Commoners Stake in Accesses

Standpoint wishes all its readers a very happy and prosperous new year2010...hope we will keep sharing the debates in similar spirits...Standpoint also offering its heartful condolence for Asheem Chakravarty,the legendary singer and percussionist(Indian Ocean)whose prematured demise was a painful jolt for all music lovers across the globe...

As we are heading for a dawn of New Year with leaving this present epoch making year in which we partially upfront with the havocking recession and later witnessed its recovery to a scale; amidst these loose and gain situation, its marginal impact on commoners or Aam admi could be sensed very high despite their substantial proportions in low end services.
Frequent retrenchments and layoffs in the name of cost cutting measures and inflation, surging like banyan trees are relentlessly jeopardizing the relative potential gain of these sections that hitherto have been never caught in such web of relative deprivation before the reform era when earlier income gap was not happened so huge.

In the early eighteenth century, India accounted for nearly a quarter of world output, but by the time India got independence, that share had declined to about 3%; the common men’s were in the centre as the deterioration of basic indexes have been largely constituted through there growing destitutions.
Major causes of this growing divides are numerous approaching frills which desperate common men to experiment adequately to raise their fortunes-indeed by data, incomes are growing up in rural areas, only the failure to innovate policies are hampering the immense scope for empowerment that sustained growth offers the common men in India.

Besides other outcomes, reforms opened up new possibilities of emancipation for the masses which can thrive and strive for inclusive growth with empowering connotations that’s strikingly sound better than earlier popular moves like Garibi hatao (Poverty Eradication) in 1970’s.
Although these all needs a consistent backing of positive political will and constructive mindsets all around; since the adoption of liberalization programme in 1991, India as nation have been countering with numerous oddities- cries of separatism in its north-east and the north-west region, religious antagonism, militancy, scams, natural calamities, instable neighborhoods and of course current global financial crisis in which despite its bid to escape have considerably caught in losses.

Before this ongoing financial crisis, the Asian crisis of 1997 and over investment in the mid-90’s brought an end to resurgent growth in the Asian continent, growth again picked up only in 2003-04; thereafter, till the present financial crisis that reached to noticeable scale in September 2008 and started receiving much notice after the bankruptcy of iconic Lehman Brothers and near about six dozen other financial institutions in western economies.
Despite such adversities on global financial integration and availing one-fourth of it territory affected by violence and insurgency, Indian economy sustained a robust growth of 7% and is expected to touch the level of pre-recession by the next fiscal year which is indeed admirable. So, we still have positive indications by surpassing the enormous challenges, the only big thing we are missing now the universalization of access to the fruits of growth….innovations at various levels could only take off when the required resources would be easily available among the executioners.
Optimization of financial delivery through no-frills services by the financial institutions could rationalize most of the innovative practices; UPA government’s moves like Unique Identification Project (UID) and payment of wages of many centre sponsored developmental flagship programmes such as NREGS, through banks could caused for a lot of positive changes which are most sought after for the being.

Usually I don’t believe in practices of blind consumerism albeit some inherent positive competition could be inferred for the while to produce it as show piece-telecommunication in India is most formidable example before the financial sector in India; the way telecom companies have been targeting the low end users through shift competition and consistently reducing of theirs margins of profit is a best example of participatory growth.
It’s worthwhile to note that even after that most of company’s including government owned, BSNL&MTNL are making handsome profits; some positive initiatives are needed from our banks to uplift the morale of common folks whose improved positions would be very imperative to see the Indian growth stories in real light.

Education and financial stability has powers to do miracle in rural hinterlands of India; the famous quotation of great communist economic thinker Karl Marx seems very conducive here “It’s material being ness that decides the awareness of humankind and not the vice-versa”….through practical understanding to deep analysis of complex developmental economics, all formed same crux that the access or entitlement that decides the fate of related folks.
After sixty-two years of independence and considerable shaping of our economy, now the time is ripe to incline the priorities towards ensuring the basic facilities for all along abandoning populist and divisive ingredients from the honest developmental agenda.
Atul Kumar Thakur
December 30th 2009, New Delhi
atul_mdb@rediffmail.com