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Impasse over JPC
No grease money, no work! |
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Redressing forces woes
Forging a new relationship
“Rakhi Ka Insaaf”
FCI MAINTAINS DOUBLE STANDARDS
Making PDS foolproof and functional
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Impasse over JPC
It
is unfortunate that the Opposition continues to disrupt the proceedings of Parliament on the issue of 2G Spectrum allocation. Even after A. Raja’s resignation as Telecommunications Minister on November 14, there is no end to the stalemate. The Opposition wants a Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) probe into 2G spectrum, Commonwealth Games and Adarsh Housing Society. However, the government says that there is no need for a JPC as the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), headed by BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi, will examine the Comptroller and Auditor-General of India’s report on the telecom scam which was tabled in Parliament on Tuesday. Technically, the mandate of both the JPC and the PAC is the same. While the PAC has 22 members (15 from the Lok Sabha and seven from the Rajya Sabha) on the basis of the proportionate representation of political parties, the JPC has no prescribed strength and every political party, including senior members, will get represented in it. Apparently, that’s why non-BJP MPs are strongly batting for a JPC. There is an erroneous impression that the JPC has “wide ranging powers” as compared to the PAC and that the latter’s scope is “limited to accounting discrepancies”. Even successive JPCs’ success rate is poor. The one on Bofors, for instance, ended up as a cover-up exercise. Obviously, the Opposition is making a hue and cry over the JPC for political expediency. Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s luncheon meeting with the Opposition leaders on Tuesday failed to end the impasse. Mr Mukherjee has said that he will report the matter to the Prime Minister. Whether the Centre finally yields to the Opposition’s demand for a JPC or not, every MP is duty-bound to ensure that Parliament’s work is not hindered anymore. In the current session, Parliament is scheduled to examine 23 Bills in 24 sittings until December 13. How will it carry out this legislative business if it is adjourned day in and day out. In the last session too, Opposition MPs had paralysed Parliament for a week demanding an adjournment motion on price rise which would have entailed voting. No government can succumb to the Opposition’s pressure tactics. But then, the government should also be flexible and try to accommodate the Opposition’s wishes if it helps to break the logjam. As frequent disruptions will render Parliament irrelevant, there is a strong case for cutting the MPs’ daily allowance of Rs 2,000 as a deterrent. Ironically, while they have substantially hiked their pay, perks and allowances, they do not bother about the incalculable damage they are inflicting on Parliament through disruptions.
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No grease money, no work!
What
Tata Group Chairman Ratan Tata has said about the all-pervasive corruption may be sensational stuff but is nothing unusual for the common man. He faces it at every step, every day of his life. Mr Tata has revealed that 12 years ago, his domestic airlines project with Singapore Airlines as partner was shot down on flimsy grounds over a period of time which saw three Prime Ministers change. A particular individual thwarted the efforts and they had to finally abandon the project. Interestingly, a fellow industrialist advised him to pay the minister concerned Rs 15 crore if he wanted to get the project cleared, but Mr Tata did not do so. He is an exception; most others find it more pragmatic to succumb. Some of them who make it are rogues who get lucrative projects by greasing the palms. Worse is the fate of those who have to pay even if they are eminently suited to get these but the corrupt officials make them corrupt even for getting their due. The ultimate sufferer is the common man who pays the taxes and also elects the corrupt leaders, who act as “commission agents”. Quite expectedly, the remarks of the highly respected entrepreneur-industrialist have raised a storm, with a former Civil Aviation Minister C.M. Ibrahim threatening to commit suicide unless Mr Tata names the minister. Unfortunately, it is not the question of the integrity of a person but of the entire system. The rust has affected the entire steel frame of the administration. Whenever such ugly stories come to light, the culprits demand proof, as if money is sought and given in front of TV cameras. Instead of swallowing the heady brew offered by visiting dignitaries like US President Barack Obama that India is not a developing power but already a developed country, we must focus on the ground reality. We continue to figure extremely high on the corruption index and very low on the human development index. There is so much to set right that nothing gets done at all. If the government can rein in its own ministers and officers, India will be a far better place to live than what it is. But who will bell the sarkari cat?
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Redressing forces woes
For
the first time in India’s post-Independence history, the country’s apex court has had to step in to take note of something that successive governments have been dragging their feet over — creating and mandating a body to examine all grievances of service personnel. This is all because successive governments have been unable to redress a long list of accumulating grievances of its serving and retired soldiers, sailors and airmen of a military which remains among the world’s most engaged — an armed force that has combated a range of challenges that have included fighting conventional wars, proxy wars, insurgency and terrorism, and handling breakdowns in law and order arising out of political and administrative mismanagement in geographically diverse terrains ranging from mountains, deserts, jungles and rivers. Noting that armed forces personnel harbour the feeling that their grievances are not being properly addressed and should be heard by an independent body, the Supreme Court in its unusual but welcome step has directed the Union government to establish an Armed Forces Grievances Redressal Commission within the next two months. The Commission will be different from the recently established Armed Forces Tribunal passed through an act of Parliament which decides cases pertaining to personnel issues concerning servicemen. Although the Commission is to only be a recommendary body and not an adjudicatory body, it has nevertheless been given the blanket mandate to look into any grievance by serving or former members of the three services or their widows or family members and recommend appropriate measures to the Union government. The Supreme Court’s decision has been sparked off by the sordid case of a widow who was drawing a monthly pension of a paltry Rs 80 even though her husband, a Major, had fought in the 1947-48, 1962 and 1965 wars and been decorated with 14 medals. The apex court has chosen the Commission’s chairman, vice chairman and members wisely – all distinguished men known for their integrity and professionalism and comprising a mix of two retired judges and two senior retired Army officers. But eventually the onus of redressing issues will still lie on the government which can ill afford to ignore dissatisfaction in the ranks of a military force of a country that continues to have disputed borders with its two biggest neighbours and is located in a challenging and adversarial neighbourhood.
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Sweet are the uses of adversity,/ Which like the toad, ugly and venomous,/ Wears yet a precious jewel in his head. — William Shakespeare
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Forging a new relationship Now that the dust has settled, Obama’s visit can be properly adjudged a success. As usual, a section of the Press and commentators, the BJP and the Left came to dire conclusions before the event and made a strategic retreat as events unfolded. It is astonishing how gullible and chauvinistic some channels and opinion makers can be but remain unabashed despite getting it wrong every time. India has not sold out to anybody and a new and constructive Indo-US engagement is in the process of being forged. Hurdles remain, as they will among friends and democracies. But they do not undermine the basic bonds that are strengthening. Obama did not appear a weakened President despite his mid-term Congressional reverses while Dr Manmohan Singh said what he needed to say with quiet and convincing dignity. The President estimated the $ 10 billion agreements signed would create 54,000 jobs in the US. The economic and technological relationships now evolving between the two countries are mutually beneficial and no strategic relationship will be to India’s disadvantage. One message that has come through clearly is that both sides know they need the other and should not permit ancient divides to cloud their future partnership, though tough bargaining remains on the cards. It is disconcerting that Indian commentators made so much of what Obama said or did not say about Pakistan and its being a safe haven for terrorism. The very fact that he stayed at Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai, laid flowers at the 26/11 memorial with families of some of its victims gathered around and said that those responsible for the carnage must be brought to justice and their safe havens in Pakistan denied, was eloquent enough. In turn, India made known its disappointment at the delayed and limited collaboration earlier manifest regarding Headley, a double US-Pakistan jihadi agent. It is demeaning that India looks for a US gift of a permanent seat in the Security Council. Obama endorsed that but suggested that India speak up on human rights violations in Myanmar (Burma), where fake elections have just been held, and on Iran. The snub was misplaced. Washington has been pusillanimous where its geopolitical interests are involved. Cheveron has stakes in Myanmar’s Yadana offshore gasfield despite sanctions. On Iran, India got the US to commit itself to “continued diplomacy” (not regime change) while its quiet advice to the junta in Myanmar has always been to move towards democratic freedoms. The main thrust of Obama’s discovery of India was his acclamation of its unique democratic roots. He saw this for what it is, a truly incredible example, warts and all, of freedom with unity in diversity for a fifth of mankind, at a time when France has banned the burqa and Switzerland minarets, and Angela Merkel says multiculturalism has failed in Germany. He spoke of partnering India in rebuilding Afghanistan and of strategic consultations with India on East Asia, and the Indian and Pacific Oceans. On J&K, Obama made the obvious point that a stable and prosperous Pakistan is in India’s highest interest, and that the US will only intervene if asked by both sides. However, some Indians constantly re-hyphenate India with Pakistan. The real damage to national interest comes from the government’s extraordinary inability to state the Indian case factually and forcefully rather than merely respond to Pakistan’s negative founding ideology of being India’s “other”. Its consequent compulsion to “defend” Islam against perceived “Hindu imperialism” (read Kashmir) has created and sustained the military-mullah complex that holds its people in thrall. The US has for 60 years armed Pakistan to the teeth, underwritten its economy and allowed it to acquire nuclear weapons and blackmail the world, mistakenly upholding its frontline ally — currently to secure Afghanistan and fight terror — though aware of its devious conduct in using terror and jihad as instruments of state policy. American policy has underwritten state power in Pakistan’s military and enabled it to suppress democracy. This is grim irony. The Kerry-Lugar Act, designed to hold Islamabad to its pledge to devote the many billion of dollars of military assistance it is giving to fight Al-Qaida and Taliban terror, has been a dead letter. But Washington is up a gum tree and refuses to get down while Islamabad waits for the Americans to quit before taking over a client Afghanistan. US militarisation of Pakistan has dried the roots of incipient democracy in that unhappy country. Its misguided and muddled AfPak policy, of which Bob Woodward writes, has become part of the problem rather than the solution. Washington’s fear is that if it stops supporting the Pakistan military’s extra-curricular activities, the Al-Qaida-Taliban and other jihadis will take over a failing state and access its nuclear wherewithal. The answer is to make a sufficiency of US economic and military aid strictly conditional on monitored performance and to support policies that regionalise the war on terror in AfPak. If Pakistan walks away, the threat of imminent economic collapse will bring the military to heel despite Chinese and Saudi assistance even as it institutionally strengthens the civilian regime. Pakistan has a stake in Afghanistan and needs a secure though soft border along the Durand Line. But Afghanistan must be enabled to remain neutral and not pressured to submit to Islamabad’s hegemony. India has no designs on Afghanistan and would readily support such a regime in cooperation with Pakistan and Iran. Regionalisation of the AfPak war has hitherto failed because of Washington’s visceral hostility towards Iran and its consistent bias against the Arabs in Palestine despite Obama’s latest broadside against Israel’s West Bank-East Jerusalem settlement policy even amidst peace talks. Despite Obama’s reaching out to the Islamic world, Washington remains mired in a flawed West Asian policy with few knowing what to expect in Iraq. These are the holes of its own making from which the US must dig itself out. The new Indo-US partnership lays a basis for mutual cooperation between Delhi and Washington to achieve peace and stability in this critical region and allow a democratic Pakistan to come into its
own.
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“Rakhi Ka Insaaf”
The
latest controversy surrounding the popular serial ‘Rakhi Ka Insaaf’, it is learnt, has forced a number of cops from police stations across the country to queue up outside the bungalow of Rakhi Sawant these days. Reason? Policemen want to learn the difficult art of tormenting feuding parties, as is done by Rakhi Sawant who subjected an already maligned, married man to such grilling during her show that he first went into depression and later died, thus becoming the first ‘martyr’ of a TV reality show. The framing of Rakhi Sawant in a police case on charges of abetment to suicide has not diminished the enthusiasm of the popular TV host, who has vowed to deliver justice in the similar manner to those women whose marriage is on the rocks. Her quick delivery system has impressed the police administration, which has sent young officers to the house of Rakhi to learn how to extract confessions from hardened criminals. As for the present case, Rakhi has tried to convince her interrogators that her quick delivery system has brought relief to both the parties. She said she drew inspiration from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar where ‘a coward dies many times before his actual death while the brave dies once.’ Daily fights and clash of ego send couples to run half marathons to police stations and courts. They only ruin the lives of both spouses. Hence, Rakhi insists that the ultimate aim of the programme is to deliver justice in a speedier manner which other courts have failed. To that end, her serial is also making a contribution towards reducing population. A rumour is doing the rounds in Mumbai that director Ram Gopal Verma is toying with the idea of making a film ‘Kaun Marega Rakhi Par” with Rakhi and Punjabi singer Mika Singh in the lead roles. The only hitch, it is leant, is that Mika is insisting on a few kissing scenes with Rakhi as he does not find himself less endowed than Imraan Hashmi. None from the Verma camp is prepared to tell whether the flick is a suspense thriller or a family drama. Not to be left behind, newly sworn in Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan has decided to appoint Rakhi Sawant as the state advocate-general to tame the two Daood brothers, who have been hoodwinking Interpol for a number of years now. Grapevine has it that the two brothers are finally thinking of surrendering before Rakhi Sawant to show respect to Indian law. |
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FCI MAINTAINS DOUBLE STANDARDS The
government is in the business of procuring, storing and distributing food grains for safeguarding the interests of farmers and ensuring food security, especially to the poor. But both farmers and the poor are unhappy with the government agencies handling food grains. This is due to a very weak accountability mechanism and the absence of regulatory authority observing their post-procurement actions. Interestingly, the callous approach of employees in handling food grains is a ground reality in a country where philosophically and culturally at the household level every grain is valued and not allowed to go waste. According to one estimate, more than ten lakh tonnes of food grains have got damaged in FCI godowns only. If the damaged food grains in the godowns of state warehouse agencies are added, the estimate will go phenomenally high. The worth of damaged food grains works out to be hundreds of crores of rupees. Statistics further reveal that the FCI has lawfully spent Rs 240 crore on preventing damage to food grains. The damage multiplied at an alarming rate and the FCI spent around Rs 2.60 crore more to dispose of the damaged food. Damage to food grains is not taking place due to lack of infrastructure, particularly godowns. Rather it is happening due to bad governance. According to information supplied by the government under the Right to Information Act, the FCI has around 256.64 lakh tonnes capacity of covered godowns against which the FCI has stored about 218.35 lakh tones, thus leaving a margin of 38.28 lakh tonnes, which can be stored additionally. Geographically speaking, the FCI has idle storing capacity. The northern region has 111.22 lakh tonnes of food grains in stores against the total storing capacity of 127.48 lakh tonnes. The respective figures for the southern regions are 57.39 lakh tonnes and 54.24 lakh tonnes. The eastern region has a total storing capacity of 23.99 lakh tonnes while only 17.10 lakh tonnes of food grains are stored. Similarly in the western region only 32.29 lakh tonnes of food grains are stored against a capacity of 43.30 lakh tonnes. The foregoing analysis clearly points to the poor quality of governance with regard to damaged food grains. Paradoxically, sufficient food stocks and unprecedented damage to food grains are taking place at a time when a sizeable proportion of the people of India go to bed without food. According to a UN report, around 60 per cent children in the country sleep hungry. The Supreme Court took up the matter of overflowing of food grains in government godowns and misgovernance as early as 2001.The court in its order on August 20, 2001, stated that food grains, "which are overflowing in the storage, especially of FCI godowns, and which are in abundance should not be wasted by being dumped into sea or eaten up by rats. Mere schemes without implementation are of no use. What is important is that the food must reach the hungry". The Supreme Court has again taken up the issues related to the storage and distribution of food grains among the poor during the hearing of a case filed by the People's Union for Civil Liberties. The court has passed the orders to distribute the food grains lying in government godowns free of cost to the poor. Not only this, the court has sought a clarification from the Central Government about supplying food grains to additional seven crore BPL families through the public distribution system (PDS). Governance issues have again come to the fore in implementing the court orders. The government has not come out with any explicit public policy about who are eligible to get food either free as per the court order or at a nominal price as per the government's understanding. In this entire discourse poverty estimate methodologies and procedures have shadowed the real hardships the BPL families face day and night. The estimate of poverty varies from 27.5 per cent (Planning Commission) to over 70 per cent (Arjun Sengupta Commission). The National Advisory Council (NAC) has proposed food security for 75 per cent of the population. No doubt the universal food distribution is an ideal objective, but due to financial and administrative constraints adopting the NAC recommendation may make a good beginning. To ensure that not a single grain is damaged and no poor person goes the bed with an empty stomach, accountability norms should be made more stringent in case of food grain procurement, storage and distribution. The loss/damage to food grains should be recovered from the erring officials. Civil society organisations should be legally allowed to conduct an audit of food grain management. An independent regulatory commission should also be set up for monitoring the working of the government agencies involved in the food grain business. The writer is a former Dean, Faculty of Arts, Panjab University, Chandigarh
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Making PDS foolproof and functional The problem facing the country today is not one of shortage of food grains but of managing the surplus. A combination of good monsoon years and higher procurement prices offered by the successive governments has filled the FCI godowns beyond the prescribed buffer stock norms. However, the availability of food grains is not sufficient to ensure food security to the poor. In spite of huge buffer stocks, one-third of the world's hungry are believed to live in this country. There are millions of rural and tribal people who have no sufficient means to purchase food. It is, therefore, necessary either to increase the income of the disadvantaged or provide them food at subsidised rates.
Targeted at the poor, the public distribution system (PDS) facilitates the supply of food at subsidised rates. However, doubts are often raised about the efficacy, cost-effectiveness and transparency of the system, especially when food gets rotten in godowns and the poor face starvation and malnutrition. Yet the PDS is a large network delivering wheat, rice, sugar and kerosene worth Rs 30,000 crore annually to about 160 million families through 4.76 lakh fair price shops across the country. The National Advisory Council's move to make food a legal right of the people is undoubtedly a great step towards universalisation of food in India. However, food security will largely depend on reforming the PDS, maintaining the food grain production and creating a decentralised modern warehousing system. Reforming the PDS is the most important challenge before the government, especially when food security is enlarged to provide 35 kg wheat or rice at Rs. 3 per kg per family to 75 per cent of the population. The India Human Development Survey, 2005, revealed that 31 per cent households in Chhattisgarh, 38 per cent in Jharkhand and 33 per cent in Bihar did not have cards corroborating the administrative callousness. Though income is the best basis for holding a BPL or Antyodaya card, there was a disturbing mismatch between income and the issue of BPL cards. The survey also revealed that of the BPL and Antyodaya cardholders only 55 per cent made any purchase of rice and 44 per cent any wheat. Hardly 13 per cent met their 100 per cent requirement of rice and 28 per cent of wheat from the PDS shops. Obviously, there is large-scale pilferage of food meant for the poor. Meanwhile, the annual food subsidy bill for maintaining the system is rising, coming to more than Rs 17 per capita per month. More and more sociologists agree that programmes targeted mainly for the poor hardly benefit them because of poor participation. On the other hand, programmes like the Mid-day Meal and the Integrated Child Development Services enjoying wider public support are more successful. Preferences for goods and services provided by the private market can greatly influence benefits reaching the needy. Kerosene is still the most sought after commodity from the PDS shops as there is no difference between that purchased from the PDS shops or the market. Clearly, the quality of food supplied through PDS shops has to be improved if the programme has to be universalised. The identification of beneficiaries, defining their participatory role and maintaining an unbroken supply chain are the other critical factors for the PDS to be dependable. It is time to bring in innovative technologies such as smart cards, food credit/debit cards, food stamps and decentralised procurement to make food available to the poor to eliminate hunger. In the rural areas community grain banks can be established from where the needy can borrow grains in times of need and repay in cash or kind once the crisis is over. To run the system smoothly there is need to exclude commodities other than rice, wheat or kerosene which the BPLs need most. To make the delivery system transparent and trustworthy, the coupon system evolved by Andhra Pradesh can be followed. Under this system a card-holder is issued coupons denominated in smaller quantities like 5 or 10 kg once in a year, whereas the card-holder gets the ration in easy installments during the whole year. The coupon guarantees the stakeholder his right to draw a specific quantity of food grains every month. The introduction of coupon system has reduced the number of bogus cards as well saved huge amounts of subsidy. Only by improving the delivery, food security can be ensured. The writer is an IFS officer. The views expressed are personal
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Farmers wait endlessly for selling their produce in mandis as the procurement agencies, particularly the FCI, insist on prescribed specifications, including moisture content. The same procurement agencies, which deliver sermons day and night to farmers to follow the specification norms, forget to follow the manual for transporting and storing food grains safely.