Yet new projects like
Global Operations were introduced and a Mumbai branch
officer was assigned for this. New recruitments were also made.
The Mumbai branch has employed 33 officers who hail from
India. The Chief Executive Officer, Slay Burger, a Belgian, was
on a service contract that expired on 31 December 2014. The
closure announcement, which coincided with the expiry of
Slay Burgers service contract, came as a surprise to all the
Mumbai branch employees. Also, the last recruitment was
made ten days before the announcement. The closure announcement declared that all employees of the XDB in Xantos
would be absorbed in the DYZ while all employees at the
foreign branches would be dismissed.
Even the three officers who work directly for the Xantos
branch and are paid directly by the head office of the XDB are
to be dismissed. It was in this state of distress that all employees of the Mumbai branch approached the unions for help and
have organised themselves by affiliating to an apex bank
officers union.
The unions suspect that the sudden closure and commitment to the European Union is associated with the fact that
the diamond business is being linked to terror financing. Else,
there would have been no reason to close down an 80-year-old
financially healthy bank, which flourished even in times of distress. The Xantos Diamond Bank Officers Union (XDBOU) has
been agitating for an amicable solution. They approached the
RBI to whom the XDB was to surrender its licence to operate in
India. Due to this organised agitation, a dialogue has been initiated between the XDB and the unions and a possible takeover
by another bank, including Indian PSBs, is being worked out.
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Here, the union is playing a crucial role in ensuring job security.


Moreover, this is the first union in the history of the Indian
banking industry that represents officers of a foreign bank.
There was an officers union in another old foreign bank that
was made defunct systematically in 2009. In 2005, there was
an attempt made to organise officers in an old foreign national
bank, but the management came to know of this in the early
phases and penalised and dismissed all the persons involved.
The example thus set, has been successful in instilling fear
against organising agitations thereafter.
The managements aversion to trade unions appears to
result in the concentration of resources and power with a
single unit which may trigger complex forms of risks that
endanger sustainability of banking organisations. The strength
of polycentric systems14 needs to be understood as institutions
complement each other at multiple levels (Ostrom 2012). It
follows that trade unions and workers collectives are of utmost
importance in attaining higher order sustainability
4.2 Unions and Organisational Efficiencies

The principles of scarcity, efficiency, futurity and working


rules are common to forms and definitions of collective action
(Commons 1931). The conflict of interests is managed by the
code of conduct enforced by collective economic sanctions.
These sanctions can be very efficient and have their relative
merits (Commons 1931). Indian banks are struggling with the
provision of advanced financial products on one hand and
bringing about inclusive banking on the other. In the current
global financial scenario, they have to be very dynamic to
cater to the economy. Yet, one cannot be ignorant of the pitfalls which are inherent in any innovative process. A more
stable institutional change should involve a dialectical process in which there is a continuous dialogue between people
with conflicting views (Commons 1931; Hargrave and Ven
2006). The following thematic discussion gives evidence of
the same.
Cross-selling implies selling more financial products to
existing customers, by using the existing bank branch network; this results in the reduction of selling costs per product. Cross-selling is the main source of fees-based income in
banks. Most of the Indian banks now have alliances with companies who provide various other financial products such as
insurance and mutual funds. New private sector banks have
been cross-selling since 2002 and offering a wide range of
products, including credit cards, mutual funds and multiple
insurance products. Other banks have followed suit. The PSBs
sell financial products of other group companies. The CNB
CanLife India Insurance Company (CNB CanLife) is a joint venture where CanLife Inc and Cantor National Bank (CNB) are
the majority shareholders. They offer a range of protection
and retirement products. The CNB, Janki and Kanha Bank and
Karma Bank leverage their network to sell products of CNB
CanLife. Most of the other banks also have made a foray into
cross-selling.
Conceptually, this is accepted worldwide, but there are
some operational difficulties in India. Initially, these products
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did not sell easily and had to be marked indirectly. People


seeking loans from the bank obliged. Priority sector products
such as agriculture, vehicle and housing loans are compulsorily loaded with insurance premiums that are not a part of the
project cost. The banks also have a tendency to sell insurance
policies by offering higher incentives. There have been instances when loan accounts have been debited for premiums
without the knowledge of the borrower and sometimes even
accounts that have been declared to be non-performing assets
(NPAs) have been debited!
The network heads pressurise their subordinates to sell and
allocate targets to the region-in-charge. The latter pressurises
the branch heads who in turn informally set a target for all
branch employees. Ideally, the selling is to be done only by
certified agents (for example, for a PSB: certified insurance
facilitatorCIF, for life insurance products; specified person
SP, for general insurance products). Because all agents face
unreasonable pressure to meet targets, the entire branch joins
in the efforts. Banks justify such efforts of non-certified people
as passing of leads, but they do much more than that and violate the RBI guidelines. This is a serious issue from a training
and development perspective, especially when the quality of
the agent training programmes is doubted. Thus, an officer
from a PSB states, ...these trainings are held at destination
spots like Tadoba for a couple of days. The actual training lasts
only half an hour....
Without a complete understanding of the subject, the agents
sell these products in haste in the anxiety to meet their targets.
This results in numerous complaints and shoddy after-sales
service. In the new private banks (NPBs), it is observed that all
branch employees are engaged in the selling activity, although
only one/two employees are actually qualified to do so. As a
cover-up, all paperwork is blindly signed by the qualified person. This causes problems frequently. Banks cannot deny that
they are unaware of the situation because it is they who assign
branch targets. However, ironically for customer complaints,
the banks blame the qualified person. There are no instances,
though, when an employee grievance of this nature has
reached the litigation stage as everything gets settled out of
court. This is logical in the light of the quantum of incentives
that are received. But banks cannot provide after-sales
service, and the customers have to be redirected to the product originator. However, people do expect services from the
point of sale.
Also, people involved in the branch that sells these products
are not benefited, as it entails CASA15 deposits and recovery
of NPAs.
One way to look at this is that the premiums are a share of
the CASA deposits. Unionists believe that the commission
earned by the banks (with special reference to the SBI and its
subsidiaries and PSBs) does not match the resources spent on
it, especially in the face of staff shortage and the extra work on
account of new government schemes, like the Pradhan Mantri
Jan Dhan Yojana, which is mainly being implemented by the
PSBs. One of the prime reasons for the disproportionality of income and expense is that a large chunk of the commissions is
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pocketed by the top brass in both monetary and non-monetary


forms, namely, valuables and foreign trips. The unions in one
bank demanded that unless 70% of the CASA targets are
reached no incentives be paid. The management had agreed to
this. Yet incentives were paid although these targets were
not achieved.
Moreover, the pattern of incentives is such that the top bosses
make more money and the incentives of the field agents are
only miniscule. The region-in-charge makes annual incentives
of approximately Rs 40 to 50 lakh. The higher ones rank, the
greater this incentive is. It was in this regard that a public
interest litigation was filed against the ex CNB Chairman
N K Ranath and others for improperly assisting the CNB CanLife
India Insurance Company before the Lucknow bench of the
Allahabad High Court (INVC 2014). Ranath was asked to leave
before attaining superannuation (retirement) age and lost his
candidature for the post of deputy governor of the RBI.
Such discrepancies in the PSBs have been brought to public
notice by unions. This shows the role of unions in bringing out
organisational inefficiencies, particularly in this case of a
flawed business model and the training model. Despite their
collective strength, corrective measures are taken after a long
time and a complete implementation remains questionable. In
entities where unions are absent, such phenomena would not
even come to light.
The merits of collective action are undermined as group cooperation is relegated to self-interested behaviour of individuals
(Olson 1965). Cooperation is more when there are well defined
rules, punishment for deviators, forum for discussions and a
robust conflict resolution mechanism. Yet, heterogeneity in
a group may hamper the collective action problem-solving
process (Bandiera and Rasul 2005) unless there are safeguards in the system to regulate hazards that emanate from
narrow group interests.
4.3 Unions and Women

Traditionally, women and men in India have had distinct roles


in the labour market. Hitherto, circumventing gender issues
may have resulted in underutilisation of workers potential
and alienation (Bronfenbrenner and Warren 2007); thus compromising group interests. The following theme elucidates
how union activism has been compromised over gender issues.
Indu Matkar was the president of the All India ABCD Employees
Union since 1980 in the ABCD International Corporation Bank,
a very old foreign bank operating in India. Not much is known
about the inhumane working conditions of their directly outsourced staff working at a unit in Goregaon, Mumbai. The
mutual fund business was suddenly closed down and the jobs
of almost 300 officers were terminated, with just one months
salary. Political intervention and the unions helped these
officers receive more compensation.
Matkar was a highly qualified person and the management
sought her help in many employee matters, but her strong
stand against many of their proposals set her at loggerheads
with them. She had signed a settlement with the bank whereby
clerical work could be undertaken by officers only in an
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emergency, for which prior approval was required from the


union. Under this settlement, clerical IDs were different, so the
use of these IDs would amount to committing a fraud. Hence,
officerisation of work became difficult. Matkar won four
cases against bank employees and emerged as a strong power
centre. The plan to transfer the office at Churchgate, Mumbai,
to Kharghar, Navi Mumbai, in 2004 was resisted and cancelled. It
would have only raised the commutation cost and involved a
longer travelling time, with no compromises on the percentage of Provident Fund. She also objected to the outsourcing of
printing jobs and hiring of cabs that the bank had given to
companies owned by bank employees, against their own policy. The management was upset with her for opposing them on
several issues and tried to get rid of her. She was offered the
voluntary retirement scheme, but in vain. They then wanted to
promote her to an officers post to stop her active participation
in union activities. Matkar was still a clerk at the time. Her
union was registered with the registrar of trade unions and
was protected under the IDA. If she had accepted the promotion, she would have to relinquish her active role in the union
and refused the promotion offer as well.
These failures goaded the bank into adopting unfair means
to oust her. They first attempted character assault by linking
her name to a colleagues and distributed pamphlets to defame
her. When she resisted, they accused her of misappropriation
of funds based on an allegation. Rumours based on this were
spread worldwide in all ABCD branches. Matkar managed to
get a cyber crime report with the name of the bank employee
who had spread the rumours and even managed to explain
the doubtful entries in her account. The bank had to reluctantly and covertly drop all charges on the pretext that
the complainant had failed to appear for the proceedings,16
which was not even mentioned in the cyber crime report. The
bank finally managed to dismiss her in September 2013 on
unfair grounds.
Matkar had accumulated leave of more than 200 days and
forwarded her application to the HR department, which was
conveniently misplaced. On her return, she was arbitrarily
denied leave on reapplication.
When Matkar had started work in 1980, the malefemale
ratio of the union members was around 10:90. All women had
voted for her. To oust her the management resorted to gradually creating a gender bias and promoted a campaign against
female leadership.17 The men would not vote for her and the
women were also encouraged not to vote for her. So, the male
female ratio which stood as 50:50 in 2012 became very important for Indu. The management immediately capitalised on
this situation.
There were two camps within the ABCD Bank Union, one of
which comprised the RLS members, with political support.
Matkar did not belong to this camp, but her treasurer was an
RLS member. Because he had not settled some accounts, he
was charged with misappropriation of funds. Also, mails
bet ween this faction of union members and the HR manager
proved that the union members were conniving with the
management. Informally, their leader told her to resign. The
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management had cancelled the unions registration, which she


managed to get back.
On one occasion, 22 women employees refused to attend
the union meeting because Matkar was absent. Their male
counterparts verbally abused these women and an officer
who witnessed this asked these women to file a complaint.
Later they were coerced to give in writing that nothing had
happened and the officer who was the witness was transferred on promotion.
Matkars supporters were threatened and had to withdraw.
The management was obviously looking for a puppet union
and was willing to encourage individuals who would help
them achieve this. Some union members preferred to put their
personal interests over the group interests and obtained numerous benefits in return for helping the management. The bank
elected preferred union office-bearers who renounced many
previous settlements that had favoured the workers. However,
Matkar was obstinate and fought vehemently, supported by a
male office-bearer at all times. She had to abruptly end her
activism when this man refused to help her further. Apparently,
he too had been threatened by the management and his
services were terminated.
Almost all women who hold key positions in a union are subjected to various forms of sexual harassment and defamation
threats to intimidate them. If they do not take the hints they
have to face other false allegations. It is ironical that union
members themselves connive with the management to harass
and victimise women. Women who have survived this have
always had some godfather favouring them. Lack of this support renders women helpless and in turn also renders the
unions ineffective.
The work culture and policies are very male-oriented. For
example, banks prefer their employees to work late hours. This
is easier for men than for the women; in fact, some men actually prefer this. Also, it is believed that women do not need
residential accommodation because they depend on their
husbands, and are therefore not given any consideration.
The key to survival for the women is therefore not to succumb to character assassination attempts and to some extent
be politically correct. Women have to adhere to norms, and
require social support and godfathers. Thus, they cannot function as aggressive trade union leaders, which is what is generally required. This is illustrated by the case of Madhumati who
was a foreign bank employee for more than 25 years but not
involved in union activity. Employees in her bank had to work
extended work hours without any compensation. She was
tipped off by Latika, a union office-bearer that the union presidents eldest child had recently got employment in the bank
and that he was seeking bank employment for his second child
as well. This meant further compromises on behalf of the
union without any explanations. Madhumati decided to stand
up against the presidents 38-year-old leadership, despite facing threats. She won the union elections in October 2009 to
serve a five-year term. Madhumati had to re-register the union,
because the registration was cancelled due to negligence.
Despite her victory, she was not given any union documents,
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but for a union account of approximately `1 lakh. Thus, an


account of the union history was lost forever. She fought for
the betterment of the members and even broke the old tradition that disallowed the union office bearers to indulge in any
bank work. All this was possible only because of her determination and righteous aggression.
The fact that a woman can hold a powerful position proved
unsettling for many of the male members. The union officebearers often hear scornful comments like baaykaanchi union
(womens union) or haldi kumkum suru aahe (ladies function
is going on). The management did not fail to see the gender
divide and tried to suppress the aggressiveness of the union,
which is relatively new. In this case despite the lack of support
from the management, Madhumati won the 2014 elections
and is at constant loggerheads with the management as she
refuses to be manipulated. She has been able to run her office
and manage the unionmanagement interface without much
turbulence as a senior board member takes cognisance of
workers opinions and issues. Unfortunately, he is about to
retire; Madhumati suspects that the management will take a
very tough stand against her to reinstate their puppet candidate after his retirement.
Off-work socialisation also has an effect on the gender divide
at the workplace. Most women are teetotallers and are unable to
mingle with men who generally tend to indulge in social drinking, etc. This has a considerable bearing at work as their absence
from off-work socialisation events results in women building
weaker interpersonal relationships as opposed to the men.
Ironically, a woman who takes an ethical and aggressive
lead to favour union members is thwarted by the union members themselves. This is frustrating and discourages any
prospects of her leadership.
Gender-based alienation has proven to be an impediment to
union activism. Unfortunately, it is not limited to women. The
Indian social fabric has caste-based heterogeneity which gives
rise to inequalities between union members. Certain groups,
members belonging to the upper castes, for example, due to
historic and sociological reasons, seem to have more power
than the others. In the process, they alienate the others and
inequality follows despite of commonality of interests (Banerjee,
Iyer, and Somanathan 2007; Bardhan, Mitra, Mookherjee, and
Sarkar 2008).
4.4 Employee Collectives and Socially Vulnerable Groups

Taking cues from Olson (1971), we may consider employee collectives as inclusive groups within which there exist exclusive
groups who try to maximise their benefits by alienating others. But, this is the reverse of the strategies propounded for
successful organising; on the lines of representation and participation of members (Bronfenbrenner and Warren 2007). In
this theme, the caste based rift within and in between the
Indian banking trade unions and other employee collectives;
as well as how the divide serves as an impediment to collective
good, is highlighted.
In 1995, Kanha Gedam joined the Collective Bank (an old
PSB) as a clerk and participated actively in the trade union
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movement. He was also the joint secretary of the Maharashtra


state level trade union apex body for four years. He sacrificed
his promotions for two decades to continue to be an active
trade unionist. He was a member of a Scheduled Caste (SC)
and tried to vainly pursue the interests of socially vulnerable
groups (SVGs) through the union. Because the trade unions
had not been conducive to caste-based issues and their movement, he left the movement and joined the SCST Welfare
Association of Collective Bank in 1995.
Caste-based reservation or affirmative action in PSBs is undertaken as per the Brochure on Reservation for Scheduled
Caste (SC), Scheduled Tribe (ST) and Other Backward Classes
(OBC) in Services by the Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, Department of Personnel and Training
(DoPT), Government of India (GoI), with the objective of
employing and empowering people from the SVGs. Public employment bestows status, power and means of livelihood.
Formal reservation in recruitments was first introduced in
August 1943, followed by reservation in promotions in 1957.
Articles 16 and 335 of the Constitution have a direct bearing
on reservation. Article 16(4A) came into force in 1995 vide
Constitution (Seventy Seventh Amendment) Act, 1995, to
enable the government to provide reservation in promotions
for the SC and Scheduled Tribes (ST). This is however subject
to the provision of compelling reasons: backwardness, inadequacy of representation and overall administrative efficiency.
The National Commission for Scheduled Castes provides for
other concessions such as age, place of transfer near the
native place and travelling allowance. The percentage of
reservation for recruitment and for promotions has been
revised periodically (Table 1).
Table 1: Reservation for Socially Vulnerable Groups in Public Sector Firms
Method

Recruitment on all India basis


(a) Open competition
(b) Other than open competition
Promotions

% for SC

% for ST

% for SEBC*
(wef 1993)

15

7 1/2

27

16 2/3

7 1/2

26 5/6

15

7 1/2

Nil

Recruitment to groups C & D in accordance with state population.


*Socially and educationally backward classes (SEBC).
Source: Brochure on Reservation for SC, ST and Other Backward Classes in Services given
by the Ministry of Personnel, DOPT, GoI.

Every PSB is supposed to have a chief liaison officer who


prepares and submits the annual review of implementation of
reservation policy. However, a senior manager claims that the
data are different from what is actually reported.
Primary data suggest that the provisioning and monitoring
of reservation entail a difficult administrative process. In
addition, there are cultural issues. For example, people with
the surname Patil in Maharashtra claim a dual status. For
seeking family alliances, they claim to be Shannav Kuli (96)
(for example, a very high status caste), whereas for employment, they claim to be Kunbi (that is, a backward caste).
Although unions represent the collective interests of employees, they have sidelined the issues of the SVGs. It is seen
that even unions do not consider SVGs as a part of their membership and act accordingly.
75

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In the mid-1970s, the SCs who were first inducted in PSBs


were the cream of their group with some academic attainment. Again, primary sources of data indicate that discrimination was prevalent even within reservation. To illustrate this,
workers had various cadres and job codes, two of which are
clerks and substaff. The latter includes peons and cleaners
(safai karmchari). Within the clerical cadre, there were initially
16 job codes. Even today the jobs with the worst opportunities
are assigned to the SVGs; these include scavenging jobs18
(cleaning and front desks) and vouching (clerical jobs).
In the class struggle, the unionists disregard the SVGs. In
one PSB, the inspecting officers are mostly from the SVGs as the
work entails continuous travelling and there are no other takers for the job. However, in the invigilation department, no
worker is from the SVGs. The president of the SC/ST welfare
association of the bank alleges that this is the department
wherein all disciplinary action is initiated and punitive action
is often initiated vengefully against members of the SVGs.
There is huge fragmentation and bias within the SVG movement: the Socially and Educationally Backward Classes
(SEBCs) regard themselves to be higher up in the caste hierarchy than the SCs and STs. In 1995, when reservation in recruitment was implemented for the OBCs, the SC/ST associations
made a vain attempt to include themselves. In banks, members of the SVGs have to eat separately and are not allowed to
touch common drinking vessels. Unions have mostly opposed
such practices, by admonishing such physical seclusion. An
activist points out, ...they have never addressed our core
issues.... Despite many organisations representing the SVGs in
banks and the measures taken by the Department of Financial
Services, which also involve the IBA, the SVGs continue to
suffer this kind of humiliation.
In all the PSBs, reservations in recruitment are mandatory,
but promotions are based on seniority cum fitness. However,
it cannot be disregarded that even in the PSBs although reservation was applicable since 1969, it was only implemented in
197576 when many SCST employee welfare associations
were formed19 and struggled to have it recognised. This was
when the backlogs (with respect to reservation) were also
cleared. With the recent changes in market situations, the
PSBs are increasing their proportion of selection/merit/performance-based promotions. Thus, the quantum of assured
promotions has reduced. Data clearly indicate glass ceilings
for being responsible for the decline in the number of SVGs as
we go up the corporate hierarchy. This highlights the need for
reservations. In the PSBs, there are concessions and relaxations for the SCs and STs in selection-based promotions, but no
reservations.
Social sanctions segregate the SVGs from the others in positions dominated by the upper castes. In 1975, Kanha Gedam
was asked to eat at a separate table. The union supported him
and reprimanded his tormentors. Much later, a woman colleague who got promoted from the clerical cadre to a Scale 120
officer was transferred to another branch. She often told
Gedam that she faced difficulties at the workplace. Coincidentally, Gedam was also transferred to her branch. One day, she
76

ordered a meat biryani despite being apprehensive about


triggering the wrath of her upper-caste colleagues.21 Later,
they discovered that their colleagues also consumed nonvegetarian food!
These incidents may seem trivial but they make a big difference in an individuals day-to-day life. In the light of such discouraging social sanctions, the upward mobility of the SVGs
becomes doubtful though it is imperative.
In the Collective Bank, a writ petition (No 847) was filed
asking for reservation in selection/merit-based promotions. In
1990, the Supreme Court ruled that although the promotions
were based on selection, the process gave 80% to 90% weightage to seniority and hence, this implies reservation. The management made vain attempts to seek a clarification of the ruling. The Court rejected all their pleas and admonished them
saying that it was ridiculous that a nationalised bank did not
know how to accommodate reservations.
In line with the Court verdict, there were some large-scale
promotions of members of the SVGs, thanks to the joint efforts
of the SCST associations from five PSBs. As an aftermath, the
management of the Collective Bank withheld promotions for
four years. This irked the people from the non-reserved category and has generally affected all employees, in turn creating
a serious employee relationship problem.22
Such informal inhibitive constraints within a formal organisation limit progressive economic action (Nee 1998) instead of
providing a framework for trust and collective action.
5 Discussion

The case of the XDB bank is unique in that the management


could have easily gone ahead and dismissed all employees and
handed over their banking licence in India. All employees
stand to gain from union action. This is in line with the claims
of the unionists that unions also provide employment security
(Freeman and Medoff 1984). It is to be noted here that the
employees organised themselves at a point where they had
nothing more to lose. In cases of other banks, the employees
have much at stake. This includes punitive actions such as
relocation to the most undesired locations, demotions or even
joblessness. The biggest cost is in the form of social implications.
Thus, any effort towards expansion of the existing unions is
nipped in the bud. Another way of looking at this from a Marxian reference is that the friction between the management and
the employees in ongoing concerns within the Indian banking
industry has not reached the point where they would be driven
to organise themselves. Yet the benefits of the trade union
have been derived by the employees of the XDB bank.
Cross-selling in banks highlights the role played by unions
in bringing out organisational inefficiencies in the layout and
efficacy of the training programmes, compliance failures,
managerial indiscretion and issues in customer relationships.
These are serious governance issues in highly regulated and
sensitive industries, like banking,23 which conforms to claims
of Kaufman (2010, 2006) and others that it is less probable that
governance of capitalist firms would be efficient, fair or
democratic. The most important aspect highlighted by the
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unions is direct implication on the financial performance of


the banks. This clearly indicates that unions contribute towards long-term financial performance of banks by ensuring
improved governance and highlighting scandals before crises.
This is also important for the unions as financial performance
is linked ultimately to wages. This is in conformance with theories suggesting that unions can contribute positively to profits
(Tzannatos and Aidt 2006).
The remaining two themes point out the inefficiencies
within the Indian bank unions; the bureaucratic manner of
functioning, their aversion to alternative forms of collective
action and the gender- and caste-based discrimination meted
out to their own members. This is in agreement with the
findings of Olson (1971) that group interests are not pursued by
the rational, self-interested individuals in large groups. Also,
there is a thin line evidently between a union that cooperates
with the management and a puppet union. Further, the managements union-aversion and the way they take advantage of
inefficiencies in the functioning of the union become evident.
This shows that there is an urgent need for unions to look at
measures like an immediate shift towards democratic functioning and support for alternative participative structures.
Today, Indian banks, especially the PSBs, are in need of major
restructuring, which is underway in the form of consolidation
Notes
1 Ely (1886) wrote the first pro-industrial relations book in America titled The Labor Movement in America...Ely asserted that Labor organizations are often a benefit to the economy
because they balance what is otherwise a onesided determination of the price and conditions
of labour....[and] the almost unlimited control of
the employer over...his employees (Kaufman
2010: 78).
2 Coined first by Sydney and Beatrice Webb in
their book on cooperative movement and further enlarged in Industrial DemocracyA
study of trade unionism in 1987; collective
bargaining can be defined as a process of negotiation between the management and the employees of terms and conditions of service and
the establishment of peaceful, orderly relationships at the workplace through mutual settlement of differences and the cooperation of all
those engaged in the enterprise (Sur 1965).
3 Keith Hart proposed the dualist theory of informal employment in 1973 during the Kenya mission when the informal sector was discovered. This was in reference to unskilled workers who could not find wage employment. Subsequently, this was rejected as the informal
sector prevailed as opposed to this theory. It
was replaced by the structuralist theory of Castells & Portes among others and the legalist
theory of Hernando de Soto. As per the definition of the informal employment (endorsed by
the International Labour ConferenceILC in
2002 and the International Conference of Labour StatisticiansICLS in 2003), it refers to
employment without legal and social protectionboth inside and outside the informal sectorfor unincorporated small and/or unregistered enterprises (Chen, Vanek and Heintz
2006; Bhowmik 2009; Bhirdikar, Paul and
Murthy 2011; Chen 2012).
4 Functional flexibility in the service sector is
achieved by multi-skilling, numerical flexibility by outsourcing, wage flexibility by shifting
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and rapid changes in their business model. This eventually


leads to creative destruction and a group of unsettled losers
who would look for relief through the political route (Rajan
and Zingales 2014a: 2). Also, there is historical evidence that
the burden of adjustments is borne by the workers themselves
(Eichengreen 2008a: 43, 2008b: 30). There have been cases
wherein employees have resorted to extreme measures as a
response to physical and psychological stress requiring counseling. Hence, restructuring can be brought about better with
social dialogue and by involving workers and employees
as it would contain the negative social consequence. Further,
improved corporate governance benefits everyone (Rajan and
Zingales 2014b). Because of its complementary nature as far as
trade unions are concerned (Hopner 2005) and the role of
trade unions in extending the tenets of corporate governance
to all stakeholders (Bridgen and Naczyk 2014), unions cannot
be sidelined. In Indian banks, the participative process is in
place, with employee representatives as members of the board
of directors. But trade unions can be effective only when the
unions put in substantial effort in overcoming their own faults
and support alternate forms of employee participation and collectives. Also, these unions have to ensure that informal workers are also enrolled and that new banks that have been established post 1991 also participate.

from a higher component of fi xed pay to incentive-based pay (in the BFSI sector, the proportion of fixed to variable component of pay is
60:40) and temporal flexibility through a higher number of working hours. Numerical flexibility is exercised through mechanisms such as
outsourcing of work defined as non-core activities or unskilled repetitive work is prevalent in
the banking sector since 2004 when the
Reserve Bank of India issued permission and
guidelines for the same. Functional flexibility
is positively co-related with the firm performance, but numerical flexibility has a negative
impact on performance (Arvanitis 2005: 997).
The skill-bias hypothesis states that a more
rapid pace of technological change in a sector
generates a greater demand for education and
training of the sectoral workforce (Mincer
1996).
Retention cost is the sum total of many expenses like training and skill upgradation, annual
increments and promotions, financing long
leaves like sabbaticals, maternity leave in case
of women (there is a verbal understanding that
it would not be claimed before the expiry of a
certain period after joining; generally two
years), statutory social security benefits (for
examplegratuity, which has to be given to an
employee if he/she has served for more than
five years), etc.
Here new banks implies banks established
after 1991the time of the issue of fresh bank
licences. Accordingly, Old banks implies
banks established before 1966the time of the
first industrywide bipartite settlement. No banks
were established between 1966 and 1991.
The consolidated figures for all nationalised
banks reflect that there was only one woman in
Scale VIII and Scale IX put together and mere
175 women were heads of functional departments (Treasury, Risk Management, etc). Assessing the percentage of women for different
cadres, we understand that it is highest for
clerks (29%). In the officers category, the percentage of women is highest for Scale I (20%)

vol lI no 16

10

11

12

which tapers to 5% as we go up to Scale III. For


Scales IVVII, it hovers around 5%. In government-owned banks, pay-scales of officers are
designated as Scale I, Scale II till Scale IX or
Grade A, Grade B till Grade F, Scale I and Grade
A being junior-most respectively.
Ninety-one per cent of the employees of the
State Bank of India are members of the State
Bank of India Staff Association, which got affiliated to the National Confederation of Bank
Employees (NCBE) after its formation in 1977.
The AITUC, first labour organisation in India, was
founded in 1925 by the CPI and the Congress
(Avadhi). Shaheed Bhagat Singh was one of the
founding members. It was largely due to his
efforts that the Trade Union Act, 1926 was passed.
The constituents of the UFBU are All India
Bank Employees Association (AIBEA), National Confederation of Bank Employees (NCBE),
Indian National Bank Employees Federation
(INBEF), Bank Employees Federation of India
(BEFI), National Organisation of Bank Workers
(NOBW), Bank Karmachari Sena Mahasangh
(BKSM), National Union of Bank Employees
(NUBE), All India Bank Officers Association
(AIBOA), All India Bank Officers Confederation (AIBOC), Indian National Bank Officers
Congress (INBOC) and National Organization
of Bank Officers (NOBO).
Union strength may have two measures viz

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oneunion density as understood by OECD,
that is, the percentage of union members in the
wage/salaried workforce. Twounion influence on socio-economic issues like inequality,
inflation and unemployment. The Indian union
movement is not strong on both counts with
union density at 1% and having had no pro-labour influnce on socio-economic factors like
informalisation, privatisation, etc.
13 Triangulating data sourcesa means for
seeking convergence across qualitative and
quantitative methodswas born (Jick 1979).
By the early 1990s, the idea of mixing moved
from seeking convergence to actually integrating or connecting the quantitative and
qualitative data (Creswell 2009: 14).
Triangulation in qualitative research assumes
that if two or more sources of data, theoretical
frameworks, types of data collected or researchers converge on the same conclusion,
then the conclusion is more credible. Put another way, findings may be judged valid when
different and contrasting methods of data collection yield identical findings on the same research subjects; a case of replication within the
same setting. The concept of triangulation
emerged within realist paradigms that aimed
to rid research of subjective bias. The concept
assumes a single reality (or point on the map)
to be known (Tracy 2010: 843).
...qualitative research is inherently multimethod in focus. In its original forms, triangulation referred only to the use of multiple forms
of qualitative research methods, not the combination of quantitative and qualitative methods.... The use of multiple methods, or triangulation, reflects an attempt to secure an in-depth
understanding of the phenomenon in question.... Triangulation is not a tool or a strategy

14

15

16

17

of validation but an alternative to validation...


(Denzin 2012: 82).
A polycentric system exists when multiple
public and private organisations at multiple
scales jointly affect collective benefits and
costs (Ostrom 2012).
CASA refers to the current account and savings
account balances. These are the low-cost building blocks for bank credit.
Series of emails with respect to Indus misappropriation of funds case are on record. Apparently, attempts were being made to frame
her. These mails are accompanied by a cyber
crime report quoting the name of the ABCD
Bank employee who had posed as the complainant.
(1) Mail dated 6 March 2012 from the HR Manager to the ABCD Bank Union Secretary.
...Allegations have been made against the
Western Region Union....We have held earlier
that such matters are internal to the federation....the complainant has also alleged that
the management is party to such wrong
doings....
(2) Mail Dated 5 December 2012 from the HR
Manager to Indu.
...On 25 December 2012, it was conveyed to
you...that the management is not proceeding
with the said inquiry, owing to the failure of
the complainant to appear before the committee....
Some confidants would tell Indu and her supporters what management representatives
were talking with the male workmen...tu kya
us aurat ke neeche kaam karega?.... (Are you
going to work under that woman?) or haldi
kumkum suru aahe(ladies function is going
on) for ongoing union meetings. There was
an incident when 15 women refused to attend

union elections in Indus absence. A male counterpart, also a management favourite; hurled a
volley of abuses on them. The women filed a
written complaint against this man. An officer
had witnessed the incident and recounted the
same to the management. The management immediately got this witness transferred to another city on an increment. In the absence of
the witness, the women were asked not only to
withdraw their complaint but to give in writing
that no such incident had taken place. This
critically assesses managements anti-labour
and anti-women practices.
18 Scavenging here implies cleaning urine pots
and wash basins. In India, this job is done only
by SCs and STs. On record, there are internal
agreements between banks and unions to provide wages for such work on a minimal piece
rate basis. In many bank branches, a couple of
generations have continued in the same trade
with no upward, social or economic mobility.
19 These welfare associations were motivated
by the Dalit Panther movement initiated by
writer and human rights activist, Namdeo
Dhasal. In turn, this movement was inspired
by the Black Panther, Afro-American movement in the United States. Raja Dhale and
Arun Kamble were other prominent Dalit
Panther leaders. This movement comprised
young SC men. Dalit Panther was regarded
close to a revolution as it was different from
the previous dalit movements and was hard
lined and aggressive. But the movement began to fragment in the early 1980s on idelogical and political lines, and hence could not be
widened.
20 Pay scales of officers in PSBs are given in slabs
designated as Scale I (junior-most) to Scale VII
(senior-most), beyond scale VII are executives.

Money, Banking & Finance


March 19, 2016
Introduction

Saibal Ghosh, Partha Ray

CONTEMPORARY ISSUES

Monetary Policy Dilemmas at the Current Juncture


The Changing Face of Indian Banking

Alok Sheel
T T Ram Mohan

SOME ANALYTICAL ISSUES ON MONEY

Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium Modelling: A Sisyphean Toil?


The New Keynesian Paradigm of Monetary Policy: A Theoretical Critique
Financial Reforms in an Endogenous Money Economy: The Case of India

Dilip M Nachane
Rohit Azad
Vineet Kohli

CHALLENGES TO MONETARY POLICY

Calm before the Storm?: Indias Relative Stability amidst Emerging Market Turmoil
Capital Account Management in India

Parthapratim Pal
Abhijit Sen Gupta, Rajeswari Sengupta

ISSUES IN BANKING

Procyclical Credit Growth and Bank NPAs in India


Do Foreign Banks in India Indulge in Cream Skimming?
Furthering the Financial Inclusion Agenda in India: How Important Is Gender?

Amaresh Samantaraya
Mandira Sarma, Anjali Prashad
Saibal Ghosh, D Vinod

ISSUES IN FINANCIAL MARKETS

FII Trading Activity and Intraday Volatility


Indian Exchange Traded Funds: Relationship with Underlying Indices

V Ravi Anshuman, Rajesh Chakrabarti, K Kiran Kumar


Vinodh Madhavan, S Maheswaran

For copies write to: Circulation Manager,


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email: circulation@epw.in
78

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SPECIAL ARTICLE
21 Upper castes in India are predominantly vegetarians, and even if they consume non-vegetarian food, it is not common knowledge, mainly
because of religious reasons.
22 There have been countrywide developments
on reservation in selection-based promotions.
In 1992, the Supreme Court held that reservations in promotions were unconstitutional, in
the case of Indira Sawhney v Union of India. In
1995, Article 16(4A) was inserted in the Constitution, which limited reservation in promotion
to the subjective view of the state on adequacy
of representation. In 2006, the Supreme Court
upheld the constitutional validity of the
amendment vide the case of M Nagraj v Union
of India subjected to the following:
(i) Backwardness of the SCST group
(ii) Inadequacy of representation and
(iii) Efficiency of administration.
In 2012, the central government introduced a
bill to declare that all SC and ST groups notified
in the Constitution shall be deemed to be backward. The provision of this bill also overrides the
parameter of efficiency in administration. As of
February 2015, this bill (177th amendment to the
Constitution) has been passed in the Rajya Sabha and awaits approval in the Lok Sabha.
23 In times of crises, the entities of the finance
industry plummet faster as compared to those
in other corporates as their value creation and
value destruction are much more rapid (Rajan
and Zingales, The Dark Side of Finance, 2014,
p 94). Also, it is well known that banks are vital
in any economy.

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Tracing the Emergence and Consolidation


of Hindutva in Assam
Malini Bhattacharjee

While the Bharatiya Janata Partys political experiment


in making inroads into Assam over the past decade has
been discussed at length, surprisingly little attention has
been devoted towards understanding the contribution
of the social and cultural wings of Sangh Parivar in
deepening the roots of Hindutva in the state. This
analysis becomes important primarily because Assam
(like her other north-eastern sister states) does not
provide a particularly fertile territory for the growth of
Hindutva, an ideology which finds a natural point of
entry in the Hindi heartland states, with its invocation
of Ram Mandir, cow protection or the propagation of
Hindi and Sanskrit languages. Given the complexity of
the demography of this region that consists of a
mlange of races, ethnicities, faiths, customs and
cultures, and the multiplicity of issues, it becomes
extremely difficult for an ideology riding on religious
nationalism to identify common ground that enables it
to make a dent in the region. This essay makes an
attempt to understand how Hindu nationalism
navigated through this difficult terrain to establish itself
both institutionally and ideologically at the social and
cultural realm in Assam.

n August last year, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh


(RSS) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) commemorated
Assams medieval saint Srimanta Sankardev at a function
in Delhi University. The popular press took notice of the event
(Rashid 2015; Devi 2015), which was marked by the launch of a
reprint of the book, Mahakavi Sankar Dev: Vicharak Evam
Samaj Sudharak by RSSBJP activists. Analysts termed this as
an appropriation of Sankardev for electoral gains in the Assam
elections (Raman and Sharma Sebastian 2015). Electoral
strategies aside, it is important to recognise that the Sangh
Parivar has, since the past 60 years or so, been working
assiduously towards establishing a base in the social and the
cultural realm in Assam. While the BJPs political experiment
in making inroads into Assam since the past decade has
been discussed at length (Prabhakara 1996; Goswami 2001; Goswami and Tripathi 2015), there has surprisingly been little attention towards understanding the contribution of the social
and cultural wings of its parivar in deepening the roots of
Hindutva in Assam. This essay makes an attempt to explore
the cultural and political appeal of Hindu nationalism in
contemporary Assam by tracing the genesis of the parivar in
the state.
This analysis assumes importance primarily because Assam
(like her other north-eastern sister states) does not provide a
particularly fertile territory for the growth of Hindutva, an
ideology which finds a natural point of entry in the Hindi
heartland states with its invocation of Ram Mandir, cow
protection or the propagation of Hindi and Sanskrit languages.
Assams complex demographya mlange of races, ethnicities,
faiths, customs and culturesand a multiplicity of issues
make it extremely difficult for an ideology riding on religious
nationalism to gain a foothold in the state. It therefore becomes
even more important to understand how Hindu nationalism
navigates through this difficult terrain to establish itself in the
cultural and political realms.
Diversities and Issues of Identity

Malini Bhattacharjee (malini@apu.edu.in) is a senior lecturer at Azim


Premji University, Bengaluru.

80

What it means to be a Hindu varies from region to region. So


local histories, myths and idioms often become vehicles for
Hindutva to promote and entrench itself. Since early times, the
region we now identify as Assam was witness to several racial,
cultural and political influences which significantly affected
ideas of identity and selfhood of its inhabitants. Moreover,
colonial categorisations and the continuous reorganisation of
the political boundaries of the state also gave birth to multiple
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identity projects. These continue to dominate the politics of


the region till date. Pachuau (nd) notes that geographically and
racially, Indias north-eastern region lies between the traditions of the Indic Asia and the Mongoloid Asia. She argues
that this condition of in-between-ness is an important reason
behind the crisis of identity in the region. Most north-easterners
therefore, according to Pachuau, are caught between the racial
cultural definition and the politico-administrative definition
of their identity. Ideologues of Hindutva intelligently makes
use of the opportunity to construct an identity for the Assamese,
the mission being to define a connection between Assam and
Bharat, since the ancient times. They selectively highlight
references to Assam in a variety of Vedic, Puranic and epic
texts to impart a strong Hindu identity to Assam.
Hinduism in Assam

Hinduism, also known as Aryan intrusion,1 is said to have


made an entry in the Brahmaputra Valley as early as one or
two centuries before Christ (Mosahary 1989: 165). Archaeological evidences show that the Saiva cult developed in the
early centuries of the Christian era (Choudhury 1999: 125).
Immigrant Brahmins from north India are said to have played
missionary roles in popularising Hindu religion and culture in
this region under active patronage from Bhaskaravarman, the
king of Kamarupa (Singh 1987: 25960). It was under their influence that the RamayanaMahabharata tradition gained popularity in this region. Several tribal groups such as the Bodos also
began worshipping Siva regarding him as Bathau, Bathau-brai
or Bathau-siv-rai (Choudhury 1999: 121).
However, Hinduisms entry in Assam was staggered with
several cults gaining popularity in different periods. Between
the end of the third century and the first part of the fourth
century AD, Vaishnavism also made an entry. The earliest
recorded reference to the worship of Vishnu in Kamarupa, occurs
in the Badaganaga Rock inscription (554 AD) (Barua 1986: 169).
The third major sect of Hinduism that flourished in the region,
particularly from the medieval period till the 18th century,
was Saktism. It manifested in the cult of Goddess Kamakhya;
her temple at Nilachal in Guwahati, considered one of the Sakti
Pithas, occupies a prominent place in the early history not just
of Assam but also of eastern India. The Kamakhya temple is
one of the most famous shrines of the sect, and the worship of
the goddess is accompanied by various rites, mantras, mudras
and sacrifices (Barua 1986: 167).
Hinduisation of the region reached its peak during the 16th
century under the patronage of the Ahoms, who ruled Assam
from 13th century to the 18th century. The adoption of Hinduism by the Ahom kings and the active patronage it received during the 17th century under the rule of Rudra Singha and Siva
Singha accelerated the assimilation of many tribes into the
Hindu fold. This eventually led to the imagination of a composite Assamese identity that consisted of both caste- Hindus and
the plain-tribals. The Ahom rulers adopted several Vedic rites
and rituals, including the coronation ceremony and the
Asvamedha or horse sacrifice. They actively encouraged
people in their kingdom to embrace Hinduism, and adopted
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Assamese as the official language instead of their native


Tai language.
For an organisation such as the RSS that rides on religious
nationalism, the prevalence of these diverse Hindu traditions
from the ancient period in Assam provides a tailor-made
ground to claim the antiquity of Hinduism in the region.
Further, the mention of Pragjyotisha and Kamarupa, the ancient
and medieval names of Assam in several Sanskritic texts such
as the Ramayana, Mahabharata and the Puranas, facilitates
the ideologues of Hindutva to argue that Assam was essentially a Hindu province and was well-connected to the rest of
Hindusthan. They also draw on mythology to trace a link to
Rukmini, the wife of Lord Krishna, a princess who supposedly
hailed from present-day Arunachal Pradesh. Attention is
drawn to the Vedic custom of Indra worship as manifested in
the Indradhvaja, which still survives in Assam in the popular
festival of Bhatheli. The practice of sacrificing an animal by
strangling it on the Siva caturdasi day is also said to date to
Vedic times.2 The introduction of Sanskrit to this region, it is
argued, brought unity among the diverse tribes and races of
the province. Modern Assamese is said to have developed from
Sanskrit around the 10th century.
Emphasis is also laid on the famous Naraka legend. It is
believed that Naraka, the child of Mother Earth (Basumati)
and Vishnu, fought with the inhabitants of Kamarupa, killed
their king Ghataka and drove the vanquished Kiratas to the
region of goddess Dikkaravasini. Vishnu then installed Naraka
on the throne of Pragjyotisha and directed him to become a
devotee of Kamakhya. He is thus believed to be not only the
initiator of Saktism but also an important figure in the spread
of Aryan culture in the region.
The cult of Kamakhya is extremely popular in Assam to this
day and the projection of these myths and legends help the
consolidation of a Hindu identity. The RSS equates Kamakhya
worship in Assam with the worship of Sakti or Durga in the
Hindi heartland; it thus draws a link to show the commonality
of Hindu traditions between the North East and mainstream
Indian Hindu society. It may be mentioned here that during
the annual Ambubasi mela held every year, thousands of
sadhus and sanyasismany of them affiliated to the Vishva
Hindu Parishad (VHP)from different parts of India, gather in
Kamakhya. Seva Bharati, Purbanchal, the service wing of
the parivar, organises free healthcare camps during this
mela and also provides financial support to the Kamakhya
Sankara Health Care Centre (established in 1992) run under
the aegis of the Kamakhya Debuttar Board (Organiser 2008).
The centre offers free medical aid to sick pilgrims visiting
the temple.
It is important to note that the Aryan influence in Assam is
presented as a civilising factor by the Hindutva ideologues. An
alternative school of thought that challenges this theory argues
that the Hinduisation process was an invasion and did not
have any a reformist or civilisational impetus; the process led
to the extinction of the Tai religious traditions and system
of worship. Girin Phukon (1994: 17377) states that Ahoms
realised over time that their adherence to Hinduism was a
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fundamental cause of their downfall. Phukon writes that the


common Ahom people were placed at the lowest level of caste
hierarchy; they were deemed outcasteseven lower than the
Sudras. Moreover, a spurt of ethnopolitical movements by the
Bodos, Bodo Kacharis, Koch Rajbongshis and Tai Ahoms in
recent times bear testimony to the fact that the IndicSanskritic
culture is perceived as a forcible imposition. Romesh Buragohain
(1989: 177) also observes that Hinduisation de-tribalised
people from tribal groups, bringing distinct changes in their
socio-religious life.
Appropriating Sankardev

In contemporary times, the Sangh Parivar has actively sought


to appropriate Sankardev, a popular cultural icon in Assam.
Sankardev, who lived in the 15th and 16th centuries, led a
reformist neo-Vaishnavite movement, Ekasaraniya Nama
Dharma. The movement which began as an anti-Brahmanical
crusade, seeking to simplify Hinduism (Deka 2006: 194), saw
the setting up of monasteries, popularly known as sattras,
across Assam. These monasteries became religio-cultural centres
for conducting community prayers, providing religious discourses
and providing a platform for performance of devotional songs
(Bargeet), drama (Ankiya Naat) and shravanakirtanas. They
came to be associated with a distinct dance form, Sattriya.
These sattras evolved as centres of equality and syncretism as
their sheer simplicity drew people from all castes, religious
and tribal groups (Misra 1999: 99).
The Sangh Parivar has hitched into this popularity of the
medieval saint and liberally uses the Sankardev brand. The
Shishu Shiksha Samiti, RSSs primary education wing, which
was established in Assam in 1979, started its first school on
Sankardevs birth anniversary that year at Ambikagiri Nagar,
Guwahati; the school was named, Sankardev Shishu Kunja.
The name and the occasion were both carefully chosen to
attract a large number of Assamese students. The medium of
instruction being Assamese added to the schools popularity.
In Bengali-dominated regions however, like the Borak Valley
region for instance, the medium of instruction in the shishu
kunjas is Bengali, while in Bodo-dominated districts the medium
is Bodo. Many of the acharyas in these schools, who are swayamsevaks, though hailing from Maharashtra are fluent in local
languages. The curriculum in these schools is similar to that of
shishu mandirs run by the RSS across the country; Sanskrit literature, science, geography, Vedic mathematics and history find a
prominent place. In addition to the compulsory chanting of
Saraswati Vandana, Shanti path and Gayatri Mantra, a conscious attempt has also been made to incorporate the Sankardev ethos. Thus students are required to sing Borgeet, celebrate events to commemorate Sankardev and the portrait of
the medieval saint is placed alongside portraits of RSS
luminaries such as Golwalkar and Hedgewar and drawings
depicting Bharat Mata. There are 490 such schools across
Assam today that operate under the aegis of the Shishu Shiksha
Samiti in Assam.3
The Sankardev Sangha, an organisation of Vaishnav devotees
that rallies more than five lakh members in its annual conferences,
82

invites prominent leaders of the Sangh Parivar to participate in


their programmes (Gohain 2003). Members of the parivar
return the favour by inviting sattradhikaris (head priests) in
various Hindu sammelans (assemblies) that are periodically
organised by the VHP in pockets of Assam. These outfits
find common ground in making allegations about Muslim
immigration from Bangladesh and religious conversions by
Christians. A number of sattradhikaris are now recruited from
the VHP and they play an important role in imparting an aggressive Hindu tenor to these institutions. An Organiser report
(2006a), laments how Borduwa, the seat of Sankar Devs
Vaishnavism, is under siege due to systematic and designed
encroachment by Bangladeshis and therefore needs to be rescued. The report further extols the role of Sankardev in bringing several non-Aryan tribes under the fold of Hinduism.
It notes:
Many non-Aryans in Brahmaputra Valley gradually came into Vaishnav
circle of their own. Shankar Devs message went deep inside (sic)
tribals from the hills under threat from the Christian missionaries.
This brought out Narottam Ata, a Naga, Govinda Ata, a Garo, and
Bolai Ata, a Mikir, among others, who took up cudgels against
proselytisation and to protect their own faith and culture.

Sankardev is thus projected as a torchbearer of Hinduism


who successfully arrested Christian proselytisation amongst
tribal people. This distorted reading of Sankardevs practice is
indeed problematic as Ekasaraniya Nama Dharma was an emblem of syncretism that had embraced even the tenets of Islam.
Organisational Beginnings

Though the RSS was established in Nagpur in 1925, it took the


organisation more than 20 years to open its chapter in Assam.
The first shakha in the North East was established in Guwahati,
on the grounds of Shukreshwar temple, beside the Brahmaputra
River on 28 October 1946. According to the RSSs own account
(Borah 1995), it was the efforts of Keshav Dev Bawri, a young
Marwari4 businessman and owner of the Mahavir Byayam
Sangha (gymnasium) in Fancy bazaar that led to the establishment of the Sanghs activities in Assam. Bawri was a close
associate of Shankarlal Sharma, a member of the Mahavir
Byayam Sangha, who also had some understanding about the
RSS. Under Sharmas persuasion, Bawri wrote a letter to the
RSS leadership in Delhi, requesting them to set up base in
Assam. He received a favourable response from the Sangh and
on 27 October 1946, three experienced Maharashtrian RSS
pracharaks, Dadarao Parmarth, Vasant Rao Oak and Shri
Krishna Paranjpe, arrived in Guwahati. While Parmarth became
the prant (regional) pracharak of Assam, he deputed three of
his colleagues to Shillong, Silchar and Dibrugarh. A few other
pracharaks who arrived soon after were Bhau Mulkar, Dutta
Bandisht, Kulkarni, Sahasrabhojne and Manohar Gurjar. At
that time, Sylhet was a part of Assam, and Manohar Gurjar
was appointed the pracharak there.
The RSS, however, had a setback when it was banned after
the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi in 1948. The organisation
suffered immense negative propaganda from the popular
press and came to be viewed as anti-Muslim, violent and
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responsible for the murder of Gandhi. In December 1948, RSS


swayamsevaks across the country launched a nationwide satyagraha against the ban. Fifty-two activists from the Assam
unit took an active role in this; among these were, Keshav Deo
Baawri, Girish Kalita, Shankarlal Tiwari and Prafulla Kumar
Bora of Guwahati. Dadarao Parmarth was arrested and detained in the Shillong jail.5 In July 1949, after the ban was lifted,
Dadarao Parmarth left due to illness and was succeeded by
Dattopant Thengdi. Manohar Rao Harekar prant pracharak
of Bengal, also took care of Sanghs activities in Assam for a
while. Towards the end of November 1949, Thakur Ramsingh
of Punjab was appointed the prant pracharak of Assam. At that
time, Bengal, Assam and Orissa were under the kshetriya
pracharak head, Eknath Ranade.
Building Networks through Local Notables

It has been observed that the RSS typically makes entry into a
new region with the help of local notables (Jaffrelot 1996;
Kanungo 2003). In their attempt at spreading the influence of
Hindutva, the pracharaks took the help of several local Assamese
intellectuals and notables. One of them was Kamakhyaram
Barua, a judge of the Guwahati High Court. Another local
notable who actively supported the Sangh activities in its initial
days in Assam was Radhikamohan Goswami of Nowgown. He
became the editor of a local Assamese weekly bulletin, Aalok,
run by swayamsevaks. Similarly, Giridhar Sharma, a professor
and principal of Arya College Guwahati, introduced important
members of the RSS to the Assamese elite circle.6 Sharma was
later appointed as the prant sanghchalak in 1974.
The association with these Assamese notables helped the
swayamsevaks when it was struggling to gain a foothold.
Thakur Ramsingh, the prant pracharak, actively built liaisons
with the Assamese notables and Marwari businessmen and
toured extensively to set up new shakhas. He strategically
positioned an army of non-Assamese, mainly Maharashtrian,
pracharaks in different parts of the North East. Among these
pracharaks were Omprakash Trehan, Madhukar Limaye,
Madhavrao Mahedale, Pajhakar Wajhe, Sudhakar Deshpande,
Appa Kulkarni and Vinayak Limaye. Swayamsevaks of the
Assam unit regularly invited senior leaders such as Golwalkar
and organised public functions to propagate their ideology
and encourage new recruits.7
The Assam Earthquake, 1950

In July 1949, the ban on the RSS was lifted. It must be noted
here that as a matter of organisational strategy, M S Golwalkar, had sought to recast the organisation in a new mould
in response to the ban in 1948 and consciously tried to shed the
image of the RSS as an upper caste, communal movement
by prioritising seva (service). It was during this phase that the
RSS accelerated its humanitarian activities such as the provision of relief during disasters and provided targeted service to
marginalised groups such as women, tribals and Hindu lower
castes. Apart from consolidating these groups under the overarching Hindu identity, the seva activities of the Sangh affiliates performed (and continue to perform) specific political
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functions such as countering Christian proselytisation in tribal


areas and inculcating values of national awareness and character building amongst marginalisedsections of the Hindu
society through a system of parallel education.
From 1950 onwards, the organisation began active philanthropic work in different places of Assam. The work picked
up pace by 1960. The RSS made one of its initial breakthroughs in this region 1950 when a massive earthquake hit
upper Assam on 15 August, leading to immense loss of life
and property. The situation was worsened by heavy floods in
the Brahmaputra and its tributaries like the Dehang. The
Marwari Relief Society of Calcutta (a close associate of the
RSS) sent some workers for relief and the Assam branch of
the RSS organised the Assam Bhukamp Pidit Sahayta Samiti
(The Assam Earthquake Sufferers Relief Society) that distributed food, clothes and provided shelter to several victims of
the earthquake (Organiser 1950a). This naturally elicited
goodwill from the local people and helped the organisation
consolidate further.
After a series of riots broke out between 1949 and 1950 in
East Pakistan, following the partition of India, Golwalkar
assigned Eknath Ranade the task of organising relief for
Bengali Hindu refugees in Assam and Bengal. The Bastuhara
Sahayata Samiti (Refugee Relief Committee) set up base at
Calcutta and extended relief work across West Bengal and
Assam (Organiser 1950c). Apart from providing food, shelter and
other essentials, the committee also helped Hindu refugees
find employment. These Bengali Hindus in course of time became an important support base for the organisation. In 1957,
the first regional camp of the RSS was organised in Nowgown,
in which 308 swayamsevaks participated.
In 1968, Assam witnessed the first communal riot in Karimganj.
The conflagration, though limited, gave the Hindutva forces
further fillip in the region. During the Emergency, the RSS
launched a nationwide satyagraha in which several Assamese
swayamsevaks; the Metei tribes of Manipur also took an
active part. This led to a change in the perception of people
regarding sanghs activities in Assam and the RSS expanded its
base beyond the Bengalis and Marwaris, and found support
amongst the Assamese and Manipuris.
Christian Proselytisation and Muslim Infiltration

Speaking at a Rashtra Jagaran Shivir organised at Nalbari in


Assam, in January 2005, Mohan Bhagwat (current sarsanghchalak of the RSS) described infiltration and conversion as the
two most dangerous threats in Assam. In his words:
The tidal waves of tsunami are a natural calamity and no one knows
when they would strike. But we are all aware that infiltration and conversion have been going on under a planned manner. Its outcome will
be more dangerous than that of tsunami. The 2001 census has just
indicated to the coming disaster (Organiser 2005).

Indeed, the issues of alleged conversion by Christian


missionaries and infiltration by Bangladeshi Muslims are the
two main axes around which all activities of the Sangh Parivar
revolve in Assam. As far as the RSS and its affiliates are concerned, both Muslims and Christians of this region are
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projected as the others. While the malevolent projection of


Muslims is easier, given the place the issue of immigration
from erstwhile East Pakistan and later Bangladesh has in the
cultural and political imagination of the Assamese, Christians
have also been constantly targeted for their alleged role in
proselytising innocent janajatis of the region.
Christian Proselytisation: Soon after independence, Golwalkar
targeted the Christian missionaries, criticising them for their
proselytising activities, particularly in the tribal regions,
and for allegedly acting as agents of a global conspiracy to
evangelise India.
As early as 19 June 1950, a report in the Organiser stated:
the tribals of Assam, who inhabit both the plains and the hills in the
province, are day by day going away from the rest of the Assamese and
it is feared that they may be lost to the province altogether.

Several publications of the Sangh Parivar claim that in the


olden days, the tribals (in Assam) were Hindus and continue to
be so, though their religious beliefs are primitive in character.
This narrative draws attention to the fact that several tribes
across Assam and the larger region of north-east display essential Hindu practices. The Mikirs chant Rama Nama, worship
the Tulsi plant, and do not kill or eat cows. The Mismis, Anka
and Uphla communities, the Sangh claims, are fire worshippers in spite of being beef-eaters and Sarek, Sili and Galong
communities practise animistic Hinduism.
The RSS is of the view that these simple mountain folk
have, over several years, been turned against Hindus by the
Christian missionaries. This has been achieved, they argue, by
sound planning and luring tribals through schools, hospitals
and other welfare amenities. In order to counter this influence, the RSS established an affiliate body, Pahari Sewa
Sangh in the 1950s, for the economic, moral and social
upliftment of tribals.8 This body emphasised on building social contact; several swayamsevaks were deputed in tribaldominated areas; they involved themselves in the day-to-day
life of the tribals, built small temples, repaired roads and
organised kirtans.
The activities of the Pahari Sewa Sangh became more
organised after they were taken up by the Vanavasi Kalyan
Ashram (VKA). While the Akhil Bharatiya Vanavasi Kalyan
Ashram was established in 1977, the Assam chapter of VKA
began in 1978. The initial activities centred on establishment
of hostels and medical dispensaries in tribal-dominated districts
such as Udalgiri, Diphu, Mayabagh, North Lakhimpur and
Dhemaji. Over time, it also established sanskar kendras
(cultural centres), schools and balwadis (preschools). The VKA
like all the other Sangh affiliates has been spearheading an
anti-Christian crusade in the north-eastern region. By equating
nationalism with Hindutva, the RSS portrays conversion to
Christianity as anti-national and separatist.
Another important RSS affiliate, which was set up with the
explicit purpose of arresting Christian proselytisation, is the
VHP. Established by Golwalkar in 1964, its Assam branch
was set up in Guwahati in 1966 by Dadasaheb Aptekar. The
organisation set up base in a small town named Halflong in the
84

North Cachar Hills of Assam by starting a residential school for


60 tribal students. By 1969, the Parishad became active in
around 45 villages, establishing hostels for tribal students,
homeopathic clinics and dispensaries and arranging doctors
for the treatment of people. It also set up a series of Ekal
Vidyalayas (Single School Teachers) to indoctrinate students
in remote villages with Hindu sanskars. Currently, the VHP
runs nine hostels for tribal students across Silchar, Halflong,
Nowgown and other places.9
The VHP also focused on mass outreach in its formative
years by organising sammelans which helped it network with
a variety of like-minded organisations and people. At the first
VHP conference held in the region at Guwahati in 1967, a good
number of tribal delegates were invited from Arunachal
Pradesh, Meghalaya and Nagaland. An interesting question
that came up for discussion in this conference was how
could the janajatis be considered Hindus, accustomed as they
were to beef-eating (Seshadri 1988: 16). Speaking to the
Shankaracharya of Dwaraka Peetha and other prominent
sattradhikars present at the conference, Golwalkar convinced
them that the janajatis, who have been essentially Hindus
all along, had been deprived of the benefit of proper Hindu
religious enlightenment because of lack of communication
with the rest of the society and its culture. As such, it was
no fault of theirs if they had remained alienated from our
religious and cultural traditions such as devotion to cow. It is
therefore ones duty to accept the janajatis as part of the Hindu
society without any hesitation. The Dwaraka peethadheesh
then declared that janajatis are Hindus and their consumption
of beef had been born out of sheer economic necessity as there
was no alternative food available to them in the deep interiors
of hilly regions. The acharya added that it was the fault of the
so-called culturally advanced people that they had not cared
to go to those hilly areas and educate the people about the
Hindu culture and heritage. To emphasise his point, Golwalkar
shared his meal with the janajati leaders at the conference. He
also called for the unity of all Hindus urging the sattradhikars
to strengthen contacts between each other and other Hindu
leaders in general.
In 1982, the VHP again organised the Purvanchal Hindu
sammelan on the lines of the 1967 sammelan, where 8,000
Hindus, Savarna janajati, Purohati, Nagarani, sadhus and
sanyasis from all over the region participated. During the Ram
Janmabhoomi andolan (movement), the VHP chapter in
Assam conducted shilapujans in more than 20,000 villages
across Assam.
During its early years in the North East, the VHP also established relationships with local tribal leaders in order to build
an alliance against the Christian missionaries. They found a
natural ally in the tribal icon Rani Gaidinliu. Gaidinliu hailed
from Manipur and had led a strong resistance movement against
the British and subsequently against the Christian missionaries,
who, she alleged, were eroding the Zeliangrong Naga culture.
The VHP and, in later years, other affiliates of the parivar have
attempted to appropriate her into their anti-Christian narrative.
In August 2015, Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the
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birth centenary celebrations of Rani Gaidinliu at Vigyan Bhavan


in Delhi and credited her with the propagation of Mahatma
Gandhis message in the North East (Indian Express 2015).
The student affiliate of the Sangh Parivar, the Akhil Bharatiya
Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) has also dedicated its efforts towards
tribal welfare in Assam. The ABVP began its work in the
region in October 1965 when a few volunteers of the organisation under the leadership of Padmanabh Acharya arrived in
Assam to study tribal life (SEIL pamphlet 2007). In the process,
they interacted with several tribal youth in Meghalaya,
Manipur, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh for almost two
months. In an attempt to integrate the tribal youth with the
rest of India an interstate living experience was devised for
students. In 1966, a few students from the North East were
selected for a Bharat Darshan. The primary motive of this
Students Experience in Interstate Living (SEIL) was to expose
the tribal students to mainstream Hindu sanskaras, and
formed part of a long-term strategy to integrate the tribals
within the fold of Hindutva. This programme proved fruitful,
and the project was converted into an association that
survives to this day. Though SEIL claims to be a voluntary association for the youth in the North East, it is primarily funded
by the ABVP and the memberships of the two organisations
overlap. In 2004, with the aim of establishing a permanent
centre for the youth of the North East, the ABVP set up a Yuva
Vikas Kendra.
Muslim Infiltration: Perhaps the most important issue that
has haunted the politics of Assam since the past several
decades is that of alleged Bengali immigration from erstwhile East Pakistan and subsequently Bangladesh. In fact the
twin issues of migration and rightful citizenship have become
the pivot around which Assams entire politics has come to
revolve, and on which elections are won and lost (Upadhyay
2005: 3002). There is a vast body of literature that documents
how the perceived apprehensions of the Assamese middle class
with regard to the impact of this large-scale immigration on
the socio-economic and cultural aspects of the region led to a
six-year-long political agitation known as the Assam Movement
(197985). This essay therefore does not elaborate on this movement. What is important for the analysis here is to examine
how the issue of alleged Muslim infiltration provides the
Sangh Parivar an opportunity to wield its influence and
consolidate its grounding.
After his first visit to Assam in 1951, Golwalkar wrote in
detail to the Prime Minister about the continuing influx of East
Pakistani Muslims into Assam and the dangers of this immigration. In 196465, the Bharatiya Jana Sangh took the lead in
forming an anti-infiltration committee. From the early
1960s, Aalok, the Assamese weekly run by swayamsevaks,
played an important role in aggravating apprehensions of the
people of Assam about the growing volume of infiltration
from across the border.
In 1979, the All Assam Students Union (AASU) started the
anti-foreigners movement to detect, delete and deport illegal
migrants of Bangladesh from Assam. The RSSBJP actively
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supported this movement and mobilised its cadres to make the


Indian public aware of the true nature of the AASUs antiforeigners movement and the dangers the illegal infiltration
from Bangladesh posed for national security (Organiser
2006b). One of the most unfortunate consequences of the
Assam movement was a violent incident in the Marigaon
District of Assam which led to the killing of around 3,000
Bengali Muslims by local tribes which popularly came to be
known as the Nellie massacre. Wary about the intentions of
the RSS in the backdrop of the Nellie episode, Shekhar Gupta
(1984: 122) pointed out:
thanks to the lack of political pragmatism among the AASU leadership, the RSS elements have been able to operate at a different and
more political level, succeeding in solely influencing some of the leaders in mofussil towns. These can be made to play a key role in whatever future scheme of things the RSS has for Assam and Northeast.
The AASU leadership, jolted by Muslim revolt within its own ranks,
has failed to check this drift and, if it continues, in five years from now
(1984) the RSS in Assam will have the clout to do the kind of stuff it has
been credited with during February 1983.

Following the Assam Movement, Parliament enacted the


controversial Illegal Migrants (Determination by Tribunal)
(IMDT) Act in 1983, which provided for judicial tribunals to
determine disputes about citizenship which might arise under
the Foreigners Act. Viewed as being strongly discriminatory
for its applicability only in Assam and for its cumbersome
provisions that did more to protect the illegal migrants than detect and expel them, the IMDT Act was lambasted by all Assamese regionalist outfits who demanded its outright repeal. In
2005, the Supreme Court struck down the act which polarised
the division between the Hindus and Muslims in the state.
New political players in the state such as the All India United
Democratic Front (AIUDF), formed in 2005,10 however, have
supported the act. The political device of the IMDT Act thus
catalysed the communal dimension and sidelined the real
problem, thus benefiting the Hindutva camp.
The Sangh Parivar has consistently maintained a difference
with other regional political outfits such as AASU and Asom Gana
Parishad on the immigration issue in distinguishing between
Hindu refugees and Muslim infiltrators. Eknath Ranade
(RSS organiser for the eastern zone, June 1950) in an interview
to the correspondent of the daily Bharat of Poona declared:
In Assam the problem is the result of provincial narrowness. Bengali
refugees are not welcome in Assam because of provincialismpeople
looked at them as outsiders and felt that they should be driven out
(Organiser 1950b).

Balasaheb Deoras (the third sarsanghchalak of the RSS)


declared that the Hindus who were streaming into Assam
were refugees, being hounded out by the Bangladeshi
Islamic regime; and Bharat was under a moral obligation to
give refuge and protection to them (Organiser 1980). On the
other hand, the Bangladeshi Muslims whose influx into Assam
is being engineered by the Bangladeshi regime in pursuance
of the decades old design of converting it into Islamic Assam,
are infiltrators. Deoras also warned the Assamese Hindus of
the dreadful fate awaiting any part of the country that would
be reduced to a Hindu-minority area and highlighted the
85

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need for maintaining Assam as a predominantly Hindu


province. This political stance has helped Hindutva strengthen
its support amongst Bengali Hindus, especially in the Borak
Valley region.
Over the years, the Sangh Parivar has been consistent on
their position with regard to this issue. While campaigning for
the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, Narendra Modi asserted in a
rally in Silchar, Assam, that all Hindu migrants from Bangladesh
should be welcomed and accommodated in India (Mahaprashasta
and Dutta 2014). Moreover, the 2012 BodoAssamese violence
has assisted the Parivar in legitimising its anti-Muslim stand.
Seva Bharati Assam grabbed the opportunity to provide
humanitarian relief and aid to Bodo victims in the violence.
VHP leader Praveen Togadia visited Kokrajhar in August 2014
and urged the Assamese, Bangla Hindus, all tribes..in Assam
to stand together as one to fight the modern-day invasion by
the Bangladeshis (Ramasesha 2012). Further, Sangh publications on the internet drew comparisons between Godhra 2002
and Asom 2012 (Kumar 2012).
It is important to note, however, that for a long period of
time (until 1971) the anti-immigrant sentiment in Assam was
essentially directed against the Bengali Hindus and not the
Bengali Muslims as the former were seen as the primary
threats to both employment and culture of the Assamese. It is
only in 1971 that the bonhomie between the Bengali Muslims
and the Assamese Hindus broke down as refugees were identified both by the language they spoke and the religion they
practised (Dutta 2013: 89). The gradual advent of the BJPRSS
in Assam and the formation of AIDUF in 2005 has contributed
towards partially twisting the AssameseBengali cleavage into
a HinduMuslim cleavage.
Hindutvas political mobilisation around the alleged Bangladeshi immigration issue has been aided by the endeavours of
several of its affiliates. The VHP has actively taken up this
cause and has carried out a sustained pamphleteering campaign to educate the Hindu masses, especially in the rural
areas, about the Muslim designs and how they are required
to face it unitedly. In February 2003, the VHP senior Vice President, Giriraj Kishore, said in Silchar that his organisation
would launch a campaign to push back identified infiltrators
into Bangladesh (Telegraph 2003). In November 2005, the VHP
decided to form an outfit called the Hindu Sena (Hindu
soldiers), in Assam in order to protect the interest of the
indigenous communities in the state. According to the Parishads leaders, it had become necessary to launch such a body,
as the government had failed to protect the indigenous
people from the growing activities of Pakistans Inter-Services
Intelligence (Hindustan Times 2005).
The ABVP has also persistently focused its attention on the
immigration issue. It supported the AASU agitation in 1979,
and demanded a thorough constituency-wise checking and
deletion of names of foreigners from the electoral rolls and in
1981, submitted a memorandum to that effect to S L Shakdhar,
then Election Commissioner. A convention organised by ABVP
at New Delhi in January 1981 proved to be a landmark in
taking the Assam issue to the national stage. Its campaign of
86

Save Assam today to save India tomorrow, launched on 15


August 1983, drew tremendous response from all over the
country. In more recent times, the ABVP has voiced its concern
over the weak fencing on the IndoBangladesh border. In
January 2007, a group of ABVP workers from 22 states
conducted a survey of the international border in the North East
and demanded that the fencing of the border be completed
and electrified.
Apart from the above-mentioned organisations, there are
several other affiliates of the Sangh which have a presence in
Assam. These include Rashtra Sevika Samiti (the womens
affiliate of the Sangh Parivar), Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh
(trade union wing), Vivekananda Kendra (engaged in spiritual awareness), Sanskar Bharati (involved in disseminating
Hindu culture), Shikshan Mandal (focused on development of
a Hindu curriculum), Bharatiya Sahitya Parishad (Literary
Society), Itihas Sankalan Samiti (Historical Association),
Sahkar Bharati (Cooperative Society), and Sanskrit Bharati.
The work of these affiliate bodies in all possible realms of society facilitates the dissemination of Hindutva in varied forms
and helps in enlisting support from different quarters. Apart
from the work of these affiliates the RSS also concentrates on
shakha building, which lies at the core of its mobilisation
strategy. The RSS currently runs shakhas in 360 blocks
across Assam and Meghalaya and has a presence in over
84 towns.11
Conclusions

Samir Kumar Das (2004: 246) has argued that religious radicalism in the North East India is embedded in ethnicity and
does not exactly manifest itself in the way it does in other
parts of the country. Religious radicalism here, according to
him, situates itself within an ethnic matrix and assumes a
highly complex character. An analysis of the spread of Hindutva
in Assam demonstrates that the movement recognises the complex ways in which ethnicity and religion are intertwined in
this terrain. For one thing, a significant portion of the population in the North East happens to be of tribal origin, for whom
the ideology of Hindutva does not have much appeal as it has
for Hindus of northern India. For another, even the Hindus living in the region for historical reasons have been and are by
and large free from many of its orthodox ingredients. The
spread of Vaishnavism particularly in the valley areas contributed enormously to the softening, and in many cases, obliteration of many inegalitarian social practices, rituals, orthodoxies and dogmas prototypical of Hindu caste system. As a result,
Assam was and to some extent is by and large free from the
maladies of communalism and casteism.
Hindutva activists have therefore, from the very beginning,
adopted novel strategies for navigating through the complex
particularities of this region in order to establish itself in the
cultural and political imagination of the people. Moving away
from its standard techniques of mobilising support through
the invocation of Hindu stereotypes like Ram or Ayodhya,
it instead focuses on adapting local cults and symbols such as
those associated with Kamakhya and SankardevSattra
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traditions. Coupled with this, it also consolidates support by providing welfare services in the realm of education, health and
cultural development, through a range of affiliate bodies.
Further the presence of a considerably large population of
Muslims in the state, and the consistent apprehension of the
natives about the accelerating influx of the Bangladeshis,
have worked to the advantage of the RSS in the region. Alignment
with regional groups who led mass political movements in
order to drive out the Bengali Muslims have obviously benefited the RSS and BJP camp. Further, the proselytising

Notes
1 It should be noted that contrary to the
ideologues of Hindutva, a group of scholars
have termed the process of Hinduisation as
an invasion which actively led to the extinction of the Tai religious traditions and
de-tribalisation of the formerly tribal people
in this region.
2 Source: http://www.hindubooks.org/temples/
assam/introduction/page12.htm, accessed on
8 August 2012.
3 Source: Vidya Bharati website: http://www.
vbassam.org/docs/schools/List%20of%20
Schools.pdf, accessed on 30 October 2015.
4 The Marwaris in Assam, though numerically
small, are highly influential in the realm of
trade and commerce since colonial times. With
their links to the Hindu heartland, they provide a natural support base for the RSS.
5 Interview with Dayal Krishna Borah (Senior
Pracharak, RSS), Keshav Dham, Guwahati, Assam, 28 November 2006.
6 Interview with Dayal Krishna Borah (Senior
Pracharak, RSS), Keshav Dham, Guwahati,
Assam, 28 November 2006.
7 Interview with Madhukar Limaye (Senior
Pracharak, RSS), Keshav Dham, Guwahati,
Assam, 28 June 2006.
8 Interview with Madhukar Limaye (Senior
Pracharak, RSS), Keshav Dham, Guwahati,
Assam, 28 June 2006.
9 Source: VHP website: http://www.vhpsewa.
org/, accessed on 6 November 2015.
10 The AIUDF (originally known as the Assam
United Democratic Front) is a political party
formed in Assam in 2005 under the leadership
of Badruddin Ajmal, a perfume merchant, who
drew the support of a majority of Bengali Muslims in the state.
11 Data sourced from Shankar Das (Senior
Pracharak), Keshav Dham, Guwahati, October
2014.

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87

NOTES

Communal Politics in Assam


Growth of AIUDF since 2016
Monoj Kumar Nath

The formation and continuous


electoral success of the Assam
United Democratic Front (AUDF,
which is now known as the All
India United Democratic Front)
has made the state a playground
of communal politics. Its success
has broken down the traditional
Muslim vote bank of the
Congress Party. As a result,
since the 2006 Assam assembly
elections, the Congress Party has
adopted a soft Hindutva approach
to polarise the non-Muslim
voters against the AIUDF.
However, the Bharatiya Janata
Partys open Hindutva line
appeared more attractive to
non-Muslims of Assam in the 2014
Lok Sabha elections.

ince the formation of the Assam


United Democratic Front (AUDF),1
shortly after the repeal of the
Illegal Migrants (Determination by
Tribunal) (IM(DT)) Act, 1983 in 2005,
and later the All India United Democratic
Front (AIUDF), politics in Assam has become increasingly communal. Muslims
in Assam have remained a vote bank for
the Congress Party since independence.
However, a large section of them, mainly
the immigrant Muslims, have been
increasingly rallying behind the AIUDF.
As a result, the Muslim vote bank of the
Congress Party has been shrinking. In
this situation, the Congress Party has
followed a two-pronged strategy to
contain the growth of the AIUDF. On one
hand, it has been trying to weaken the
growth of AIUDF by labelling it as
communal, and on the other hand it has
been trying to consolidate the nonMuslim votes against AIUDF to win the
elections in the state.
The growth of the AIUDF has also
helped the growth of the Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP) in the state. This is
evident from the results of the 2014 Lok
Sabha elections in which the BJP, for the
first time, won seven out of a total of 14
seats in the state, while the AIUDF got
three seats. The Congress Party could
win only three seats against seven in the
2009 Lok Sabha elections. During the
last decade, the Asom Gana Parishad
(AGP), the regional political party that
won the assembly elections in 1985 and
1996, has been gradually marginalised
in electoral politics.
Muslims in Assam

Monoj Kumar Nath (mknath2007@rediffmail.


com) teaches political science at Nowgong
College, Nagaon, Assam.

88

Muslims constitute 34.22% of the total


population of Assam (2011 Census). The
Muslim population has increased significantly (Table 1) compared to the Hindu
population and this has become the

main source of fear among the Hindus in


the state. According to the 2011 Census,
out of 27 districts, nine are Muslim
majority while three have more than
35% Muslim population. Another seven
districts have between 10% and 35%
Muslim population. The 12 districts with
more than 35% Muslim population are
mainly in lower Assam (Dhubri, Barpeta,
Darrang, Goalpara, Bongaigaon, Kamrup and Nalbari), and middle Assam
(Nagaon and Morigaon) of the Brahmaputra Valley, and from Barak Valley
(Hailakandi, Karimganj and Cachar).
Table 1: Religion-wise Growth of Population in
Assam (19612011)
(in percentage)
Year

Hindus

Muslims

Christians

Others

1961
1971
1991
2001
2011

69.75
71.00
67.13
64.89
61.46

24.70
24.03
28.43
30.92
34.22

4.45
4.46
3.32
3.09
3.78

1.10
0.51
1.12
1.10
0.54

Census was not conducted in Assam in 1981.2


Source: Census of India reports.

The Muslims in Assam can be divided


broadly into two groupsAssamese Muslims (meaning indigenous Muslims) and
Bengali Muslims (meaning immigrant
Muslims) (Ahmed and Yasin 1997). The
indigenous Muslims in Assam do not live
in a contiguous area; they are scattered
throughout the state. Two prominent
indigenous Muslim groups living in middle
and upper Assam are Garia and Maria.
Indigenous Muslim groups living in the
lower Assam Districts are Ujeni/Deshi/
Goalpara, Datia, Jhula, Dhuli and Musi,
Tulu and Chandar. Maimol and Pongal
are two important indigenous Muslim
groups from the Barak Valley (Ahmed
2014). A section of indigenous Muslims
are low-caste Hindu converts as a result
of the spread of Islam by Muslim religious saints like Azan Fakir in the 17th
century (Dev and Lahiri 1985; Ahmed
1999).
The immigrant Muslims are those
who came to Assam over different phases
in the last century from East Bengal (now
Bangladesh). They settled mostly in the
char (high land formed in the river by
silt deposits) areas of lower and middle
Assam in the Brahmaputra Valley and in
the Barak Valley. The mother tongue of
this section of Muslims is Bengali.

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NOTES

However, the immigrant Muslims of the


Brahmaputra Valley identify themselves
as Assamese and their children study
in Assamese medium schools. Such Muslims call themselves Na-Asomiya or
Neo-Assamese. It should be noted here
that the cut-off date for identification
and deportation of illegal migrants from
Assam is 25 March 1971 according to the
clause of the Assam Accord (1985)
against the all-India cut-off date 19 July
1948 as per Article 6 of the Constitution
of India. In this article, when we use the
term immigrant Muslims, it does not
indicate illegal foreigners, but the Muslims who migrated to Assam since the
beginning of the last century till 1971.
Muslims in Electoral Politics
Table I shows how the Muslim population is increasing in Assam compared
to other religious communities. This
growth is increasingly influencing electoral equations in the state. The growing dominance of the Muslim community in elections has made the indigenous population fearful of losing political power. However, it should be noted
that only the immigrant section of Muslims is becoming powerful in electoral
equations because they live in contiguous areas. On the other hand, indigenous Muslims cannot dominate the
results in a single assembly constituency
as they do not form the majority of voters
in any constituency. In this situation,
indigenous Muslims are also losing their
importance in the power politics of the
state and are becoming like a minority
within a minority.
Out of the total 126 constituencies in
the Assam Legislative Assembly, 24 are
reservedeight for Scheduled Tribes
(STs) and 16 for Scheduled Castes (SCs).
From the total 102 unreserved constituencies, 23 are Muslim-dominated and
Muslims are the deciding factor in another
eight constituencies. This means that
Muslim voters determine election
results in 31 out of 102 constituencies.
These 31 constituencies are in Dhubri,
Goalpara, Barpeta, Bongaigaon and
Darrang Districts of lower Assam, Nagaon and Morigaon Districts of middle
Assam and Cachar, Karimganj and
Hailakandi Districts of Barak Valley,
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where mainly immigrant Muslims live/


reside (Nath 2015).
Muslim-based Political Parties
After partition, the Muslims of Assam
joined the Congress Party en masse
under the leadership of Syed Saadulla,
the former Muslim League premier of
Assam creating an enduring alliance between the Congress Party and Assamese
Muslims. This alliance was the result of
mutual necessity. The Congress Party
needed the Muslims to boost its image as
a staunch advocate of secularism, and as
a vote-catching instrument for political
power as they would be patronised by
the ruling party. The alliance with the
Congress Party gave Muslims three
benefits: greater safeguards, an image of
being secular and the chance to share
power with the Congress Party (Kar 1990)
The alliance between the Muslims
and the Congress Party continued without a break from 1952 till the 1983
Assembly elections. However, the Muslims
in Assam remained only a vote bank in
elections for the Congress Party. Their
interests were never taken seriously
by consecutive Congress governments.
Against this backdrop, a Muslim-based
political party, the Eastern India Muslim
Association (EIMA), emerged in 1977.
The EIMA argued that Muslims needed a
separate political party because of their
disillusionment with the Congress Party,
the denial of equal rights and privileges,
the need for protection, the belief that
Muslim Congressmen were pseudo representatives, the need for a distinctive
Muslim platform and the need for a
Muslim entity in a multicultural India.
However, in October in the same year,
EIMA was formally dissolved and merged
with the Indian Union Muslim League to
re-emerge as the Eastern Zonal Muslim
League (Kar 1990). Although the latter
could not influence electoral politics in
the state, the formation of EIMA established the arguments for a Muslim-based
political party in the state.
United Minority Front
The Assam Accord was signed on 15
August 1985 to bring an end to the sixyear long Assam movement. It provided
for detection and deportation of illegal

vol lI no 16

migrants staying in Assam. Several


Muslim and linguistic minority groups
opposed the Assam movement (1979
1985) and the Assam Accord. Three months
after the accord was signed, a new regional political party, the United Minority
Front (UMF) emerged. Representatives
of the All Assam Minority Students
Union (AAMSU), All Assam Minority
Front, Citizens Right Prevention Committee (formed to oppose the Assam
movement), All Assam Minority Yuva
Parishad, the Assam unit of Jamiat Ulemae-Hind and others participated in the
convention where the party was formed.
The partys principal commitments were
the well-being of minorities and their
protection in the atmosphere created by
the Assam Accord (Ahmed 1999).
Though Jamiat was involved in the
formation of the UMF, its role was marginal. Kalipad Sen, a linguistic minority
leader, was elected as the first president
of the party. In the assembly elections
(1985) held just after its formation, the
party received support from a large
section of the linguistic minority and
immigrant Muslims. In this election, the
party won 17 assembly seats out of 126
and got 10.85% of the total votes polled.
However, after the 1985 elections, several
prominent members of the party defected to other political parties and two
decades after its formation, it broke up
several times. In the 1996 elections, the
UMF could win only two seats and in the
2001 assembly elections, only 0.41% of
the total votes. In 2005, a section of the
UMF merged with AUDF when the latter
was formed.
Assam United Democratic Front
In July 2005, the Supreme Court of India
declared the IM(DT) Act as illegal and
undemocratic and the act was repealed.
The IM(DT) Act was imposed on Assam in
1983 by the then Congress-led central
government to show its solidarity towards
the minorities in Assam. This made the
process of identification and deportation
of illegal nationals in Assam very complex. After this law was passed, the Congress Party claimed that it had been enacted to safeguard the minorities from
the Assam Movement. Yet, like the AGP,
the BJP and students organisations such
89

NOTES

as All Assam Students Union (AASU) repeatedly demanded repeal of the act.
This polarisation helped the Congress
Party to keep its Muslim vote bank intact.
The repeal of IM(DT) Act generated
fear among immigrant Muslims in Assam.
Minority organisations, led by a section
of Muslims, began to blame the Congress governments at the centre and in
Assam for their inactivity in the Supreme
Court to stop the repeal of the act. Since
the repeal of the law, the Jamiat came
forward to address the fear of the Muslims. The president of the state unit of
the Jamiat, Badruddin Ajmal, took the
lead to form a new political outfit. His
intention was to teach the Congress Party
a lesson which had, according to him,
betrayed the Muslims of Assam. In October 2005, 13 Muslim minority organisations came together and formed a new
regional political party, the AUDF. The
state president of the Jamiat, Badruddin
Ajmal, became its president.
For the first time in the politics of
India, Jamiat actively involved itself in
the formation of a political party. In
2000, the Shahi Imam of the Jama Masjid,
Syed Ahmed Bukhari, announced that he
would play a direct role to set up a political party for Muslims to ensure that the
lost rights of the minorities are regained
(Engineer 2003). He blessed Badruddin
Ajmal for forming the AUDF. In this
respect, the AUDF can be seen as a new
experiment by Indian Muslim leaders to
form a political party for Muslims
(Bhaumik 2009). After three years of
formation, in February 2009, the AUDF
relaunched itself as a national party
under the name of All India United Democratic Front. However, its activities have
remained confined to Assam.
In the 2006 assembly elections, AUDF
won 10 seats by securing 9.03% of the
vote. Compared to this, the UMF had
done better in 1985 when it got 17 seats
and 10.85% of the vote. However, AIUDF
continued its success in the 2011 assembly elections by securing 18 seats and
12% of the vote. As a result, it became
the main opposition party in the Assam
Legislative Assembly.
Although both the UMF and the AIUDF
were created to safeguard the interests
of the minorities, between the two it is
90

the AIUDF that can be considered a


Muslim-based political party. While the
Jamiat was actively involved in its
formation, no significant organisation of
linguistic minorities was involved (unlike
the UMF). In the 1985 assembly elections,
both linguistic and religious minorities
of Assam sided with the UMF. But in the
2006 and 2011 assembly elections, the
immigrant Muslims remained the main
supporters of the AIUDF.
Communal Politics in Assam
(200514)
Since the formation of the AIUDF, both
national parties, the Congress and the
BJP, as well as the AIUDF have been playing communal electoral politics.
2006 Assembly Elections
After the AIUDF was formed, the immigrant section of Muslims rallied behind
the party. AIUDF chief Badruddin Ajmal
termed the Congress governments at the
centre and in the state as betrayer of the
Muslims of Assam because of the repeal
of the IM(DT) Act. Jamiat strongly supported the AIUDF and openly campaigned
for the party. The Congress Party had
calculated that the Muslim vote would
probably shift to AIUDF. To attract and
mobilise the non-Muslim vote, the seasoned Congressman and Chief Minister
Tarun Gogoi played a game of soft
Hindutva. Gogoi started to question the
identity and existence of AIUDF chief by
openly and repeatedly asking, Who is
Badruddin? This became the Congress
Partys slogan during the 2006 assembly
elections.
When the Supreme Court declared
IM(DT) Act as undemocratic and illegal,
Sarbananda Sonowal, then Lok Sabha
Member of Parliament (MP) from the
AGP, was the petitioner in the case. The
judgment helped Sonowal to emerge as
the leader of the ethnic Assamese who
considered the act as an obstacle to identification and deportation of illegal foreigners from the state. The AASU that led
the Assam movement and had always
demanded the scrapping of the IM(DT)
Act, declared Sonowal as the Jatiya
Nayak (the hero of Assamese nationality). However, Sonowals own political
party, the AGP, could not reap the benefit

of this victory because of the infighting


among its top leadership. On the other
hand, the Who is Badruddin? campaign of Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi
made him the hero among the ethnic
Assamese population in the 2006 elections.
The ethnic Assamese populations were
increasingly suffering from the threat of
losing political domination in the state at
the hands of the immigrant Muslims and
they considered AIUDF as a political party
of the immigrant Muslims. In such a
situation, the open challenge of Tarun
Gogoi to Badruddin Ajmal polarised the
assembly elections between immigrant
Muslims and others.
In this election, even though the
Congress Partys traditional Muslim vote
bank shifted to AIUDF, it still won 53
seats. The indigenous Assamese population supported the Congress to contain
Table 2: Party Position in Assam Assembly
Election, 2006
Name of the Political Party

% of Total No of Seat
Vote Polled
Won

Indian National Congress


Asom Gana Parishad
BPF (H)
Bharatiya Janata Party
Assam United Democratic Front
Others
Total

31.08
20.39
3.72
11.98
9.03
23.80
100.00

53
24
11
10
10
18
126

Source: Election Department, Government of Assam.

the AIUDF. After the elections, the


Congress Party formed the government
in alliance with the Bodoland Peoples
Front (Hagrama) (BPF, H) a regional political party influential in Bodoland Territorial Area Districts (BTAD) region.
2011 Assembly Elections
After the 2006 assembly elections, the
Congress presumed it could marginalise
the AIUDF as it had done with UMF in the
past. Three years after the UMF showed
surprising success in the 1985 assembly
elections, 10 UMF Members of Legislative Assembly (MLAs) defected from the
party and joined the Congress. The main
architect of this exercise was former
Congress chief minister and later Governor of Mizoram, the late Hiteswar Saikia.
Tarun Gogoi was president of the Assam
Congress at that time. This defection
weakened the UMF and no candidate
from the party could win in the 1991
assembly elections. With AIUDF too, the

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NOTES

Congress has tried hard to break the


party. Just before the 2011 assembly
elections, two MLAs from AIUDF defied
the party whip and voted for Congress
candidates in the Rajya Sabha election
from Assam. But repeated attempts by the
Congress could not stem the growth of
the AIUDF in the 2011 assembly elections.
Between 2006 and 2011, the Congress
repeatedly branded the AIUDF as communal and declared it as enemy. After
the 2006 elections, the AGP again broke
into two fractionsAGP and AGP (Progressive) led by former president and
Chief Minister Prafulla Kumar Mahanta.
As a result, the 2011 election campaign
began with the Congress as the favourite. The Congress did not face any strong
opposition in upper Assam, but in middle
and lower Assam and Barak Valley it had
to contend with the AIUDF. This time
also, indigenous Assamese rallied behind
Congress to stop AIUDF, as there was no
other better alternative, while the
Muslims supported the AIUDF. From
200511, the Congress government tried
hard to woo back Muslim voters through
different government schemes and
measures, but failed. Security and identity have always remained important
issues for immigrant Muslim voters. These
twin issues were hijacked by AIUDF from
the Congress during the 2006 elections.
Since 1998, the Congress had repeatedly
spoken about the D (Doubtful) voters,3
but never took any initiative to address
the problem. AIUDF began to expose the
hypocrisy of the Congress on this issue
by speaking louder than Congress about
D voters. The party approached the
Supreme Court before the 2011 assembly elections against the provision of
D voters. This helped the AIUDF to
keep its voters intact and to attract more
to its fold.
Table 3: Party Position in Assam Assembly
Election, 2011
Name of the Political Party

% of Total No of Seats
Vote Polled
Won

Indian National Congress

39.39

78

Asom Gana Parishad

16.29

10

BPF (H)

06.13

12

Bharatiya Janata Party

11.47

05

Assam United Democratic Front

12.57

18

Others

14.15

03

100.00

126

Total

Source: Election Department, Government of Assam.


Economic & Political Weekly

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APRIL 16, 2016

In the 2011 assembly elections, Congress gained 39% of the total vote polled
and won 78 seats as against 31% of the
vote and 53 seats in the 2006 assembly
elections. The vote share and total seats
won by the AGP declined from 20.39%
and 24 seats in the 2006 elections to
16% and 10 seats in the 2011 elections.
The BJPs vote share remained almost
the same in the 2006 and 2011 elections
(11%). However, the number of seats it
won fell from 10 in 2006 to five in the
2011 elections. The AIUDF increased its
vote share from 9% in 2006 to 12% in
the 2011 elections. The number of seats it
won increased from 10 in 2006 to 18 in
the 2011 elections.
2014 Lok Sabha Elections
The 2014 Lok Sabha elections showed a
clear religious polarisation in the whole
country. Although Narendra Modi led
the BJP campaign on the agenda of
development, the communal ideology of
the party also influenced voters. Incidentally, Sarbananda Sonowal, who
became a hero among the indigenous
Assamese population because of the
repeal of the IM(DT) Act, joined BJP after
the 2011 assembly elections and became
the president of the Assam BJP a year
before the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.
Sonowal was previously the president of
AASU. Because of the Assam movement,
AASU leaders are not accepted by immigrant Muslims. However, Sonowal, because of his active role in the Lok Sabha
during 200409 and his role in the
IM(DT) Act repeal, has emerged as a
strong ethnic leader among the indigenous communities of Assam. He belongs
to Sonowal Kachari community, a ST
(Plains) community. Because of his tribal
status, he has a better appeal among the
tribal communities of the state than other
non-tribal leaders. The Narendra Modi
Sarbananda Sonowal combination has
brought a new Hindutva-regionalism
formula for the BJP in Assam. This combination worked very well for the BJP in
Assam in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.
In 2014, AIUDF faced a huge challenge
from the BJP. To counter it, the AIUDF
started communal politics on an unprecedented scale. For example, on 22 March
2014, after returning from Mecca, AIUDF

vol lI no 16

chief Badruddin Ajmal declared at a


public meeting that if BJP wins because
of the mistakes of his party, almighty
Allah would not forgive him (Nath 2014).
The AIUDF chiefs communal campaign
divided Assamese voters along communal lines. This made it easier for the BJP
to mobilise Hindu voters. While immigrant Muslims rallied behind the AIUDF
to oppose the BJP, this time, a large
section of the indigenous Muslims also
supported AIUDF and opposed the BJP.
On the other hand, indigenous Assamese
largely rallied behind the BJP, considering
it as a better alternative than the Congress to defeat the AIUDF.
The results of the 2014 elections
showed clear religious polarisation in
the state. For the first time in Assam, the
BJP won seven (50%) of the total 14 Lok
Sabha seats. AIUDF won three seats, and
the Congress got only three seats. Clearly, the soft Hindutva of Congress lost
to the open Hindutva of the BJP. Because
of clear religious polarisation, the BJP
and the AIUDF showed unprecedented
success.
Table 4: Party-wise Performance in Lok Sabha
Elections in Assam (200914)
Name of the Political Party

2009
2014
% of Vote Seats % of Vote Seats
Polled Won Polled Won

Indian National Congress 34.89


Bharatiya Janata Party
16.21
Asom Gana Parishad
14.6
Assam United
Democratic Front
16.01
Others
18.29
Total
100.00

07 29.90 03
04 36.86 07
O1 3.87 00
01 14.98
01 14.39
14
100

03
01
14

Source: Election Commission of India, 2014.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the


BJP won Dibrugarh, Guwahati, Jorhat,
Lakhimpur, Mangaldoi, Nagaon and
Tezpur constituenciesall Hindu-dominated. The AIUDF won Muslim-dominated
Barpeta, Dhubri and Karimganj constituencies. The Congress won the Autonomous District constituency dominated by
hill tribes Karbi and Dimasas and Kaliabor and Silchar constituencies. Kaliabor
Lok Sabha constituency has both Muslims and Hindus in almost equal proportions. Gaurav Gogoi, Assam Chief Minister Tarun Gogois son, won it. The Silchar
constituency is Hindu Bengali dominated
and Sushmita Deb, daughter of veteran
Congressperson from Barak Valley Santosh Mohan Deb, won it.
91

NOTES

Jamiat and Electoral Politics


The Assam Jamiat has been playing a
very active role in the states electoral
politics. As has already been discussed,
it participated in the formation of the
UMF prior to the 1985 assembly elections
in which the party won 17 seats. This
was the first time that immigrant
Muslim voters deserted the Congress
resulting in its worst-ever performance
in assembly elections. However, in the
1991 assembly elections, Jamiat lent its
support to the Congress again and
Congress returned to power with a comfortable majority. In the 1996 elections,
Jamiat supported the AGP-led coalition
and the coalition came to power after
the election by defeating the Congress.
Again in 2001 elections, Jamiat supported the Congress and it returned back to
power in the state. In 2005, the Jamiat
helped in the formation of the AIUDF and
its president became the head of the new
party. He has remained president till
now. Jamiat leaders openly campaigned
for AIUDF both in the 2006 and the 2011
assembly elections. The AIUDF did well
in the 2006 assembly elections, and
emerged as the main opposition party in
the 2011 assembly elections.
Jamiat Ulema-e-Hinds primary political purpose has been to defend Muslim
Personal Law and oppose any attempt
by the state to change or interfere with it
through either specific laws or through
the enactment of a uniform civil code
(Brass 2001). Its constitution allows it to
support any political party from outside
for the cause of Muslim welfare.
In the post-Assam movement period,
the Jamiat has had a significant influence
over the immigrant Muslim voters. In
1991, 1996 and 2001 assembly elections,
that party or coalition came to power
to which the Jamiat lent its electoral
support. From this, three aspects of the
Jamiats role and influence over Muslim
voters are evident. First, whenever the
Jamiat supported the Congress in the
assembly elections, immigrant Muslims
en masse voted for the party and the
Congress comfortably won the elections.
The 1991 and 2001 assembly elections are
examples of this. However, the Congress
continued to retain power in the state
after the 2006 and 2011 elections without
92

the support of the Jamiat. After the 2006


elections, Congress had to ally with BPF
to form a government as the party did
not have a majority. And in the 2011 elections, the Congress got the support of
the indigenous Assamese people against
the AIUDF.
Second, whenever Jamiat has not supported the Congress, but provided a suitable alternative, Muslim voters have
shifted their vote to that alternative. The
elections of 1985, 2006 and 2011 prove
this. Muslim voters shifted from the
Congress to the UMF in 1985, and to the
AIUDF in 2006 and 2011.
Third, when the Jamiat is not
supporting the Congress but has failed
to provide an acceptable alternative for
Muslim voters, the voters remained
divided. The 1996 assembly elections is
proof of this. In this election, Jamiat
lent its electoral support to the AGP-led
coalition. The AGP is not a party of choice
for a significant portion of immigrant
Muslims as leaders of the Assam movement formed it. As a result, a significant
portion of immigrant Muslim voters voted for the Congress against the recommendation of the Jamiat. Although the
AGP-led coalition won the election, the
Congress improved its performance in
the immigrant Muslim-dominated constituencies.
Although the Jamiat has played a
crucial role in determining the electoral
behaviour of the immigrant Muslims in
Assam in the post-Assam movement
period, this has remained controversial
for several reasons. First, from 1985 to
2006 in every assembly election, Jamiat
shifted its electoral support to different
political parties/coalitions. In 1985, it
supported the UMF, in 1991 it supported
the Congress, in 1996 it supported the
AGP-led coalition, in 2001 again it
supported the Congress and in 2006 it
supported the AIUDF. Jamiat has never
disclosed on what basis it lends its
electoral support to a political party or
coalition. It is also not known what
Jamiat has achieved from consecutive
governments in return for its electoral
support of the welfare of the Muslim
community in Assam.
Second, the Jamiats electoral choices
have remained questionable. Although it

strongly opposed the Assam movement


and played an active role in the formation of UMF against the AGP in 1985, it
still supported the AGP-led coalition in
the 1996 assembly elections.
Third, the Jamiats electoral support
has remained confined to the election
period. In 1985, it took part in the
process of forming the UMF against the
Assam Accord and AGP. However, after
the elections, it did not pay any attention
to keep the UMF united and to make it
stronger. After the 1985 elections, most
of the MLAs who won on UMF tickets
defected to the Congress and the UMF
disintegrated. The Jamiat did not pay
any attention to these developments and
in the 1991 elections, it shifted electoral
support to the Congress.
The Jamiats constitution allows it to
support any political party from outside.
However, in Assam, the Jamiat openly
led the process to form the AIUDF in
2005 and Badruddin Ajmal has remained
the president of both the Assam Jamiat
and the AIUDF. In the 2005 and 2011
assembly elections, the Jamiat leaders
openly campaigned for the AIUDF.
For all these reasons, the role of the
Jamiat in Assams electoral politics has
remained controversial. At present, the
AIUDF represents the Assam Jamiat in
the politics of Assam. If AIUDF fails to
remain strong in Assams electoral
politics, it will definitely marginalise the
importance of the Jamiat in the states
electoral politics.
AIUDFs Success
Unlike the UMF, the AIUDF showed
continuous success in two consecutive
elections (2006 and 2011) and the Jamiat
stood solidly behind the party. The
AIUDFs success is increasing the religious
polarisation in the state. There are four
reasons for the AIUDF becoming stronger
in successive elections.
First, Jamiat has a strong presence
and influence among immigrant Muslims
of Assam. They are Assams most backward community both socially and economically. They mainly live in rural and
char areas. A large section of this community has been voting in the elections
on the directions of the Jamiat. They
voted for AIUDF in the 2006 and 2011

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NOTES

elections because the Jamiat supported


the party.
Second, immigrant Muslims do not
have any alternative but to vote for the
AIUDF. Till the 1983 elections, Assamese
Muslims supported the Congress. In the
1991 and 2001 elections they continued
to support the Congress. However, in
return for the continuous support of the
community, consecutive Congress governments did nothing special for it. As
a result, Assamese Muslims feel neglected
and deprived. This feeling is becoming
stronger with the spread of education.
However, the problem they face is that
there is no secular alternative to the
Congress in Assam. The community
never trusted the BJP. It cannot support
the AGP as its leaders were the leaders of
Assam movement. Moreover, the AGP
aligned with the BJP in the 2006 assembly elections held in Assam. And the left
parties do not have a significant presence in Assam or do not have the possibility to form a government.
Third, immigrant Assamese Muslims
have always been equated with and branded as illegal Bangladeshis by popular
media and some political and non-political
organisations of the state. This is creating
anguish among the community and it is
feeling increasingly alienated from the
mainstream society of Assam. It realises
that a strong political existence is necessary and this is helping the AIUDF to
grow election after election.
Finally, Muslims constitute more than
one-third of the total population in
Assam and can therefore be influential
in election politics. The immigrant
Muslims live in contiguous areas and
can dominate electoral politics significantly. The community realises this and
has thus started to believe that it can
easily grab power in Assam if it remains
politically united. After the 2011 election,
AIUDF emerged as the main opposition
party in the Assam Legislative Assembly.
This has encouraged the community to
remain united and to rally behind AIUDF
for a greater role in politics of Assam in
the days to come.
notes
1

AUDF was formed in 2005 and it fought 2006


Assam Assembly election as a state political
party. In 2009, leaders of the party decided to

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APRIL 16, 2016

extend the activities of the party to other parts


of the country and the party was renamed as
All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF).
However, till Lok Sabha election 2014, the
Election Commission of India recognises the
AIUDF as a state party in Assam.
Census could not be held in Assam for 1981
because of Assam movement and the opposition
of the movement leaders.
In 1998, the Election Commission of India initiated the process of identifying D (Doubtful)
voters in Assam. Those, who cannot provide any
document of nationality during preparation of
voters list, will be identified as doubtful voter
in the voters list and they will be debarred
from casting their vote. This has become a very
contentious issue among the immigrant
Muslims in Assam, and after 1998, in every
election, D voter has become an election issue.

REFERENCES
Ahmed, Muhiuddin (2014): Asomor Musalman:
SamajSanaskriti loi Avadan (in Assamese)
[Muslims in Assam: Contribution to Society
and Culture], Jorhat, Assam: Udika Prakashan,
pp 12144.
Ahmed, S U (1999): Muslims in Assam (12002000),
Nagaon: Marigold Compu Print, pp 1011, 174.
Ahmed, A N S and Adil-Ul-Yasin (1997): Problems
of Identity and Nation Building: A Case Study
of the Muslims of Assam in Girin Phukon and
N L Dutta (eds), Politics of Identity and Nation
Building in Northeast India, New Delhi: South
Asian Publishers, pp 14352.
Ahmed, Muhiuddin (2014): Asomor Musalman:
SamajSanaskriti loi Avadan (in Assamese)
[Muslims in Assam: Contribution to Society
and Culture], Jorhat, Assam: Udika Prakashan,
pp 12144.
Baruah, Sanjib (2001): India against Itself: Assam
and Politics of Nationality, New York: Oxford
University Press.
Bezboruah, D N (2002): Illegal Migration from
Bangladesh, Dialogue, Vol 3, No 3, Jan-Mar, p 32.
Bhaumik, Subir (2009): Troubled Periphery: Crisis
of Indias North East, New Delhi: Sage Publications India, p 218.
Brass, Paul R (2001): The Politics of India since
Independence (Second Edition), Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, p 236.
Census of India Reports, Govt of India (Select
Volumes).
Dev, B J and D K Lahiri (1985): Assam Muslims:
Politics and Cohesion, Delhi: Mittal Publications,
pp 3, 1011.
Election Department Reports, Government of Assam.

Engineer, Asghar Ali (2003): Communal Challenges


and Secular Response, Delhi: Shipra Publications,
pp 17274.
The Foreigners Act, 1946, Act No 31 of 1946, 23
November.
Goswami, Sandhya and Monoj Kr Nath (2007):
Politics of Separatism in Assam, Indias 2004
Elections: Grass-roots and National Perspectives,
in Ramashray Roy and Paul Wallace (eds), New
Delhi: Sage Publications, pp 22939.
Hazarika, Sanjay (1994): Strangers of the Mist:
Tales of War and Peace from Indias North East,
New Delhi: Viking.
Hussain, Monirul (1993): The Assam Movement:
Class Ideology and Identity, New Delhi: Manak
Publishers.
Illegal Migrants (Determination by Tribunal) Act,
1983 (Repealed).
Kar, Makhanlal (1990): Muslims in Assam Politics,
Delhi: Omsons Publications, pp 35055, 36064.
Karim, Rejaul (2006): Asomor Sankhyaloghu
Rajnitir Uthan Aru Sodou Asom Satra Santha
(in Assamese) [Growth of Minority Politics in
Assam and All Assam Students Union],
Garima,Vol 1, No 6, October, pp 2527.
Misra, Udayan (1999): Identity Transformation
and the Assamese Community: Illusion and the
Reality in Kailash S Aggarwal (ed), Dynamics
of Identity and Intergroup Relations in Northeast
India, Shimla: Indian Institute of Advanced
Study, pp 98116.
Nath, Monoj Kumar (2013): Muslim Marginalization and Minority Policy in Assam, Looking
East, Probing Deep: Unraveling the SocioEconomic Realities of the North-East, Cotton
College, in Manoj Kr Talukdar and Jagadish
Dutta (eds), Guwahati: APPOCCUS, pp 8095.
(2013): Immigrant Muslims and Their SocioEconomic Position in Assam, Assam: Society,
Culture, History, Assam College Teachers
Association, in Subhash Barman (ed), Guwahati,
pp 22838.
(2014): Khilonjiar Songsoi, Musalmanor Atmosanman (in Assamese) (Threat of the Indigenous People and Dignity of the Muslims), Banalata, Guwahati, p 86.
(2015): Asomor Rajnitit Musalman: Biswas,
Bastob aru Sanghat (in Assamese) (Muslims in
Politics of Assam: Myth, Reality and Conflict),
Banalata, Guwahati, pp 14453, 27172.
Rehman, Mamuna (2005): Des Bivajan, Anuprabesh, Asom Andolan Etyadi: Noboi Bosoror
Sankhyaloghu Rajniti (in Assamese) (Division
of India, Immigration, Assam Movement etc:
Minority Politics of Ninety Years), Ityadi,
Dainik Janasadharan, Guwahati, 6 November,
pp 56.

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vol lI no 16

93

DISCUSSION

Gujarat Riots
Determining Perception from
Opinion Polls
Gautam Pingle

In Communal Riots in Gujarat:


Examining State Power and
Production of Marginality in
the Attempt to Constitute the
Past (EPW, 19 December 2015)
Pooja Bakshi seems to have had
access to the raw data and has
reclassified the responses to
draw some conclusions about
perceptions of Hindu versus
Muslim respondents as a proxy
for general Gujarati Hindu and
Muslim views. Her treatment
of the data raises serious
analytical issues. Keeping the
methodological infirmities in
view, this response examines
the strong conclusions derived
by Bakshi and suggests that the
same data can have alternate
explanations, albeit of a more
modest and tentative nature as
befits the data itself.

Speech was given to man to conceal his


thoughts (Talleyrand).

ujarat is not unfamiliar with


HinduMuslim communal riots.
The first recorded riot happened
in 1716 in Ahmedabad at the time of the
emperor Farrukhsiyar. J D B Gribble
(2002: 357) has mentioned in his book,
History of the Deccan,
It is remarkable that this is the first instance,
on record, of the Hindoos having taken up
arms in this matter since the commencement of the Mahomedan rule.

The trigger was a Hindu celebrating Holi


in front of a Muslims house and the
Muslim slaughtering a cow, in return.
More recently in 1969, there were
extensive riots and great loss of lives and
property which was triggered by Quran
and Ramayan desecration incidents,
and an attack on the Jagannath Temple
cows by Muslims.
In 1716, the emperor had other things
to worry about, so he did nothing. In
1969, a three-man commission of judges
headed by Justice Jaganmohan Reddy
of the Supreme Court inquired and submitted the report.1
The 2002 riots were different in the
sense that all the modern national and
international media gave extensive and
extended coverage and many official,
academic, activist and propaganda works
were published on every aspect of the
riots. This included the official Report
by the Commission of Inquiry consisting
of Justices G T Nanavati and Akshay
H Mehta (GOG 2008).
Perception Survey Problems

Gautam Pingle (gautam.pingle@gmail.com) is


an economist and public policy analyst based
in Hyderabad.

94

We have little idea of peoples perceptions either in 1713 or 1969. However,


the Gujarat pre-poll surveys (Lokniti
2007 and 2012) conducted by the Lokniti

unit of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies provide us with some
data on the reactions of Gujaratis to the
2002 Godhra train burning and the communal riots that followed. The Lokniti
(2007) and (2012) are available on the
Lokniti website, but the 2002 report2 is
unfortunately not available.
Though the Lokniti studies did not
distinguish between the Hindu and Muslim respondents in their studies, Pooja
Bakshi (Communal Riots in Gujarat:
Examining State Power and Production
of Marginality in the Attempt to Constitute the Past, EPW, 19 December 2015)
seems to have had access to the raw
data. She has reclassified the responses
to draw some conclusions about perceptions of Hindu versus Muslim respondents as a proxy for general Gujarati
Hindu and Muslim views. However, her
treatment of the data raises serious
analytical issues.
For a start, in such surveys, much depends on the way the questions were
framed and how the interviewees interpreted them before responding. Further,
changing perceptions can only be measured, if at all, if the questions and statements offered for responses are the
same across surveys. This manifestly is
not the case with these Lokniti surveys
with changes, deletions and additions
being made over time. More importantly, the problem with these perception
surveys is not so much the responses, as
the non-responses or negative responses
of the interviewees to the necessarily
leading questions or statements. Lastly,
the analysis of the responses depends on
the analysts approach to the subject.
Methodological Infirmities
These surveys were based on statistically
representative samples drawn from only
60 out of the 182 assembly constituencies in Gujarat. The sample is then representative of only one-third of the Gujarat
population3this must be borne in
mind during the discussion. Even so, any
extraction of subgroups from the sample
does not mean the data relating to these
subgroups will be representative of the
subgroup population as a whole. Thus,

APRIL 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

DISCUSSION

by extracting data of the responses of


Muslims from the sample data, these
responses cannot be said to be representative of the Muslim population of
even this is a limited sample. That is to
say, whatever statistical validity and
legitimacy that applies to the whole
sample cannot be extended to parts of
the sample.
This lack of statistical validity of the
Muslim subgroup in the main sample is
further compounded by the fact that the
Muslim population is unevenly distributed over Gujarat.4 To achieve a credible
Muslim sample, therefore, it would have
to be drawn from a sampling universe
containing exclusively the Muslim population of Gujarat. This would take care of
the spatial distribution of the Muslim
population.5 Generally, any statistically
credible comparison of data/responses
of any two (or more) populations would
have necessarily to be based on data/
responses of samples drawn separately
from two (or more) sampling universes,
each exclusively containing a homogeneous population.
Moreover, the 2007 pre-poll survey
sample consisted of 10.7% Muslim respondents (Lokniti 2007: 43) and the
2012 pre-poll survey sample accounted
for 6.1% Muslim respondents (Lokniti
2012: 40), while in 2011, the share of
Muslims in the total Gujarat population
was 9.67% (Census of India 2011) and
9.06% in 2001 (Census of India 2001).
Compared to the two census figures, this
suggests that the sample over-represented Muslims by nearly 11%18% in
2007, and worse, under-represented them
by huge 33%37% in 2012.6 This nonconformity of the Muslims proportions
in sample with their rightful population
share reinforces the methodological
weakness in the subgroup analysis.
These are serious statistical and methodological issues which disallow authenticity to comparison of data of subgroups
extracted from a representative sample
of any population universe. That this is
done regularly does not confer legitimacy
to the exercise.7 Keeping the above
methodological infirmities in view, we
examine the strong conclusions derived
by Bakshi and suggest that the same
data can have alternate explanations,
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

APRIL 16, 2016

albeit of a more modest and tentative


nature as befits the data itself.
Negative or Non-responses
First, Bakshi states that in the case of the
2002 pre-poll survey:
Seventy-three per cent of the people in
Gujarat had the opinion that the riots were
absolutely wrong. About 50% of the people
in Gujarat expressed the opinion that the
state government could not do enough to
control the riots. This shows that the people
in Gujarat condemned the riots (pp 6768)
(emphasis added).

One question is what proportion of


the remaining 50% is a negative or nonresponse? Either way this would be a
matter for concern as half the sample
avoided the strong condemnation.
Further, Bakshi neglects to inform the
readers that as per the earlier 2007 survey only 55% of the main sample thought
the riots were absolutely wrong, while
10% agreed with the opinion (suggestion) offered to them that something
was about to happen, but what happened
was a bit (much?) and 8.5% agreed with
the notion that whatever happened had
to happen, and it was also necessary.
However, 27% said they had no opinion or cant say (Lokniti 2007: 28). If
these choices also available in the 2002
survey, it would have allowed for comparisons with those of 2007. We are left

in ignorance on this score. But we do


know that the 2012 survey did not put
this section of statements to the respondents, which is again unfortunate.
We are also left to wonder why the
second sentence in the quote above
should have been left unresolvedsurely could not do enough is significantly
different from did not do enough. The
dispute over this issue was the main
political controversy all over the country
and abroad. This is so especially as the
2012 survey offered the unambiguously
direct statement for responses: if Modi
wanted he could have stopped the riots.
To this, the main sample respondents
responded by 43% agreeing, 27% by disagreeing and 30% saying they have no
opinion (Lokniti 2012: 14). A break-up
of these responses between Muslims and
Hindus would have been interesting, but
this is not provided. It is also a pity that
this very same statement was not put in
2002 and 2007 surveys for us to see if
the perceptions had changed over the
12-year period.
With regard to the 2002 pre-poll survey, Bakshi writes: More interestingly,
80% people said that the Godhra incident would not make any difference to
their vote preferences (p 68). Then she
says that in 2007 survey, across Hindus
and Muslims less than 10% people said

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vol lI no 16

95

DISCUSSION

that the governments role in procuring


justice for the victims of Gujarat riots
2002 would affect their choice of vote
(p 68). This implies that negative or nonresponses had declined from the 20%
(2002) to 10% (2007). How is this to be
interpreted? Is this then to be taken as
an evidence of popular satisfaction with
the Gujarat governments role by these
respondents during and after the riots?
Both in the case of the 73% of the
2002 sample and the 55% in the 2007
sample who thought the riots were absolutely wrong (and the balance res
ponses) as also in the case of the 80% to
90% who thought the riots would not
affect political outcomes, we need to

know the views of the Hindu and Muslim respondents separately to come to
any conclusion, however tentative.
Thus, Bakshis statement that the
people of Gujarat condemned the riots,
is subject to that fact that a quarter of
the people of Gujarat in 2002 did not
agree to the statement that the riots
were absolutely wrong or avoided
res
ponding to this leading statement.

This seems to have increased to 45% by


2007 (Lokniti 2007: 28). More importantly, the samples represent only onethird of the people of Gujarat.
Punishment
Second, as regards the survey question
whether those responsible for the riots
in 2002 should be punished, Bakshi
writes:
As Figure 1 shows, there is not much change
in the percentage of Hindus who agree
with this statement (in 2007, 67% Hindus
agreed with this statement, and in 2012,
66% Hindus agreed with this statement).
It is significant that a considerable portion
of the Hindus have the opinion that those
responsible for the riots in 2002 should be
punished. But the more interesting finding
is the considerable drop in the percentage
of Muslims (in 2007, 75% of Muslims agreed
with this statement, and in 2012, only 52%
Muslims agreed with this statement), minorities (in 2007, 72% of minorities agreed with
this statement and in 2012 only 49% of the
minorities agreed with this statement) have
the opinion that those responsible for the
riots in 2002 in Gujarat should be punished.
This is a clear reflection of the disbelief that
the Muslims and minorities have developed

in the processes of ensuring justice in this


given context (pp 6869).

The 2007 non-response or negative


response to the question whether the
rioters should be punished is that 6.6%
of the main representative sample disagreed and 25% had no opinion on the
matter (Lokniti 2007: 28). By 2012, the
responses to the same question was
9.7% disagreeing and 27% reporting no
opinion (Lokniti 2012: 21). This lack of
complete agreement to a straightforward and unambiguous question of punishment of those responsible for murder
is alarming, to say the least, and in terms
of policy is more significant than the
high positives.
Between the 2007 and 2012 surveys
and even earlier (since 2003), the legal
processes had moved forward, albeit at
the usual Indian pace. In February 2011,
the trial court convicted 31 Muslims (11
sentenced to death and the rest to life
imprisonment) for the killings in the
Godhra train burning. One feature of
that outcome was that the 63 others,
including the main accused Maulvi

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96

APRIL 16, 2016 vol lI no 16 EPW Economic & Political Weekly

DISCUSSION

Umarji of the Godhra station mosque


and Mohammad Kalota, then president
of Godhra Municipality, were acquitted
by the court. Further, in relation to the
murders that followed Godhra, between
2003 and August 2012, the Gujarat special
courts had handed out nine life sentences
and 25 various tenures of imprisonment
to Muslims, while 134 Hindus have received life sentences and 50 were given
jail sentences.8 Surely these judgments
would have had their effect one way
or the other on the Hindu and Muslim
respondents in the sample.
In the above context, Bakshis conclusion that this is a clear reflection of
the disbelief in Muslims and minorities
developed in the process for ensuring
justice in the judicial process between
2007 and 2012 is not acceptable. In fact,
Bakshis assumption is countered by the
2012 survey which gives responses to the
direct question: how much trust do you
have in Gujarats judiciary/courts? Almost 71% of the main sample answered
a great deal or somewhat; 14%
ticked not at all and 15% reported no
opinion (Lokniti 2012: 21). Bakshi needed to substantiate her remark that Muslims had developed a disbelief in the
judicial process by giving the breakdown
of these responses by religious groups.
All these responses could have been
made in the context of two separate
(though connected) issues: (i) the Godhra
train burning of Hindu karsevaks by the
accused Muslims and (ii) the communal
riots that followed when many Hindus
and Muslims were murdered in communal riots. It is possible that Muslim and
Hindu respondents in the sample may
have had different perceptions on these
separate issues, while responding to
questions which alternated bet ween
referring to the Godhra incident and
the riots.
Given that the Hindus in the sample
expressed a continued (between 2007
and 2011) and high (67%66%) level of
demand for punishment of those responsible, an alternate view could be taken
that these Hindus were still not satisfied
with the results of the criminal cases
relating to Godhra train burning murders,
while Muslims and minorities in the
sample were satisfied with the outcome
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

APRIL 16, 2016

of the legal processes relating to the


post-Godhra communal riots.

unrepresentative subgroups and coming


to non-credible conclusions.

An Odd Question

Notes

Third, Bakshi states:

Figure 2 represents the public opinion of


Hindus, Muslims and minorities in Gujarat
in 2007 and 2012 in response to the statementthe incidents which followed the
Godhra train burning in 2002; Hindus, Muslims and everyone should forget about it. A
significant section amongst the Hindus has
this opinion, and there is not much change
in the percentage of Hindus who have held
on to this opinion from 2007 (67%) to 2012
(66%). But over a period of years, a smaller
(sic) percentage of Muslims (in 2007, 71%
Muslims had this opinion and in 2012, 66%
Muslims had this opinion) and minorities
(in 2007, 69% of minorities had this opinion and in 2012, 59% of minorities had this
opinion) seem to have the opinion that the
incidents, which followed the Godhra incident, should be forgotten. The significant
aspect that emerges here is that the majority
of people across religions in Gujarat seem to
think that the riots of 2002 need to be forgotten (p 69).

It was a very odd question. In 2007


Survey, it was Whatever happened in
Godhra and after that HinduMuslims
and everyone should forget it, and in
2012 survey, Hindus and Muslims
should forget what happened in Godhra
and after it (emphasis added). The
questions included both the Godhra
train burning and the riots, while Bakshi
(p 69) gives the impression it is only the
incidents, which followed the Godhra
incidentthat is, only the communal
riotsthat was placed before the respondents. This obviously is not the case.
Further, 24% (Lokniti 2007: 28) and 21%
(Lokniti 2012: 23) of the main sample
returned Dont Know to this statement and it would have been useful, if
Bakshi had told us how many of them
were Muslims and how many Hindus
were there.
The author has a subhead at the end:
Can There Be Multiple Conclusions?
What Is New? As for the multiple
conclusions, we have illustrated that
possibility in three important issues
based on the same data. What is not
new is the methodological infirmity
in the continuing practice of splicing up
statistically representative samples into

vol lI no 16

7
8

Government of Gujarat (1971), Justices Pingle


Jagamohan Reddy, Nusserwanji K Vakil and
Akbar S Sarela, Report of the Inquiry on Communal Disturbances at Ahmadabad and at Various Places in the State of Gujarat, 2 volumes,
Ahmadabad: Home Department.
The 2002 pre-poll and post-poll studies are not
available. The questionnaire is available, but
only in Hindi. Bakshi has not distinguished the
2002 responses between those of Muslims and
Hindus in that sample. This is regrettable as
the 2002 study was conducted shortly after the
Godhra train burning and communal riots that
followed it. She needs to explain the reason for
this serious omission.
This is not unreasonable as the delimitation
commissions draw assembly constituency borders to ensure that the population sizes in the
constituencies are similar.
The ratio of Muslim population to total district
population varies between 1.57% (the Dangs)
and 22.15% (Bharuch). Of Gujarats 26 districts,
16 have Muslim population ratios below the
state average of 9.67% (Census of India 2011,
available at: http://www.census2011.co.in/
census/state/districtlist/gujarat.html), accessed
on 23 December 2015.
In the case of Hindus, their share of the population is large (89%) and widely spread so that
any representative sample of the population as
whole can serve as a sample of the Hindu population within standard error limits. Of course,
it would be better, methodologically speaking,
to draw a sample only from the Hindu population to achieve full credibility.
Hindus share in the two samples is in line with
their population share. Minorities (classified as
Jains, Christians and Sikhs) in both the sample
do not exceed 2%, with the Jains the overwhelming part of this group. However, Jains in
the two samples are over-represented (with
1.5%) compared to their 2011 population figure
of 0.95% and Christians under-represented at
0.10% compared to their 2011 population of
0.52%. Sikhs are fairly represented at 0.10% in
the samples in relation to their share in the
population (Census of India 2011).
For further discussion on this see Pingle (2014).
Wikipedia and related media sources.

References
Government of Gujarat (2008): Report by the
Commission of Inquiry consisting of Justices
G T Nanavati and Akshay H Mehta, Ahmedabad: Government of Gujarat, 18 September.
Gribble, J D B (2002): History of the Deccan, New
Delhi: Rupa Publications.
Lokniti (2007): Pre-Poll Survey of Gujarat Assembly Elections Report, prepared by LoknitiCentre for the Study of Developing Societies,
New Delhi, available at: http://www.lokniti.
org/ pdfs_dataunit/Questionairs/ Gujarat%20
pre%20poll%202007-report.pdf, accessed on
25 December 2015.
(2012): Pre-Poll Survey of Gujarat Assembly
Elections Report, 2012, prepared by LoknitiCentre for the Study of Developing Societies,
New Delhi, available at: http://www.lokniti.
org/pdfs_dataunit/Questionairs/gujarat-prepoll-2012-survey-fi ndings.pdf, accessed on 25
December 2015.
Pingle, G (2014): Hindu-Muslim Rural Household
Income Comparisons, Journal of Indian School
of Political Economy, Vol 26, Nos 14.

97

CURRENT STATISTICS

EPW Research Foundation

Wholesale Price Index

Foreign TradeMerchandise

The year-on-year (y-o-y) inflation rate based on WPI dropped for the 16th month
in a row to -0.9% in February 2016, compared to -2.2% in February 2015. The
index for primary articles inched up by 1.6% in February 2016 against 1% in
February 2015, but the inflation rate for food articles was 3.4% compared to
7.8% last year. The index for fuel and power fell by (-)6.4% in February 2016
compared to -14.8% a year ago, whereas for manufactured products it declined
by (-)0.6% in February 2016 against a moderate increase of 0.3% in February
last year.

The merchandise trade deficit narrowed to $6.5 billion (bn) in February 2016
from $7.6 bn in January 2016 and $6.7 bn, a year ago. Exports dipped for the
15th month in a row in February 2016 by (-)5.7% to $20.7 bn from $22 bn in
February 2015, while imports shrank by (-)5% to $27.3 bn from $28.7 bn. Oil
and non-oil imports stood at $4.8 bn and $22.5 bn in February 2016 compared
to $6.1 bn and $22.6 bn a year ago. During AprilFebruary 201516, the
trade deficit narrowed to $113.4 bn from $126.3 bn during the same period
last year.

Consumer Price Index

Index of Industrial Production

The CPI inflation rate stood at a four-month low of 5.2% in February 2016
against 5.7% in January 2016 as the consumer food price index was lower at
5.3% compared to 6.9% a month ago. The CPI-rural inflation rate decreased to
6% in February 2016 compared to 6.5% in January 2016. The CPI-urban inflation
rate was down to 4.3% in February 2016 against 4.8% in the last month. As per
Labour Bureau data, CPI inflation for agricultural labourers increased to 5% in
February 2016 against 5.6% in January 2016, and industrial workers recorded
5.5% February 2016 compared to 5.9% in January 2016.

The y-o-y growth rate in IIP dipped to -1.5% in January 2016 compared to 2.8% in
January 2015, with manufacturing segment of IIP contracting by (-)2.8% against 3.4%
a year ago. The IIP for mining registered moderate growth of 1.2% in January 2016
compared to (-)1.8% in January 2015, and for electricity generation grew by 6.6%
against 3.3% last year. As per use-based classification, the IIP for capital goods declined
substantially by (-)20.4% in January 2016 against 12.4% in January 2015. Consumer
durable goods grew by 5.8% in January 2016 compared to (-)5.7% in January 2015
and growth of consumer non-durable goods fell by 3.1% against 0.3% a year ago.

Movement of WPI Inflation AprilFebruary

Merchandise Trade February 2016

Year-on-Year in %

February 2016
($ bn)

Exports
Imports
Trade deficit

Over Month
(%)

20.7
27.3
6.5

Over Year
(%)

-1.6
-5.0
-14.4

(AprilFebruary)
(201516 over 201415) (%)

-5.7
-5.0
-3.0

-16.7
-14.7
-10.2

Data is provisional. Source: Ministry of Commerce and Industry.


0

Components of Trade AprilFebruary of 201415 and 201516


-0.91%

290

$286 billion
Exports

-2.17%

-3

$238 billion

-6
April

May

June

July

August September October November December January * February*

* Data is provisional.

$126 billion
Trade Deficit

Trends in WPI and Its Components February 2016* (%)


Weights

All commodities
Primary articles
Food articles
Fuel and power
Manufactured products

Over Month

100
20.1
14.3
14.9
65.0

Financial Year (Averages)


201213 201314 201415

Over Year

-1.0
-3.4
-3.2
-1.2
0.3

-0.9
1.6
3.4
-6.4
-0.6

7.4
9.8
9.9
10.3
5.4

$78 billion
$113 billion

$131 billion
Oil Imports

6.0
9.8
12.8
10.2
3.0

2.0
3.0
6.1
-0.9
2.4

-290

$274 billion

$282 billion
Non-oil Imports

Oil refers to crude petroleum and petroleum products, while non-oil refers to all other commodities.

Movement of IIP Growth AprilJanuary

* Data is provisional; Base: 200405=100; Source: Ministry of Commerce and Industry.

Year-on-Year in %

Movement of CPI Inflation April 2014February 2016

12

Year-on-Year in %
8

Consumer Food

2.8%
6

5.3%
5.2%
4.4%

CPI
3

-1.5%
-4

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November December

January *

* January 2016 are quick estimates; Base: 200405=100.

Miscellaneous

Industrial Growth: Sector-wise January 2016* (%)

0
April M
2014

Jan F
2015

D Jan* F*
2016

* Data is provisional.
Source: Central Statistics Office (CSO), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation, Base: 2012=100.

CPI: Rural and Urban February 2016* (%)


Latest
Month Index

Over
Month

Over
Year

Financial Year (Avgs)


201314 201415

Rural (2012=100)

127.8

-0.2

6.0

9.6

6.2

Urban (2012=100)

123.8

-0.3

4.3

9.2

5.7

CPI: Occupation-wise
Industrial workers (2001=100)

267

-0.7

5.5

9.7

6.3

Agricultural labourers (198687=100)

843

-0.7

5.0

11.6

6.6

* Provisional. Source: CSO (rural and urban), Labour Bureau (IW and AL).

Weights

Over
Month

100
14.2
75.5
10.3

1.4
0.9
1.3
2.8

-1.5
1.2
-2.8
6.6

-0.1
-0.6
-0.8
6.1

2.8
1.4
2.3
8.4

45.7
8.8
15.7
29.8
8.5
21.3

1.7
-1.3
0.9
2.1
7.7
-0.9

1.8
-20.4
2.7
0.0
5.8
-3.1

2.1
-3.6
3.1
-2.8
-12.2
4.8

7.0
6.4
1.7
-3.4
-12.6
2.8

General index
Mining
Manufacturing
Electricity

Over Year

Financial Year (Avgs)


201314
201415

Industrial Growth: Use-based


Basic goods
Capital goods
Intermediate goods
Consumer goods
Consumer durables
Consumer non-durables

* January 2016 are quick estimates; Base: 200405=100; Source: Central Statistics Office.

Comprehensive current economic statistics with regular weekly updates are available at: http://www.epwrf.in/currentstat.aspx.

98

APRIL 16, 2016

vol LI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

CURRENT STATISTICS

EPW Research Foundation

Indias Quarterly Estimates of Final Expenditures on GDP


201415
Rs crore | at 201112 Prices

Q1

Private final consumption expenditure


Government final consumption expenditure
Gross fixed capital formation
Change in stocks
Valuables
Net Trade (Exportimport)
Exports
Less Imports
Discrepancies
Gross domestic product (GDP)

Q2

1406817
294338
832420
48976
42871
-40831
620869
661700
-49687
2534903

(8.2)
(9.0)
(8.3)
(23.0)
(16.3)

1422029
322557
828754
48434
38194
-55355
625875
681230
-36835
2567778

(11.6)
(-0.6)
(7.5)

Q3

(9.2)
(15.4)
(2.2)
(20.6)
(0.3)
(1.1)
(4.6)
(8.3)

1495823
261886
843733
45077
37174
-45813
636468
682281
21305
2659185

Q4

(1.5)
(33.2)
(3.7)
(16.0)
(10.8)

1539614
223826
903344
52520
55036
-13989
625190
639179
29933
2790285

(2.0)
(5.7)
(6.6)

201516
Q2

Q1

(6.6)
(-3.3)
(5.4)
(21.6)
(32.2)

1496865
297285
875840
50641
47906
-43945
584770
628715
1870
2726461

(-6.3)
(-6.1)
(6.7)

(6.4)
(1.0)
(13.8)
(20.7)
(15.4)

1501895
336578
891606
50894
47703
-58970
598797
657767
-3536
2766170

(-2.0)
(-0.4)
(7.6)

Q3

(5.6)
(4.3)
(14.7)
(26.4)
(28.9)

1591508
274071
867229
48907
47749
-31889
576676
608565
54763
2852339

(-4.7)
(-4.8)
(7.8)

(6.4)
(4.7)
(9.8)
(30.5)
(32.6)
(-5.1)
(-6.1)
(6.9)

Indias Overall Balance of Payments (Net): Quarterly and Annual


201415 ($ mn)
Q4

Q3

Current account
Merchandise
Invisibles
Services
of which: Software services
Transfers
of which: Private
Income
Capital Account
of which: Foreign investment
Overall Balance

-7721
-38635
30913
19982
17844
16428
16521
-5497
22864
13194
13182

Q1

-645
-31560
30916
20116
18625
16425
16600
-5625
30023
22993
30149

201516 ($ mn)
Q2

-6147
-34181
28035
17750
17556
16153
16267
-5868
18595
10308
11430

-8748
-37425
28677
17897
18029
16263
16421
-5483
8576
3198
-856

201415 (Rupees bn)


Q3
Q4

Q3

-7081
-34004
26923
18083
18418
15250
15305
-6409
10536
10576
4056

-478 [-1.5]
-2393
1915
1238
1105
1017
1023
-340
1416 [4.5]
817
816 [2.6]

201516 (Rupees bn)


Q2

Q1

-40 [-0.1]
-1964
1924
1252
1159
1022
1033
-350
1869 [5.6]
1431
1876 [5.7]

-390 [-1.2]
-2,170
1,779
1,127
1,114
1,025
1,033
-372
1,180 [3.7]
640
725 [2.3]

Q3

-568 [-1.7]
-2432
1863
1163
1171
1057
1067
-356
557 [1.7]
427
-56 [-0.2]

-467 [-1.3]
-2242
1775
1192
1214
1005
1009
-423
695 [2.0]
711
267 [0.8]

Figures in square brackets are percentage to GDP.

Foreign Exchange Reserves


Excluding gold but including revaluation effects

Rs crore
US $ mn

Variation
1 April
2016

3 April
2015

31 Mar
2016

2226250
337189

2018890
322664

2229020
337605

Over
Month

Financial Year So Far


201617
201516

Over
Year

26180
8234

207360
14524

-2770
-417

Monetary Aggregates
Rs crore

Money supply (M3) as on 18 March


Components
Currency with public
Demand deposits
Time deposits
Other deposits with RBI
Sources
Net bank credit to government
Bank credit to commercial sector
Net foreign exchange assets
Banking sectors net non-monetary liabilities
Reserve money as on 1 April 2016 *
Components
Currency in circulation
Bankers deposits with RBI
Other deposits with RBI
Sources
Net RBI credit to Government
of which: Centre
RBI credit to banks & commercial sector
Net foreign exchange assets of RBI
Govts currency liabilities to the public
Net non-monetary liabilities of RBI

Outstanding
2016

Over Month

11633540

52770 (0.5)

Over Year
201415

1089320 (10.3)

8490
1356

201112

201213

108086
-14361

82800
-485

Variation
Financial Year So Far
201516

1026840 (10.8)

201213

1087990 (10.3)

1024980 (13.9)

Financial Year
201314

251570
16769

201415

201516

322660
40486

218620
16297

Financial Year
201314

1127560 (13.4)

201415

1028170 (10.8)

1593900
997510
9028610
13520

35550
49070
-18240
-13610

(2.3)
(5.2)
(-0.2)
(-50.2)

207590
106010
771160
4550

(15.0)
(11.9)
(9.3)
(50.7)

140490
79520
799830
7000

(11.3)
(9.8)
(10.7)
(355.3)

207550
106770
774740
-1070

(15.0)
(12.0)
(9.4)
(-7.3)

118420
42240
863900
420

(11.6)
(5.9)
(15.3)
(14.9)

104760
58760
965330
-1270

(9.2)
(7.8)
(14.9)
(-39.2)

140530
78760
796250
12620

(11.3)
(9.7)
(10.7)
(640.6)

3233290
7803400
2486730
1911200
2181110

-91590
109210
-23920
-59070
117530

(-2.8)
(1.4)
(-1.0)
(-3.0)
(5.7)

226550
770380
254150
163640
349030

(7.5)
(11.0)
(11.4)
(9.4)
(19.1)

-38130
587730
308640
-166510
-96380

(-1.3)
(9.1)
(16.0)
(-8.7)
(-5.0)

227130
763820
236090
140930
370

(7.6)
(10.9)
(10.5)
(8.0)
(0.0)

337320
709420
92880
116530
217860

(14.2)
(14.3)
(6.0)
(7.7)
(14.4)

335850
777430
287280
275010
195710

(12.4)
(13.7)
(17.6)
(16.8)
(11.3)

-38710
594290
326700
-143800
252280

(-1.3)
(9.2)
(17.0)
(-7.5)
(13.1)

1663460
502560
15080
425330
425290
304540
2380710
21910
951380

28620 (1.8)
86690 (20.8)
2210 (17.2)
-99310
-99330
185080
26720
600
-4420

(-18.9)
(-18.9)
(154.9)
(1.1)
(2.8)
(-0.5)

214680 (14.8)
108540 (27.5)
25810 (-240.5)
47060
47000
203300
245090
2480
148890

(12.4)
(12.4)
(200.8)
(11.5)
(12.8)
(18.6)

470 (0.0)
-71540 (-15.4)
-25310 (-173.6)
13750
17250
-101270
8340
0
17210

(3.8)
(4.8)
(-50.0)
(0.4)
(0.0)
(2.2)

0 (0.0)
740 (0.1)
-370 (-2.4)
340
730
0
-2770
0
-2790

(0.1)
(0.2)
(0.0)
(-0.1)
(0.0)
(-0.3)

110090 (9.2)
109020 (34.0)
-1280 (-39.5)

147240 (11.3)
35860 (8.3)
12620 (643.9)

215150 (14.9)
36260 (7.8)
870 (6.0)

108120
107150
14070
244460
2000
150810

-334180
-336610
145030
324760
2090
-58040

60470
63520
102030
256200
2480
168890

(18.3)
(18.1)
(32.4)
(15.7)
(13.0)
(21.8)

(-47.8)
(-48.2)
(0.0)
(18.0)
(12.1)
(-6.9)

(16.6)
(17.6)
(0.0)
(12.0)
(12.8)
(21.5)

* The value of column 201516 correspond to 201617 and those of 201415 correspond to 201516, 201314 correspond to 201415 and 201213 to 201314.

Scheduled Commercial Banks Indicators (Rs crore)


Outstanding
2016

(As on 18 March 2016)

Aggregate deposits
Demand
Time
Cash in hand
Balance with RBI
Investments
of which: Government securities
Bank credit
of which: Non-food credit

8 April
2016

S&P BSE SENSEX (Base: 197879=100)


S&P BSE-100 (Base: 198384=100)
S&P BSE-200 (198990=100)
CNX Nifty (Base: 3 Nov 1995=1000)
Net FII Investment in equities (US $ Million)*

24674
7668
3199
7555
166631

Over Year
201415

9378650
898440
8480220
57890
387440
2639890
2638400
7277650
7172400

Capital Markets

Variation
Over Month

(-14.1)
(-13.5)
(-12.2)
(-13.3)
(-1.1)

27400
48800
-21380
0
330
-77170
-76930
104910
107440

(0.3)
(5.7)
(-0.3)
(0.0)
(0.1)
(-2.8)
(-2.8)
(1.5)
(1.5)

Month
Ago

24659
7583
3153
7485
163692

845360
104410
740960
4530
14370
148070
148650
741230
730400

(9.9)
(13.1)
(9.6)
(8.5)
(3.9)
(5.9)
(6.0)
(11.3)
(11.3)

Year
Ago

28708
8862
3644
8714
168504

(26.5)
(30.1)
(33.9)
(28.2)
(11.9)

827730
80110
747620
7490
56730
279000
278560
542320
546350

Financial Year So Far


201516

(10.7)
(11.2)
(10.7)
(16.3)
(17.9)
(12.6)
(12.6)
(9.0)
(9.3)

845360
104410
740960
4530
14370
148070
148650
741230
730400

201213

(9.9)
(13.1)
(9.6)
(8.5)
(3.9)
(5.9)
(6.0)
(11.3)
(11.3)

Financial Year So Far


Trough
Peak

201516
Trough
Peak

24674
7656
3193
7546
-

22952
7051
2938
6971
-

25400
7859
3271
7759
-

29044
8980
3691
8834
-

841360
36970
804400
4360
-41000
268320
268640
648610
633490

(14.2)
(5.9)
(15.2)
(12.1)
(-12.7)
(15.4)
(15.5)
(14.1)
(14.0)

201314

22386
6707
2681
6704
149745

(18.8)
(18.1)
(17.2)
(18.0)
(9.9)

Financial Year
201314

955110
51620
903480
5380
34080
206720
207540
733640
731610

(14.1)
(7.8)
(14.8)
(13.3)
(12.1)
(10.3)
(10.4)
(13.9)
(14.2)

End of Financial Year


201415

27957
8607
3538
8491
168116

(24.9)
(28.3)
(31.9)
(26.7)
(12.3)

201415

827730
80110
747620
7490
56730
279000
278560
542320
546350

(10.7)
(11.2)
(10.7)
(16.3)
(17.9)
(12.6)
(12.6)
(9.0)
(9.3)

201516

25342
7835
3259
7738
166107

(-9.4)
(-9.0)
(-7.9)
(-8.9)
(-1.2)

* = Cumulative total since November 1992 until period end | Figures in brackets are percentage variations over the specified or over the comparable period of the previous year | (-) = not relevant | - = not available | NS = new series | PE = provisional estimates
Comprehensive current economic statistics with regular weekly updates are available at: http://www.epwrf.in/currentstat.aspx.

Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

APRIL 16, 2016

vol LI no 16

99

1 Settlement Volume of Government Securities Transactions


Settlement
Period

Mar 2016
Mar 2015
201516*
201415*

Outright

Repo
Volume
(Rs Cr)

Number
of Trades

Volume
(Rs Cr)

89747
67027
883167
977948

967140
747618
9728541
10156162

12964
9625
135623
109391

1478570
1360107
17249279
15735514

4487
3192
3665
4126

4 Tenor-wise Settlement Volume of Central


Government Dated Securities
Year

APRIL 16, 2016

2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
2026
2027
2028
2029
2030
2031
2032
2033
2034
2035
2036
2037
2038
2039
2040
2041
2042
2043
2044
2045
2055
Total

Mar 2016

7291
9741
14278
35963
167733
7581
12705
61646
25367
78736
158633
12922
3428
133714
97491
0
3997
2157
6256
605
97
0
0
87
1704
1218
1982
2833
4863
3300
0
856328

201516*

53705
67668
70619
141427
1067139
56114
127163
745384
1635838
1734883
627060
96188
381777
253843
1145744
0
48377
61163
33843
2644
4767
0
0
128
15394
9233
19942
19624
58764
44793
1623
8524847

2 Netting Factor

Daily Average (Outright)


Number
Volume
of Trades
(Rs Cr)

Number
of Trades

48357
35601
40367
42853

589
418
490
381

67208
59135
62272
54828

3 Instrument-wise Break-up of Securities Transactions (Rs Cr)

a Securities
Net
Netting
(Rs Cr)
Factor (%)

Gross
(Rs Cr)

2445710
2107725
26977725
25891676

943950
932351
10438154
10026109

61.40
55.77
61.31
61.28

Gross
(Rs Cr)

b Funds
Net
(Rs Cr)

Netting
Factor (%)

2479913
2174359
27433525
26141572

401681
431825
4352880
4216733

83.80
80.14
84.13
83.87

17306
21889
10314
184966
954359
10196
250208
2420760
2174126
14402
209265
571746
1936526
0
104345
0
39490
16241
976
2105
4494
0
0
36
17034
12432
41029
56236
17365
0
0
9087846

< 5 Cr
% to Total
Trades

(0.19)
(0.24)
(0.11)
(2.04)
(10.50)
(0.11)
(2.75)
(26.64)
(23.92)
(0.16)
(2.30)
(6.29)
(21.31)
(0.00)
(1.15)
(0.00)
(0.43)
(0.18)
(0.01)
(0.02)
(0.05)
(0.00)
(0.00)
(0.00)
(0.19)
(0.14)
(0.45)
(0.62)
(0.19)
(0.00)
(0.00)
(100)

vol lI no 16

< 1 mn

Mar 2016
201516*

a Outright Trades
Treasury
Bills

856328
663521
8557672
9149608

63492
61952
854390
823470

Mar 2016
201516*

5.10
3.48

5 Cr
% to Total
Value

% to Total
Trades

% to Total
Value

0.66
0.43

59.65
60.18

27.67
27.32

> 5 Cr <=10 Cr
% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

19.22
20.28

>10 Cr<=20 Cr
% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

17.78
18.37

5.46
5.55

8.63
8.56

Category

Outright

Reverse Repo
(Funds Lending)

Cooperative Banks
Financial Institutions
Foreign Banks
Insurance Companies
Mutual Funds
Others
Primary Dealers
Private Sector Banks
Public Sector Banks
Total

3.80
0.13
27.65
2.03
9.86
3.07
11.81
17.07
24.59
100.00

0.39
1.10
27.88
9.69
35.58
0.00
4.98
12.06
8.31
100.00

Period

Buy
CBLO
Lending

Uncollateralised
Money Market
Lending@

Forex

31.97
7.02
0.04
17.32
43.66
100.00

0.32
0.00
41.05
24.60
34.03
100.00

2.98
3.32
4.44
15.46
56.98
7.04
0.15
3.09
6.55
100.00

Outright

Repo

3.87
1.54
0.18
0.00
25.71 20.81
1.38
0.16
11.89
0.14
2.65 16.44
12.66 31.06
14.46
16.16
27.20 13.69
100.00 100.00

OTC

Sell
CBLO
Borrowing

2.26
9.56
6.86
0.25
9.73
15.22
4.12
19.19
32.82
100.00

Trades

% Share

7422
5812
60560

8.44
8.59
6.86

Value (Rs Cr)

% Share

Trades

20.56
22.08
19.42

80498
61847
822803

196615
165957
1891410

% Share

NDS-OM
Value (Rs Cr)

% Share

92
91
93

759500
585791
7846591

79.44
77.92
80.58

11 Type-wise Settlement Volume of Government Securities Transactions (Rs crore)


Outright

Period
Proprietary
Trades
Volume

Mar 2016
Mar 2015
201516*

74952
58474
786932

% to Total
Value

% to Total
Trades

35.52
33.13

5.38
5.03

39.71
42.61

% to Total
Value

13.35
14.63

793659
658318
8653526

> 1 mn <= 5 mn
% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

11.70
16.25

10.58
10.51

Trades

Economic & Political Weekly

(Rs Cr)

Mar 2016
201516*

3017
29214

Tom
Value
(US $Mn)

552448
5512112

Repo
Constituent
Trades
Volume

Proprietary
Trades
Volume

Constituent
Trades
Volume

14795
8553
96235

6135
4540
65011

279
249
2825

173481
89300
1075014

9.63
17.33

> 5 mn <= 10 mn
% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

0.48
3.06

Trades
(Rs Cr)

Uncollateralised
Money Market
Borrowing@

Forex

0.82
13.57
23.23
35.29
27.09
100.00

0.30
0.00
41.52
24.67
33.50
100.00

Mar 2016

Mar 2015

Value
(US $ Mn)

Trades

201516*

201415*

Settlement Period

State
Govt

153117
253084
2248204
3259007

12266
10800
142765
144343

685442
639276
8167673

45023
37681
453992

1.16
10.01

> 10 mn <= 20 mn
% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

0.80
1.40

> 20 mn
% to Total
Trades

% to Total
Value

11.79
3.55

66.50
44.70

3.99
8.30

Forward
Value

Trades

(Rs Cr)

(US $ Mn)

1695492
17113232

252142
2613073

(Rs Cr)

Total
Value
(US $ Mn)

Trades

9686 680232 100389 180215


103967 6665777 1017190 1885129

(Rs Cr)

Value
(US $ Mn)

Trades

Average
Value
(Rs Cr) (US $ Mn)

3607676 536206 9011 180384


35925694 5489286 8056 153529

26810
23458

< 30 Days
% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

> 30 Days & <= 90 Days


% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

Mar 2016

Mar 2015

201516*

201415*

67.19
81.12
87.09
90.69

82.37
88.98
92.67
95.53

66.26
82.74
88.47
91.80

79.28
91.80
96.45
97.74

8 Market Share of Top Five Members


(Category-wise) (%)
Categories

Mar 2016

Mar 2015

201516*

54.74
87.43
47.39
79.12
66.14
91.03

29.95
43.64
23.96
52.11
34.54
40.83

60.56
86.10
50.22
83.16
63.90
89.18

Cooperative Banks
Foreign Banks
Public Sector Banks
Private Sector Banks
Mutual Funds
Primary Dealers

9 Market Share of Top n Members (%)


Period

Top 5
Top 10
Top 15
Top 20

Mar 2016

Mar 2015

201516*

201415*

29.49
45.20
55.27
62.12

29.76
46.65
57.18
65.48

32.08
48.64
58.60
65.67

31.06
46.52
56.59
64.50

12 Settlement Volume of Collateralised Borrowing and Lending Obligations (CBLO)


Period

Overnight
Number
Volume
of Trades
(Rs Crore)

Mar 2016
201516*

14484
184915

1241750
15480390

13 Top 5 SecuritiesBasket Repo


Security

7.28% GS 2019
7.83% GS 2018
6.35% GS 2020
8.12% GS 2020
21/07/2016 Maturing 364 DTB

Term
Number
Volume
of Trades
(Rs Crore)

2867
30236

17351
215151

1447788
17833529

14 Top 5 SecuritiesSpecial Repo

Value

Rate

Security

154
136
138
133
38

29436
29360
26522
13431
11329

7.03
7.02
7.04
7.03
6.80

7.72% GS 2025
7.59% GS 2026
7.88% GS 2030
8.27% GS 2020
7.68% GS 2023

Trades

Value

Rate

705
428
391
225
286

75798
46682
32804
20630
14659

6.73
6.96
6.69
6.95
6.79

16 Category-wise Forex ActivityDeal Type


Category

Gross
(US $ Mn)

536206
5489286

Netting Factor: Forex


Net
Netting
(US $ Mn)
Factor (%)

24053
250784

95.51
95.43

Foreign Banks
Public Sector Banks
Private Sector Banks
Cooperative Banks
Financial Institutions

Cash

Tom

Spot

Forward

38.62
34.13
26.75
0.48
0.02

42.81
30.79
26.05
0.35
0.00

40.14
36.38
23.14
0.33
0.00

44.80
29.89
25.21
0.09
0.00

20 Forex Trading Platform: FX Clear (Amount in US$)


Period

> 90 Days & <= 180 Days


% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

Total
Number
Volume
of Trades
(Rs Crore)

206038
2353139

Trades

19 Tenor-wise Forward Trade Analysis (%)

18 Market ShareForex (%)


Period

Spot

82440 4504 679505 101235 163008


843416 43890 6634573 1015607 1708058

565082
413073
6230697
4471896

b Repo
Treasury
Bills

> 180 Days & <= 365 Days


% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

> 1 Year
% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

Spot
Trades

Value

Daily Average
Trades
Value

Mar 2016
47541
25583
2377
1279
Top 5
29.27
28.95
29.29
29.05
Mar 2015
37270
20620
1775
982
Top 10
48.82
48.54
49.46
49.51
Mar 2016
18.51
24.97
20.48
26.25
13.10
12.10
44.13
32.74
3.78
3.94
201516*
453562 246902
1882
1024
Top 15
62.67
62.75
63.40
64.62
Mar 2015
16.22
23.98
16.39
17.49
15.50
13.74
48.27
40.97
3.61
3.81
201415*
335515 188421
1416
795
Top 20
72.97
73.69
73.98
74.95
201516*
15.85
23.40
18.62
21.88
14.23
11.94
48.11
40.06
3.18
2.73
* Data pertains to April 2015March 2016. @: Call and term money segment. (i) Figures in brackets are percentage to total, (ii) Tables 1 to 11 relate to Government Securities Market, (iii) Tables 12 to 14 relate to Money Market, and (iv) Tables 15 to 20 relate to Forex Market. Source: Clearing Corporation of India Limited (CCIL).

EPW Research Foundation

EPW

Cash

47320
22145
316479
183083

Top 5
Top 10
Top 15
Top 20

45.25
45.32

15 Forex Settlement
Settlement Period

Central Govt
Dated

Period

10 Trading Platform Analysis of Outright Trades

1 mn

% to Total
Trades

> 20 Cr
% to Total
% to Total
Trades
Value

7 Intercategory Member Turnover Activity for All Category

Mar 2016
Mar 2015
201516*

State
Govt

6 Market Share of Top n Securities (%)

Settlement Period

17 Forex Deal Size Analysis (%)


Settlement Period

Central Govt
Dated

5 Deal Size Analysis (%)

201415*

(0.63)
(0.79)
(0.83)
(1.66)
(12.52)
(0.66)
(1.49)
(8.74)
(19.19)
(20.35)
(7.36)
(1.13)
(4.48)
(2.98)
(13.44)
(0.00)
(0.57)
(0.72)
(0.40)
(0.03)
(0.06)
(0.00)
(0.00)
(0.00)
(0.18)
(0.11)
(0.23)
(0.23)
(0.69)
(0.53)
(0.02)
(100)

Daily Average (Repo)


Number
Volume
of Trades
(Rs Cr)

CURRENT STATISTICS

100

Secondary Market Transactions in Government Securities, Forex Market and Money MarketMarch 2016

POSTSCRIPT
LANGUAGE

The Unbearable Freshness of Things


In this age when everything is getting increasingly glocal, small-town Indias rummy appropriation of the
English language is, By God se, downright amusing.
ShobHit Mahajan

by Ravalgaon Sweets. For adults, these were the preferred


he small town in Bihar where we had stopped for
remedy for motion sickness.
the night exuded an old-world charm. The chowkidar
Holsol and lumsum are two expressions which were
at the Circuit House was courteous and suitably
not in frequent use earlier but are now used extensively, esobsequious. He asked me to go and become fresh and
pecially by artisans and shopkeepers. The meaning conveyed
then he would lay out dinner since it was already late.
by holsol is not quite the same as its homophone, whole
Assuming that he wanted me to have a wash, I promptly
sole. It is commonly used to refer to the whole of things rather
went and washed my face and came out for dinner in
than a single agency with complete control. Thus, Holsol
under two minutes. I could not figure out the extremely
mein 4 din ka kaam hai. Similarly, lumsum means slightly
surprised expression on his face but decided to ignore it.
different from its basic root of lump sum. It typically refers
It was only much later that I found out that fresh hona
to an approximation rather than a sum. Thus, Lumsum mein
in eastern India is the polite cognate for evacuation of
50 rupaiye lagenge.
the bowels!
Words or expressions also undergo an evolution with
Interestingly, the mobility of people from the East, espetime in terms of their context. My favourite example is the
cially in the last few decades, has ensured that this expresuse of the word local to describe an inferior, non-brand
sion is now commonly understood even in North India. Or
name product. Thus, earlier one could either buy
why else would a popular laxative chooran adWords or
a cheap local fan or mixie (itself a strange
vertise itself as Easyfresh?
expressions also
word for a mixer!) or buy one from Murphy (of
But this was not always the case. Expressions,
undergo an
especially those derived from English, have evolution with time the chubby-cheeked boy fame) or the time-tested
Bajaj. But now things seem to have become
changed. When I was growing up in the 1960s
in terms of their
inverted. The other day when I went to buy
and 1970s in the small, dusty town of Gurgaon
context. My
an electronic call bell, the shopkeeper offered a
(yes, hard it may be to believe that the Cybercity
favourite example is
local one for `100 while a branded one was
was once indeed a truly small town)there were
the use of the word
going for `175. This seemed alright till I realised
several English words which were common
local used to
that the local one was made in China and the
currency. These were used by everyone, includdescribe an inferior, branded one was made in Uttarakhand! Maybe
ing those who had no idea whatsoever of the
non-brand name
we have taken to heart the new wave concept of
English language. But they had entered the
product
the glocal!
common idiom and were easily understood in
Then there are some expressions which seem to have
their nuances. Of course, they sounded weird, or indeed, in
become obsolete because of changing societal mores. In our
some cases, plain wrong to someone who was not familiar
small town of the 1960s, a girl wearing a sleeveless dress or
with the angularities of the local language.
By God se was one such expression. It had nothing to do
trousers or, heaven forbid, seen talking to members of the
with the fanatic Hindu Mahasabha hero but was simply a
opposite sex in college was invariably termed forward as
way to attest to the veracity of ones statement as in By God
in Woh to bahut forward hai. Now, with jeans becoming
se, mere paas koi paisa nahin haiwhen asked to treat a
ubiquitous and more and more girls joining the workforce,
friend. To curse ones luck would be to exclaim Meri to bad
this expression is outdated.
luck kharaab hai. The redundancy in this never seemed to
On the other hand, some words in Hindi are still used combother us, maybe because as the linguists tell us, the more
monly though their origins are not very clear. Thus, while a
redundant a language, the better it is!
screwdriver is obviously a pechkas, a plier is a plaas,
Redundancy, it seems, was popular: Sunday vale din
which seems to have no connection to its functionality but
jaana hai or Birthday vale din ham appu ghar jaayenge
instead is obviously a vernacular adaptation of pliers. Interwere common. Another peculiarity was to refer to a cousin as
estingly, the plumbers wrench or monkey wrench for some
cousin brother or cousin sister. In fact, this one is so
reason has become tota plaas (parrot wrench) in the veringrained that I have heard it being used even now. And as
nacular, no doubt owing to its peculiar shape.
children, one always craved for lemonchoos which was
Similarly, when you first learned to ride a bicycle, you
simply fruit-flavoured hard sweets mostly manufactured then
always rode karanchi, which was possibly a distortion
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

APRIL 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

101

POSTSCRIPT
LANGUAGE | BOOKSHELVES

of the Hindi word for scissors, given the contorted shape


that one had to acquire to ride the bicycle, not sitting on
the seat (which was too high) but in a sort of a crossshaped fashion.
And when one got some goods transported, one had to
go and get the bilty released as in bilty chhuddwana. A
bilty is basically a dispatch note or a goods receipt with all
the information about transportation charges, consignee,
value of goods, etc. From the sound of it, it seems to be a distortion of some English word (maybe bill of lading) but it is
not clear which one. However, this is still used extensively
and in our Digital India, there is now even a package developed by Manglait Solutions called Bilty Software!
During my recent visit to Bihar, when I asked the driver
about the bad condition of the highway, he assured me that a
few miles on, the road was phor lane. And, after a little
distance, we did come to a divided road. Except this one was
a six-laned highway rather than a four-laned one! Clearly,
phor lane is a concept which has little to do with its literal
meaning.
Shobhit Mahajan (shobhit.mahajan@gmail.com) is Professor of Physics and
Astrophysics at the University of Delhi.

102

APRIL 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

POSTSCRIPT
LANGUAGE | BOOKSHELVES

A Trophy Home
for Pages
Bookshelves, books and even the manner in which
they are arranged on the shelves can provide a
fairly accurate reading of our personalities and
literary sensibilities.
Divya N
A bookshelf is a biography written by others.
Kat Lehmann

ust and age carry history, imagination and reminiscences. Browsing through the old cleaned-up or
sandy bookshelves full of fiction, poetry and history
can be another journey in analysing the past of human existence, transcending the present and moving into the future.
The exercise can unfasten multiple sites of inquisitiveness
and imagination as poetic and fictive thoughts sprout from
the remote corners of the human psyche in acquaintance
with a seemingly dreamy and mythical world.
For many of us, the beginning of our acquaintance with
bookshelves can be traced to our homes and the neatly
archived book collections there. During the initial phase, the
inquisitiveness about the world of books would have definitely outdistanced our thoughts about the bookshelf. Later
familiarity with the fictive and non-fictive endeavours of

102

English and regional writers, and musing on the pleasures


of the physical and psychological quests in traversing the
world of books might have made at least some of us recognise
the significance of the bookshelf as a habitat of books.
George Bernard Shaw mocked the intellectual pretensions
of snobbish society in plays like Arms and the Man, drawing
on the library and the bookshelf as possible spaces of
thought. Shaw was ironic in describing and classifying the
library: It is not much of a library; its literary equipment
consists of a single fixed shelf stocked with old paper-covered
novels, broken-backed, coffee-stained, torn and thumbed
Bookshelves impart and a couple of little hanging
shelves with a few gift books on
the cognition that
them, the rest of the wall space bereading a book
ing occupied by trophies of war and
is not a mere act
chase. Nicolas comment in Arms
of traversing the
and the Man that I was only speakpage but a unique
ing to this foolish girl about her
experiencing of
habit of running up here to the lithe inner life of
brary whenever she gets a chance,
the book through
to look at the books. Thats the
seeing, smelling
worst of her education, sir: it gives
and touching it
her habits above her station makes
us ironically aware of the role of the library and the bookshelf in the art of reading. Bookshelves impart the cognition
that reading a book is not a mere act of traversing the page
but a unique experiencing of the inner life of the book
through seeing, smelling and touching it. Bookshelves thus
become the gateway to intellectual consciousness.
The popular imagination has always been fired by the
screen appearances of actors gazing dreamily at bookshelves, as the stacks of books become the home of their
romantic muse. Every bookshelf is a ladder to the pinnacle
of knowledge as it stimulates a fresh curiosity and enthusiasm about the inner lives of others. The grey colours of the
shelves help us transcend the black-and-white compartmentalisation of life.
Browsing through the rows in the shelf occasionally
becomes an act of serendipity as we stumble into previously

Sameeksha Trust Books

Village Society
Edited by SURINDER S JODHKA
The village is an important idea in the history of
post-Independence India. A collection of articles that
covers various features of village society: caste and
community, land and labour, migration, discrimination
and use of common property resources.

Pp x + 252 Rs 325
ISBN 978-81-250-4603-5
2012

Orient Blackswan Pvt Ltd


www.orientblackswan.com
Mumbai Chennai New Delhi Kolkata Bangalore Bhubaneshwar Ernakulam
Guwahati Jaipur Lucknow Patna Chandigarh Hyderabad
Contact: info@orientblackswan.com
APRIL 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

EPW

Economic & Political Weekly

POSTSCRIPT
BOOKSHELVES | POEM | TRAVEL

The sight of a bookshelf abounding with books communicates an emotional sensation of collective existence as
against the feeling of loneliness created by empty bookshelves. They remind us that intense and passionate reading
is always a solitary exercise.
Despite the expansion of e-books and e-bookshelves, most
bibliophiles still perceive the bookshelf as a physical entity, not
a virtual one. The empirical and intuitive experiencing of the
physical sensation evoked by the real presence of a bookshelf is invariably greater than its virtual counterparts.
Just as our choice of a book can articulate volumes about
ourselves, our arrangement of the bookshelf too can provide
a reading of our personalities, pointing to our comprehension, perception and literary sensibilities. By arranging
books title-wise and alphabetically we announce our desire
to explore and transcend the known and the unknown,
through the medium of the word. Our shelf consciousness
can denote our self-consciousness, as the bookshelves become repositories of both collective and individual memory.
Bookshelves continue to be symbols of prescience and foresight, carrying in their psychological womb generations of
history and experience.
Divya N (ndiv87@gmail.com), formerly a research scholar at the Centre for English
Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, is now Assistant Professor, Department
of English, Sree Kerala Varma College, Kerala.

unvisited terrains of authors and their characters, fostering


fresh thoughts. They remind us of Oscar Wildes statement:
It is what you read when you dont have to that determines
what you will be when you cant help it.
Separate tiers of books organised under the names of
different authors become a kind of platonic living space,
housing the multiple lives of the characters and their
creators, as they silently love, laugh and weep, all in an
ambience of solitude. For the artistic and creative reader,
these protagonists might seem to indulge in a synchronic
relationship, despite their diachronic and dislocated existence in time and space.
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

APRIL 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

103

POSTSCRIPT
BOOKSHELVES | POEM | TRAVEL

Share This
Chalani Ranwala

I bet you wouldnt have guessed that


this is not an ordinary poem about the
Unceasing Darkness of our Turbulent Existence,
about the numbness of the State and the piercing shots
of bullets to young flesh, and the blood-curdling scream of
a motherless child.
No, this is not that.
For I cannot do justice to these emotions
of which I know nothing of.
I know nothing of their anger and fear, and hence
I cannot mourn for my generation like so many
articles tell me to, with their pictures of dirty blood
and political injustice.
What this poem is about is this the gnawing, agonising
conscience that grows
every second of every day until I sit still at night, briefly,
to think about what I have not done to deserve the good stuff
and what I wont be doing to deserve everything else that
will follow.
They do not prepare you for this, not in school and not in books,
and certainly not in the aesthetically crafted advertisements
carefully measuring
every emotion they wish to evoke.
No, that wont work for me.
They will have to create a brand new system of capitalising
on human grief to
make me believe in the power of my own prayers.
Share this, to save a life.
Chalani Ranwala (cranwala@yahoo.com) is a writer and artist based in Colombo,
Sri Lanka, currently working in media and communications at an independent
think tank.

Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

APRIL 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

103

POSTSCRIPT
BOOKSHELVES | POEM | TRAVEL

Pin Code 173217


Beyond the verdant hills of Chail, a quiet hamlet
in Himachal Pradesh, never-ending treks
lead through sun-dappled backwoods that
unexpectedly open up to clear blue skies.
Chitvan Singh Dhillon

hail is a quiet and rather dull hamlet neatly tucked


away in the mighty hills of Himachal Pradesh. It is
luxuriously spread over an area that spans 72 acres on
three adjoining hillsthe Rajgarh Hill, the Pandava Hill
and the Siddh Tibba. The chief tourist attraction is the
imperial Chail Palace. Built by the Maharaja of Patiala state,
Sardar Bhupinder Singh, during the British Raj, the palace is
grand and extravagant. Apart from the stunning magnificence of Chail itself, one also gets a dramatic view of Shimla
and Kasauli in the glistening moonlight. Chail also brags of
housing the highest cricket pitch and polo ground not just in
the country but in the world. Built in 1893, it stands at a whopping 2,444 m. One can breathe in lungfuls of fresh, pristine
and clean Himalayan air accentuated by the scent of chir
pine and gigantic deodars.
What was once famed for being home to the highest cricket
pitch in the world and the luxurious Chail Palace with its
Economic & Political Weekly

EPW

APRIL 16, 2016

vol lI no 16

103

POSTSCRIPT
TRAVEL

grand architecture is now mainly an off-the-beaten-track hill


of sceneries come about at the end of a mountain trail
station that is eternally shrouded in a blanket of mist and
and at the beginning of another. You are face-to-face
clouds. Laden with stone-fruit trees and quaint and pleasing
with lush green pastures that spread miles and miles across
walking routes, it is a must visit if solitude and calm is what
with lazy cows grazing on them amidst quaint huts in the
your gadabout self craves for.
clearing. Past a few more hills, you find yourself climbing
There is a strange sense of ease that settles in when you
an abrupt cliff atop which is a never-ending open terrace
with a small Kaali temple in the middle. Kaali ka tibba, as
are headed to the hills, breaking free from the monotony and
it is pertinently called, lays threadbare a panoramic view of
boredom of everyday life, to seek solitude amidst pine and
the distant peaks of Choor Chandni, Karol Tibba
deodar trees. Chail was born as the summer capiLong, unending
and the surrounding towns of Sirmour, Solan
tal of Maharaja Adhiraja Sardar Bhupinder Singh
walks on secluded
and Shimla. The temple door is kept shut when
of Patiala State in 1893 when he was barred from
roads and
the city of Shimla by Lord Kitchener after the infathere is no visitor for fear of notorious monkeys.
walkways, with a
mous Scandal Point incident. The obstinate and
The monkey population simply thrives in
cool breeze and
grand Maharaja was determined to build himself
Chailyou chance upon them everywhere!
the music of the
a bespoke summer capital that would be the
Otherwise, this vantage point is a godsend for
Himalayan thrush
envy of the British. By and by, the diminutive
shutterbugs.
and barbets for
hamlet of Chail developed around the colossal
Sidh Baba ka Mandir is another historical
company,
Palace premise, which today has been converted
site of attraction; travellers on their return
beckon you
into a heritage hotel maintained, rather shabbily,
journey from Shimla stop by here to pay their
by the Himachal Pradesh Tourism Development Corporation.
obeisance. Legend has it that this was the exact site from
Long, unending walks on secluded roads and walkways,
where Maharaja Bhupinder Singh initially began constructwith a cool breeze and the music of the Himalayan thrush
ing his palace. As the myth goes, it is widely believed by
and barbets for company, beckon you. There are neverthe local folks that a holy saint magically appeared in the
ending treks all the way through sun-dappled civilised
Maharajas dream and requested him to shift his palace to
backwoods that unexpectedly open up to an abundant
another spot as he meditated there. The Maharaja obliged.
clear blue sky, with the impenetrable valley stretching into
That was that.
the distance.
If the winged ones are your friends and birdwatching is
The best part about Chail is that everything is almost
what you fancy, head to the Chail Wildlife Sanctuary. On a
three to four kilometres away from each other. A couple of
safari you might spot some highly endemic species such as
kilometres from the Palace brings you to the bustling Chail
goral, kakar and sambar, besides Himalayan birds like the
bazaar, a typical hill-town marketplace, unharmed by the
red jungle fowl and cheer pheasants in plenty. Make sure
winds of globalisation, where shopkeepers wear a warm
you make use of the sighting posts which, although a little
smile selling funky replicas of
dilapidated, are built around
LAST LINES
wayfarers and the yesteryear
the sanctuary at premeditated
candies like lemon and orange
points. The sanctuary is a predrops, bullseye and traditional
cipitous climb up a tapered,
caramel toffees. They are more
unpaved boulevard from a
than happy to guide tourists
sharp turn-off at the local batrying to find their way through
zaar, with the opening stretch
the endless mountain trails.
passing through thick woods
The ambience of no Indian hill
of cedar and oak.
station is ever complete without
Chail is an immaculate, una cute little post office with a
touched and pristine hill station.
bright crimson postbox. I spot
The clouds appear happy on
one with a board screaming
top of the sky, like light-as-air
CHAIL, Pin code: 173217.
vanilla ice-cream scoops, shiftFurther on, the road winds
ing dreamily across the horizon,
down and stretches ahead of the
occasionally breaking into a
bazaar past forests of rhododrizzle without ceremony. Its
dendrons in their bloom season,
nothing short of a fairy tale, for
their burgundy and pomegrantime stands still in Chail.
ate red mouths bursting open
Chitvan Singh Dhillon (filmbuff100@gmail.
from the branches at every single
com) is a Chandigarh-based economist and
freelance journalist.
bend. The most overwhelming
104

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Explaining Village-level Development Trajectories through Schooling in Karnataka
Suraj Jacob, Balmurli Natrajan, Indira Patil
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ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846

Students Fight Discrimination


The students of the University of Hyderabad have passed a resolution unanimously at their
Students' Union's general body meeting on 12 April 2016 demanding a Committee Against
Prejudice and Discrimination on campus. This committee is seen as a way to institutionalise their
struggle against prejudice and discrimination, which saw an intensification in the past few months.
This proposed CAPD will comprise all sections of the university community and will focus on
redressing complaints of prejudicial treatment and discrimination within campus. Modelled on the
anti-sexual harrassment committee, it is also expected to create awareness about overt and covert
forms of discrimination and prejudice.
We, the Students Union of University of Hyderabad, believe that Rohith Vemulas decision to take
his own life is a symptom of a larger problem that plagues institutions of higher education in India.
The University of Hyderabad (UoH), considered a premier institution of India, has not taken
adequate steps to support and protect students from socially underprivileged castes, even after
students have raised grievances repeatedly, and some had even taken their own lives in despair!
To address caste-based, and other forms of discrimination in higher educational institutions, the
institutions must accept that discrimination on the basis of caste and other identities, in overt and
covert ways, is a reality on our campuses. The Students Union of UoH would like to suggest an
institutional mechanisms that shall ensure that these deep-seated social practices are addressed
head-on.
We demand that each higher educational institution establish a Committee Against Prejudice
and Discrimination (CAPD). It must be in keeping with Article 15 and Article 21 of the
Constitution of India, which together protect citizens from discrimination by the state or
fellow citizens on the grounds of religion, race, caste, sex or place of birth, and ensures the
right to live with human dignity. The main focus of the CAPD must be to look into complaints
regarding acts of prejudice and/or discrimination against Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled
Tribes (STs), Other Backward Classes (OBCs), religious minorities, sexual minorities, women,
transgenders, racial, and ethnic minorities. The CAPD must be structured on the lines of the
Gender Sensitisation Committee Against Sexual Harassment (GS-CASH). The CAPD must be
widely representative (women, OBCs, religious, sexual, racial, and ethnic minorities, etc),
while ensuring that at least half the committee comprises SC and ST members and it is
headed by a person from SC/ST background. Student representatives must be part of the
committee.
Higher educational institutions must collectively constitute a high-level committee to
formulate rules for the CAPD immediately. And the committee must be given a clear briefing,
and a deadline to submit its report.
A course should be introduce for all students in universities and colleges to increase their
knowledge and understanding about the problem of caste ,ethnicity ,gender and other issues
.This course should be compulsory. Many countries such as USA, Scotland and UK have
introduced courses on civic learning or Citizenship Education for students.
A Module and administrative guidelines should be prepared to sensitize administers and
teachers in universities and colleges.
Reform the present Remedial Coaching schemes of UGC to make it effective with increased
funding.

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An Ombudsman must be appointed for each university for redressal of grievances of students
as per the University Grants Commission (Grievance Redressal) Regulations, 2012.
We believe that this will help the campus communities and institutions address issues of prejudice
and discrimination, which otherwise have no dedicated forum to redress these kinds of grievances.
It is, we hope, understood that creating awareness about prejudiced practices, and acts of
discrimination will be one of the main roles of the CAPD. This is the only way that a dialogue about
prejudice and discrimination can be brought about in our educational institutions.
We hope that the heads of the higher educational institutions will act immediately on our proposal,
and help build prejudice- and discrimination-free campuses and institutions.
Tags:
Hyderabad
Rohith Vemula
Caste
Discrimination

ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846

Innovating Waste Management


Bhavya Dore (bhavya.dore@gmail.com) is a journalist based in Mumbai.
Six towns in MaharashtraLonavla, Shirur, Deolali Pravara, Umred, Vengurla and Sangola, made
remarkable achievements over the last one year in waste disposal and management. A combination
of proactive and punitive measures ensured that waste management is seen as part of a larger set
of social problems and community initiatives.
What does it take for a town to clean up its filth? One answergetting rid of public dustbins. An
unusual and counterintuitive move is among the reasons why six small towns in Maharashtra have
been able to effectively collect, segregate and manage waste.
Earlier this year, Lonavala and Shirur in Pune district, Sangola in Solapur, Deolali Pravara in
Ahmednagar, Umred in Nagpur and Vengurla in Sindhudurg were felicitated by the state
government for their remarkable achievements over the past year in cleaning up their towns.
Their success has stemmed from a combination of factors.
Initial Steps
First, it began with a pilot. A year and a half ago, on the back of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan (SBA)
announcement, consultations were held with officials from 338 councils in Maharashtra. Of these,
24 councils that had been performing well in terms of waste management were picked for a pilot
project. We said, let us begin with the slum areas, said Meeta Rajivlochan, principal secretary
and director of municipal administration, whose role in the crusade was crucial. But people
thought they would be the most difficult to clean.
In January 2015, a bunch of councils pulled up their socks and plunged into the slums. By March
2015, there had been a visible improvement. People realised there was progress, said
Rajivlochan. The task was to build confidence. Once they believed in it, residents started pitching
in.
Since then each of these six towns has effected some astonishing achievements. The sizes of these
towns varyfrom populations of about 15,000 to 60,000, but they have followed a broad set of
similar practices. Karmcharis are being paid on time, toll free helplines have been set up, education
programmes are afoot in schools, and that central totem of cleaning upthe dustbin has been
consigned to the dustbin of ineffective practices.
Unlearning Old Ways
It works like this, each of the chief officers of the six benchmark councils explainedif there is a
community bin in a residential area, people are likely to dump their household rubbish there any
time of the day. As a result, such bins are invariably full, causing a stench and ensuring the area
remains dirty.
So the councils decided they need to think out of the straitjacket of the bin. Residents were instead
told there would be specific collection times when the vehicles would come around. They would

ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846

then have to hand over their separated wet and dry waste to the vehicle doing the rounds. (In
Sangola for instance, the council went one step ahead and handed out separate bins for wet and
dry garbage in hundreds of homes.)
Into this new paradigm, the officials built in a self-correcting mechanism. Residents were enjoined
to inform the council in case the vehicle did not show up on a particular day. Offending contractors
would then not receive their wages. Toll free lines and complaint numbers were set up, including
the possibility as in Lonavla of complaining via Whatsapp.
In some cases the councils increased the number of collection vehicles if they could, but staff
numbers remained broadly the same.
Each of the garbage collection vehicles was also fitted with a global positioning system (GPS), to
ensure they went to the spot on time. If there was a complaint, payments would not be made. These
micro measures have gone a long way in impacting the cleanliness and culture of these towns by
ensuring accountability and resident-centric vigilance.
Dealing with Open Defecation
Each of these councils followed some core principles in their quest for cleaning up their towns. But
each also added its own ingenious twist to the proceedings. Public shaming was one device used to
try and root out the practice of open defecation. This was done by putting up names of the
offenders in the local square, or printing their name in the local newspapers. Ramakant Dake, chief
officer of Sangola, found these measures while somewhat effective were not good enough.
First they got the toilets cleaned every four hours in the morning. That did not work. Then they
brought regular water supply and extra bulbs into the public toilets. It still did not work. It was
about the mindset, he said. People would take their iPhones and get into their cars to go to
openly defecate.
Passive aggressive measures like distributing roses were tried but it seemed to be ineffective. Then
the officials innovated with a band. Every offender would be chased back home with karmcharis
playing and singing behind him, to inform the village of the shame. That too, was not enough. Then
Dake moved to file first information reports (FIRs)200 of themdetaining people at the police
station for a few hours. This largely did the trick. The cultural change trickled in.
This is the specific story of Sangola, but other officers narrated varying versions of similar stories.
In all councils, staff moved to build more public toilets and/or individual toilets in every home.
Lonavla for instance put in place 120 new public toilet seats whilst ensuring regular water supply
to the public toilets. Vengurla set up mobile toilets in public spaces. In Shirur, existing public
toilets were cleaned up and renovated following complaints that proper doors or regular water
supply was not there.
Councils were also quick to introduce elements of shamingeither by putting names of offenders
on posters, banners or in the local newspaper. Fining also helped, as did detaining people at the
police station.
Banning Plastic
One of the old villains that come in the way of clean up schemes is the seemingly innocuous but

ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846

totally potent plastic carry bag. Each of these councils banned plastic bags thinner than 50
microns.
At Umred for instance, in over a series of raids officers seized 79 kg of plastic from retailers and
sellers. Such people could, and were, fined. If we can control them, we realised we can control the
problem, said Vinod Jalak, chief officer of Deolali Pravara, where 41 people were made to pay a Rs
50 fine for the offence.
Those defecating, those using plastic carry bags, those failing to separate their garbageeach of
these acts could invite a fine. Using sections of their local municipal bye laws or the Bombay Police
Act, the councils found that legal action helped where awareness drives and public shaming failed
to do the job.
Incentivising Staff
In many of these councils, officers said the population had ballooned but commensurate staff
numbers had not increased over the years. One small step to start with was handing the existing
staff better equipmentgloves, mask and septic equipment. Another move was by offering them
medical insurance or medical check-ups. In Shirur, all pending arrears were paid off.
First we awakened our staff by capacity building, said Ramdas Kokare, chief officer of Vengurla.
We said, with door to door garbage collection, our work can be less.
As the culture of cleanliness has set in across these councils, work for the staff, which might have
required serious investment of energy and time at the start, has now a better payoff with residents
cooperating and easing their jobs in the long run. When the process started they thought there
work had increased, said Thorat. But when peoples attitudes changed, they realised their work
had actually decreased.
Other Innovations
Each of these councils followed a rough mix of most of these methods in terms of investing in new
toilets, regularising garbage collection and imposing fines. But each one also tried something
unique to itself to deal with its own circumstances and specific challenges. In Vengurla for
instance, a six-acre dumping ground normally strewn with rubbish was cleared up and converted
for most part into a playground and picnic spot. Only 10% of the spot is now a dumping ground,
while composting is done in one part and a green zone created, where cashews, mangoes and
coconuts have been planted. Not just that, the plastic waste is crushed and has been integrated into
road development as a material.
In Shirur, there is a new sewerage treatment plant which processes the water from the drains
before it is let out into the river. In Deolali Pravara, biogas is being generated from the waste
collected in two schools, and now hoteliers have also approached the council for such a facility.
In Sangola, those who owned pigs were enjoined to keep them separately and not let them roam
around, else they would be killed by council staff. After five pigs were killed, their owners realised
they meant business. But if the pigs were not allowed to roam around to forage for food, how would
they be maintained? Here the council hit upon an ideawhy not direct all the waste from hotels for
pig feed? This effectively helped link the hotel business with the owners, and deal with rubbish in a
unique manner.

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Similarly, in Lonavla, a hill station which sees a large tourist influx, several hotels have now started
composting some of their own rubbish.
Role of the Leadership
For the councils, the political leadership was indifferent at first, to cleaning up. In some cases,
contracts were given out on the basis of political ties, considerably hampering a clean system and
clean town. In such cases contract clauses were created in such a manner as to disqualify those
errant contractors.
Politicians in any event, did not see how cleanliness was necessarily a political issue. Once the
local political leadership saw that the municipal staff was taking the initiative seriously, they joined
in and gave their wholehearted support, said Rajivlochan. When the initial results came in, they
realised that this would yield rich political dividends.
Council chiefs said that political support was now strong, with clear results to show. The chiefs
were themselves proactive, going on rounds from 6 am with various staff, personally crusading for
the cause. They also pointed out that Rajivlochans drive gave the movement some shape. Officers
said she was one of the first principal secretaries to actually come into the field and work from
there on.
Aside from this there were regular training programmes for chief officers and other levels of staff
members.
Looking Ahead
Residents have quickly realised the benefits of waste segregation and disposal. For instance, in
Umred, from 3,000 cases of water-borne diseases, the figure was down to 1,200 last year. Dengue
used to be a problem, but this year we didnt have a single case, said Vijay Sarnaik, the chief
officer.
Councils have made an effort to build the next generation of waste conscious residents through
extensive school-level education programmes as well. Students are asked to take pledges on
segregation and cleanliness. In several schools in Lonavla composting pits have been started. Our
target is that what we do should be sustainable, said Ganesh Shete, the chief officer of the council.
In other councils, more public toilets and individual toilets are in the process of being built, more
composting efforts are underway and more individual home bins being ordered. Although the fines
system is in place, the need for fining residents has come down as people increasingly toe the line.
The entire experiment has further shown that its the little things and not the big costs that can
effect change. Small things can make a difference, said Tejaswini Deshmukh, Buldwana
coordinator of Stree Mukti Sanghatana, who was a member of the evaluation committee that
prepared a report on these councils. Others can also be successful.
What these six have been able to achieve is now something that is sought to be repeated in other
places. Such things are not difficult to do, but require political will, said Rajivlochan. These six
have shown great results. Now we will try to replicate this and scale it up.
Tags:
Waste

ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846

Waste Disposal
Waste Segregation
Waste Separation
Sanitation
Swacch Bharat Abhiyan
Lonavla
Shirur
Sangola

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