LOAN WAIVER SCAM AND ACCOUNTING GIMMICK MARKS BUDGET 2008-09;
KARNATAKA DRAWS A BLANK


The decision of the Finance Minister and the UPA government to waive Rs 60,000 crores of farm loans is an election year gimmick that smacks of populism. Rather than reform agriculture to make it more market driven, encourage research and development, the government has chosen the easy way of loan waiver scheme with intentions of capturing the votes of farming community in the coming Lok Sabha elections. Much needed farming reforms could have been enacted in the current budget that would have improved farm incomes, escalated agriculture growth to 5%, making agriculture more vibrant in the country.


Instead, the government has chosen a populist measure to waive loans of farmers and project that benefits might likely reach four crore poor farmers. But the data and experience of the last farm bailout portrays a completely different picture. The last loan waiver scheme of Rs 10,000 crore orchestrated by the then Agriculture Minster Mr. Devi Lal along with the Minister of Finance Mr. Janardhan Poojary was termed as a big failure by many farmers and research scholars, since it never reached the intended beneficiaries. Instead it became a grandiose distribution to political cronies and party workers of the party in power. Lok Partiran feels the result this time around will likely be the same, with political cronies and party workers likely to siphon off major portions of the funds, with very little of the benefit reaching the poor farmer.


Contrary to Finance Minister's claim in the parliament about sound fiscal shape of the country, India's fiscal deficit is one of the highest in the world and the government finances are the worst amongst the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries. The budget presented by the Finance Minster in the parliament projects revenues of Rs 6,02,935 crores and revenue expenditure of Rs 6,58,119 crores projecting a total fiscal deficit of Rs 1,33,827 crores. These figures are a farce since it does not include subsides to Oil and Fertilizer companies. The government uses the Provident Fund account and Consolidated Fund of India (CFI) to make provision for these bonds, which is a terrible practice. While acknowledging this fact in the speech, Mr. Chidambaram again chooses convenience over good practice.


The overall debt position of the country is staggering and currently stands at more than 75% of the GDP and is a major source of weakness for finding much needed resources for development. The high debt ensures that interest payment makes up a major portion of the government expenditure. The current interest payment of Rs 1,90,807 crores indicates that Rs 60,500 per second is being added to the debt of the country. With sixth pay commission report due at the end of March 2008 and given that all political parties are in election mode, the government will be under enormous pressure to implement the recommendations. If the recommendation is anything like the last one – an increase of 30%, a massive burden will be imposed on both the central and state government finances that does not bode well for the debt position of the country.


With revenues buoyant, it would have been a sound fiscal move if the finance minister had indulged in the reforming of government subsidies. During the recent petrol and diesel price hike, even the left parties indicated that government should reform oil subsidies. Fertilizer subsidies could have been reformed with a start being made to direct the benefits directly to the farmers rather than route through state owned companies. With no respite in the rise in oil prices and urea prices in the world commodity markets, the government will have a very difficult time to contain the 2008-09 subsidy bill to the stated amount in the budget.


Reforms have also stagnated in the much needed infrastructure and power sectors of country. The Finance Minister has done very little in the budget to provide a fillip to these sectors. Roads need to be developed at a much faster pace than the current one and power shortages in critical industries are stifling growth in critical industries. An enactment of reforms in these sectors would have made people more optimistic about the Finance Minister's overall economic growth projection.


Finally, the Karnataka unit of Lok Paritran is appalled at the negligence of UPA government of the needs of the state in both the Union budget and Railway budget. Many measures were announced in the budget that focused on most unproductive states, while a very productive state like Karnataka is ignored and starved of central government resources in its quest for developmental. The Union government could have benefitted from the goodwill of people with a
sanction of an IIT in North Karnataka or housing scheme for Dakshina Karnataka. Lok Paritran if elected in the coming elections promises to fight these disparities and bring more development funds to fulfill the aspirations of the people of Karnataka.


Note: Karnataka Unit of Lok Paritran will make a detailed analysis of the Union Budget in the coming week.

















Government of India online Grievance Cell : http://darpg-grievance.nic.in/

==============================

====

Corrupt, useless and inefficient people are elected by the GOOD people

of the nation BY NOT VOTING !!

==================================

Lok Paritran, Karnataka State Unit

15, Wood Street, Ashok Nagar,

Bangalore - 560025

98455 97452, 98440 04439

www.lokparitran.org



Mahatma Gandhi said -



The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing

would suffice to solve most of the world's problems.



Be the change that you want to see.

Tata Nano: A curse for the upper classes or a blessing for the rest?

Its been quite some time since I wanted to write this article about the Tata Nano. I have had a bad feeling about traffic jams and pollution ever since the plans to have such a car were announced. And the negative feeling was there until the car was about to be released and I had a sort of realization that my views on the Nano were purely elitist.


The Tata Nano will lead to a lot of traffic problems and being a Bangalorean I would say we don't even need a Nano to choke up the existing potholed streets of Bangalore. Along with traffic congestion Nano is expected to bring in more air pollution and increased stress to people traveling on the roads.


Because its going to be the reason of the common man's pain, sneering at Nano sounds like an elitist attitude, an attitude that I would love to explain. Imagine that there are a group of people including me and you the reader as well. I happen to be the only one among the group to be having a car that costs Rs. 50 Lakhs. Applying the same elitist attitude, if my opinion is to ban all cars that cost less than Rs. 40 Lakhs so that the owners expensive cars get to zip around the city and also the city gets clean air, you know what kind of a hole people will call me :)


Thats why the attitude seems to be elitist. Probably the solution for the possible root of the problem lies in the government's response to the infrastructure woes of the country. Instead of pointing fingers at Nano - a car that has proved many cynics wrong, its a better idea to ask for better road infrastructure. And that is why I personally feel that the Nano is a blessing in disguise. The Indian system (the govt and the civil agencies) never wakes up until it gets a jolt and the jolt will be when Nano swarms the roads and cripples the complete system (although this looks a little far fetched, it is possible).


Widening the roads to any extent is not a good solution, especially when there is no concept of lanes in India and with the two and the three wheelers squeezing through the every available gap in the traffic its almost impossible to even dream of a disciplined traffic. Its surprising to see many people, especially the ones arguing against the Nano speak of implementing the congestion charge system similar to that of London while they are not thinking of the kind of amazing public transport present in this city. London has an excellent metro rail transport system and is very well complemented by the bus transport through out the city. With such an infrastructure it makes sense to have a congestion charge. But implementing it in any Indian city, the city would be better off by asking the businesses to shut down operations and move to some other country and people can swat flies sitting at home.


While Ratan Tata says that the idea of Nano is to provide a safer mode of transport to the Indian family of 4+ riding a 2-wheeler, Sunita Narain of the CSE claims that 2wheelers are a better option since they pollute less and is more inclined towards buses. Both sticking to their points, both are correct and sound noble in what they are saying. But IMHO a mass rapid transport system like a metro rail augmented with an excellent bus transport will do wonders to big cities in reducing the pollution levels, traffic density, travel time and convenience.

So a Nano may be perceived as a blessing or a curse, but the governments can do a lot towards having a good public transport system.

PS: I took the photos at the auto show :)

Racist Indians?

Its been a while since I came to this foreign land (US) and my views and perspectives of the world including India (and "us" Indians) have changed!


Then what makes me name this post with such a title? Well, in plain words, we Indians(99% of "us" Indians) are born racists, bred racists. It is in our blood to categorize people based on race, colour, language and many other things, which is what we learn throughout our schooling, thanks the the caste system and the politics that hangs on to it!


US is more diverse (than India) in every possible aspect and seems to have people who respect each other a lot i.e., at least they don't categorize people saying that you speak this language so you are so and so, you are from this country, so you are something else. Where as most desis have a name to call people from every possible corner of the planet. Eg: Makku, Kallu, Goraa, Chinki etc etc. The problem doesn't lie in the naming, but that attitude exhibited by many Indians, being immigrants or tourist/students who find a problem with the Americans (easpecially the ones who have been named as M,K,G or C). Not only this, when a desi lands in US and happens to be in a high desi density area, its very common to notice their comments saying OMG there are so many desis over here expressing both surprise and disappointment (sometimes) in their reaction !

Where does the problem lie? Is it in the Indian education system or the cultural upbringing of the typical Indian or the society in which we Indians grow up?

Here is the problem:

With every single political party thats there in the Indian Political Arena claiming cater to a certain caste/creed/religion and the past 60 years of not so glorious Independent India, the system in the country has been decaying with the rot spreading slowly and silently. Years of slavery under the British came to an end on 15th August 1947, but for the Indians it was a dawn of a new era, an era where illiterate, shrewd, criminal Indians would rule the literate (professionals like engineers, doctors, lawyers etc) Indians with the slaves of the Independent India never realizing that they are the literate slaves of the illiterate rulers! The current breed of political aspirants is so polarized that the debutents have to be criminal, casteist etc.

So is it the problem with these politicians? To some extent, yes. But to a greater extent the problem is with the non participatory democracy in the country that has made the good people (the slaves of the independent India) passive to the politics, even though the slaves are the ones to be screwed by the masters!

Why is it that the largest democracy of the world so non-participatory? Something wrong in the democracy itself? The current constitution of India was a great folly by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar??

The answer to the above questions may be Yes.

With the same old constitution being followed by our dear politicians, the country has no poption but to remain in the 50's while the rest of the world marches ahead! Dr. Ambedkar himself was of the opinion that the constitution has to evolve itself with time and also made it clear that the country will deteriorate if there are no amendments to the constitution.

Sadly, Dr. Ambedkar's name has been misused by many groups (politicians and the so called "dalit groups") to such an extent that the underprivileged people consider him to be there god but fail to realize how flexible the constitution was meant to be! Anyone trying to change or amend the constitution is called as anti-dalit or anti-Ambedkar person whereas the scores of amendments that have taken place behind the scenes are never questioned! Over the years these behind the scenes acts have been performed without the knowledge of the literate as well as the illiterate Indians!

Now, whats wrong if the constitution has been amended a few hundred times over the past sixty years? Isn't/Is it cool to have had so many amendments?

The problem lies in the ulterior motives of the corrupt political ruling parties that have raped the Independent India. The amendments have been done to facilitate corruption at all levels. Most of the amendments degraded the constitution to the next level. While these amendments are never questioned by the dalits for their lack of knowledge, every good amendment that is anti-corruption gets very good publicity, which is opposed by the parties and the dalit groups (that its an insult to Dr. Ambedkar)!



To be continued ............

Great Video from TED Talks

Fumes from indoor cooking fires kill more than 2 million children a year in the developing world. MIT engineer Amy Smith details an exciting but simple solution: a tool for converting farm waste into cleaner-burning fuel. Plain-spoken and passionate, Smith talks about some other tools she and her students are creating, including an incubator that stays warm without electricity and a grain mill that frees women from hours of grinding every day. These are basic tools with world-changing results.

About Amy Smith:

Amy Smith designs cheap, practical fixes for tough problems in developing countries. Among her many accomplishments, the MIT engineer received a MacArthur "genius" grant in 2004 and was the first woman to win the Lemelson-MIT Prize for turning her ideas into inventions


Source: TED Talks

Dalit Freedom Network

This post is about an organization that claims to do good work, but it has many not believable facts making me write strongly against it. I have no personal anguish against the real dalits nor the real Christian missionaries, but this article portrays my anguish against the fakies in this world of deception! People who feel offended by any real religion/caste discussions are advised not to read the article.

Quoted from the DFN website

"The Dalit Freedom Network partners with the Dalits in their quest for religious freedom, social justice, and human rights by mobilizing human, informational, and financial resources.

We at the Dalit Freedom Network value the contributions of others who have gone before us, and through those efforts made the world a better place. Therefore, we seek to carry forward the legacy of William Wilberforce who worked for the abolition of slavery and the reformation of society; the legacy of William Carey who worked for the abolition of Sati, the practice of burning widows on the funeral pyre of their husbands; the legacy of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar and Mahatma Phule who pioneered the movement for the abolition of caste and the Dalit quest for freedom and dignity; the legacy of Mother Teresa who showed God’s love in word and deed to the sick and dying; and to follow the command of Jesus Christ who called us to be ‘the salt of the earth’ and ‘the light of the world’."

Sounds good?

DFN claims to do the "good things" for the dalits and its intention is to abolish the caste system. Of course it is a benevolent idea to help the downtrodden, but, a few questions arise in my mind, for I have been a skeptic of such "social z or NGOs" who claim to do good work.

The only proof of authenticity is the ECFA (Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability), which is (quoted from the ECFA website) "an accreditation agency dedicated to helping Christian ministries earn the public’s trust".

Why aren't there any other affiliations, memberships, approvals appearing on the website???

Why should the NGO show only the ECFA membership seal and not bother about any Indian certification agencies?? ECFA guarantees that the money is used for good purpose (according to their rules and regulations).

Quoted from their best practices website, the very first 'Standard' says "Every member organization shall subscribe to a written statement of faith clearly affirming its commitment to the evangelical Christian faith ".

So, by their own standards, it seems like ECFA and members of ECFA are committed to Christian Evangelism!

Caste system, Dalits, SC/ST are all the 'tags' that are used by the political parties to garner votes from the most gullible vote bank, because of which I strongly feel that DFN is in India to mislead the people.

The donors may assume that the donations go to the actual dalit projects (its good if this really happens), but there is a clause clearly stating that "if" for any reason the funds collected are in excess, it will be used for other projects.

A full scale critique would require a complete (on the ground) investigation, but with the limited amount of sources of information, its not fair to blame the organisation on no grounds. This last few lines may sound contradicting when compared to the rest of the article, hence its up to the reader's intelligence/prejudices/suspicions to agree/disagree with suspicion pointed out over here.

Will update this article after further pondering :)