Too poor to acknowledge poverty?

Who is a poor in our country? This may sound like a very rhetorical question, which everyone in the country has an answer to, but never the less needs to be brought into light again and again, because so is the condition of this new age that we have the retention level of a five year old.

Poverty, according to the World Bank; Poverty is pronounced as deprivation in well being, and comprises many dimensions. It includes low incomes and the inability to acquire the basic goods and services necessary for survival with dignity. In simpler terms it means the inability of a person to access to the basic necessities like food, clothing and shelter.

And according to the World Bank, a person must earn approximately $2 per day, if he is to call himself above poverty line, and according to this, an approximate 60% of India’s population is below poverty line.

However if Indian economic ‘scholars’ are to be believed $2 per day is a very steep amount, and on the contrary all you need to survive in this high growing rate economy and with an ever so fluctuating inflation index, is Rs 28.62 per day and that too if you are living in urban areas of the country, but in case you live in rural part of the country (where mind you, most of the population of India lives) you only need Rs 22.42 per day, well that is, at least what the Planning Commission of India thought was needed to survive.

But what people fail to realize is that these small numbers matter big when it comes to defining policies, a decline of even Rs 2 in the minimum amount needed to survive means migration of millions of people from the BPL families to those that are above it.

And over the years all that the various governments, in order to promote themselves and to show the tremendous amount of work that they have done to uplift the poverty stricken people, have done is play with the numbers. That is the reason why the poor and poverty in our country does not depend on the money, an individual earns, rather it depends which government is in power.

This is the situation of poor in this country, he may not be able provide his family with food, but because he earns a little over than Rs 30 per day, he does not fall under the category of BPL families. 

And if the Planning Commission coming out with these reports was not enough, there are other prominent Political leaders who try to justify these reports.

But if mocking the poor is the main aim of the Planning commission, why do they stop here? Why not make these people who are above the poverty line pay taxes, hey if they can lead a sustainable life in Rs 28.62, they very well contribute in the development of the country.

Well certainly for a country in which only 2.77% of the people pay taxes, it is rather criminal to believe that only about 29% of the population is below poverty line.

If the only work of these reports is to try and hide the actual number of poor in the country, then why come out with a number at all, why not go out and say that the country is free of poverty and that no one dies of hunger and malnutrition.

For at least then the reports could be called totally biased and not be in the limbo that they today stand in.

The governments must understand that the numbers can be played with, but the ground reality remains that even after 65 years of independence poor still remain poor, but depending on the government.

The Planning Commission would be soon coming out with its new report in a few months and it would be rather interesting to see, how many poor people would the Commission find fit to be called poor.

Thank god it’s a Democracy

The last two years can best be described as Protest years; there have been a rather unusual rise in the number of protest that have taken place in our country. The count of protest began with the Anna Hazare’s, anti corruption campaign that saw thousands of people coming on the streets in the various parts of our country and showing their anguish against the sudden outburst of scams that engulfed the administration of the country. And probably the biggest protest that the country has seen in the recent times came last December, viz a viz the Delhi gang rape, which I must admit as a human being, shook me.

These protests saw the youth of the country taking part with immense motivation and in huge numbers. This was perhaps the first time in a long time that such a huge number of the population stood up for something. It was probably the first that the greater chunk of the society realized what it is like to live in a democracy, something that has to be actually experienced in order to realize.

But what they seem to have forgotten is that although they have the right to protest, sit on agitations, or strike, they can’t hold this right as a tool for blackmailing the government. People must understand that the population of India is not in a few thousands or millions; rather it is more than 1.2 billion. So it not possible for the law to be changed every time a few thousand men and women sit on a protest to change a law (which was made to cater the needs of a nation) which has been serving for more than 65 years. As much sad and biased as this may sound, this is the ugly truth that people must grasp if we as a country are to progress. The Supreme court’s decision that as many as 90% of all the dowry cases in India were wrongly filed is one the best examples how laws can be easily misused in our country. This is the reason that any law before passing through, has to go through severe scrutiny. This is the reason that any law made is crafted in such a manner that it caters to a large number of people.

The people must understand that just like they have right to protest, the government has some rights too, a wrong or a flawed law can do much more harm to the society than the reason it was made for. They must try to understand that it’s not just the law that has to be changed with the changing times, but the attitude too needs to be changed. The law can be changed nth time but it does not guarantee less offenses, for they can be misused if not implemented properly, rather it is the attitude of the people that has to be worked upon and is due for a change.