People's Democracy

AS Indians we are quite used to appalling acts. We are routinely exposed to violent crime, to communal hatred and aggression, to attacks against women both inside and outside the home. We are even constantly observing economic crimes, from petty theft to the most blatant piracies of the rich super-criminals. But while we may be used to such things happening, we have not yet reached the point where such acts are completely condoned. Still, in our society and politics, acts of violence are condemned or opposed, or at least noticed.

But what about when the crime is not an act but the lack of it ? When it is not violent action, but inaction with violent effects, that is responsible for making people suffer ? Now that is very different for us, that is something that we both forgive and forget far more easily. That is why we allow a government to survive in power at the centre, even when it has perpetrated so much violence on the people through sheer inaction.

The year that has just ended provided stark, if obscene, examples of this in economic terms. Over the 1990s, the central governments have done much to change circumstances for the people of this country. Typically, these changes benefited some elements of large capital and urban middle classes, and made workers and peasants worse off. But they were usually the results of direct actions of the government. There were tax measures that reduced the burden on the rich and increased it for the poor. There were policies that killed off small scale industries and forced domestic consumers to pay more while benefiting multinational companies. There were measures that increased the price of food for most of the population, even those with incomes that were just around the official poverty line. Other policies reduced farmers’ incomes by making them pay more for their inputs, while making them more vulnerable to external trends.

These were direct actions with fairly clear results. But over the last year, the dominant mode of the central government has been inaction. And it has been inaction in the face of the most extreme provocation in terms of an economy that is near crisis in many sectors. This inaction has meant worsening material conditions for so many people that an impartial court would certainly find the government guilty of major crimes against its own citizens. So the inertia of the government over the past year has not simply been unfortunate, it has had more tragic dimensions.

Consider the basic issue of access to enough food for survival, which is now internationally recognised to be a basic human right. More than 300 million people living in this country are officially estimated to be absolutely poor. This means that their household incomes do not ensure them the nutrition that is considered to be the minimum necessary for survival. And yet this is a country which proudly proclaims self-sufficiency in food because of the extra food grain stocks the government holds. It is a country which is even trying to export the food stocks because they have become so large and expensive to hold.

The desired level of public food stocks is around 20 million tonnes. But between January and December of 2001, they increased from 40 million tonnes to 62 million tonnes. They grew so much because the high prices in the Public Distribution System meant that people simply stopped buying from it. So the Food Corporation of India was forced to hold on to the stocks and even add to them through more procurement from farmers.

There was a lot that the government could have done in this situation. It could have used the food stocks as part payment to go in for employment schemes that would provide jobs and build and maintain infrastructure. It could have tried to strengthen and expand the Public Distribution System and bring down prices to give more people access to the food grain. It could have focussed on providing more grain to areas of special need, like the impoverished and backward regions of Orissa where there was real distress because of hunger.

But in fact it did none of these. It just carried on as usual, without taking any special measures beyond announcing a small increase of 10 million tonnes to the state governments for food-for-work programmes. And so the food stocks have continued to build up, in the most criminal waste the country has seen. And starvation deaths have become common in certain regions and among particular economic groups, even though the press does not bother much with them.

Consider the employment situation in the country. The decade of the 1990s saw the lowest rate of growth of rural employment in Post-Independence history, and a sharp drop in urban employment growth as well. The basic problem of the time is lack of productive employment for the labour force. There are many reasons for this. There is the decline in public employment because of the fiscal squeeze, and the decline in demand for private production that comes from public expenditure. There is the devastating effect of "economic reforms" on small scale enterprises in both manufacturing and services, who faced more problems in getting bank credit because of financial liberalisation, and then faced competition from newly liberalised imports.

There is the shift towards more import-intensive or large-company-led production and consumption, which meant that fewer jobs are being created. There is the fact that the economic reforms have not put the economy on a higher growth trajectory, and in any case the growth that occurs does not create sufficient jobs. There is the ongoing recession in industry which has meant more closures and layoffs.

Once again, there was a lot that could have been done, to protect domestic producers from cheap imports, to provide some jobs directly and stimulate demand for private industry which would create more jobs indirectly. But in fact nothing was done, and so the problem of recession and unemployment continues to grow. Depriving workers of employment and the ability to feed their families must surely be a crime of major dimensions, but it has gone unnoticed in the mainstream media.

The list of possibilities and failed chances can go on and on : the mess in the power sector, the public sector enterprises, the decline of urban and rural infrastructure, the collapse of the public health system. And then the government tries to divert attention from these major crimes by creating warlike situations with Pakistan and other means. It is time that such criminal inaction is recognised for what it is, and punished collectively by the people.