A Faustian Pact

 A Faustian Pact

The President, Pranab Mukherjee, long a good Congressman, has signed the “Food Ordinance” which will morph into the National Food Security Act after debate and amendments in parliament.

It commits the Government to feeding millions, with near- free grain, and extras in cash to pregnant women and lactating mothers, and hot meals to children, between ages 6 to 14.  

Much of the largesse is at a subsistence level, being just 5 kg of food grain per month which translates into rice, wheat, and coarse grains. But, it covers a gargantuan qualifying population of 800 million people, out of the total population of over 1.2 billion.

So two- thirds of the populace, 75% of the rural and 50% of the urban, are deemed to need subsistence rations at between Rs. 1 to Rs. 3 a Kg. God help the quality of what they will get, judging from “ration grain” in the past, but still it is a mammoth undertaking, probably the largest of its kind in the world. But two-thirds deemed to be needing this, sixty five years into the history of independent India, is a shocker too.

That this does not quite jive with the poverty- line statistics is baffling.  Because either two- thirds of the population is practically starving, or this kind of blanket coverage makes no sense. What about our claims of “food sufficiency” and overflowing grain store houses over the years?

We were always told there was plenty of grain after the Green Revolution and on-going improvements on the farm. But there was always talk of a shortage of storage space causing some of the Government “procured” grain to rot out in the open, and the rest to be somewhat rat, and rat dropping infested.

We have very few modern grain silos and not much by way of scientific modern storage systems. But we apparently do and did have a lot of grain which we even exported from time to time, usually with mixed reactions from the recipients due to low quality.

The Government has put aside Rs. 90,000 crores as food subsidy in 2013-14 and this includes a mere Rs. 10,000 crores for the implementation of the Food Security Act. As a consequence of the ordinance being promulgated, the Centre will have to find another Rs. 47,000 crores in 2014-15. It will cost a further Rs 1.25 lakh crores to roll out the programme nationally, and yet another Rs. 12,000 crores to pay for the maternity benefits incorporated. And these are just estimates.

The Food  Ordinance /Act is in addition to the plethora of other welfare schemes and subsidies thrust onto the camel’s back, probably to test its breaking point. This is the Indian economy being trashed, with no thought given about its sustenance or growth.

Our fiscal deficits are bound to soar out of control now and our international credit ratings will once again be threatened, more severely than ever before.

 But much of the impact will come only once the new Government comes to power after the general elections. So for the moment, no one in this Government is very worried, as is evident when one listens to the pronouncements of the Finance Minister, the Commerce Minister, the Prime Minister, the RBI Governor, the Planning Commission Head, The Chief Economic Adviser, the Congress Party President, the Congress Party Vice President, and sundry multiple spokespersons on  TV and elsewhere.

The farm- loan waivers of Rs. 60,000 crores are credited with winning the UPA the election in 2009. This time, what with the wall of bad news and tsunami of corruption allegations, the Congress Party is going for broke, somewhat literally.

Bankrupting the nation inclusive of the prospects of many future generations, is worth it if the Congress Party continue to rule and be seen  as the nation’s annadatas!

The Food Ordinance, rushed through recently, has its undoubted propaganda value, which makes it difficult for the Opposition to oppose it.  But, it may not yet save the day for the UPA because large as it is in its scope of works, it really is not very much to each voter on the ground. Aspirations have risen beyond coarse grains we may well find.

There have been several  versions of the Faustian legend. Goethe had his version. Thomas Mann had his. Germans seem obsessed with losing their souls to the Devil.

We in India have our own Faustian pacts. We are slipping and sliding down toward Hell on a path paved with hypocritical calculations on electoral dividends. And all the while, we are genuflecting our mea culpas and protesting our innocence, our desire to help the poor and downtrodden. Yes, but will it prove to be enough.

(780 words)

July 7^th, 2013

Gautam Mukherjee