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singhvp
March 6th, 2010, 12:58 AM
Historically, India’s countryside has been a neglected lot. In pre-independence era alien rulers of British India, in connivance with their sovereign counterparts i.e. rulers of princely states, used to usurp major chunk of hard-earned income of hapless farmers, accrued from their agriculture produce, in the name of ‘lagaan’ (rent). The revenue so generated was spent, towards palatial luxuries, maintenance of armaments and beautification of the capitals, leaving the villages to fend for themselves. The intractable issue of rural development met the same fate at the hands of sovereign rulers post-independence. The plight of rural poor continues unabated. Majority of villages in India, including Haryana, UP, MP or Rajasthan which are focus of our attention on this forum, still remain without basic civic amenities viz. road, rail/bus service, education, health services, telephone, playgrounds, not to speak of cyber café , pub or discotheque which are still considered as ingredients of alien culture.


Now the question is, even after 62 years of independence, why the pace of development is so slow and lop-sided? Why the developmental activities are centered round the big/metropolitan cities only? In my perception the underdevelopment and backwardness of villages is due to a cumulative effect to the following factors:

(a) Dynastic politics: Politics has been monopolized by a handful of families, be it Haryana, UP or Rajasthan. By hook or by crook these families are able to capture power alternatively- thanks to the coterie of sycophants and vote- brokers around them. Once in power, these leaders exert their energies in accumulating money for themselves and their relatives gliding over Chandigarh, Lucknow, Jaipur or Delhi roads in their Hummers or SUVs giving a damn to their voters and their demands for developmental agenda.

(b) Indifferent attitude of educated youth towards politics and development of their area:

Majority of modern educated youth who migrate to cities or abroad stay away from politics considering it a dirty game which is a wrong perception overlooking the fact that politics is an inalienable part of our life and their indifference comes handy to the type of politicians mentioned above at (a). In the absence of any pressure group consisting of educated people from the constituency, the MLAs/MPs tend to be lax and conveniently ignore the demands for developmental schemes in their respective constituencies.

(c) Lack of political awareness among the villagers: Due to inadequate knowledge, they fail to pursue their agenda with administration in an effective manner and  fail to pressurise  the concerned officials responsible for implementation of the projected schemes.

(d) Malpractices in election: Money and muscle power plays a great role in election thereby making it easy for the corrupt, dishonest candidates with criminal records to make it to the Assembly/Parliament. Such people will have no concern for development of the area.


(e) Gotra Factor in election : Sometimes we are driven by Gotra factor while voting which results in selection of a weak and inefficient candidate who would not be able to deliver inspite of his good intentions – due to his inefficiency.

-------------

PS: Comments from viewers are welcome

brahmtewatia
March 6th, 2010, 02:24 PM
singh sahab namaskar... i can see JATland fever is catching on you... ahahaha.

good topic up for discussion. your point of contention, rather call it a sort of blame, has predominantly focusing the apathy caused by politicians. well, that is a factor, no doubt. but, for that matter i will hold central govt more responsible.

the crux of the matter in my opinion lies in the phenomena called ‘rural-urban migration’. this phenomena of rural-urban migration gains impetus when there becomes acute shortage of employment opportunities in rural sector. let me try to explain further…

some will say that the terms rural development and urbanization as synonymous. i don’t agree to this assumption in entirety, because the basic difference between the rural and the urban economies is that of their dependence and not of the amenities or facilities of life available for the people living there. now since you are talking of u.p., haryana, rajasthan and m.p. in specific, hence my focus goes to agriculture. that being said, a rural economy substantially depends on land and agriculture. on the other hand, an urban economy substantially depends on any one or a combination of industry, trade and commerce. if we want to develop a rural economy we should develop land and agriculture. the land and agriculture development would increase income of the rural people whereby they would tend to raise their living standard by letting urban amenities, facilities and traditions enter in their life.

1. now we come to the same off-beat concern of laxity by government in pushing those real agriculture incentives, despite of the fact that india still remains an agriculture based economy. i am not saying, that the performance of the govt is below standard, but we still have to achieve a lot to see that no farmer dies of xyz reasons. this really holds true, that agriculture in india, never remained a priority for any govt since independence.

2. second point that comes into picture, as stated above is the rural-urban migration. how many entrepreneurs have stayed back and have pushed the cause of agriculture from their confines and resources. you’ll hardly find a handful of them. though, off-late the trends are changing, where few entrepreneurs have made substantial gains in the field of agriculture. you’ll find few exemplary examples of achievements from few nri’s retuned in punjab state.

coming back… whatever the high level of living standard that is achieved in the rural setup on the basis of increased income generated on account of land and agriculture development, the economy remains rural. all the same... it becomes developed but is not converted into an urban economy.

let me try to explain what exactly is 'rural development'... in my opinion.

take the example of rural villages in u.s.a. [or say for example australia or even south-africa for that matter] they look far better than indian cities and/or towns… but those are still the part of u.s. rural sector because the economy of those villages is still land and agriculture based. this course of strengthening of a rural economy is called ‘rural development’ in real essence. if the urban way of living is made available to the rural mass without raising their income through land and agriculture, their consumption, traditions and living become urban. this is urbanization and not rural development.

urbanization is enjoyed by rural people till it is free of cost for them. as soon as it starts costing to them, either they revert to their pre-urbanization living standard or, if they have become habitual, they indulge in illegal activities to earn more income to maintain the enjoyed living standard. that is why the urban youths in India are day by day advancing towards crime. therefore, urbanization can pay nothing positive to rural mass in real sense. nor, urbanization means rural development. each of the rural development, the rural extension, the urbanization, the urban development, the urban extension and the rural urban transformation has its separate meaning.

... my two cents !!! hope to receive some more meaningful input from other worthy members.

singhvp
March 6th, 2010, 07:29 PM
Hi Braham,


Thanks for your valuable comments.

Inarguably, Central government is largely responsible for building macro level infrastructure for country’s pre-dominantly agrarian economy. Nevertheless, states cannot absolve themselves of the responsibility of creating congenial atmosphere for the agricultural sector to grow as a profitable and organized industry rather than being an unavoidable traditional obligation. Like in several developed countries (Britain, France, Belgium and Germany to name a few), State government should initiate steps to introduce enhanced subsidies, crop insurance, improved warehouse facilities, better road/rail siding facilities for ferrying the produce to markets, subsidized and soft loans for establishment of food processing plants, guarantee for procurement of produce by government at remunerative prices etc., for a sustainable growth of agriculture sector. Apart from the above, it is also a State subject to provide facilities for a civilized subsistence of villages viz. schools, hospitals, playgrounds, streetlights, parks, community centre, gyms etc. which are available in villages in countries like USA, Australia and even South Africa as mentioned by you. If extension of these facilities amounts to urbanization, then be it. There is no harm.

Due to poor and appalling living conditions, lack of employment and pressure on land holdings in countryside, cities are getting a heavy influx of rural migrants taking its own toll. In spite of a heavy dose of funds for development, town planning in some of the mega cities has gone haywire with slums of ‘Dharavi magnitude’ mushrooming, defacing the beauty of these cities. It is therefore a serious issue to maintain a precarious balance between rural and urban development for their harmonious growth.

----

Note: Above perception is subject to free, fair and objective criticism

Samarkadian
March 8th, 2010, 11:06 AM
Responses inline.


Historically, India’s countryside has been a neglected lot. In pre-independence era alien rulers of British India, in connivance with their sovereign counterparts i.e. rulers of princely states, used to usurp major chunk of hard-earned income of hapless farmers, accrued from their agriculture produce, in the name of ‘lagaan’ (rent). The revenue so generated was spent, towards palatial luxuries, maintenance of armaments and beautification of the capitals, leaving the villages to fend for themselves. The intractable issue of rural development met the same fate at the hands of sovereign rulers post-independence. The plight of rural poor continues unabated. Majority of villages in India, including Haryana, UP, MP or Rajasthan which are focus of our attention on this forum, still remain without basic civic amenities viz. road, rail/bus service, education, health services, telephone, playgrounds, not to speak of cyber café , pub or discotheque which are still considered as ingredients of alien culture.

Cite any source which you deem trustworthy to establish a bit of this particular claim, if it is objective in nature ; but if an opinion, nothing can be done except disagreeing respectfuly. Do you mean that 60 years of self rule to a nation, who has a long history of slavery, is a touchstone to achieve everything a first world country's third grade county side have? Show us the example of any country who with such a devastating past has establisted itself as a developed in less than a centuary? It takes more than 3 generation atleast to qualify for the real improvement.
Now the question is, even after 62 years of independence, why the pace of development is so slow and lop-sided? Why the developmental activities are centered round the big/metropolitan cities only? In my perception the underdevelopment and backwardness of villages is due to a cumulative effect to the following factors:

(a) Dynastic politics: Politics has been monopolized by a handful of families, be it Haryana, UP or Rajasthan. By hook or by crook these families are able to capture power alternatively- thanks to the coterie of sycophants and vote- brokers around them. Once in power, these leaders exert their energies in accumulating money for themselves and their relatives gliding over Chandigarh, Lucknow, Jaipur or Delhi roads in their Hummers or SUVs giving a damn to their voters and their demands for developmental agenda.



Lack of self esteem in educated and uneducated blokes is the pinnacle of cause of every malice we are having. Politicians have got power but who has given? Aliens?

(b) Indifferent attitude of educated youth towards politics and development of their area:

Majority of modern educated youth who migrate to cities or abroad stay away from politics considering it a dirty game which is a wrong perception overlooking the fact that politics is an inalienable part of our life and their indifference comes handy to the type of politicians mentioned above at (a). In the absence of any pressure group consisting of educated people from the constituency, the MLAs/MPs tend to be lax and conveniently ignore the demands for developmental schemes in their respective constituencies.

That has made a bit of sense finally.

(c) Lack of political awareness among the villagers: Due to inadequate knowledge, they fail to pursue their agenda with administration in an effective manner and  fail to pressurise  the concerned officials responsible for implementation of the projected schemes.

Taking them as a fool voting machine would only harm the anyone's own predictions.They teach better lessons to officials as well as politicians than their urban cousins.

(d) Malpractices in election: Money and muscle power plays a great role in election thereby making it easy for the corrupt, dishonest candidates with criminal records to make it to the Assembly/Parliament. Such people will have no concern for development of the area.

You know what, politics is for strong people , it is an irony that good people aren't strong but but the bad ones have the audacity and that essence of daring to go beyond rules to pursue the power. Again it is the psychosocial submission to a strong master.Don't blame it on those who do it, rather who give it.

(e) Gotra Factor in election : Sometimes we are driven by Gotra factor while voting which results in selection of a weak and inefficient candidate who would not be able to deliver inspite of his good intentions – due to his inefficiency.

I didn't get this point at all. Obama was voted heavily by blacks.


-------------

PS: Comments from viewers are welcome

Sometimes compartmentlised thinking serves the purpose also. Sometimes!

rakeshsehrawat
March 8th, 2010, 12:18 PM
A Very Nice Topic After long time

Rural development kar di to kayee nuksan ho jange
1) Is desh ko worldbank se mil rahi rakam milni band ho jayegi
2)Gaon dehat ke padh likh jayenge aur fer sarkar ke lath denge.
3) Jo vote Garibi hatao abhiyan ke naam pe mil rahi hain wo band ho jayengi
4) jo grant kagjo mein to development ke naam par hain par jinhe matri ji chara ghotalo ya aise ghotalo mein dakar jate hain wo milna band ho jayega.
5) Kalabazari par bhi kaafi hadh tak rok lag jayegi aur Lala log bhukhe mar jayenge.

ek udharan ke taur par lete hain ek naami company ko
Mother Dairy
is company ka ek bhi dairy plant nahi hai.aur ye apna doodh VITA se kharidti hai with packing aur market mein bechti hai. Is company ne ek bahut badi rakam world bank se utha rakhi hai rural development ke naam par.Aur ye koi private company nahi sarkari company hai jiska naam sunke log iska doodh lete hain jabki VITA naam logo ko pasand nahi aata.
Ye sirf ek akeli company nahi aisi hajaro company hain joki rural development ke naam par sarkar se karja aur subsidy ka fayda utha rahi hain.
Jo cosmetics ki company herbal naam istemal kar rahi hain wo bhi sab isi tarike se logo ko bewkoof bana rahi hain.
Iska ilaj kya ho?
iska siraf ek ilaj mujhe samajh aata hai par use karne ki himmat nahi ho pati.
Gandhi mujhe pasand nahi par uska Satyagrah hi sab bimariyo ka ilaj hai.
Gaon ke log ekjut ho gaon mein hi sabji fal aur anaj paida karein apas mein ek doosre saman ke badle len den karein. Bahar ki cheezo ka bahiskar karein apni jaroorto ko seemet kar dein. Agar poora gramin bharat ye kaam siraf 6 mahine ke liye kar deta hai to sab kuch ho jayega. Par....................

brahmtewatia
March 8th, 2010, 12:46 PM
Responses inline.

Cite any source which you deem trustworthy to establish a bit of this particular claim, if it is objective in nature ; but if an opinion, nothing can be done except disagreeing respectfuly. Do you mean that 60 years of self rule to a nation, who has a long history of slavery, is a touchstone to achieve everything a first world country's third grade county side have? Show us the example of any country who with such a devastating past has establisted itself as a developed in less than a centuary? It takes more than 3 generation atleast to qualify for the real improvement.
...
Lack of self esteem in educated and uneducated blokes is the pinnacle of cause of every malice we are having. Politicians have got power but who has given? Aliens?
...
That has made a bit of sense finally.
...
Taking them as a fool voting machine would only harm the anyone's own predictions.They teach better lessons to officials as well as politicians than their urban cousins.
...
You know what, politics is for strong people , it is an irony that good people aren't strong but but the bad ones have the audacity and that essence of daring to go beyond rules to pursue the power. Again it is the psychosocial submission to a strong master.Don't blame it on those who do it, rather who give it.
...
I didn't get this point at all. Obama was voted heavily by blacks.

Sometimes compartmentlised thinking serves the purpose also. Sometimes!
samar, could you please elaborate a bit further... esp. this compartmentalized thinking?

honestly speaking... i don't understand whether you are questioning, answering, suggesting or criticizing?

singhvp
March 8th, 2010, 09:43 PM
[QUOTE=Samarkadian;241356]Responses inline.

Mr. Kadian,


Even though I could not make out much of your reaction, I submit my explanation with all humility, as under:
For sure, I have neither cited from Time, Newsweek or Popular Science nor from National Geographic/Discovery channels or any other mass media. This is firsthand narrative by a son of the soil who has not only witnessed the harshness and inadequacies of village life but have experienced too. Therefore, I feel an urge of romancing the idea of radical transformation of villages to make these places worthy of living for human beings.

60 years is a very long time. However, there can be no “touchstone” or benchmark for measuring development which is an evolving and relative concept. The pace of development in countryside during these 60/62 years has definitely been abysmally low and sluggish resulting in disparity in terms of availability of civic facilities in villages vis-*-vis cities. Whilst villages are clamoring for bare necessities due to paucity of funds, the fiscal overdose to cities led to their emergence as nerve centers of business activities, political maneuverings, land mafia, black-marketers, money launderers, self-centred white-color officials lethargic intellectuals, and last but not the least phoenix like emergence of slums harbouring petty ciminals. (Lop-sided development ke side-effects). This criminal disparity need to be addressed urgently.

You wanted an example of a country with a history of 60 years of slavery which was able to catapult itself into a developed country. Yes I have an example. Malaysia, which got independence in 1957, has done much better than us as far as overall development is concerned. We are seeking their cooperation in building highways and basic infrastructure including mono-rail in Mumbai.

Due of severity of our political relations many eye-brows are bound to rise, but, China may be quoted as another example.


As far as other points are concerned you need to refine and elaborate your comments .


You are, however, entitled to disagree and I respect your freedom of expression.

kapdal
March 9th, 2010, 01:33 AM
VP singhji,

There is no denying the fact that development of rural India leaves much to be desired. Though some good developments did take place post independence like land reforms and the green revolution, but the cumulative effort has been much less than what was required. Having said that, I consider your diagnosis of the problem in "urban vs rural" terms as flawed. Rural India is not under-developed because the emphasis has been on urban India. It is underdeveloped because there are far too many people subsiding on land than is possible.

I'd instead argue that the problem with rural India is because of the failure to develop urban Indian properly. Can we name one planned city that the govt. has come up with since independence? The likes of Gurgaon are extensions of existing cities. I am talking about stand alone cities built from the scratch. Through out the history of mankind, development has taken place around cities. All civilizations built cities which became the nerve centers for economic action for them. A village in itself just doesn't have the numbers for making any big project economically feasible. Just imagine a big hospital or a big mall or a university opened in a village. Where would the demand be to justify the investment? These things have to come up in the nearest town/city, which need to be well connected to the villages through roads, telephones, etc.

Population of India is 1.2bn, of which more than 70% live in rural India. Majority of these are involved in agriculture. This is more than 3 times since independence. So number of people living off the land has tripled, while the amount of land has remained almost the same. This is just not sustainable. When a peon earns more than a farmer, it just tells you that there are far too many farmers than is economically feasible. People understand that and hence you see mass scale migration to the cities.

On the other hand, the developed countries developed themselves on back of rapid industrialisation. As per wiki, in 1870, 70-80% of US population was employed in agriculture. Now that percentage is like 2 to 3%. Farmlands have become much bigger thus giving economy of scale to the farmer. Even in 1950, one US farmer supported around 15 citizens. By 2000, that number was close to 150. Compare this to India where one farmer is supporting less than 1.5 citizens including himself in 2010. This link has good information on development of agriculture in the US. We don't have to follow US example, but if you look at any developed country, the results would be similar.
http://www.csrees.usda.gov/qlinks/extension.html

The other issue is that the Indian state had been so busy making everything from soaps to steel that it didn't really have resources to concentrate on what should have been its priority- public goods like health, education, infrastructure. Plus it didn't have the money. Given the high growth of last decade and a half, the money issue has been sorted. The tax revenue to the govt. has increased a lot. The onus is now on the govt. to stop wasting money on wasteful subsidies and use it to build the infrastructure.

The issue is not with people migrating to the cities. That is a natural outcome of the inequilibrium between rural/urban economies. The govt. needs to plan for this migration. They need to build new cities that can absorb the rural population and provide them with means of livelihood apart from agriculture. The extension of the current cities should be planned and not haphazard like it is now. And most importantly, what is needed is to develop the skill-set of rural communities so that they have options other than agriculture. Uneducated rural migrants end up in the usual unskilled/semi-skilled jobs in cities. Instead, they should be imparted with skills that can be used in the manufacturing/service sector.

The topic itself is very broad in its scope. My write-up merely touches upon some key points.

Samarkadian
March 9th, 2010, 12:22 PM
samar, could you please elaborate a bit further... esp. this compartmentalized thinking?

honestly speaking... i don't understand whether you are questioning, answering, suggesting or criticizing?

Sir Brahm,

Compartmentalised thinking refers to ,''The inablity to think cross board, a tendancy to to look at each matter in the isolation of other matter OR To compartmentalise an idea means that you have learned a specific skillset but only are able to understand and apply it in the original context in which it was taught.''

Here author have thought and presented his observation in a non-compartmentalised way, linking three to four adjacent states in the same manner. They may be resembling in some aspects but to me it did appear some over generalisation without any trusted source. My inline responses from the alcove of my little brain are simply comments in non-cynical manner without quiblling the matter of importance.

As Kapil has pointed out that US growth,development,industerilisation is that land only specific. Territory like India which is governed by the vast and huge rule of diversity, you can't pick up the developmental model from any already developed place and ingenerately believe in them. In upshot, I meant the picture presented is not that desperate as the author of original post described, I just stated the other bright of coin which I see around daily. For example, he stated about Telephones, road connectivity, education schools. We all know that nowadays even a labour keep the updated gadjet and drivers of local threewheelers[Tethan, Bhund], jeeps ; which are alternate transport means to reach villages, uses PEN DRIVE instead of Cassettes. Without sneering the author's intent I wanted to say that situation is not that desperate. In Haryana particularly, education has become a prolific sector in rural areas, ruralite blokes are much more concerned about their kid's education more than any time in history. In the outskirts of any village there are scores of private educational institutions. School education in the rural part of Haryana is the latest Zeigtgeist. This has resulted in over 200 engineering institutions across Haryana. Boys and girls from village are knocking the door of prominent education institutions like IITs. I believe the same for the other states mentioned but I would not claim. It is the matter of another thread that WHAT should be taught and HOW it should be. Next author mentioned about playgrounds, I don't know what really provoked him to mention this. Anually, there are scores of criket, athletics [ Buddho ki race esp],football and Wrestling, Kabbadi tournaments. If by chance author is aware about village Fairs and turnout of folks participating in big playgrounds he surely is going to reevaluate his opinions. Valients from village Akhadas are doing much better in sports. Almost every home in village has invertor, electrical madhani, fridge. Gone are the time when I used to sit in the lap of my mother while she used to blow milk in bilowani. Water, village wells are just left for frogs to enjoy their escapading honeymoon. Villagers hardly look up to government water supply. They have created their own system where they have digged the pipeline from tubewell to each home at the expanse of 50 rupees per month.

Don't prop your analysis on the plausible deniablity of evident facts. Only problem rural folks face is the proper guidance.

Author shall know that voting turnout is maximum in villages than city and urban parts. Under the rural heading he stated the attitude of youth of city which didn't make any sense. Villagers are damn shrewd when it comes to voting and Gotra factor hardly counts as he stated.

Again in next he just writes instinctively the example of Malaysia getting its independnce in 1957. What is Malaysia? Yes What is Malaysia? Does it have gargantum diversity of language, castes, religion , beliefs, cluture, subculture and geography? Kindly do not infer from the development of a rose plant to the development of a banyan tree. It is non-compartmentlized, sounds good but does it work.? Again he cites the example of China. A lot has been hyped about the Chinese bubble, a lot around the world. But lets just have a glimpse at the facts like nature of their governing. Political philosophies are poles apart when it comes to development, progress. They started the first SEZ in late 1970s across its vast coastal line. We tried to mimic it in NDA govt. where is it now? Probably not even in the territory of half and wouldn't be. Grown, developments and progress is very much compartmentlised, Otherwise Microsoft, Apple and Sun won't be having the different USPs. You can't cure asthma by treating cough symptoms. Every system has its own quirks which needed to be stated in its own manner. Perils of copying and pasting other's growth are huge both culturaly as well as economically. Yes, what we can copy, imitate is the intangible attributes of inspiration, enthusiasm and determination from them.

Having said that , I sit in my balcony early in the morning and watches the new bride in neighbourhood finishing her chores faster to catch the school bus where she teaches and you know what she is happy walking the street proudly in ghunghat with her purse swinging. I sign off to my routines as the school kids clamourly wave bye to their grand parents.

rakeshsehrawat
March 9th, 2010, 01:00 PM
You forgot to add Cable Connections and Dish T.V's in villages . Now you won't see bunch Taus sitting in GHER listning B.B.C. News anymore.Almost Every home has got one vehicle( Two, three or four wheeler).Everyone has Colour T.V. Washing Machines are also part of 50% homes. Now lesser and lesser people prefer toilet in open.During recession these so called backward villagers came forward for rescue of several MNC's


they lack only in one thing that is getting right prices for their produce.

http://www.domain-b.com/brand_dossier/marketing/20090117_rural_markets.html

LG, Hero Honda, Nicholas Piramal to focus on rural markets newshttp://www.domain-b.com/images/10x10spacer.gif17 January 2009http://www.domain-b.com/images/at_narrow_top.gif



[/URL] (http://www.domain-b.com/my_profile.aspx)Spread across 650,000 villages, with an average population of 1,100 rural villagers were long regarded by city dwellers as backward and impoverished and irrelevant, something to drive past on the way to something else.
That is no longer the case. Rural India is now becoming a major market for India Inc. Don't forget India lives in its villages. That's because roughly three-fourths of the country's population resides in the rural interiors of the country.
http://www.domain-b.com/brand_dossier/marketing/images/consumer_showroom.jpgConsider the fact rural India has 3.3 million active internet users, a new report by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) states. The research - part of the ongoing I-Cube 2008 being jointly undertaken by IMRB International and IAMAI - also notes there are 5.5 million people who claim to have used internet at some point. Since rural India was mapped for the first time, the year-on-year growth of internet users in rural India could not be estimated.
"The penetration of internet in rural India is directly related to the activities of the government and NGOs," says Subho Ray, IAMAI president. "Given the various government and private sector efforts to connect rural Indians, this was the right time to take the survey to rural India and find out the state of affairs there."

India's 700 million villagers now account for a massive $100 billion a year consumer spending in the country. Millions step into consumerism each year, graduating from the economics of necessity to the economics of gratification, buying themselves motorcycles, televisions, mobile handsets and four-wheelers.
The National Council of Applied Economic Research, or NCAER, has pared its demand forecasts for automobiles, refrigerators and television (TV) sets for this fiscal year and the next, signaling that a slowdown in demand for these products, which make up a quarter of India's manufacturing output, may drag on longer than foreseen by industry executives.
NCAER is, however, bullish on untapped potential in rural areas and believes demand in the countryside will continue to clock double-digit growth.
Korean consumer elctronics firms LG Electronics India and Samsung, two-wheeler maker Hero Honda, pharma products maker Nicholas Pirmaml, mobile services provider Bharti Airtel are among a handful of well-established companies making a concerted push into rural India in recent months to boost flagging sales. They are joining some notable segment leaders like Bajaj Electricals and Bajaj Auto that have had a strong presebnce in rural areas.
Now, the largest consumer electronics company in India by sales, LG, plans to focus heavily on rural markets through channel expansion, set up a services network and roll out a slew of entry-level products.
LG Electronics defines all cities and towns other than the seven metros cities as rural and semi-urban market. To tap these unexplored country markets, LG has set up 45 area offices and 59 rural/remote area offices.
Earlier Airtel and Samsung tied up with IFFCO to sell their mobiles and services. IFFCO is the world's largest farmers co-operative of fertilizers (See: Bharti Airtel sets up joint venture with IFFCO to provide rural mobile phone services (http://www.domain-b.com/companies/companies_b/bharti_tele-ventures/20080502_joint_ventre.html)). IFFCO has about 37,000 member units spanning all-over India. Some of the other telecom giants and DTH service providers are looking at dying PCOs as a channel of distribution.
Hero Honda wants to change the rural market dynamics which is hovering around 10 per cent (of households owing a two-wheelers).
Its strategies include selling during festive seasons, tying up with new dealers, providing finance with local co-operative institutions. Meanwhile, Bajaj is launching a Bike, specifically to suit rural Indian youth needs. It is setting up 20 outlets in affluent, but severely under penetrated, rural districts. Moreover, it has created specialist dealerships for rural markets, called 'Rural Dealerships'.
Nicholas Piramal has focused on general practitioners, to cater to rural markets to increase its penetration with a field-force of 800 people. Most of the pharma companies are looking at post-office as their distribution platform. Some of these companies conduct health-care workshops in the rural areas by tapping the local doctors.
The challenges
Mohan Krishnan, senior vice-president BIRD, a specialised unit of IMRB International says, "The rural market holds tremendous potential for any media. However, for the internet to flourish in rural India, the applications need to be in vernacular languages, preferably with Text to Speech capabilities. It would be better if visual symbols, graphics and rich media applications are used. The key question is, whether we have the right infrastructure to support these applications."
The first challenge is to ensure availability of the product or service. India's 650,000 villages are spread over 3.2 million sq km; 700 million Indians may live in rural areas, finding them is not easy.
However, given the poor state of roads, it is an even greater challenge to regularly reach products to the far-flung villages. Any serious marketer must strive to reach at least 13,113 villages with a population of more than 5,000. Marketers must trade off the distribution cost with incremental market penetration.
For marketers, the challenge is to ensure affordability of the product or service. With low disposable incomes, products need to be affordable to the rural consumer, most of whom are on daily wages.
Some companies have addressed the affordability problem by introducing small unit packs. LG plans to roll out several new models in low-end segments like direct cool refrigerators, twin-tub washing machines, solo microwave and CRT TVs in the first half of 2009. This is in sharp contrast to LG's erstwhile strategy to focus on premium products in the Indian market for the past couple of years.
[URL]http://www.livemint.com/2009/07/29231449/Hero-Honda-net-up-83-on-susta.html
Hero Honda net up 83% on sustained rural growth
New Delhi: The country’s largest two-wheeler company, Hero Honda Motors Ltd, reported record profits in the June quarter as lower commodity prices, excise tax savings from its Haridwar factory and gains due to sales of higher priced variants helped it surpass its past performance.
http://www.livemint.com/images/5D8E06DF-3C8C-4BAA-ABB5-F0B83C41AD2DArtVPF.gif
In high demand: A file photo of a Hero Honda sales camp at the Khirni village panchayat office in Rajasthan. Four out of every 10 motorcycles and scooters the firm sells are to customers in rural areas. Harikrishna Katragadda / Mint


Net profit for the quarter stood at Rs500.11 crore, a growth of 83% over the corresponding quarter in 2008-09 while sales rose 34% to Rs3,822.44 crore. A Mint poll of analysts on 15 July had forecast a profit of Rs383.5 crore.
At the core of the company’s strong performance is a continued emphasis on the rural hinterland: Four of every 10 motorcycles and scooters Hero Honda sells are sold in rural areas.
Even as competitors try to emulate Hero Honda’s rural strategy, however, there’s a likelihood of rural demand for bikes being hit by a poor monsoon.
“We need to wait for another 15-20 days to assess what demand (on account of possible poor monsoon) would be like,” said Ravi Sud, chief financial officer of the company.
Also Read Hero Honda gains from lower costs, tax sops (http://www.livemint.com/2009/07/29222027/Hero-Honda-gains-from-lower-co.html)
That, though, will happen with a lag effect of a couple of quarters, according to Mahantesh Sabarad of Centrum Broking Pvt. Ltd.
Until then, Hero Honda will continue to reap the benefits of a decision it took in 2007 to establish a rural vertical.
Since then it has steadily expanded rural dealerships or “touchpoints” as the company defines them.
This year, the company hopes to take the number of touchpoints to 3,500, up from 2,000 two years ago. “We have a rigorous expansion plan in place,” Pawan Munjal, Hero Honda’s chief executive said in a statement.

rakeshsehrawat
March 9th, 2010, 01:01 PM
http://www.livemint.com/images/F03F973D-455A-4710-9816-B7313C539507ArtVPF.gif



Last year, as growth in urban markets slowed, Hero Honda continued to post healthy sales numbers as rural buyers were less affected by a slowing economy. Last fiscal its sales stayed flat even as Bajaj Auto Ltd and TVS Motor Co. Ltd reported identical declines of 19% each.
Another reason for the sales growth: the company’s lack of dependence on financing as rural buyers generally prefer to pay cash.
In the last year, as banks and non-banking finance companies pulled back from financing bike purchases, Hero Honda had been largely unaffected. At present, only about 25% of Hero Honda’s bikes have been financed compared to upwards of 30-35% for rivals Bajaj and TVS, according to analyst estimates.
Analysts, however, anticipate that sales could begin to slow in the coming months as the effect of rural schemes such as the farm loan waiver and the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act are beginning to wear off.
Competitors are stepping up their rural marketing activities, according to Sabarad of Centrum Broking. “The company will have to work harder for rural customers in future.”
Below normal monsoons also have the potential to dent rural demand.
So far India’s monsoons have been 19% below the 50 year average. This has led to delayed sowing of the kharif (summer) crop across several parts of the country and a contraction in the farm area under foodgrain cultivation, a first in five years.

singhvp
March 9th, 2010, 03:06 PM
Sir Brahm,

We all know that nowadays even a labour keep the updated gadjet and drivers of local threewheelers[Tethan, Bhund], jeeps ; which are alternate transport means to reach villages, uses PEN DRIVE instead of Cassettes. Without sneering the author's intent I wanted to say that situation is not that desperate. In Haryana particularly, education has become a prolific sector in rural areas, ruralite blokes are much more concerned about their kid's education more than any time in history. In the outskirts of any village there are scores of private educational institutions. School education in the rural part of Haryana is the latest Zeigtgeist. This has resulted in over 200 engineering institutions across Haryana. .

Thank you for devoting your valuable time and energy in offering your vehement criticism. I get an impression that your criticism is just for the sake of criticism and purely for academic purpose. Even though your message is highly messy and unclear, I try to give a reply as under:


If a "Tethan" a electrical madhani, a small fridge received in "dowry" or a flash drive are to be the only parameters of progress, then I think we need to come out of the "slumber of satisfied insouciance". You are talking about flash drive, in my village 99% high school students have not even heard of this device, not to speak of its usage. They know only camel drive. I narrate the picture of my village with some facts which prompt me to be desperate and radical in my approach:

1. So far there is no landline telephone (If no landline, internet is virtually impossible. If no internet, no need of computers and I think for flash drive a computer is necessary). So in my
village IT is not a buzzword, only desert drive/safari on a camel cart on sand dunes is a popular drive there.


2. Electricity supply is on alternate days that too for 8-9 hours during day time - Few people have invertors which last only 3-5 hours.

3. No drinking water supply - Only a few households have been able to have submersibles pumps in the recent past. The water from such wells is contains harmful chemicals ( As per a water testing report from Haryana Agricultural University, Hissar in respect of our own bore-well with submersible pipe)
4. No Primary Health Centre. Only some quakes can be seen roaming around with infected multi-user syringes and outdated crocin (may be nowadays panadol) which is considered panacea.

5. Virtually no public transport System - only one bus in the morning to the nearest city and the same returns in the evening. People have to walk down 5 km to get a bus for district headquarters or a Tehsil or some nearby shopping centre for shopping.

6. Not a single play ground or "Akhara" in your parlance. Wrestling is not the only passion for everyone. There are other sports also which need proper playgrounds like hockey, football, tennis, table tennis, basketball etc. which are important for the youth. (Only wrestling will make Jai Kishan a dull boy).

7. There is however, a high school with skeletal staff in the name of faculty (some of the important posts remaining perennially vacant) - inspite of a long queue of trained and unemployed teachers in Haryana. Most of the teachers are from nearby villages who have to attend to more important works like feeding and milking of buffaloes etc. and marking there presence to village chaupal for attending to important gossib related to local politics and "Partibazi" or "Khap Panchayat" matters. Dream for IIT & IIM or MIT is a distant reality as hardly a few have heard about these premier institutes.


8. There is, however, one private school - but I doubt the academic level and teaching skills of the teachers as some of them are either third class Matriculates/High Secondary pass or college drop outs. Another important point: Credentials of some of these teachers are suspect having dubious distinction of drinking habits and other un-ethical activities like having evil eye on female students or even indulging in incestuous behavior.
9. Major portion of agricultural land is still arid without water. Tube-wells are the only source of irrigation which are not economically viable in view of heavy and frequent power-cut and high cost of energy. I give a small example of development. A small stretch of canal which was the life-line of hundreds of families had a breach 3 years ago which has not been repaired so far. As a result the canal is lying dry for the last 3 years inspite of so many audiences with local politicians.

Mine is not the only village facing such problems. It is just a tiny example. This is a general problem in majority of villages in northern part of India and also some other states which were are not being discussed under the assumption that this site is Jat centric and I did not think it worthwhile to expand the horizon of discussion beyond Jat Belt. It is not that I am not averse or wary of discussing the plight of other parts of rural India. There is a very wide rural belt in Rajasthan with even worse conditions. In UP the conditions may be slightly better but not upto the mark. Over all situation is desperate in the villages and it cannot be explained away by citing the size of population or other statistical illustrations or manipulations. It would be ironical if people from rural background do not acknowledge this fact and would like to contradict this start reality simply for academic reasons or in pursuit of being called as "fast developing" or "fast growing" nation. May be you are content with whatever conditions you have around your village (if you are Resident Indian). But that does not change the reality and the general perception. Let us have some more views and then will conclude. As of now I do maintain my position stated earlier.

As far the rich, thoughtful and indepth analysis presented by Shri Kapil Dalal is concerned, I am going to reply separately as it will requires more time, energy and logic to counter this intellectual giant.

singhvp
March 9th, 2010, 03:46 PM
VP singhji,

There is no denying the fact that development of rural India leaves much to be desired. Though some good developments did take place post independence like land reforms and the green revolution, but the cumulative effort has been much less than what was required. Having said that, I consider your diagnosis of the problem in "urban vs rural" terms as flawed. Rural India is not under-developed because the emphasis has been on urban India. It is underdeveloped because there are far too many people subsiding on land than is possible.



The topic itself is very broad in its scope. My write-up merely touches upon some key points.

Dear Dalal Sahab,

Thanks you for your comments which are, as usual, based on scientific reasoning and an unprejudiced analysis. This is just to acknowledge the fact that I have gone through your post and have found it very rich in letter and spirit. I will offer my reaction in due course.

Samarkadian
March 9th, 2010, 05:55 PM
Thank you for devoting your valuable time and energy in offering your vehement criticism. I get an impression that your criticism is just for the sake of criticism and purely for academic purpose. Even though your message is highly messy and unclear, I try to give a reply as under:


If a "Tethan" a electrical madhani, a small fridge received in "dowry" or a flash drive are to be the only parameters of progress, then I think we need to come out of the "slumber of satisfied insouciance". You are talking about flash drive, in my village 99% high school students have not even heard of this device, not to speak of its usage. They know only camel drive. I narrate the picture of my village with some facts which prompt me to be desperate and radical in my approach:

1. So far there is no landline telephone (If no landline, internet is virtually impossible. If no internet, no need of computers and I think for flash drive a computer is necessary). So in my
village IT is not a buzzword, only desert drive/safari on a camel cart on sand dunes is a popular drive there.


2. Electricity supply is on alternate days that too for 8-9 hours during day time - Few people have invertors which last only 3-5 hours.

3. No drinking water supply - Only a few households have been able to have submersibles pumps in the recent past. The water from such wells is contains harmful chemicals ( As per a water testing report from Haryana Agricultural University, Hissar in respect of our own bore-well with submersible pipe)
4. No Primary Health Centre. Only some quakes can be seen roaming around with infected multi-user syringes and outdated crocin (may be nowadays panadol) which is considered panacea.

5. Virtually no public transport System - only one bus in the morning to the nearest city and the same returns in the evening. People have to walk down 5 km to get a bus for district headquarters or a Tehsil or some nearby shopping centre for shopping.

6. Not a single play ground or "Akhara" in your parlance. Wrestling is not the only passion for everyone. There are other sports also which need proper playgrounds like hockey, football, tennis, table tennis, basketball etc. which are important for the youth. (Only wrestling will make Jai Kishan a dull boy).

7. There is however, a high school with skeletal staff in the name of faculty (some of the important posts remaining perennially vacant) - inspite of a long queue of trained and unemployed teachers in Haryana. Most of the teachers are from nearby villages who have to attend to more important works like feeding and milking of buffaloes etc. and marking there presence to village chaupal for attending to important gossib related to local politics and "Partibazi" or "Khap Panchayat" matters. Dream for IIT & IIM or MIT is a distant reality as hardly a few have heard about these premier institutes.


8. There is, however, one private school - but I doubt the academic level and teaching skills of the teachers as some of them are either third class Matriculates/High Secondary pass or college drop outs. Another important point: Credentials of some of these teachers are suspect having dubious distinction of drinking habits and other un-ethical activities like having evil eye on female students or even indulging in incestuous behavior.
9. Major portion of agricultural land is still arid without water. Tube-wells are the only source of irrigation which are not economically viable in view of heavy and frequent power-cut and high cost of energy. I give a small example of development. A small stretch of canal which was the life-line of hundreds of families had a breach 3 years ago which has not been repaired so far. As a result the canal is lying dry for the last 3 years inspite of so many audiences with local politicians.

Mine is not the only village facing such problems. It is just a tiny example. This is a general problem in majority of villages in northern part of India and also some other states which were are not being discussed under the assumption that this site is Jat centric and I did not think it worthwhile to expand the horizon of discussion beyond Jat Belt. It is not that I am not averse or wary of discussing the plight of other parts of rural India. There is a very wide rural belt in Rajasthan with even worse conditions. In UP the conditions may be slightly better but not upto the mark. Over all situation is desperate in the villages and it cannot be explained away by citing the size of population or other statistical illustrations or manipulations. It would be ironical if people from rural background do not acknowledge this fact and would like to contradict this start reality simply for academic reasons or in pursuit of being called as "fast developing" or "fast growing" nation. May be you are content with whatever conditions you have around your village (if you are Resident Indian). But that does not change the reality and the general perception. Let us have some more views and then will conclude. As of now I do maintain my position stated earlier.

As far the rich, thoughtful and indepth analysis presented by Shri Kapil Dalal is concerned, I am going to reply separately as it will requires more time, energy and logic to counter this intellectual giant.

Me Lord Singh,

I do not know what impression you have imprinted on your awaken grey cells. Your use of word ''fridge in dowry'' is not only immature but derisive too. Without dowry , what do you think people do not know about common gadjets.That is a common truism. I can't help overblown cynicism expressed neither would try a whit. Had I talked of statistics proving my statements, then you could have rightly labelled the above mentioned facts as torrid academic criticism. But I symphatise with your village conditions if that is the actual scene. That needs serious intra-venous injection of generation 5 antibiotics. But your belief of portraying the whole north India equvivalent to your village or worst and desperate is not only illogical but also lacking on the grounds of rational discussion. Associated emotions to do some good are great but that 'some good' do not need a pile of ''everything is worst'' as its precursor. With this I am forswearing this discussion at its present state.

Thanks for your time.

akshaymalik84
March 9th, 2010, 05:59 PM
Well, I am not a suitable person to talk on rural development.
I live in a metro with a busy life (khamkha ki busy life without any purpose). Never think of my village, though I visit my village once in 2-3 months. But it is to meets my elders, not to discuss the underdevelopment of my village.

My village doesn’t have Concrete roads, desirable electricity, drinking water facilities, proper transport service, good educational institutes etc. etc. But I rarely think about these things. I would not go to village SARPANCH or file a RTI to get the information about the progress of proposed Rural development Programs like PMGSY, NREGA, and SGWY etc. etc. I don’t ask MLAs and MPs what they are doing with all that money and time. I don’t advise my fellow villager, I don’t teach their children. I don’t give a crap what they do, how they live. All I do is work in AC cabin, surf internet, have good time with friends & family and sleep. And next morning I read newspaper, magazine and criticize politicians, authorities for not doing what they are supposed to do. And start the next day just like the last one.

I can argue/discuss on various aspects of development, I can gather whatever information from internet and paste it here. But what’s the benefit?

A villager in past and an urban in present but doing nothing for villages and deteriorating the urban. I am an Indian and I am selfish.

brahmtewatia
March 9th, 2010, 06:17 PM
thanks samar for your answer. i guess, it makes more sense than your earlier (in my opinion) a knee-jerk reaction. i guess, you have more to say after mr. VP's last reply... period.

brahmtewatia
March 9th, 2010, 06:21 PM
the topic indeed is enormous and encompasses many cross-cutting issues, also it might require few main point/issue(s) pick-ups and then call for elaborative discussion. that being said, the hard part still, apart from figuring out the solutions, lies in the implementation as well. more specifically in the prioritizing and sequencing of the implementation. the ball then goes in the court of politicians and the buck stops here.

when talking of urban under-development, i touched two aspects in my post 1). laxity by central (as well state) govts and ignoring the predominant agrarian indian economy. 2). rural-urban migration. i cited reference of few countries, but would agree with samar here that a country specific model cannot be equated vis-*-vis india due to its diversity and more importantly – the population.

perhaps the issue is more about the lack of economic opportunity in villages – given good employment prospects and the availability of basic services in rural areas, i’d still venture to say that more people would opt to stay in a place where they have stake over the land and the possibility of a higher standard of living.

agree in totality with kapil, and this holds true... that every economy has followed the path which begins with agriculture being the main source of income for the majority of the population and ends with agricultural employment being a very small fraction of the total labor force. while the general tone of development in countries across the world is centered around cities, i wonder if such a model is healthy for a place like India, where most of its population lies in rural areas. the implications of the migration shift (as stated in my 1st post) could be destructive, from family issues to shifts in labor markets to environmental impacts <<< as can be very well seen from the recent spurge of 'urban slums'. but still the answer might lie in urbanization... how that is going to be implemented will always remain a billion dollar question.

is urbanization really the answer? should India focus more on creating these “mega-cities” (kapil, pls. note) rather than developing rural infrastructure?

my 1st post was keeping in view the subject urban under-development… another discourse for the discussion can be – urban development… and that’s where the major part of discussion would lead to. if mr vp.singh allows, i would like to touch ‘urbanization’ as the topic to further my views on urban development.

brahmtewatia
March 9th, 2010, 07:11 PM
With this I am forswearing this discussion at its present state.samar, i rate your post # 9 as excellent, as seen by me for quite some time. though, this also holds true that VP has a very viable reasoning in his counter post.

honestly, i would appreciate your further discussion rather than renouncing from the discussion at this stage. please do participate. i do not want this (turning good) discussion meet the same foreordained fate. hope you will oblige.

singhvp
March 9th, 2010, 07:50 PM
Me Lord Singh,

I do not know what impression you have imprinted on your awaken grey cells. Your use of word ''fridge in dowry'' is not only immature but derisive too. Without dowry , what do you think people do not know about common gadjets.That is a common truism. I can't help overblown cynicism expressed neither would try a whit. Had I talked of statistics proving my statements, then you could have rightly labelled the above mentioned facts as torrid academic criticism. But I symphatise with your village conditions if that is the actual scene. That needs serious intra-venous injection of generation 5 antibiotics. But your belief of portraying the whole north India equvivalent to your village or worst and desperate is not only illogical but also lacking on the grounds of rational discussion. Associated emotions to do some good are great but that 'some good' do not need a pile of ''everything is worst'' as its precursor. With this I am forswearing this discussion at its present state.

Thanks for your time.

Dear Samar,

Yes I agree with you the village needs Gen-5 or even next higher Generation Injection (if already invented). Trust me, I have tried not to exaggerate the conditions. For a first hand information, please do come to my village and be my guest whenever I am around.

singhvp
March 9th, 2010, 08:00 PM
the top

[COLOR=blue][FONT=Century Gothic]my 1st post was keeping in view the subject urban under-development… another discourse for the discussion can be – urban development… and that’s where the major part of discussion would lead to. if mr vp.singh allows, i would like to touch ‘urbanization’ as the topic to further my views on urban development.

Hi Braham,

Thanks for your very positive and sensible comments. I was in hibernation since my registration on this forum way back in 2006 and you were the motivating force behind my coming out of hibernation. Do you really need my permission to start a new topic captioned as "urban development" ? You are a very serious and mature member of this forum. Sharminda mat karo. Please go ahead.

brahmtewatia
March 9th, 2010, 08:38 PM
Hi Braham,

Thanks for your very positive and sensible comments. I was in hibernation since my registration on this forum way back in 2006 and you were the motivating force behind my coming out of hibernation. Do you really need my permission to start a new topic captioned as "urban development" ? You are a very serious and mature member of this forum. Sharminda mat karo. Please go ahead
singh sahab,

you got me wrong... 'rural development' has to go with 'rural under-development'... i've no intention to start this topic under different thread, but the idea was to carry out the discussion with a slight discourse to the main theme, and on this very thread... thats all. well, anyway that's obvious as well.

honestly, speaking i am also very impressed with your writing skills. its never too late at JATland... this 'dystopia' (ahahaha) will always remain for you [ ;-) ] as i hope to see more of your participation and the very best from you... and off-course i would love to digg out your platonic thoughts (as said earlier) as well... though at a later stage. (again ahahaha)

now me... serious (if not senior) and mature ??? ahahaha... not at all... http://i209.photobucket.com/albums/bb248/dietje-bucket/smiley/shhh.gif this is just an eye-wash

kapdal
March 10th, 2010, 02:05 AM
Brahm,

I agree that we can't really ape any country's developmental model. India has its unique set of conditions, and any solution has to keep that in mind. Having said that, one can always learn from others' experiences. A car may need some different features keeping in mind Indian roads, but one doesn't need to reinvent the engine from the scratch.

The key point, in my opinion, is that you can't have more than 70% of population contributing to only 20% of GDP. I fully agree that the infrastructure for rural India needs to be improved by leaps and bounds. Better roads, information on prices, availability of seeds/fertilisers, etc. is going to give the agriculture sector a boost. But only till a point. The huge labor oversupply would mean that:
1. The wage of a laborer working in agriculture is going to be low.
2. Land holdings would become even smaller, making farming more inefficient. Successful farmers have huge tracts of land that give them economy of scale.
3. Outright unemployment, or disguised/seasonal unemployment (You have 5 people working on a piece of land where 1 is enough.) Apart from depressing income, unemployment also leads to other social problems as the unemployed youths' energy gets diverted to less desirable areas (crime, alcohol, drugs, etc.)

So even if you remove all other bottlenecks that are stifling agriculture right now, you can't go beyond a point as long as you have this huge labor oversupply. On the other hand, you have the manufacturing/service sector that is constrained by labor undersupply. There is a huge shortage of skilled work force in India, be it, engineers, doctors, scientists, teachers, etc. Even the govt. sector is hugely understaffed in police, defence, health, education, etc. The obvious conclusion is that labor needs to shift from rural agrarian society to the maufacturing/service sector. If you don't plan for it, it'd happen anyways leading to urban slums, congestion, crime and the associated jazz. The problem is not urbanization, but not doing it in a planned way.

My point about civilization and cities was to stress that any organized industry needs a critical no. of people and resources to come together and that is not possible in a standard sized village. So, yes, urbanization is the solution. But that doesn't mean mega-cities only. In fact mega-cities like Delhi and Mumbai become inefficient due to governance issues. However, we still need more metropolitan cities than we have right now. But more than that we need towns and smaller cities like Jamshedpur set up by TATAs (never been there, but heard it is very well planned). Is there any town/city that GoI has planned since independence? We need to develop Rohtak so that people don't land up in a Delhi suburb hunting for opportunities. Or much worse, from Azamgarh to Dharavi.

A town like Rohtak can act as nerve center for villages surrounding it (It already does to an extent but the scale needs to be much bigger). For example, food processing industry bordering Rohtak can provide employment to the surrounding population; while benefiting from the availability of raw materials. The farmers can then grow what is needed in the industry rather than growing what is going to be bought by the govt. at Min Support price. Once you have a big enough industry employing a large no. of people, you need all kinds of services from restaurants to schools to shopping complexes, which employ more people. The govt. having to spend less on subsidies to the farmers in form of MSP and making additional money from taxation of industry can use that money to hire teachers, police and doctors and build roads, hospitals and schools. So you systematically take care of the labor inequilibrium and unemployment, while improving the standard of living of everyone. The above is a very crude representation of how urbanization can transform rural landscape, but the attempt is to convey the basic idea.

sanjaymalik
March 10th, 2010, 10:22 AM
Resurgence Rural India.

Forget those images of raveged villagers, kid with distended bellies and ragged cloths and future as girm as the cracked sun baked earth. Island of poverty still exist but most of rural India is transformed beyond imaginations and thanks to a host of factors like alternate crops, water managing technique and Land pricing boom, which has put inpresedence wealth into the hand of farmer across the country and turns it into a huge consumer market. Latest statics show that agriculture growth and rural income has largerly beeen unaffected by economic slowdown, despite the fact that the contribution of agriculture to total rural income has actually comedown.Instead we have growing service industry and alternate revenue channels for horticulture, polutry, fishers and other activities which are less rain dependent and were vitually non existent a decade ago .India's 6,38,000 villages which harbour 72.2%, once the albatross around its neck are now signpost to its future..Call it new adventurism or enterpreneurship but most farmer have gained from these new techniques .Rising price may be pinching the pokect of urban consumer, but it has brought new affluence to farmers who have already their income in recent years, alongwith aspiration.Peoples owns new expensive mobils in villages and new bikes and even cars( not struck to Maruti 800 only as before 7 or 8 years back).they have nothing to do with recessions.
New innovaton apart from crop chages innovative farming technique are boosting productivities,encouraging new enterpreunership and having huge social impact.
Much of the prosperity is to do with connectivity and new channels of communications. Rural road projects have made it easier and faster for farmers to get their produce to markets which communication tools have given them e-choupal reaches 3.5 mill farmers giving them instent acess to new varieties of crops, pricing and markets.Bardhaman in WB became first in country to became fully internet connect with panchayat organising video conference across distt. Modern management technique like drip immigration give farmer water to irrigate three crops.
Rural Land price boom- this sigle biggest reason for the kind of money visible in rural India in skyrockting prices of land which increased their wealth and those who are wise enough have invested,their income in alternative resources.
Nothing can illustrate the remarkable changes in rural India.Today women wear decent sari, suit gold rings and other ornaments and having given jobs at local centre for family health care, education and privat institutions. People are spending as much as they can on their kids education in convent schools.Those deparates days of starvation and near death are distant memory.
Although i have already mentioned in begining of my post that island of poverty is still exist.its the phase of resurgence. Revamping Face of rural india.
Regards
Sanjay

singhvp
March 10th, 2010, 11:53 PM
VP singhji,

There is no denying the fact that development of rural India leaves much to be desired. Though some good developments did take place post independence like land reforms and the green revolution, but the cumulative effort has been much less than what was required. Having said that, I consider your diagnosis of the problem in "urban vs rural" terms as flawed. Rural India is not under-developed because the emphasis has been on urban India. It is underdeveloped because there are far too many people subsiding on land than is possible.

I'd instead argue that the problem with rural India is because of the failure to develop urban Indian properly. Can we name one planned city that the govt. has come up with since independence? The likes of Gurgaon are extensions of existing cities. I am talking about stand alone cities built from the scratch. Through out the history of mankind, development has taken place around cities. All civilizations built cities which became the nerve centers for economic action for them. A village in itself just doesn't have the numbers for making any big project economically feasible. Just imagine a big hospital or a big mall or a university opened in a village. Where would the demand be to justify the investment? These things have to come up in the nearest town/city, which need to be well connected to the villages through roads, telephones, etc.

Population of India is 1.2bn, of which more than 70% live in rural India. Majority of these are involved in agriculture. This is more than 3 times since independence. So number of people living off the land has tripled, while the amount of land has remained almost the same. This is just not sustainable. When a peon earns more than a farmer, it just tells you that there are far too many farmers than is economically feasible. People understand that and hence you see mass scale migration to the cities.

.
[URL]http://www.csrees.


Dear Kapil,


First of all I am taking the liberty of addressing you by first name as you look much younger than me in your profile picture.

Thank you for acknowledging the fact that all is not well as far as development in rural areas is concerned and much more is desired to be done. I also found your argument convincing that my diagnosis in terms of “rural vs urban” was flawed. Though it was well intended without any bias to city-dwellers, you may not find the presentation in an articulate and coherent manner . Thank you for correcting me.


As far as pressure and labour inequilibrium is concerned, the onus, perhaps, lies on the State for taking corrective measures by creating new employment avenues. As you must be aware it is almost impossible to get a jobs in government sector in many states (at least in Haryana ) unless you are a relative or a crony of some Minister or MLA or have the purchasing power. As far as private sector is concerned, the position seems to be dismal. Inspite of substantial growth in manufacturing and service sector, over the years, only those having some technical knowledge, vocational diploma or degrees viz. B.E. , MBA etc. stand a chance there and not average village folks. So how the pressure on agriculture sector will be eased.? A paradigm shift in economic module is needed. In my view a reasonable portion of wealth generated by the much-hyped growth of GDP should be diverted to the countryside for making better infrastructure viz. power houses, highways, Engineering and technical institutes, research centres, hospitals and also some industries like food processing depending upon availability of raw material an requisite facilities. This process will generate employment for rural people and create congenial conditions for increased economic activity like trade and auxiliary services viz. banking, insurance and recreational centres which will ease pressure on cities also. Anyway it is a matter of prolonged and unending debate. Thanks again for offering your views.



Also I have found your post in reply to Shri Braham Tewatia very subtle and convincing.

singhvp
March 11th, 2010, 07:50 AM
Resurgence Rural India.

Forget those images of raveged villagers, kid with distended bellies and ragged cloths and future as girm as the cracked sun baked earth. Island of poverty still exist but most of rural India is transformed beyond imaginations and thanks to a host of factors like alternate crops, water managing technique and Land pricing boom, which has put inpresedence wealth into the hand of farmer across the country and turns it into a huge consumer market.
Sanjay

Sanjay Bhai,

Only yesterday, there was a news item carried by Zee News (also may be carried by print media) narrating a money distribution ceremony in Bhadoi constituency in UP where the Minister of Higher Education was shown distributing money (Rs. 50 each). The ceremony was attended by an odd number of about 5000 poor villagers consisting of ladies in majority. The poor ladies were shown touching the "smelly" feet of the Minister for such a meagre amount ( 50 Rupees). Isn't it pathetic. It is a testimony, how desperate the situation is. How can we be so complacent and oblivious of the abject poverty afflicting millions and millions of people living below poverty line. Another documentary proof is the exercise of making BPL cards undertaken by various State governments including Haryana. If our villages are so prosperous, where is the need of all this exercise. By government's own admission, the number and percentage of people living below poverty line is quite high (I do not have the authentic figures at the moment). It is ironical that instead of contributing our bit to this cause, we are not even willing to acknowledge this.

sanjaymalik
March 11th, 2010, 10:12 AM
Sanjay Bhai,

Only yesterday, there was a news item carried by Zee News (also may be carried by print media) narrating a money distribution ceremony in Bhadoi constituency in UP where the Minister of Higher Education was shown distributing money (Rs. 50 each). The ceremony was attended by an odd number of about 5000 poor villagers consisting of ladies in majority. The poor ladies were shown touching the "smelly" feet of the Minister for such a meagre amount ( 50 Rupees). Isn't it pathetic. It is a testimony, how desperate the situation is. How can we be so complacent and oblivious of the abject poverty afflicting millions and millions of people living below poverty line. Another documentary proof is the exercise of making BPL cards undertaken by various State governments including Haryana. If our villages are so prosperous, where is the need of all this exercise. By government's own admission, the number and percentage of people living below poverty line is quite high (I do not have the authentic figures at the moment). It is ironical that instead of contributing our bit to this cause, we are not even willing to acknowledge this.

Dear Sir,
With due respect i acknowledges your views as i have had candidly admit the factum of island of povety still exists in my post.But i have been witnessed a lot of transformation in rurual India since last one decade or at a fast ratio in 5 or 6 years.Peoples are spending more on health, education, and for thier own development at least specially in Hartyana. It's a phase of revamping not totally revamped. Education systems or quaility of education is improving due to surge of private schools or convent schools. But still rural youth lacking some skills which need to improve and make them to fetch some good jobs.
Regards
sanjay

malikdeepak1
March 11th, 2010, 01:44 PM
Dear Sir,
With due respect i acknowledges your views as i have had candidly admit the factum of island of povety still exists in my post.But i have been witnessed a lot of transformation in rurual India since last one decade or at a fast ratio in 5 or 6 years.Peoples are spending more on health, education, and for thier own development at least specially in Hartyana. It's a phase of revamping not totally revamped. Education systems or quaility of education is improving due to surge of private schools or convent schools. But still rural youth lacking some skills which need to improve and make them to fetch some good jobs.
Regards
sanjay

True bhaisaab! Par iska kshetr seemit hai. Haryana me Mahendergarh, Rewari me ja ke dekho. Saher bhi gaam barga laage se. Unke gaama ki haalat to fir soch e sako ho. Development hua hai par har jagah nahi. Rajasthan situation, which VP ji told in his post, is correct to a great extent. Major part of rajsthan rural area has not developed to that extent where children will(should) be knowing essentially about Pen drives/DVDs. Khaan ne daane nahi hote unke ghra me, pen drive to jab chalani seekhe the. Kayi gaon me to jane ke liye sadak bhi nahi hai. It needs LOADS of improvement there to enhance their living standards.

Rohtak/ Sonipat side I would agree with you that most of the villages are now well connected and have got basic amenities within their reach. They have progressed well in the reign of Hooda. Same for Sirsa in term of Chautala. But it won't give you the actual picture of Haryana as a whole. I can't assume that all the villages have got all the basic amenities and their living standard has been raised just based on these few districts, since I reside nearby it and everything I see around me looks good.
The situation needs to be assessed as a whole and not in parts only!

singhvp
March 11th, 2010, 02:56 PM
True bhaisaab! Par iska kshetr seemit hai. Haryana me Mahendergarh, Rewari me ja ke dekho. Saher bhi gaam barga laage se. Unke gaama ki haalat to fir soch e sako ho. Development hua hai par har jagah nahi. Rajasthan situation, which VP ji told in his post, is correct to a great extent. Major part of rajsthan rural area has not developed to that extent where children will(should) be knowing essentially about Pen drives/DVDs. Khaan ne daane nahi hote unke ghra me, pen drive to jab chalani seekhe the. Kayi gaon me to jane ke liye sadak bhi nahi hai. It needs LOADS of improvement there to enhance their living standards.

Rohtak/ Sonipat side I would agree with you that most of the villages are now well connected and have got basic amenities within their reach. They have progressed well in the reign of Hooda. Same for Sirsa in term of Chautala. But it won't give you the actual picture of Haryana as a whole. I can't assume that all the villages have got all the basic amenities and their living standard has been raised just based on these few districts, since I reside nearby it and everything I see around me looks good.
The situation needs to be assessed as a whole and not in parts only!
It is a very pragmatic evaluation of the situation.

(Deepak Bhai halat to jyada Sonepat ke gaman ke bhi achchi konya. Par Bhai meri Sasural hai sonepat district mein Dahiya Khap mein. Ye Dahiya Badshah naraj ho jyange aur pher Bhai Sonepat mei rahna muskil kar denge. Isliya Sonepat ka jikar nahi kiya. Aar halat Rohtak ke gammon ke bhi itni achch nahin sai. Hooda Sahab ke an te pehle Rohtak ke pas me Bohar gam dekhya tha, bhai galiyan mein ganda pani bhara tha aur gobar bhi kafi parya tha yehan vehan. ye bhai log vaise hi "Switzerland" se compare kar rahen hain apne aak ko. Inko yeh nahin pata ke is "Bagri Jat" ne Switzerland bhi Ghoom ke dekh rakhya sai, Kora Bagri nahin sai).

Anyway, it was in a lighter vein. I hope friends from Rohtak and Sonepat will not feel offended. But it is true conditions in the villages of these districts also not that cosy as depicted by some distinguished and learned members earlier. I have travellled in so many villages of Rohtak and Sonepat districts. However, Hooda Sahab is now doing well in Rohtak and surroundings but pace in other parts is still very slow and the process need to be catalyzed. Thanks for the feedback and keep giving your valuable comments.

jitendershooda
March 11th, 2010, 05:07 PM
you got me wrong... 'rural development' has to go with 'rural


:) http://www.ndtv.com/news/india/a-bag-that-could-solve-indias-toilet-woes-17537.php

brahmtewatia
March 11th, 2010, 09:30 PM
:) http://www.ndtv.com/news/india/a-bag...woes-17537.php (http://www.ndtv.com/news/india/a-bag-that-could-solve-indias-toilet-woes-17537.php)
भाईसाहब फेर त या प्रॉब्लम हो जायेगी
v
v
v
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSKnhCB0nEk

brahmtewatia
March 11th, 2010, 09:30 PM
this is true that the development in rural villages hasn’t been up to the mark. reasons can be many, poor vision, poor implementation, lack of infra-structure, education, lack of energy resources, corrupt practices and last but not the least – our crooked politicians and the population.

we go round and round the discussion, with no concrete answer.

okay take urbanization to be the answer !… but, this is already happening today with the development of tier II and tier III cities, though with the by-product called ‘urban slums’. most indians living in villages would welcome the chance of living in well-designed efficient cities. they are already doing so as is evidenced by the fact that tens of millions of rural people migrate to cities, often choosing to live in urban slums. they are voting with their feet saying that life in an urban slum is preferable to life in a village... sad, but true !

again, for a moment i believe that rural population of india has to urbanize… and the correct answer might still lie in urbanization. that being said, it goes without mentioning that no doubt there is a need to have new urban centers to accommodate the hundreds of millions of rural people. now, imagine building absolutely new cities from scratch for say 500/600 or may be 700 million people. imagine 500/600 or 700 new large cities of one million people each. imagine building houses, schools, shopping centers, parks, factories, roads, public utilities, hospitals, libraries etc etc… and imagine doing that using the best urban planning known to humanity (<<< this may pls. be noted) can india afford that much ???

in my personal opinion this should happen naturally by improving the infrastructure and capacity of existing cities. forced development, as in setting up of new cities can be counterproductive. this is because it is more difficult and more costly to get water, drainage, jobs, correct location, people etc than it is to improve an existing city. plus this can have many bottlenecks like red-tape bureaucracy, corruption apart from proper planning and the cost involved, as mentioned earlier.

ok let’s start playing the blame game >>> politicians > over-population > lack of education > infrastructure > red-tape bureaucracy > poor implementation > corrupt politicians > education > ### (<<< you can add anything here, eventually the buck stops at the politicians)

… there you are… going round and round in the same vicious circle.

vijay123
March 11th, 2010, 10:19 PM
You guys have very high expectations. The reality is that whether we like it or not, govt invests where she can get returns. Govt is investing thousands of crores of Rs in building several lane highways as they get private companies also in investing them. There will be a return in the form of toll tax, octroi etc. Same is not true in case of rural development, there is no tangible returns by building roads, providing water etc. I think you got the point what I am trying to say here. Only villages that has prosperous people living in it or ouside are developed. Going back 15 years I remember there were few villages in Punjab from whom every family has atleast one person abroad at that time. Those villages looked better than cities. Each house was a kothi better than you see in cities and has big cars parked inside. I dont think you will see govt building sewage system or water supply in any village, it's people who built them for their use.

brahmtewatia
March 11th, 2010, 10:29 PM
vijay... who/what is govt?

vijay123
March 11th, 2010, 10:36 PM
Kendriya or Rajya Sarkaar.


vijay... who/what is govt?

brahmtewatia
March 11th, 2010, 10:49 PM
Kendriya or Rajya Sarkaar.
and who constitutes kendriya or rajya sarkar ?

now don't say our 'elected representatives'... the answer is politicians !... and the buck stops here !

correct ?

annch
March 11th, 2010, 10:52 PM
And who elects these politicians?

and who constitutes kendriya or rajya sarkar ?

now don't say our 'elected representatives'... the answer is politicians !... and the buck stops here !

correct ?

vijay123
March 11th, 2010, 11:06 PM
Gaam ka jo pardhaan ban jaa na uski bhi niyat paise khaan ki hi ho ja. Politicians ko to kya dosh do.


and who constitutes kendriya or rajya sarkar ?

now don't say our 'elected representatives'... the answer is politicians !... and the buck stops here !

correct ?

upendersingh
March 12th, 2010, 02:13 AM
You guys have very high expectations. The reality is that whether we like it or not, govt invests where she can get returns. Govt is investing thousands of crores of Rs in building several lane highways as they get private companies also in investing them. There will be a return in the form of toll tax, octroi etc. Same is not true in case of rural development, there is no tangible returns by building roads, providing water etc. I think you got the point what I am trying to say here. Only villages that has prosperous people living in it or ouside are developed. Going back 15 years I remember there were few villages in Punjab from whom every family has atleast one person abroad at that time. Those villages looked better than cities. Each house was a kothi better than you see in cities and has big cars parked inside. I dont think you will see govt building sewage system or water supply in any village, it's people who built them for their use.


But they are paying very high price for this 'rural development'




Over 20,000 youths from Punjab attempt illegal migration every year to 57 different countries. The trend is also spreading to the neighbouring states of Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir, says a report “Smuggling of Migrants from India to Europe and in particular to UK from Punjab and Haryana” released by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).


The report, released on Thursday, says forged visas of 41 countries are being used, and many instances of forged visas for Italy, Greece, France, Spain and UK have come to light.


Over one lakh Punjabi youths are behind bars in foreign countries and face deportation. In the last one year, 20 countries have approached the Indian government to deport 1,195 Punjabi youths, with Ukraine topping the list with 282 persons, adds the report.


While illegal migration is reported from Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur, Kapurthala and Nawanshahr districts of Punjab, in Haryana such cases are witnessed in Ambala, Kurukshetra, Karnal and Kaithal. As per the report, the reasons for illegal migration are varied: high unemployment rate, general attitude of youth that migration is the best alternative, potential illegal migrants consider other successful migrants their role models, and illegal migration not being a stigma amongst families.
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/20-000-Punjabi-youths-migrate-illegally-every-year--UN-report/589810

vijay123
March 12th, 2010, 02:27 AM
Rewards are always proportional to Risks. Go to a city in Punjab and then compare it with a city in UP and you will see the difference. Rest all are just arguments.


But they are paying very high price for this 'rural development'

vijay123
March 12th, 2010, 02:53 AM
Anjoo ji, ek khoob padha likha aadmi bhi yeh soch rakhta hai ki MCD ya DDA mei lag jaon ya phir koi aisi nauri lage jisme 2 no ki kamai khoob ho. Pher hum kyun in neta logon ko single out karte rehte hai?


And who elects these politicians?

upendersingh
March 12th, 2010, 03:01 AM
Rewards are always proportional to Risks. Go to a city in Punjab and then compare it with a city in UP and you will see the difference. Rest all are just arguments.

:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:Your first line may be true, but your second line is just logicless and if not then can you please put any link for any of Punjab city as I am putting here about Ghaziabad:
http://propertybytes.indiaproperty.com/index.php/city-scape/ghaziabad-global-city-of-tomorrow

http://www.citymayors.com/statistics/urban_growth1.html

vijay123
March 12th, 2010, 03:18 AM
No, you dont compare cities like Chandigarh, Mohali with Gaziabad or Noida. Just compare normal cities like Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Amritsar with cities like Meerut, Allahabad, Kanpur. You will see the difference. One point is that people from UP, Bihar and Orissa go to Punjab for emplyment and not vice versa.


:rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:Your first line may be true, but your second line is just logicless and if not then can you please put any link for any of Punjab city as I am putting here about Ghaziabad:
http://propertybytes.indiaproperty.com/index.php/city-scape/ghaziabad-global-city-of-tomorrow

http://www.citymayors.com/statistics/urban_growth1.html

singhvp
March 12th, 2010, 05:47 AM
Anjoo ji, ek khoob padha likha aadmi bhi yeh soch rakhta hai ki MCD ya DDA mei lag jaon ya phir koi aisi nauri lage jisme 2 no ki kamai khoob ho. Pher hum kyun in neta logon ko single out karte rehte hai?


Vijay ji, Netas are the mother of corruption. Corruption and nepotism takes birth at high places and power centres percolating down to the lower strata. Right from allocation of party tickets before Assembly/Parliament elections, it manifests itself in recruitment for government posts viz. Tehsildar, Provincial Services (HCS/RAS etc.), DSPs, Teachers, clerks and peons etc. Isn't it an open secret that governments jobs are sold out in auction or given to the relatives of influential politicians depriving common man who do not have any political godfather or purchasing power making them to suffer in silence. I know some HCS officers in Haryana (my contemporaries) already inducted into IAS by now who got recruited to their post by virtue of their political links. Isn't it the liability of politicians in power to eliminate this cancerous malaise. It is also true that we, the people, have to share the blame for electing corrupt, dishonest and inefficient candidates imposed upon us by the "Uncrowned Tribal Kings" /feudal lords and the Khaps which continue to get undeserved reverence from their respective communities.

It is high time, the unemployed youth and those suffering in silence should get polarized and rise in rebellion against the unfair practices in recruitment and against other social maladies.

kapdal
March 12th, 2010, 06:39 AM
VP Singhji, Brahm, All,

Thanks for comments, ideas and criticism. My previous posts were trying to focus on the diagnosis and causes of rural backwardness. One of my assertions was that urbanization has to happen, given the huge inequilibrium between rural and urban economies. It will happen (as it is happening now) whether you plan for it or not. So better plan for it.

As such, the "ideas" for development that I was putting forth were very general and not a "plan" that could be followed. It is easy to find problems with such ideas and it should be done till the idea gets shaped into an implementable solution.

I'd like to make a few more points based on the discussion:

1. The urbanization need not happen to the extent of Western countries. Probably 20% rural population is the right answer for India (compared to 2% in US). 20% population contributing to 20% of GDP. Maybe more, maybe less. It is a democracy. Govt. can't force people to ruralize or urbanize. Urbanization is happening as a result of the huge inequilibrium. It would cease when a balance is achieved, when rural incomes/lifestyles are high enough to sustain the population that wants to live a rural lifestyle.

2. The equilibrium won't be achieved overnight. Say the magic no. is 20%. That still means urbanization of 50% of population- that is a huge number. We are looking at 5 decades at the least. Again, please note that the solution is not to force people to live in cities. Just living in cities is not going to change anything. You first need the rural population to have skills apart from agriculture. You then need employment opportunities for them. The marriage of these two requirements can happen on an economically sustainable scale only in a town/city--> please note this, the urbanization needs to follow these two conditions, it can't precede it.

3. I agree with Brahm that building 500/600 new cities/towns from scratch would create havoc. Again, the idea is not to build concrete islands in middle of nowhere. For 70-80% of India to "urbanize", existing cities would have to become bigger, many towns would have to become cities, many villages would have to become towns. And you don't pick and choose today on who becomes what. It happens gradually with time. You create the right conditions (stress again- skill sets and opportunities) and rest follows it. There would be room for many new cities/towns as well. I dont have a number for it and there is no need to chase a number. How many ports do we have right now and how many should we have for a country of our size. How many industrial towns do we have and how many should we have?

4. None of this means that you ignore the existing villages. There is no argument that the existing infrastructure needs to be augmented by leaps and bounds as has been discussed in the thread already. The emphasis should be on education, on equipping the new generation, that has just enrolled in primary schools, with the right skill set.

kapdal
March 12th, 2010, 06:58 AM
Corruption of Netas or of general public is a sick reality. There are no ifs and buts about it. But there is something wrong about how every debate on any issue leads to lamenting corruption, politicians- the usual suspects. My argument is not to ignore corruption or inefficiency of the political class. But to not simplify every issue to that dead end.

Let me ask this. Consider India was a corruption less country. Would that have meant high standard of living in rural areas and no poverty, had everything else remained the same? The answer is no. There was much that was wrong with the policies of the past. The situation would have been better, but much would still have been bad.

Much has happened despite corruption/politicians. Politicians all over the world are inherently the same. They are just interested in power. Even the leaders of developed countries take their nations on warpath just for their political survival. The scope for corruption/inefficiency in Indian system is more given the screwed up policies. So it is important to realize that there is much more benefit in attacking a wrong policy than in attacking a wrong person (politician/bureaucrat). Again, doesn't mean you let go the wrong guy. Demand accountability by all means. But don't lose the bigger picture.

Mobile revolution finished the corruption involved in getting a new connection or a dead line activated. Food for thought....

annch
March 12th, 2010, 09:35 AM
In a democracy, people get the government they deserve- Jefferson.
After elections, people can still hold their elected reps responsible/ accountable, if they want to. There is a protest going on in US- Tea Party Movement.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_movement

In line with the topic of discussion, I would be keen to know about the initiatives taken by rural population itself.

Corruption of Netas or of general public is a sick reality. There are no ifs and buts about it. But there is something wrong about how every debate on any issue leads to lamenting corruption, politicians- the usual suspects. My argument is not to ignore corruption or inefficiency of the political class. But to not simplify every issue to that dead end.

Let me ask this. Consider India was a corruption less country. Would that have meant high standard of living in rural areas and no poverty, had everything else remained the same? The answer is no. There was much that was wrong with the policies of the past. The situation would have been better, but much would still have been bad.

Much has happened despite corruption/politicians. Politicians all over the world are inherently the same. They are just interested in power. Even the leaders of developed countries take their nations on warpath just for their political survival. The scope for corruption/inefficiency in Indian system is more given the screwed up policies. So it is important to realize that there is much more benefit in attacking a wrong policy than in attacking a wrong person (politician/bureaucrat). Again, doesn't mean you let go the wrong guy. Demand accountability by all means. But don't lose the bigger picture.

Mobile revolution finished the corruption involved in getting a new connection or a dead line activated. Food for thought....

singhvp
March 12th, 2010, 10:01 AM
Dear Kapil, Anju ji, Braham and other honourable participants,


True that given a huge gap in terms of density of population, level of industrialization and per capita income, it would be utopian to imagine levelling our rural infrastructure to the extent of that in Western bloc. Also, it would be imprudent and hypothetical to ape the economic module of “laissez faire” practiced in the EU Block and other developed societies. Our material conditions and ground realities are diametrically opposed to ones prevalent in those societies. (I don’t need to elaborate on this as many of you know better than me). Hence our economic formulations have to be envisioned in a different perspective. But, my contention is that the whopping gap could have been minimised considerably, if intention and efforts were there, which did not happen due to lack of good intention, poor vision and reasons mentioned in the initial write-up. Therefore, the policy makers are main culprits in my opinion. An initiative has to be there to solve any problem which was not taken in right earnest. I agree, urbanisation will not come overnight. It is an evolving process but needs a right direction, clear vision and proper implementation which were missing in case of our rural development. Most of the plans for rural development were either ill-conceived, getting bogged down in bureaucratic red tap or mired into economic doldrums at embryonic stage. Who is the culprit?

Incidentally, I would like to give an example of Haryana. Except for the first two tenures of Chaudhary Bansi lal (I think 1969-1977) when Haryana progressed leaps and bounds, no serious effort to develop rural side were ever made by the successive Chief Ministers except for their respective constituencies. The districts, other than Sirsa, Hissar , remained grossly neglected like orphans and the infrastructure created by Ch. Bansi lal could not be expanded further. (Inspite of my divergence in certain matters, I would like to pay my sincere tributes to him - Nahin to hum nire Bagri ke bagri rahte Rohtak Sonepat walon ki Nigah mein-... joking). There was rather a degradation of the infrastructure due to poor maintenance viz. roads, canals, educational institutions and electricity generation etc. The successive governments, however, excelled in corruption, sale-purchase of government posts, political vendetta and in flaunting their “Sukki Chaudharahat” going down the roads in caravan of luxury vehicles/Hummers flanked by their gun-totting sycophants and cronies . The status was being maintained till recently. How efficiently, Hooda Sahab, who enjoyes a much better image, moves in this direction is a matter of conjecture. Rohtak, of course is shining. Let us wait and watch for the report card.

Corruption: I agree, it is a universal phenomenon but its magnitude in our country is considerably high. As per the report of Transparency International (last year), even some African States which are considered epitome of corruption have better ranking than us. Botswana is an example which stood at Number 3 whereas India was having a rank more than 100. So it cannot be denied. It is a major impediment in development and need to be taken seriously.


Recall of Elected Representative (Anju Ji): Well, Anju ji, unfortunately, the provision of plebiscite or referendum giving right of recall was not enshrined in our constitution by our most revered visionaries who drafted this statute-book, unlike in some countries. An amendment will be required, I think

jitendershooda
March 12th, 2010, 10:41 AM
Population of India is 1.2bn, of which more than 70% live in rural India.

Despite of so much migration indian sensus still shows more than 70%, I doubt.

Interesting read on migration in Europe
http://www.let.leidenuniv.nl/history/migration/chapter3.html

brahmtewatia
March 12th, 2010, 01:51 PM
perhaps the issue is more about the lack of economic opportunity in villages – given good employment prospects and the availability of basic services in rural areas, i’d still venture to say that more people would opt to stay in a place where they have stake over the land and the possibility of a higher standard of living.

i go back to the point of contention from where i started – rural development, though keeping the broader picture of ‘shining india’ in perspective.

one cannot but come to grief if disregards reality for a sufficiently long time. under-development, and its child “poverty”, is the result of a prolonged disregard for the laws governing the universe and more specifically - india. what we see around us are the children of poverty, the grandchildren of under-development (and/or haphazard development), hatred, ignorance, illiteracy, malnutrition, disease, and so on. one will have to wake up pretty early in the morning if one had to tackle a problem by painfully addressing each of its symptoms.

i woke up early this morning and this is what i’ve to say…

we assume, that we are talking here of 70% of indian population that has to fixed. kapil puts the magic no. at 20% to remain in agriculture and contribute 20% towards gdp. i would say that we must strive and make in serious efforts with proper implementation of policies to pull up (say for example) up to 35% (though not an easy task nd pardon my ignorance on economies here… kapil can correct me). and mind you when i say 35%, i haven’t arrived at this figure out of the blue… with the recent focus on organic food and related products, the trends are changing. also, while developing the entrepreneurship in rural areas, we must also focus as well on agriculture related industries to be located within the rural. that being done, we still have 50% of the population to be fixed. now this 50% of the population don’t have to run to cities and stamp themselves as ‘urbanized’, cos we have lucrative rural sector giving 35% to the gdp… just my thoughts, subject to criticism and/or amendments.

now how this can be achieved ?

before i answer that… let me reiterate, once again that agriculture sector in india has performed poorly and eventually we have to recognize that the control was malevolent in its effect, if not in intent. as pointed out by economists and reiterated by members here, urbanization and economic prosperity are bi-directionally related to cause(s) and consequences. to a significant extent, the poverty of india is directly a consequence of the neglect of earlier rural and now haphazard urban growth. gandhi and nehru (kapil, pls excuse me here) as they’ve usually done/doing - get the wrong end of the stick and india suffers.

most of all, must remember that governmental control is exercised by a bureaucracy. it is in the interests of bureaucrats to increase their power by controlling even more severely whatever they can. bureaucrats are only human. and like all humans have an ingrained lust for power… couple that with bounded rationality and imperfect foresight, and give allowances for the operation of the law of unintended consequences… and we have the perfect recipe for disastrous failures, as has been the case in the past.

so, without pointing any fingers this time >>> i would emphasize (... though with very less hope) on the paradigm shift of power from the (widely recognized as corrupt) politicians and bureaucrats to thoughtful people who are visionary, can create wealth and actually help in social welfare.

p.s. : look, and mark my words, of which I’ve said on this portal earlier as well… that agriculture is going to come-up in a very big way in the next decade or so.


1. The urbanization need not happen to the extent of Western countries. Probably 20% rural population is the right answer for India (compared to 2% in US). 20% population contributing to 20% of GDP. Maybe more, maybe less. It is a democracy. Govt. can't force people to ruralize or urbanize. Urbanization is happening as a result of the huge inequilibrium. It would cease when a balance is achieved, when rural incomes/lifestyles are high enough to sustain the population that wants to live a rural lifestyle.

2. The equilibrium won't be achieved overnight. Say the magic no. is 20%. That still means urbanization of 50% of population- that is a huge number. We are looking at 5 decades at the least. Again, please note that the solution is not to force people to live in cities. Just living in cities is not going to change anything. You first need the rural population to have skills apart from agriculture. You then need employment opportunities for them. The marriage of these two requirements can happen on an economically sustainable scale only in a town/city--> please note this, the urbanization needs to follow these two conditions, it can't precede it.

jitendershooda
March 12th, 2010, 03:02 PM
p.s. : look, and mark my words, of which I’ve said on this portal earlier as well… that agriculture is going to come-up in a very big way in the next decade or so.



Though it is bit different but related somehow to this subject.

Was Green Revolution a success or unplanned race sponsored by fertilizer/pesticide companies from UK/US whose consequences we are now facing in rural India?

jitendershooda
March 12th, 2010, 03:04 PM
Kapil's statistics are convincing and seems logical. But Brahm's idea of increasing agri sector itself first seems more practical.

brahmtewatia
March 12th, 2010, 03:31 PM
Though it is bit different but related somehow to this subject.

Was Green Revolution a success or unplanned race sponsored by fertilizer/pesticide companies from UK/US whose consequences we are now facing in rural India?
jitender bhaisahab, you too are very much associated with the soil. please give us your opinion on your own question to make the discussion more meaningful.

now the buzz word is 'organic'... if i assume (<<< only assuming) that those fertilizer/pesticide cos. brought disaster in india... then what about this new 'buzz', i mean organic ? what about its success in india ?... knowing the fact that the harmful effects of pesticides and fertilizers have reached in पाताल in our soil ?

gains in agriculture will definitely help in rural development... so my assertion that 'agriculture will come up in big way' holds good... correct ?

vicky84
March 12th, 2010, 04:07 PM
i go back to the point of contention from where i started – rural development, though keeping the broader picture of ‘shining india’ in perspective.

so, without pointing any fingers this time >>> i would emphasize (... though with very less hope) on the paradigm shift of power from the (widely recognized as corrupt) politicians and bureaucrats to thoughtful people who are visionary, can create wealth and actually help in social welfare.

p.s. : look, and mark my words, of which I’ve said on this portal earlier as well… that agriculture is going to come-up in a very big way in the next decade or so.



Brahm ji, pardon me for jumping in between..Just wondering..What does this conclusion suggest..Does it suggest to get rid of Democracy, or Keeping democracy in place but but get rid of corrupt officials and politicians. And how this paradigm shift of power can be achieved i.e getting rid of corruption..

brahmtewatia
March 12th, 2010, 06:15 PM
Brahm ji, pardon me for jumping in between..Just wondering..What does this conclusion suggest..Does it suggest to get rid of Democracy, or Keeping democracy in place but but get rid of corrupt officials and politicians. And how this paradigm shift of power can be achieved i.e getting rid of corruption..
honestly speaking atish, i have no clue to that. i tried to wash my hands by blaming the politicians, but kapil and others dragged me back into the discussion.

so, here i am... making that wishful assumption, but with the disclaimer in the post picked up by you >> (... though with very less hope). i didn't want myself, again to be muddled in between throwing blame here and there... guess, no harm in wishful thinking ?

we cannot get rid of democracy, neither the corrupt officials... they are the biggest sore to our democracy and the sick-reality... and off-course, the biggest reason for india's institutional failure.

but, still all hopes are not lost. if we can find person(s) like sreedharan of dmrc (delhi metro) that can bring back almost 'going dead' city of delhi on tracks, then i've all the reasons to be optimistic about... also i dont want myself to be labeled as hypocrite nri doing bakar bakar from outside india... ahahha.

off recently, happened to go through few of nandan nilkeni's (co-founder of Infosys) blogs on "imagining india" (<<< google that) where he made an excellent case why indian cities need to have local control rather than being controlled by state or central government agencies. i am sure that their are few think-tanks, working behind the scenes... hence the reason of my optimism and my assumption.

hope that clarifies :-)


Corruption of Netas or of general public is a sick reality. There are no ifs and buts about it. But there is something wrong about how every debate on any issue leads to lamenting corruption, politicians- the usual suspects. My argument is not to ignore corruption or inefficiency of the political class. But to not simplify every issue to that dead end.

vicky84
March 12th, 2010, 06:31 PM
honestly speaking atish, i have no clue to that. i tried to wash my hands by blaming the politicians, but kapil and others dragged me back into the discussion.

so, here i am... making that wishful assumption, but with the disclaimer in the post picked up by you >> (... though with very less hope). i didn't want myself, again to be muddled in between throwing blame here and there... guess, no harm in wishful thinking ?

we cannot get rid of democracy, neither the corrupt officials... they are the biggest sore to our democracy and the sick-reality... and off-course, the biggest reason for india's institutional failure.

but, still all hopes are not lost. if we can find person(s) like sreedharan of dmrc (delhi metro) that can bring back almost 'going dead' city of delhi on tracks, then i've all the reasons to be optimistic about... also i dont want myself to be labeled as hypocrite nri doing bakar bakar from outside india... ahahha.

off recently, happened to go through few of nandan nilkeni's (co-founder of Infosys) blogs on "imagining india" (<<< google that) where he made an excellent case why indian cities need to have local control rather than being controlled by state or central government agencies. i am sure that their are few think-tanks, working behind the scenes... hence the reason of my optimism and my assumption.

hope that clarifies :-)

Thanks Brahm ji for your reply and time..and i think debate is required over state and center government role in the development in a country.

dskadyan
March 13th, 2010, 12:39 AM
Reason for all these problems are:

We are work shirker,selfish and clueless. we are who get choose we are bureaucrats and we are executive. We are govt, and we indian are corrupt and all the thing we are saying to our politician. And we have to change and take responsibility. So I am at fault, any body there who is not in fault.

vicky84
March 14th, 2010, 08:19 AM
The major factor of negligence of country side is insufficient funds.That is what this fact justifies."India has said it needs investment of $500 billion in infrastructure during the five years to 2012 and has recently made a renewed push to develop roads with a target of building 20 kilometres (12 miles) per day." Now it depends upon state government and central government. If a state government does not have enough money to spend then it would either seek money from central Government or from World Bank. A Government needs to justify, why it is spending money and what are the possible outcomes from this. For an example, when a new road is built, would it reduce the transport cost for industry by cutting travel times and fuel costs? Will the government be able to generate enough out of the money invested? Problem is that State Government is not able to generate tax revenues out of it policies or because of high subsidies which left a very little room for spending upon infrastructure. To generate higher revenues, a Government would require private investment that is open doors for private firms to jump in its projects. That is Government would require liberalization of its business. For example with the recent liberalization airline business has introduced new low cost carriers to spring up. Jet Airways, Kingfishers and Deccan, cutting the cost of domestic air transport dramatically. Same is with other business.

As author of this thread has questioned that even after 62 years of independence, why the pace of development is so slow and lop-sided?

The answer to that is one should look into number of factors. During the three decades that followed by independence, India's annual average rate of real GDP growth was a mere 3.5 % a year. A throttling system of Government licensing and quotas, which was set up by Nehru, was refined by his daughter, Indira Gandhi to the point where it became virtually impossible for companies to produce anything. The liberalization of this system known as 'the licence raj'; began in 1980's helping real GDP growth to accelerate to an annual average of 6 % per year in that decade. Further extension to this, after financial crisis in 1991, India's second spate of liberalization took place when Dr. Manmohan Singh was finance minister. This liberalization was quite radical, with cuts in taxes and tariffs and the virtual abandonment of licensing and quotas. For more information on this policy please refer to this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Licence_Raj. And go through the consequences of this policy.

Here is the snippet from the above link : The Licence Raj is considered to have been significantly reduced in 1991 when India had only two weeks of dollars left: "In return for an IMF bailout, Gold bullion was transferred to London as collateral, the Rupee devalued and economic reforms were forced upon India."[8] The federal government, with Dr Manmohan Singh as finance minister, reduced licensing regulations; lowered tariffs, duties and taxes; and opened up to international trade and investment.[8]

When the main phase of economic liberalization began in 1991, peak import tariffs on non-agricultural goods were 300% and many import tariffs were subject to quantities controls; in 2006-7, the peak tariff was down to 12.5% which is still higher than China's equivalent tariff of about 5 %.

Samar in his one his post raised a very good point about Sez, its significance and what are major barrier to this policy of central government. Sez are essentially a way to introduce new rules favourable for business in specially designated areas but not a country as whole. This facilitate in attracting multinationals to locate their factories, so when the government announced in 2005 that it planned to boost the incentives available in special zones it looked like a way for India to sidestep some of the obstacles to its growth. Companies would exempt from corporate income tax for five years, with further concessions for another ten, and from all customs duties, as well as enjoying faster Sez are approved by central government, land acquisition for the zones is handled locally(State Government). And in many cases rather than leaving investors to negotiate directly with the existing landowners, state government have been acting intermediator. So this policy has put forward by central Government and leaving state government to negotiate with the private owners for acquisition of a land. The failure of state government in the land acquisition could cause private firm to withdraw from its project. For an example, SEZ planned at Nandigram for a chemical plant that was to be built by an Indonesian conglomerate, the Salim group, and a new car factory at Singrur (though not an sez) for tata motors, India's biggest car maker. Another example is when Laxmi Mittal threatens to exit its 20 billion steel projects in Orissa and J'khand because of delays in land acquisition. Although Firm was supposed to look after the acquisition but a state government should facilitate it. In that case either firm has to look for some other state in India, or just withdraw its project and look for some other countries to invest in. If a state looses such projects that means that will create an imbalance of growth in a country leading to some states are very far better than others. That means people will be unemployed and poor infrastructure on top of that will also reduce a state economic performance. West Bengal is a very good example where Naxalities are able to hire more and more unemployed people and leaving a country to face internal security threats. That means Government will need to spend more and more money to tackle with such issues and will be left with no money to spend upon infrastructure. That's why our prime minister has described it as a single biggest internal security challenge ever faced by the government.

The major hurlde for a private firm to start a business in India faces infrastructure bottlenecks which is a result of red tape, difficulties of land acquisition. Infrastructure and growth of a country are interrelated. It’s a government responsibility to understand its significance and to cleverly find ways to deal with it. It depends upon Government policies to make it easier for private firm to jump into major projects and make it easier for them to invest in. For example, Roads, railways, ports and the Airports have been outdated and grossly insufficient, adding to the cost of any firm wanting to import components, export finished goods or simply ship their goods to Indian buyers. The electrical supply has been unreliable, forcing firms to take on the cost of producing their own power, which leaves them with a lot of wasted capacity. Complex labour laws make it very difficult for a firm to start a business in India.

More and more private investment (Foreign,Domestic) would not only fill the Government reserves, but will also facilitate in raising employment, more infrastructure development and eventually would lift the GDP of a country which will lead us to a Developed country.

singhvp
March 14th, 2010, 09:41 AM
Corruption of Netas or of general public is a sick reality. There are no ifs and buts about it. But there is something wrong about how every debate on any issue leads to lamenting corruption, politicians- the usual suspects. My argument is not to ignore corruption or inefficiency of the political class. But to not simplify every issue to that dead end.

Let me ask this. Consider India was a corruption less country. Would that have meant high standard of living in rural areas and no poverty, had everything else remained the same? The answer is no. There was much that was wrong with the policies of the past. The situation would have been better, but much would still have been bad.

Much has happened despite corruption/politicians. Politicians all over the world are inherently the same. They are just interested in power. Even the leaders of developed countries take their nations on warpath just for their political survival. The scope for corruption/inefficiency in Indian system is more given the screwed up policies. So it is important to realize that there is much more benefit in attacking a wrong policy than in attacking a wrong person (politician/bureaucrat). Again, doesn't mean you let go the wrong guy. Demand accountability by all means. But don't lose the bigger picture.

Mobile revolution finished the corruption involved in getting a new connection or a dead line activated. Food for thought....




Kapil and others,

There can be no argument this issue should not be oversimplified to the dead end of corrupt politics. But, you would agree that dynamics of economy of any particular society are supposed to be determined and controlled by the political forces, not by a common man. Therefore the epicenter of all discussions on underdevelopment, which is an outcome of the flawed politico-economic formulations and crude vision of our unduly honoured politicians – thanks to our lower esteem. Now the question arises what prompts the political powers to formulate such flawed economic policies detrimental to rural development. It is a matter of long debate bringing into its ambit multiple factors which might lead to a little digression. Therefore in a nutshell, I would like to add that contours of our economy are being decided by captains of market & industry thereby ruling the country by proxy - by generously sharing their dividends with corrupt and highly selfish politicians overtly or covertly in the guise of ‘Party Donation’, offering them lavish hospitalities during their foreign sojourns (where they keep going for convalescing in the name of orientation tours or for signing the MOUs which is very easy to accomplish in their their posh cabins in India with the advent of Internet). For obvious reasons, the captains of Indian business and industry do not have any interest in rural development until the time it becomes beneficial to their business empires and divert the conduit of nation’s wealth towards development of places of their interest only. Political parties are just an offshoot of wealthy business mafia and play subservient to them for their vested interest. Present economy is illegitimate and physically challenged child of the wealthy industrialists , traders and other mafia who keep switching over their loyalties even ditching their political allies whenever they venture to bring some rural oriented legislation once in a blue moon.


Mobile revolution is a reality and need to be acknowledged.


To avoid further digression whole gamut of economic issues need to be discussed in length and breadth under a different thread in due course, I think.

vicky84
March 14th, 2010, 10:54 AM
Kapil and others,

For obvious reasons, the captains of Indian business and industry do not have any interest in rural development until the time it becomes beneficial to their business empires and divert the conduit of nation’s wealth towards development of places of their interest only. Political parties are just an offshoot of wealthy business mafia and play subservient to them for their vested interest. Present economy is illegitimate and physically challenged child of the wealthy industrialists , traders and other mafia who keep switching over their loyalties even ditching their political allies whenever they venture to bring some rural oriented legislation once in a blue moon.


Mobile revolution is a reality and need to be acknowledged.


To avoid further digression whole gamut of economic issues need to be discussed in length and breadth under a different thread in due course, I think.

VP Singh ji,

I beg to differ. Rural Development is ignored due to the fact that a Government does not have enough money to support it. Not even in some developed cities. Gurgaon is a very good example of that. we need to think about the past development, what were the loopholes in the system. Whether the economic reform required for a cash flow in a country was enough to support any development. You have been stressing on rural development. How many projects in all a Government can support on its own. State Government like Haryana does not have enough funds in its reserves to support major projects. You are blaming wealthy industrialist for ignorance. Mukesh Ambani and his side of Reliance are engaged in India's most ambitious urban development project yet. It requires lot of funding to support such projects. One of his project in Haryana, to develop Sez will not only benefits in Urban Development but also would create a lot of jobs in the state. Unfortunately due to global recession that project has been put on hold but land acquisition has already been done. At present our Government cannot support such initiatives on its own and thus would require hands of these wealthiest industrialist.

singhvp
March 14th, 2010, 02:42 PM
VP Singh ji,

I beg to differ. Rural Development is ignored due to the fact that a Government does not have enough money to support it. Not even in some developed cities. Gurgaon is a very good example of that. we need to think about the past development, what were the loopholes in the system. Whether the economic reform required for a cash flow in a country was enough to support any development. You have been stressing on rural development. How many projects in all a Government can support on its own. State Government like Haryana does not have enough funds in its reserves to support major projects. You are blaming wealthy industrialist for ignorance. Mukesh Ambani and his side of Reliance are engaged in India's most ambitious urban development project yet. It requires lot of funding to support such projects. One of his project in Haryana, to develop Sez will not only benefits in Urban Development but also would create a lot of jobs in the state. Unfortunately due to global recession that project has been put on hold but land acquisition has already been done. At present our Government cannot support such initiatives on its own and thus would require hands of these wealthiest industrialist.


Atish ji,

Thanks for your thoughtful analysis. After having received similar objective assessments from some other distinguished members I seem to have been exhausted all weapons in my arsenal at present for defence of my post. It has helped me in a great way to refine my understanding on the subject. But I still beg to differ on certain points, especially location of SEZ and shortage of money in State's coffers and acquittal of the politician or State for that matter. Will revert with facts and figures in due course. After having acknowledged existence of the problem by majority of viewers - there are conflicting views about the causes. More comments on causes and remedies will be welcome. Meanwhile, I cannot help admire your deep knowledge and grasp on the subject and a very soft and refined texture of post.

Samarkadian
March 14th, 2010, 03:15 PM
samar, i rate your post # 9 as excellent, as seen by me for quite some time. though, this also holds true that VP has a very viable reasoning in his counter post.

honestly, i would appreciate your further discussion rather than renouncing from the discussion at this stage. please do participate. i do not want this (turning good) discussion meet the same foreordained fate. hope you will oblige.


Sir Brahm, Not an issue.


Kapil and others,

But, you would agree that dynamics of economy of any particular society are supposed to be determined and controlled by the political forces, not by a common man. Therefore the epicenter of all discussions on underdevelopment, which is an outcome of the flawed politico-economic formulations and crude vision of our unduly honoured politicians --thanks to our lower esteem. Now the question arises what prompts the political powers to formulate such flawed economic policies detrimental to rural development. . Present economy is illegitimate and physically challenged child of the wealthy industrialists , traders and other mafia who keep switching over their loyalties even ditching their political allies whenever they venture to bring some rural oriented legislation once in a blue moon.

To avoid further digression whole gamut of economic issues need to be discussed in length and breadth under a different thread in due course, I think.

Mr Singh, I would try to take it a bit further. Like you have started your incipient post with independence story. A generation or nearly a generation has passed since then.


It is a kind of fashion among youth nowadays to blame Nehru/Gandhi with piquant and risible anecdotes for everything [read everything ] what we are countering presently . May be it helps in easing out our current social and economical responsblity arisen due to past inablity of leaders of that epoch. But for a moment, lets pause and reflect calmly that what was the vision held by other contemporary leaders of Nehru/Gandhi era.? Any Idea.? Any hint. Answer to this is that almost all of them had same vision about development. Any person born in that era would have thought the same things most likely. Lets suppose you are JL Nehru. What options had you had to put in to a naive nation's growth. Possibly, something which was going in the world and what was going in the world in those times.? Soviet Russia's Socialism Philosophy and USA's Capitalism. Right ? In 1947 , World had already witnessed WW2 and a great depression. So What would have prompted You as JL Nehru to adopt? An already sunk Capitalism in the abyss of depression OR Depression immune Soviet's Socialism. To explain it further , I will be shamelessly quoting Aris Hobsbawn from his work Age of Extremes . He proposes two kind of models to be adopted at that time as :-


Model A:


1.These countries, which embraced A , had their economy stagnant during the periods between 1914 and 1939.

2. The industrial production fell by about ONE-THIRD between 1929 and 1931.


3. During 1929 and 1938 their share of world’s manufactured goods decreased.


4. The unemployment was between 10% and 18% during 1920s. And during Great Depression it was between 22% and 44%.


5. The inflation rate was explosive sometimes reaching levels where one person’s life savings would only fetch a 'drink in a café'.

Model B


1. These countries, which embraced B, had a robust economy during the pervious 30 years.


2. In these countries the industrial production TRIPLED from 1929 to 1940.


3. Their share of worlds manufactured goods almost QUADRUPLED.


4. There was virtually NO unemployment.


5. There was virtually NO inflation even during the Great Depression.


6. These countries completely escaped Great Depression of 30s.


Now, me as a JL Nehru as the head of a newly founded state would have choosen the model B and in my opinion, you too. Correct me?

Model A represent Capitalism while model B represent Socialism. Best these seems the torrent at those time but not in 2010 at all. Socialism has failed in its own home as it was doomed to because of its unnatural proclivity.

So that is the root. Borrowing the models from outside always fail. Sooner or later Capitalism too will be in same place. So Sir Brahm now found a new way to shift blame from desi politicians to international one. Karl Marx hmm? Today what are we and how are we is the direct ramification of model B. But gents, that was gold according to that world situations. Now it is a ''buyer's regret''.

As far as lower-self esteem is concerned, we have it because of our ''Grandfather of Independent Nation'' - Lord Mclaay . He instilled in our already slave mind that everything non-British is inferior. And anything inferior causes low- self esteem. It engulfs confidence and independency of minds and thoughts which was the goal of Grandfather. He plundered everything with the curriculam of english alzebra. Till today we would appreciate that - Angrez kitne aandy sai, dekh, yo kar diya, wo kar diya. Sooner we burn the hobgoblin of grandfather, faster we would move ahead in genuine way and in our style.

So your current generation of politicians are merely the upgradation [ or downgradation ] of British era. Colonial hangover would still take decades to be washed but when whole world is now being westernised culturly and economicaly, so no salvation apparantly unless we devise a system of development which purely would be in nature of our ethnicity. For example:- Mohammad Yunus, The Noble Awardee from Bangladesh.

Moving further , realising the importance of Indian population as a big investment asset , paleolithic way of strengthening the agricultural, dairy products, rural tourism , could be a few but strong innovative ventures to help the rural sector without urbanising it unneccessarily . Urban population is hughely dependent on rural sector for milk, vegetables and grains. Government may be cold but people of rural area always have this opporutnity open. Don't expect government to baby feed the progress in to your hungary stomach. You will have to vouch for your hunger. Enterpreneuring of our blood professions are the ways and quiet easiest ways.

Rural folks are deft in these basic professions for centuaries. So why to look at outside and seek service industeries to knock at door step to acquire their land. As I said earlier, they only lack in guidance.

Corruption , it would not take more than five minutes to understand and accept that every human group of any kind is doomed to corrupt. It is one of the inherent quality of humanity. Our Cro-Magnan and Neanderthal - chimp fathers were corrupt too. They had stolen food from their brothers. But to live and function harmoniusly we are expected to practise the lately induced rules[ like 10,000years back] of society, governance. But alas! inherent,innate base qualities/motivations in our genome always trumps the newly induced codes of behaviour. As we have evolved past the survival , we tend to behave more socially and for this to appear practise there MUST be a homogenius enviornment of culture, values, ethics. Indians, overall firmly and dedicatively believe in easy forgving, forgetting and classic '' Sab Kuch Chalta Hai Yaar, Aisi Taisi Karaye Duniya, Apne ko Kya''. Without proper and suffice checks in any governance system development remains down-played. May be it is true that we better understand and behave onto the aria of flagellation better than following rules. But who will whip our lazy asses? I leave you here with the question of the millenium.

singhvp
March 14th, 2010, 06:22 PM
Sir Brahm, Not an issue.



Mr Singh, I would try to take it a bit further. Like you have started your incipient post with independence story. A generation or nearly a generation has passed since then.


It is a kind of fashion among youth nowadays to blame Nehru/Gandhi with piquant and risible anecdotes for everything [read everything ] what we are countering presently . May be it helps in easing out our current social and economical responsblity arisen due to past inablity of leaders of that epoch. But for a moment, lets pause and reflect calmly that what was the vision held by other contemporary leaders of Nehru/Gandhi era.? Any Idea.? Any hint. Answer to this is that almost all of them had same vision about development. Any person born in that era would have thought the same things most likely. Lets suppose you are JL Nehru. What options had you had to put in to a naive nation's growth. Possibly, something which was going in the world and what was going in the world in those times.? Soviet Russia's Socialism Philosophy and USA's Capitalism. Right ? In 1947 , World had already witnessed WW2 and a great depression. So What would have prompted You as JL Nehru to adopt? An already sunk Capitalism in the abyss of depression OR Depression immune Soviet's Socialism. To explain it further , I will be shamelessly quoting Aris Hobsbawn from his work Age of Extremes . He proposes two kind of models to be adopted at that time as :-


Model A:


1.These countries, which embraced A , had their economy stagnant during the periods between 1914 and 1939.

2. The industrial production fell by about ONE-THIRD between 1929 and 1931.


3. During 1929 and 1938 their share of world’s manufactured goods decreased.


4. The unemployment was between 10% and 18% during 1920s. And during Great Depression it was between 22% and 44%.


5. The inflation rate was explosive sometimes reaching levels where one person’s life savings would only fetch a 'drink in a café'.

Model B


1. These countries, which embraced B, had a robust economy during the pervious 30 years.


2. In these countries the industrial production TRIPLED from 1929 to 1940.


3. Their share of worlds manufactured goods almost QUADRUPLED.


4. There was virtually NO unemployment.


5. There was virtually NO inflation even during the Great Depression.


6. These countries completely escaped Great Depression of 30s.


Now, me as a JL Nehru as the head of a newly founded state would have choosen the model B and in my opinion, you too. Correct me?

Model A represent Capitalism while model B represent Socialism. Best these seems the torrent at those time but not in 2010 at all. Socialism has failed in its own home as it was doomed to because of its unnatural proclivity.

So that is the root. Borrowing the models from outside always fail. Sooner or later Capitalism too will be in same place. So Sir Brahm now found a new way to shift blame from desi politicians to international one. Karl Marx hmm? Today what are we and how are we is the direct ramification of model B. But gents, that was gold according to that world situations. Now it is a ''buyer's regret''.

As far as lower-self esteem is concerned, we have it because of our ''Grandfather of Independent Nation'' - Lord Mclaay . He instilled in our already slave mind that everything non-British is inferior. And anything inferior causes low- self esteem. It engulfs confidence and independency of minds and thoughts which was the goal of Grandfather. He plundered everything with the curriculam of english alzebra. Till today we would appreciate that - Angrez kitne aandy sai, dekh, yo kar diya, wo kar diya. Sooner we burn the hobgoblin of grandfather, faster we would move ahead in genuine way and in our style.

So your current generation of politicians are merely the upgradation [ or downgradation ] of British era. Colonial hangover would still take decades to be washed but when whole world is now being westernised culturly and economicaly, so no salvation apparantly unless we devise a system of development which purely would be in nature of our ethnicity. For example:- Mohammad Yunus, The Noble Awardee from Bangladesh.

Moving further , realising the importance of Indian population as a big investment asset , paleolithic way of strengthening agriculture , dairy products and rural tourism could be a few but strong innovative ventures to help the rural sector without urbanising it unneccessarily . Urban population is hughely dependent on rural sector for milk, vegetables and grains. Government may be cold but people of rural area always have this opporutnity open. Don't expect government to baby feed the progress in to your hungary stomach. You will have to vouch for your hunger. Enterpreneuring of our blood professions are the ways and quiet easiest ways.

Rural folks are deft in these basic professions for centuaries. So why to look at outside and seek service industeries to knock at door step to acquire their land. As I said earlier, they only lack in guidance.

Corruption , it would not take more than five minutes to understand and accept that every human group of any kind is doomed to corrupt. It is one of the inherent quality of humanity. Our Cro-Magnan and Neanderthal - chimp fathers were corrupt too. They had stolen food from their brothers. But to live and function harmoniusly we are expected to practise the lately induced rules[ like 10,000years back] of society, governance. But alas! inherent,innate base qualities/motivations in our genome always trumps the newly induced codes of behaviour. As we have evolved past the survival , we tend to behave more socially and for this to appear practise there MUST be a homogenius enviornment of culture, values, ethics. Indians, overall firmly and dedicatively believe in easy forgving, forgetting and classic '' Sab Kuch Chalta Hai Yaar, Aisi Taisi Karaye Duniya, Apne ko Kya''. Without proper and suffice checks in any governance system development remains down-played. May be it is true that we better understand and behave onto the aria of flagellation better than following rules. But who will whip our lazy asses? I leave you here with the question of the millenium.

Dear Samar,

First of all thanks for your comments which are very clear to me this time. A great & deep analysis which I really admire from the core of my hearth and not just a rhetoric.

Definitely If I were JL Nehru I would have gone for Model B which was most suitable for India given the prevalent state of affairs. Having said that I have my reservations about Pandit Nehru's intentions behind adopting the so-called 'Nehruvian Socialism" an indigenous name for soviet brand communism. For one, the public mood was against anything associated with imperialism and capitalism was considered a bourgeois concept propounded by the colonial masters they had just overthrown. Nehru was wise enough to gauge public mood and aspirations. Second, before independence there was one section of left oriented freedom fighters (including Bhagat Singh) with radical agenda led by Marxists and social democrats who were for socio-economic transformation on the line of Soviet socialism after independence. To preempt any socialist movement by the erstwhile home grown communists Nehru thougt it proper to follow the Soviet Module. I doubt Nehru's credentials as a socialist. It was out of these two political compulsions in my opinion which may be subjected to free and fair criticism. Inspite of Nehru's claims of following Soviet module in the form of 5-year plans, I do not think it was followed in toto. Soviet module was followed as far as making heavy infrastructure like setting up steel plants (Bhilai, Bokaro), dams (like Bhakhra) with an eye on Soviet collaboration. So we did not adopt the totalitarian economy but preferred a mixed one leaving space for private players. But, I do not think it was a wrong decision. Why we could not achieve that level of development which was witnessed in Soviet Union is a matter of discussion.

Your idea of Paleolithic way of strengthening the agriculture, dairy products, rural tourism makes great sense in my view. Let other send their comments.

brahmtewatia
March 14th, 2010, 10:21 PM
shaded blue:
samar, what your entire write-up (though written excellent) has to do with development and/or non-development ? what do you want to say ?... that we (nehru) followed socialistic set-up (model-B) that is why we are developed/under-developed ? (... also answered by mr. vp singh in actual context)

or, we didn't followed capitalist set-up (model-A) that is why we are developed/under-developed ?

even your write-up after blue doesn't clarify that. i would like to give the title of your previous post # 9 as india shining aka bjp style... where you have given a rosy picture of development in and around delhi or major haryana cities. i am in a fix whether you are speaking for or against the motion. combine both your posts in the 'extracted meaning'... and i find a total chaos of thoughts.

shaded red:
this makes sense !... same as suggested by me and other members in the previous posts.


It is a kind of fashion among youth nowadays to blame Nehru/Gandhi with piquant and risible anecdotes for everything [read everything ] what we are countering presently . May be it helps in easing out our current social and economical responsblity arisen due to past inablity of leaders of that epoch. But for a moment, lets pause and reflect calmly that what was the vision held by other contemporary leaders of Nehru/Gandhi era.? Any Idea.? Any hint. Answer to this is that almost all of them had same vision about development. Any person born in that era would have thought the same things most likely. Lets suppose you are JL Nehru. What options had you had to put in to a naive nation's growth. Possibly, something which was going in the world and what was going in the world in those times.? Soviet Russia's Socialism Philosophy and USA's Capitalism. Right ? In 1947 , World had already witnessed WW2 and a great depression. So What would have prompted You as JL Nehru to adopt? An already sunk Capitalism in the abyss of depression OR Depression immune Soviet's Socialism. To explain it further , I will be shamelessly quoting Aris Hobsbawn from his work Age of Extremes . He proposes two kind of models to be adopted at that time as :-

Model A:

1.These countries, which embraced A , had their economy stagnant during the periods between 1914 and 1939.

2. The industrial production fell by about ONE-THIRD between 1929 and 1931.

3. During 1929 and 1938 their share of world’s manufactured goods decreased.

4. The unemployment was between 10% and 18% during 1920s. And during Great Depression it was between 22% and 44%.

5. The inflation rate was explosive sometimes reaching levels where one person’s life savings would only fetch a 'drink in a café'.

Model B

1. These countries, which embraced B, had a robust economy during the pervious 30 years.

2. In these countries the industrial production TRIPLED from 1929 to 1940.

3. Their share of worlds manufactured goods almost QUADRUPLED.

4. There was virtually NO unemployment.

5. There was virtually NO inflation even during the Great Depression.

6. These countries completely escaped Great Depression of 30s.

Now, me as a JL Nehru as the head of a newly founded state would have choosen the model B and in my opinion, you too. Correct me?

Model A represent Capitalism while model B represent Socialism. Best these seems the torrent at those time but not in 2010 at all. Socialism has failed in its own home as it was doomed to because of its unnatural proclivity.

So that is the root. Borrowing the models from outside always fail. Sooner or later Capitalism too will be in same place. So Sir Brahm now found a new way to shift blame from desi politicians to international one. Karl Marx hmm? Today what are we and how are we is the direct ramification of model B. But gents, that was gold according to that world situations. Now it is a ''buyer's regret''.

As far as lower-self esteem is concerned, we have it because of our ''Grandfather of Independent Nation'' - Lord Mclaay . He instilled in our already slave mind that everything non-British is inferior. And anything inferior causes low- self esteem. It engulfs confidence and independency of minds and thoughts which was the goal of Grandfather. He plundered everything with the curriculam of english alzebra. Till today we would appreciate that - Angrez kitne aandy sai, dekh, yo kar diya, wo kar diya. Sooner we burn the hobgoblin of grandfather, faster we would move ahead in genuine way and in our style.

So your current generation of politicians are merely the upgradation [ or downgradation ] of British era. Colonial hangover would still take decades to be washed but when whole world is now being westernised culturly and economicaly, so no salvation apparantly unless we devise a system of development which purely would be in nature of our ethnicity. For example:- Mohammad Yunus, The Noble Awardee from Bangladesh.

Moving further , realising the importance of Indian population as a big investment asset , paleolithic way of strengthening the agricultural, dairy products, rural tourism , could be a few but strong innovative ventures to help the rural sector without urbanising it unneccessarily . Urban population is hughely dependent on rural sector for milk, vegetables and grains. Government may be cold but people of rural area always have this opporutnity open. Don't expect government to baby feed the progress in to your hungary stomach. You will have to vouch for your hunger. Enterpreneuring of our blood professions are the ways and quiet easiest ways.

Rural folks are deft in these basic professions for centuaries. So why to look at outside and seek service industeries to knock at door step to acquire their land. As I said earlier, they only lack in guidance.

Corruption , it would not take more than five minutes to understand and accept that every human group of any kind is doomed to corrupt. It is one of the inherent quality of humanity. Our Cro-Magnan and Neanderthal - chimp fathers were corrupt too. They had stolen food from their brothers. But to live and function harmoniusly we are expected to practise the lately induced rules[ like 10,000years back] of society, governance. But alas! inherent,innate base qualities/motivations in our genome always trumps the newly induced codes of behaviour. As we have evolved past the survival , we tend to behave more socially and for this to appear practise there MUST be a homogenius enviornment of culture, values, ethics. Indians, overall firmly and dedicatively believe in easy forgving, forgetting and classic '' Sab Kuch Chalta Hai Yaar, Aisi Taisi Karaye Duniya, Apne ko Kya''. Without proper and suffice checks in any governance system development remains down-played. May be it is true that we better understand and behave onto the aria of flagellation better than following rules. But who will whip our lazy asses? I leave you here with the question of the millenium.

brahmtewatia
March 14th, 2010, 10:32 PM
So that is the root. Borrowing the models from outside always fail. Sooner or later Capitalism too will be in same place. So Sir Brahm now found a new way to shift blame from desi politicians to international one. Karl Marx hmm? karl marx !!! who is karl marx ???

when did i shift my blame from desi politicians to international one's ?

instead, in my previous post addressed to atish, i even withdrew my pointing fingers from desi politicians and talked of my suggestions under the assumption of a utopian set-up.


so, without pointing any fingers this time >>> i would emphasize (... though with very less hope) on the paradigm shift of power from the (widely recognized as corrupt) politicians and bureaucrats to thoughtful people who are visionary, can create wealth and actually help in social welfare.

VirJ
March 15th, 2010, 06:44 AM
The plight of rural poor continues unabated. Majority of villages in India, including Haryana, UP, MP or Rajasthan which are focus of our attention on this forum, still remain without basic civic amenities viz. road, rail/bus service, education, health services, telephone, playgrounds, not to speak of cyber café , pub or discotheque which are still considered as ingredients of alien culture.


Now the question is, even after 62 years of independence, why the pace of development is so slow and lop-sided? Why the developmental activities are centered round the big/metropolitan cities only? In my perception the underdevelopment and backwardness of villages is due to a cumulative effect to the following factors:

(a) Dynastic politics:

(b) Indifferent attitude of educated youth towards politics and development of their area:

(c) Lack of political awareness among the villagers:

(d) Malpractices in election:

(e) Gotra Factor in election :
-------------



Dear OP,

Thanks for this excellent post. But my little brain fails to comprehend the exact meaning . Are you trying to say that all the above underlined problems are rural specific and are solely/vastly responcible for the under development of the rural areas. Arent these problems equally relevant to urban as well and if they are than how come they differenciate between urban and rural. If you could explain, please. I agree with Samar that its too much of generalisation and the post somewhere fails to explain (people with little knowledge like me) how these are related to the rural specific perspective which the post is about.

Also could you please also tell me that whether a city like Sirsa is urban in ur dictionary or rural.

I didnt go through all the posts so if this is already addressed, apologies.
Thanks

singhvp
March 15th, 2010, 08:52 AM
Dear VP,

Thanks for this excellent post. But my little brain fails to comprehend the exact meaning . Are you trying to say that all the above underlined problems are rural specific and are solely/vastly responcible for the under development of the rural areas. Arent these problems equally relevant to urban as well and if they are than how come they differenciate between urban and rural. If you could explain, please. I agree with Samar that its too much of generalisation and the post somewhere fails to explain (people with little knowledge like me) how these are related to the rural specific perspective which the post is about.

Also could you please also tell me that whether a city like Sirsa is urban in ur dictionary or rural.

I didnt go through all the posts so if this is already addressed, apologies.
Thanks

Dear Vipin,


Thanks for your participation, albeit a little late. As far as your realisation about your brain is considered, I do not seem be agreeable because going by your profile you seem to have quite a reasonable exposure to the outside world. Moreover, there are no fixed parameters for judging the brain or its offspring - the intellect. Also the area you hail from is no more a pure “Bagar” and is much more advanced than my desolate hamlet. I think we all are in the same boat, with different perceptions which are determined by our environs and opportunities available to us. Anyway I appreciate your humility and without delving into linguistic and philosophical nuances, come to your query.


There is no denying the fact that the malaise of under-development is afflicting cities also including your own city Sirsa. But, I hope you would agree the dimensions and magnitude differ. Hence, I thought is proper to discuss in a different format separately once this topic is over. I have equal concern about our brothers in cities as well who had to migrate to cities due to various reasons – inadequacies of rural areas being the one - as already discussed. You may like to go through some very valuable posts by some of our learned participants. (There will not be any exaggeration if I call some of them as crème de la crème).

Another important guiding principle behind the post being rural-specific was my assumption, which may not be correct, that this forum is Jat Centric and main thrust of Jat community being in rural side I preferred to touch only the rural aspect/side of the issue. Members are, however, free to expand the horizon of this discussion and can take to any heights by bringing into its ambit the developmental problems afflicting cities also.

By virtue of its Being a district headquarters, Sirsa falls under the category of a city in my opinion.

singhvp
March 15th, 2010, 09:14 AM
karl marx !!! who is karl marx ???

when did i shift my blame from desi politicians to international one's ?

instead, in my previous post addressed to atish, i even withdrew my pointing fingers from desi politicians and talked of my suggestions under the assumption of a utopian set-up.






Braham, don't play ignorance. You know Marx better than anyone else. Incidentally, I would like to add that inspite of crass failure of our indigenous comrades to make inroads in major parts of India except for the three States Bengal, Tripura and Kerala, I consider Marx a great philosopher mankind has ever seen. It is not his philosophy which has failed, it the leadership in different countries including in India which failed Marx. But the contribution of this great philosopher in revolutionizing 1/3 of the world cannot be undermined, if we undertake a disinterested study of history.

Disclaimer: I dissociate myself with any particular ideological school of thought when I am on this forum. So please do not read between the lines. I will try my best to be highly apolitical on this forum.

VirJ
March 15th, 2010, 01:41 PM
Dear Vipin,


Thanks for your participation, albeit a little late.

Vijay,

My whole point basically was your post/s failed to link the problems you stated to the condition of the rural land. You yourself have agreed to the fact that urban india faced similar problems. You says it differ in magnitude. Well that needs to be argued.

You stated lot of problems and facts but how are they responcible for the rural undevelopment. These are general problems pervalent in India and thats why Samar( I believe) has questioned that. You says politics is a problem but how? If rural and urban face the same problem/s than why they develop( as you say) urban and not rural. I am not saying the facts you stated are responcible or not but want to see how and how much they are directly/indirectly connected to the rural "development" problem.

Your all ( and of all fellow members) posts are nevertheless Great but for a post which says "an Analysis" i expected a detailed study.

I think we are responsilble for our current state not the politicians

P.S I refer OP as original poster who are u in this case, that wasnt mis-spelled.

singhvp
March 15th, 2010, 02:07 PM
Vijay,


Your all ( and of all fellow members) posts are nevertheless Great but for a post which says "an Analysis" so i expected a detailed study.

I think we are responsilble for our current state not the politicians

.

Vipin. Thanks for the comments. Will stay in touch.

Oh about that OP, I thought it to be a spelling mistake. Thanks for correcting me.

singhvp
March 21st, 2010, 01:05 PM
VP Singh ji,

I beg to differ. Rural Development is ignored due to the fact that a Government does not have enough money to support it. Not even in some developed cities. Gurgaon is a very good example of that. we need to think about the past development, what were the loopholes in the system. Whether the economic reform required for a cash flow in a country was enough to support any development. You have been stressing on rural development. How many projects in all a Government can support on its own. State Government like Haryana does not have enough funds in its reserves to support major projects. You are blaming wealthy industrialist for ignorance. Mukesh Ambani and his side of Reliance are engaged in India's most ambitious urban development project yet. It requires lot of funding to support such projects. One of his project in Haryana, to develop Sez will not only benefits in Urban Development but also would create a lot of jobs in the state. Unfortunately due to global recession that project has been put on hold but land acquisition has already been done. At present our Government cannot support such initiatives on its own and thus would require hands of these wealthiest industrialist.


Going by revelations of Baba Ramdev, wealth worth billions of Rupees is stashed away by the corrupt politicians, industrialists and bureaucrats which is kept either in Swiss or Luxembourg banks or wasted in pleasurable activities. That money could be utilized in making better roads, hospitals, educational institutions and other welfare activities in the impoverished rural areas. Mayawat's garland is one example of ill-gotten money possessed by politicians in the name of Party Fund. I do not think there is dearth of money. Allocation of funds at the budgetary stage need to be revamped cutting down the infructuous non-plan expenditure. There is a need to curb the unwarranted, unfruitful and so frequent foreign jaunts by the bureaucrats and politicians which entails huge expenditure towards their stay in luxurious hotels, DA, and transport etc. Majority of them go abroad just for sight seeing, gambling in Casinos or visiting erotic massage parlours. There is hardly any output . Except for a few VVIP visits which are required by the protocol of reciprocity, most of such foreign tours can be stopped/banned altogether. All the deals can be negotiated by our foreign Missions abroad or by video conferencing. Similarly, back home we need to restrain our politicians and bureaucrats to indulge in extravagant activities involving heavy expenditures incurred on local tours, organising seminars and conference in 5-Star hotels dining and wining with rich and famous. All the corrupt bureaucrats found guilty of graft charges should be dismissed with summary/fast track trails and money so recovered should be put in development funds.

There are so many ways to generate and unearth sufficient funds for development. If that is not enough flood-gates for FDI need to be opened for tapping the huge potential in rural development. You mentioned about SEZ by Ambanis. I know it is proposed to be developed somewhere near Jhajjar which is not very far from Delhi. It will again increase population pressure in NCR creating in equilibrium already discussed. Ideally, its location should have been in a relatively more backward and far flung area like semi-desert areas of Bhiwani Mahendergarh or remote areas of Rajasthan like Churu District etc. giving these areas an opportunity to keep pace with the developing India. Of course by doing so the element of profit to Ambanis would have substantially decreased but their respect in the hearths of lakhs and lakhs of 'have nots' would have increased treating them as true patriots who want to be equal partners in the development of this country.

Samarkadian
March 21st, 2010, 01:40 PM
More than money rural development needs determined people like http://www.google.co.in/imgres?imgurl=http://www.indiabuzzing.com/wp-content/uploads/sant-balbir-singh-seechewal1.jpeg&imgrefurl=http://www.indiabuzzing.com/2008/07/25/sant-balbir-singh-seechewal/&h=200&w=250&sz=35&tbnid=bIVOrD1I66r1yM:&tbnh=89&tbnw=111&prev=/images%3Fq%3DBalbir%2Bsingh%2Bseechewal&hl=en&usg=__0CXDlVHf525K3PGsXW5_Wl1823c=&ei=EdKlS6bELcS4rAeC1M3-CA&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=6&ct=image&ved=0CBMQ9QEwBQ

singhvp
March 21st, 2010, 04:11 PM
More than money rural development needs determined people like]

No doubt our society needs people like Sant Balbir Singh Seenchewal who has done wonderful job by cleansing the rivulet with the help of local people, where State fails to deliver. The similar cleansing is needed for the streams of our politics which have been clogged by the weeds of corruption, nepotism and inefficiency. Hope the message of Sant Balbir Singh will reach millions of people who have been waiting in vain for the politicians for a change in their lives. An awakening is really needed.

anilsinghd
March 22nd, 2010, 05:09 PM
You got to be kidding me to assume that I read all the posts , I read few with concentrations , I stumbled over a few and then I skipped some as well.

Hopefully that was enough to give me some understanding of what the discussion over here focuses on. Though probably Kapil has said all that I could have but still no harm in repeating the rhetoric ( as already there have been some on the thread itself!).

Apologies before I start if any body believes I am too late to enter over here. Brahm "Sir" , let me know if i am allowed to enter into the class. ;)

Ok , so we are talking about rural under development here. And I read that the emphasis is on analysis. First thing , we need to set up a benchmark. You can choose that to be other countries today or India as of 1947 ( let !, ps : hope , using let is not being mathematical :(). Now , no matter how hard one tries , setting up a benchmark independent of the contemporary western countries( or for that matter , even the india cities ) is impossible. Reason being that we have seen good quality roads , facilities , electricity supplies etc etc so when we see the other side in the rural india , we get bewildered. The flaw in doing such an comparison is that we tend to stretch too far and also downplay the actual development.
Let's stop for a moment and look at the chart : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BPL_Data_GOI.png , let's not go into the discussion of the definition of poverty line and blah blah , but rather let's be objective at things. Things have moved , have not they?
If you stretch the chart to 1947 on left and 2010 on right , the effet might be more pronounced. So any assumption that things have not happened is wrong , things have certainly moved on.
Okay , so we all agree that there has been some development , now let's try and answer whether that's enough or not (in context of the resources we had and the initial conditions we were in)?
Let me try and take an example ( no one else that myself). So my father was the only sibling that went out of village and did a job, I can distinctly remember situation in Palam Colony (Kapil should as well!) 15 years ago. (Note :for those who do not know ,Palam Colony is in New Delhi and is close to Dwarka). Norm was the Power cuts upto 3 days , water logging everywhere even in scant rains , landlines phones were few and far(I used to go to my neighbours to attend calls at times), electricity naked wires all over (illegal) , people doing double face of electricity (to up the dim power to run motors , pumps , fridges etc) ( I once did a double face when the power was normal and only brought down my fridge , TV etc only to recieve my first lesson of electricity -- a tight slap on my face by my father :-| , electricity is dangerous)! Today some of those thing remain but it has improved a lot! If i can correctly recall , the cousins back in my village were so casual(and ok) with the things that we used to face , for them "those" were never a issue, but today , it is. I can see them going through the same phase that i had 10 years back.
The point I am trying to make is that things percolate , they will trickle down , you cannot expect things to be done in a day, Brahm is a fan of "Rome was not built ... " :p ;) .

I agree that if we be systematic and sincere and put all our efforts in synchrositaion , things can be better. But I certainly do not like the undue negative rehtoric which is wrong and is uncalled for. I appreciate that we have identified the issues, but then emphasis is on solutions going forward.

Next , regarding the evergreen topic of corruption , politics , politicians , this is a catch 22 situation for me , are we corrupt and then make decisions which get us the corrupt politicians or are politicans corrupt and give us a system which is corrupt and then attracts us to corruption? I was reading the Mayawati ki Maya and something came to my mind which is as follows: I remember one of my friend did his engineering from Agra and you can possibly guess the students/hostels culture there. I used to visit him often and once had a chat with one of his friends who was the kind of leader of the students. He told me that their methods of using the powers are also seasonal/govt. based. They would play the "bhaiya" card when Mulayam is in power and the "behanji" game when Mayawati is. And the way it works is that if you get into trouble (like a policemen catching you for something illegal) , you call a guy and then he calls another and if it is not resolved it is escalated to local mla etc and ultimately it would get done. Now look at the system we are developing , apart from the guy at the TOP , the MP's , MLA's , CM's , PM's , the whole chain is responsible , is not it? And where does it start from , from the very beginning of life that is college. What do you expect when these folks get old? Old habits die hard they say. We live in a state of being "jugaadu" about things. Going right way is going for the most difficult thing it seems. Now do not ask me for a solution because I do not have but certainly bashing the politicians in isolation is not going to get us anywhere.
Anjoo , you raised a point of people doing something about this similar to the protests that happen in the west , I will say its much more difficult in Indian context because of the sheer size of things here. More size leads to more diverse interests as well. We see similar on JL as well , no? Some like Ajit , some don't. :)

I would go with Kapil on the solution side of things , I think educating folks and giving them opportunities would be the way to go. Each generation learns from the experiences of past. We are at a stage where the educated folks are getting "westernised" at a rapid rate , I can easily see them finding solace in accumulating wealth as of now but I have a strange feeling that at some point of time in future they will get bored of this. Going by human nature they would start becoming dissatisfied of that alone. Their marginal utility in getting more money , getting a better job , getting the comfy life will decrease with time. What I am hoping is that they will start getting more awake about the past , present and future of India and would work towards a better system.
Note that I already think that in some way we are also doing the same , the thinking process has already begun , the discussions that we have which are pages long are a testimony of the process starting to develop , just that we are still far from the critical threshold for a upshoot!

May the hope prevail.

brahmtewatia
March 22nd, 2010, 09:19 PM
a more meaningful change would be to work towards a better model of local self government, with the taxes collected in a village/town/city primarily spent on that area, and a fixed percentage going to the levels above (district/state/union). the current model of most revenues going to the union, followed by the state, leaves cities, districts and small towns/villages at the mercy of the politicians and bureaucrats. even 63 years after the brits left, we still see our villagers go with a begging bowl to the DC or to the local politician... imo, this concept, if implemented properly can bring amazing results towards rural development.

brahmtewatia
March 22nd, 2010, 09:20 PM
samar,

some time back, you talked of 'swaraj - local self-governance' >>> http://www.jatland.com/forums/showthread.php?28424-Swaraj-Local-Self-Governance.&highlight=swaraj

what are your views if you adopt that concept to rural development ?... and how that can be achieved through gram sabha or any other local body and related difficulties in its practical implementation ?... any thoughts ?


Boys, you can always whin and can always be a part of change provided you are not pessmistic. Any mundane arguments can be countered with another superior or inferior argument. Thats not my problem, I am optimimistic and that too up to dangerous level. You waste your energy in whinning or can or wait for some aliens to come down and take away all miseries. I choose to seek answers in real and don't wait opposition party or ruling party to consider it . I make use of RTI and results are termendous with a 10 rupees form.

Dristi sudharo Dristikon sudhrega. Iski outsourcing nahi ho sakti, sadly.
Swarg paane ke liye padosi ko nahi khud ko marna padta hai.


::: Swaraj in modern-day India

•Swaraj is about giving direct control of funds, functions and functionaries to people’s assemblies – Mohalla sabhas in urban areas and Gram Sabhas in rural areas.
•These assemblies should meet every month and take decisions regarding all issues in their area.
•Decisions taken by these assemblies shall be implemented by their elected representative (Mohalla sabha representative in urban areas and Gram Sabha members in rural areas)
•If elected representatives act against the will of the people, the people’s assemblies should have the power to recall them.
In short, the people, through people’s assemblies shall directly manage all affairs of their area, which can be managed at their level. Only such issues, which cannot be managed at their level will go to higher levels of government. If majority of Gram Sabhas and Mohalla sabhas in a state vote for a particular issue, the state government shall implement it or enact necessary law or amend existing law.

That would be true democracy – government by the people.
This is swaraj. This is self-rule. This is Lok Raj.

singhvp
March 22nd, 2010, 10:31 PM
Though probably Kapil has said all that I could have but still no harm in repeating the rhetoric ( as already there have been some on the thread itself!).

First thing , we need to set up a benchmark. You can choose that to be other countries today or India as of 1947 ( let !, ps : hope , using let is not being mathematical :(). Now , no matter how hard one tries , setting up a benchmark independent of the contemporary western countries.

The flaw in doing such an comparison is that we tend to stretch too far and also downplay the actual development.
Let's stop for a moment and look at the chart : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BPL_Data_GOI.png


I agree that if we be systematic and sincere and put all our efforts in synchrositaion , things can be better. But I certainly do not like the undue negative rehtoric which is wrong and is uncalled for. I appreciate that we have identified the issues, but then emphasis is on solutions going forward.
I used to visit him often and once had a chat with one of his friends who was the kind of leader of the students. He told me that their methods of using the powers are also seasonal/govt. based. They would play the "bhaiya" card when Mulayam is in power and the "behanji" game when Mayawati is. And the way it works is that if you get into trouble (like a policemen catching you for something illegal) , you call a guy and then he calls another and if it is not resolved it is escalated to local mla etc and ultimately it would get done. Now look at the system we are developing , apart from the guy at the TOP , the MP's , MLA's , CM's , PM's , the whole chain is responsible , is not it? And where does it start from , from the very beginning of life that

I would go with Kapil on the solution side of things , I think educating folks and giving them opportunities would be the way to go.


If you repeat a lie 99 times it will become a truth the 100th time……Goebbels, perhaps.

If you repeat a truth even 100 times it will remain a truth without being any negative rhetoric.,....said by none other than me.

The problem will surface again and again unless it is addressed to in right earnest. It seems difficult to smother this sick reality by us the cyber savvy digital-haves by downloading economic graphs/statistics from the web-sites like Wikipedia or the Brettonwood institutions as the majority of the rural have-nots do not have access to the Internet tools. They see the problem from different prism and so do I, being a villageois. Baba Ramdev’s pronouncements to jump into the political fray vindicates the fact that desperation is there. I have already narrated a picture of my village and surrounding areas in reply to Samar's post. You must read. I am sure you will not be kidding if you go through all my posts. The incremental Naxal movement or insurgency is another testimony to the desperate situation in rural belts of India.


As I said in my earlier posts, development is an evolutionary process which keeps happening in all phases of time. Even now it is happening. But the pace has not been upto the mark. With whatever resources at our disposal, we could have achieved much more, if there was a sincere will, clean & corruption free politic/bureaucracy and proper planning If we are talking about benchmark, we at least could have kept pace with our Asian brothers, if not the West. The countries like Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia or China have better rural & urban infrastructure than us - some of them earning the nickname of Asian Tigers.

As far as solution is concerned, you have rightly quoted Braham “Rome was not built in a day”. Problem is there but not insurmountable. You have rightly suggested educating folks and giving them opportunities will go a long way. and for that we need quality educational institutions comparable to the ones available to the urban elites. (Matter again starts revolving around better infrastructure for rural folks) The illuminated and enlightened youth like you, and others will have to come out of their cyber rooms and share the responsibility by actively participating in the political process inculcating a sense of rebellion in the minds of gullible masses who seem to have reconciled to their destiny, lest the undercurrent of resentment among rural mass of people should be hijacked by any extremist ideology like Naxalism, which would be suicidal. Future belongs to them. The need is to speed up the pace of development at a much faster trajectory.

atamjeet78
March 23rd, 2010, 12:52 AM
A very good topic indeed and heading in the right direction. Most of the thread leads to digression and finger pointing.
As most of us still finding our roots in the rural India, I can understand how sensitive and emotional it could be to us when we see our brothers back in the villagesstill going thru the hardships of life which could have been eased their life with the proper utilization of technology and development.
Going thru the post of learned and educated members on this forum my conclusion is that there has been development in villages and technology has simplifed hardships like Dhood Bilona to Haal Bhanna with the use of electric madhani and tractors. But a lot can be done still.
Well blaming politicians or bueracrats for everything is not right either because they are also the part of same society they have not come from distant land like Britisher they are the people who get elected or selected among us. They are just the reflection of our society.
Lets say if today CM hooda calls a Tau from your village and ask him what he wants I am sure he will ask a government job either for his son or son-in-law. He wonts say our village needs cemented road or a secondry school or something for the welfare of whole village. Since we are selfship so are our politicians as they are one of us.
But how can we change this thinking.... I think its only answer is quality education teaching young ones of character building and recognising selfless leader like Bhagat Singh, Neetaji and Ram Prasad Bismil naming schools, roads and hospitals after there name than Rajiv Ghandi, Mulayam, Mayawati or Chautala.

vicky84
March 23rd, 2010, 02:59 PM
Going by revelations of Baba Ramdev, wealth worth billions of Rupees is stashed away by the corrupt politicians, industrialists and bureaucrats which is kept either in Swiss or Luxembourg banks or wasted in pleasurable activities. That money could be utilized in making better roads, hospitals, educational institutions and other welfare activities in the impoverished rural areas. Mayawat's garland is one example of ill-gotten money possessed by politicians in the name of Party Fund. I do not think there is dearth of money. Allocation of funds at the budgetary stage need to be revamped cutting down the infructuous non-plan expenditure. There is a need to curb the unwarranted, unfruitful and so frequent foreign jaunts by the bureaucrats and politicians which entails huge expenditure towards their stay in luxurious hotels, DA, and transport etc. Majority of them go abroad just for sight seeing, gambling in Casinos or visiting erotic massage parlours. There is hardly any output . Except for a few VVIP visits which are required by the protocol of reciprocity, most of such foreign tours can be stopped/banned altogether. All the deals can be negotiated by our foreign Missions abroad or by video conferencing. Similarly, back home we need to restrain our politicians and bureaucrats to indulge in extravagant activities involving heavy expenditures incurred on local tours, organising seminars and conference in 5-Star hotels dining and wining with rich and famous. All the corrupt bureaucrats found guilty of graft charges should be dismissed with summary/fast track trails and money so recovered should be put in development funds.

There are so many ways to generate and unearth sufficient funds for development. If that is not enough flood-gates for FDI need to be opened for tapping the huge potential in rural development. You mentioned about SEZ by Ambanis. I know it is proposed to be developed somewhere near Jhajjar which is not very far from Delhi. It will again increase population pressure in NCR creating in equilibrium already discussed. Ideally, its location should have been in a relatively more backward and far flung area like semi-desert areas of Bhiwani Mahendergarh or remote areas of Rajasthan like Churu District etc. giving these areas an opportunity to keep pace with the developing India. Of course by doing so the element of profit to Ambanis would have substantially decreased but their respect in the hearths of lakhs and lakhs of 'have nots' would have increased treating them as true patriots who want to be equal partners in the development of this country.



I am not saying that corruption does not play any role in negligence of rural areas. Yes it is endemic in India as well as in other developing countries like China. But we should also look at the other factors which impede the economic growth and main reason of evolution of corruption. Everyone knows that corruption is a root cause of all problems but emphasis has to be on curbing it. The corruption evolved in our system was due to bad practices, policies by the Government which left the country with a slow growth. And that would eventually lead a Government with insufficient funds. Yes if we can bring the stashed money back in home, our government would have sufficient in its reserve to support major projects. But we should still focus on our current economic reforms in order make our economy competitive and resilient. If we have to compete with some strong economies like China, our focus has to be on our economic reforms. I have already discussed about the liberalization of government business in my first post. The old Government policies were largely responsible for our creeping economic growth as well as for the corruption. The dismantling of old Government policies has brought the recent growth in our economy which started back in 1991. This dismantling of Government resistive policies has made it easier for businesses to grow, make their own decisions and has reduced the burden of regulations and bureaucratic inspection. That helped in reducing the corruption to some levels and also provided people with best services. Imagine if only BSNL holds the rights to distribute the mobile SIMS in Haryana. How painful it would be for a customer to get a mobile SIM card. The world class service of Delhi Metro is another example of private involvement in a Government Project. Imagine the services people would have availed if that project was carried out by Delhi Government. First Government had not enough money to support it. Second, if the Government had enough money to support it, was it possible for the Government to finish it on time and providing the best services to the people. The answer is no. The above lines are in response to your question: “Even after 62 years of independence, why the pace of development is so slow and lop-sided?”

In order to provide more growth in rural areas, our industrial economy should be able to pull more people from agriculture. And emphasis should be on non- farm activities. I believe urbanization creates more opportunity for rural growth. As more and more people will be employed in industrial economy, the purchasing power of people will increase .That will increase more demand in retail sector. I think, the rural economy should not longer be limited to the agriculture. Opportunities in non- farm activities are other side of rural development. The urban development can lead to rural non -farm activities. More urban development would lead into more demands in food, housing, health, transport, education, clothing footwear, consumer durables etc.

Coming back to Sez and its locations, the concept of Sez introduced in our country was to boost the economy by attracting FDI. That would allow more companies to invest in the country and would generate capital flows in the country. As I have mentioned in my last post, Sez is essentially a way to introduce new rules favourable for business in specially designated areas but not a country as a whole. I think Jhajjar is still a better place for Sez rather than far flung areas in Rajesthan. As Jhajjar is more close to major industrial locations like New Delhi and Gurgaon, companies would find it easy in doing business rather than in remote areas. In order to attract FDI, Sez should be at place where companies find it more profitable and comfortable to operate. Sez is not supposed to place anywhere in the country. Location must be very ideal for businesses like near coastal regions where companies can easily export and import their goods. In India, some of the approved Sez are not able to attract the FDI, because their location is not well suited for business. The semi desert areas are more suited for educational institutes, Government offices, etc. Again it depends upon a state Government to attract more business in a state by slashing taxes, easy to do business condition, simple incorporation, simple labor laws etc. This topic is too broad to discuss as it involves lot of factors like responsibilities, policies, economic reforms by a Government .

narwaldeepak
March 23rd, 2010, 04:43 PM
I am sure a man who joins the discussion at this stage will not be able to put the thoughts very clearly .Still i would relay some info thru a glance over expert comments posted here.
Rural India is under developed . This should not be a topic for debate neither should it fetch the differences in thoughts. I feel the narrators here are all in same state of contemplations , the difference is the expression. It’s so simple to say India is not yet developed ( Be it Rural or urban ) . I can Conclude things in three lines
Cause : laid up plans , even worse execution of these , worst resource handling and corrupt system.
Effect : 20 years lag back, compared to developed nations , India : still an ignored entity at international stage.
Cure : An utopian system of governance which is next to impossible.

anilsinghd
March 23rd, 2010, 05:11 PM
If you repeat a truth even 100 times it will remain a truth without being any negative rhetoric.,....said by none other than me.

Let's try and re-iterate this with a cricket match context ( don't thrash me for being non-serious about this , i am very serious on this). First ball of the match and you drop a catch. 3rd over of the match you drop another one , cometh the 15th over , you have dropped 5 catches let's say. What would you do for the remaining part of the match ? Cribb over your dropped chances? Keep repenting on your dropped chances , on how the fielder did not manage to get under the ball , focus on it and blah blah? Yes, if their is flaw with the technique , that needs to be noted and worked on.
Now I work with two assumptions here , one , you know cricket. Two , I thought that each one of us have discussed/thought about Development and if you want to be more specific the rural development in detail at some point of time. Not sure about you , but can bet some money on other folks , at least myself have done that. This is not to say that the topic is irrelevant. Topic for sure is important but what I would be interested in would be either to view the problem in an innovative way or to focus on solutions. Who denies the inherent corrruption in our system? Who denies that the situation of roads could have been better? Who denies that the number of poor people in India should be much less that what we have?
You might believe in the "understanding the problem" first before thinking/proposing a solution , I also do ( recall that Einstein quote of if given an hour to solve a problem , he would spend 55 minutes on understanding the problem , or something similar!). But a topic like this is something that is discussed in every other conversation , be it with friends in college , with folks at office , or with people on internet portals. My whole point of categorising the repeated rhetoric as negative was to try and look for a different treatment to the topic. One must also keep in mind that start is important , also any start must factor in the available resources , and any start must be based on "realistic" assumptions.



The problem will surface again and again unless it is addressed to in right earnest.

No , the problem will not surface again and again. Since we are not solving the problem in the immedaite future , its a continous problem (in reality , in the virtual spaces of mind , yes it can resurface if one has a short memory), the solution ( any solution for that matter) is not a time bound solution , you cannot say with surity if we can solve all the problems addressed in the coming 5 , 10 , 15 , 20 years. Infact , as I said in my initial post , you will have to construct a benchmark first to compare the initial conditions against and then compare any performance improvements.

It seems difficult to smother this sick reality by us the cyber savvy digital-haves by downloading economic graphs/statistics from the web-sites like Wikipedia or the Brettonwood institutions as the majority of the rural have-nots do not have access to the Internet tools. They see the problem from different prism and so do I, being a villageois.

I find that surprising in a negative way. On one hand we agree that we want to modernise and educate folks and also give them the tools of analysis and on the other you are trying to deny the power of such tools and analysis techniques. I am not trying to play down anything here. I am also not trying to run away from the problem. What I am trying to give is a quantitative assessment of what has "happened". Qualitative assessment is good but is not something you can benchmark your performance/results against. Ultimately whichever solution path you embark upon you will have to set some quantitative milestones. Again i find an iota of revolving/stuck around the problem here rather than looking ahead and tackle the solution kind of attitude. Let's be practical and realistic than be emotional about things.

Baba Ramdev’s pronouncements to jump into the political fray vindicates the fact that desperation is there.

I do not understand the logic behing this statement. If all the "babas" jump into politics would that imply that we are on brink of default?

I have already narrated a picture of my village and surrounding areas in reply to Samar's post. You must read.

Yes , I had read that earlier as well.


The incremental Naxal movement or insurgency is another testimony to the desperate situation in rural belts of India.


Again something that I would say you just planted in to support your arguement(typical attitude to try and divert the attention to uncounsciously strengthen one's arguement) , I can remember that you started the thread by trying to focus on the northern belt of UP , Raj , Haryana , MP , guess naxals are not much problematic in these areas.


As I said in my earlier posts, development is an evolutionary process which keeps happening in all phases of time. Even now it is happening. But the pace has not been upto the mark. With whatever resources at our disposal, we could have achieved much more, if there was a sincere will, clean & corruption free politic/bureaucracy and proper planning If we are talking about benchmark, we at least could have kept pace with our Asian brothers, if not the West. The countries like Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia or China have better rural & urban infrastructure than us - some of them earning the nickname of Asian Tigers.

If I really have to be counter to you , I would say can you come up with what we could have achieved if you would not have all these deficiencies as you mention. Do you strictly believe that a corruption free India would have its villages having the most modern amenities by now? I particularly do not like comparisons with the countries you mention or for that matter any other countries , you have to factor in the initial conditions , social and cultural context before trying to do a comparison.



As far as solution is concerned, you have rightly quoted Braham “Rome was not built in a day”. Problem is there but not insurmountable. You have rightly suggested educating folks and giving them opportunities will go a long way. and for that we need quality educational institutions comparable to the ones available to the urban elites. (Matter again starts revolving around better infrastructure for rural folks) The illuminated and enlightened youth like you, and others will have to come out of their cyber rooms and share the responsibility by actively participating in the political process inculcating a sense of rebellion in the minds of gullible masses who seem to have reconciled to their destiny, lest the undercurrent of resentment among rural mass of people should be hijacked by any extremist ideology like Naxalism, which would be suicidal. Future belongs to them. The need is to speed up the pace of development at a much faster trajectory.

Can you really come out with bullet points which are realistic and practical rather than suggesting qualitative measures? I mean the "how's" of solution?


Let us try to be constructive. Bottom line we all realise that there is a long way to go before we can have all the folks of India to have all the facilities and really call ourselves as developed. There is no denying the issues that are at hand. As i think more and more on this and related topics , I also get a feeling that it might be that people really do not deserve this at the moment.
How about this quote:
“It isn't that they can't see the solution. It's that they can't see the problem. (http://thinkexist.com/quotation/it_isn-t_that_they_can-t_see_the_solution-it-s/207391.html)”

As I also said in my previous post , people do seem to have different priorities than nation building at the moment, Me , you and others , we all seem to focus on things that have nothing to do with development of the country. If i have to give an example , I would say if I stand in the next parliamentary election ( to my credentials I am young , I have a post graduate degree from a premier institute, 7 years(at the time of next elections) of industry experience that includes management / technology / engineering work , international exposure , a sound head on my shoulders (Brahm might want to disagree ;)) , would that ensure that I get a win against a candidate that has tainted image , is old , has not done anything for the constituency (per you or some of the educated folks here)?

A Holistic approach is put into the garbage bin(I can vividly remmber how Brahm thrashed this term of mine in the reservation context ;), no starting the same fun again please). I would say let the problem mature , let people really feel the pinch. Ofcourse if one wants to start , he/she is most welcome. But as you also said , sitting in the cosy rooms and punching keypads is not taking us anywhere and so is the repeating of the issues.

singhvp
March 23rd, 2010, 09:07 PM
Very mature of you Anil. I really appreciate your analysis. I would like to sincerely clarify that there is absolutely no conscious effort to be self-righteous in my approach. Well it was just my understanding which may not be correct and should be subjected to critical analysis. Floor is all yours to offer your critical comments. Both of your posts are very valuable and thoughtful and I really admire your analytical strength and intellect. Please keep sending your views. Thanks. However, I owe an explanation to you on certain points of divergence with you and it will be forthcoming in due course.

VirJ
March 24th, 2010, 11:29 AM
Excuse my ignorace but before I post my reply here I wanted you to please clarify what do you mean by the term "developed"

Better economy (against which bench mark), Better roads, Better Literacy rate or having pubs, cafes?

So when we say under-development I guess you are refering to/comparing to a particular area against western standard in all measures?

My teacher used to say development should be focused primarily on humans not roads if humans are developed they will develop their country automatically sooner or later. Even if govt develop roads but fail to develop their country man than that wont be a real development( of course against certain western standards it may be). He said an intelligent guy with no money is poor but one who has money but nothing else is poorer.

And developement is a relative term. We are more developed than our ancestors but compared to Western people we are "less developed". To survive we have to develop faster than others.

Focus should be on people ? How can they be developed? One way is education may be but a practical education not the old "old, gold, classy 'jack and jill type' ".

Rest Ummmmmmmm------ Later

Regards,
_

singhvp
March 24th, 2010, 01:44 PM
To all distinguished participants, viewers and would be participants.

Let us give a little twist to the topic and expand it further to include the whole gamut of developmental issues concerning the entire rural India and the 'Grey areas' of cities as well (satellite townships, slums around). Now, without going deep into the historical background and without getting deeply involved I would like to have some leisurely moments and would like to be enlightened by the distinguished viewers - which include a galaxy of intellectuals/intellentia, IT & Management Gurus and Academics - as to whether they are satisfied with the present level/trajectory of development in rural areas and the slums around the cities referred above as 'Grey areas' . If not, what are the steps they would like to suggest to ameliorate the situation in our countryside as well as the satellite townships (Grey areas) ? Whether people's aspirations to develop their areas at par with the developed countries are legitimate?. If yes what should be our (we the people) role in the whole process?

So far, I have been at the receiving end. Now it is my turn to turn the tables. With this I conclude the question/answer session and will wait for your valuable comments only, not making me a respondent essentially.

cooljat
March 24th, 2010, 05:35 PM
I think Vipin got a valid point here and its quite practical too, focus should be on developing and educating rural people. But question is how to educate them for better tomorrow, when they are reluctant for change?

@VPSingh: Thanks a lot sir for sucha enlightening and thought provoking thread. Haven't gone thro' whole of thread yet, just did some skimming as of now but I'll surely read it in spare time and add my two cents.

Cheers
Jit






My teacher used to say development should be focused primarily on humans not roads if humans are developed they will develop their country automatically sooner or later. Even if govt develop roads but fail to develop their country man than that wont be a real development( of course against certain western standards it may be). He said an intelligent guy with no money is poor but one who has money but nothing else is poorer.

And developement is a relative term. We are more developed than our ancestors but compared to Western people we are "less developed". To survive we have to develop faster than others.

Focus should be on people ? How can they be developed? One way is education may be but a practical education not the old "old, gold, classy 'jack and jill type' ".

Rest Ummmmmmmm------ Later

Regards,
_

singhvp
March 25th, 2010, 07:32 PM
Excuse my ignorace but before I post my reply here I wanted you to please clarify what do you mean by the term "developed"

Better economy (against which bench mark), Better roads, Better Literacy rate or having pubs, cafes?

So when we say under-development I guess you are refering to/comparing to a particular area against western standard in all measures?

My teacher used to say development should be focused primarily on humans not roads if humans are developed they will develop their country automatically sooner or later. Even if govt develop roads but fail to develop their country man than that wont be a real development( of course against certain western standards it may be). He said an intelligent guy with no money is poor but one who has money but nothing else is poorer.

And developement is a relative term. We are more developed than our ancestors but compared to Western people we are "less developed". To survive we have to develop faster than others.

Focus should be on people ? How can they be developed? One way is education may be but a practical education not the old "old, gold, classy 'jack and jill type' ".

Rest Ummmmmmmm------ Later

Regards,
_

You have already defined "development" as did I in one of my previous post.

Better Economy: Let us not fix any benchmark as everything cannot be explained with mathemetical exactitude. There is, however, no harm in emulating the planning and designs of rural areas of West and the other developed parts of the planet. But to achieve that level is a far cry for us. Incidentally, I have to mention that after having travelled to about 30-32 odd countries I have a pretty fair idea of benchmarks for rural development. So please let us forget the benchmarks. Basic facilities, which will continue to be the ubiquitous part of my discussion on this subject, viz. quality education, better roads, a primary health centre, telephone and internet connection, street light, proper drainage/sewerage system etc. are the primary duties of a welfare state and there is no need of any benchmark to make these available and I would reiterate that I do not buy any argument about paucity of funds with the governments that be.

I agree with the teachings of your ideal teacher but unless our children get an opportunity of equality by way of quality education how will they develop themselves. If not, the society cannot get "automatically developed" as cherished by the respected Guru ji.

Due to poor educational standards in government owned schools in comparison to commercially oriented private institutions, our children are lagging far behind. I know here you may quote a few exceptions who could make it to IITs, IIM, Oxford, Harward or Princeton, but the ratio/percentage is negligible.

I agree to a great extent that education is the most important tool to enable people to raise the level of development of the areas they live in. But the sad part is that many of us tend to turn a blind eye to our roots the moment we make it to Gurgaon, Bangalore, Noida - not to speak of Melbourne, Sydney, NY or Toronto, Calgary, Ontario or London where they get metamorphed into westernized icons of modernity caring little about their siblings.

If your posts are to be an indication, you seem to be a very bight financier and an intelligent person with a reasonably high degree of IQ. I presume, you do not need any further explanation. Please do keep offering your thoughtful comments to enlighten all of us.

PS: It is characteristic of us, the Jats (I include myself) to play anti-hero and being antagonistic inspite of being in agreement in our heart of hearts on any topic of discussion to outsmart each other. Please do not feel offended.

VirJ
March 26th, 2010, 05:40 AM
You have already defined "development" as did I in one of my previous post.
Better Economy: Let us not fix any benchmark as everything cannot be explained with mathemetical exactitude.
PS: It is characteristic of us, the Jats (I include myself) to play anti-hero and being antagonistic inspite of being in agreement in our heart of hearts on any topic of discussion to outsmart each other. Please do not feel offended.


I thought you wont take active part in this thread again !! An Intellect like you can't and shouldn't sit back on the cosy couch:D

Mr Singh.
If you go through my posts ( I assume u have already been as claimed by you twice though many of them were not worth reading.) you can see that I never tried to outsmart others. On contrary I always ask expert's opinion. But If I believe /support something I might have 1000 arguments to back that. If I come up with that thats not out smarting others thats called "holding your ground". See you cant be an expert in all fields and you cant be always right. I never get offended by agruments. I also dont cut copy and paste from other sources. I write what I believe and you or someone else doesnt have to agree with that, I welcome that. I am not testing anyone's knowledge. Questions popped up in my mind and i throw them out. Chinease say a person who ask question might be fool once but one who don’t might be fool forever.
I dont have such ideal guruji. "My teacher used to say" ummmm ---------we just say it-----ummmmmmmm
Anyway coming back to the topic You say lets not fix any benchmark?? You have already set the standards as indicated in your earlier posts. The western standards. In economics you have to set benchmarks. I just asked whats your benchmark. Without benchmark we cant compare and the present state might be the ideal state.

If you read my post again, I said development is a relative term.


Basic facilities, which will continue to be the ubiquitous part of my discussion on this subject, viz. quality education, better roads, a primary health centre, telephone and internet connection, street light, proper drainage/sewerage system etc. are the primary duties of a welfare state and there is no need of any benchmark to make these available and I would reiterate that I do not buy any argument about paucity of funds with the governments that be..

These were not basic facilities a century before.:D. Telephone, internet was a luxary few yeras before. I believe they are still for many.

These might be basic facilities in your "ideal countries" but what is basic in one country can be a luxary in other.

However quality education, better roads, a primary health centre, drainage/sewerage system are the responcibility of the state in today's world or one can say in today's democracy and many Govt try to achieve this with the help of private sector but what I wanted to say is that not everything can be left to the Govt. And by focus should be on " humans not roads". What I mean is develop/educate the humans. You don’t have to go to IIT to be educated. An "education" can be provided by parents as well. In fact it should start from parents. In my dictionary there is a difference between education and literate and a professional. But if your are literate than its easier to be educated or should I say an educated person would thrive to get literate.

Once educated and literate this person would demand better roads better healthcare and better internet like you and would force the Govt to work on these areas, would quesiton the Govt how they are spending the money, would see the big picture that country is our home. But if 70 % of the people don’t demand these " basic needs" Govt wont care because its 'democracy'. They wont listen to the 30% like you.

Roads and infrastructure are a means to get more developed but first there should be people who can take advantage of these infrastructure otherwise these wont have lot of advantage and being more developed doesn’t necessarily mean more money. Money is a mean not an end.

In a perfect world and in a perfect country of that world Govt would provide all the " basic necessities" as mentioned by you and because of this people raise their living standards and everyone is happy.

Economics: There are lot of vicious circles in economics. Vicious circle of poverty is one of them.



Now poverty and corruption are also linked somehow but corruption also depends on a lot of thing.
1. Culture may be but I think after some time corruption become culture.

This theory might go hand in hand with Samar ( Post #71 and earlier)

Now how to break this bundliya circle. There are lot of theories. What I said above is my theory, what you said is your theory. But what I said is what I believe today and your counter arguments might change my views. No one is right or wrong but both arguments have their own merits and that’s the beauty and confusion :D
This is just my theory probably not written anywhere before and hence will attract lot of criticism and I welcome that.
My teacher used to say:) " India is a rich country inhabited by the poor".
Lot can be written but have to go.

Samarkadian
March 26th, 2010, 10:45 AM
Lets not touch the 'ego-epidemic' button here. Though we can always choose to out-intellect each other through e-mails.

An entry at web from wiki source states about development :-

Economic development' or 'development' is a term that economists, politicians, and others have used frequently in the 20th century. The concept, however, has been in existence in the West for centuries. Modernization, Westernization, and especially Industrialization are other terms people have used when discussing economic development. Although no one is sure when the concept originated, most people agree that development is closely bound up with the evolution of capitalism and the demise of feudalism.

Also note ;

Economic development refers to social and technological progress. It implies a change in the way goods and services are produced, not merely an increase in production achieved using the old methods of production on a wider scale. Economic growth implies only an increase in quantitative output; it may or may not involve development. Economic growth is often measured by rate of change of gross domestic product (eg., percent GDP increase per year.) Gross domestic product is the aggregate value-added by the economic activity within a country's borders.

Economic development typically involves improvements in a variety of indicators such as literacy rates, life expectancy, and poverty rates. GDP does not take into account important aspects such as leisure time, environmental quality, freedom, or social justice; alternative measures of economic wellbeing have been proposed.

A country's economic development is related to its human development, which encompasses, among other things, health and education.


Further , to define 'Development' or to know and understand comprehensively what is 'underdevelopment' , there is a wonderful and awarded work by an Indian author names P. Sainath- [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P._Sainath] . It is available as a book titled - Everybody Loves a Good Draught . It is the stastical, social and economical study of Poorest districts in our country. Anyone with an interest in social development, underdevelopment and true development , must have patience to purchase this work and go through it. It covers the vital and critical topics like :-

#Healthcare

#Education

#Displacement

#Survival strategies

#Water

#Crime

#Media

I am sure that after reading this book you would be engendered as a different person altogether.

VirJ
March 26th, 2010, 11:02 AM
No One is touching the 'ego-epidemic' button here. A healthy argument/debate is not out-smarting. I guess we all are mature enough to know that people will have different views, different thinking and hence different approach.

We all have probably already read these defination earlier but understanding may be different. There is no one size fit all approach. I guess you have read the book. Rather than quoting the name of it Why dont you put the key points here which might help others :D

anilsinghd
March 27th, 2010, 01:16 AM
I am sure that after reading this book you would be engendered as a different person altogether.

E-copy bitte?

singhvp
March 27th, 2010, 07:38 AM
E-copy bitte?

E-copy would be worth I think. Excerpts are not out of context and will really help many in refining their understanding about development. Good work by Samar. I would expect him to keep us updating in similar fashion.

singhvp
March 27th, 2010, 08:29 AM
As mentioned in my post No. 81, I owe an explanation to Shri Anil S Dalal which I submit as under, though belated. Excuse me for that.

Situation in Palam Colony(Anil’s Post No. 73): I think faster speed of transformation could be attributed to its proximity to the airport and Delhi itself and to some extent Dwarka as well.

Baba Ramdev’s jumping into politics(Anil’s Post No. 80): It was not my main supporting argument. A peripheral argument but cannot be dismissed as irrelevant. There are definitely some maladies which provide a fertile ground to all the “Babas” to spread their tantrums among the innocent people. In my opinion, main plank of Baba Ramdev is corruption and developmental maladies which has given him an alibi to offer his heeling techniques. Individually, I do not endorse major part of his manifesto. but his fiery discourses appeal many beyond imagination for obvious reasons. We cannot negate the truth in spite of our disliking.

Incremental Naxalism(Anil’s post No. 80): Your observation is correct to some extent. My original post talks about rural development in India with specific emphasis on Jat dominated areas. After some very valid reactions from some members, including yourself, I have expanded the area of discussion to entire India including suburbs of cities which are suffering from the same ailment. You may now refer to my post No. 83.

Suo Moto: I do not proclaim to be a versatile writer and do not rule out any crudity in my analysis which may be subjected to ruthless criticism as I know healthy criticism can come only from good friends, siblings or well-wishers which always helps in fine-tuning our approach. I would be the last person to hesitate in offering apologies for any offensive remarks which could be prejudicial to anyone’s self-respect and dignity.

PS: I also owe explanations to some other esteemed friends especially, Shri Atish Mohan ji (I read all your posts carefully). I hope they would forgive me for not being able to reply some of their posts or the delayed replies as I also remain consumed like you with usual duties and hardly find sufficient time. But I value all the posts equally. Will revert in due course.

Samarkadian
March 27th, 2010, 11:17 AM
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We all have probably already read these defination earlier but understanding may be different. There is no one size fit all approach. I guess you have read the book. Rather than quoting the name of it Why dont you put the key points here which might help others :D

Okay, will do a bit of baby sitting as you have asked. I 've stolen excerpts from online sources AS I can't type the book here.

We have this point of 62 years of Independence. P. Sainath divides it in to pre and post reform era and quotes about poverty :-

The average monthly per capita expenditure (MPCE) of the Indian farm household is a long way from Rs.15 lakh. And further from $115,000. It is, in fact, Rs.503. Not far above the rural poverty line. And that’s a national average, mixing both giant landlords and tiny landholders. It also includes States like Kerala where the average is nearly twice the national one. Remove Kerala and Punjab and the figure gets still more dismal. Of course, inequality is rife in urban India too. And growing. But the contrasts get more glaring when you look at rural India.

About 60 per cent of that Rs.503 is spent on food. Another 18 per cent on fuel, clothing, and footwear. Of the pathetic sum left over, the household spends on health twice what it does on education. That is Rs.34 and Rs.17. It seems unlikely that buying unique cellphone numbers is set to emerge a major hobby amongst rural Indians. There are countless households for whom that figure is not Rs.503, but Rs.225. There are whole States whose average falls below the poverty line. As for the landless, their hardships are appalling.

It is not that inequality is new or unknown to us. What makes the last 15 years different is the ruthlessness with which it has been engineered. The cynicism with which it has been constructed. And the scale on which it now exists. And that’s at all levels, even at the top. As Abhijit Banerjee and Thomas Piketty put it in a paper on “Top Indian Incomes 1956-2000,” “The rich (the top 1 per cent) substantially increased their share of total income [in the reform years]. However,
while in the 1980s the gains were shared by everyone in the top percentile, in the 1990s it was only those in the top 0.1 per cent who made big gains.”

“The average top 0.01 per cent income was about 150-200 times larger than the average income of the entire population during the 1950s. This went down to less than 50 times as large by the early 1980s. But went back to being 150-200 times larger during the late 1990s.” All the evidence suggests it has gotten worse since then


Further on your favourtite fourth piller of democracy,media, he says under the chapter - From ''Mass Media'' to ''Mass Reality '' :-




•"By official estimates, over one lakh farmers have taken their lives in the last 10 years. Not a single person has been punished for it. There have been lots of relief packages, but more packaging than relief. What sort of human beings and reporters would we be to stay silent, throw in the towel?"


•"As for the media, there is a great and urgent need for introspection. The failure of journalism was far more predictable than the poll results. For years now, the media have stopped talking to ordinary people. How on earth can they tell their readers and viewers what is going on? There are 400-plus journalists to cover Lakme India Fashion Week. Almost none to cover the agricultural crisis in any informed way. The labour and agriculture beats in newspapers are almost extinct. The media have decided that 70 per cent of the population does not make news. The electorate has decided otherwise."


•"Embedded journalism is a state of the mind. You don’t have to be travelling with an army to be an embedded journalist. Between 1965 and 1975, there were 5,000 American journalists in Saigon, and they still didn’t get the story right. Not one of these unembedded guys managed to tell the true story of the Gulf of Tonkin Incident for about a decade. So ‘embeddedness’ is a state of mind, you can sit right next to your PC in your office in Oklahoma or wherever and be an embedded journalist.... that it is possible to have the world’s largest media and the world’s least informed public.


•"In war, the hypocrisy of media sometimes stands naked, so we are all ready to condemn and criticize. However, the same media does that and much worse during peace as well. It does so when it covers the WTO, when it covers the disputes over economics, when it covers markets and market fundamentalism and neoliberal ideologies, when it covers so-called “success stories."


•"...however much I might support... alternative media experiments, I am not willing to give up my space in the mainstream media. I think that has got to be liberated from the embedded hierarchies of neocolonialism. And to liberate the media from the embedded structures of the global conglomerates, we need public action. We need to assert that public space has to be respected in the private fora, we need to assert that public interest must prevail over private profit, I think we have to recover the public space that the conglomerates have taken over in the media. If you cannot stop the march of monopoly, you will find it very difficult to liberate yourself from embedded propaganda."


•"...I can't be speaking in the voice of the masses, the people have their own voice. What I can do is talk to peasants and workers and let you know what those conversations are like, and ask if you want to listen. I'm looking at the human condition in this society and telling it the way I see it."

Further reading which were in PDF and can't be copy pasted :-

http://www.scribd.com/doc/5491296/On-PSainath Good debate about Rural India

http://www.arvindguptatoys.com/arvindgupta/womenonwheels.pdf - About Women in Rural India

'
'
'

E-copy bitte?

Often , I find my self medicaly unfit to understand what are you conveying , the gargantum-mathematical-giant. My left-brain is dwarfed congenitaly. Pardon me for my morbid ignorance.

anilsinghd
March 28th, 2010, 12:33 AM
.

Often , I find my self medicaly unfit to understand what are you conveying , the gargantum-mathematical-giant. My left-brain is dwarfed congenitaly. Pardon me for my morbid ignorance.

Can i have an e-copy , i mean a pdf or whatever of the book? Can I buy it online for that matter?

"bitte" is please in german , thought you would get that, my bad!

yudhvirmor
March 28th, 2010, 06:00 PM
4-5 years ago I read India Unbound of Gurcharan Das. He also writes editorial article for TOI for sunday edition. I also went through some posts on this thread and I found some common things that most of the members agreed on:

There is a growth in rural areas. Living standard, access to education, technology, health care, water resources has improved considerably. However, When we compare with other countries who got independence in 40's, our growth is quite average. one of the reason may be because of India's sheer size, Alignment with USSR and snail pace due to congress policies.

Majority of us are saying that more need to done in terms of all the areas mentioned above. I think we are solving today's problems with yesterday's approach. 70% of our population is still in villages and they are contributing hardly 20% to the country's GDP. There is massive shortage of skill labor and lots of hidden unemployment. These things needs to addressed to move forward and add masses to nation's growth.
I would like to highlight the priorities:
1. Education : it needs complete overhaul, education staff, more interactive teaching methods and improved infrastructure.
2. Health Care: Need to build AIIMS like medical institutes at district level, train more doctors, educate people on personal hygiene. Average life expectancy in our country is still below 70.
3. Electricity: This may be major challenge because majority of the villagers don't pay for electricity and majority of their appliances are not energy efficient. I saw some positive steps taken by Haryana govt by privatizing electricity distribution. Concept of community fodder machines (Gandasa) and flour machines(Chaki) needs to be introduced.
4. Hidden unemployment: I like one thing about Gandhi. He understood the importance of Small scale industries. We need to emphasize on it again, there is massive scope in this field. It can help people to increase their income and spend that money on better health care and education for their wards.
5. Roads: In Haryana and Punjab, Govt has improved the local access roads to connect all villages but this has to be done in other states.

narwaldeepak
April 3rd, 2010, 05:24 PM
4-5 years ago I read India Unbound of Gurcharan Das. He also writes editorial article for TOI for sunday edition. I also went through some posts on this thread and I found some common things that most of the members agreed on:

There is a growth in rural areas. Living standard, access to education, technology, health care, water resources has improved considerably. However, When we compare with other countries who got independence in 40's, our growth is quite average. one of the reason may be because of India's sheer size, Alignment with USSR and snail pace due to congress policies.

Majority of us are saying that more need to done in terms of all the areas mentioned above. I think we are solving today's problems with yesterday's approach. 70% of our population is still in villages and they are contributing hardly 20% to the country's GDP. There is massive shortage of skill labor and lots of hidden unemployment. These things needs to addressed to move forward and add masses to nation's growth.
I would like to highlight the priorities:
1. Education : it needs complete overhaul, education staff, more interactive teaching methods and improved infrastructure.
2. Health Care: Need to build AIIMS like medical institutes at district level, train more doctors, educate people on personal hygiene. Average life expectancy in our country is still below 70.
3. Electricity: This may be major challenge because majority of the villagers don't pay for electricity and majority of their appliances are not energy efficient. I saw some positive steps taken by Haryana govt by privatizing electricity distribution. Concept of community fodder machines (Gandasa) and flour machines(Chaki) needs to be introduced.
4. Hidden unemployment: I like one thing about Gandhi. He understood the importance of Small scale industries. We need to emphasize on it again, there is massive scope in this field. It can help people to increase their income and spend that money on better health care and education for their wards.
5. Roads: In Haryana and Punjab, Govt has improved the local access roads to connect all villages but this has to be done in other states.

i found this v vcool !!! right said sir

singhvp
April 14th, 2010, 11:20 AM
In reply to Yudhvir's post

A good analysis by Yudhvir. All the suggestions are very much valid. In his Book Gurcharan Das has also emphasized the spread of education as well as industrialization.

The following excerpts from this former Proctor & Gamble CEO turned journalist, seem to be underlining the importance of education as an important step towards raising the level of development in India, especially rural areas at a faster speed.

“Although Indians gloss over it, the British Raj was the most important event in the making of modern India--for better and for worse. Britain gave us democracy, the rule of law, an independent judiciary, and a free press. It built railways, canals, and harbors, but it could not bring about an industrial revolution. It could not raise economic growth or lift the people out of poverty. It could not avert famines. The truth is that the Raj was economically incompetent. It just did not know how to "develop" a country. Had it known it, Britain could have gained much from having a larger market for its manufactures. It introduced modern education and helped create a small middle class, but it did not educate the mass of the people. This was its other failure and linked to the first, for development is not possible without mass literacy”.

rkumar
May 19th, 2010, 05:26 PM
Dear Friends,

I am starting a new thread on rural development. Rural India constitutes about 70% of Indian population. However, hardly 10-20 resources are spent in rural area. Problems of rural India are many. Rural India hardly finds any mention in National news media except for Khap, Gotra and honour killings like issues. There is hardly any govenment machinery present in villages. DM rarely visits a village. Anyone who has some money, wants to leave village and build a house in nearby town. Village is no more a self sufficient economic unit. Scope of the topic is really very large. Let me put some of the issues and how these can be addressed;

1. Rural Education: There is hardly any investment in rural education. Teachers don't attent their duties. There is nothing a library in a village school. There is nothing like a science lab in a village school. Forget about comupter lab, its too high tech for most of the teachers in rural India. What is the solution?

2. Rural Hygene: What are we talking? Has anyone really bothered that villages also require clean streets. Is there any village in India where street cleaneres are employed by Village Panchayats? Most of the village "Johads" are filled up and water overflows in streets during rain. Anyone who cares?

3. Rural Health: There is no public health facility in majority of Indian villages. No doctor wants to establish his clinic in village as there is no electricity, there is no law and order machinary...nothing for his way of life. Who is going to address this? Its not on the agenda of any government.

4. Agriculture: Agriculture is the main livelyhood of people. Has there been any change in our methods of agriculture in last 50 years other than the better seeds and fertilisers? How outdated is our irrigation system? Do our farmers have resources for modern methods of agriculture ? Are our farmers free to sell their produce anywhere in India? Do they have the means to market their produce? Has anyone in any government bothered to pay enough attention to these problems in timely manner?

There are loads of issues I can go on. From time to time I raised to issues with authorities along with simple solutions. It does not excite anyone to address these problems. Its not glamourous to work in rural India. Can one talk of developed India when 70% of India living in villages remain neglected ?

RK^2

brahmtewatia
May 19th, 2010, 05:44 PM
RK sir, we had a very nice discussion on a recently concluded thread on the same subject.

please have a look here >>> http://www.jatland.com/forums/showthread.php?29621-Rural-under-development-An-analysis

rkumar
May 19th, 2010, 05:56 PM
RK sir, we had a very nice discussion on a recently concluded thread on the same subject.

please have a look here >>> http://www.jatland.com/forums/showthread.php?29621-Rural-under-development-An-analysis

Thanks. I missed the thread. Let me go through that thread and will contibute my thoughts there. May be administrators can shift my post over there.

RK^2

rkumar
May 19th, 2010, 06:14 PM
........I would say let the problem mature , let people really feel the pinch. Ofcourse if one wants to start , he/she is most welcome. But as you also said , sitting in the cosy rooms and punching keypads is not taking us anywhere and so is the repeating of the issues.

Point well taken. People solve their individual problems when they feel the pinch. In my view popel are trying their best in villages to solve their problems at individual level. However, in moden world, more and more problems are falling outside individual's capabilities. Individual farmer can grow the crop but has no means to market it. Government machinery tends to take sides of mill owners and not the farmers. Village resources are not enough to solve higher education, electricity and other issues which can stop rural migration or attract professionals like doctors to villages. Village Panchayats don't have resources or powers to solve such issues.

RK^2

VirJ
May 19th, 2010, 06:24 PM
Dear Friends,


There are loads of issues I can go on. From time to time I raised to issues with authorities along with simple solutions. It does not excite anyone to address these problems. Its not glamourous to work in rural India. Can one talk of developed India when 70% of India living in villages remain neglected ?

RK^2

You seems to be well experienced/have good grasp in all fields. Have read bit of ur blogs. Also looks like u are doing social service as well. Could u please share what simple solutions u provided to authorities?

rkumar
May 19th, 2010, 06:50 PM
[B][U]............. but it could not bring about an industrial revolution. It could not raise economic growth or lift the people out of poverty. It could not avert famines. The truth is that the Raj was economically incompetent. It just did not know how to "develop" a country. Had it known it, Britain could have gained much from having a larger market for its manufactures. It introduced modern education and helped create a small middle class, but it did not educate the mass of the people. This was its other failure and linked to the first, for development is not possible without mass literacy”.

Aim of Britain was not to bring industrial revolution in India. Had that been the aim, surely they could have done it. Problem is that even in independent India our villages are not devoloping the way they should have been. Living environment is not good enough to attract professionals who can serve the population. Villagers alone can not do it unless government addresses the issue as a nation building mission. Priorities of government are misplaced. I can agree about spending money on national defence, but find it ridiculous when 1000s of crores are spent on Common Wealth games and Ambedkar Parks etc. and neglecting basic facilities in villages. Its government's job to create the conditions for the development. People alone can not do it. I find no logic when government is trying to build new universities and neglecting the existing ones. Let me give few examples. In New Delhi they have tow of the largest hospitals facing each other across a road (Safdarjang and AIIMS). Initially AIIMS was supposed to have only teaching component and Safdarjang only the hospital component. However, with time it all changed. Was it not a faulty planning? Same goes on even today. On the one hand we build facilities which are doomed from day one and on the other hand we having nothing. There are talks of building AIIMS in different parts of country. Think of a AIIMS in Haryana. What will happen? I can tell you with all cerainty that most of the doctors from PGIMS Rohtak will leave and join the new place. What all this will achive? driaing total blood from one person to keep another alive. Same thing is happening whenever better new teaching institutions are created. AIIMS in New Delhi does not have enough doctors, how can another AIIMS in Haryana or else where have? Village primary schools hardly have any infrastructure. I went around places and suggested that instead of opening new schools, these schools should be improved. There can be some sort of Public Private Participation. Same can be in health. Issue is not that people in government don't know what the problems are. Major issue is that they prefer only the solutions which suit them politically. These silutions need not necessarily be in public interest. Needs of the people and the needs of politicians seem to be different.

RK^2

rkumar
May 19th, 2010, 06:53 PM
You seems to be well experienced/have good grasp in all fields. Have read bit of ur blogs. Also looks like u are doing social service as well. Could u please share what simple solutions u provided to authorities?

Let us continue it on other thread on rural development... We all know problems. Let us come with solutions which are implementable.

RK^2

rkumar
May 19th, 2010, 07:01 PM
One major issue for farmers is of land acquisition. Think of a farmer who has small land holding and his entire land is acquired at governmet rates. Infrastructure is important and one requires land for that. At the same time welfare of farmers is important. How to address both the issues so that neither suffes. I have written to PM and even to Bengal CM when Sangrur issue was going on. My solution is that wherever the land is required for common use, acquire it in the form of shares from all the farmers of area not just from farmers whose land directly falls in the area of project. Its a win win situation for everyone and govenment need not pay massive market rates. This way project's commercial viabilty is also very high.

RK^2

singhvp
May 19th, 2010, 09:01 PM
One major issue for farmers is of land acquisition. Think of a farmer who has small land holding and his entire land is acquired at governmet rates. Infrastructure is important and one requires land for that. At the same time welfare of farmers is important. How to address both the issues so that neither suffes. I have written to PM and even to Bengal CM when Sangrur issue was going on. My solution is that wherever the land is required for common use, acquire it in the form of shares from all the farmers of area not just from farmers whose land directly falls in the area of project. Its a win win situation for everyone and govenment need not pay massive market rates. This way project's commercial viabilty is also very high.

RK^2

The idea of land acquisition by making the farmers of that particular area as share/stake holders as a cooperative society sounds good in principle. But, execution of any project on the land so acquired may not be as smooth as acquisition by government alone or a private company, due to conflict of interests. Handsome incentives may, however be offered to the land-owners in lieu of take-over of their land. For example, Haryana Government, has started offering attractive incentives to the land-owners for the land acquired in recent years, especially for SEZ near Jhajhar. Instead of receiving once-off payment, the farmers will be getting a monthly/annual fixed income per acre from their land for certain years etc. I do not remember the exact details.

rkumar
May 19th, 2010, 09:31 PM
The idea of land acquisition by making the farmers of that particular area as share/stake holders as a cooperative society sounds good in principle. But, execution of any project on the land so acquired may not be as smooth as acquisition by government alone or a private company, due to conflict of interests. Handsome incentives may, however be offered to the land-owners in lieu of take-over of their land. For example, Haryana Government, has started offering attractive incentives to the land-owners for the land acquired in recent years, especially for SEZ near Jhajhar. Instead of receiving once-off payment, the farmers will be getting a monthly/annual fixed income per acre from their land for certain years etc. I do not remember the exact details.

Farmers don't become share/stake holders in the project. Farmers contribute the land for the project in a way that the land is deduced from larger number of farmers in the ratio of their land holding and boundaries of their remaining land is redrawn. Its like a form of Chakbandi. Let us assume that the land required for the project is 10 acre and the land on all sides of this is 2000 acres. After taking 10 acre out of this one is left with 1990 acres. This 1990 acres can be redistribute among farmers in the raio of their land holdings. This way each farmer hardly looses any significant land. This model can be extemely useful for projects like roads, railway lines etc. For the projects where one require larger amount of contiguous lands, land pool size can be made larger. Since remaining lands near the project will have more value, their share contibution can be larger. This method of land acquisition will reduce the court cases. Only extra cost will be of redrawing the land boundaries, which in my view is not very high.

RK^2

singhvp
May 19th, 2010, 09:58 PM
Farmers don't become share/stake holders in the project. Farmers contribute the land for the project in a way that the land is deduced from larger number of farmers in the ratio of their land holding and boundaries of their remaining land is redrawn. Its like a form of Chakbandi. Let us assume that the land required for the project is 10 acre and the land on all sides of this is 2000 acres. After taking 10 acre out of this one is left with 1990 acres. This 1990 acres can be redistribute among farmers in the raio of their land holdings. This way each farmer hardly looses any significant land. This model can be extemely useful for projects like roads, railway lines etc. For the projects where one require larger amount of contiguous lands, land pool size can be made larger. Since remaining lands near the project will have more value, their share contibution can be larger. This method of land acquisition will reduce the court cases. Only extra cost will be of redrawing the land boundaries, which in my view is not very high.

RK^2

Thanks for clarification Mr. Kumar. I have understood now. The idea is really good.

singhvp
May 20th, 2010, 03:35 PM
Respected Kumar Sahab,

I do not find your posts here on this thread which you had written under another thread started by you recently "Rural Development......". I think Moderators have not yet merged those posts with this thread. You have a good grip on the subject. I find those posts excellent. Being a senior and leaned member of the community, you may play an instrumental and leading role in chalking out an action plan for submitting to the government for catalyzing implementation of their plans already underway and for making new rural-oriented policies for improvement of over all living conditions in the villages. Your support and guidance is solicited.

Warm regards.

rkumar
May 20th, 2010, 05:48 PM
Respected Kumar Sahab,

I do not find your posts here on this thread which you had written under another thread started by you recently "Rural Development......". I think Moderators have not yet merged those posts with this thread. You have a good grip on the subject. I find those posts excellent. Being a senior and leaned member of the community, you may play an instrumental and leading role in chalking out an action plan for submitting to the government for catalyzing implementation of their plans already underway and for making new rural-oriented policies for improvement of over all living conditions in the villages. Your support and guidance is solicited.

Warm regards.

1. Trouble with the people in government is that very few of them are proactive. May be when governemt acquire land next time and there is agitation, some of us will join the bandwagan and try to push our solution. For projects where large chunk of land is required, multiple approached can be merged. Those who want to surrender their total land willfully, can do so. Where as remaining land can be acquired by method suggested in my post.

2. About rural education and heath, my suggestion is that let the govenment calculate how much money they are spending presently per patient or per health centre. If some one from private sector can provide the services at lesser cost in area where there is no health coverage, government should be willing hand over the same to private sector atand pay the same costs. Same approach can be applied to rural education. Government should only monitor if services are being provided as per agreement. Quality control of services should be done jointly by govenment and the public.

3. Gram Panchayat should be given some judicial powers to handle simple civil matters. Since there is a new law that all marriges should be regiseted, repersentatives of Gram Panchayats should be made mandatory witenesses to a
to all marriges in their jurisdictions. Issues like Gotra etc can be taken care at this level.

One thing I am very clear. Problems of villages can only be addressed by the people who have local stakes. Expensive and complicated solutions are not going to work. I spend quite good amount of time in villages and notice that people have simple problems. I give few examples;

1. Present day "Jhotta-Bughi" was designed and fabricated by local carpenters in mid fifties. Before that we had all bullack carts. Plateform heights of these "Jhotta-Bughis" is quite high and can easily be reduced. This will help to make them more stable and also it will be easier to load goods on them. Inspite being a major mode of goos transport, no one has cared about this simple issue. I have seen farmers strugling when they load sugar cane on these bughis. If w
This is one issue on which I have done some work and hope to implement it someday soon.

2. Over irrigation of sugarcane is another big issue. This is another area where I hope I should be able to come out with some simple solution.

RK^2

Samarkadian
May 25th, 2010, 04:58 PM
3. Gram Panchayat should be given some judicial powers to handle simple civil matters. Since there is a new law that all marriges should be regiseted, repersentatives of Gram Panchayats should be made mandatory witenesses to a
to all marriges in their jurisdictions. Issues like Gotra etc can be taken care at this level.


RK^2

Dr Kalkhande,

Very good point. This would avoid further mess. I am not sure wether Govt. would be willing to give enchanced rights to panchyats about marriage issues.But yes Panch and Sarpanchs can certianly do that. Local administrators like SDM or District Block Members or any other medium level authority can successfuly collaborate in marriage issues. Again this depends on the willingnessof DC of the cocerned district.


Mr Singh,

This village of District Rewari, Haryana is going to be the case study in self-governance and self dependency.


बिजली रहे या न रहे, भुरथला गांव के ग्रामीणों को इससे कोई फर्क नहीं पड़ता। यहां के सभी 224 घर सौर ऊर्जा से जगमग हैं। यह हरियाणा का पहला सौर ऊर्जा गांव बन गया है।

करीब 1200 की आबादी वाला भुरथला पिछले दिसंबर तक आम गांवों की तरह धूल धक्कड़ से भरा गांव था। यहां के लोग बिजली-पानी के लिए तरसते रहते थे। अधिकांश समय बिजली गुल ही रहती थी। दिसंबर में यहां एक नई शुरुआत हुई। गुड़गांव ग्रामीण बैंक ने गांववालों से उनके घरों में सौर ऊर्जा सिस्टम लगाने की पेशकश की। जब ग्रामीणों को पता चला कि किट की कीमत 15 हजार रुपए है तो उन्होंने मना कर दिया।

सरपंच सतीश कुमार के मुताबिक, इसके बाद लोगों को समझाया कि उन्हें पांच साल तक सिर्फ 300 रुपए प्रतिमाह की किश्त देनी होगी तो कुछ ग्रामीण मान गए। पहले सात-आठ लोगों ने शुरुआत की। बैंक ने किट में एक सौर ऊर्जा पैनल, एक बैटरी, दो ट्यूबलाइट और एक पंखा दिया। बिजली जाने पर जब सौर ऊर्जा वाले घर रोशन रहने लगे तो पूरे गांव को यह तरीका पसंद आ गया।

नए साल का पहला महीना बीता ही था कि गांव के सारे घर ‘24 घंटे सातों दिन’ बिजली वाले हो गए। बैंक ने गांव को शत प्रतिशत सौर ऊर्जा के प्रयोग पर एक लाख रुपए इनाम या 10 सोलर स्ट्रीट लाइट का इनाम देने की पेशकश की, वो भी सोलर वाली।

गांव के एक बुजुर्ग रामकिशन ने कहा, ‘देखो, बिजली नहीं है, मगर पंखे की हवा खा रहे हैं।’ गांव की महिलाएं भी खुश हैं। गृहणी सुशीला कहती हैं, ‘हमें अब अंधेरे में काम नहीं करना पड़ता। पहले हम बिजली के हिसाब से टाइम टेबल बनाते थे, अब सब कुछ हमारे हिसाब से चलता है।’

भुरथला की राह पर कई गांव

गुड़गांव ग्रामीण बैंक के मैनेजर विजयपाल चौहान के मुताबिक भुरथला गांव को देखते हुए दूसरे गांवों के लोग भी प्रेरित हो रहे हैं। लुला अहीर, झाल, जाहिदपुर, सुरहेली, कोसली आदि गांवों में भी सौर किट लगाई जा रही हैं। बैंक अध्यक्ष एनपी हेगड़े ने कहा कि भुरथला सौर ऊर्जा गांव बन गया है।

224

घर है भुरथला गांव में

2009

दिसंबर में शुरू हुई थी

300

रुपए महीना दिया प्रत्येक घर ने। किट की लागत १५ हजार।





Further, This month witnessed the results of matric and senior secondary classes . Mr Singh , rural schools have relegated urban schools in results. They are coming and they are coming in style.


हरियाणा विद्यालय शिक्षा बोर्ड की 12 वीं कक्षा के परिणामों ने इस भ्रम को तोड़ दिया है कि शहरी क्षेत्रों में ही होनहार होते हैं। ग्रामीण स्कूलों का परिणाम 93 फीसदी रहा है, जबकि शहरी क्षेत्र के स्कूल 89 प्रतिशत का आंकड़ा ही छू पाए हैं। झज्जर जिले के गांवों के छात्र-छात्राओं ने 98 प्रतिशत का आंकड़ा पार कर अपनी काबिलियत का लोहा मनवा दिया है। शहरी क्षेत्रों में रेवाड़ी जिले में 82 प्रतिशत विद्यार्थी ही पास हुए हैं। पूरे प्रदेश भर में किसी भी जिले में लड़कियों ने लड़कों को आगे नहीं जाने दिया। सोनीपत में 97 फीसदी लड़कियां पास हुई हैं, जो यहां के लड़कों से तीन फीसदी ज्यादा है। सोमवार को घोषित परीक्षा परिणाम में झ ार और सोनीपत जिले के 96 फीसदी विद्यार्थी पास हुए। इस आंकड़े के साथ ये दोनों जिले प्रदेश भर में पहले स्थान पर रहे हैं। फतेहाबाद व यमुनानगर 87 प्रतिशत के आंकड़े के साथ सबसे पीछे रहे हैं। लड़कों के पास प्रतिशत के मामले में झज्जर सबसे ऊपर रहा है। यहां 95 प्रतिशत लड़कों ने परीक्षा पास की। लड़कियों में सोनीपत व झज्जर जिलों ने बेहतर प्रदर्शन किया है। इन दोनों जिलों में लड़कियों का पास प्रतिशत 98 रहा है।

rkumar
May 25th, 2010, 05:29 PM
......
Further, This month witnessed the results of matric and senior secondary classes . Mr Singh , rural schools have relegated urban schools in results. They are coming and they are coming in style.

Most of the core professionals like doctors, engineers, scientists, defence, etc are going to come only from rural India. The reason is very simple. Most of these jobs are not very high paying any more. Most of the urban boys opt for high paying business and banking jobs. Time and again I have been writing to our Science and technology misnisters to invest in rural education, else we won't have quality scientists and doctors in next 10-15 years. I met former Army Chief Kappor in one party and requested him to focus on rural schools as they will send most the future defence officers. Army should give scholarship to those desrving boys who want to have career in defence forces. In my view its the rural India only which will fight and defend the nation on every front. Urabn India is too selfish and its all about money and power.

RK^2

Arvindc
May 25th, 2010, 06:41 PM
Farmers don't become share/stake holders in the project. Farmers contribute the land for the project in a way that the land is deduced from larger number of farmers in the ratio of their land holding and boundaries of their remaining land is redrawn. Its like a form of Chakbandi. Let us assume that the land required for the project is 10 acre and the land on all sides of this is 2000 acres. After taking 10 acre out of this one is left with 1990 acres. This 1990 acres can be redistribute among farmers in the raio of their land holdings. This way each farmer hardly looses any significant land. This model can be extemely useful for projects like roads, railway lines etc. For the projects where one require larger amount of contiguous lands, land pool size can be made larger. Since remaining lands near the project will have more value, their share contibution can be larger. This method of land acquisition will reduce the court cases. Only extra cost will be of redrawing the land boundaries, which in my view is not very high.

RK^2

That's full of issues. At ground level there are lots and lots of issues in redrawing boundaries. There are issues of soil fertility, slopes, sand dunes, number and verity of trees, closeness to canal/road/main path etc. I have seen big issues arising out of family settlements even when the land is distributed equally with consent of most family members. Can't even think of re-distribution at village/community level.

My opinion is to extend the Jhajhar formula. One option is to give the land on a lease, say 100 yrs, with annual rent based adjusted to the inflation index.

Giving most of the money to the current generation is disastrous in many cases. A farmer is inexperienced in handling that big money. Also, many people just throw is away in drinking or latest models of luxury cars. So any such formula should be focused in securing the future generation’s bread and butter the way the farmland had been doing.

Arvindc
May 25th, 2010, 06:56 PM
Most of the core professionals like doctors, engineers, scientists, defence, etc are going to come only from rural India. The reason is very simple. Most of these jobs are not very high paying any more. Most of the urban boys opt for high paying business and banking jobs. Time and again I have been writing to our Science and technology misnisters to invest in rural education, else we won't have quality scientists and doctors in next 10-15 years. I met former Army Chief Kappor in one party and requested him to focus on rural schools as they will send most the future defence officers. Army should give scholarship to those desrving boys who want to have career in defence forces. In my view its the rural India only which will fight and defend the nation on every front. Urabn India is too selfish and its all about money and power.

RK^2

Yeap, that's the trend nowadays. Most of the merits are now coming from the backward areas. For example, Mahindergarh, a samall backward city, has taken over the school education brilliantly. In fact, that belt has a much higher than the average literacy rates in Haryana.

This has happened in spite of very poor facilities. It is their hard work alone that has helped them.

The only problem which still eludes them from the fruits of success is communication skills.

rkumar
June 15th, 2010, 08:35 PM
This is what one of our top scientists thinks of Indian education;

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/City/Mysore/Varsities-not-fit-for-research-CNR-Rao/articleshow/6048180.cms

In last paragraph he says;

"About education in rural India, he said: The poor students are more interested and enthusiastic to learn and research science. The government should set up more residential schools in rural areas."

This is exactly i have mentioned in one of my post above and has been telling the politicians I met. Unfortunately our politicians, young and old don't seem to understand this.

RK^2

yudhvirmor
June 15th, 2010, 09:04 PM
This is what one of our top scientists thinks of Indian education;

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/City/Mysore/Varsities-not-fit-for-research-CNR-Rao/articleshow/6048180.cms

In last paragraph he says;

"About education in rural India, he said: The poor students are more interested and enthusiastic to learn and research science. The government should set up more residential schools in rural areas."

This is exactly i have mentioned in one of my post above and has been telling the politicians I met. Unfortunately our politicians, young and old don't seem to understand this.

RK^2

Sir Navodya Schools failed miserably. Public schools approach is falling apart in UK. I never heard very positive feedback about US public schools. Education sector needs whole new approach. May be Public-Private partnership or we may need to give incentives to private sector to explore this area. In Education/Health sector, There is a huge demand but no supply at all.

rkumar
June 16th, 2010, 03:24 PM
another very interesting article on the status of Indian education;

http://news.asiaone.com/News/Education/Story/A1Story20100616-222362.html

This is what it says of rural education;

"Sixth, the excessive regulation by the government and multiple agencies leads to stagnation and corruption, which tends to get institutionalised. Seventh, the quality of school education has not improved. There is little or no teaching in fifty per cent of the primary schools in the rural areas of northern India."

RK^2

singhmanish
June 17th, 2010, 11:14 PM
Dear Mr Kumar,
Your knowledge and points are well appreciated. We need more people like you who are working at the root level...respect...

Some techincal view on your point from my side
1. Present day "Jhotta-Bughi" was designed and fabricated by local carpenters in mid fifties. Before that we had all bullack carts. Plateform heights of these "Jhotta-Bughis" is quite high and can easily be reduced. This will help to make them more stable and also it will be easier to load goods on them. Inspite being a major mode of goos transport, no one has cared about this simple issue. I have seen farmers strugling when they load sugar cane on these bughis. If w
This is one issue on which I have done some work and hope to implement it someday soon.

My point :If you reduce the height of bughi then it will put more pressure on Jhotta while then he will be not only pulling the Bughi but also lifting it...so two force on poor animal...optimal solution is to add sort of level selector in bughi...si while loading lower the level and while pulling bring back the level to animals height.


2. Over irrigation of sugarcane is another big issue. This is another area where I hope I should be able to come out with some simple solution.

My point: President kalam already suggest joining rivers to facilitate irrigation..but its a govt initiative...on village bases rain water harvesting can be done by making a pool etc..

regards,manish

satishsparp
June 29th, 2010, 02:11 PM
good analysis

rkumar
June 29th, 2010, 03:27 PM
Dear Mr Kumar,
Your knowledge and points are well appreciated. We need more people like you who are working at the root level...respect...

Some techincal view on your point from my side
1. Present day "Jhotta-Bughi" was designed and fabricated by local carpenters in mid fifties. Before that we had all bullack carts. Plateform heights of these "Jhotta-Bughis" is quite high and can easily be reduced. This will help to make them more stable and also it will be easier to load goods on them. Inspite being a major mode of goos transport, no one has cared about this simple issue. I have seen farmers strugling when they load sugar cane on these bughis. If w
This is one issue on which I have done some work and hope to implement it someday soon.

My point :If you reduce the height of bughi then it will put more pressure on Jhotta while then he will be not only pulling the Bughi but also lifting it...so two force on poor animal...optimal solution is to add sort of level selector in bughi...si while loading lower the level and while pulling bring back the level to animals height.


2. Over irrigation of sugarcane is another big issue. This is another area where I hope I should be able to come out with some simple solution.

My point: President kalam already suggest joining rivers to facilitate irrigation..but its a govt initiative...on village bases rain water harvesting can be done by making a pool etc..

regards,manish

1. I am working on a Jhotta Bughi which will have four wheels and be very cost effective. If I am not wrong, the force acts at the level of axle, and therefore the load height should not matter. Also I am working on a simple lever mechanism to load these bhugies.
2. I wrote to PM on the simplest part of joining the rivers. Shortest distance between the Himalyan rivers is near the base of hills. If these rivers can be joined near the hills, costs involved will be minimal as one will require to construct only the one side of embankment and by having wide canals, one can use them as reservoirs also. ..Hope someone will take notice of our ideas.

RK^2

satyendra15
June 29th, 2010, 06:09 PM
I would like to suggest few actions which can help in the rural development:
1. Active and Mandatory Partcipation of the students/universities in the rural development : Each university should have few days (10 or 15 days) project as a part of educational curriculum in which group students should be sent to the village for rural projects. This wil hae dual advantage - rural people will get aware of the latest technology and may be those projects can be used say for farming, dairying etc. , Secondly students will be sensitized toward rural India and wil not be alien to the real India
2. Proper implementaion of NREGA: Its actually a very good scheme and if the villagers are properly educated and corrupt contractors, panchayat members are audited regularly then for sure it will have huge impact on rural development
3. Many of the developmental issues are closely related to social ill-customs which are still prevalent in rural India like: child marriage, preference for boy child etc..
4. Educational Infrastructure is required to be developed in rural areas as being said in earlier posts : The major issue is retaining good teacher/faculty in the school and maintenance of proper discipline (for teachers as well as for students). This can be catered by giving good salaries and incentives ( it could be little more than urban /cities) to attract them. Also school result should be used as the performance appraisal factor for the teachers . Frequent transfers should be avoided.Its obvious that quality education will surely lead to the development
5.Cooperative structure and business model can be successful if it is implemented like Amul in Gujarat, Also we community as whole need to sideline our personal biasis and work together , trust other villagers/farmers and generate entrepreneurial skills. We need strong leader and vision to pursue cooperative movement and it can be started thru a small village.
6. Lastly sometimes we act selfishly and society suffers as a whole, For eg: sometimes people dont allow to construct/widen the road in front of their house even if the land is not owned by them -as they use it for their personal drainage, keeping cattles and so on

Regards,
Satyendra S. Choudhary

singhvp
September 8th, 2010, 09:13 PM
Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda announced recently that the government will spend Rs 1200 crore for development of rural areas and that Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) will be allocated Rs250 crore this financial year. (Courtesy Facebook - Deepender Singh Hooda's wall). The link is pasted below.

DNA: India - Rs1200 crore to be spent on development of rural areas: Bhupinder Hooda (http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_rs1200-crore-to-be-spent-on-development-of-rural-areas-bhupinder-hooda_1414503)
www.dnaindia.com (http://www.dnaindia.com/)

It is hoped the money will percolate down to the villages and will actually be spent towards rural developments. The trend so far has been that more than 50% of the funds are misappropriated by the middlemen. Presume, Government would now feel the pulse of villagers correctly to diagnose the malaise.

Arvindc
September 8th, 2010, 10:00 PM
Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda announced...

That's a good move on part of the Hooda goverment. However a lot has to be seen on how this money is to be spent. There is an urgent need to educate the office holders (where this money would go) about the basic, essential issues that are leading to a lot of human sufferings in rural areas.

Most prominent in them is the health care, particularly women and infant health care. Haryana tops on the rural health facilities amongst the worst states. The sector needs a lot of will power on the government front and not a strong money power.
Even the awareness about some very basic things can do wonders. For example, a one rupee chlorine tablet can protect against 70% of bacterial infections and save thousands of rupees in the long term. However, people are mostly ignorant about its use.
Training staff, including sarpanchs on these issues, and then having a constant monitoring on the progress can go a long way towards reducing the sufferings of the rural folks.

vdhillon
December 1st, 2010, 10:24 PM
Well, I am not a suitable person to talk on rural development.
I live in a metro with a busy life (khamkha ki busy life without any purpose). Never think of my village, though I visit my village once in 2-3 months. But it is to meets my elders, not to discuss the underdevelopment of my village.

My village doesn’t have Concrete roads, desirable electricity, drinking water facilities, proper transport service, good educational institutes etc. etc. But I rarely think about these things. I would not go to village SARPANCH or file a RTI to get the information about the progress of proposed Rural development Programs like PMGSY, NREGA, and SGWY etc. etc. I don’t ask MLAs and MPs what they are doing with all that money and time. I don’t advise my fellow villager, I don’t teach their children. I don’t give a crap what they do, how they live. All I do is work in AC cabin, surf internet, have good time with friends & family and sleep. And next morning I read newspaper, magazine and criticize politicians, authorities for not doing what they are supposed to do. And start the next day just like the last one.

I can argue/discuss on various aspects of development, I can gather whatever information from internet and paste it here. But what’s the benefit?

A villager in past and an urban in present but doing nothing for villages and deteriorating the urban. I am an Indian and I am selfish.

@Akshay: Why are you talking about me on this thread :) I see me in you. Tujhe mein Dhillon dikhta hai malik saab mein kya karun ...lol


@ALL
I am a late entrant to this thread and just started. Apologies to all other members, bear with me while I catch up, some of my post my be out of synch until I catch up.

Inline with Akshay's thoughts, I too am wondering as to how qualified I am to post here.

I can be disqualified on the basis of various things,
- my limited physical connection with India (a country I left 16yrs ago and no longer retain citizenship of)
- or my own jat villages (which I have visited may be 4 or 5 times max, no more than 2 hours in last 10years), or
- on the basis that I consider myself more of a global citizen rather than Indian/Aussie/Singaporean/jat who has been heavily influenced by Indian+western+chinese/oriental cultures and more inline with gen-Y (though older than them) in terms of thinking, attitudes, likes, dislikes, attitude towards relationship/dating/marriage/race/sexual preferences/gays/lesbians, etc.
- on the basis that this is neither an area of my formal academic studies nor my professional work experience

Having established that I am no expert in this area, I will still post as i do read and I am quiet opinionated. If still interested in the views of an "opinionated non-expert", please read on but with the pinch of salt.

I see this topic about rural development. I also see people arguing about . I am wondering the following:
1. Some of today's rural people may become urbanites due to migration, some of rural (e.g. closer to NCR) or semi-rural centers may become urban in nature.
"Are we better off discussing overall development of jat samaj and within that context focus on bridging the gap between rural-urban divide."

2. I see members arguing (with excellent oratory and prose skills), but not agreeing, about what constitutes development, anecdotes about miserable conditions in villages to usage of ac and USB in villages.
"Are we not better off agreeing to use some internationally accepted development index"
e.g. UN and World Bank's Human Development Index (HDI) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index), various agencies including UN, GOI, WB, etc collect data on thes eindexes, easier to see historical trends in development.

By establishing common definitions and baseline, we can discuss the topic itself rather than differing definitions and perceptions of development based on anecdotes and personal views <apologizes if thread has already resolved this, i will eventually catchup with you guys>.

TBC <work-in-progess>
-----------------------------------------------------
I am still on the 2nd page of the thread, bear with me, I will keep updating this post as I go along..

vdhillon
December 2nd, 2010, 12:41 AM
Sir Brahm, Not an issue.



Mr Singh, I would try to take it a bit further. Like you have started your incipient post with independence story. A generation or nearly a generation has passed since then.


It is a kind of fashion among youth nowadays to blame Nehru/Gandhi with piquant and risible anecdotes for everything [read everything ] what we are countering presently . May be it helps in easing out our current social and economical responsblity arisen due to past inablity of leaders of that epoch. But for a moment, lets pause and reflect calmly that what was the vision held by other contemporary leaders of Nehru/Gandhi era.? Any Idea.? Any hint. Answer to this is that almost all of them had same vision about development. Any person born in that era would have thought the same things most likely. Lets suppose you are JL Nehru. What options had you had to put in to a naive nation's growth. Possibly, something which was going in the world and what was going in the world in those times.? Soviet Russia's Socialism Philosophy and USA's Capitalism. Right ? In 1947 , World had already witnessed WW2 and a great depression. So What would have prompted You as JL Nehru to adopt? An already sunk Capitalism in the abyss of depression OR Depression immune Soviet's Socialism. To explain it further , I will be shamelessly quoting Aris Hobsbawn from his work Age of Extremes . He proposes two kind of models to be adopted at that time as :-


Model A:


1.These countries, which embraced A , had their economy stagnant during the periods between 1914 and 1939.

2. The industrial production fell by about ONE-THIRD between 1929 and 1931.


3. During 1929 and 1938 their share of world’s manufactured goods decreased.


4. The unemployment was between 10% and 18% during 1920s. And during Great Depression it was between 22% and 44%.


5. The inflation rate was explosive sometimes reaching levels where one person’s life savings would only fetch a 'drink in a café'.

Model B


1. These countries, which embraced B, had a robust economy during the pervious 30 years.


2. In these countries the industrial production TRIPLED from 1929 to 1940.


3. Their share of worlds manufactured goods almost QUADRUPLED.


4. There was virtually NO unemployment.


5. There was virtually NO inflation even during the Great Depression.


6. These countries completely escaped Great Depression of 30s.


Now, me as a JL Nehru as the head of a newly founded state would have choosen the model B and in my opinion, you too. Correct me?

Model A represent Capitalism while model B represent Socialism. Best these seems the torrent at those time but not in 2010 at all. Socialism has failed in its own home as it was doomed to because of its unnatural proclivity.

So that is the root. Borrowing the models from outside always fail. Sooner or later Capitalism too will be in same place. So Sir Brahm now found a new way to shift blame from desi politicians to international one. Karl Marx hmm? Today what are we and how are we is the direct ramification of model B. But gents, that was gold according to that world situations. Now it is a ''buyer's regret''.

As far as lower-self esteem is concerned, we have it because of our ''Grandfather of Independent Nation'' - Lord Mclaay . He instilled in our already slave mind that everything non-British is inferior. And anything inferior causes low- self esteem. It engulfs confidence and independency of minds and thoughts which was the goal of Grandfather. He plundered everything with the curriculam of english alzebra. Till today we would appreciate that - Angrez kitne aandy sai, dekh, yo kar diya, wo kar diya. Sooner we burn the hobgoblin of grandfather, faster we would move ahead in genuine way and in our style.

So your current generation of politicians are merely the upgradation [ or downgradation ] of British era. Colonial hangover would still take decades to be washed but when whole world is now being westernised culturly and economicaly, so no salvation apparantly unless we devise a system of development which purely would be in nature of our ethnicity. For example:- Mohammad Yunus, The Noble Awardee from Bangladesh.

Moving further , realising the importance of Indian population as a big investment asset , paleolithic way of strengthening the agricultural, dairy products, rural tourism , could be a few but strong innovative ventures to help the rural sector without urbanising it unneccessarily . Urban population is hughely dependent on rural sector for milk, vegetables and grains. Government may be cold but people of rural area always have this opporutnity open. Don't expect government to baby feed the progress in to your hungary stomach. You will have to vouch for your hunger. Enterpreneuring of our blood professions are the ways and quiet easiest ways.

Rural folks are deft in these basic professions for centuaries. So why to look at outside and seek service industeries to knock at door step to acquire their land. As I said earlier, they only lack in guidance.

Corruption , it would not take more than five minutes to understand and accept that every human group of any kind is doomed to corrupt. It is one of the inherent quality of humanity. Our Cro-Magnan and Neanderthal - chimp fathers were corrupt too. They had stolen food from their brothers. But to live and function harmoniusly we are expected to practise the lately induced rules[ like 10,000years back] of society, governance. But alas! inherent,innate base qualities/motivations in our genome always trumps the newly induced codes of behaviour. As we have evolved past the survival , we tend to behave more socially and for this to appear practise there MUST be a homogenius enviornment of culture, values, ethics. Indians, overall firmly and dedicatively believe in easy forgving, forgetting and classic '' Sab Kuch Chalta Hai Yaar, Aisi Taisi Karaye Duniya, Apne ko Kya''. Without proper and suffice checks in any governance system development remains down-played. May be it is true that we better understand and behave onto the aria of flagellation better than following rules. But who will whip our lazy asses? I leave you here with the question of the millenium.

Where is the moderator who keeps deleting bulk of my posts for bing "off-track" ...
Bhram ji has raised a similar question about relevance of this post (though an excellent standalone read) to the core OP.
seems not all members are treated same.

singhvp
December 4th, 2010, 09:02 AM
@Akshay: Why are you talking about me on this thread :) I see me in you. Tujhe mein Dhillon dikhta hai malik saab mein kya karun ...lol


@ALL
I am a late entrant to this thread and just started. Apologies to all other members, bear with me while I catch up, some of my post my be out of synch until I catch up.

Inline with Akshay's thoughts, I too am wondering as to how qualified I am to post here.

I can be disqualified on the basis of various things,
- my limited physical connection with India (a country I left 16yrs ago and no longer retain citizenship of)
- or my own jat villages (which I have visited may be 4 or 5 times max, no more than 2 hours in last 10years), or
- on the basis that I consider myself more of a global citizen rather than Indian/Aussie/Singaporean/jat who has been heavily influenced by Indian+western+chinese/oriental cultures and more inline with gen-Y (though older than them) in terms of thinking, attitudes, likes, dislikes, attitude towards relationship/dating/marriage/race/sexual preferences/gays/lesbians, etc.
- on the basis that this is neither an area of my formal academic studies nor my professional work experience

Having established that I am no expert in this area, I will still post as i do read and I am quiet opinionated. If still interested in the views of an "opinionated non-expert", please read on but with the pinch of salt.

I see this topic about rural development. I also see people arguing about . I am wondering the following:
1. Some of today's rural people may become urbanites due to migration, some of rural (e.g. closer to NCR) or semi-rural centers may become urban in nature.
"Are we better off discussing overall development of jat samaj and within that context focus on bridging the gap between rural-urban divide."

2. I see members arguing (with excellent oratory and prose skills), but not agreeing, about what constitutes development, anecdotes about miserable conditions in villages to usage of ac and USB in villages.
"Are we not better off agreeing to use some internationally accepted development index"
e.g. UN and World Bank's Human Development Index (HDI) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index), various agencies including UN, GOI, WB, etc collect data on thes eindexes, easier to see historical trends in development.

By establishing common definitions and baseline, we can discuss the topic itself rather than differing definitions and perceptions of development based on anecdotes and personal views <apologizes if thread has already resolved this, i will eventually catchup with you guys>.

TBC <work-in-progess>
-----------------------------------------------------
I am still on the 2nd page of the thread, bear with me, I will keep updating this post as I go along..

Being a person of Indian origin with linkages in rural hinterland and having visited villages 4-6 times you are supposed be a qualified person to post here on this thread.

The people like Salman Rushdie, V.S. Napaul and Amritya Sen have also spent major part of their life outside India (not sure about their global status), but all of them have written about India in length and breadth with authority and their works are internationally acclaimed.


It is your own perception that you are not an expert in this area. Moreover, no expert study is required to assess the current state of development in our villages. One doesn’t need testimony of unrealistic statistics compiled by UN or Brettonwood Institutes who have never been able to penetrate into real India - the blind and desolate alleys of backward belts consisting of rural hamlets of Rajasthan (Churu, Badhmer, Jaisalmeer, Bikaner), and even some districts of oft-repeated ‘developed State’ Haryana ( Bhiwani , Mahendergarh and parts of Hissar), tribal areas of Jharkhand, Chattisgarh, Bihar, MP, Orissa and some other States, to name a few. A mere glance at heaps of dung and dirt strewn around, stinking and choked drains, dilapidated schools without necessary logistics, bumpy narrow roads with pot holes and stagnant water both sides, people travelling on the rooftops of jeeps, humble an un-plastered houses & cottages made of straw, bands of unemployed youth with gloomy faces, and “barbaad jawaniyan with unkempt hair”, would testify the sorry state of affairs. (Many more things already mentioned time and again in previous posts).

The fact that why the rural people want to be urbanites itself corroborates the truth that all requisite facilities are not available in villages. It is a big question as to why all the educated people having employment migrate to urban estates at the first opportunity.

Certainly, we are better off in terms of life-style and facilities around us in comparison to our forefathers because change is inevitable and it keeps happening every moment. But what is important is to catalyze the process of change with optimum force and the egalitarian utilization of resources available i.e. the capital generated making the ruralites equal stake holders in development.

It is my guess that Human Development Index is country specific and does not deal with rural development in isolation. The statistics compiled are all encompassing including metropolitan cities in its sample survey which is more based on life expectancy, GDP and per capita income of the entire population including, inter alia, our billionaires too. It is quite hypothetical as it doesn’t provide segregated data in respect of rural areas to examine the case under study.

You have quoted Akshay and seem to have endorsed the individualistic, seemingly a little snobbish and feudal attitude which most of the 'digitized haves' normally assume towards the hapless 'have-nots' of this digital era. Going by that analogy, the legendary freedom fighter and martyr Bhagat Singh was, perhaps, a stupid who could have enjoyed his life in his cozy drawing room fitted with an AC instead of incarcerating in Lahore Jail and finally going to gallows for the sake of his conviction and freedom of nation. What was the need to sacrifice his precious life for the sake of freedom, fruit of which were going to be shared by only a few ungrateful, snobbish and self-centred people. The tragedy is that majority of our middle class people prefer to severe relations with their extended family members/relatives still languishing in the quagmire of poverty in villages, once they are able to carve out some space in the urban social milieu/corporate culture following in the footsteps of Indian aristocracy.

singhvp
December 4th, 2010, 10:54 AM
Where is the moderator who keeps deleting bulk of my posts for bing "off-track" ...
Bhram ji has raised a similar question about relevance of this post (though an excellent standalone read) to the core OP.
seems not all members are treated same.

Vishal the contents of Samar's post in question were not off-topic, in my opinion. It was in tune with the context. (As you said, it was an excellent read, standalone or in conjunction with the thread)

vdhillon
December 6th, 2010, 12:41 PM
Vishal the contents of Samar's post in question were not off-topic, in my opinion. It was in tune with the context. (As you said, it was an excellent read, standalone or in conjunction with the thread)

I agree Samar's post was an excellent read.

I was being a jerk and taking a cheap pot shot on MODdeys, as some of my posts elsewhere (having similar degree of relevance) were deleted with the reason "off-track". I have already apologized to Samar via PM many days ago.

But I will still like to retain my post (124) above as my peev about moderation style remains valid.

Bisky
August 23rd, 2011, 09:55 PM
"ए वतन की खाक, मुझे एड़ियाँ रगड़ने दे
मुझे यकीन है कि पानी यहीं से निकलेगा"

vicky84
October 5th, 2011, 10:00 AM
World Bank Report on India's agriculture and rural development :

http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/COUNTRIES/SOUTHASIAEXT/EXTSAREGTOPAGRI/0,,contentMDK:20273764~menuPK:548214~pagePK:340041 73~piPK:34003707~theSitePK:452766,00.html (http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/COUNTRIES/SOUTHASIAEXT/EXTSAREGTOPAGRI/0,,contentMDK:20273764~menuPK:548214~pagePK:340041 73~piPK:34003707~theSitePK:452766,00.html)






BACKGROUND
Although agriculture contributes only 21% of India’s GDP, its importance in the country’s economic, social, and political fabric goes well beyond this indicator. The rural areas are still home to some 72 percent of the India’s 1.1 billion people, a large number of whom are poor. Most of the rural poor depend on rain-fed agriculture and fragile forests for their livelihoods.
The sharp rise in foodgrain production during India’s Green Revolution of the 1970s enabled the country to achieve self-sufficiency in foodgrains and stave off the threat of famine. Agricultural intensification in the 1970s to 1980s saw an increased demand for rural labor that raised rural wages and, together with declining food prices, reduced rural poverty.
Sustained, although much slower, agricultural growth in the 1990s reduced rural poverty to 26.3 percent by 1999/00. Since then, however, the slowdown in agricultural growth has become a major cause for concern. India’s rice yields are one-third of China’s and about half of those in Vietnam and Indonesia. With the exception of sugarcane, potato and tea, the same is true for most other agricultural commodities.
The Government of India places high priority on reducing poverty by raising agricultural productivity. However, bold action from policymakers will be required to shift away from the existing subsidy-based regime that is no longer sustainable, to build a solid foundation for a highly productive, internationally competitive, and diversified agricultural sector.
ISSUES AND CHALLENGES
Slow Down in Agricultural and Rural Non-Farm Growth: Both the poorest as well as the more prosperous ‘Green Revolution’ states of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh have recently witnessed a slow-down in agricultural growth. Some of the factors hampering the revival of growth are:

Poor composition of public expenditures: Public spending on agricultural subsidies is crowding out productivity-enhancing investments such as agricultural research and extension, as well as investments in rural infrastructure, and the health and education of the rural people. In 1999/2000, agricultural subsidies amounted to 3 percent of GDP and were over 7 times the public investments in the sector.
Over-regulation of domestic agricultural trade: While economic and trade reforms in the 1990s helped to improve the incentive framework, over-regulation of domestic trade has increased costs, price risks and uncertainty, undermining the sector’s competitiveness.
Government interventions in labor, land, and credit markets: More rapid growth of the rural non-farm sector is constrained by government interventions in factor markets -- labor, land, and credit -- and in output markets, such as the small-scale reservation of enterprises.
Inadequate infrastructure and services in rural areas.
Weak Framework for Sustainable Water Management and Irrigation:

Inequitable allocation of water: Many states lack the incentives, policy, regulatory, and institutional framework for the efficient, sustainable, and equitable allocation of water.
Deteriorating irrigation infrastructure: Public spending in irrigation is spread over many uncompleted projects. In addition, existing infrastructure has rapidly deteriorated as operations and maintenance is given lower priority.
Inadequate Access to Land and Finance:

Stringent land regulations discourage rural investments: While land distribution has become less skewed, land policy and regulations to increase security of tenure (including restrictions or bans on renting land or converting it to other uses) have had the unintended effect of reducing access by the landless and discouraging rural investments.
Computerization of land records has brought to light institutional weaknesses: State government initiatives to computerize land records have reduced transaction costs and increased transparency, but also brought to light institutional weaknesses.
Rural poor have little access to credit: While India has a wide network of rural finance institutions, many of the rural poor remain excluded, due to inefficiencies in the formal finance institutions, the weak regulatory framework, high transaction costs, and risks associated with lending to agriculture.
Weak Natural Resources Management: One quarter of India’s population depends on forests for at least part of their livelihoods.

A purely conservation approach to forests is ineffective: Experience in India shows that a purely conservation approach to natural resources management does not work effectively and does little to reduce poverty.
Weak resource rights for forest communities: The forest sector is also faced with weak resource rights and economic incentives for communities, an inefficient legal framework and participatory management, and poor access to markets.

vicky84
October 5th, 2011, 10:01 AM
Contd:

Weak delivery of basic services in rural areas:

Low bureaucratic accountability and inefficient use of public funds: Despite large expenditures in rural development, a highly centralized bureaucracy with low accountability and inefficient use of public funds limit their impact on poverty. In 1992, India amended its Constitution to create three tiers of democratically elected rural local governments bringing governance down to the villages. However, the transfer of authority, funds, and functionaries to these local bodies is progressing slowly, in part due to political vested interests. The poor are not empowered to contribute to shaping public programs or to hold local governments accountable.
PRIORITY AREAS FOR THE WORLD BANK SUPPORT
1. Enhancing agricultural productivity, competitiveness, and rural growth
Enhancing productivity: Creating a more productive, internationally competitive and diversified agricultural sector would require a shift in public expenditures away from subsidies towards productivity enhancing investments. Second it will require removing the restrictions on domestic private trade to improve the investment climate and meet expanding market opportunities. Third, the agricultural research and extension systems need to be strengthened to improve access to productivity enhancing technologies. The diverse conditions across India suggests the importance of regionally differentiated strategies, with a strong focus on the lagging states.


Improving Water Resource and Irrigation/Drainage Management: Increase in multi-sectoral competition for water highlights the need to formulate water policies and unbundle water resources management from irrigation service delivery. Other key priorities include: (i) modernizing Irrigation and Drainage Departments to integrate the participation of farmers and other agencies in irrigation management; (ii) improving cost recovery; (iii) rationalizing public expenditures, with priority to completing schemes with the highest returns; and (iv) allocating sufficient resources for operations and maintenance for the sustainability of investments.
Strengthening rural non-farm sector growth: Rising incomes are fueling demand for higher-value fresh and processed agricultural products in domestic markets and globally, which open new opportunities for agricultural diversification to higher value products (e.g. horticulture, livestock), agro-processing and related services. The government needs to shift its role from direct intervention and overregulation to creating the enabling environment for private sector participation and competition for agribusiness and more broadly, the rural non-farm sector growth. Improving the rural investment climate includes removing trade controls, rationalizing labor regulations and the tax regime (i.e. adoption of the value added tax system), and improving access to credit and key infrastructure (e.g. roads, electricity, ports, markets).

2. Improving access to assets and sustainable natural resource use
Balancing poverty reduction and conservation priorities: Finding win-win combinations for conservation and poverty reduction will be critical to sustainable natural resource management. This will involve addressing legal, policy and institutional constraints to devolving resource rights, and transferring responsibilities to local communities.


Improving access to land: States can build on the growing consensus to reform land policy, particularly land tenancy policy and land administration system. States that do not have tenancy restrictions can provide useful lessons in this regard. Over the longer term, a more holistic approach to land administration policies, regulations and institutions is necessary to ensure tenure security, reduce costs, and ensure fairness and sustainability of the system.

Improving access to rural finance: It would require improving the performance of regional rural banks and rural credit cooperatives by enhancing regulatory oversight, removing government control and ownership, and strengthening the legal framework for loan recovery and the use of land as collateral. It would also involve creating an enabling environment for the development of micro-finance institutions in rural areas.


3. Strengthening institutions for the poor and promoting rural livelihood
Promoting Community-Based Rural Development: State Government efforts in scaling up livelihood and community-driven development approaches will be critical to build social capital in the poorest areas as well as to expand savings mobilization, promote productive investments, income generating opportunities and sustainable natural resource management. Direct support to self-help groups, village committees, user’s associations, savings and loans groups and others can provide the initial ’push’ to move organizations to higher level and access to new economic opportunities. Moreover, social mobilization and particularly the empowerment of women’s groups, through increased capacity for collective action will provide communities with greater "voice" and bargaining power in dealing with the private sector, markets and financial services.
Strengthening Accountability for Service Delivery: As decentralization efforts are pursued and local governments are given more prominence in the basic service delivery, the establishment of accountability mechanisms becomes critical. Local governments’ capacity to identify local priorities through participatory budgeting and planning needs to be strengthened. This, in turn, would improve the rural investment climate, facilitating the involvement of the private sector, creating employment opportunities and linkages between farm and non-farm sectors.

Dagar25
October 21st, 2011, 07:55 AM
A Very Nice Topic After long time

Gaon ke log ekjut ho gaon mein hi sabji fal aur anaj paida karein apas mein ek doosre saman ke badle len den karein. "Bahar ki cheezo ka bahiskar karein apni jaroorto ko seemet kar dein". Agar poora gramin bharat ye kaam siraf 6 mahine ke liye kar deta hai to sab kuch ho jayega. Par....................


Rakesh bhai shuruwaat tu a kar........mann tai laagtaa kona bahar ki cheeja bana kaam chaal jaga...khet me naaj bhi naa ho saktaa...bahar ki cheeza bana to.

vicky84
December 19th, 2011, 06:42 AM
VP singhji,

There is no denying the fact that development of rural India leaves much to be desired. Though some good developments did take place post independence like land reforms and the green revolution, but the cumulative effort has been much less than what was required. Having said that, I consider your diagnosis of the problem in "urban vs rural" terms as flawed. Rural India is not under-developed because the emphasis has been on urban India. It is underdeveloped because there are far too many people subsiding on land than is possible.

I'd instead argue that the problem with rural India is because of the failure to develop urban Indian properly. Can we name one planned city that the govt. has come up with since independence? The likes of Gurgaon are extensions of existing cities. I am talking about stand alone cities built from the scratch. Through out the history of mankind, development has taken place around cities. All civilizations built cities which became the nerve centers for economic action for them. A village in itself just doesn't have the numbers for making any big project economically feasible. Just imagine a big hospital or a big mall or a university opened in a village. Where would the demand be to justify the investment? These things have to come up in the nearest town/city, which need to be well connected to the villages through roads, telephones, etc.

Population of India is 1.2bn, of which more than 70% live in rural India. Majority of these are involved in agriculture. This is more than 3 times since independence. So number of people living off the land has tripled, while the amount of land has remained almost the same. This is just not sustainable. When a peon earns more than a farmer, it just tells you that there are far too many farmers than is economically feasible. People understand that and hence you see mass scale migration to the cities.

On the other hand, the developed countries developed themselves on back of rapid industrialisation. As per wiki, in 1870, 70-80% of US population was employed in agriculture. Now that percentage is like 2 to 3%. Farmlands have become much bigger thus giving economy of scale to the farmer. Even in 1950, one US farmer supported around 15 citizens. By 2000, that number was close to 150. Compare this to India where one farmer is supporting less than 1.5 citizens including himself in 2010. This link has good information on development of agriculture in the US. We don't have to follow US example, but if you look at any developed country, the results would be similar.
http://www.csrees.usda.gov/qlinks/extension.html

The other issue is that the Indian state had been so busy making everything from soaps to steel that it didn't really have resources to concentrate on what should have been its priority- public goods like health, education, infrastructure. Plus it didn't have the money. Given the high growth of last decade and a half, the money issue has been sorted. The tax revenue to the govt. has increased a lot. The onus is now on the govt. to stop wasting money on wasteful subsidies and use it to build the infrastructure.

The issue is not with people migrating to the cities. That is a natural outcome of the inequilibrium between rural/urban economies. The govt. needs to plan for this migration. They need to build new cities that can absorb the rural population and provide them with means of livelihood apart from agriculture. The extension of the current cities should be planned and not haphazard like it is now. And most importantly, what is needed is to develop the skill-set of rural communities so that they have options other than agriculture. Uneducated rural migrants end up in the usual unskilled/semi-skilled jobs in cities. Instead, they should be imparted with skills that can be used in the manufacturing/service sector.

The topic itself is very broad in its scope. My write-up merely touches upon some key points.


The best post in this thread!! Wo Kehyaan karee nai ke "Jamma Nichod Kadh diya"...

singhvp
December 19th, 2011, 10:36 AM
The best post in this thread!! Wo Kehyaan karee nai ke "Jamma Nichod Kadh diya"...

Atish, contrary to Kapil’s argument, the cities are certainly eating into the rural budget. Take the example of cities in our proximity viz. Rohtak in Haryana. There is no comparison between the pace of development going on in Rohtak and the one in villages. I can cite the example of Delhi also where a whopping sum of money was spent recently towards CWG. Even half of this money could have provided basic amenities in hundreds of villages. The perception that rural India is underdeveloped because “there are far too many people subsiding on land than is possible” doesn’t seem to be based on facts. If we take into account the per capita outlay, the figure of budget spent in rural India would be much less in comparison to the per capita outlay in cities. Moreover, density of population has nothing to do with development. Assuming, there was no pressure on land in rural areas and the per capita income of the village dwellers was higher than their counterparts in cities, the villagers wouldn’t have spent their income on building infrastructure of common use viz. roads, electrification, schools and hospitals. They would have instead migrated to the places (cities) where these facilities already exist. The work of providing basic and common amenities is the responsibility of a government.

rakeshsehrawat
December 19th, 2011, 10:47 AM
Atish, contrary to Kapil’s argument, the cities are certainly eating into the rural budget. Take the example of cities in our proximity viz. Rohtak in Haryana. There is no comparison between the pace of development going on in Rohtak and the one in villages. I can cite the example of Delhi also where a whopping sum of money was spent recently towards CWG. Even half of this money could have provided basic amenities in hundreds of villages. The perception that rural India is underdeveloped because “there are far too many people subsiding on land than is possible” doesn’t seem to be based on facts. If we take into account the per capita outlay, the figure of budget spent in rural India would be much less in comparison to the per capita outlay in cities. Moreover, density of population has nothing to do with development. Assuming, there was no pressure on land in rural areas and the per capita income of the village dwellers was higher than their counterparts in cities, the villagers wouldn’t have spent their income on building infrastructure of common use viz. roads, electrification, schools and hospitals. They would instead migrate to the places where these facilities already exist. The work of providing basic and common amenities is the responsibility of a government.


Decision for place for CWG was wrong and it was taken only to make money. If the place would have been different situation would have been much more better and with less expenses they would have created a world class city anywhere in India.
These idiots care for themselves only.
Bhad mein gaya desh

vicky84
December 19th, 2011, 04:36 PM
Atish, contrary to Kapil’s argument, the cities are certainly eating into the rural budget. Take the example of cities in our proximity viz. Rohtak in Haryana. There is no comparison between the pace of development going on in Rohtak and the one in villages. I can cite the example of Delhi also where a whopping sum of money was spent recently towards CWG. Even half of this money could have provided basic amenities in hundreds of villages. The perception that rural India is underdeveloped because “there are far too many people subsiding on land than is possible” doesn’t seem to be based on facts. If we take into account the per capita outlay, the figure of budget spent in rural India would be much less in comparison to the per capita outlay in cities. Moreover, density of population has nothing to do with development. Assuming, there was no pressure on land in rural areas and the per capita income of the village dwellers was higher than their counterparts in cities, the villagers wouldn’t have spent their income on building infrastructure of common use viz. roads, electrification, schools and hospitals. They would have instead migrated to the places (cities) where these facilities already exist. The work of providing basic and common amenities is the responsibility of a government.


Sir,

Contrary to your argument, I think urban development derives rural growth.The contribution of Agriculture in the GDP has remained the same. In fact it has been little less over the last decade or so. Agriculture employs 60 percent of workforce in India while its contribution to the economy has decreased over the time. Whereas other sectors are doing well with lesser number of people. The idea is to create more skilled employment which can absorb unemployed people from agriculture sector.

I think Kapil is not saying that Government should stop spending money in rural areas. Infact spending has increased over the last decade. Reason is, the contribution of other sectors in the GDP. Government has got more money to spend on the infrastructure and rural development. But its not up to the mark. Neither in the Cities nor in the villages. Indian economy is struggling with Infrastructure bottlenecks. Every sector is being hit by old and inefficient infrastructure. In my previous posts, I have mentioned the same. Growth and Infrastructure is co related. Good infrastructure means more favorable conditions for businesses resulting in more prosperity.

karan
December 22nd, 2011, 02:47 AM
Everyone is talking about numbers, and hyperbole. You want your nation developed quickly--provide sanitation to all villages, cities. Provide closed drainage system for sewage and waste water. No more open sewage. This one thing will eliminate diseases like dengue, malaria, hepatitis, TB etc and the best benefit it will remove stench from air. Everything else will follow. Healthy population saves nation money on healthcare spending that in turns provide more money for other things. I was in Delhi last month, traveled little bit. I was flabbergasted to see so much stench in air, open sewage getting worse, so much trash. I saw the real meaning of "Incredible India" in Trash, Traffic, Population Overload.

vicky84
December 22nd, 2011, 05:46 AM
Everyone is talking about numbers, and hyperbole. You want your nation developed quickly--provide sanitation to all villages, cities. Provide closed drainage system for sewage and waste water. No more open sewage. This one thing will eliminate diseases like dengue, malaria, hepatitis, TB etc and the best benefit it will remove stench from air. Everything else will follow. Healthy population saves nation money on healthcare spending that in turns provide more money for other things. I was in Delhi last month, traveled little bit. I was flabbergasted to see so much stench in air, open sewage getting worse, so much trash. I saw the real meaning of "Incredible India" in Trash, Traffic, Population Overload.


This is called proactive. Whereas our government is reactive! And that makes a lot of difference!! I mean its not only with healthcare sector but it is very common in every sector or may be you can call it a culture in our country.

Prikshit
February 19th, 2012, 04:46 PM
Under development in is every sector, it needs a complete overhaul. But development is kept on hold due to political reasons. As there has to be some issues ready to ask vote for.

subhashmahla
November 17th, 2012, 12:16 PM
The manual is concerned with the type of analysis that will serve as a basis for identification and formulation of rural development activities. The proposed analysis is diagnostic in nature, and it focuses on the rural household. The design reflects the argument that a thorough understanding of what the rural people do and an understanding of why they do what they do is the most relevant basis for formulating rural development activities. The emphasis is placed on problem analysis and explanation. The interest is not so much to establish e.g. the percentage of farmers using improved seed but to explore why those farmers not using improved seed do not do so. The survey proposed in this manual will not cover hundreds of households, but rather an in-depth exploration of a limited number, and will contain an explanatory analysis that will attempt to clarify what determines behaviour at household level. The manual contains an introduction and an instruction on this type of explanatory analysis. It also contains a format for information generation. This format is an inventory of variables that are expected to be important in explaining characteristics of rural underdevelopment as they manifest themselves at the household level. The immediate objective of the proposed analysis is an attempt to 'explain' or at least to better understand the causes of certain characteristics of rural underdevelopment as they manifest themselves at the household level.

subhashmahla
February 19th, 2013, 11:07 PM
good work dudes keep up

DrRajpalSingh
May 15th, 2013, 01:00 PM
Investment in rural areas in small scale industrial units, upgradation of educational and health care institutions and supply of electricity and irrigation water would surely help in improving the standard of living only but also discourage migration of rural people to Cities and towns in search of these basic amenities.

Conversely, this would ease out the burden of ever squeezing city dwelling conditions and other related problems.

That is why Mahatma Gandhi, Ch. Chhotu Ram, Ch. Charan Singh and Ch. Devi Lal always raised the voice for rural development which is in real sense development of both Rural and Urban India.

The political parties must pay attention to this need of raising the share of amount to be spent on planned development in India towards rural development.

singhvp
January 7th, 2015, 05:36 AM
For long there has not been any feedback on the topic. Let us discuss the policy directive of the new government on betterment of the rural India. Is there any visible shift of paradigm for development of rural side with the advent of 'good governance'?

anandkhoja
March 4th, 2015, 09:29 PM
thanx mr.tewatia ...
As you have nicely explain about rural development and also about urbanization