Oh Can’t We See?
Back in the 1970s, still wading through Watergate, Vietnam
War, and past the civil rights protests, rock and roll came
into its own. With searing music,
exploring strands from across the world, and asking searching questions. Can’t you see was a one hit wonder from a
relatively obscure band. While it seems
only a break-up rock song, its guitar work, flutes, and vocals were indeed
haunting. That “Cant you see” being a metaphor
for “Cant we see?” directed at those of
us dreaming of a better India,
In terms of financial bandwidth, we have moved on. When P Chidambaram presented his dream budget
in 1996-97 for Rs 100,000 crores with the 20% each already allocated to
servicing the debt, funding the states, funding defense, and paying salaries
for government staff, he had only Rs 20,000 crores to develop the country - about Rs 200 per capita. With such meagre resources, even a single
flyover over one intersection was a luxury.
We seemed forever consigned to third world existence, While poverty was an un-mutable fact, what
could be challenged was the swing to the right.
The horrors of the violence that we were witness to in the early 1990s
kept us transfixed on what should or should not be the agenda for the
country. Like deer caught in those
headlights we have not moved on.
India’s economy has certainly grown leaps and bounds, The interim budgeted this February has a government
spend which is 47 times higher than that at 1996 .. at
47 00,000 crores. While in 1996, we the consuming middle class
were barely 10% of the population. Our influence on national politics was
limited. Who gets voted to power
depended on the poor. But much has changed
since then . With 15 million two
wheelers and 4 million cars sold every year, the aspiring classes are at least
500 million strong – less than 40% of the country, but our voice carries, through
the influence we wield on social media demanding amenities from the government,
and the loyal discourses that we sustain through whatsapp university. It is to this segment that I ask and to those in
the liberal left and the pro-establishment right – Cant’t we see?
If one were to Pareto out the problems that Indians face, it
is lack of access to dignified housing for the urban poor – about 100 million
Indians live in slums – in small shacks with poor sanitation, schooling and
health care. It is amazing that while
Mumbai glitters like Manhattan, with more than Rs 100,000 crores spent on sea
links and metros, the poor continue to live in such poor conditions. The same applies across metros and tier 1 and 2 cities in India. The
problem is also one of a poverty trap that over 50% of those in rural India face, There is a paucity of jobs in India, Support prices of crops have not
kept up with inflation for more than a decade.
Infrastructure for storage of agro-produce is non-existent. Opportunities to augment incomes through
distributed renewable energy (solar panels on roof tops and irrigation pumps),
solar farms in fallow lands, biofuel and energy from crop waste have been frittered
away in favour of Renewable Energy projects favouring a few large industrialists. And those in rural India have poor access to
schools, colleges and education. In many
small villages education is available only to primary and middle school. Overcoming such barriers is something that
the poor cant afford. If one throws in
caste structure into the mix the problem is even worse, While climate change is an elite problem ripe
for discussions, it is a lived crisis for the rural poor, Climate change and the normal vagaries of monsoon seem to have colluded
to throw up either a cycle of relentless drought or destructive floods, Large scale government and private
intervention is needed to address this issue, to augment Renewable Energy for non-industrial
use, and increased reliance on agro based biofuels for transportation. If technologies for the same are invested
such that the value add is at the farmers door step the near permanent poverty
in rural areas can be redressed, It is
the absence of ideas, policies and investment in this space that results in
migration of millions to cities for a better livelihood.
While the agenda required for the country is clear, we have an almost
Dystopian fight between the right wing and liberals over religion. If one were to focus on day to life for the
millions of the majority and minority, the rights to worship, attire, identity
is fairly unfettered. The banks in India
shut down for Good Friday, while in US they do not. Our stock markets close for Eid and Guru Nanak
Jayanthi. Each religion has its own
civil code and rightly so, to be challenged only when individual rights are breached. What we fight over and take cudgels with and
rightly so, is on incidents of violence.
That said the elephant in the room is that at least 30 to 40% of the
population is trapped into poverty with limited recourse for a better life. And another 20% are just one crisis away from
a slide back to destitution.
Yet in the kaleidoscope of issues that I see being debated in the press, on TV and social media, it is –
mostly focused on religious divide, whose single biggest benefit is to help us
voice opinions which are in tune with our
identity markers. I feel like again
screaming – “Oh Can’t we see?” Because real
issues are lost in irrelevant echo-chambers.
While the poor really struggle to live in dignity across India.
