Mukul-da,
You are very courageous - berating your brother-in-law in an open forum!
Umesh
mc mahant <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
mc mahant <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
A little history!1986 end 1987--HN Das was eased out from Chief Secy post and sent to manage the new Administrative Staff College(to perpetuate babudom-And probably as Easy money had to be made giving the contract ,to set it up ----) coming up.I was new to Guahati. I was of course in the same class at Cotton -and our wives are cousins.So he sent me an invitation to Guest-Lecture various batches of Civil Sevants in initiating and refresher IAS/ACS courses ther --on the subject of Project/Planning.I always began with myths debunking; Indira's "Give the poor Bastards more money"-"HNDas's -micro-financing the way Gramin Bank was doing in Bangladesh" are not needed in Assam.What we needed- I stated LOud and Clear-are OXomiya Toka, Straight Trade Deals,Open Skies, and Planning and Projecting BY us FOR us Of us. I also told India will go to dogs sooner rather than later if these are not implemented forthwith.Word travelled to Dispur and Delhi.The car stopped coming to collect me after about 2 months!And India Continues in their path of Calculated Self-Destructionmm
From: umesh sharma <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: Rini Kakati <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, [email protected]
Subject: Re: [Assam] From The Sentinel Editorial: A Measure of Assam?sBackwardness
Date: Thu, 1 Dec 2005 21:25:11 +0000 (GMT)
I think the argument for Assam getting a better deal should include the follwoing negatives it has faced since India's Partition after British left --and left it with just a 22km "chicken neck" connecting Assam with Rest of India -- its is a unique situation not faced by most backward and populous states such as Orissa, Rajasthan or Bihar:-- much much much reduced access to trade routes, consumer markets, intellectual and educational avenues/institutions.All this translates that Assam(and rest of NE) is in the position of Alaska or Hawaii in US - cut off from rest of the country -- so needing special attention and funding. But as PA Sangma argued -- NE is already getting lot more AID than any other region -- so competitiveness must go up too.Any comments?UmeshThe author wrote:"Population of the backward districts being the criterion of financial allocation States like Assam would not get much because the divisible pool is limited and the more populous States such as Bihar, UP MP, and Orissa will take away the lions share. "
Rini Kakati <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:The second one would be State Infrastructure and Reforms Window. This would also be a "grant facility for providing viability gap funding which will enable resources to be leveraged for core infrastructure projects at inter-district or State- level in less developed States. These projects will include projects that would otherwise be considered as not viable financially but are necessary for removing backwardness. The amounts to be made available to States will be in proportion to the population residing in their backward districts.In each Five Year Plan, this objective of achieving regional balance has been prominently emphasized. However, each subsequent Plan document has bewailed the fact that the objective has not been achieved. In the latest mid-term appraisal (MTA) of the Tenth Five Year Plan, made in June, 2005, it has been candidly admitted that, "regional imbalances have actually got accentuated, particularly over the past 15 years." It has been further asserted that "with the opening up of the economy and removal of controls, the play of market forces may tend to exacerbate disparities." The MTA has, therefore, prescribed two broad approaches to address this problem. "The first involves proper identification of backward areas and targeting them with additional resources and investments to help them overcome the infrastructural deficiencies that contribute to their backwardness." It then states that "the second approach would be to seek to improve the overall environment for the economic growth of less developed States and areas through a combination of major infrastructure interventions, institutional reforms and appropriate incentive structures."A Measure of Assams BackwardnessH N DasI n her concluding address to the National Development Councils meeting held on July 12 and 13, 1984 the former PrimeMinister late Indira Gandhi had made a profound statement when she said that "we are acutely aware that India as a nation cannot remain together if disparities in incomes and living conditions of different regions, different States, different communities, tribes and castes are not removed. We look at the Centre-State relationship also in this perspective. Balanced all round development, irrespective of the resource capabilities of the units has been one of the major objectives of our Plan."On the operational plane, the Union Budget for 2005-06 hasalready announced the establishment of a Backward Regions Grant Fund (BRGF). This decision is based on the National Common Minimum Programme (NCMP) of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) Government. The MTA has recommended that "the objective of bringing about greater regional balance must be the overriding consideration for determining the use of Central funds that flow as Central assistance to State Plans." In order to achieve this objective MTA has recommended that BRGF should be structured to have two windows. The first one would be the Backward Districts Window and will initially cover all districts which are included in the Rastriya Sama Vikash Yojana (RSVY) list. It will then be enlarged to cover the hard core backward states of Bihar, Orissa, Jharkhand, Chattisgarh, Assam, east UP and east MP. According to MTA "elimination of minimum normative gaps in local area developments; in physical infrastructure; in social attainments in health and education and land productivity should be the prime objectives of financing interventions from this window."It is good that this nagging problem of regional imbalance which might hurt the very unity andintegrity of the country is now being seriously addressed. But one doubt persists. Population of the backward districts being the criterion of financial allocation States like Assam would not get much because the divisible pool is limited and the more populous States such as Bihar, UP MP, and Orissa will take away the lions share. In this connection, I have been advocating a special treatment for Assam for more than two decades ever since the Seventh Five Year Plan not on emotional grounds but on solid analysis of hard facts and relevant data. While preparing the Seventh Five Year plan (1985-90) as the Government of Assams (GOA)s Planning and Development Commissioner I had made extensive research into the behaviour of the time series of per capita income and reworked the figures to find that we were better off in 1950 than in 1984 in comparative terms in relation to all India and other State indexes. I had also shown that year after year Assam had ben given less per capita plan assistance than the all India average. That is why the growth rate has been sluggish and there was actually a deceleration of Assams economy. (H N Das, "A New Paradigm of Development: Regional Imbalance and Assam", The Economic Times, October 23, 1985.) Since then this fact has been publicized by various politicians, economists and others over and over again in various forums. After my retirement in 1995, I made another study of the situation with 1970-71 price index as the base. But I came to the same conclusion that Assam was comparatively better off 40 years earlier. (H N Das, "A model for Assams Development", The Sentinel, April 24, 1995.The recent figures show that while the all Indiaaverage per capita income (PCI) was Rs 7,690 in 1993-94. Assams PCI was Rs 5,715, that of Punjab was Rs 12,710 and of Maharashtra Rs 12,183. The small States of Chandigarh, Delhi and Goa were far better off. But these states cannot be compared with the bigger States among which Punjab and Maharashtra were better off than the rest. In 2003-04, that is, eleven years later, at constant 1993-94 prices the figures stood at Rs 11,799 (all India), Rs 6,520 (Assam), Rs 15,800 (Punjab) and Rs 16,479 (Maharashtra). This means that while the all India PCI increased by Rs 4,109 Assams PCI increased by only Rs 805. During the same period, Maharashtras PCI increased by Rs 4,296 and Punjabs PCI increased by Rs 3,090. The highest increase of Rs 6,983 was, however, recorded by Gujarat from Rs 9,796 in 1993-94 to Rs 16,779 in 2003-04. It is very unfortunate that Assam lagged behind so badly in spite of the fact that not only our own politicians but also the Government of India (GOI) and the Planning Commission were aware about the lower plan allocations to Assam. If we analyse the year wise figures for Assam during this period we find that in 1994-95, the States PCI increased by only 0.4 per cent, in 1995-96 by 0.4 per cent, in 1996-97 by 0.6 per cent and in 1997-98 by 0.1 percent. Then suddenly it fell by 2.3 percent in 1998-99. That was the trough. From the next year onwards the growth rate of Assams pci started slowly recovering. It became 2.1 per cent in 1999-2000, 2.7 per cent in 2000-01, 2.1 per cent in 2001-02, 2.6 per cent in 2002-03 and 4.8 per cent in 2003-04.There is no doubt that an improving trend has been recorded. But this is rather slow. Again, the overall PCI increaseof only Rs 805 for Assam against the all India increase of Rs 4,109 during the eleven year period from 1993 to 2003 should raise alarm bells and should be seriously viewed by all concerned. This is specially important because Assams PCI in 2003-04 (Rs 6,520) is Rs 5,279 less than the all India average (Rs 11,799) and Rs 10,259 less the highest big State PCI of Gujarat (Rs 16,779). Another indicator would show how Assam is falling behind. In 1993-94, Assams share in the aggregate Indian state domestic product at constant 1993-94 price was 1.93 per cent. By 2003-04, it fell to 1.40 per cent. This is really unfortunate to put it mildly. Seen against the fact that Assam has 2.59 per cent of Indias population this looks absolutely dismal for a State which is so rich in natural resources.I must emphasize that my analysis is completely based on my own research and reflection and on data available from GOI. It seems that an organization called for Policy Alternatives from New Delhi have given out certain conclusions on the same line very recently. Since they are from outside the State naturally much credence has been placed on their views specially by the local media.Finally, I would once again appeal that something drastic, something revolutionary needs to be done in order to reverse the trend. And this must be done urgently. GOA must derive the maximum benefit from BRGF. It must also draw whatever funds are available from the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme and the Bharat Nirman Programme. It may be mentioned that quite substantial funds are available under these two schemes and unless the concerned officials are activated and the Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRI) are made aware, Assam may not be able to obtain its due shares. Several other schemes are also available for drawl of additional funds.However, as past experience has shown nothing much will be gained if the funds are not properly utilised. For this purpose, the system of governance must improve. Civil society must agitate against corruption, inefficiency and sloth. Moreover, PRIs and local bodies must be given due status and responsibilities in the proper spirit of the 73rd and 74th amendments of the Constitution read with Article 243 and Eleventh and Twelfth Schedules. As specifically stated in the MTA the District Planning Councils must be appointed and properly empowered. I had repeatedlyreminded that the provisions of NCMP of the UPA Government contain quite a few provisions which will be beneficial to Assam. I had also advocated that Assam must take advantage of the provisions and the allocations made in the current years (2005-06) Union Budget. In fact the entire State Plan of Assam must be recast, revised and revamped.(The writer was Chief Secretary, Assam, during 1990-95)
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Umesh Sharma
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Ed.M. - International Education Policy
Harvard Graduate School of Education,
Harvard University,
Class of 2005
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