If there is no plan what you review? Promises are not real for Indian Government

The rejection of Planned Development of the country by the new government since 2014, has resulted in allocation of budget to departments and state based on the sourced knowledge. The NITI Ayog the renamed and totally new version of policy making has made poor progress in understanding the needs of country. It has selectively picked the points based on the party Manefesto rather than working paper by experts. The masters voice is loud and clear to the babus and experts in Ayog (ex-employee's of Planning Commission) to follow the new change  to suit the political bosses.

The series of programs floated has no serious basis, or re-worked old programs or simply renamed, an political excercise on the behest of party in power. The plan periods would be lapsed in 2017, before be see the end of Nehruvian era. May be the birth of market economy with India slated to poise to lead the Asia with more investments, flow of money, able -skilled people, ease of doing business etc. But whether the country can look inwards into the problem of Agriculture, Market, Urbanization, Water, Environment, Climate Change etc which are global concern. The fundamental shift in Macro economics and political think is still to be directed and questioned by those who are running it. The higher education institutes, experts and market leaders are supporting the current agenda as they had supported earlier agenda. No particular school of thoughts holds point since we are slated to follow the leader.

The development track or the world community is watching the change in India silently, knowingly well its shortfall in dealing with social, infrastructure and economic issues. They want to control the Indian economy and time is right now to enter and convince the political bosses. What PMO during UPA-II cannot do due to call for 'inclusive growth' where the rights based approach was adopted by the policy makers. Now the current government is preparing the grounds for big bang reform with expected investments, flow of funds  and hopes into Indian economy. Whether these would also enhance the risks, stop social funding or remove the subsidies from majority etc. can be debated in next phase of govt.

Two years have passed with drastic change in plan system, and entry of market is awaited, it would be too late it does not kick up by this year end. Lets hope that we sense the market well, and desires of people who feels government has failed them by not understanding their needs of hunger, unemployment, poverty and agriculture. 

Believe it or Not Smart City, Digital India and Make in India is not just slogan

During past 18 months and more we are made to believe the strength of the government is in its resolve to pursue the popular programs so listed by new dawn of digital era who wish to take the world economy upfront. It was said, India is now getting prepared to take the economy by its horn, the projections even after months have been bullish by the agencies. Even though the market did not respond so well to the call for investment it tanked to lowest level post diwali, The investors in the infrastructure is hard to come by, given the budgetary provisions which might foresee the light within next week should give boost to investment climate. The basics are right for India, but the digital divide which shortened due to penetration of mobile telephony made to believe the real strength of Indian people and enterprise is yet to come.

The strong linkages established in the government programmes like Smart City, Digital India and Make in India makes us believe the government is serious, but not so good feeling when we look at the penetration of the program. The participation of the state government is low, and corporate are shying away from making the commitments. The revival of the Smart city program with more cities are likely to join is hard when cities do not commit easily to the pending reforms. The infrastructure and investment plans where all in place in so called 'Smart cities' when during the earlier phases of JNNURM the City Development Plans were prepared. There is ample scope for reforms but the state's not ruled by the party in power at the center finds it hard to accept, mostly due to political polarization in development agenda.

The people are now made to believe in virtual environments, the sales pitch of the e-comm. sites coupled with delivery prangs shows the purchasing power of the Indian consumers. But with lack of growth in real estate sector, and slowing of demands in key sectors, there is hard learning for the manufacturers to stay back in competition. The India's share of global trade might have marginally improved with little scope for economic revival very soon when trade from India can become competitive. The global rich and poor divide during the current economic slow down and poor revival does not through enough to give boost to India's Make in India programe. The skills required to stay competitive demands for the global change in the manner we produce the things, the labour intensive industries shows slow progress, with machine based productions gains competitive edge. The industrial and manufacturing base needs an improvement in the country side and rural India to raise the demands of the consumable goods. 

The entrepreneur developments and poor funding disbursal's from the key banks does not make the change as desired by the 'Modi Sarkar'.  The recent drubbing in state elections, and not being able to perform the legislative functions at the centre frustrates the ministries. The BJP ruled states even do not perform to expectation and shows the poor political upmanship to steer the economy forward. The hope for change when millions of Indians wants to join reflects in the lack of infrastructure investments in rural India, the investors looking for the space in the ever growing cities, mostly metropolitan cities. 

Government of India: Post Budget Agenda

Riding on the media bandwagon the Union Finance minister presented budget on 28th Feb 2015 admist lot of hope as change maker. While increasing the scope for the insurance cover to the poor, there is chance to include poor in monitized economy. Whether the claim is granted and reclaimed by the poor as regards to insurance? Only time would tell the benefits it would do to the poor. Thats apart the budget curtail the spending on the social sector, including Panchayati raj, education, health, water resources has been reduced. As mentioned by one analyst as under;

"Many of the social sectors have experienced huge cut in allocation. The allocation for women and child development has been reduced by staggering 44 per cent, the reduction for school education and literacy has been facing a reduction of closer to 10 per cent. The allocation for environment and forest has been slashed by almost 5 per cent and for water resources the allocation was reduced by 29 per cent. Allocation on Mid-day meal scheme has been reduced by almost 22 per cent. Allocation for JnNURM has been reduced from Rs. 6, 2167 crore to Rs. 240 crore and the money would be transferred to the creation of 100 smart cities across the country. In the name of giving fiscal autonomy to the states, 12 schemes earlier funded by central government have been winded up and left to the states to use their additional resources. As a result, backward region grants fund, tourist infrastructure development scheme, model school at block level, part of agricultural development has to be taken care of by the state governments."

For detail :https://expldev.wordpress.com/2015/03/01/union-budget-2015-16-hopes-and-apprehensions-anjan-chakrabarti/

What can be expected from the government who has done wonders to facilitate the corporate by providing for the tax breaks, have been planning to disinvest from the public enterprise, facilitate new business  etc has been lack lustors in promoting the agricultural growth. With lots of hope on the 'niti ' ayog, this has been non starter with Rs.20000 crore seed capital alloted. The state are now left with the recommendations of the finance commissions for their share of central revenue. Most of the state are now made to look for their own resources. Right approach but state needs to be trained, monitored and supported for the planning excercise. The largest share of revenue from the centre now goes to the defence sector with over Rs.2.5 lakh crore expenditure allocation. 

With the objective of bringing the labour from the agriculture to the services sector the focus retains on the skill development. What skills? mainly to serve the service sector, which has seen the rise of service tax from 12 to 14 percent directly, and with addition proposed cess of 2 percent its going to rise above 16 percent. This can harmful for the growth of service sector it self. More or less it would effect the tourism, hotel and restaurant business in big way. The middle class households are largely effected, not only in urban India but also in rural. The development scenario would never receive investments as expected due to poor rise in income of households. There is poor chance of saving the money, thus where is scope for the investment in infrastructure or govt schemes. 

The arm twisting of the middle class has been opposite to the 'achhe din' slogan by the Modi Sarkar, promised on the eve of election. The net benefit to the poor would be lesser if the investment in rural infrastructure is declining, and the employment scope is declined due to poor service sector growth. The decline in crude prices have not helped the customers but it has helped the government and corporate to save the addition revenue and foreign exchange. The additional levies and taxes would burden on the common men and rich alike since many of them who consume these raw material would be hard hit by increasing price rise. 

The global competitiveness would decline since the delay in the major projects like Dholera SIR, GIFT city and DFC would take toll on the corporate expectation. Even with rise in government investment the projects on the ground are moving at slow pace. The first of the projects mentioned might be expected to finish by 2017-18, if the projects do not get the investors who are really interested in starting projects there is likely chance to even foresee employment generated on the ground. 

Though the governments abstain itself from being populist it attracted the attention of the market and corporate since it facilitated them for the want of investment and employment. As per the experience of Gujarat goes hardly 30 to 40 percent being realized even after facilitating the corporate in most of the manufacturing sectors. 

Planning Commission gone to dustbin, now 'Niti Ayog' : India reduced to blah blah development

The government must set the priority on the basic essence of Indian planning system. The proposed renaming of planning commission, has no meaning unless there is functional change. Its not clear what the government wants, just throwing away the organisation and function is not the intention. May be blindly following the US way of doing of the things means we are entering into capitalist based economic system. But this would always increase fight between the states, and center should have minimum role in planning of state. Are states prepared to open planning and policy making. Policy making at the national level had been centres task and planning commission did many good things, just before rejected due to dislike of developed state as well as BJP ruled states. The axis of development would change post congress era but whether it should go away from constitutional commitments. If not, planning commission is best option available with little reform to suit the current macro requirements. Its sad that intellectuals and politicians who had taken big and bold steps are silent on serious basis of Indian economic and development system. This also shows serious lapse on our commitment to the world bodies. Is that so simple to change the name ' Niti Ayog' i.e. Policy commission, what about five year plan, we are getting away from plan regime means we do not now talk of poverty, inequality, inclusion and employment, but talk more of export-import, national security, industries, SEZ and urbanization. The national macro priorities have flipped now till they receive some serious thoughts from planning from below.

The policy making is loose till there is some essence in planning. Many have in past talked about planning from below, which mean decentralization of decisions. India needs to rethink on the development agenda at par with the directions from the UNDP or ADB or WTO or UNFCC in order to follow the agenda of world on one hand and look for the solutions for the problems at hand. The land and agricultural policies connected with the livelihood of the masses cannot be resolved by making policy (we already have plenty). The centre needs to redistribute the funds in order to reduce the inequality amongst the states and its people. The resources in the country is not equally distributed thus making the role of centre very important to address the regional and sector based issues.

The past commission did not pay much attention to the regional needs including those of states and districts, the legislative power given to the local bodies including district authorities also needs to be enhanced. The district development plans must now be given top priority while taking for the developments. Most of the problem facing the country are felt locally and can be resolved by having the integrated development plans. The resource exploitation has become serious threat to the eco-systems, fueling the migrations trends. The justifiable development must be achieved by going towards the people centeric approach in planning.

Where is direction to the nation by changing these names, the frequency of neglect of the primary and secondary sector is serious. While growth may happen from the FDI investments but this would also destroy the synergies between the people and state. The manufacturing capacities of the Indian people and markets are understated and killed by systematic intrusion by the foreigners in our economic space. It seems we would be back to the imperialism of economic character with more loose strings now going into the MNC giants. The vested interest have taken now control of the economic systems to retain the benefits of economic growth to few and planning to leave the rest of India on its own.

Instead of reviving the public systems if governments in power in centre and state chooses to ignore them, there is going to be total chaos in social order which might be starting from below. The time might be appropritate for the citizens and working class to understand that their strengths are misunderstood in present context. India, must be awake to the changes and support where ever  these are appropriate but also be strong enough to resist the change which can hamper their economic and social prospects. 

Upsetting the Planning Commission: Old Wine in New Bottle

The setting of the planning commission in year 1950, an about 54 years ago and up to 12th five plan it served the nation with advising the central government and directing the states from time to time. The planning commission established to promote and protect the rights of the citizens. The development planning emerges as science which was practiced and researched while we planned for our nation. The basis of planning commission was following;

The Constitution of India has guaranteed certain Fundamental Rights to the citizens of India and enunciates certain Directive Principles of State Policy, in particular, that the State shall strive to promote the welfare of the people by securing and protecting as effectively as it may a social order in which justice, social economic and political, shall inform all the institutions of the national life and shall direct its policy towards securing, among other things:-
(a) that the citizens, men and women, equally, have the right to an adequate means of livelihood;
(b) that the ownership and control of the material resources of the community are so distributed as best to sub serve the common good; and
(c) that the operation of the economic system does not result in the concentration of wealth and means of production to the common detriment.

With new government elected in May2014, there is urge to change and new direction to be sought from the organisation which now is allowed to shut and become defunct. The new regime with eyes on the growth of economy, and post libralization effects give rise to capital and market based policy making. The rights based approach subsided by the economic and employment concerns of the urban India. The rising middle class and their hopes giving way to new thinking promoting greater participation from the enterprises. 

The so called 'think tank' based approach is not new, the guards changed with planning commission paid fitting obituary to its structure and planned era by going beyond the means by extending itself too much into the political economy. India has not achieved coordinated growth among the stakeholders like the states and centre, the federal structure needs to be strengthened with states taking more responsibility in planning.

The tiff between centre and state in earlier regime and emergence of Gujarat Model with more action towards inviting the private players and high stake of state in capital investment. The sector based growth in Gujarat, with more corporate segments of government, due to emergence of companies owned and sustained by Government. The model succeeded in reducing the government department to signing authorities and release of lumpsum financial support to new organisations. The improvised management techniques minus lack of government (middle level management) helped these government run corporate to functions. But none of the corporate (of government) was evaluated for its result except their contribution and zeal in signing the MoUs with limited companies. Public-Private partnership was done in true spirit with both the parties unshackled themselves from the government systems except receiving the financial aid and decision ability. The American dream of Gujarat government to establish the brand succeeded in making the model adaptable to wider use once the ruling party came to power in India.

Now, the model needs to be tested on India's economic fate yet, failing to recognize the need there is little doubt that the re-organised decision making body will not be planning commission. This would work as disinvestment commission on one hand when government departments would give birth to state run enterprises. Eventually, PPP model bringing out the change (financial control) to their own hand for quick decision making. It would be hard to replace the planning commission, by its nature but its easy to open a new way of governance with no government in place to decide the path to development. State and local bodies now need to compete among themselves to get the wider power and investment. It would be not long before they come together to demand more assistance and thus market playing its role.

Development: Must be removed from the shackles of Bad Economics

Election once again has started throwing data on the public forum, when the services of the economists are being used to measure the merits of the development. The key holed eyed economist are again judging using the time and variables which they only can define as the unit for the representation of their argument. The reinvention of the data takes place which even the original collectors of information like NSSO, RBI, WB, or others would have imagined to use. The deconstruction of the economy in the claim to be politically correct development jumps out of the economic boxes and does a shadow boxing for the political masters. The utility of the Nobel and ultra Nobel, elite economists thrown out of race of award often fight for the opposition whom this gentlemen represent. The representation of data in the favour of the parties who tries to disown the economic preferences of the ruling parties often treat the data from the government as farce and not to be quoted. In most of the cases they build the economic argument based on the political notion of the justification as if the data (if its so) can be manipulated to suit a political agenda.

In a way the political masters do not control the economic affairs as it is made to believe, they are not one who can feed the poor or even stop the down slide of the economy. They are no way responsible for the development status of the people, why the economists make us believe that what you are looking at is the outcome of the political gentlemen/women who tried very hard to save you from economic oblivion.

The international development forums have often rejected, economic indicators as true representative of the 'development' of the people and regions. What macro economy represents anyway..a state of health regarding the country. There are some who tries to overthrow the planning commission, who rather shall be strengthened for whatever they would have done in last 60 plus years. Is it so easy that for the sake of the political freedom the division of the nation should be accepted. Whether there is political nexus between a national and regional parties to weaken the development strategies from central organisation, for more federal power to the state in the name of financial autonomy. In the competition between the political parties, which in India is getting transformed into the state autonomy (which on the ground is not true) in the macro economic debates turns out to decentralization of power for the sake of political benefits. If at all the states transfers similar financial autonomy to the constituent districts.

Development in the election year have become a show game for the political parties often reflecting the feudal mindset with exclusive political strategies to corner maximum funds from the corporate. The deprived social class as always were granted little political mileage in the development  debate since they rather contribute little to the national and state domestic product. The growth charts cannot be filled while the poor are serviced by the state, the free education, land rights, rights to health, forest rights, creation of wealth at grassroots shows no insight from the popular economic theorists and thinkers who run after the political masters for the sake of intellectual acceptance. The realization of the development inputs cannot only be take if there is public-private participation where public means government and private means corporate. The sectors which were limited to the government departments mainly tribal, forest, irrigation, education, health etc were privatized by the government citing bad economics after the post liberalization. But these social change by installing the corporate partners did not help in improvement of social sectors. Most of the economically developed states are examples of giving not so good human development indicators. In fact HDI is common indicators where the economic development has lesser impact if the fundamental resources of the respective states remain intact.

In fact the economic principles practiced by many intellectual who often que before the political class are nurtured by desire to gain the power to have say in handling millions of rupees often at the cost of the common men. The idea of the projects and crores of rupees in the schemes gives immense satisfaction to such who are often not bothered to understand the outcome or forget about the social audit. Most the million rupee scheme are wasted on the lack of monitoring, where outcome is not the goal to which economists have worked rather they limit themselves to the funding.

Development Debate: Circus by the political class

'Everybody loves Good Draught' by P.Sainath, tries to explore the dimensions of developmental reality and fate of depressed class in the post independent India. The political class though estrainged with many criticism often look away from the reality. The national parties are claiming for the development models are far from the reality. The people who decide on the government programs, often forwarded by the political class do not belong to either of national parties. The programs are made to feel that people would get some doles from the government exchequer in turn to democratic favour of electing parties into the power. When would people in India understand the governance, and realise that the they need to come forward and participate in governance. The political class often take over the claims, unless privately they are in favour of few individuals, either from their friends, family and business. The unholy nexus is known and many state government particularly in western India, colluded with the corporate to the advantage of the business over the people.

The numerous promises made by the political class often is limited to corporate, the pledging of government land, providing cheap infrastructure and absolute guarantee of the cheap labour by the states encourages the corporate to exploit the land. The encouragement of the state capital by infusing the investment by the state to create companies under the Acts that suits the governments to divert the tax payers money to business ventures. These companies are no more labour intensive public sector units and babus paradise, but a corporate run company managed by the government employees as its managing director. Government becomes a share holders which keeps the money to fuel the state domestic product. Even the social institutions, para goverment institutions and organisations formed by the governments are often used to divert the functions and budget of the standard government to the run an exmarital affairs with the business world.

In many cases the funds are diverted to run a pro government campaign often helps the party in power to play its role in getting the cheap funds for promoting the agenda more closer to the leader. Thus making the circus of the development efforts. Often the leader of the government becomes the ring master who drives the others to fall into the line or tame the opposition to be a quite puppy.  

A tale of two cities by CSE, New Delhi

I could not resist to relay story by CSE, New Delhi worth reading by fellow planners, Thanks to them..

EDITORIAL: A tale of two cities 
by Sunita Narain
======================================================
I travelled to two different cities in two different states last week—Indore and Guwahati. I came back with images identified by common distinctions: piles of garbage and glitzy new shopping malls. Is this our vision of urban development? There is no question that cities are imploding; growth is happening faster than we ever imagined. Construction is booming and expansion is gobbling agricultural land.

But the quality of life is no better. In most parts there is traffic, dust, air pollution and most of all the chaos of unplanned growth. Road expansion is eating up lines of shady trees—in Guwahati I saw the most majestic trees hacked down mercilessly. The city’s lungs are going, and so are its sponges, as waterbodies are making way for buildings. In Indore its residents will tell you that the names of the colonies are the names of the lakes they are built on. In Guwahati, the airport has been built by killing the grand Deepor beel. First a road was built (obviously without culverts to channelise the water), then as the waterbody died, it was filled to undertake new construction. This year, as always, Guwahati airport was flooded and air traffic disrupted.

The two cities are different ecosystems, so they should have had different water and waste issues. One is located in the relatively dry Malwa plateau and the other in the high-rainfall region on the banks of the mighty Brahmaputra. But both cities have acute water stress, even as rain leads to swamping of cities, disrupting life and destroying property. Both cities have no water culture. Both are drowning in their waste.

Indore, because of its location, had a rich tradition of lakes. Rain water was harvested and stored in structures, which recharged groundwater. Then, in 1977, the city brought Narmada water from some 110 km to the city. Indore should have had enough to drink and to swim. But 35 years later, the water has still not reached all distribution pipelines. Over 50 per cent of the 172 million litres per day of water it sources is lost in distribution, which means there is far more costs but far less water to supply. The city water utility has no money to repair and extend its water system. It spends all it has and more in just electricity costs of bringing the water. Politicians are vying with each other to bring the water from the Maheshwar dam. The recent jal samadhi by the Maheshwar dam-displaced has met with enormous anger from Indore’s power elite. They say they need the dam’s water at all costs. They do not care if the people, whose land has been submerged by the dam, have not received compensation or been resettled.

The same power elite never demand systems to deal with the sewage they flush out of their homes. In Indore, the sewage system was constructed in 1936 at the time of the Holkars. Independent Indore has added to it insignificantly. The bulk of the sewage pours into its rivers, Khan and Saraswati, and Piliyakhal Nullah, untreated. It forgets that the Khan pollutes the Kshipra; the main water source of the neighbour, Ujjain.

Guwahati is no different. When I went in early October, floods were still ravaging the city. This was the third pulse of flooding, which began in early June. Residents explained that the intensity and duration of floods had made life impossibly difficult. They also spoke of desperate water shortages in this region of plenty. Worse, life-giving water is now the cause of diseases—death by dengue fever was top news in Guwahati.

This is when both cities have options to do things differently. They are yet to build all their homes, roads and water and sewage systems. They can execute a plan, which allows them to modernise but with quality of life intact and even better. This requires not to want to grow in the way Delhi, Mumbai or any other “old-growth” city has.

For instance, they should not repeat the mistake of allowing fleets of cars to take over their roads. Indore was an enlightened city to plan for a bus-based future. Some years ago it invested in new buses, rationalised routes, created systems for efficient operation and put GPS in place to track and inform customers. Now cost of bus fuel is up, fares have not been revised and buses are losers. Still the majority of the city population rides or walks, even though the city’s footpaths are long gone. Indore is now building a bus rapid transit (BRT) corridor. It has a many foreign and Indian consultants to design the system but the people of Indore have no idea what is being proposed and why BRT is important. So they already hate it.

Guwahati’s footpaths are gone as well, taken over by mounds of garbage. The city has taken the route of its bigger cousins. It has put the task of garbage disposal out to a concessionaire, who, it hopes, will sweep the city clean. It does not. Instead, Guwahati could collect, segregate and compost garbage at the household level. It could reserve areas in colonies for environmental services. This way it would not have to first collect and then transport the waste. It would not have to live in filth.

In the end Indore and Guwahati will be the creations of their people. The only question is whether they will be dreams or nightmares. 

You can post your comments on this editorial online at http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/tale-two-cities

Development erodes your past...

As it is true for the community development programs, the image make over of the CM Modi in Gujarat had been immense. For the worse nightmares of 2002 to the giagentic development projections of 2012, the state has moved ahead to bulldoze any defamation sought after the Godhra and its aftermath. Despite the thousands of rims have been written accusing the CM, he has staged a clear win over his rivals. Many may not like it this way, but not many would also like to punish the CM who has benefitted the citizens of state he is being cherished as Gujarat no Sher. There are people who with real passion for the secularism have backtracked given the frontal attack by the RSS, BJP and other friends. The ideologies produced for the political gain have succeded in polarisation of the societies and now the state against the centre. The notion of state verses central if it limited to political lobies its okay but it has traversed its path towards the general public, hoardings and banners have come out in support or opposing the claims by the centre and state. Who has the authority on the state is clear Round -I Mr. CM has won over the centre's so called the weak PM. The personal attack has become talk of the political circles if you do not like my thought just go out and bark somewhere else.

Nothing happens so as to unplease Mr. Modi, he feared and respected as Uncle SAM, the streets are well praising the Namos success, the past has given to the ghost to talk about till the table is turned. Not for sure in next election.

Hail the ruler.. Hail the Namo Kings Amen!!

Dream Merchants: Dharavi Unmarked

Dharavi represents the class conflicts and the lust for the land grabber with slew of promises to the slum dwellers, during the last ten years scores of architects and planners have landed in Dharavi each promising them better life than another. The state government going with the wind pledged investment to the tune of 15000 crores just to see the face of Dharavi lifted from being 'Slum' to an 'elite' areas with all the modern amenities and lifestyle. Rather than listning to what the learned professionals were saying and people in the slum tend to believe in themselves have rejected the lure by the developers. The people who had planned heavens for them are lingering again to adjust their plan as per the peoples wishes, but there is not a end to their desires.

The urban elitists who would otherwise have shunned the slum dwellers are vying for their precious land, just to justify their investments. The combination of professionals makes them deadly in the sense that they have counted themselves as 'stakeholders' and have forgotten about the people. The numerous design awards for the space design had really place excitment over the place but counter arguments and so called stakeholders veto the decisions. Thus there is hangover of the desingers looming large over the space and people repeatdly confronting them of the why and how. May be the manner in which the Slum Rehabilitation Schemes have progressed in Mumbai where in the developers and builders have chance to grab the land and give some peanuts to the people. The people who they have termed illigal and unwanting on not so precious at another site and place here they have been cajoled to shall out the peice of land for the neo-rich where they agree to stay with providing identical settings for the slum dwellers.

Mr. Architect, turned back from US now, looks for green pastures outside the Dharavi, where to go now, ten years of wait has made the life of his firm on backseat with state governments not promising any action, these dream merchant is now selling spree on other parts of country. Here comes the big stakeholders, do you know what slum rehabilitation is like...just a peice of concrete and nothing more. The image of city, without Dharavi will be no diffrent there are fifty more in making...some more thought making your city 'Slum free' just ignore them!

Electoral Politics: Cult Personality and Development

Indian political system has followed election to election development model whereas the planning commission have different timings. The plan initiated by one government in power during planning state is never fully implemented if another party comes to power during a plan period. The eye for the election victory is so strong that the politicians by nature is in denieal mode while looking for the develoment opportunity (for their own party and collegues). The loyality to the party is stronger than the nation, the gag orders within the party says it all. The near polarisation of the parties on the ideological lines have drawn sords within the political system.

This is not good for the development politics in the country. Strong political masters, such as Smt. Mayawati in Uttar Pradesh, J.Jayalalitha in Tamil Nadu, Narendra Modi in Gujarat and Nitish Kumar in Bihar. They all make or break for their ideologies and party which allows them to work in their states to save their party in coming elections. In this process, one may think the state has grown, which is more towards the party in power. The actors like IAS babus and state admininstrators have to follow the party line while dealing with the issues. Mostly the respective CM dictates what needs to be done and followed by the masses. The rule of law, and their obidient policemen/women follow the 'CM Saheb' or Maam while leading the masses to places, while they are made to appreciate, present a united front and attend all sundry functions to please the masters.

The election politics, though have reached a pinnacle the state governments have no more showing any restraints in respecting the central government (belonging to a national party). The center-state relations can now be looked from the same party and other party relations, as if the maharajas used to look at the friendly and non to friendly states. The opposition rules states like UP, Gujarat etc would vie for their genuine rights, but the centre may decline. The CM then tend to go public about the centers wrong doing, vexing the whole relation into the anti state.

In the era of national movement, the state were made to be part of the fedral characteristcs if the country, the recent upheavel in the state demand for more autonomy and freedom to deal with their issues would be bad for India. The ideological pinning of the citizens of India on the party line is open ended question which has positive as well as negative fall out. Even urban elites in the states are made to sit long hours (including intellectuals from state, universities, schools, corporates) are officially told to remain present during CM chanting about the ills of center. All may look good from a distance, but this would result in weaknening of the national character.

Admininstration have moved into the politics of party in power, the district collectorates, municipal bodies and local bodies are told to follow the party line or remain defunct (lack of fund and state support). The institution funded by the state cannot afford to make state government (aka the party in power) angry, for its peaty ideological mindset. Much so the institutions promoted by the congress elites or Gandhians have been taken over by other party representatives. Making it an ideological 'Bhel', the institutions do not want to stick to starting point and made to follow new line.

This is outcome of the cult politics in country...

Development Planning: Repeating Mistakes

Many people on the media and elsewhere commented about failure of the 'wada na todo' abhiyan wherein Governement of India aka the Planning Commission took help of civil society in generating the mood of participatory process in planning for the 12th Plan. The activists, intellectuals and organisations who participated in the activities cried foul the way the approach paper dealt with the issues concerning serious for the effective and 'inclusive planning'. Given the election centric planning in India what more could have be apt to follow what politics of the nation dictates. We the people of India were repeatdly promised moon even though we fail to generate enough food and water for our people. India is going to urbanised and industrialised further in the coming periods, we fail to address the need for the food security except the pending bills, the spatial planning through the regional approach takes back seat, where in budgetory planning remains at the peak.

One can only assume the economist centric planning strategies has limitation even though they might claim to have reduced poverty which is statistically remains insignificant given the failure to reduce the income disparity. The HDI report suggest the improvement in the vital indicators but experts have suggested that we might miss most of the Millineum Development Goal (MDG) target set for 2015. The lagging states even though have steamed up their performance much needs to be done to eradicate abjuct state of apathy in many socio-economic indicators. Why developed states like Gujarat performs poorly in education and health where as the lagging state move faster to bridge the difference. The theory taking roots that economic development does not guarentee the social development, then what more the planning approach is going to acheive. The declining small and medium town through out country presents grim picture for the ever increasing urbanisation in the country. The lack of development for the improvement in the quality of life in these urban centres are bringing the investment elsewhere for creating new urban areas adding to the urban chaos.

Planning commission needs to leave certain planning to the state and local bodies let the spatial planning for the regions being made based on the scientific investigation before any investment plan being materialised for the region. The huge program investment in the way of MNREGA or the watershed development cannot happen without specific planning for the region, otherwise planned efforts would have negligible impact.

Who wants to do business here anyway?

India has been ranked 134th out of 183 countries for the 'ease of doing business', tought for the analyst who think India has globalised and libralised from red tape since last two decades. The poor performance emerges from the lack of sanctity of the contract system between the players. Be it corruption or speed money this is rocking the business world in dealing with Indian system of functioning. No matter what we do, it is failing in keeping the promises. The example of Common Wealth Games (CWG) mired with controversies refuses to pay to its international suppliers, coursey, Kalmadi and Co. The 14.0 Lakh crores worth MoU signed in Gujarat, would take years to materialise, the system is pathetic. The small and medium enterprise cannot think to survive in this scenario. Govt and their department just does not hounour the contracts, it takes numerous communications to get through your money.

As someone rightly points INDIA is business logic ' I'll Not Do It Again'.

Even though Anna's anti graft movements has raised the corruption, this Diwali could not be less merrier for the Govt. officials, who lapped up gifts, with both hands. Some even heard to have supplied gold and silver bars to the state secraterate in Gujarat. Just to boost business the gratidute is given to the babus and political masters, to ensure your ability to do business in India. The state govt's is also no exception in accepting the speed money from over the table in country. The fearlessness of the system would not go just because Anna and Co wanted, because it feeds on self, the system is prone to such attitude.

India cannot expect to have 'Arab' revolution or Capturing of Wall street, we can at best 'tweet' to rest in our residences, allowing the poor traffic walas to take his share of cake. The political system right from the local councellors to the state cheif, is marred with steep rise in rates post diwali asking for more. What they say of Anna, thats for his carrier and people who join them, we raise the toast. Alex says, 'Those who wonder where are the corrupt persons, we all must say, its here..its here..its here'. Amin!!

Urban Planning and 4000 Sq.Km of Countryside

Urban planning is going to big boost at the cost of numerous land loss in the countryside. The recent information about Gujarat nearing to acquire 4.8 Lakh Ha of land outside the existing urban areas for the numerous Special Investment Region (SIR) and SEZ throws light on the future character of state.

Across the state, there are three planning institution looking at the urban issues, rather arm chair one to present the glossy picture of ongoing development in the state. The busy state officials are key to presenting the land for the greedy corporates to setup never imagined empire of their estates. There us euporia in the planning community going gaga over the development, example is one of the leading planning schools (now turned University) to capture assignments, and join the party in the state.

The concerns of the 'common men' are limited to city management, rooting for the 'slum free India' these new school of thought has emerged maximizing the consultancy effort to take a peice of cake. The trend to establish their stamp now has emerged as keen party to rout for the barren lands in the hinterland for more urbanization led by the industries. There is no dirth of professionals taking advantage of current situation, and hardly any few tries to study the impact of the such as high end public policy. The apathy of the people towards these professionals has also come to be known as lobbiest at their best. The less we question the government in power the more we are likely to get works (consultancy). The privy to critical information most of them have tied up with builders and developers to participate in great official land grab.

Land Acquisition related issues have often divided the scholars but never too serious to hamper the present professional approach..who takes..forget about it approach. This has often resulted in negating the efforts of the planners engaged in listening to impact of proposed approach in the state. There is still time to oversee the proposal in the light of current conflict induced by the present development models. There is rejection of public participation in the planning efforts, no matter these are part of the Detailed Project Reports often casually undertaken without due process. The state has turned blindfolded on the concerns of general masses, giving lot of media coverage's to newly colored areas. Till the new planners realize their areas of working let the scrutiny of current planning proceed independently.

AMC on Demolition Spree: Building Cities-Destroying Homes

This time again the demolition of hutments along the Sabarmati River Front project highlights the priority of the Gujarat government and Ahmadabad Municipal Corporation (AMC). The displacement of over 50000 persons overnight in the city causes serious violation of human rights and plight is politcised to gain the development of the city. The ruthless attempt by the AMC to throw away whosoever comes on the way of clean city, making it 'slum free'. The high ideals set by the judiciary in coming to support the slum dwellers in what is called as their homes, stands nullified amidst the urgency of the local body. The series is similar to what has been observed in most part of the country including Jharkand, Maharashtra, Delhi, Punjab, Karnataka and others, wherein the homes made out of temporary materials are demolished along with the hopes of the people. The city administrative makes it hard for the poor to survive given its preference to rich dwellers where they escape demolition by paying the much legalized 'impact fees'.

The nature of conflicts invited by the local bodies calls for utmost serious thought on the governance and right to justice for the affected people. The dance of terror on the daily life of poor is inflicted by the administration and police who were supposed to protect them in time of dire needs. There is ample legal scope to save the poor from ultimate humiliation and apathy given the judgements made in past for the people and against the demolition. The high handedness of the administration emerges from the lack of awareness and system in place even after 65 years of independence. The dominance of the class over the others mixed with fair amount of greed for land and unjust planning forces the poor to accept the fate in the event like what has happened in Ahmadabad recently.

Hopes of the people in the city specially the poor and unprotected is running dry for any acceptance from the society where they can seek justice. The repeated acquisition of land for the development projects also adds more slum dwellers in the city in absence of seeking job and shelter. The insufficient compensation and high cost of living in the cities makes the task of poor households very difficult to survive. Only when the development projects further targets them to make way for another giant project which might be luxury for some group of society. The selective target of the people based on class and creed is humilating and defeating for the very purpose of Indian democracy. The lack of stringent legal backing and support system leaves people little choice in accepting the fate without protest. The reaction of the homeless group if turns violent is just to have another day to mute protest is high expectation from the administration. The immediate attention of the people and leaders is called to stop the savage practice in the name of urban development and beautification.

From Dwarpal to Lokpal

Imagine the role of law keepers when they are made to stand on the doors of politicians to save them from intruders who can overhear or eves-drop on the discussion of the public representatives. The closed door meetings of the ministries and sachivalayas do not allow common citizen to hear what has been conversed on deciding about their fate. The political masters along with the service class discuss the manner of program or development intervention, it more cases they try to maximise the economic and political returns of their investment in public. The agencies intended to protect the masses from financial fraud are informed or entertained as and when the group decide about things required, to make sure things are settled in advance.

The mere formality of approaches like PAC (parliamentary accounts committee) who is supposed to investigate major expenses has never been heard till the 2G scam happened, and this is supposed to be regular committee. High profile cases makes these committee stand in front and account, but sadly this also goes political way of addressing their party agenda.

The idea of 'lokpal' would allow the 'dwarpal' to enter into conversation with such decision makers and question their working. Thats the reason the bill had been waiting and revised nth time since 1968 under various political and government heads. Now, where is urgency? Lets be sure before 15th August (unofficial deadline set by Mr. Anna Hazare) arrives, half of the team members would go on leave and even if draft is prepared no one would agree to place it on the table of house of parliaments.

The law makers and other stakeholders (civil society) would not either their break their heads or bones to bring consensus to their agenda, never mind the main opposition parties too would be waiting to heard on their draft on 'Lokpal'. Till then let the agencies like CBI, PAC or CAG act like dwarpal and not to allow anyone to hear the conversation, so as to redefine the democratic setup of the country.

Are we entering Corruption central politics?

Thanks to series of media reports and activism 'corruption' is now central to political class. We may accept it right when political leaderships acknowledges the ills associated with corruption. There can be 'we' verses 'they' citing the our flawed understanding of the so called 'civil society' and 'political class'. Most of us are swayed by both of these phenomenon, where is line of separation between the two streams of leadership.

The todays civil leaders would become tomorrows political class, whether we love or hate them, the democratic setup of country wants not legitimacy of the group but cohesive working towards the key agenda i.e. Corruption. Not easy to demystify the legal setup and legislative provision imbibed in the constitution of the country. We need to be alert on the issues, and now be sure with constant pressure the political parties would hear the civil society. Unless political class exercise their full power the voices are going to be heard on corruption, the legislative powers of the class cannot be withdrawn and remains backbone of various institutions.

The revamp of the systems as suggested by various commissions on the Indian administration needs to be carried out with a eye on the mentioned central theme. The people must practice what they want from the political class and their leaders, more often the mass have abandoned the idea if it does not suit their characteristics. Whether its central, left or right the political class needs to understand the demand of new generation. They want them not be shamed by the world in notifying them to be citizens of an corrupt nation. Over the years the benchmarking of all the products and services from India had been through this glass, and new entrepreneurs and professionals find it difficult to answer the uncertain questions on ethics and fair play.

Gujarat Touches 6.03 Crores..mark in Census 2011

On 31st March 2011, Finally on dot the Census provisional results are out for the nation. The Country has exceeded 1.20 billion population have 17 percent of world population (China 19.0 percent). Gujarat has added nearly 10 million people in last decade 2001-2011. It touches 6,03,83,628 persons including 3,14,82,282 males and 2,89,01,346 females having 4.99 percent of country's population. Though low on overall sex ratio, in spite of efforts of the governments, good news is that, there is improvement in juvenile sex ratio (0-6 years) during the period.

The literacy rates have improved to nearly 79.31 percent in Gujarat (74.04 in India) and 87.23 percent males and 70.73 females in state. This is significant improvement given the efforts of the state government on the enrollment of children during 2001-2011. Census 2011 shows further decline in sex ratio in state from 920 to 918 females per thousand females during the two census. Lets wait to check the district figure in terms of population growth and sex ratio.

For more on census results visit: http://www.censusindia.gov.in/2011-prov-results/prov_rep_tables.html

Japan - Massive Earthquake

TOKYO: A powerful tsunami spawned by the largest earthquake in Japan's recorded history slammed the eastern coast Friday, sweeping away boats, cars, homes and people as widespread fires burned out of control. Tsunami warnings blanketed the entire Pacific, as far away as South America, Canada, Alaska and the entire US West Coast.

Authorities said at least 32 people were killed. The magnitude 8.9 offshore quake was followed by at least 19 aftershocks, most of them of more than magnitude 6.0. Dozens of cities and villages along a 1,300-mile (2,100-kilometer) stretch of coastline were shaken by violent tremors that reached as far away as Tokyo, hundreds of miles (kilometers) from the epicenter.

Growth v/s Development

Near obsession with the Economic Growth, the state has keen on pursuing the agenda and has forgotten the debates on the Human Development and Sustainable development. Growth would take care of Employment, Education and Health of citizens, thats the mantra we had been pursuing till the recent plan periods. Country has witnessed increasing dissatisfaction in the associated parameters which is related to development. Our annual ritual of the budget does not mention the development goals the world bodies have set out, and we being signatory of it continue to provide lip service.

One recent deliberations on the GDP verses Employment at a national seminar, speakers mostly agreed the lack of relationship between the two, since there is little hope for the organised sector to provide employment, the GDP growth to which they contributes remains non-distributive. Even though the rich demographic dividend which country enjoys by having larger share of youth, would fizzle away if proper actions are not taken. Planning for the given targets and centralization of the growth is leading to backlog on many fronts, we are not doing enough for the youth, women and children. More so, the dance of capital by the way of massive land acquisition has affected the informal economies (which provides employment to 94 percent of work force).

What happens at the state and district levels in development? This has remained elusive in absence of any field data, the information shared by the agencies are hardly verifiable in the actual context. The race for claiming the best acheivements is increasing and districts have been improving their social database rather, playing with data to get positive funding. The failure of programs or otherwise the machanisms have never been detterent in getting sweeping change. The business as usual attitude of planning agencies, force the people to question the validity of the state and in many respect might emerge as distinct social and political agenda for the future.

The distribution of wealth (if at it happens) remains a token sustainance by the state to the people by the way of providing employment guarentees for a limited period. This would never been possible for the urban areas, and thus discontent and corruption prevails in attainment of the social goals of individuals.

Regional backlogs and growth measurements are still not done in many parts of the country and way forward seems to be distributing cash to the hand of people, increasing the doles further in countryside. What makes governments to bypass the constitutional obligation? The right to life and dignity is compromised by system seems to be incapable in dealing with issues.