In The Media ⁽⁴⁰⁰⁾

The latest example of this trend is the policy package relaxing foreign direct investment (FDI) in single-brand retail from 51% to 100%.See full article Rather than promote inclusion through reforms, which would pave the way for rapid expansion of labour-intensive manufactures and, hence, well-paid jobs for the low-skilled, and through redistribution, which would directly transfer income from the rich to the poor, we seem to have set on a course to converting every policy into the instrument of advancing social goals. The consequent muddying of policy waters has been distorting incentives, undermining the primary objective of the policy while opening ever more avenues to corruption. The latest example of this trend is the policy package relaxing foreign direct investment (FDI) in single-brand retail from 51% to 100%. Rather than do away FDI cap in a clean way, the policy requires retailers going beyond 51% FDI to source 30% of the value of products they sell from Indian small and village industries. Thus, a policy that was meant to remove a distortion and facilitate commercial transactions to take place freely has been…

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Read full article Abstract: That Kerala has the best indicators of health and education outcomes among all Indian states and enjoys a low rate of poverty is beyond question. The state unequivocally enjoys the highest male and female literacy rates and life expectancy at birth, and the lowest rates of infant mortality, maternal mortality and malnutrition. Because the communist and other left-of-centre governments have ruled Kerala for the better part of its post-Independence history, analysts routinely attribute its superior achievements in health and education to the high priority these governments have allegedly assigned to equity and related social goals over time. This view has gained so much currency that, while its advocates feel little obligation to offer supporting evidence, detractors remain ill at ease to insist upon it.

Subsidised grain, which can be readily converted into cash in the open market, will do precious little to alter the consumption pattern of the beneficiaries.Read full article While some may view the food security Bill as the instrument of combating poverty, this distinction belongs to the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, the flagship anti-poverty programme of the United Progressive Alliance government. The proponents of the food security Bill at the National Advisory Council have promoted it as the instrument of fighting widespread and rising hunger, instead. But what is the empirical basis of the claims of widespread and rising hunger in India? Surely, we cannot go by the claims of the Food and Agricultural Organization, World Bank and many NGOs who themselves prosper from propagating the view that India and Africa suffer from ever-rising hunger and poverty.

Miscommunication has led to people not realising that new poverty estimates count more Indians as poor.Read full article Watching the recent debate on the poverty line has been a depressing experience. As the debate unfolded, we witnessed self-righteous commentators engaged in a game of one-upmanship to prove that no one was more concerned for the poor than they, electronic media failing in its responsibility to inform the public simple facts and the Planning Commission proving itself incapable of communicating in simple terms the rationale behind its proposal either the public or the Supreme Court. To understand what was so wrong with the debate, it is important to note at the outset that the revised poverty line, which became the punching bag of all and sundry, had been recommended by the late Professor Suresh Tendulkar, an economist with impeccable knowledge of both the history and economics of poverty and poverty lines in India. He had also been known and uniformly admired for his integrity and forthrightness. Therefore, contrary to the picture the activists and media painted, the revised poverty line was not…