India’s golden moment

Demonetisation is an ethical step. It can help us leave behind culture of illegality, indiscipline, ill-gotten wealth.

The public frenzy for getting hold of cash is visibly subsiding. However, the pressure may well be shifting to smaller towns to which currency supply may not have kept pace. Also, the next wage payment for casual workers, who may well comprise nearly 60 per cent of the workforce, is approaching. Therefore, it may be a good time to take stock, draw lessons and initiate steps to prevent short-term pains from resulting in permanent loss of economic activity.

For me, the ethical and social aspects of this dramatic move are of utmost importance. The measure represents the draining of a cesspool, created over seven decades. We are all party to its creation, either actively or in our passive acceptance of the growing vulgar ostentatious consumption that threatens to become all pervasive. Demonetisation will surely reverse, to some extent, the brazen flaunting of ill-gotten wealth. It may induce India to turn away from the Latin American model of state, with its extreme inequities and rampaging drug mafias, and hopefully, turn it towards the more equitable and honest East Asian model.

We know that black money (currency) is only a small part of the black economy. However, this does not necessarily imply that it is not worthwhile to liquidate stocks of black money without simultaneously attacking other “illegally” acquired assets. The aggregate black economy is estimated at over 30 per cent of the formal economy. Even if black money constitutes 10 per cent of this amount, it represents a cash hoard of nearly Rs 5.5 lakh crore. To try and immobilise that amount or even a substantial part would convey a strong anti-corruption signal.

Three types of criticism have been mounted against the measure. First, economic costs would far outweigh any potential benefits. Second, implementation has been badly botched. Third, it has not gone far enough because it only attacks the stock and does nothing to stymie future flows of illegal economic activity. The first and the third arguments are contradictory because the first considers the measure to be harmful, while the third demands more of the same.

A major concern has been that all those in the informal sector who have legitimate business, though carried out in cash, will be undeservedly hurt. Some may be hurt mortally and result in their permanent closure resulting in job losses and the slowdown of GDP growth. Some wild estimates see GDP growth plummeting to zero in the next two quarters and not recovering in the foreseeable future.

This is surely scare-mongering. All medium, small and even micro production enterprises (production MSMEs as opposed to wholesale or retail traders) surely have some access to formal credit sources. This must be true of MSME export units that are reported to account for 45 per cent of India’s total merchandise exports. The majority of MSMEs deal only partially in cash. Anticipating the onset of GST, many had started to move away from cash transactions as these would not receive any tax credit. Therefore to argue that demonetisation spells doom and disaster for MSMEs is sheer exaggeration.

Farmers, it was asserted by Lalu Prasad, are in deep distress and dying. This is hyperbole. Farmers can sell their kharif harvest of sugarcane to mills with receivables being directly credited to their bank accounts as always. Any amount of paddy can be sold to the FCI at the government-declared minimum support price (MSP). Agro-inputs are normally available at 30-60 day credit to virtually all farmers.

Rabi sowing is, therefore, reportedly on track, opposition parties’ grandstanding notwithstanding. In his November 16 blog on Modi’s bold move, Kenneth Rogoff, the author of The Cashless Economy, wrote: “The short-run costs are unfolding, but the long-run effects on India may well prove more than worth them, but it is very hard to know for sure at this stage.”

It is, therefore, not surprising that the opposition parties find themselves terribly short of public support. Not surprisingly, they have been patently unsuccessful in taking their protests out of Parliament to the streets, where they will be exposed to the strong public support for the PM’s move.

The implementation certainly could have been better. Admittedly, the measure was humungous in scale, cloaked in necessary secrecy and complex. The RBI and ministry of finance should own up their responsibility. To their credit, they have been learning on the job, and have been open to suggestions.

Three practical questions must be answered for further course correction. First, was the relatively short window of 50 days necessary and could it not be extended? Second, could the domestic security printing press capacity constraint not be overcome by placing orders on foreign printers to produce Rs 100 and Rs 50 notes? Printing additional quantities of these denominations would not have breached secrecy and could have augmented the much needed currency supplies? Third, given the scale and time constraint, could government departments and treasuries not be used as points for dispensing and exchanging currency to overcome the shortage of ATMs that are still being re-calibrated.

It is, of course, necessary to take steps to restrict future flow of illegal earnings without which this huge exercise could come to a naught. Some measures are already in place: Greater transparency in governance and roll back of the “inspector raj”, strictures and action against the corrupt in the central government, compulsory linking of Aadhar card with deposits and withdrawals from bank accounts and large purchases of jewellery and real estate, the impending GST, greater surveillance by the CBDT and commercial banks of brokers, developers and jewellers and Jan Dhan accounts, which are the expected conduits for laundering black money. Modi has repeatedly announced that demonetisation is but the beginning and that other steps to curb black money are in the pipeline.

Modi has risked the support of the core constituency of the BJP and RSS — traders, middlemen and small entrepreneurs. He has taken this risk because he believes the measure can help India leave behind the culture of illegality, indiscipline and ill-gotten wealth. Every country needs its “golden moment” to transform itself and surge ahead. I suspect Modi feels it in his bones that this might be that moment for India.

The writer is senior fellow, CPR, and founder director, Pahle India Foundation

Indian Express, 25-11-2016

Parenthood by adoption is not a second choice

Adoption Week for many countries including India has just ended. It’s a particularly poignant time for my family as we celebrate on November 28 a year since our adopted daughter came home.

The past two years has seen both Deepak Kumar, Central Adoption Resource Authority (CARA) secretary/CEO, and Maneka Gandhi, minster for women and child development, demand that adoptions of Indian children be increased. There are currently 10,000 registered PAPs (prospective adoptive parents) with only 1,500 children available for adoption. At least 2,000 are waiting to be declared by CWCs (child welfare committees) eligible for adoption.

Adoption is still a sensitive subject in India. For many it is the last option to have a child after fertility treatment has failed, and those choosing it can face opposition from family, friends and society – after all, aren’t blood ties the strongest and most important in terms of a family? In India, culture and tradition also give a great deal of importance to blood lines. But to give a child a home, a life and love is the greatest gift of all and for which the giver is rewarded many times over.

A recent meeting in Pune brought together professionals, adoptive parents, adoptive children and birth parents to participate in a conference, Understanding Adopted Children.

Eminent professor Nilima Mehta, author of Ours by choice, spoke on the importance of support and counselling for all involved in adoption. Effective pre-adoption counseling is essential to help people make an informed choice. Her lecture resonated on many levels, but the two phrases that have stayed with me? “Adoption is a relationship of choice, just like marriage” and “Parenthood by adoption is not a second choice”.

For me adopting my daughter was not a second choice, and I had always wanted to add to our family in this way, but for our wider families, it was a challenge to accept this. Now a year on, our daughter’s journey to us is part of our family story. I am often contacted by friends of friends to ask about the process and how we did.

A couple at the conference who had given up their daughter for adoption spoke and I found it an eye-opener to listen to their story. It is all too easy to condemn such people as irresponsible but that is a simplistic response. Somewhere there is a couple that gave my daughter her birth, just as we now give her life. They should not be judged by different yardsticks to the ones applied to parents who go in for adoption as a choice.

I am often asked what I will tell our daughter about her adoption. The answer is I need to tell her very little as we are bringing her up to know she is adopted. Adoption is not an easy choice, but it has to be done out of love for it is a connection as strong as any made by blood.

Annie Natarajan is an education consultant

source: Hindustan Times, 25-11-2016

 Know vs Understand

SWAMI SUKHABODHANANDA





What does one have to understand about life? You have many centres: intellectual centre, emotional centre, and body centre.In each centre, there is a mechanical and magnetic part. The mechanical part acts like a machine, while the magnetic part acts with ore awareness. Your mechanical movements and thinking have to change. Your mechanical emotions like jealousy and hatred have to be overcome. You can do this by bringing in more awareness. When you increase awareness, even poison can turn into medicine; and with no awareness, medicine can become poison.In a relationship, is it not necessary to judge? Keep yourself relaxed. Increase your awareness and love. Not to judge should not be a conclusion. Don't make it a demand or compulsion. Let there be a choice. There is a difference between `should' and `choice'. `Should' creates stress; it limits you to only one option. Don't judge. It is not a demand but a wise choice.
What should one be really aware of ? Negative emotions poison. Like avoiding poisonous food, avoid negative emotions.Don't identify with them. Don't participate in them. Choose to create a new will, not be driven by negative emotions. For example, somebody's success should not be your failure. We define our failure by somebody's success. We feel jealous seeing someone successful.Jealousy is a great poison.
Compete with your potential.Even if you compete with others, enjoy it. See beauty all around. Do not define your success and failure by someone's success and failure.

41% of Indian women face violence before 19: Survey

26% Say They Were Groped In The Last One Month

More than four in 10 women (41%) in India experience harassment or violence before the age of 19, according to a new ActionAid research. The four-nation survey conducted by the international women and child rights NGO also revealed that women experience harassment for the first time at a very young age with 6% of them experiencing it before the age of 10 in India.The figure for Brazil is 16%, while it is 12% in UK and 8% in Thailand. The survey will be released on Friday .The research also found that around 73% of women in India have experienced some form of violence or harassment in the past month. The figure is higher in other countries with 87% of women polled in Brazil and 67% in Thailand having been subjected to harassment or violence in the past month. In UK, it was 57%.
More than one in four (26%) women in India said they were groped in the past month. This compared with one in five women in Brazil (20%), one in four women in Thailand (26%) and one in six in UK (16%), according to the YouGov poll of over 2,500 women aged 18 and above.The poll was commissioned to mark International Day for Elimination of Violence Against Women and was conducted online with 2,518 participants. The findings also show how women are increasingly taking steps in their daily lives to guard against such threats. More than 82% women in India said they had taken steps to protect themselves against harassment.
This figure was 91% for women between 25 and 34 years. The measures they take include avoiding parks and poorly lit areas (35%) and changing a travel route (36%) to using objects like keys as a weapon (23%) or carrying a device like a rape alarm or pepper spray (18%).
Speaking about the sur vey , ActionAid India executive director Sandeep Chachra said, “Cross country findings suggest immediate action is needed to curb harassment and violence against women. While awareness on rights of women, women's abilities and potential has increased over decades, we are still a long way off from realizing the promise of a just and equal world for half of our humanity . Threats to safety of women are directly related to patriarchal mindsets that manifest itself on streets, at the workplace and at homes“.

Source: Times of India, 25-11-2016

What Marrakesh achieved

The proclamation on climate change has just about managed to make sure that the pre-2020 commitments made by the developed world remain on the discussion table.

A fortnight ago, when the delegates to the Marrakesh climate change conference were sitting down to discuss the scope and design elements of the rules for implementing the Paris agreement, news of developments across the Atlantic came in. Although too early to be taken seriously, it was difficult not to notice the gathering clouds on the post-Paris actions. They could have easily dampened the celebratory mood arising from the early ratification of the Paris agreement. However, it must be said to the credit of the governments and non-government players that they stayed the course in Marrakesh. The spirit of Paris was re-affirmed through the Marrakesh Proclamation on Climate and Sustainable Development. The proclamation is, in this sense, a small but determined step after Paris.

This small step was, however, taken after some struggle. There are still four years to go before the Paris agreement kicks in. But the pact is increasingly being seen as a licence to extinguish the pre-2020 commitments. The proclamation’s title reflects this tension. While the concern for climate is immediate, sustainable development is the context for differentiated and climate-just actions in the long term.

While it is easy to hang all the concerns on the peg of future developments in the US, it is useful to recall that there are commitments and pledges made under the Cancun agreements (2010) that are yet to be realised. Doha amendments to the Kyoto Protocol, although older than Paris agreement by three years, are yet to be ratified. The targets of Kyoto Protocol parties are not only low (the European Union’s 20 per cent from the 1990 level against the 40 per cent recommended by the IPCC) in the context of global ambition and historical responsibility, but they also depend on the reduction of emissions in the “land, land use change and forestry sectors” — such reductions are cheap and do not last long. (Interestingly, a school of thought makes similar arguments against the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris agreement because their total impact is not large enough). The US may not be a party to the Kyoto Protocol, but is party to the Cancun Agreements that were reached as early as 2010. The Cancun pledges are, in fact, the precursor of the NDCs under the Paris agreement. All developed countries that are signatories to Cancun had pledged to raise as much as $100 billion every year by 2020 to support climate change actions but, as of now, the Green Climate Fund, the officially constituted international body for climate has received less than $3 billion. Instead, the solutions recommended now emphasise the flow of private investments, to be attracted with fiscal and non-fiscal incentives, and use of risk mitigation financial instruments.

The catch is that the developing country governments are expected to bear the cost of incentives.

It seems improbable that the Paris agreement could be constructed despite such odds. The secret perhaps lies in the fact that the pivot of the Paris agreement is not the global ambition to stablise climate — as it appears to be — but “transparency of actions”, which is a tool for mutual/collective verification and review of actions from a competitive perspective. This has already been achieved and is likely to remain the focus of rule-making under the Paris agreement. Hence, the major threat to the Paris agreement may come not from the intractability of domestic environmental policies in major economies of the West, but from their unwillingness to address pre-2020 actions. The willingness to fulfill the pre-2020 commitments fully and effectively was the central assurance exchanged by all countries when the Durban platform for post-2020 arrangements was set up. The Marrakesh conclusions, hopefully, keep this assurance alive on the table.

The Moroccan presidency had a modest ambition in delivering the Marrakesh Conference of Parties (CoP) as an action-based meeting, and of safely launching the process of facilitative dialogue for 2018. In the past year, it had projected Marrakesh as a place where all players will re-commit or declare new actions. This was implicitly a call to all governments and non-government players to make contributions for climate stabilisation, in addition to those that had already been made by the governments under the Paris agreement. Notably, the Paris agreement has, for the first time, recognised that the basket of international actions could include actions taken by NGOs, civil society, sub-national or constituent units of states, business coalitions, and/or international bodies. In fact, two climate champions appointed at Paris had been working through the year to showcase such actions at Marrakesh. There were two significant developments just before Marrakesh that typified such additional actions that would be promoted outside the UNFCCC process. The Montreal Protocol amendments effected at Kigali (bringing HFCs into the regulatory regime of the Montreal Protocol on Ozone Depleting Substances) and the ICAO resolution on a market-based mechanism to regulate international civil aviation emissions, both agreed to in October this year, are cases in point. While these supplementary efforts may be welcome as long as they follow the agreed principles of cooperative actions for climate, they must not detract from the commitments made before or under the Paris Agreement.

The 2018 facilitative dialogue between parties and stakeholders was the other engaging issue at Marrakesh. This dialogue is often regarded as an euphemism for exploring the ways and possibility of updating and increasing the NDCs. Very often, one hears complaints about the inadequacy of the commitments, particularly of the mitigation variety, made under the Paris agreement. IPCC has already been requested to come up with a special report on the global climate scenarios for achieving a 1.5 degree climate stabilisation goal. This is designed to put additional pressure on countries and persuade them to take more ambitious and early actions for stabilisation of climate in view of the projected gravity of situation. There are many who genuinely believe that all should contribute to this exercise, little realising that the ambition expressed for a post-2020 period is rooted in how finance and technology is delivered now. Dialogue will be meaningful only if it is able to advance the two key concerns that have remained unaddressed so far: How shall the countries having the largest potential of reducing emissions get the necessary finance, and how will the needs of the countries, most vulnerable to adverse impacts of climate change, be met.

It was crucial for the parties gathered at Marrakesh to demonstrate that their commitment to the Paris agreement is real and there is no slippage. It is in no one’s interest to retract from the Paris agreement. While all international agreements work on the principle of cooperation and reciprocity, the Paris agreement needs special attention. For the first time, the private sector and businesses have started genuinely believing in climate change actions as a strategy for their future growth. These actions will be sustained not merely because of global expectations but imperatives of sustainable development. All assurances under the Cancun pledges need to be redeemed well in time. The Marrakesh Proclamation serves the purpose of underlining this assurance, if not redeeming it.

The writer is special secretary in the government of India. Views are personal.

Source: Indian Express, 24-11-16

Fearsome Unknown

JANINA GOMES





Life has a way of challenging us and pushing us to the edge, when our fears could get the better of us and we refuse to move either forward or upward.All the while we feel threatened, alone and fearful. God, like a mother eagle, hovers over us, protecting us on all sides. And then suddenly , the nest is knocked from under our feet and we are left to negotiate the air and the winds alone.When it seems we would have a free fall and dash ourselves to death, suddenly , the protective hand of God -whether through family , friends or compassionate strangers -covers us and we are able to right ourselves again. Repeatedly , we are thrust into the unknown, the uncharted and the uncertain. But just as we develop cold feet and fall from fear and fright, God hovers over us and protects us.
Sometimes our sense of timing could be all wrong. We may have a set of plans and believe we could chart our future. Yes, sometimes, our sense of timing could agree with God's, at other times, not. But like the mother eagle, God is in control.
At times, we believe that we can no longer handle the uncertainty . We cling to the familiar, but the only constant in life is change. Then, like the eagle and the eaglet that learns to fly, we will have to trust in the larger scheme of life and the universe, to believe that we have it in us to meet and overcome all that has to be overcome and that we rest in the palm of God's hand. We may yet flounder, but God's protective hand will bear us up and enable us to walk and to fly .

Nalanda University governing board: Amartya Sen, Sugata Bose out

Founding chancellor and Nobel laureate Amartya Sen is no longer a part of the governing board of the Nalanda University (NU).

President Pranab Mukherjee has approved a reconstitution of the governing board in his capacity as the Visitor of NU, according to a government order.

Professor Arvind Sharma, faculty of religious studies, McGill University (Canada), Prof Lokesh Chandra, president, Indian Council for Cultural Relations and Dr Arvind Panagariya, vice-chairman of the NITI Ayog, are the new faces in the reconstituted board.

Along with Amartya Sen, Harvard professor and Trinamool Congress MP Sugata Bose and UK-based economist and Labour politician Lord Meghnad Desai are out of the board.

“President Pranab Mukherjee, in his capacity as Visitor of NU, is pleased to approve the constitution of the governing board with immediate effect in accordance with clause 7 of the NU Act,” said the November 21 order from the ministry of external affairs.

The move coincides with vice-chancellor (V-C) Gopa Sabharwal’s tenure, which ends on November 24 and the process for her successor is already on.

The governing board has a chancellor, presently George Yeo of Singapore, V-C, representatives of five member countries, including India, China, Australia, Laos and Thailand, secretary (east), ministry of external affairs (MEA), two representatives from the government of Bihar and one representative from the ministry of human resources and development (HRD).

The only member of the mentor group, to have retained his position in the new governing board, as government of India representative, is former Rajya Sabha MP NK Singh. Other countries would name their representatives later.

Sen was with the NU since its inception and was its founding chancellor. He had resigned last year after being reportedly upset over the “delay in extension of his tenure and political interference” despite board’s recommendation for his second term.

NU outgoing V-C Sabharwal said the decision to reconstitute the governing board was surprising.

“It has come midway through the process of appointment of a new V-C, bypassing the chancellor. It was the NU governing board, which was hitherto insisting on fresh constitution of the board. However, it was not done then on the plea that amendments to the NU Act would first need to be carried out. Now, the board has been suddenly reconstituted,” she said.

Singh said though the board had recommended another year’s extension for Sabharwal, it was not found legally tenable following consultation with the attorney general.

Sabharwal had got a year’s extension after completion of the stipulated five-year tenure in 2015.

As per the Nalanda University Act, the senior most dean of NU will take V-C’s charge till a new incumbent is appointed.

The NU search committee had invited applications for the V-C’s post in October. The last date for applying is November 30. The Visitor makes the appointment from the panel of names recommended by the governing board.

Source: Hindustan Times, 24-11-2016