Let Go of the Past

NEERAJA RAGHAVAN





Why do unhappy events stay on in the mind? Why are we haunted by those episodes in our lives that left us grief-stricken, frustrated, resentful, hurt, guilty or upset, and not by those that left us happy and contented? Across the mind's screen, unpleasant images of the past flash by more often than fulfilled pleasant ones.Perhaps the key lies in the word `fulfilled'. Fulfilment implies completion. It refers to something that is over, finished with, with no loose ends. Close that file. We need to click on the filename if we wish to open it.Otherwise, the file is tucked away inside a folder, somewhere. However, numerous haunting memories continue as current files. Something in each one of them remains to be finished. It may well be an apology that was due. It could also be an unwillingness on our part to accept a loss.
Whatever the case, that niggling file is always open in the mental computer screen. As sole operators of the `files' that trouble us, we have it in our power to `complete' those files and save them, too, in that folder in the recesses of the mind. But to do that, we will have to let go of some of the pride, hurt, guilt, resentment or whichever emotion is coming in the way of our `completing' that file.
Each religion has its own prescription for this `completion'.Confession, forgiveness, mindfulness, conscious acceptance -all these are different ways of telling those open files to close. For, this is one computer that never shuts down -not even when we sleep. Our troubled dreams testify to that.

Ourview The promise and pitfalls of urbanization in India

The urbanization that has taken place is skewed and cannot be a healthy long-term model

The eye has never seen a place like it,” wrote Persian ambassador Abdur Razzak of Vijayanagara, capital of the Vijayanagara empire, “and the ear was never informed that there existed anything to equal it in the world.” He was writing in 1443, during the long summer of the empire. Other visitors would praise the city’s wealth and prosperity in later years; Domingo Paes, a Portuguese traveller, compared it favourably to the Italian city-states in 1520. A high compliment indeed—the latter, at the height of the Renaissance, were global centres of wealth, commerce and culture. Sailing east along the Mediterranean coast would have brought a traveller like Paes to one of their few rivals, Constantinople (now Istanbul)—in its time the richest and largest city in Europe.The role of cities as engines of economic growth and innovation has a long history. Urban studies pioneer Jane Jacobs has argued that cities, not nation-states, are the main players in macroeconomics. The Economic Survey, 2016-17 starts its chapter on cities as growth dynamos by quoting her, as it happens. It goes on to detail the manner in which urbanization has defined—and will continue to define—Indian development. From 1991 to 2011, the percentage of India’s population that lives in cities and towns has increased from a quarter to a third. This segment produces more than three-fifths of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP). The survey notes that controlling for GDP per capita, India’s rate of urbanization is not particularly slow—and as the former picks up, so will the latter.

Higher rates of urbanization will in turn boost GDP more, creating a virtuous cycle; the core thesis of agglomeration economics is that productivity increases with proximity to high levels of economic activity such as are likely to be found in urban centres. A 2016 National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) paper, What Is Different About Urbanization In Rich And Poor Countries? Cities In Brazil, China, India And The United States, finds that the agglomeration effect in India is, in fact, larger than the US. Nor are the benefits confined to capital owners. Unlike the other countries studied, there is a significant real-wage premium associated with denser population clusters in India. There are also associated differences in the quality of human capital due to differences in the quality of education and the like. In other words, greater urbanization in India will boost citizens’ quality of life just as it will boost the GDP.

So far, so good. But urbanization in India also faces a large number of problems, many of them related to internal migration. The 2011 census showed that a third of India’s population consisted of internal migrants. The NBER paper, however, noted that “only two per cent of the sample had moved during the preceding five years in 2011, and that figure replicates results for 2001 and 1993. Less than one per cent of the population had made a major move.” A substantial number of studies back this up. Although there is a lack of comprehensive data about the composition of India’s migrant population—a problem in itself when it comes to policymaking— independent surveys point to the reason for the discrepancy: The majority of internal migrants are seasonal workers.

Thus, policymakers must address two parallel issues: how to enable temporary migrants, and how to enable more long-term migration in the formal sector. There are no silver bullets here, only a host of overlapping measures. Empowering urban local bodies (ULBs) is one, as the Survey points out. The political deficit—the lack of responsibility and authority vested in a city government— leads to governance fragmentation, deficits in funding and infrastructure and low expenditure per capita. This failure of the majority of cities to deliver adequate services and infrastructure means that urbanization patterns are skewed, adding pressure on a handful of already burdened urban centres.

Another measure is allowing temporary migrants to easily access financial services and benefits. The present administration’s JAM (Jan Dhan-Aadhaar-Mobile) Yojana is a start—but only that, as the numerous reports of account dormancy and duplication show. Stabilization here, allowing migrants to access and transfer resources through formal banking, must be followed by delinking benefits from location to the extent possible and gradually shifting to the direct benefits transfer model.

That would be just a start. Encouraging more compact urban development through changing land use regulations, investing in urban mobility and addressing the convoluted classification process of census towns that results in denied urbanization should all be on the menu. As matters stand, the many problems mean that the organizing principle of urban economics—spatial equilibrium, which dictates that if an urban centre has high wages and good services, it will also have a high cost of living, which in turn will make other centres attractive and lead to equalization of growth across a region—has failed to function adequately in India. The skewed urbanization that has resulted cannot be a healthy long-term model.

Source: Mintepaper, 9-02-2017

Looking after leaping

Economic Survey’s hesitations are both refreshing and disturbing

For those who read every line, the latest Economic Survey is alarming. For those who read in-between the lines, it is disturbing. Certainly, there is some good news. FDIs, for instance, are still on the rise (while foreign portfolio investment is declining) and the current account deficit has been reduced, in spite of the diminution of remittances, largely because of a contained trade deficit. Growth remains high at 7.2 per cent, but its rate is declining and its composition is worrying. Services continue to grow at 8.8 per cent and agriculture is back at 4.1 per cent because of a good monsoon, but industry registers a setback, from 7.4 per cent in 2015-16 to 5.2 per cent in 2016-17.

The Economic Survey asks: “What went wrong?” and offers the following explanation: In the 2000s, “economies all over the world were booming”, Indian firms “made plans accordingly. They launched new projects worth lakhs of crores”, their “investment financed by an astonishing credit boom”. Naturally, “projects that had been built around the assumption that growth would continue at double-digit levels were suddenly confronted with growth rates half that level”. Firms stopped investing and banks, mostly public, which have accumulated a huge amount of bad loans, stopped lending. The growth of credit to industry became negative during the last fall, making SMEs suffer even more than big companies.

What to do? This is where the Economic Survey needs to be read in-between the lines. A few pages after celebrating the liberalisation of the economy and the end of socialism, the authors admit that while “Most economic problems are best resolved through market-based mechanisms”, “in this case, this mechanism doesn’t seem to be working” — more, “a centralised approach might be needed”.

Which means that “the bulk of the burden will necessarily fall on the government” and that it may even imply “forgiving some burden on the private sector”. In other words: Businessmen have not strategised properly, but they should not be held accountable, and the taxpayer has to help them. In this market economy of some kind, benefits can be private, but losses have to be socialised.

To be fair, this is only the short-term solution the Economic Survey is suggesting. The authors do not content themselves with this quick-fix perspective because they know that “unless there are fundamental reforms, the problem will recur again and again”. Why? Because, as Atul Kohli has already demonstrated, India is not market-friendly but business-friendly (As the Economic Survey says on page 42, “India is not quite what it appears to be”): Even if crony capitalists have bad projects in mind, politicians will twist the arm of the public bank managers to lend them the necessary amount — in exchange for the funding of some election campaign.

Hence, this suggestion: “Structural reform aimed at preventing this can take many forms but serious consideration must also be given to the issue of government majority ownership in the public sector bank”. Why is the suggestion not more precise and so hesitant, because the authors know (and say!) that it is in the domain of reform that “the least amount of progress has occurred” under the Modi government. While the prime minister has reached the middle of his term, the Economic Survey points out that “Perhaps the most important reforms to boost growth will be structural”, like strategic disinvestment, tax reform and subsidy rationalisation. This is long overdue for those who supported the BJP in 2014 and for whom reforms were the mandate. These reforms have not really taken place yet, according to the Economic Survey.

In fact, the epithet “structural” is repeated 18 times in the Survey, to say that structural reforms are needed, to suggest they are on their way and to say that they have happened already. The chapter on demonetisation illustrates this fundamental hesitation.

The Economic Survey offers the first official detailed analysis of demonetisation. The reasons it mentions are standard: “to curb corruption”, counterfeiting, the use of high denomination and especially, the accumulation of “black money”, generated by income that has not been declared to the tax authorities. The authors admit that the impact of this decision on the growth rate is underestimated because the evolution of the informal sector — that has been the most directly affected — is not measured precisely in the national income accounts. Yet, the graphs shown by the Economic Survey are telling: Sales of two-wheelers and cars have dropped by 10-20 per cent after the November 8 announcement; the real estate market has sunk, etc. The Survey candidly admits that the most badly affected have been the poor, a category coterminous with the 350 million people who have no cellphone. These “digitally excluded” cannot easily go cashless. (Paradoxically, the Survey considers that demonetisation has been popular in India on the basis of a “phone survey across households in five states (that) shows that approval rates for demonetisation have remained high, over 75 per cent on average”).

While the short-term damage is obvious, the most disturbing conclusions pertain to the long-term gains. The authors of the Economic Survey do not conceal that the long-term effects are conditional: Demonetisation will only bear fruit economically if it is accompanied by structural reforms, including an ambitious GST. Speculating that “GST will probably be implemented later in the fiscal year”, the authors conclude: “The fiscal gains from implementing the GST and demonetisation, while almost certain to occur, will probably take time to be fully realised”.

The many doubts that are pervasive in the Economic Survey are refreshing in the present era of post-truth democracy, when facts are often conveniently overlooked. But they are disturbing too because the rulers’ sense of direction does not seem to be as firm as public discourse would like citizens to believe.

P.S.: One of the main issues for Indian society, jobs, is mentioned in passing — in contrast to the detailed study of the labour market in last year’s Survey. One of the few indirect references made to it concerns the loss of India’s competitive advantage in the textile and leather industries vis-à-vis Vietnam and Bangladesh — one more reason for asking for structural reforms.

The writer is senior research fellow at CERI-Sciences Po/CNRS, Paris, professor of Indian politics and sociology at King’s India Institute, London

Source: Indianexpress, 9-02-2017

Will gendered spaces prevent sexual abuse?

How do segregated canteens, wearing salwars protect women?

I have mixed feelings about the incident, having studied in Miranda House as well as co-ed schools. I think the concept of a dress code is viewed in a very myopic way in this country. Corporate offices impose dress codes on both men and women. Even TV anchors are never seen wearing kurta-pajamas, and don dark coloured coats and ties instead, even in the sweltering summer. I have seen TV journalists on Haryanvi channels wearing formal Western dress. How could this have escaped us, while we scrutinise a school for imposing uniforms? If a college decides that women should not be wearing skimpy ridiculous garments, we should treat it with an equal footing. I would envy public school girls in their salwars when I wore a skirt on cold winter days. We accept the Western dress as a symbol of freedom and progress in this country which is ridiculous. As soon as someone errs on the side of the Indian dress code, it is seen as regressive. As for gendered spaces, sexual harassment will not be prevented from separating men and women but I can safely say that an all-women environment has its perks. Girls can relax without being conscious all the time and made fun of for their body and appearance, because young boys can get annoying. But this should not come at the cost of women being afraid. Women should be able to look men in the eye, and make them lower their gaze instead.

—Madhu Kishwar, academic, feminist and writer

Sexual harassment is a state of mind, which a gendered canteen or traditional uniforms will not be able to stop. Besides, this seems like a very cosmetic, knee-jerk reaction. I think there should be awareness programmes centred around boys to reinvent their thinking. But this is a long-term solution. Short term: families as well as schools should take a stand. Boys should not be pampered into thinking that their actions will not have consequences. Those who break the law by ogling, stalking or worst, molesting, should be reprimanded accordingly. The current system allows culprits to get away with it.

—Olga Tellis, journalist

Spaces are always gendered, some more secure, as compared to others. Gender segregation will not prevent sexual harassment. Gendered spaces are counterproductive and will not prevent sexual harassment. The real world does not function like this. Addressing the larger issue of why it happens is crucial, and a zero-tolerance policy is needed. Uniforms too, especially at a tertiary level, prevents students from expressing themselves, and positive differences from emerging. Boys and girls should be like each other, and prescribed behaviour along the lines of ‘boys will be boys’ is befuddling and regressive. If we prescribe gendered spaces and salwar-kameezes to young adults, they will not learn the concept of consent and women will not be equipped to protect themselves in the future.

—Shoma Choudhury, HOD of Sociology, St Xaviers, Kolkata

Source: DNA, 9-02-2017

An extraordinary academic

The story of a distinguished Indian scholar in public policy studies

Few Indians know about the huge and poignant tribute that the United States has paid to their distinguished compatriot: the late Dr. Sripati Chandrasekhar (November 1918-June 2001). And, by extension, to India. Indeed, the University of Toledo (UOT), Ohio, has preserved papers documenting Sripati’s life and research for the benefit of other scholars. Sripati’s collection is housed at UOT’s Carlson Library’s Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections.

“Chandra,” as Sripati was known to his friends, wore many hats. A former Vice-Chancellor of Annamalai University, he was a prolific scholar/demographer and wrote 32 books. Indeed, he fell in love with the subject of demography (population studies) as a teenager. He started contributing to The Hindu on Indian demography and other themes. And his undergraduate essay on India’s population problems won the Papworth Prize. He founded the Indian Institute of Population Studies and the academic journal, ‘Population Review,’ which he edited for over 40 years.

As a Cabinet Minister

However, he is best known for his work as Union Minister for Health and Family Planning in Indira Gandhi’s Cabinet. In this position, he played an important role in popularising birth control methods, advocating for smaller families, for women’s biological emancipation, and for a cleaner India. Chandra was a charismatic conversationalist, and an eloquent orator. He persuaded President Lyndon B. Johnson to continue supporting India’s family planning programme. This way, he brought the subject to the attention of policymakers abroad, and to the attention of many non-specialists. A passionate social scientist, Chandra was 83 and still working on half a dozen projects, including his autobiography, when he died in La Jolla, California.

How did Chandra’s papers achieve the privilege of being archived at UOT in 2002? Chandra’s family members had previously agreed that they would gift his materials to the University of California, Berkeley. In fact, karmic connections between Chandra and his earnest shishya (student) and colleague, Dr. Daniel Johnson, who at the time of his death was the University of Toledo’s president (vice-chancellor), best explain this.

Karmic ties

But first, a little about Chandra’s karmic ties with the U.S. With Mahatma Gandhi’s blessings, Chandra set sail for the free world at the end of 1940. He took his M.A. in economics from Columbia University, then went to New York University to take his Ph.D. in 1944. He wrote his doctoral dissertation on India’s population problems. His advisers were Professors Harold Hotelling and Henry Pratt Fairchild. In 1945, under the auspices of Pearl S. Buck’s East and West Association, Chandra criss-crossed the U.S., lecturing passionately for India’s freedom. (Founded during the Second World War, the East and West Association sought to mobilise American public opinion in favour of the Allied Powers’ war effort in Asia).

In 1947, Chandra married Anne Downes, an American Quaker, at the St. Peter’s Church in New York. The priest who solemnised his marriage was Mahatma Gandhi’s American disciple. From 1947 to 1994, Chandra lectured at various institutions in the U.S., India, and Europe. Indeed, he is the first Asian scholar that the University of Washington, Seattle, invited to deliver the John and Jezzie Danz lecture on the problem of abortion, with special reference to India. Over the years, Chandra accumulated several awards and honours, including honorary doctorates from the U.S., Hungary, Canada, and India.

Chandra last taught demography from 1993-94, at the University of North Texas, Denton. He was invited by Daniel Johnson, Dean of the School of Community Service at Denton. A distinguished urban sociologist, Johnson had first learned of Chandra when he wrote a paper for an advanced graduate seminar in demography, in which, he compared the populations of India and Japan. However, it was only in 1993 that Johnson first met Chandra, when Professor Vijay Pillai, a mutual friend and colleague brought him to Johnson’s office. “What was intended to be a 10-minute introduction turned into a four-hour conversation about world population,” says Johnson. And it morphed into a lasting and meaningful friendship. This culminated in securing a permanent home for Chandra’s collection at Toledo, since 2002.

The project

Having persuaded Chandra’s family to gift his materials to the University of Toledo, Johnson oversaw the move from start to finish. The Rockefeller Foundation in New York co-funded this project. Barbara Floyd, a veteran archivist, drove to La Jolla to take possession of the library materials and bring them back to Toledo. Floyd, with Kimberley Brownlee, a manuscripts librarian, readied the materials for public use. Chandra’s collection reaches over 78 linear feet. It is a veritable treasure trove. It comprises materials on family planning, birth control, and human rights with special reference to women. It also includes materials on other related subjects, such as migration, Indian culture and history, environmental and health issues, and food production and nutrition. Also included are photo albums documenting special events in Chandra’s life, and audio-visual materials of his speeches with Martin Luther at Amherst College, Massachusetts, and his appearance on the Today Show, the American TV programme. Chandra’s awards, honours, personal papers, and correspondence, including correspondence with public figures, from Jawaharlal Nehru to Hillary Clinton, complete this collection. Finally, at Johnson’s initiative, Chandra’s books, including Hungry People, Empty Lands and Red China: An Asian View, have been re-published.

Chandra was a pioneer in his field, demography. Moreover, demography intersects with many areas including sociology, economics, statistics, global health, human rights, women’s rights, international law, peace and security, and the history of medicine. Small wonder that his collection continues to attract scholars from the U.S., Canada (Professor Ian Dowbiggin) and the U.K. (Rebecca Williams, Warwick University and Cathryn A. Johnston, King’s College, London. The latter’s doctoral dissertation submitted in January 2016 focusses on the “problem of population in India, 1938-74”).

(The author was S. Chandrasekhar’s research assistant in the U.S. and later an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Political Science, University of Toronto)

Source: The Hindu, 24-01-2017

UPSC Economic Service/Statistical Service Exam 2017: Notification issued, check it here

The Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) on Wednesday issued a notification announcing examination date and procedure for applying for Indian Economic Service/Indian Statistical Service Examination, 2017 on its official website.

Approximately 44 posts in 1) Indian Economic Service (15 posts) 2) Indian Statistical Service (29 posts) would be filled through the examination.

The last date to apply for the examination is March 3, 2017 till 6pm.

Aspirants are required to check eligibility conditions and instructions before applying for the exam, exclusively through the website www.upsconline.nic.in.

Candidates shall be issued an e-admission certificate three weeks before the commencement of the examination and will be available on the official website.

Source: Hindustan Times, 8-02-2017

Education in Budget: Plenty of promise, but will it pass practical exam?

Your college may soon be able to draft its own curricula. You may be able to take more online courses from trusted, even elite, institutes. It may just become easier to secure a postgraduate (PG) seat if you are a medical student.

The Union Budget, presented last week by finance minister Arun Jaitley, had plenty in store for the education sector. The government promised a 9.9% increase in budget, for one thing. It has also promised to loosen the purse strings for on-campus research.

“Both moves will be helpful. In a country with around 41% of the population under 20, the measures will produce more employable graduates and enhance scientific innovation,” says Ajeenkya DY Patil, chairman of Ajeenkya DY Patil University, Pune.

But while the budget sounds like good news all around, there are questions over whether the Centre will fare well when it comes to implementation. In the immediate future, all eyes are on the reforming of the University Grants Commission (UGC), which will allow universities and institutes greater autonomy.

TEXTBOOKS TO TECHNOLOGY

“The redesign of the UGC will benefit the colleges striving for betterment,” says Apoorva Palkar, member of the higher education department at the Rashtriya Uchchatar Shiksha Abhiyan (RUSA). Palkar is also the former director of Mumbai university’s department of higher and technical education and believes the move will help teaching staff too. “Colleges and universities can now be academically and financially independent, which will let them hire better teachers and conduct more research,” she adds. “The institutes can also collaborate with students and industry experts to design modules and make lessons more contemporary.”

Many institutions have struggled to wrest autonomy from the government, but the process has been complicated. Selection is arbitrary and there are too many tests and much paperwork involved. The budget has simplified this. What will now happen is that colleges and universities will be evaluated on performance. “Those that do well will be granted autonomy without much hassle,” Palkar says.

For the first time, the budget has announced a 5,000-seat increase in medical seats at the post-graduate (PG) level. “Currently there are only 18,000 PG seats for clinical subjects across the country,” says Dr KK Aggarwal, president of Indian Medical association (IMA), a national voluntary organisation of doctors.

This means that only half the students that graduate in medicine secure a means to study further. Dr Aggarwal believes there should be more PG seats than undergraduate seats, “so students from abroad can study here”, making it a revenue source for India. “The US has 19,000 undergraduate seats and 32,000 post-graduate seats,” he points out.

A welcome plan this year has been the setting up of a system that measures annual learning outcomes which refers to the level of proficiency students get in the skills such as English, analytical thinking and creative thinking at educational institutions across India. We currently have no way of knowing, say, how proficient are the students in what they need to be and just exam marks are not the way of knowing.

“Every year, national surveys reveal the disparity in the skills between government and private institutions,” says Dhiraj Mathur, partner-Education, PwC India, a network that provides assurance, tax and advisory services. “The country needs an objective assessment of how students actually fare, to improve education quality.” The idea, though will take time to materialise, he says, given how much data will need to be analysed.

Students are particularly excited about the Swayam initiative mentioned by Jaitley. The portal, launched in November, is run by the Union HRD ministry and offers free online courses across the arts, sciences and other streams.

“The announcement that Swayam will have over 350 courses and will be linked to DTH channels will help it get more content and better features,” says Anil Sahasrabudhe, chairman of All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE), which developed the platform. “Soon, a student will be able to take the course online and have an option to transfer credits for the it to the university he or she studies at.”

Among other proposals is one to establish a national testing agency for all entrance exams. The move aims to relieve AICTE and Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) from conducting entrance exams so they can concentrate on academics. You will not need to write multiple entrance exams for engineering colleges and deemed universities once the national testing agency is established. “Students will have to write fewer exams for admissions,” says Sahasrabudhe. “We will also get engineers of uniform quality as the exam will be standard.”

Emphasis on learning foreign languages is greater than ever this year after the minister mentioned that 100 skill centres with courses in foreign languages will be set up. “Learning foreign languages helps in getting jobs at multinational companies in India and getting hired abroad,” says K Saicharan, founder of Vivekananda Institute of Foreign Languages, Hyderabad.

A BUMPY RIDE?

The budget looks good on paper. Will it pass the practical exam?

Agnelo Menezes, principal of Mumbai’s St Xavier’s college, says that greater autonomy is a much-needed, long-overdue development, but there are loopholes that must be addressed.

“Along with autonomy, institutions should be allowed to appoint teachers as per international standards,” he says. He also believes that a differential fee structure (depending on a student’s economic background) be introduced so the instate can afford qualified teachers. Currently, St Xavier’s is facing a faculty crunch in seven departments, the gaps are filled by temporary, visiting faculty.

The budget does not also provide the kind of monetary benefits required to function in autonomy, says Menezes. “For the longest time, institutions like the UGC have been in control of our fee structure, which does not allow flexibility according to the economic and financial well-being of a student, rather relies on the quota and other systems,” he says, adding that because of this, there is always lack of funds to concentrate on bettering educational facilities for students. “As long as these pre-requisites are not properly met with, the autonomy will remain only on paper, failing to make any difference in effect,” he adds.

As for a unified way to study how students fare across India, that dream is a long way away from reality, says Mathur of PwC. “The US has been trying to implement it for a decade. We need adequate infrastructure and resources to implement it.”

Source: Hindustan Times, 8-02-2017