In Response to ‘Bye Bye Nanny State’

Mr Swapan Dasgupta in his column “Bye Bye Nanny State dated 13.03.2004, craftily chosen words to give undue credits to his all-time favourite BJP government for the liberalisation of Indian economy.
In the penultimate paragraph, Mr Dasgupta writes “That economic model ran out of steam by the mid-Seventies, although it was another three decades before it was formally junked”. Nothing can be more untrue than this. It is, in fact , the Janata Party government which was dominated by erstwhile Jan Sangh members driven out Coca Cola in late seventies and abused MNCs operating in India in every possible way. The Statement of Economic Policy of the Janata Party’s Working Committee (1977) took a much tougher stand vis-à-vis foreign capital when it harped on the theme of self-reliance and did not envisage foreign collaboration in areas where adequate Indian skills and capital are available. The statement specifically urged, “The provisions of FERA must be rigorously enforced in the sector of consumer goods industries. The foreign firms should be asked to carry forward the process of Indianisation.Their production capacities should also be frozen at the existing levels.”
On the other hand, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru clarifying his government’s position in the Constituent assembly, had said, “The object of our regulation should be the utilization of foreign capital in a manner most advantageous to the country. Indian capital needs to be supplemented by the foreign capital not only because our national savings would not be enough for the rapid development of the country on the scale but also because in many cases scientific, technical and industrial knowledge and capital equipment can best be secured along with foreign capital.”  

Pandit Nehru assured the foreign interests that they would not be subject to restrictions or conditions not applicable to similar Indian enterprise, that they would be permitted to earn profits subject only to regulations common to all and would continue to enjoy existing facilities for remittances of profit and that in the event of their nationalisation, they would be paid fair and equitable compensation and given reasonable facilities of the remittance of proceeds.
The entire process of liberalisation started when the manifesto of the Congress (I), the party which eventually won the 1991 General election, explicitly stated the need for a drastic policy change seeking to liberalize Indian economy from the shackles of bureaucratic tangles. This for the first time in the history of independent India, any political party expressed its strong determination to abandon the four decade long economic model. In fact, there was considerable amount of scepticism in the RSS top brass about the new economic policy of P.V.Narasimha Rao government which they expressed from time to time. Mr Dasgupta writes” For the past six years, the National Democratic Alliance government has attempted to change the philosophy of governance from state intervention to state facilitation. Beginning with the progressive dismantling of the licence-permit-quota raj that marked the Congress’s shortage economy and stretching to the cautious privatization of the public sector, the trend is towards the rollback of the state.” The choice of word is such that it might lead a reader to believe that it is the NDA government which supplied the philosophy.
And Mr Dasgupta suffers from selective amnesia when he talks of euphoric middle class and shining India. The GDP growth delivered by Atal Behari Vajpayee is lowest since 1991 which is 5.62% far lower than P.V Narasimha Rao’s 6.40%. Public debt has gone up from 52.7% in 1999-00 to 63.3% in 2002-03. Across the country, there are 41.6 million people – four times the population of Belgium – registered at unemployment offices. According to UN report, there is an increase of 19 million people in India who do not even get two square meals a day from 1999 to 2001. If we are talking about a surging stock market, which might be a short-lived and synthetic phenomenon, India is definitely shining. But going by the same yard-stick was India shining while Harshad Mehta was reigning?
That 75 lakh people, more than the population of Switzerland, had applied for a mere 38,000 lowly-paid jobs in the Indian Railways, is no longer a matter of concern for de-facto spokesperson of BJP like Mr. Dasgupta at times when the country is on a fast track information highway. When the country is plagued by poverty, unemployment, corruption at every sphere of life, the government is shamelessly projecting a cosmetic image spending taxpayers’ money for its narrow political purpose.
In the mid 1980, the sale of Banita, a minor girl from Kalahandi in Orissa, had shocked the nation. Unfortunately, two decades later, the pro-government media pundits of shining India is refusing even to notice the cries of a one month old baby who was sold by her mother for a mere Rs 10 in the same state. Is this called ‘shining on’?
IIT-Kharagpur , 14th February, 2004   

  Note:  This was written in response to an article published in The Telegraph on Friday, Feb 13-2004 http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040213/asp/opinion/story_2888680.asp