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Between the Lines by Kuldip Nayar

BUDGETS in the early years of independence were an enigma wrapped in secrecy. India's economic base was limited. The dependence was, therefore, on the ingenuity of finance minister. Crises could not be pulled out of a hat to maintain the morale. Yet he would do the rope trick because the government's popularity depended on that.

The haves grumbled over fewer benefits than before but realised that they still had enough. Other people did not count in the scheme of things. The growth rate averaged 3.5 per cent annually but it did not disturb anybody's sleep. The debate after the budget would not be whether the proposals had merit but whether they gave the country an ideological tilt, close as we were to the culmination of freedom struggle.

One point that evoked discussion was the distance between Jawaharlal Nehru's way of development, the socialistic pattern with the state playing prime role, and Mahatma Gandhi's concept of self-sufficient countryside without interference by the state. Over the years, the first became urban in character and the second rural. One got associated with the growth, however slow and slovenly, and the other with values and idealism.

The first has manifested itself through consumerism. The other has got stuck in simple but marginalised living. One has all the opulence and wasteful expenditure whereas the other has all its adverse fallout: poverty and neglect. Nehru's associates, lessening day by day, still talk radical and they recall the period from Karl Marx to Harold Laski. But the Gandhian followers, close to the ground, have grown sceptical of ideologies which draw inspiration from abroad. New India has moved away from it and the governance is directed towards higher growth through globalisation or whatever the means.

It is difficult to run away from the plazas, the malls and the new eating places. But of what use they are or the multi-storey buildings, big dams and foreign direct investments when at least 300 million people, more than the entire middle class, are destitute? Those who live below the poverty line are roughly 400 million, official figures testify.

All budget speeches - Finance Minister Chidambaram's are no exception - applaud the role of the farmer or small man. But there is very little left for him when the real beneficiaries have eaten from the plate.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been promising the countryside a good deal for some time now. But agricultural growth is stagnant. The import of food grains is, in fact, ominous. Rural unemployment is rampant. Farmers are committing suicide, not only in Andhra Pradesh and Kerala but in the soya-belt of Punjab and the cotton-growing areas of Maharashtra. It has been noticed at many places in the countryside the students leaving schools and colleges and opting for work on the fields.

There is a loud demand for another Green Revolution. But this may well be wishful thinking. Farmers have no money to invest in land to make it productive.

The corporate sector, if given a chance, will convert it into another industry, changing the very ethos of the countryside. Land is for people, not people for land. Bhoodan (gift of land) did not work. Even what was offered was being reclaimed. Even in the distribution of bhoodan land, an element of corruption had crept in. No inquiry was ordered because some important people were suspects.

The Employment Guarantee Scheme that the government has introduced in 200 districts is only a palliative, not a solution. The government has yet to spell out specific schemes for employment. However, the budget on defence and security has been increasing year after year. The explanation is that the naxalites and the desperate people in Kashmir and the north-east are to blame. Pakistan also comes into the picture. Maybe, the reading is correct to some extent. But what about the causes that are responsible for the deterioration of the economic condition? The budget is of little help to those who are at the lower rung. The government says that it has no money. But its bureaucracy is bloating and the non-plan expenditure increasing.

Have our priorities been wrong? The first five-year plan which Nehru formulated was to industrialise the country so as to lessen its dependence on land which is a victim of whimsical monsoons. Some may interpret it as a scientific approach.

But it has been left half way. Services have done better than industry. On the other hand, people living in villages, India's two-thirds of population, have been left high and dry. Nehru initiated land reforms and had to amend the constitution - it was India's first constitution amendment after independence - to implement them.

Still, he could not give land to the tiller free. All that he did was to put a ceiling on the individual's holding: 18 acres per family. Sheikh Abdullah in Jammu and Kashmir was the only one in the country who gave land to the tiller without compensation. Nehru wanted to emulate him but he could not do so because the Congress was dominated by kulaks. The landed aristocracy still plays an important role in the party.

True, there is a case for constituting a commission to go into the land reforms. But does the government have the guts to do so? Vested interests in the party will not allow that to happen.

Nonetheless, with land getting divided and re-divided among children and their children, there is a fragmentation of holdings all over the country. This affects food production as well. Some way must be found to redistribute the land. As things are today, discontentment will grow. Already, the dalits, the tribals and the marginalised farmers are migrating from their village in search of job.

The basic fact that India must face is: it has not enough land for the people who depend on it. The countryside can be made attractive. The best schools can be opened there. It does not matter if teachers are given salaries five times more than they get in cities.

The standard of teaching should be so high that students from cities could prefer to travel to the countryside for studies there. Not only teachers but doctors should also be tempted to go to villages. Salaries should not come in the way. The purpose is to focus attention on the countryside where most people live.

We talk of the good of society. Is this something apart from and transcending the good of the individuals composing it? We may mock at the Gandhian values. But what type of society is it where the individual is "ignored?" Whatever name we may give it, the progress, however impressive, is creating more and more disparities. Probably, this is the price the development of sorts exacts. Can we pursue this path without peril?

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