Dear Chandan-da:
Integration into the world economy is not
just about the misery-peddling world bank, IMF and mindless schemes concocted
by bureaucrats around the world. It is also about groups in India being
able to connect to meaningful non-profit, charitable and other voluntary
organizations in the west, eventually to ordinary people here who happen to care
– as has happened in the case of AID – about being able to fund-raise
on an international basis. Once upon a time not too long ago, the isolationist state
in India
would have brutally crushed all such linkages. There would have been no
infrastructure to permit transfer of funds, knowledge, access. Today, quite a
bit of the incentives for doing NGO work comes directly or indirectly from
such international linkages. And its not just money – its also the fact
that your work is heard and understood by people who care across the world, the
flow of information and their support – these are important factors. Whether
the state likes it or not, the world has entered India. Not just for the rich
consumers. But in other silent ways -
Santanu.
From: Chan Mahanta
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Tuesday, January 03, 2006
12:12 PM
To: Roy, Santanu;
[email protected]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED];
[EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: RE: [Assam] Assam Trip-2
Thanks Santanu. I am pleased to be able to spread the good news, tiny
as it may be, isolated as it may be.
My classmate and close friend from IIT, Murthy Sudhakar,of South Pasadena, California,
also is doing something similar in Tamilnadu, with Dalits and other such people
left behind by the kind of 'PROSPERITY' Ram and others love to cite in these
'PERFORMING' states.
I was talking to Sudhakar the other day about RVC. He raised a point,
without MY coaching him :-), about something I debated extensively here in
Assam Net months back- that NGOs cannot be a replacement for the GOs, who have
the resources and the responsibilities for doing what these NGOs are doing with
little resource and fighting the GOs who work against the interest of these
people, or do not co-operate or even pose as obstacles.
But without NGOs like RVC, so many would be in so much worse shape than
they are.
Most of all though I wanted to touch upon the point you raised about
"--integration of the Indian
economy into the global economy ".
*** This is something that is a very complicated issue and I have
learned, a little bit, how such 'global bodies' as the Asian Development Bank,
the World Bank, and WTO agreements are ACTIVELY and DIRECTLY harming many if
not MOST of these people in the margins of our societies, their livelihoods,
their environments and their very existence.
Let me give you one tiny example someone gave me:
World Bank sponsored
EXPERTS from
Australia,
private CONSULTANTS
that is ( they do
not come free like NGO Volunters you know?)
were in
Meghalaya,apparently to study and recommend sanitary latrine
designs or some such
thing, and had one ( or three I forget) prototype
built, and
ran up a bill for $ 3,000,000 or some such outrageous
number, which is a
part of an even larger an mount being LENT
to Meghalaya by the
World Bank.
(And just for
perspective, RVC helps build a semi-sanitary latrine for
these uprooted
people, with a fiberglass pan with a trap , 2 meter
long PVC piping, a
bamboo enclosure withthatched roof and a
meter deep X meter
in diameter perforated concrete lined pit for
about $ 20 each (
Rs. 800 or so).
Does this money come
free for Meghalaya? You take a guess. Would
the politicians NOT
want to take this kind of a loan for DEVELOPMENT?
Again take a guess.
When will the loan become due? Who will pay for it?
And what kind of
DEVELOPMENT would Meghalaya get in return?
I may not be
accurate of the details. But you get the picture,
don't you? There are
elements of a HUGE, monster scam in these deals.
Same as in the mega
loans for mega dams in Arunachal or elsewhere.
Similar is the story
of the Bogibeel bridge that is causing major
havoc -- that you
will believe only when you see what is going
on out there. Some
people will make out like bandits. And the returns
could be waved as
PROGRESS, but is it really?
Ravindranath gave me another example about the negative impact of WTO's
market opening. The people he ministers to are people who will be sold useless
goods--like make-up, fancy clothing, cell-phones, but will buy NOTHING in
return from them. It is not MUTUAL trading! It is ONE sided EXPLOITATION.
You being the economist will know far more about these than I would.
But from the little I saw and heard, it does not at all look good Santanu. It
left me very angry.
Perhaps you will enlighten us.
At 10:57 AM -0600 1/3/06, Roy,
Santanu wrote:
Dear Chandan-da:
Thank you for writing about the RVC. It
was very uplifting. I think we should try to do something to help in our own
small ways - whenever we can.
Of course, hats off to the people who
dedicate their life and skills to such organizations.
For me, a greater sign of hope is the fact
that an environment for such voluntary enterprises exists now. I don't think it
would have been possible fifteen or even ten years ago. The success stories of
some skillful and dedicated NGOs in other parts of the country (along with the
bad eggs that are just out to make money), the recognition they receive now
from society at large and the incentives from international bodies and global
voluntary organizations that are a part of the integration of the Indian
economy into the global economy - have created some of the essential conditions
for sprouting of such activities in more neglected areas of the country where
none but the missionaries had gone before. I also think it is a sign that
sufficient "peace" exists for people to feel secure enough to work in
such long term projects and that bodes well for the future.
Regards,
Santanu.
