4858 - PDS supplies for Delhi’s poor being diverted to private flour mills - Niti Central

PDS supplies for Delhi’s poor being diverted to private flour mills

By Niticentral Staff on October 15, 2013

A few months ago, the UPA Government went ahead with its extravagant Food Security Bill, despite opposition from all quarters, including BJP, which saw the inevitable and hence proved it that the Centre’s aim was only to indulge in more corruption. While the principal Opposition insisted that the prevailing Public Distribution Systems be taken into account, as BJP ruled States like Chhattisgarh have excelled in utilising these systems to address the needs of the poor, UPA chairperson, Sonia Gandhi brushed it aside and insisted upon her version of the Bill be passed as an Act.

However, a recent sting operation carried out by Headlines Today special investigation team’s hidden cameras caught the pilferage of grain meant for poor in the National Capital under the Public Distribution System.  The operation exposes Congress’s lies on delivering the benefits of its schemes to the needy.

For this chilling revelation, the team didn’t have to travel too far to get the real picture. The team’s journey that began from Parliament, where the Food Security Bill was passed about a couple of months ago, came to a halt barely a few kilometres away, when they came across a Food Corporation of India (FCI) depot from where the grains at controlled rates are channelled out to fill the coffers of traders who wield enough influence to short circuit the system.

A truck, bearing registration No DL 1M 1475 loaded with PDS grain, started from the FCI godown. However, instead of reaching out to the allocated Government-run ration shops, it changed the route and headed towards Lawrence Road, where most of the big flour mills are located.

However, the team continued to follow the  truck and reached Lawrence Road. The truck stopped near a big private flour mill. It was shocking to  see that the wheat meant for the poor had actually reached Golden Flour Mill in Delhi.

It was not the only truck that went off track. Another truck (No. – HR 55E 1145) also reached Lawrence Road and stopped at Hathi brand flour mill. More trucks (Nos. – DL 1GB 4035 and DL 1G B 3953) were captured by Headlines 

Today cameras as they ferried wheat at controlled price, which was supposed to be made available to the Delhi’s hungry at Rs.7 per kg, to other private flour mills. It was clearly written on these sacks that those were meant for distribution under PDS.

The channel’s cameras also captured four trucks ferrying food grains to benefit the private mill owners. When the team countered and questioned them about the activities, they admitted on hidden cameras how the PDS wheat was essential to run these factories. They also revealed that they had no fear of Police, indicating the mill owner’s involvement in this scam, which has been running under the nose of Delhi Food and Civil Supplies Minister Haroon Yusuf.

The man also confessed that the Government stamps are also removed from the sacks. His next admission was even more startling as he claimed that no flour mill in the National Capital could function without the siphoning of the PDS grains. The team then called the Police after the shocking revelation of diversion of food grains meant for PDS. A Sub-Inspector led the Headlines Today team inside the store of a private flour mill. The team came across sacks full of PDS grain.

Meanwhile, a person involved in the transport of grains also reached the spot trying to talk his way out of the tight corner. It was even more evident from a receipt showed by him that the truck had just transported wheat meant for PDS shops, i.e., Garg Provision Store in Laxmi Nagar and Sabir Ali Sarfaraz Shop in Vishwas Nagar to Hathi Flour Mill, Lawrence Road.

The Police, however, locked the store and took the trucks to Keshavpuram Police Station but 24 hours after getting the trucks seized, the team found out that the truck was released. When they questioned about the whereabouts of the trucks, the Station House Officer (SHO) Ramnivas revealed the trucks had been released as nothing was found wrong after verifying with the FCI and the excise department.

The SHO claimed that the truck was released and the mill gates were unlocked at the behest of Delhi Food & Civil Supply department’s enforcement team. 

Headlines Today then approached Food and Civil Supply department’s enforcement inspector Ambesh Kumar. But to their shock, the said official just refused to acknowledge the visual proof. In fact, he declared that the vehicles never went wayward and had off-loaded grain at the right destination. He even produced proof that the consignments were delivered at the right place.

However, the team was not ready to accept that the same vehicle could dump the same stock at two different destinations. The team then met Delhi’s food and civil supplies commissioner Sajjan Singh Yadav, who admitted that the loot has been almost a regular affair in the city.

Meanwhile, an insider on a hidden camera revealed that how things operate in this entire scam. The person involved in transporting the wheat said the diverted stock is sold to private mills at a lower price and the ration shop owners used hundreds of duplicate ration cards to siphon off the grains meant for the down-trodden.

He also revealed that officials from top to bottom of the concerned departments get a cut from around Rs 200 profit earned by diverting each sack of wheat. This racket cannot function without connivance of everyone from the local police to the food inspector, he said. When the pilferage of these grains has been so rampant in New Delhi, then how can Congress president Sonia Gandhi and vice president Rahul Gandhi say so confidently that food grains will be given to every poor of the country?

The UPA Government’s promise was busted, which will cost the exchequer a Rs 1.25 lakh crore a year to satisfy the hunger of country’s poor as the new scheme might also just go down the drain.

4582 - Food Security Bill passed by Rajya Sabha - NDTV

Food Security Bill passed by Rajya Sabha

Edited by Nadim Asrar | Updated: September 03, 2013 00:22 IST

New Delhi:  Despite being in a minority, the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government succeeded in getting the National Food Security Bill passed in the Rajya Sabha through a voice vote. The landmark bill is being seen as the Congress's trump card ahead of the 2014 general elections due by May.

Here are the latest developments:

1. "Food Bill passed unanimously... Process of consultation with states has started," Food Minister KV Thomas told NDTV after the vote in the Rajya Sabha on Monday night.
2. After the Rajya Sabha passed the bill, the BJP attacked the government saying it has made a "half-hearted" attempt and the shortcomings will be rectified if it comes to power. "Elections are around and that is why they have brought the bill at this time," senior BJP leader Venkaiah Naidu said.
3. All the amendments moved by the opposition to the bill were rejected. Some amendments, like the one moved by Samajwadi Party member Naresh Agrawal, were withdrawn while some members including Mr Naidu and Prakash Javadekar did not press for their amendments.
4. Leader of Opposition Arun Jaitley offered a scathing critique of the government's motivation behind the bill, calling it "a repackaging of existing food schemes." "What was the dire emergency to abuse constitutional powers and bring an ordinance?" he said.
   
5. In a rare speech while opening the debate in Lok Sabha last week, Sonia Gandhi had urged Parliament to take a "historic step" by passing the bill. She, however, couldn't vote on it as she was taken ill and had to be escorted to hospital. Today, as the Rajya Sabha passed the bill she championed, Ms Gandhi was on her way to the US for her medical check-up.
6. The Food Security Bill was passed by the Lok Sabha on August 26. The landmark bill, aimed at providing rice at Rs.
   3 per kg, wheat at Rs.
   2 per kg and coarse cereal at Re 1 per kg to almost 800 million Indians, is expected to cost the national exchequer Rs.
   1.25 lakh crore.
7. Amid concerns that the country's fragile economy may not bear the burden of the food scheme, Finance Minister P Chidambaram assured last week that the government will not spend more than the Rs.
   90,000 crore already budgeted to fund the programme.
8. The scheme will depend on an inefficient national network of public granaries, transporters and 500,000 ration shops. One widely quoted study published in 2005 by the Planning Commission found that 58 percent of grains in the Public Distribution System (PDS) failed to reach their intended destinations.
9. The UPA government in July passed the food security ordinance which was adopted by a few Congress-ruled states on August 20, birth anniversary of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi.
10. The bill now needs the presidential assent to become a historic law. The scheme is expected to deliver high returns for the ruling Congress, as similar populist schemes like the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS) and loan waiver to farmers did in the last election.
    

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4580 - Five myths about the Food Security Bill - Live Mint

Five myths about the Food Security Bill

Criticism of the Food Bill is drowning out the fact that its passage is a seminal moment for the entitlement revolution

Anil Padmanabhan

First Published: Sun, Sep 01 2013. 04 04 PM IST

Updated: Sun, Sep 01 2013. 05 51 PM IST

The passage of the proposed food security law in the Lok Sabha last week told us two things.

One, Sonia Gandhi proved once again that she is the politician to beat. Gandhi got an otherwise completely divided Parliament to collectively endorse the proposed law and revive momentum for the otherwise struggling coalition. The additional spin-off was of course that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which, rightly or wrongly, believes it is just months away from acquiring power, was once again shown up as a party without a positive agenda, especially in showcasing a credible economic alternative.

Second, it led to a clutch of economists, analysts and the paper tigers that inhabit television studios unleashing a vicious assault against the Bill and Gandhi. From a healthy debate they turned it into something personal. Allegations varied from being mistimed (they are right, it should have come about earlier) to how it will cause the fiscal deficit to go off the rails (implicitly claiming that it is in the pink of health) and how Gandhi had inspired bad politics to trump good economics.

Somehow the nature of the unravelling discourse is such that if you repeat the same point enough times, even if it is gravely wrong, it gains legitimacy. But actually these are myths and the facts show them up.

First, the Food Security Bill will completely derail the fiscal arithmetic of the Centre. While the government has claimed that it will cost an additional Rs.25,000 crore to what is already being spent on the food subsidy, some have argued that the actual cost will be anywhere upwards of Rs.200,000 crore annually. Complete nonsense. A bunch of erudite economists have dismissed this claim in a brilliant piece published in The Financial Express . That aside, the scheme is to kick in after a year. So then why would it impact the fiscal deficit target for this year. What were the foreign institutional investors (FIIs) thinking when they bolted for the door? And to think they draw six figure bonuses!

Second, since the Bill states that only 67% of the population will be covered, some bright minds are claiming that this is the actual poverty level in the country.

If I may, this is the level at which the government, based on scientific criteria, concludes that 33% of the population is automatically excluded.

Yes, there would be people within the 67% cut-off who should not be eligible for concessional food. But then, if the authorities press the criteria of exclusion, there is a risk of leaving out the genuinely needy—an error of commission.

The hope and belief is that there will be self-selection—just like we, who possess cars and homes, will presumably never claim the cooking gas subsidy on our first nine cylinders when the government moves to cash transfers.

For the record, the poverty level in the country as estimated by the Planning Commission is 22% at the end of 2011-12.

Third, it is claimed that the Food Security Bill would put a massive burden on an already overburdened exchequer as the government would have to procure additional food grain. Not only would they have to find more storage but also spend extra to procure the grain. Yes, it is fact that the procurement will have to be 62 million tonnes (mt) a year.

But guess what, the country procured 72 mt of foodgrain in 2012-13. And in case you wonder, in the previous year procurement was 63.38 mt, with the existing infrastructure at its disposal.

Fourth, leading on from the previous point, the additional procurement will drive up food inflation, even as fiscal overruns will create even more inflationary impetus. Bizarre as it turns economic logic on its head. At the moment one of the key reasons why food, especially cereal, inflation is up is because there is not enough supply in the market even while the food stocks—at 73.51 mt on 1 July—are mostly rotting. Now, if these stocks were instead offloaded through the public distribution system (PDS) at a subsidized price, what do you think will have happen to food inflation?

Fifth, it is claimed that the entire scheme entails throwing good money after bad. Bandying previous numbers, outlandish claims of leakages of food through the PDS are being used to make this argument. This may be true of a few states, but not all. It ignores the fact that several states, under the pressure of the Supreme Court, including Tamil Nadu, Odisha and Chhattisgarh, have shown a remarkable improvement in both the coverage as well as reduction in leakages. This point has been made explicitly by Himanshu, assistant professor in Jawaharlal Nehru University and a Mint columnist, in a comment published on 7 August, where he argues that the improvements as well as expansion of PDS coverage has increased consumption of cereals from 23% households in 2004-05 to 44.5% in 2011-12. Yet, critics claim this is bad economics.

In the final analysis, it is clear that it is a seminal moment for the entitlement revolution that was inspired by Gandhi and Parliament should be saluted for its unanimous support. The deluge of criticism will drown out this point.

Unfortunately, to talk in its defence is to invite the charge of being a Congress stooge or being fiscally irresponsible or being politically correct. Obviously, we conveniently forget that Bharat is also part of India and any sustainable progress requires them to be included as stakeholders.

Anil Padmanabhan is deputy managing editor of Mint and writes every week on the intersection of politics and economics. Comments are welcome at capitalcalculus@livemint.com.

 First Published: Sun, Sep 01 2013. 04 04 PM IST

4578 - This perverse rage against the poor - The Hindu

August 30, 2013

This perverse rage against the poor

Harish Khare

With the economic boom petering out, those who benefitted from it are angry with the government for the Food Security Bill because it is paying attention to the needs of the underprivileged for a change

This week’s received wisdom insists that the Indian economy has irretrievably collapsed because on Monday, the Lok Sabha passed the National Food Security Bill (NFSB). The Hindu Business Line headline (Aug.28, page 1) said it all: “Re, Sensex sink on fears Food Bill will feed deficit.” The subtext of the lament appears to be that the rupee decline was the market’s way of registering a pointed disapproval of the food security initiative. The Schadenfreude-wallahs are as happy as are the market-reformers that the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) leadership has been fixed so gloriously for venturing into a “populist” course of action. The bandwagon routine has acquired a momentum of its own; even Hindi and other vernacular newspapers have allowed themselves to be mesmerised by the crisis-mongering on television. This, though, is no time to panic. This is the time to strike a balance between short-term difficulty and long-term promises and commitments.

What wrong signals?

Once every few decades comes a moment in a Republic’s life when a few fundamental commitments have to be renewed — or rejected. This is one such week, a time to test our core beliefs. It is also the time to ask a fundamental question: since when in this country has a veto been ceded to the markets and its manipulators, at home and abroad, to decide the issues of equity, social justice and economic fairness? There is something inherently perverse in the suggestion that this much-needed welfare measure would send out the “wrong” signals. Pray to whom? Those half-a-dozen professional financial manipulators in London?

Indeed, economists can always be relied upon to argue that there is always a better way to do anything. Some are competing among themselves to declare that this food security initiative will neither work, nor fetch any votes for the ruling party. Let us make no mistake. Beyond all these sophisticated arguments is a certain class prejudice, resentful that so many resources are being “wasted” for the poor and other socially disadvantaged people, that in this age of “reforms,” political considerations and calculations are being allowed to determine the allocation of societal resources.

This misses the very essence of the concept of political legitimacy in a democratic arrangement. A democracy survives and prospers only when every stakeholder gets an abiding sense of participation, partnership and entitlement. We often seem to keep forgetting that politics is all about who gets what at whose expense. During these last five years, at least for most of the time, the corporates and their policy preferences have been accorded unprecedented acceptance. The time is ripe to strike a new balance. And the NFSB does just that.

Reform by stealth

If we are honest with ourselves, we will have no difficulty in acknowledging that for 20 years, economic reforms have been operationalised without a political mandate. Not until recently when the Congress party held a public meeting to rally opinion behind the Manmohan Singh government’s FDI policy, did any political party have the courage to proclaim openly and boldly its commitment to “economic reforms.” Yet, the “reforms” have been routinely and regularly proclaimed to be “irreversible,” irrespective of the political colour of the government in New Delhi. The process has well been summed up in that evocative phrase, “reform by stealth.”

So now, when we are confronted with a veritable economic meltdown, we are ill-equipped to attend to the more serious and more debilitating crisis of our democratic project running out of its popular legitimacy. India’s democratic arrangements no longer appear to have the requisite social and political sanctions behind them. And we are unable to deal adequately with the systemic overload because our public discourse has been hijacked by a self-serving advocacy crowd and by a professionally disoriented media. For example, a year ago there was carping all around that the crony capitalists and the corrupt politicians were robbing the nation of its wealth, and we staged massive spectacles of resentment at Jantar Mantar; now, a year later, we are ranting and raving that we are not listening to or heeding those who rig the stock markets.

If shouting and screaming every evening could produce solutions to difficult and complex problems, India would have been the most efficacious and working corner of planet Earth. Despite the obvious disapproval of the shouting class, the UPA leadership has gone ahead with the Food Security Bill. Hence, the exaggerated anger.

As social philosopher Roberto Mangabeira Unger points out, a peaceful social order is in itself not enough; “ [S]ociety must be set up in a manner capable of justification in the yes of each of its members.” In political economy terms, each section of society, and every stakeholder gets to determine: what is in it for me? The Democratic Project is a social compact, an indefinable construct, but nonetheless one that hinges on a promise of a fair deal for all. The poor are asking this question with greater urgency — and in the Maoist-strongholds with arms and blood — as decades of “economic growth” have produced new inequities and disparities.

Rather than wait for the next round of the “Maoist” violence to jerk us back to harsh realities, what the Food law does is that at one stroke, it sends out a message that the Indian state has not turned its back on the poor, and that the have-nots continue to have a claim on the collective resources, and that they have not been left to their own devices or to the market’s curative potency.

This message has to be understood and appreciated in the context of the growing preference in some quarters for authoritarian solutions — throw out the encumbering paraphernalia of social equity or fairness, and let the floodgates of enterprise and business acumen be thrown wide open.

Resenting interventionism

A decade of economic prosperity has allowed millions and millions of middle-class families to realise their upwardly revised aspirations and life experiences; at the same time, the UPA saw to it that the welfare state kept expanding the “social agenda,” providing a safety net against the vagaries of the market.

Now, the good days have seemingly come to an end, and there is anger that the state remains equally mindful of the welfare poor. We all thought that the poor have been disappeared from the policy drawing room; and suddenly, they are back with almost a veto. The narrative-controllers resent that. Just when they thought they had successfully defanged the Indian state of its interventionist impulses, here comes the Food Security Bill.

The bill can be seen as the other side of the “stimulus” coin. The 2008-2009 stimulus was used by the super-rich to buy real estate in London and other European cities. At that time, no one seemed to find anything inherently wrong at this massive, disproportionate allocation of resources for so few. None of it was invested here to create jobs; instead, the super-rich petulantly proclaimed that the government was not sufficiently attentive to their “sentiment” and hence they would take their ball (Indian savings and taxpayers) and play in other economies. No one complained; instead, the government was blamed for the corporate sector’s misplaced priorities.

If subsidised food can reduce the food spending of the poor, and place some surplus money in their hands, which would then be spent in India, that may end up stimulating domestic consumer demand. It would be a kind of stimulus lite, for the poor.

A ruling party in India is called upon to fulfil its basic obligation to keep intact the democratic credentials of the “system.” The food security legislation is a partial response to that obligation and must be applauded.

(Harish Khare is a senior journalist, political analyst and former media adviser to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. He is currently a Jawaharlal Nehru Fellow.)

4576 - Don’t blame the Food Bill - The Hindu

Don’t blame the Food Bill

The currencies of India, Indonesia, Brazil, South Africa and Turkey have fallen quite dramatically against the dollar in the past few months. Whatever their domestic weaknesses, the reasons for this unprecedented decline — ranging between 13 to 21 per cent — are primarily global. In the past 48 hours, as tension mounts in West Asia, an already unprecedented situation has become even more difficult. On Wednesday, the rupee, as also other emerging market currencies, fell yet again as it became apparent that the Obama administration is preparing to bomb Syria. Ignoring the global context, many analysts in India are attributing Tuesday’s big fall in the rupee and the Sensex to the fiscal excesses that the new food security law may create. In reality, the food law did not have much to do with the sharp fall in the rupee’s value. Given that it is party time for bear operators in the financial markets, big players are now looking for any reason to ride on pessimism. The food security law has been actively debated for a year and its cost was worked into the Union Budget for 2013-14. Indeed, no such reaction was seen in the stock market when the Finance Minister announced the outlay in the budget. At most, the extra expenditure on account of the Food Security Bill will be no more than 0.3 per cent a year. Besides, the government explicitly said that it would stick to its fiscal deficit target of 4.5 per cent in 2013-14.

The truth is that big institutional investors have an inherent bias against welfare expenditure. Psychologically, market players seem to assume that any welfare scheme is bad for capital. This is a flawed assumption because the history of the market economy in the West clearly shows that a strong welfare framework has played an integral part in the expansion of capitalism. There is also a lot of hypocrisy in the way market players view government support to various sections of society. They reject loan waivers to farmers but welcome the massive loan restructuring and postponement of repayment obligations done for big business. Among neo-liberal policymakers, there is also a tendency to paint a worse picture than actually exists on the ground in order to push the very same reforms that end up creating external debt traps. The massive support in Parliament for the Food Security Bill sharply contrasted with the lack of support it had from market players and businesses. This chasm between the political class and market players needs to be bridged. As Jean Drèze and Amartya Sen have convincingly argued, nowhere has capitalist growth preceded improvement in human development indices. The market needs to internalise this reality.

4519 - Salient features of the Food Security Bill launched in three states by Sonia Gandhi to mark Rajiv Gandhi's birthday - dna

Salient features of the Food Security Bill launched in three states by Sonia Gandhi to mark Rajiv Gandhi's birthday

Tuesday, Aug 20, 2013, 19:06 IST | Place: New Delhi

DNA Web Team  

According to the Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Prof KV Thomas, the bill will lead to massive PDS reforms including doorstep delivery of food grains, end-to-end computerisation, leveraging "aadhaar", etc.

Despite being one of the biggest producers of food supplies, India has a huge amount of population that not only suffers from malnutrition but also cannot afford three meals a day.

The UPA led govt, constructed the Food Security Bill in a bid to provide food security to 75% of the rural and 50% of the urban population with focus on nutritional needs of children, pregnant and lactating women.

President Pranab Mukherjee signed the ordinance on food security on 6th July, 2013. With this began the historic endeavour to give the nation's two-third population, the right to get 5kg of food grain every month, at highly subsidized rates of Rs 1-3 per kg.

According to the Minister of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution Prof KV Thomas,the bill will lead to massive PDS reforms including doorstep delivery of food grains, end-to-end computerisation, leveraging “Aadhaar”, etc. PDS will become more transparent and subject to grievance redressal at appropriate levels with provisions for penalties and compensation.

Congress President Sonia Gandhi today launched the ambitious programme in Delhi on the birth anniversary of Rajiv Gandhi, while hailing it as an "unparalleled" scheme in the world.

The scheme was rolled out in three Congress-ruled states of Delhi, Haryana and Uttarakhand even as the consideration of the Bill was scuttled in Parliament by the Opposition, which cornered the government on the issue of missing files related to the coal block allocation.

Unveiling the scheme by handing over food grain packets and Aadhar-based smart cards to a number of poor women, Gandhi lauded UPA government for bringing "revolutionary changes" in the life of common man but noted that the struggle is not yet over and a lot was still to be done.

Characteristics of the Bill:
* Up to 75% of the rural population and up to 50% of urban population are to be covered under Targeted Public Distribution System.

* At least 3kg of foodgrains per person per month to be given to general category households,at prices not exceeding 50% of Minimum Support Price.

* The priority households (46% in rural areas and 28% in urban areas) to have a monthly entitlement of 35 Kgs (equivalent to 7 Kgs per person) at a subsidized price of Rs. 1 per Kg for millets, Rs. 2 per Kg for wheat and Rs. 3 per Kg for rice.

* The oldest adult woman in each house would be considered the head of that household when issuing the ration card.

* Children aged six months to 14 years would get take-home ration or hot cooked food.

* The work of identification of eligible households will be left to the states/Union Territory's, which may frame their own criteria or use social, economic and caste census data.

* Maternity benefit to pregnant women and lactating mothers.

* Three-tier independent grievance redressal system.

* Food Security Allowance in case of non-supply of foodgrains or meals.

4460 - The devil is in the detail by Reetika Khera - The Hindu

August 6, 2013

Updated: August 6, 2013 01:48 IST

The devil is in the detail

REETIKA KHERA

Per capita entitlements under the food security bill will not cover beneficiaries as comprehensively as household entitlements

The government hopes to secure in this session of Parliament, approval for the National Food Security Bill (NFSB) so that it can replace the food security ordinance.

The NFSB, on which the ordinance is based, guarantees supplementary nutrition services through anganwadis for all children under six, midday meals for schoolchildren, and, very importantly, maternity entitlements for all pregnant women. But before the draft legislation is approved, some aspects of it could benefit from further discussion. These include the proposed transition from per household to per capita entitlements under the Public Distribution System (PDS), the identification of “eligible households,” and the provision for cash transfers, among others.

Per capita entitlements

According to the current version of the NFSB, 75 per cent of the rural population (and 50 per cent in urban areas) will be entitled to a monthly quota of 5kg of grain from the PDS. Currently, each Below Poverty Line (BPL) household is entitled to 35kg per month as per Central norms (many States, however, have reduced this to 25 or even 20 kg per BPL household to enable wider coverage) irrespective of the number of household members. The main argument for per capita entitlements is equity — that larger families get their fair share. The per capita approach (5kg/capita/month), if implemented, will benefit families with more than seven members.

According to National Sample Survey (NSS) data for 2009-10, only 10 per cent of rural families have more than seven members!

Besides this, some argue that the per capita approach prevents “cheating” by families pretending to be separate households to enhance their entitlements. Finally, the argument goes, population totals are better defined and better known than household counts, and, therefore, better suited for determining State-wise grain allocations.

Three disadvantages

Three other disadvantages of the per capita approach emerge from Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu which already use the model, albeit with a “cap” — irrespective of household size, a family cannot get more than 20kg per month. One, an important advantage of a “per household” approach is that it helps to ensure that people are clear about their entitlements. Clear and uniform entitlements, by themselves, have a major impact on creating awareness to ensure that people are not cheated. In the per capita approach, entitlements will vary across households. People may not understand why their neighbours get more than they do. Worse, this lack of clarity is likely to be exploited by PDS dealers to create confusion and give less to households.

Two, the per-capita approach opens the door to hassles and harassment. Adding a name to the ration card (e.g., when a child is born), tends to be difficult (including demands for bribes). Even in States with a reputation for effective administration and good systems, enrolling new members can be a struggle, as witnessed in these two southern States.

Three, the transition to a per capita system is likely to be disruptive. This would be particularly unfortunate in States where the per household approach works reasonably well now (e.g., in Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Odisha, and, to some extent, even Rajasthan). Any transition will not only be painful, but also introduce further delays in the implementation. Some States are, in any case, opposed to the “per capita” approach.

Further, the per capita approach carries a risk that people will enrol “fake” household members to inflate their entitlements. To prevent such fraud, demands for integrating the PDS with biometrics are bound to arise. Pilots integrating cash transfer schemes with the Unique Identification/Aadhaar number (UID) have had dismal reviews so far. After months, coverage remains poor, the attempted integration has led to disruptions, and people face harassment. Linking the PDS with biometrics, if it happens, is unlikely to be different.

Equity can be ensured without forcing States to adopt the per capita approach, e.g., by considering every nuclear family as a separate household (the practice in the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act). Alternatively, the Central government could allocate grains to States on the basis of the entitled population and let States decide which approach to use.

Over-centralisation

Greater flexibility to the States is, in general, a good principle, and the “per capita” issue illustrates the larger concern of over-centralisation of the PDS. Elsewhere too such flexibility is necessary, e.g. fixing eligibility criteria for identifying entitled households. For instance, living in a “pacca” house is often used as an exclusion criterion. In the plains it is often a sign of wealth, but not necessarily in the hills. This suggests that exclusion criteria should be State specific.

In fact, there is ample evidence that decentralised initiatives have contributed to the revival of the PDS in recent years. Many PDS reforms in the NFSB actually build on State experiences: reduction in PDS price (in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu); expanded coverage (almost the same set of States), introduction of pulses (in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh and Tamil Nadu) and edible oils (same list, except Chhattisgarh), etc. Similarly, to ensure transparency, State-specific technologies are being used: from sophisticated Global Positioning System (GPS)-equipped trucks to easy-to-identify yellow trucks for delivery of PDS grain, painting the names of all beneficiaries on public and private walls to prevent “duplicates,” and so on. State-specific initiatives can be more effective than a centralised diktat.

(Reetika Khera teaches economics at the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. E-mail:

reetika.khera@gmail.com)

Keywords: National Food Security Bill, food security ordinance, poverty line

4415 - Food Security Bill a game-changer? - Business Standard

N C Saxena  July 8, 2013 Last Updated at 21:46 IST

Food Security Bill a game-changer?

Food insecurity and hunger are rooted in bad policies, faulty design, poor governance and a lack of political will

According to the latest Global Hunger Report, India continues to be in the category of those nations where hunger is "alarming". What is worse, despite high growth, the hunger index in India between 1996 and 2011 has gone up from 22.9 to 23.7. National Sample Survey Organisation data show that the average per capita food expenditure during the period 1993 to 2010 increased only by 0.2 per cent annually in rural India, and fell slightly by 0.1 per cent per annum in the urban areas. At any given point of time, the cereal intake of the bottom 20 per cent in rural India, despite doing more manual work, continues to be at least 20 per cent less than the cereal intake of the top decile of the population, despite better access of the rich to fruit, vegetables and meat products. From their limited resources the poor are forced to spend more on health, children's education, transport and fuel than before. Food is still needed, but not demanded for lack of resources. In the process they get stunted and malnourished. Endemic hunger continues to afflict a large proportion of the Indian population.

Despite the President's declaration in Parliament on June 4, 2009 that a National Food Security Act would be formulated, it took the central government more than four years to bring it through an ordinance. From a date to be notified by the government, two-thirds of all households, as opposed to only one-third right now, will be entitled to cheap cereals. However, there are operational problems.

Of these, the most important challenge is to decide the interstate allocation of foodgrain for the Public Distribution System (PDS). At present, this allocation is arbitrary and is neither based on population nor poverty. Thus, poorer states like Uttar Pradesh (UP) and Bihar get much less food allotment than their share in poverty, whereas, it is just the opposite for the Southern states. This is why Tamil Nadu is opposing the Bill.

Secondly, actual distribution cannot begin unless the eligible households are identified. The final results of the Socio-Economic and Caste Census will not be available for all the states, especially the larger states like UP, Bihar and Tamil Nadu, until the beginning of 2014. Further, there has been a lot of secrecy in conducting the survey, and people even in states like Haryana, where the lists on paper have been shared with the people and finalised, no one knows whether he/she is in or out. There could be a great deal of disenchantment and anger when the actual distribution of grain begins.

In order to meet the increased requirement of foodgrain for PDS, export of cereals should be stopped immediately. If basmati rice is to be exported, an equal amount of ordinary rice must be imported. It is highly unethical to export foodgrain when our own people are dying of starvation.

The Bill encourages states to reform the PDS, including doorstep delivery of foodgrain, end-to-end computerisation; and leveraging "Aadhaar" (UID) for unique identification of entitled beneficiaries. The progress is extremely slow, though not in all states. Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Himachal Pradesh, and Rajasthan have undertaken state-level reforms by extending coverage, improving delivery and increasing transparency. The best results are seen in Chhattisgarh. Here, private dealers have been replaced by panchayats, commissions have been increased and more than 80 per cent of the families have been covered under the scheme (as opposed to only 40 per cent who are officially recognised as being Below the Poverty Line or BPL under the Central government). A regular monitoring and grievance redressal mechanism leads to swift action if foodgrain does not reach the people.

The UID programme will certainly help eliminate duplicate and fake beneficiaries from the PDS rolls. Another advantage with the UID is making PDS entitlements portable, as beneficiaries would be able to withdraw their entitlements from any ration shop in the state. However, large-scale substitution of PDS by direct cash transfers (DCT) is not feasible, as foodgrain bought from the farmers through the minimum support price mechanism need an outlet for distribution. Besides, DCT needs a good banking structure, a functional registration system and widespread use of debit cards. At best, it could be tried on a pilot basis in a few poor localities in metropolitan cities.

Lastly, the Central government should discourage the distribution of manufactured "ready-to-eat" food under the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS) since it leads to grand corruption at the ministerial level. Unfortunately, the government has encouraged such tendering by laying down the minimum nutritional norms for take-home rations, including micronutrient fortification, thus providing a dangerous foothold for food manufacturers and contractors, who are constantly trying to invade child nutrition programmes for profit-making purposes.

A recent evaluation of the ICDS in Gorakhpur by the National Human Rights Commission showed that despite Supreme Court orders to provide hot, cooked meals, all centres supplied only packaged ready-to-eat food, which had only 100 calories against a norm of 500 calories, and 63 per cent of food and funds were misappropriated. Being unpalatable, half the food ends up as cattle feed. However, such reports, though few, are never discussed in state Assemblies, as they now meet for less than 30 days a year. We need a new law making it compulsory for the Parliament and Assemblies to meet for at least 150 days a year.

The ICDS should learn from the success of the hot, freshly cooked mid-day meals programme that runs fairly well even in states not known for efficiency, whereas, the supply of packaged food in the ICDS even in Maharashtra and Karnataka is not popular with the children, besides encouraging corruption and discouraging local participation.

In the ultimate analysis, the constraints to food security and hunger are rooted in bad policies, faulty design, lack of appropriate monitoring and evaluation, poor governance and lack of political will. Action is needed on all the fronts

3423 - Why the Food Security Bill is neither populist nor unaffordable - Economic Times

Why the Food Security Bill is neither populist nor unaffordable

14 Jun, 2013, 05.00AM ISTPost a Comment

The official poverty threshold is low. Many people above the threshold are also poor and look just like the people below the threshold. As a result, there is no reliable way in which subsidies can be targeted only to the people below the official threshold.

By Ashok Kotwal 

Criticism of the National Food Security Bill (NFSB) has led to the government dropping the idea of issuing an Ordinance and, instead, saying it would try to get the Bill passed in a special session of Parliament. 

But doubts persist over the very concept of the Bill. Is it not extravagant to subsidise food for such a large part of the population when the poor constitute only 30 per cent of the population? Can a poor country afford such spending? Isn't the Food Bill just corruption by another name? Wouldn't the Bill lead to a virtual takeover of the grain trade by the central government? As a rising tide lifts all boats, should we not invest in growth rather than spend on consumption? These are all valid questions and we will attempt to answer them. 

In a nutshell, we think the Bill is neither populist nor unaffordable. Some of the anxiety over the cost, corruption and the government's ever-increasing role in the grain market stems from the assumption that PDS will remain forever the main vehicle of delivering the food subsidy. But if the government develops the necessary infrastructure — e.g., UID-linked bank accounts — states will be encouraged to switch to cash transfers. The extra costs of government storage and distribution will then be saved and the problems caused by the distortion of the grain trade will be mitigated. Many worries that arise from the identification of the food Bill with the PDS will disappear. 

The Right to Food campaign is right to stress the need for a food subsidy with near-universal coverage but is wrong in its visceral opposition to cash transfers. The result is a food Bill written wholly in terms of an expansion of the PDS. Suggestions for reforms such as cash transfers and the use of biometric ID have been shunted to an obscure chapter despite the fact that the Delhi government has already opted for delivering the food subsidy through cash transfers. 

Anyone who has had a cursory look at the food Bill tends to assume it is just expanding the present PDS and, thus, worsening existing problems of leakage, corruption and high costs of storage and distribution. This makes people antagonistic toward the idea of the food Bill. The opposition of the Right to Food campaign to even experiment with cash transfers has harmed the poor by making people sympathetic to the critics of the food Bill. 

Cash transfers are often opposed on the grounds of paternalism. "If we give cash to the poor, they might blow it on frivolous things. If we give them food, they will be better nourished." This can work as an argument for midday meals but not as a justification for PDS, which is nothing but an income transfer: the effect of the subsidy is that households save the money that would have otherwise been used to buy food at market prices. 

Why do we need such an income transfer? Because about 90 per cent of India's labour force makes a living in the informal sector. For inclusive growth, we need to invest in education and skills and remove constraints to the absorption of labour by the formal sector. But we also need to improve productivity in the informal sector, which depends on human capital and access to credit. Financial aid that gives the poor some flexibility in managing their affairs helps improve the productivity of their time. What looks like consumption also works as investment. 

But if "the poor" are only the bottom third or so, why offer food subsidy to the bottom two-thirds of India? We often talk about the poor as if it is a well-defined group, but that is hardly the case. The official poverty threshold is low. Many people above the threshold are also poor and look just like the people below the threshold. As a result, there is no reliable way in which subsidies can be targeted only to the people below the official threshold. 

Finally, there is the issue of costs. Official projections are that it would cost close to 1.5 per cent of GDP. But even in the most pessimistic scenario, our GDP is expected to grow at 5 per cent per annum in the near future. If we think of the fact that the Bill will cost less than one-third of the growth in the national income next year, it does not seem that unaffordable, especially given its value to the millions who will receive it. 

(The writer is professor of economics, University of British Columbia. Co-authored with Milind Murugkar, a food policy analyst based in Nasik, and Bharat Ramaswami, professor of economics at the Indian Statistical Institute, Delhi)

3405 - UPA failed to fulfil promise on Food Security Bill: CPI(M) - The Hindu

UPA failed to fulfil promise on Food Security Bill: CPI(M)

NEW DELHI, June 7, 2013

‘Government must ensure universalisation of public distribution system’

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) has accused the government of trying to hoodwink people on food security.

Neither the Food Security Bill nor the cash transfer scheme could provide the much-needed relief to people. On the contrary, over a period of time, due to rising prices, such cash transfers would increasingly become too inadequate to meet the nutritional requirements of the family, it said.

“This United Progressive Allaince-2 government is, thus, out to ensure that the vast mass of our people are pushed into still greater misery,” the editorial in the latest edition of party organ People’s Democracy said. It pointed out that what was required was not a special session of the Parliament but a special resolve by the government to provide genuine food security to people. It suggested that adequate allocations be made to ensure universalisation of the public distribution system through which people were provided the wherewithal to first survive and then to improve their livelihood status.

“The dismantling of the public distribution system will have another serious consequence as well. At the moment, foodgrains are procured by the government at a stipulated minimum support price from farmers. This stock of grains is then distributed through ration shops to people at specified prices. With the dismantling of the PDS, the government would not any longer need to procure foodgrains. Thus, it would also escape from its responsibility of providing a fair price to the farmer,’’ it said.

ATTEMPT TO ELIMINATE SUBSIDIES

The direct cash transfer scheme, on the one hand, allowed the government to abdicate its responsibility of providing grains to people and thus protect them from being victims of hunger and malnutrition. On the other hand, the government could also abdicate its responsibility of providing the farmer a minimum support price. Through such a mechanism, the government would continuously be reducing, if not eliminating, its already meagre subsidies to keep people away from hunger and misery. At the same time, it could also be relieved of its subsidies to provide a minimum support price to farmers, it said.

On speculation over the convening of a special session of Parliament to facilitate the passage of the Food Security Bill, it said that when the government assumed office, then President of India, in her first address to the joint session of Parliament, outlined various measures that the government would implement in the first 100 days. Among other things, this list prominently featured the Food Security Bill. “More than four years have passed since then. The government has not managed to bring such a bill for the consideration and adoption of Parliament. The government has nobody to blame but itself for not fulfilling its own promise to the country and people.”

3293 - UPA introduces Food Bill in Parliament amid protests

UPA introduces Food Bill in Parliament amid protests

Food minister K.V. Thomas said the legislation, which seeks to ensure that poor get access to food at affordable prices, is a historical initiative

Liz Mathew  

          

First Published: Mon, May 06 2013. 03 47 PM IST

Updated: Mon, May 06 2013. 03 50 PM IST

New Delhi: The United Progressive Alliance government introduced the National Food Security Bill in Parliament amid protests by the opposition seeking the resignation of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Food minister K.V. Thomas said the legislation, which seeks to ensure that poor people get access to food at affordable prices, is a historical initiative.

Supporting the legislation, the Congress party’s Sanjay Nirupam criticized the opposition for disrupting Parliament despite a pro-poor, path-breaking legislation having been introduced in the House.

3170 - A summary of the National Food Security Bill, 2013 - Kafila

A summary of the National Food Security Bill, 2013

MARCH 24, 2013

tags: Food security India, Hunger in India, malnutrition, National Food Security Bill 2013

by Shivam Vij

This summary of the National Food Security Bill 2013 (revised version, as tabled in Parliament, 22 March 2013) comes to us via Jean Dreze

1. Preliminaries

The Bill seeks “to provide for food and nutritional security in human life cycle approach, by ensuring access to adequate quantity of quality food at affordable prices to people to live a life with dignity and for matters connected therwith and incidental thereto”.

It extends to the whole of India and “shall come into force on such date as the Central Government may, by notification in the Official Gazette appoint, and different dates may be appointed for different States and different provisions of this Act”.

2. Entitlements

Public Distribution System (TPDS)

Priority households are entitled to 5 kgs of foodgrains per person per month, and Antyodaya households to 35 kgs per household per month. The combined coverage of Priority and Antyodaya households (called “eligible households”) shall extend “up to 75% of the rural population and up to 50% of the urban population”.

The PDS issue prices are given in Schedule I: Rs 3/2/1 for rice/wheat/millets (actually called “coarse grains” in the Bill). These may be revised after three years.

Children’s Entitlements

For children in the age group of 6 months to 6 years, the Bill guarantees an age-appropriate meal, free of charge, through the local anganwadi. For children aged 6-14 years, one free mid-day meal shall be provided every day (except on school holidays) in all schools run by local bodies, government and government aided schools, up to Class VIII. For children below six months, “exclusive breastfeeding shall be promoted”.

Children who suffer from malnutrition will be identified through the local anganwadi and meals will be provided to them free of charge “through the local anganwadi”.

Entitlements of Pregnant and Lactating Women

Every pregnant and lactating mother is entitled to a free meal at the local anganwadi (during pregnancy and six months after child birth) as well as maternity benefits of Rs 6,000, in instalments.

[Notes: (1) “Meal” is defined in the Bill as “hot cooked meal or ready to eat meal or take home ration, as may be prescribed by the Central Government”. All “meals” have to meet nutritional norms specified in Schedule II. (2) The entitlements of women and children are to be delivered by state governments through schemes “in accordance with the guidelines, including cost sharing” to be prescribed by the Central Government. (3) Every school and anganwadi is to have “facilities for cooking meals, drinking water and sanitation”. (4) For purposes of issuing ration cards, the eldest woman in the household (not less than 18 years of age) shall be considered head of the household.]

3. Identification of Eligible Households

The Bill does not specify criteria for the identification of households (Priority or Antyodaya) eligible for PDS entitlements. The Central Government is to determine the state-wise coverage of the PDS, in terms of proportion of the rural/urban population. Then numbers of eligible persons will be calculated from Census population figures. The identification of eligible households is left to state governments, subject to the scheme’s guidelines for Antyodaya, and subject to guidelines to be “specified” by the state government for Priority households. The lists of eligible households are to be placed in the public domain and “displayed prominently” by state governments.

4. Food Commissions

The Bill provides for the creation of State Food Commissions. Each Commission shall consist of a chairperson, five other members and a member-secretary (including at least two women and one member each from Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes).

The main function of the State Commission is to monitor and evaluate the implementation of the act, give advice to the states governments and their agencies, and inquire into violations of entitlements (either suo motu or on receipt of a complaint, and with “all the powers of a civil court while trying a suit under the Code of Civil Procedure 1908”). State Commissions also have to hear appeals against orders of the District Grievance Redressal Officer and prepare annual reports to be laid before the state legislature.

The State Commission may forward “any case” to a Magistrate having jurisdiction, who shall proceed as if the case has been forwarded under Section 346 of the Code of Criminal Procedure 1973.

5. Transparency and Grievance Redressal

The Bill provides for a two-tier grievance redressal structure, involving the District Grievance Redressal Officer (DGRO) and State Food Commission. State governments must also put in place an internal grievance redressal mechanism which may include call centres, help lines, designation of nodal officers, “or such other mechanisms as may be prescribed”.

Transparency Provisions

Mandatory transparency provisions include: (1) placing all PDS-related records in the public domain and keeping them open for inspection to the public; (2) conducting periodic social audits of the PDS and other welfare schemes; (3) using information and communication technology (including end-to-end computerisation of the PDS) “to ensure transparent recording of transactions at all levels”; (4) setting up vigilance committees at state, district, block and fair price shop levels to supervise all schemes under the act.

District Grievance Redressal Officers

DGROS shall be appointed by state governments for each district to hear complaints and take necessary action according to norms to be prescribed by state governments. If a complainant (or the officer or authority against whom an order has been passed by the DGRO) is not satisfied, he or she may file an appeal before the State Food Commission.

Penalties and Compensation

The Food Commissions have powers to impose penalties. If an order of the DGRO is not complied with, the concerned authority or officer can be fined up to Rs. 5,000. The Commission can authorise “any of its members” to act as an adjudicating officer for this purpose.

In case of “non-supply of the entitled quantities of foodgrains or meals to entitled persons”, such persons will be entitled to a food security allowance from the state government, as prescribed by the central government.

6. Other Provisions

PDS Reforms

In Chapter VII, the Bill states that central and state governments “shall endeavour to progressively undertake” various PDS reforms, including: doorstep delivery of foodgrains; ICT applications and end-to-end computerisation; leveraging “aadhaar” (UID) for unique identification of entitled beneficiaries; full transparency of records; preference to public institutions or bodies in licensing of fair price shops; management of fair price shops by women or their collectives; diversification of commodities distributed under the PDS; full transparency of records; and “introducing schemes such as cash transfer, food coupons or other schemes to the targeted beneficiaries in lieu of their foodgrain entitlements” as prescribed by the central government.

Obligations of Government and Local Authorities

The main obligation of the Central Government is to provide foodgrains (or, failing that, funds) to state governments, at prices specified in Schedule I, to implement the main entitlements. It also has to “provide assistance” to state governments to meet local distribution costs, but on its own terms (“as may be prescribed”). The Central Government has wide-ranging powers to make Rules.

The main obligation of state governments is to implement the relevant schemes, in accordance with the guidelines issued by the Central Government. State governments also have wide-ranging powers to make Rules. They are free to extend benefits and entitlements beyond what is prescribed in the Bill, from their own resources.

Local Authorities and Panchayati Raj Institutions are responsible for proper implementation of the act in their respective areas, and may be given additional responsibilities by notification.

7. Schedules

The Bill has three schedules (these can be amended “by notification”). Schedule 1 prescribes issue prices for the PDS. Schedule 2 prescribes “nutritional standards” for midday meals, take-home rations and related entitlements. For instance, take-home rations for children aged 6 months to 3 years should provide at least 500 calories and 12-15 grams of protein. Schedule 3 lists various “provisions for advancing food security”, under three broad headings: (1) revitalization of agriculture (e.g. agrarian reforms, research and development, remunerative prices), (2) procurement, storage and movement of foodgrains (e.g. decentralised procurement), and (3) other provisions (e.g. drinking water, sanitation, health care, and “adequate pensions” for “senior citizens, persons with disability and single women”).

2476 - The Food, the Bad and the Ugly by Sainath - The Hindu

The Food, the Bad and the Ugly by Sainath - The Hindu

March 22, 2012

P. SAINATH

MORE THAN THREE BAGS FULL: Food not reaching those who need it. A file photograph of wheat being loaded at an open FCI godown at Sonepat, Haryana

Average per capita net availability of foodgrain declined in every five-year period of the 'reforms' without exception. In the 20 years preceding the reforms — 1972-1991 — it rose every five-year period without exception.

The country's total foodgrain production is expected to touch a record 250 million tons this year (2011-12).

Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar

PTI, February 17, 2012

Record foodgrain output of 235.88 million tons in 2010-11.

Sharad Pawar,

PTI, April 6, 2011

India's foodgrain production hit a fresh record at 233.87 million tonnes in 2008-09.

Sharad Pawar, Lok Sabha,

July 20, 2009

The Minister (Mr. Pawar) said food grain production in 2007-08 had reached a record 227.32 million tonnes and record production has been achieved in a number of crops.

Economic Times,

April 23, 2008

“During 2006-07, the agriculture sector has posted new landmarks. The record production of 216 million tonnes of food grains…”

Sharad Pawar,

November 13, 2007

Economic Editors conference

Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar doesn't just deal in foodgrain production, he deals in records. Landmarks he's fond of citing as foodgrain production rises every year. (Barring blips like those in 2009-10, of course). Sticking to absolute numbers helps him maintain a modest silence on another record he's been a big part of.

The daily per capita net availability of foodgrain has been falling steadily and dangerously during the “reform” years. If we take five-year averages for those years from 1992 to 2010 — the figure declined every five years without exception (see table “Declining per capita …”). From 474.9 grams of cereals and pulses for the years of 1992-96 to 440.4 grams for the period 2007-2010 (The 2011 figure is yet to come). A fall of 7.3 per cent. There has not been a single five-year period that saw an upward blip.

What about the 20 years preceding the reforms? That is 1972-1991? The per capita availability figure rose every five-year period without exception. From 433.7 for 1972-76, to 480.3 grams in 1987-91. An increase of 10.7 per cent.

Not reaching the needy

Consider the average for the latest five years for which data are available. It was 441.4 grams for the period 2006-2010. That's lower than the corresponding period half a century ago. It was 446.9 for the years 1956-60. Not great news for a nation where malnutrition among children under five is nearly double that of Sub-Saharan Africa's. (A point the India Human Development Report 2011 — from a wing of the Planning Commission — concedes).

If production is rising, which it is; if the upper classes are eating a lot better, which they are; and if per capita availability keeps declining, which it does — that implies three things at least. That foodgrain is not getting to those who most need it. That the gap between those eating more and those eating less is worsening. And that food prices and incomes of the poor are less and less in sync.

It also tells us how disastrous the reforms-era policy of “targeting” through the Public Distribution System has been. The poor have not gained from “targeting” in the PDS. They have been the targets. The “reforms” period has seen more poor and hungry people shut out of the PDS in practice. The latest budget suggests that “targeting” is about to get more ruthless. A universal PDS covering all would cost much less than what the government gives away each year in concessions to the corporate sector.

Small wonder that Mr. Pawar sticks to aggregate numbers in his claims of records. He stays with production in absolute numbers, because that's rising. As the Big Boss of Cricket in India (and the planet) Mr. Pawar would not be satisfied with totalling up how many runs a batsman of his makes. He'd divide it by the number of innings the batter has played. He'd perhaps even look at the number of balls he faced, strike rate and so on. But when it comes to his boss role on foodgrain, aggregate figures will do. The big numbers look so nice. Why complicate things by looking at how much foodgrain is available per Indian? That too, per day or year?

Economic Survey document

For those worried about food availability, though, it matters. The highest figure for any year in our history was the 510.1 grams for 1991. Aha! Chalk one up for the reformers? Not really. The data are based on the agricultural year — i.e. July to June. So the 1991 figure corresponds to the production of July 1990 to June 1991. Manmohan Singh made his speech launching the reforms on July 24, 1991. And the average for 2010, after nearly two decades of “reforms,” was 440.4 grams.

The decline across the reforms years has been dismal. Indeed, some five-year periods in this era compare poorly even with those in the pre-Green Revolution years. For instance, 2006-10 throws up worse figures than 1956-1960. All figures from 1961 are seen in the latest Economic Survey of 2011-12. (http://indiabudget.nic.in/es2011-12/estat1.pdf See A22, 1.17. Last year's survey has data going back to 1951.

This, of course, is the point at which someone pops up with: “It's all due to the population. The poor breed like flies.” Is it? The compound annual growth of population was much higher in pre-reform decades than it is now. But the CAGR for food production was always higher and ahead of it. Even in 1961-1971, when the CAGR for population was 2.24 per cent it was 2.37 for grain production. In 2001-10, the figure for population was just 1.65 per cent. But foodgrain production lagged behind even that figure, at 1.03 per cent. (For the growth rate in foodgrain, we have not taken 2010-11 into account. We have only advance estimates for that year and these can vary quite a bit from final figures).

In all the southern states the fertility rate is either at replacement level or even below it. And the population growth rate is falling everywhere in the country, and at quite a rapid pace. Yet, per capita availability has declined. So the population claim does not fly. There may be one-off years in which the growth rate of food production (or even per capita availability) gets better, or much worse. Hence, looking at five-year or decadal averages makes more sense. And the trends those show are awful.

This is a context where foodgrain production per capita is on the decline. Where, however, the buffer stocks with the government in fact show an increasing trend. So per capita availability is in fact declining at a faster rate. It means the poor are so badly hit that they cannot buy, or have access to, even the limited grain on offer.

GHI ranking

True, this will invite yowls of rage from the Marie Antoinette School of Economics (or ‘Let-them-eat-cake' crowd). For them the decline only shows that people now care less for cereals and pulses. They're eating much better stuff since they're doing so much better. So much better that we'd be lucky to reach Sub-Saharan Africa's rate of child malnourishment in a few years. Or improve enough in the Global Hunger Index (GHI) to challenge an upstart Rwanda in a few years. Presently we rank 67 in the GHI (out of 81 countries with the worst food security status). Rwanda clocks in ahead of us at rank 60. India's GHI value in 2011 was worse than it was 15 years before that in 1996.

We've spent 20 years promoting cash crops at the expense of food crops. No one knows quite how much land has been converted from the latter to the former, but it would run to lakhs of acres. As food crop cultivation has grown less remunerative, many have abandoned it. As farming tanks across large swathes of the country, more and more land lies fallow. The owners have given up on the idea of making a living from it. Close to seven-and-a-half million people quit farming between 1991 and 2001 (and we still await the figures for 2001-11). Two decades of policies hostile to smallholders, but paving the way for corporate control, have seen public investment in agriculture crash. No surprise then that foodgrain production is “growing” only in absolute numbers but falling at an alarming rate in per capita terms.

psainath@mtnl.net.in

2472 - Below the sarkari line - The Asian Age

Below the sarkari line

              Antara Dev Sen

Stop being so middle class. Remember how kind our sarkar is. For ever changing to suit your needs, for ever trying to make you feel better.

Stop complaining about rising prices. So what if food inflation is close to 10 per cent? You’re still stinkin’ rich. The sarkar has decided that if you spend Rs. 32 a day, you are not poor. (It dips to `26 a day for rural folk.) And considering you spend way, way more than that, you are utterly untouched by poverty. Whew! Isn’t that great news? Relax. Enjoy your new status as Mr and Mrs Moneybags, stop fretting over the price of pulses and rice and onions. That’s so low class! The point of being rich is that you don’t think about prices. Life is priceless. Just focus on getting ahead at any cost.

So get into the mode, sister. Stop being so middle class. Remember how kind our sarkar is. For ever changing to suit your needs, forever trying to make you feel better. Dignity is so important in life, don’t you think?
Reminds me of a Bengali poem, Daaridra-rekha (Poverty Line) by the late Tarapada Ray. It goes:

I was merely poor, very poor.
I had no food to eat
No clothes to hide my shame
No roof over my head.
You, the very soul of benevolence,
You came to me and said:
“No, ‘poor’ is an ugly word,
It robs people of human dignity,
No, you’re actually poverty-stricken.”

Stricken by relentless poverty,
My days of suffering,
My days of pain,
Ran on day after day,
I wasted away.
Suddenly, you appeared again, and said:
“Look, I’ve been thinking about it,
‘Poverty-stricken’ isn’t a good word either;
You’re impoverished.”

My days and nights in chronic impoverishment,
Panting in the furnace of summer,
Shivering in the chill of winter nights,
Soaking in the monsoon rain
I became more and more impoverished.
But you are tireless,
You came to me again, and said:
“Impoverishment makes no sense.
Why must you be impoverished?
You have always been deprived,
You’re deprived, historically deprived.”

There was no end to my deprivation,
To bed half-fed year after year,
To bed in the street, under the naked sky,
I had a skeletal existence.
But you did not forget me,
This time, your clenched fist raised high,
You called out:
“Awake, arise, ye dispossessed!”

By then, I had not the strength to rise,
Hunger had almost finished me,
My rib cage rose and fell like bellows,
I could not keep up with
Your enthusiasm and excitement.

See, that’s the problem. We can’t keep up with the enthusiasm and excitement of our brilliant sarkar. Why, even many of us freshly discovered stinkin’ rich, instead of being delighted at our new status, have been attacking the sarkar, demanding to know what possessed it to keep the poverty line so ridiculously low. Was it to minimise the number of the poor? Was to it deprive the poor of government benefits? Was it to look more presentable in general?

This is not a measure of poverty, we snapped, it’s a measure of desperate destitution. What can you get for `32 a day? Certainly not good health. Not nutrition. Not proper clothes. Not a roof over your head. Not education. Not regular access to transport. Not old age security. Not healthcare. And certainly not the joy of living. What is the point of this absurd exercise in limiting poverty to absolute deprivation of the naked and the half-dead?

“If Rs. 25 for rural areas and Rs. 32 for urban areas per capita expenditure was ‘adequate’, then it is not clear to us why Planning Commission members are paid up to 115 times the amount (not counting the perks of free housing and health care and numerous other benefits),” fumed social activists, including some members of Sonia Gandhi’s National Advisory Council, like Aruna Roy. And several distinguished economists and social scientists, including Ashok Mitra, Prabhat Patnaik and Yoginder K. Alagh, urged the government to delink food entitlements from such a curious poverty line. Undernutrition is more widespread than income poverty anyway, they said, and linking such faulty official poverty estimates to basic entitlements of the people, particularly entitlement to food, is counterproductive.

Besides, why should there be a poverty line that determines “caps” on the below poverty line population? Access to food is a basic entitlement. Why link it to a silly imaginary line that measures deathly destitution, not adequate nutrition and basic standards of living?

Come on! Aren’t we being unfair? Give the sarkar its due. It’s trying so hard to establish us as a world power. To get us the dignity we deserve. Shouldn’t we help? Forget the old roti, kapda and makaan logic. Things change. We can’t be trapped in a time warp for ever. We should recognise the importance of being a rich country — as we now are — and allow the sarkar to reduce poverty in any way it can. Lowering the threshold of prosperity magnificently improves our looks as a rich nation, buzzing with billionaires and a vibrant first world economy. Focusing on the abysmally poor doesn’t. Anyway, we still have 450 million people living below this crawling poverty line. And you want more, mister?

Besides, how has a more inclusive poverty line helped? The poor still spend far more than `32 a day merely to get a BPL card that gives them access, after deducting middlemens’ cuts, to welfare schemes. We must move with the times.

“Long days have passed in the meantime,
You are now wiser,
And smarter.
This time, you have brought a blackboard with you,
On it, with great care, and with some chalk,
You have drawn a perfectly straight line;
This time you’ve had to work hard,
You wipe the sweat from your brow and tell me:
“See this line? Below it,

Way below it, is where you are.”
Wonderful!
Thank you, thank you so much!
Thank you for my poorness,
Thank you for my poverty,
Thank you for my impoverishment,
Thank you for my deprivation,
Thank you for my dispossession,
And finally, thank you for that long and perfect line,
Thank you for this bright and shining gift.”

The writer is editor of The Little Magazine. She can be contacted at:
sen@littlemag.com

2471 - Which world do economists live in? - The Asian Age

Which world do economists live in?

Sep 23, 2011

On September 20, the Montek Singh Ahluwalia-led Planning Commission filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court stating that anyone capable of spending more than Rs. 965 a month (Rs 32 per day) in urban India and Rs. 781 (Rs 26 per day) in rural India is not poor and, therefore, will not be allowed to benefit from Central and state government schemes meant for people living below the poverty line. Many may have forgotten that the aforementioned “generous” estimates were arrived at by the Planning Commission after it faced criticism from the Supreme Court for claiming in May this year that a person is not poor if s/he earns more than Rs. 20 a day in urban areas and Rs. 15 a day in villages.

“The Planning Commission may revise the norms of per capita amount looking to the price index of May 2011 or any other subsequent dates,” the court had firmly suggested.
The apathy of the government and its so-called compassionate economists towards finding a humanistic social policy to improve the lot of the “capability deprived” (to use an Amartya Sen phrase) majority of this country is indeed shocking.
The enormity of this institutional neglect, apparent in the plan panel’s latest estimates, needs to be looked at from the perspective of the August 2007 report on the “Conditions of Work and Promotion of Livelihoods in the Unorganised Sector” released by the National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (NCEUS).
According to this report, in 2004-05, 77 per cent of our population, i.e. totalling 836 million, was subsisting on an income of less that Rs. 20 per capita per day, and is therefore, poor.
But the Planning Commission, uncomfortable with the truth, seeks not to remedy the situation but use anachronistic methodology and derive from it more comfortable figures that will drop the poverty line and make the “77 per cent of Indians are poor” fact go away.
According to the official definition, the poverty line is the monthly cost of a “basket of food” that gives 2,400 calories of nutrition per capita per day in rural areas and 2,100 calories per capita per day in urban areas.
In 1973-74, the government fixed this line at Rs. 49.09 and Rs. 56.64 per capita per month for rural and urban areas respectively. These values were revised in 1999-2000 to Rs. 327.56 and Rs. 452.11 per month. In other words, we were made to believe at that time that a person who earns Rs. 328 per month in a village and Rs. 453 per month in a city is not poor.
Astonishingly, these outdated figures still form the basis of poverty calculations in India. The Planning Commission, in March 2007, used these figures to claim that the number of people living below the poverty line had declined to 21.8 per cent from 26.1 per cent in 1999-2000. The NCEUS report contradicted this contention in August the same year
with its 77 per cent report card.

The common international poverty line has in the past been roughly $1 a day. In 2008, the World Bank released revised figure of $1.25 at 2005 purchasing-power parity (PPP). To avoid such conflicting claims the poverty line must be redefined for a realistic evaluation of the number of poor in India.
In this connection, the methodology used by Australia may be worth studying as it takes into account even non-income indicators to calculate poverty. For instance, “for a family comprising two adults, one of whom is working, and two dependent children” the Australian poverty line for the March quarter 2011, inclusive of housing costs, was $835.3 per week (or $3,341 per month). This was an increase of $27.72 over the poverty line for the previous quarter, December 2010.
The poverty line in Australia is drawn from a benchmark weekly income of $62.7 established in December 1973. Since then it has been periodically updated using an index of per capita household disposable income, which includes housing and other requirements. Interestingly, the Australian poverty line is always higher than the welfare payments the state makes, like dole.
A comparison of Indian and Australian methodologies would reveal the ridiculousness of Indian estimates.
For instance, an Australian family of four with a monthly income of less than $3,341(approximately Rs. 1,65,000) is deemed to be below the poverty line in that country, whereas a city-based Indian family of the same size earning just a rupee over the beggarly sum of Rs. 3,860 (that is, Rs. 965 x 4) a month is designated “not poor” by our government and denied relief.
Even if one were to factor in the higher cost of living in Australia, it is extremely distressing to note that as per the Planning Commission’s definition, an Indian BPL family has to be 43 times poorer than its Australian counterpart to be called “poor”!
The truth is that through the Planning Commission’s affidavit to the Supreme Court, the government has sought to grossly understate endemic poverty in India — perhaps to escape censure by the aam voters in the next general election.
One wonders if members of the Planning Commission are aware of the cost of living in “urban” India.
Some tenements in Mumbai slums cost up to `15,000 per square foot. A two-room house at the Matunga labour camp, for instance, sells at Rs. 40 lakh, and it has been reported that rents in Wadala’s slums are around Rs. 2,500 to Rs. 3,000 a month for a 100-sq-ft home and around Rs. 3,500 for a 200-sq-ft tenement. Add to this the cost of food, clothing, medicine, education and you are looking at anywhere between Rs. 10,000 to Rs. 15,000 a month for a family to survive — consuming no more than 2,100 calories a day — in India’s metropolitan cities.
If Mr Ahluwalia’s Planning Commission feigns ignorance of this reality, it must be living in a time warp.

A. Faizur Rahman is a Chennai-based civil engineer and social activist. He may be reached at faizz@rocketmail.com