Monday, February 11, 2019
The solution is universal
Strengthening the MGNREGA would be more prudent than a targeted cash transfer plan like PM-KISAN
Rural distress has hit unprecedented levels. According to news reports, unemployment is the highest in 45 years. To allay some misgivings of the distress, one of the announcements in the Budget speech was that “vulnerable landholding farmer families, having cultivable land up to 2 hectares, will be provided direct income support at the rate of Rs. 6,000 per year”.
This cash transfer scheme has been called Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN). The Ministry of Agriculture has written to State governments to prepare a database of all eligible beneficiaries along with their Aadhaar numbers, and update land records “expeditiously”. The letter further states that changes in land records after February 1, 2019 shall not be considered for this scheme.
A comparison
Undoubtedly, farmers’ distress needs urgent attention but let’s see if the PM-KISAN is a reasonable solution. Let us first compare some basic numbers with the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). For example, if two members of a household in Jharkhand work under MGNREGA (picture) for 30 days, they would earn Rs. 10,080 and a household of two in Haryana would earn Rs. 16,860 in 30 days. Jharkhand has the lowest daily MGNREGA wage rate, and Haryana the highest. Put simply, a month of MGNREGA earnings for a household is more than a year’s income support through PM-KISAN anywhere in the country.
PM-KISAN is a targeted cash transfer programme and MGNREGA is a universal programme. Any rural household willing to do manual work is eligible under the Act. According to the 2011 Socio-Economic and Caste Census, around 40% of rural households are landless and depend on manual labour. The landless can earn through the MGNREGA but are not eligible for the PM-KISAN scheme. Notwithstanding the meagre amount, the PM-KISAN might be pitting the landless against a small farmer.
Further, it is unclear how tenant farmers, those without titles, and women farmers would be within the ambit of the scheme. There is also substantial evidence to demonstrate that universal schemes are less prone to corruption than targeted schemes. In targeted programmes, it is very common to have errors of exclusion, i.e., genuine beneficiaries get left out. Such errors go unrecorded and people continue to be left out. It is in some of these contexts that strengthening an existing universal programme such as the MGNREGA would have been a prudent move instead of introducing a hasty targeted cash transfer programme.
The Agriculture Ministry’s letter states that “funds will be electronically transferred to the beneficiary’s bank account by [Government of India] through State Notional Account on a pattern similar to MGNREGS”. There are important lessons to be learned from the MGNREGA implementation. The Centre has frequently tinkered with the wage payments system in the MGNREGA. It’s creditable that timely generation of pay-orders have improved, but contrary to the Centre’s claims, less than a third of the payments were made on time. And in contempt of the Supreme Court orders, the Centre alone has been causing a delay of more than 50 days in disbursing wages.
Field realities
Moreover, repeated changes in processes result in a hurried bureaucratic reorientation on the ground, and much chaos among workers and field functionaries alike. Field functionaries are pushed to meet stiff targets. Being short-staffed and inadequately trained, this results in many technical and unforeseen errors. A case in point is the rushed manner in which Aadhaar has been implemented for the MGNREGA.
Several MGNREGA payments have been rejected, diverted, or frozen as a consequence. In the last four years alone, more than Rs. 1,300 crore of the MGNREGS wage payments have been rejected due to technical errors such as incorrect account numbers or faulty Aadhaar mapping. There have been no clear national guidelines to rectify these. There are numerous cases of MGNREGS payments getting diverted to Airtel wallets and ICICI bank accounts. In a recently concluded survey on common service centres in Jharkhand for Aadhaar-based payments, it was found that 42% of the biometric authentications failed in the first attempt, compelling them to come later. This continued harassment faced by people would have been a more humane question to address rather than brushing them aside as “teething problems” and build a new scheme on similar shaky platforms.
The success of the PM-KISAN is contingent on there being reliable digital land records and reliable rural banking infrastructure — both are questionable at best. While Rs. 75,000 crore has been earmarked for this scheme, the MGNREGA continues to be pushed to a severe crisis. The MGNREGA allocation for 2019-20 is Rs. 60,000 crore, lower than the revised budget of Rs. 61,084 crore in 2018-19. In the last four years, on an average, around 20% of the Budget allocation has been unpaid pending payments from previous years. Thus, subtracting the pending liabilities, in real terms, the Budget allocation has been lower than 2010-11. Despite a letter to the Prime Minister by citizens and MPs in January 2019, (as of February 8) all MGNREGA funds have been exhausted. While the country stares at an impending drought, workers languish in unemployment. The MGNREGA is neither an income support programme nor just an asset creation programme. It is a labour programme meant to strengthen participatory democracy through community works. It is a legislative mechanism to strengthen the constitutional principle of the right to life. That the MGNREGA works have demonstrably strong multiplier effects are yet another reason to improve its implementation. Despite all this, the MGNREGA wage rates in 18 States have been kept lower than the States’ minimum agricultural wage rates. This acts as a deterrent for the landless. Yet, work demand has been 33% more than the employment provided this year — underscoring the desperation to work. By routinely under-funding this Act, the Bharatiya Janata Party government continues to undermine the constitutional guarantee.
In an employment programme, adequacy of fund allocation and respectable wages are crucial, so meaningless claims of “highest ever allocation” and other dubious claims through a management information system are unhealthy for democracy.
At a time of such acute distress, does it not behove the Central government to improve the existing universal infrastructure of the MGNREGA before plunging into a programme pretending to augment farmers’ income?
Rajendran Narayanan teaches at Azim Premji University, Bengaluru. Debmalya Nandy is a social worker
Source: The Hindu, 11/02/2019
Caught between two extremisms
Wahhabi influence and Hindu nationalism are responsible for the radicalisation of a small segment of Muslim youth
News reports about occasional acts of terrorism outside of Jammu and Kashmir, which for historical reasons forms a special case, attributed to young Indian Muslims have appeared intermittently in the press. In addition, several recent reports suggest that global jihadi organisations such as the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) have recruited a few Indian Muslim youth primarily by exploiting the latter’s local grievances to serve their own global goals.
Many analysts, Indian and foreign, had assumed until recently that Indian Muslims were immune to extremist propaganda because of both the syncretic and moderate nature of Indian Islam and the democratic and secular character of the country which made them feel they were equal participants in the political process. Both these assumptions are now problematic, as several factors have been at work in the past three decades that challenge this conventional wisdom.
Wahhabi influence
The first is the increasing influence of Saudi Wahhabism and related forms of Salafism on Islam as practised in the Indian subcontinent. This is the result of several inter-related variables but the most important of these is the vast increase in employment opportunities in the energy-rich West Asian countries following the oil boom of the 1970s. This resulted in many Indians of all faiths temporarily locating to these countries in search of higher earnings. While a much larger number of Indians belonging to other religions moved to West Asia in search of lucrative jobs, both white and blue-collar, the religio-cultural impact of the encounter with the fundamentalist form of Islam followed in these countries, especially Saudi Arabia, on a section of Indian Muslim emigrants was qualitatively different.
Several of these temporary migrants returned to India enamoured with the obscurantist ethos of these oil-rich countries. This fascination was publicly exhibited above all in the adoption by a section of Muslim women, often under patriarchal pressure, of an ultraconservative dress code, including the niqab, or full face covering, popular in Saudi Arabia and some other West Asian countries. This dress code is very different from the traditional concept of purdah (covering up or modesty) practised by conservative Muslim families in the Indian subcontinent.
Protected by Sufism
But this display of presumed orthodoxy constituted merely the tip of the iceberg. The impact of Wahhabi/Salafi Islam on the mindset of a segment of returnees, who also passed on their preferences to a much larger group of relatives and acquaintances already impressed by the former’s newly acquired prosperity, was more profound. Islamic beliefs and practices among some Indian Muslims began to approximate the harsh Wahhabi dogma, which stands in stark contrast to the indigenous version of Islam in India. The vast majority of Muslims in the Indian subcontinent belong to the Hanafi sect based on the most liberal school of Islamic jurisprudence.
Moreover, traditionally Indian Islam has been greatly influenced by Sufi teachings and is, therefore, tolerant and accepting of religious diversity. Visitors to major Sufi shrines, such as those of Khwaja Moinuddin Chishti in Ajmer and Nizamuddin Aulia in Delhi, where people of all confessions come to pray and seek blessings, can testify to the syncretic spirit of Indian Islam. Consequently, it harbours natural defences against extremism in belief and practice. The ideological infiltration of Wahhabism/Salafism has eroded some of these defences and made a section of Muslims more insular and, therefore, open to extremist ideas.
Equally important, the spectacular rise of Hindutva or Hindu nationalism from the 1990s has had a major psychological impact on a section of Muslim youth, prompting their estrangement from the national mainstream. Inter-religious riots in which Muslims suffered disproportionately had been common in India since Independence. In some cases the police killed Muslim youth in fake encounters. The Hashimpura massacre in Uttar Pradesh by members of the Provincial Armed Constabulary in 1987 was the most macabre example of such incidents.
However, until the 1990s the vast majority of Indian Muslims treated such occurrences as aberrations and their belief in the secular and non-discriminatory character of the Indian state remained unshaken. The demolition in 1992 of the Babri mosque by a Hindu mob under the direction of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) luminaries and the riots that ensued, in which scores of Muslims lost their lives, shook the confidence of many Muslims in the secular character of the Indian state. What was most galling was the Central government’s apathy in the face of this brazen act of mob violence despite the fact that it had been forewarned. This event began the process of alienation among a section of Muslim youth from the Indian state.
This feeling grew exponentially a decade later in 2002 with the massacre of about 1,000 Muslims in Gujarat under BJP rule to avenge the death of 59 kar sevaks who were burnt to death in a train at Godhra after an altercation with local Muslims. What added insult to injury was the inaction, or, as the Human Rights Watch report on the bloodbath put it, the refusal of the state machinery to protect Muslim citizens.
More recently, the disenchantment caused by these earlier events has been reinforced by the lynching of several Muslims in northern and central India on the pretext that they were taking cows for slaughter or eating beef. The lynching of Mohammad Akhlaq in Dadri, in western Uttar Pradesh, in 2015 on suspicion that he had stored beef in his house was the most chilling example of such incidents. It was followed by additional acts of mob violence carried out with relative impunity by the so-called gau rakshak (cow protector) vigilantes. Such incidents have led to a widespread feeling among Indian Muslims that the state, instead of providing security to them, now colludes with those determined to intimidate them into submission. This series of actions and reactions makes it evident that the growth of Hindu nationalism has acted as a major stimulus for the radicalisation of a section of Muslim society in India and that the two phenomena feed off each other.
Onus on governing elites
Opinion leaders and religious scholars from within the Muslim community have the primary duty to confront and defeat the malign Wahhabi-Salafi influence on Indian Muslims in order to preserve the liberal and syncretic nature of Indian Islam thus pre-empting the spread of extremist ideology among Muslim youth. However, the impact of the growth of Hindu nationalism on the Muslim psyche can be countered only by the policies and actions of the governing elites at the Centre and in the States. Only they can take concrete steps, such as quick and impartial action against those responsible for creating mayhem in the name of religion, to reassure Muslims that the state will not shirk its responsibility of providing them physical security and ensuring that they are treated with fairness and dignity. This will be the best antidote to the percolation of radical ideas among Muslim youth by removing their sense of alienation from the Indian state that in the long run can threaten the country’s security.
Mohammed Ayoob is University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of International Relations, Michigan State University and Non-Resident Senior Fellow, Center for Global Policy, Washington DC
Source: 11/02/2019
Gained in Translation: Gandhi’s art of disagreement
Nathuram Godse and Gandhi both had an abiding love for India but Godse was so deeply offended by Gandhi’s idea of India that killing Gandhi was, for Godse, the most satisfying way of settling this disagreement.
On the evening of October 30, 1947, exactly three months before Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was shot dead, one person who had come to the prayer meeting on the lawns of Birla House objected to verses from the Quran being included in the prayers. The majority of the people present were in favour of the entire multi-faith prayer and they compelled the person who had objected to leave.
The entire episode deeply pained Gandhi. First of all, he said, all are welcome to the prayer meeting “but after coming here it is not good manners to raise any objection”.
This was no mere difference of opinion on some fleeting issue of the moment. The objector was striking at the very heart of what was most dear to Gandhi — prayer and acknowledging that all faiths are paths to the same divinity.
Yet even this did not prevent Gandhi from approaching the objector with empathy and seeing that there was pain behind his anger. At the same time, Gandhi firmly stood his ground: “…I am helpless because it (verses from Quran) is an inseparable part of my prayer.” Gandhi vowed to continue to persevere, despite this disagreement, strictly within the boundaries of nonviolence.
This story does not offer any easy copy-paste solution for our times. But it is potentially an entry point for reflecting on the delicate art of disagreement. Before we look more closely at that incident on the lawns of Birla house, 72 years ago, there is merit in re-stating some well-known fundamentals.
To be human is to disagree. Diversity of views and convictions has been an essential part of what has brought our species this far. The scale of viciousness and open hatred over social media may be new but the problem itself is very old.
Historically, disagreement has led to a wide range of responses — from killing, shouting down or ignoring the opponent to listening and attempting dialogue with the “other”.
In India, at present, it is easy to mistakenly believe that religion, caste and other forms of social identity are the main causes of violent disagreement. But some of the most famous murders in recent history have happened within the same ideology. For example, Stalin not only commissioned the murder of Leon Trotsky, his rival within the communist movement, he also presented the assassin a medal in absentia.
Nathuram Godse and Gandhi both had an abiding love for India but Godse was so deeply offended by Gandhi’s idea of India that killing Gandhi was, for Godse, the most satisfying way of settling this disagreement.
Today it is common to hear praise for Godse’s idea of India. Those who hold this view will sympathise with the person who objected to the inclusion of verses from the Quran in the evening prayer meetings led by Gandhi.
Usually this is seen as a disagreement between the advocates of Hindutva and those who believe that to support Godse is to betray both the legacy of the freedom struggle and the very essence of what it means to be a Hindu.
January 30, Gandhi’s martyrdom day, is commonly recognised as a stark marker for this on-going dispute in Indian society. Gandhi was indeed killed for his refusal to give up his respect for all faiths. But the political urgency of this dispute can obscure the core significance of this day. Gandhi’s assassin was, above all, striking at the art of disagreement which Gandhi had so assiduously cultivated.
Gandhi’s life and his politics brought forth a truth that ordinary people knew instinctively — namely, that a mat-bhed, difference over an issue, need not become a man-bhed, a division of hearts. Among the millions who lined up to pay respects to Gandhi’s ashes, many would have disagreed with him on many specific issues but that paled in comparison with the glow left behind by his art of disagreement.
Current projections of Godse as a hero are essentially about obliterating the vital difference between disagreement over an issue and a division of hearts. In this context what are the key lessons from Gandhi’s experiments with the art of disagreement?
First and foremost we must recognise, if not celebrate, that Gandhi’s practice was not perfect. This is why it is human, accessible and replicable. For instance, Gandhi’s differences with B R Ambedkar over separate electorates are perhaps the best-known instance where Gandhi fell short. Gandhi’s fasting onto death on this issue had an internal and authentic logic, but it acted upon Ambedkar as a form of coercion and laid the grounds for a lingering bitterness.
Here then is just one version of Gandhi’s key gains in the art of disagreement.
One, engagement with the other’s views is always possible and worthwhile — no matter how obnoxious that view may appear at first glance. Two, this can and must be done while being true to the fundamentals of your own conviction. Three, this requires a willingness to both listen deeply to the “other” so as to decipher their underlying concerns and anxieties and to respond accordingly.
Of course, all of the above is possible only if we seek power with others rather than over them. When there is confidence in power with others then there is potentially strength in agreeing to disagree. It is when we crave power over others that disagreement veers towards fatal conflict and any reduction in the polarisation seems threatening because a resolution of the conflict becomes anathema.
Gandhi was able to cultivate the art of disagreement not because he was drawing on modern liberal values but because he located himself in the spiritual traditions of the Indian subcontinent. Seeing all faiths as different paths leading to the same truth was only one part of this legacy. More importantly, he was rooted in the conviction that when primacy is given to the spiritual domain then our worldly disagreements become proportionally small and fleeting.
Therefore, the shouting down of the man who objected to the Quran verses was a form of violence. That evening, on October 30, Gandhi refused to have the prayer meeting. But he was clear that “disappointing 300 persons for the sake of two or three is also a kind of violence.”
So the next day the multi-faith prayer gathering proceeded complete with verses from the Quran. In case anyone objects, Gandhi had said earlier, the rest of those gathered must put up with the objection without anger: “Because you are in the majority, you should not think that you can ignore the people who are protesting. If you think you can ignore them, you would be following the path of violence. We must be more concerned about the people who are in the minority.”
Having refused to drop the Quran verses from his prayers Gandhi invited the objectors to meet him later and explain how they were harming the Hindu religion. “Personally, I think I have only done some good to Hinduism. Through this practice of reciting from the Quran I am able to draw my Muslim friends nearer to me. I have not done anything wrong in this.” After the prayer meeting, Gandhiji thanked the objectors for remaining silent and also complimented the rest of the gathering for tolerating their protests.
Three months later, the objector took the form of Nathuram Godse and killed Gandhi.
Godse’s disagreement with Gandhi ended in murder. When the court found Godse guilty and passed a death sentence, Gandhi’s family and followers pleaded that the assassin’s life be spared.
It is for each one of us to decide whether it was violence or ahimsa that was victorious on the lawns of Birla House on January 30, 1948. As individual beings, as members of a family and as a society — we cannot hope to resolve differences of issues if we are caught in the quicksands that divide hearts.
This is an abridged text of the 46th Vishnu Shastri Chiplunkar Memorial Lecture delivered at Ruia College, Mumbai on January 24. Abridged and translated from Hindi by the author
Source: 10/02/2019
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