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Miles away were the godowns of the Food Corporation of India (FCI) - full
of grain, some of it rotting and a feast for rats.
This is the spectre of starving India.
In 1988, in the case of Kishen Patnaik, when starvation deaths were
brought to the notice of the Apex Court, the court accepted the assurances
of the Government of Orissa that the situation would be looked into, and
hoped that starvation deaths would cease. Ten years later, another
petition was filed, detailing hundreds of starvation deaths. In 2001,
when Kavita Srivastava of the People's Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL),
Rajasthan, filed a petition, the condition of the people had not changed.
No will to Act
Why is it that with 60 million tonnes of grain in surplus of the buffer
stock, India still has hunger on this scale? Why are half of India's
children malnourished? No answer. Shanta Kumar, the minister responsible,
remains unruffled despite widespread condemnation. And the Prime Minister
appeared on television recently to say that the reports of starvation
deaths are false and politically motivated.
All this in a situation where it has been calculated that it is cheaper to
give grain away free to the poor than to transport and store it! A
compassionate court would have none of that. It found it incomprehensible
that a litigant would have to move the highest court merely for a
direction to government to implement its own schemes.
"Cut the flab somewhere else", said the Court when confronted with the
argument that the states had no funds to feed hungry children.
Schemes in disarray
The British evolved a Famine Code which ensured that anyone needing food
in a famine area had only to turn up at a work site - a road, a school
building, a watershed management programme - to get work. At the end of
the day, she would get half of her wages in grain. Famine records show
that the prompt implementation of food for work programmes reduced hunger
and prevented starvation deaths. For those unable to work - the old,
infirm and disabled - there was a dole of fifty paise per day.
Fifty years after Independence, this Famine Code is in disuse and the
elaborate procedure laid down for tackling famines disregarded. The
watered-down remedy - the Employment Assurance Scheme - provided for
employment for two family members on food for work projects for 100 days
in a year. This was never implemented. And recently, the Prime Minister
announced from the Red Fort that the scheme was being upgraded and renamed
the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojana. This 'upgraded' scheme provided work
for only ten days in a year!
The ration card system, the only mechanism in place to feed the poor, is
in disarray. In India's capital, the identification of Below Poverty Line
(BPL) families started after the court case and there were many complaints
of corruption in the issuing of forms.
The Midday Meal Scheme, introduced as far back as 1995 and requiring a
cooked meal to be given to all children in government and
government-assisted schools, was implemented fully only in Tamilnadu.
The Delhi government only gave a few biscuits to its schoolchildren.
The Annapoorna Scheme, which provides grain to the poorest of the poor at
Rs. 2 per kg was also not implemented. The beneficiaries of the National
Old Age Pension Scheme usually received their pensions six months late if
at all.
No wonder that the Comptroller & Auditor General, in his Year 2000 Report,
found significant systematic weaknesses in the fair price shop system. He
found the reports of employment generated not genuine. The Employment
Assurance Scheme, which promised a hundred days of food for work, in
practice provided only nine days of work. Scarce resources were lost in
the labyrinth of a slothful administrative system. The report found
one-fifth of rural households facing the prospect of hunger. Forty
percent of all households did not get two square meals a day. Concluding,
the Computer & Auditor General found serious flaws in design, execution
and monitoring of the schemes.
A study conducted by the Tata Economic Consultancy Services found a large
number of bogus ration shops, and 30 per cent of the grain being diverted.
Supreme Court Orders
The court directed that the targeted public distribution system be fully
implemented by January 2002 and that all governments complete their
identification of BPL families, issue ration cards and distribute 25 kg of
grain per family per month by that date.
A similar order was passed for the Antyodaya Anna Yojana scheme, under
which the poorest of the poor get grain at Rs. 2 per kg. The Supreme
Court directed that the governments should consider giving the grain free
to people who are too poor to buy it. It directed governments to provide
a cooked midday meal in all government and government-assisted schools.
It directed governments to implement the National Old Age Pension Scheme
fully by January 2002 and to make payments of pension by the seventh of
each month.
Similarly directions were made in respect of the Annapoorna Scheme, the
Integrated Child Development Scheme, the National Maternity Benefit Scheme
and the National Family Benefit Scheme.
The last order is dated 8.5.02. In this order the gram panchayats have
been empowered to frame the Food-for-Work schemes, wherein special
emphasis is to be given for the poor, women and dalits. Contractors are
prohibited. The gram sabhas are also empowered to conduct a social audit
of all the food and employment schemes and to report instances of misuse
of funds. On such reports being made, the authorities are required to
punish the guilty.
The gram sabhas are also empowered to monitor the implementation of the
various schemes and to have access to relevant information as to how
beneficiaries are selected and how benefits are disbursed. A grievance
redressal procedure is set out in this order. Complaints of non
implementation of the Supreme Court's order is to be made to the CEO /
Collector and these complaints are to be acknowledged with a receipt.
Ultimately, it is the Chief Secretary who is made responsible. Dr. N.C.
Saxena, former Planning Secretary and Mr. S.R. Shankaran, former
Secretary, Rural Development have been appointed as commissioners of the
Supreme Court for the purpose of looking into people's grievances. The
Supreme Court has also directed government to frame clear guidelines for
the proper identification of BPL families as there were complaints that
this criteria is neither clear nor uniform. Ration shops have been
directed to remain open throughout the month during fixed hours, the
details of which should be displayed on notice board.
Transparency
Most officials do not know of the schemes in their own jurisdiction. There
is no way for people in a village to know what schemes they are entitled
to. The order of the Court in the Rajasthan PUCL case will hopefully
change the situation for the better. A translated copy of the Supreme
Court order and the list of the beneficiaries of each scheme are to be
displayed on every gram panchayat notice board and in schools. Doordarshan
and AIR are to publicise the schemes.
All said and done, even with the Apex Court order, the level of compliance
will go up to, say, 35 per cent. Hunger will remain institutionalised. As
along as priorities do not change, half of India's population will be kept
deliberately hungry by State policy. Only a revolution can change that.
Madhura Swaminathan in her recent publication Weakening Welfare has
studied the Public Distribution System (PDS) in India. Noticing that food
deprivation and insecurity persists on a mass scale, she concludes that
this situation of mass deprivation is likely to worsen in the current
context of "liberalisation, structural adjustment and the weakening of
welfare systems". She argues that there is need to expand and strengthen -
not undermine or disband the PDS system. She has identified 'targeting' as
a dangerous policy introduced as a mechanism to ultimately close down the
PDS. This part of the article is largely taken from her book.
History of Public Distribution System
The Spectre of Mass Hunger
A shift is noticed from cereals to other food items of lesser nutrition
among the poor. The National Sample Survey data, shows that per capita
consumption of cereals declined in every state except Kerala.
A commonly used indicator of undernourishment is Body Mass Index (BMI).
This is the ratio of weight (kg) to the square of height (m). 18.5 is
normal. Using this indicator, Shetty and James found 46% of persons
chronically deficient in 1991-1992.
Severe undernourishment was observed among 9%. In other words one half of
the population in the country is malnourished. Of these 53% of children
were found to be undernourished and 21% severally undernourished.
Poverty Line Excludes Many Hungry Persons
The original standard for the definition of the poor was thrice the food
expenditure as it was shown that poor families spend 1/3 of their
expenditure on food. Any household that spends more than 1/3 of its income
on food is considered poor in the United States and eligible for food
stamps. If this standard is used in India 95% of all households would be
considered poor. If one uses the China standard of food share of 60%, then
80% of the rural population and 60% of the urban population would be poor.
Thus in India, the top 20% of the population can be excluded from systems
of food security.
When there is mass hunger the weight attached to every undernourished
person who is wrongly excluded should be much higher than the weight
attached to a rich person who benefits from the scheme.
The conclusion drawn by Swaminathan is that the proportion of persons
suffering deprivations in food and nutrition is
higher than those below the poverty line. For example 37% of urban
household were BPL in 1993-94 while 80% of households were calorie
deficit.
If the objective of PDS is food security then it should also look at those
facing the risk of undernourishment. While anthropometric measures suggest
50% adults are undernourished, 70% of households are deficient in food
consumption.
Decline in Per Capita Offtake
There are sharp regional variations in total and per capita offtake. Some
of the southern states, Andhra Pradesh,Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka,
accounted for almost one half of the PDS offtake of grain in the country.
By contrast the four northern states Bihar, Madhya Pradesh , Rajasthan
and Uttar Pradesh accounted for only 10% in 1995. Kerala was undoubtably
the leader with a fair system of public delivery. The average per capita
offtake was 53.3 kg. per year as compared to 2.3 kg. in Bihar and 4.6 in
Madhya Pradesh.
The most striking feature of immediate post structural adjustment
(1991-1995) was the widerspread decline in per capita offtake.
In Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in 1987, 98% of the rural population did not
purchase any grain from PDS. In Kerala by contrast, 87% of the population
purchased grain from PDS. The data indicated that PDS was not serving the
vast majority of the country's population and that there was a near total
collapse of the PDS system in Bihar and some northern states.
Corruption and Maladministration
In Thane district in Maharashtra, Swaminathan found that ration cards of
scheduled tribes showed full offtake though the tribes had not purchased
food from the ration shops. Other researches have found bogus ration
cards, poor quality grains and short weighing of foods. Researchers have
estimated that only 17% of the wheat lifted from the FCI by the state
governments reaches the final consumer in Bihar!
Insufficient supply of grains was the most important reason given for not
using PDS. 40% did not buy grain because there was none to be bought.
Targets, Food stamps and other rackets: Sabotaging the PDS
In recent times advisors to the G.O.I. and the World Bank have suggested a
shift from PDS to a system of food stamps or coupons. Such advice
generally ignores not only the experience of other countries but also
the inherent difficulties in implementing such a system. Swaminathan
points out that a food stamp system entails extensive book keeping,
revalidating of coupons and the possibility of fraud by the counterfeiting
of coupons.
Two major moves were made by government of India to sabotage the PDS
system; in all probability with the nudging of the WB and the IMF. The
first came in 1992 with the Revamped PDS (RPDS) and the second in 1997
with Targetted PDS (TPDS). This comes together with another major policy
shift in the 1990's away from the agricultural strategy of self
sufficiency in food grains production.
In many tribal areas poor families were excluded
from the Public Distribution System if they
stated that they ate meat!
Swaminathan's study of the revamped and targetted PDS found that
entitlements were lower in the revamped PDS areas than under general PDS.
She found that retail prices in PDS shops in Maharashtra were the highest
in the country and rising faster than at the national level. As a result
quantities of grain sold were falling since 1991. Targetting had replaced
the per capita norm by the family norm. Using the poverty line resulted in
misidentification of households and mistargetting.
Moghe in his study of Maharashtra found that when targetted PDS was
announced there were 60 lakhs households, according to the central
government, eligible for BPL category. The state restricted this number to
43 lakhs.
In slums, households were classified as BPL or APL on the basis of a few
queries resulting in absurdly low numbers. In Dharavi, Asia's largest slum
with a population of 0.5 million, the Rationing Control Officer identified
only 365 BPL families in 1997 and after 're-checks' the number fell to 151
in 1999!
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Issue #3, Combat Law
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The spectre of starving India
Combat Law, Issue #3
:
The Right to Food
Combat Law, Issue 3 -
I was in Jaipur for a meeting organised by Kavita Shrivastav of the
People's Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL), unconnected with starvation
deaths, where I met
Jean Dreze, a professor of economics at Delhi. He
suggested that I visit a village nearby to see the extent of hunger in the
countryside. An hour's drive from Jaipur and we were in another world
-that of the dispossesed. People had no food at all and fluoride in the
well-water had prematurely aged the youth.
In December 2000, the Union Minister for Consumer Affairs and Public
Distribution wrote to all chief ministers admitting that five crore people
are victims of starvation. A few days later, the Chief Minister of
Rajasthan complained to him that he had heard that lakhs of tonnes of food
grains were lying in the godowns of the FCI and that there was a proposal
to dump it in the sea, to make storage space for the next crop. When
Manoj Parida, Senior Regional Manager of the FCI, was interviewed on the
Star TV news channel, he said that he could only give the grain to the
states if the central government allocated it, and that his dilemma was
that he couldn't just throw it away!
"Cut the flab somewhere else", said the Court when confronted with the
argument that the states had no funds to feed hungry children. From The
Ratlam Municipality v. Virdichand (AIR 1980 SC 1622) onwards, the
Apex Court has held that when it comes to the enforcement of a fundamental
right, courts will not entertain the argument of financial incapacity.
Hunger spreads not because the State lacks the funds to act but it chooses
to use its money elsewhere in what V. R. Krishna Iyer once called "a
perverse expenditure logic". A second aircraft carrier for the Navy, to
be purchased soon, will cost a thousand crore, an amount that could feed
all of this nation's children. But macho muscle flexing is more important
than that! And we have examples of ostentation such as the foreign trip
of the Vice President of India, Krishna Kant, and his family, at the
State's expense.
The National Sample Survey data, shows that per capita consumption of
cereals declined in every state except Kerala in both urban and rural
areas.
A shift is noticed from cereals to other food items of lesser nutrition
among the poor. This exacerbates undernourishment.
Nutritional surveys done by the National Nutrition Monitoring Board
confirms this inadequacy of food (and cereal) intake by large parts of the
population is below the recommended intake of 460 grams.
Referring to "hidden hunger" it found an inadequate intake of
micronutrients, which play a critical role in body functioning.
The National Sample Survey Organisation found in 17 of India's most
populous states that the average caloric intake declined between 1972 and
1994. The decline was particularly sharp in rural areas.
At the all-India level total calories per head in rural areas has fallen
on 2149 by 1999-2000 compared to 2211 in 1983, a decline by 72 calories
per head. This level of 2149 calories per head in 1999 - 2000 is
substantially lower than China or Brazil's level of 2757 calories and 2797
calories in 1993. It is also lower than Tanzania or Kenya's level of 1980.
One way of weakening the PDS in the early 1990's was by repeatedly raising
the price in the PDS shops. These prices were increased to such an extent
that the cumulative price increase of food grains in the PDS shops was
higher than the rise in the general price index. Coupled with this,
government sharply reduced the supply of food grains to the PDS since
1991. Thus from 1991-1998 there was a fall in per capita offtake.
Revamped PDS involved tagretting specific areas such as drought prone,
desert, tribal, hilly and urban slum areas. Targetted PDS used the
poverty line to demarcate poor and non poor. This system was so arbitrary
and irrational that it resulted in large numbers of poor persons being
excluded. There was no method at all to determine whether the family fell
below the poverty line. The income criteria was not followed in most
states and particularly in the rural areas as, following the started
income criterion would result in 90% of households falling below the
poverty line. Reports from many rural areas indicated households were
classified as falling below the poverty line on the basis of visual
inspection as to whether the household had a tiled roof or a mud floor. In
many tribal areas poor families were excluded if they stated that they ate
meat!
Amartaya Sen's support for the movement to save the PDS is crucial. His support would mean much. His position however is not clear. There are broadly two camps. The pro-PDS and anti-PDS. Both speak of concern for the poor, so the debate can be confusing.
The pro-PDS camp (anti globalisation)- Seek the expansion and strengthing of PDS
- Universal coverage
- Increased subsidies or at least the present level
- Continued procurement from farmers (reforms are fine if poor farmers and not the rich benefit from procurement)
- Seek an end to PDS
- An end to procurement
- Free market as the solution
-
Food stamps as a replacement for PDS
The World Bank has recommended that PDS be targetted to the "very poor"
and that a distinction be drawn between the "very poor" and the
"moderately poor" to improve transfer of food to the "ultra poor". The
very poor are defined as households that have expenditure less than 3/4
the BPL expenditures. The remaining 1/4 are defined as moderately poor. In
short, an extremely narrow form of targetting is being propagated to
groups within the poor. This, Swaminathan concludes, is most undesirable.
What we need is a system of near universal provision. At most the top 20%
of the population can be excluded.
When there is targetting especially with a low income cut-off, errors in measurements can mean disqualification for a genuinely poor person. Secondly, there is an incentive to cheat. Thirdly, time specific cut-offs make little sense when there is downward income mobility. Gaiha in his 1987 study found that 13% of the non poor in 1968 had become poor in 1970.
Planned Destruction of India's Agricultural Production
Usa Patnaik has written on this issue. In this part of the article we rely on her inputs. Food grain output dropped sharply to 1.66% (1999-2000) compared to 3.54% for the previous decade. There was a decline of 8 million ha in the area sown to food grains. The sharp cut back in government rural development expenditures reduced growth in rural employment to only 0.6% (1993-1999) as compared to 2% (1987-1993).
Surplus production of a few 'advanced countries' accounts for 4/5 of the global trade in cereals. These countries have focussed their attention on the markets of the 'developing world'. To penetrate these economies and attack their agricultural production systems, the advanced countries ensured that their export of grain would be at very low prices so as to make local prices appear exorbitant. One of the ways in which the prices were kept artificially low was by the grant of large subsidies to the farming sector including grants to agro - business corporations.
During 1980 to 1986, for example, cereal prices fell by one-fourth; the US increased the Producer Subsidy Equivalent (PSE) as a % of total value of agricultural output from 9% to an astronomical 45%. European countries followed suit. Ten European countries raised the PSE to agricultural output percentage from 25 to 66 while Japan raised it from 71 to 93. These highly inflated susbsidy levels of the mid-Eighties were then deliberately made the base from which a mere one fifth cut was undertaken by advanced countries in the Agreement on Agricultural of GATT in 1994.
There is another indicator of farm subsidies. It is called the "Total Support Estimate (TSE)". This is the figure of total support to farmers. The USA which had reduced its TSE to 34% of it value of agricultural production by 1997, raised it by 51% in 1991 and then hugely in 2002 thus transferring between 71 to 96 billion dollars between 1997 and 1999 to the farm sector. There is a Farm Bill before the US Congress proposing to pay additional subsidies of 73.5 billion over the next 10 years. Similarly, the 24 OECD countries including Japan increased their TSE from 46.5% in 1997 to 59.4% by 1999.
As a result, the global prices of major staples like rice, wheat and maize have been halved and developing countries where protection has been removed have become vulnerable.
The proponents of globalisation thus have double standards. While massively subsidising their farm sector including massive agro- corporations, the argument is simultaneously made in the developing world for subsidies to be removed! Advanced countries have through incessant pressure applied succeeded in getting quantitative restrictions removed fully, years before the mandatory date. They are now pushing for the winding up of the PDS. Thus opening up to free trade in agriculture is taking place at the worst possible time when global food prices have been crashing. After grain inputs for Eastern Europe and CIS countries declined sharply in the early 1990's, the USA turned its attention to penetrating South East Asian countries using the familiar rhetoric that all subsidies were bad. The Philippines, for example, gave up its functioning grain procurement and distribution system and became a net importer of US grain.
Suicides
In India, liberalised trade policies have resulted in massive losses for farmers. Farmers in Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka and other states have been devastated. Many have committed suicide. Cotton farmers have been killing themselves since 1998. In the first month of 2002 over 25 new cases of suicide were reported from Andhra Pradesh. Many have resorted to selling body parts such as kidneys. Recovery proceedings have resulted in the taking away of land, houses, farming tools and equipment and even household articles including utensils!
Swaminathan has demolished the myth that the 'burden' of food subsidies is too high, pointing out that food subsidy as a percentage of GDP has remained unchanged over the last 31 years at 0.31% of GDP. This compares favourably with Sri Lanka (1.3% in 1984), Mexico (0.63% in 1984) and Tunisia (2% in 1993).
Kerala leads the way
According to Swaminathan, the Kerala experience shows that with political commitment food security can be obtained. The establishment of an effective PDS system in Kerala was the outcome of a strong people's movement for food. As a result the coverage is almost universal. In 1996, 95% of households were covered. The poor depend on and use PDS more than the rich. The functioning and delivery system is better than in other states.
Colin Gonsalves
August - September 2002Colin Gonsalves is an advocate practising in the Supreme Court of India and one of the Joint Editors of Combat Law.
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