Re-energise Rural INDIA

There was a sense that "India lives in her villages". Villages were considered as the backbone of our nation. The farmer was seen as carrying the nation's future on his shoulders. At least, that was the image. But, today, the situation is differen.
Rural India is in tears. Farm Income have collapsed. Hunger has grown very fast. Employment has collapsed. Non-farm employment has stagnated. Millions move towards towns and cities where, too, there are few jobs to be found. Many move towards a status that is neither farmer nor worker. A credit squeeze has pushed lakhs of farmers into bankruptcy. The Government tells us over 1,12,000 farmers have committed suicide since 1993. These are suicides driven by debt.
Large sections of rural India are starving. Rural masses have lost the purchasing power. Indian poverty is predominantly rural, where landless Labourers and casual workers are worst affected economic group. Schedule Castes and Tribes, women and children face more deprivation than others. Over large tracts of the country there is not enough work, not enough income, not enough food to eat and not enough water to drink for the rural population. So Rural India is in Acute distress.
Problem of Malnutrition :-
• A Man should eat at least 2400 Kilo Calorie food in a day according to National and International standard scale.
• Among the poorest section of the country 30 per cent of the people take 1600 Kilo Calorie food or less than it.
• In our country each year around 24 Lakh and 20 Thousand children of average age less than 5 years die because of malnutrition.
• In Maharashtra alone 1590 children died in 15 districts in just four months.
• More than 75% pregnant women, young women and less than 3 years of children are suffereing from malnutrition and mental and body weakness.
• An ADB study conducted by Administrative staff college of India, Hyderabad (1997) calculates malnutrition cost to India's GDP as 3-9% in 1996 (approximately $ 10-28 billion)
• The problem is no longer of absolute food shortage, but of bad distribution and poor governance.
• In a democratic country like India the problem of malnutrition is a matter of shame. The government should give priority in its agenda to reduce the problem of malnutrition.
Hunger and Poverty :-
Poverty is an extremely complex phenomenon, which manifests itself in a range of overlapping and interwoven economic, political and social deprivation. These include lack of assets, low income levels, hunger, poor health, insecurity, physical and psychological hardships, social exclusion, degradation and discrimination and political powerlessness and disarticulation. Therefore, policy makers should address not only the low-income or no-income and consumption aspects of poverty but also the complex social dimensions.
The Problem of unemployment :-
The Unemployment problem is also not tackled by the government effectively
Officially there are 3 crore educated unemployed youth from Rural areas registered with the employment exchanges across the country.
Highest Number of unemployed youth registered in :
West Bengal 46.74 Lakhs
Tamil Nadu 36.48 Lakhs
Maharashtra 33.66 Lakhs
Kerala 22.65 Lakhs
Karnataka 12.94 Lakhs
Assam 11.69 Lakhs
Haryana 6.57 Lakhs
Punjab 3.44 Lakhs
Delhi 7.39 Lakhs
Himachal Pradesh 5.82 Lakhs
Chandigarh 43000
Jammu & Kashmir 84000
This Problem of unemployment and under employment must be tackled on a war footing.
Total negligence of Basic Amenities :- There is a sharp contrast in Houses and Housing amenities in urban and rural areas. Housing in rural India is dominated by small huts, made of mud and clay. People have to fetch drinking water after travelling a minimum distance of 500 meters. Rural India still depends on kerosene for lighting. There is no bathroom and latrine facility for more than 80% of people in villages.
Exploitation of Poverty and Hunger :-
In Villages, due to poverty, Naxalite activities are growing
• Naxalite violence is continuing unabated. Available reports indicate that 125 districts, in 12 states, have now been affected by Naxalite violence in varying degrees and another 24 districts were being targeted by Naxal outfits.
• Till August this year, Naxalite violence has claimed 405 lives in 1140 incidents against 348 deaths in 1138 incidents in the corresponding period last year.
• CPI (ML) leader Kanu Sanyal proclaimed. "State power could be seized only through armed revolution. Guerilla war alone can expand the small bases of armed struggle to large extensive areas and develop the people's Army".
• Naxalites painted the streets of Calcutta with slogans such, as "China's chairman is our chairman".
• They had dumped Mahatama Gandhi literature in a heap and set fire to it in Jadavpore University.
• Naxals declared that "Annihilation of class enemies" is their goal.
• Who have given the Naxals the right to brand a particular person as class enemy ?
• The Naxals insurgency of three and half decades caused immense loss of life. About 2800 persons lost their lives so far. A large number had lost their limbs., about 10,000 children became orphaned.
• The Naxals blasted Govt. Buildings, Railway Stations, Bridges, Telephone Exchanges, Microwave Stations, Police Stations and burnt more than 1,000 RTC buses.
• The value of public and private property destroyed by various Naxal groups run into several crores.
• In each case of death by the extremists, the victims were severely beaten in the presence of the villagers to terrorise them and then ultimately the victim was killed.
• In one case, where a couple belonging to the backward class were returning home from their fields in the evening, the extremists caught hold both of them, severed the head of the husband and put it in the palms of his wife and his wife was made to parade in the village with the severed head of her husband in her palms.
• Who will stop these evil men and put an end to their gruesome inhuman violence and killings ?
Rural, Urban divide :-
Food grain, milk, vegetables, fruits etc, are produced in the villages and given to urban nourishment. So, the blood of the villages is the cement with which the urban edifice has been built. This development process has helped urban India to a greater extent than rural India. So it is high time, we must direct the development process to strengthen rural India and bridge the rural urban divide.
Farmers, who feed the country are committing suicide. It is an alarming situation in the country side. Poverty dominates the life of Indian farmers who produce food grains and feeds more than one billion people. It is the matter of national concern that the farmers of Maharashtra, Punjab, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, West Bengal etc., are committing suicide. It is most saddening, unfortunate and horrifying. Majority of farmers are suffering due to burden of heavy debt. Farmers are suffering due to lack of availability of good seeds, electricity, water, lack of credit facility and marketing arrangement. There is absolute poverty, ignorance and lack of resources, which altogether have caused great pain and misery. It is a matter of shame, that the farmers, who feed the entire nation, are unable to feed their own children.
We all need to eat. The farmer in fields is thus making a sacrifice, in terms of opportunity, by remaining in it. We need to first recognise agriculture as an important field for public good and identify ourselves with the farmers.
A country wide movement is necessary to put an end to the suicide of farmers. Suicides are the result of debts, which were a consequence of the rising cost of production and falling prices. Something very fundamental is happening. The trends of growing dependence of formers in the suicide belt on hybrid and genetically modified seeds, which were costly and could not be saved.
In the year 1998, the world banks structural adjustment policies forced India to open up its seed sector to global corporations. The global corporations changed the input economy overnight. Farm saved seeds were replaced by corporate seeds which needed fertilizers and pesticides and could not be saved.
Corporate seeds :-
As seed saving is prevented by patents as well as by the engineering of seeds with non-renewable traits, seed has to be bought for every planting season by poor peasants. A free resource available on farms become a commodity which farmers were forced to buy every year. This increases poverty and leads to indebtedness. As debt increase and become unplayable, farmers are compelled to sell kidneys or even commit suicide. Seed saving gives farmers life. Seed monopolies rob farmers of life.
In the 1990s the worst sorrows of Farmers came to the surface. In the beginning it was believed that most of the suicides were happening among the cotton growers, especially those from Vidarbha. A look at the figures given out by the state Crime Records Bureau, indicate that it was not just the cotton farmer but farmers as a professional category were suffering, irrespective of their holding size. More over, it was not just the farmers from Vidarbha, but all over Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka and Punjab, farmers suicide continues unabated.
UPA Government at the centre is anti Farmers and antipoor :-
The UPA government at the centre is, more bothered about registering economic growth rates to attract foreign investors, with the plight of the poor in India becoming a matter of secondary interest. Heartless central government is importing lakhs of tonnes of wheat from abroad.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is in the habit of forming committees for every serious issue, but when the report is ready, he usually becomes very reluctant to accept the recommendations. It is therefore important to exert pressure on the government to evolve a cohesive policy to check the spate of farmers suicides. The directionless government announces package after package. But the farmers are not happy with the 'relief packages' announced by the state and central government. they want the large issues driving the suicides are addressed. "Give us a price, not a package" is the demand of the farmers. They expect the government to actually implement the various money - lending Acts that already exists to prevent the alienation of the farmers land holding. Crop - insurance scheme must be made more farmer friendly, with lower premiam and less red-tape. Farmers should have quality agricultural inputs like seeds, fertilizers and pesticides. They should be prevented from cheating by unscrupulous suppliers of Industrial inputs for agriculture. Reliable agricultural advisories for farmers on form related practices are needed Better access to markets for agricultural produce to get higher rates for farmers produce will help them to a great extent. Better Education and Health facilities must be available in the villages itself. Since expenditure on these basic needs has been one of the most important financial drain in the village.
Small Farming is almost impossible :-
The direction of policy on farming - central to rural India is simple in its main idea to take agriculture out of the hands of farmers and place it firmly in the hands of large corporations. Every move, every policy, only pushes this idea further forward. We are witnessing the largest displacement in our history. It is not happening in a dam or a mining project. It is happening in agriculture. This is not being done with tanks and bulldozers. The Government make farming impossible for small holders. We have to stop this negative process.
Rejenuvation of Rural India is the need of the Hour :-
The entire country, its opinion makers, intelligentsia must identify themselves with sufferings of the poor and downtrodden. The nations prosperity is touching selected few of urban India while majority in the villages are the worst sufferers. There is an urgent need to quickly and radically change the living conditions of the disadvantaged in this country. Development of rural areas and rural people must be the primary concern of the economic planning and development process of the country. We must guarantee the wage employment, ensure food security, rural education, health, housing, roads, and drinking water. Better rural infrastructure can improve the economic status of the villages. The true cure to our problems is to create more jobs and better jobs. A report of the ministry of statistics and programme implementation which showed that BJP ruled states have faired better in implementing schemes like Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojana, Village Electrification and assistance to SC/ST's and the weaker sections are really a matter of satisfaction.
V. Shanmuganathan