As recession fears intensify, is India a safe haven?

A ‘helicopter view’ from INSEAD alumna Helen Alexander (‘84), Vice President, Confederation of British Industry (CBI)
“India is not simply setting new standards on trade, investment and economic terms, it’s also emerging as a genuinely influential player in many of the big global policy issues that we are all talking about at the moment – climate change and energy sustainability, WTO (World Trade Organisation), and global corporate responsibility; because some of the Indian companies are models in this respect, and – the more interesting – because of their different origin.”
Helen Alexander, the new CBI Vice President, holds an MBA from INSEAD and was previously Chief Executive of the Economist Group. She is also a non-executive director of Centrica and Rolls Royce, and she says she understands some of the opportunities and challenges these companies face in doing business in India.
India is a “hugely exciting and hugely attractive market” and potential investors should look beyond its stereotypical image of an economy driven by IT or outsourcing combined with life sciences, she says.
Speaking recently in London at the Next Generation India: Talent, Trends and Technology Inaugural Summit, organised by the UK India Business Council, Alexander said the stereotypical image of India does indeed have an element of truth, but is keen to emphasise that the nation is continuing to grow in more and more sectors.
Advance manufacturing capability is increasingly strong - pharmaceuticals, financial services and healthcare are just some of the fast-growing areas, she says.
Luxury leads the way
Three key areas were focused on in the session in which Alexander participated- media, sport and luxury retail. According to Alexander “all have strong commercial objectives where a liberalising economy can allow them to blaze the trail where others can enter later.”
The media industry, Alexander says, is opening up in some respects, but is not yet allowing foreign newspapers or news magazines to be printed there.
“And there is one feature of that industry that is quite different from the rest of the world – newspaper circulations are growing and the newspaper business is a growing one, not a declining one.
“According to the registrar, there are 8,512 newspapers and magazines with an eye-watering circulation - if you are a press executive - of more than 180 million copies!”
Sport is already showing how it can be a driver for new business models. Alexander says the Indian Premier League (IPL) illustrates just how “a cricket-mad country can lead the world when it combines a love of sport with glitz.”
Retail – and the high-end, luxury segment in particular - will also create new routes to markets. The new emporium in South Delhi is one example and Alexander reckons the fact that India has 52 billionaires compared to China’s 30 will help bring that along.
What is more, argues Alexander, some of these business enterprises can have virtuous effects on other sectors of the economy. One good example is that transportation links are being put in place ahead of the 2010 Commonwealth games. These will undoubtedly improve the transport infrastructure for the long term, she says.
“So not only do these industries like sport and media have an effect on the national psyche, but they also have the capacity to bring further economic development and further economic liberalisation.”
Macroeconomic challenges
India’s GDP growth has been impressive by anyone’s standards – nine per cent for three years running, says Alexander. There was even talk earlier this year of double-digit growth, but that, she maintains, is a tall order and would require a pace of economic reform that is highly unlikely in India’s democratic context.
“There’s no reason why India could not maintain rates of growth upward of the traditional six per cent. Whether it’s seven per cent or eight per cent depends on your economic commentator.”
This has led to a huge influx of overseas capital but in recent months some fault lines have started to emerge, Alexander warns.
Shares have slumped following the giddy heights of last year and interest rates have risen to about nine per cent – a record high.
Politics will also clearly have an important role to play as general elections loom by May next year. The current government faces some major economic challenges. These include issues such as fuel subsidies, given high oil prices, and the impact of farm levy waivers announced in the budget earlier in the year.
Other areas to watch are public sector salaries, along with major government expenditure, in particular infrastructure spending.
“How the government responds to those pressures clearly has an influence on its own political future,” Alexander maintains.
But, she argues, these factors should not alter the overall perception of India and should be simply regarded as vagaries of the market place.
“The truth is it is still a hugely exciting and a hugely attractive market.”
Partnerships in India are ‘business critical’
Unlike a few years ago, the trading relationship between Britain and India today is genuinely two-way, Alexander says.
Tata’s acquisition of Jaguar and Land Rover was, she affirms, welcomed by all sides, in particular by the workforce and unions. They saw the Indian company was buying into the brands, the technologies and the cache of two UK icons. Tata was viewed as a long-term investor with clear strategic goals and Alexander predicts that those trends are only set to continue.
Alexander says she’s also encouraged by the number of slightly smaller, perhaps less high-profile, deals in other sectors - the CBI estimates that more than 500 Indian companies have invested in the UK. Fifty-two Indian companies are now listed on the London Stock Exchange.
But, Alexander warns, there are potential areas of concern in the sub-continent: levels of education, reliability of power supply, bureaucracy and the regulatory environment, labour laws and the political implications of rural poverty.
Nevertheless, these obstacles do not appear to be deterring British investment in India। “It is now definitely deemed ‘business critical’ by British business to have partnerships in India,” she says.

Source: knowledge.insead

http://knowledge.insead.edu/IndiaSafeHaven081004.cfm

Political sovereignty of a developing country like India has become subservient to a globalised economy

Political sovereignty of a developing country like India has become subservient to a globalised economy.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh with Finance Minister P. Chidambaram.
INDIA is a sovereign state, which means that as a nation it is a self-governing political entity. Sovereignty means full supremacy of the state and its right to have control over the area of its governance, people and law-making authority, to ensure its independent existence, to supply social services such as education and health to its people, to provide them shelter and to regulate the economy.
In March 1950, the National Planning Commission headed by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru set for itself the following goals:
1. to increase production to the maximum possible extent so as to achieve a higher level of national and per capita income;
2. to achieve full employment;
3. to reduce inequalities of income and wealth; and
4. to set up a socialist society based on equality and justice and devoid of exploitation.
The foremost objective of planning in India was to bring about rapid economic growth through the development of agriculture, industry and infrastructure. Normally, the economic development of a country is reflected on the expansion of per capita in real terms. Indian planners assumed that the continuous increase of national income would eventually percolate to the masses and reduce the level of their poverty. But at the end of the Third Five-Year Plan, it was found that the increase of national income at the macro level did not reduce the poverty of the masses at the micro level.
Accordingly, the Fourth Plan emphasised the need to raise the standard of living of the people, especially the less-privileged sections of society। It stated: “While increased production is of the utmost importance, it is equally important to remove or reduce, and prevent the concentration of wealth and economic power. The benefits of development should accrue in increasing measure to the common man and the weaker sections of society, so that the forces of production can be fully unleashed.”

New Economic Policy
The new economic policy of liberalisation, privatisation and globalisation introduced by Finance Minister Manmohan Singh in 1991 marked a total departure from the Nehruvian model of planning. Emphasising the role of a globalised market economy, he declared in his 1991-92 Budget Speech: “A vast number of people in our country live on the edges of a subsistence economy. We need credible programmes of direct government intervention focussing on the needs of these people. We have the responsibility to provide them with quality social services such as education, health, safe drinking water and roads. In the same way, the development of capital and technology intensive sectors, characterised by long gestation periods, such as transport and communications and energy will need to be planned with much greater care than ever before.”
He also assured the nation that the austerity of Gandhiji would be the guiding principle and stated: “In highlighting the significance of reform, my purpose is not to give a fillip to mindless and heartless consumerism we have borrowed from the affluent societies of the West. My objection to the consumerist phenomenon is two-fold. First, we cannot afford it. In a society where we lack drinking water, education, health, shelter and other basic necessities, it would be tragic if our productive resources were to be devoted largely to the satisfaction of the needs of a small minority.”
In his Budget Speech of 1992-93, Manmohan Singh asserted: “We must begin a new chapter in our agricultural history where farm enterprises yield not only more food, but more productive jobs and higher income in rural areas.
The new economic policy initiated by the Narasimha Rao-Manmohan Singh government was faithfully followed by successive governments led by the United Front and the Bharatiya Janata Party. In 2004, when Manmohan Singh became the Prime Minister of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government, the policy of globalisation got more importance in all forms and means of governance.
Let us see how far the objectives and targets visualised by Manmohan Singh and followed diligently by successive governments during the last 17 years have been fulfilled, especially in increasing production in the agricultural sector, ensuring higher income in rural areas and providing to people drinking water and roads and “quality social services” such as education and health।

Agricultural decline
Agriculture has always been considered the backbone of the Indian economy as it provides employment to about 60 per cent of the total labour force in the country even now. However, when the economic and industrial growth of the country has significant progress, the share of the agricultural sector in the gross domestic product (GDP) has been falling continuously during the last six decades of free India as follows: 1950-51 – 55 per cent; 1970-71 – 44 per cent; 1990-91 – 31 per cent; 2000-01 – 26 per cent; 2001-02 – 24 per cent; and 2007-08 – 17.5 per cent.
Compared with the steep fall in the share of the agricultural sector in GDP, the proportion of the workforce depending on agriculture has only declined marginally from 72 per cent in 1951 to 69 per cent in 1991 and to 58 per cent in 2001.Thus the per capita earning capacity in the agricultural sector has fallen to irretrievably low levels, forcing farmers into more indebtedness and eventually leading to suicide.
As Finance Minister in 1991, Manmohan Singh was assertive that the main objective of globalisation and invitation to foreign investors was to develop social services such as education and health।

Education and health
In 2004, as Prime Minister, he released the National Common Minimum Programme (NCMP) of his UPA government, giving categorical assurances to the people to raise public expenditures on education to at least to 6 per cent and on health to at least 2-3 per cent of the GDP over the next five years. Even as early as 1965, the government had accepted the recommendation of the Kothari Commission to make annual allocation of not less than 6 per cent of the GDP for education.However, the government has miserably failed to keep its promises. The share of the governments’ expenditures on education (the Central and State governments combined) in terms of the total GDP has declined 3.1 per cent in 1990-91, 2.69 per cent in 2005-06, 2.88 per cent in 2006-07 (RE), and 2.84 per cent in 2007-08 (BE); the budgetary allotments for health by the governments (the Centre and the States combined) for these years have been 1.2 per cent, 1.27 per cent, 1.36 per cent and 1.36 per cent.
In 1991, Manmohan Singh emphasised the need of foreign investments under the globalised economy in India “to provide them with quality social services such as education, health, safe drinking [and] water”. Where did the government allow all the flow of foreign investments to be invested? It has not been able to come anywhere near its targets in the most vital sectors of human development such as education and health.
It is obvious that the grand march of globalised economy and the rapid flow of foreign exchange into India have failed to develop in any way the agricultural sector or the social services of education and health. Instead of development, there has been a steep deceleration in these vital fields, affecting large sections of society.
The government claims to have succeeded in raising the foreign exchange reserves from $5.8 billion at the end of March 1991 to $310 billion at the end of March 2008. In his 1991-92 Budget speech, Manmohan Singh said that his purpose was “not to give a fillip to mindless and heartless consumerism we have borrowed from the affluent societies of the West” and that “our productive resources were to be devoted largely to the satisfaction of the needs of the poor”.
Has the government prevented the frittering away of the procured resources in “heartless consumerism”, which is reflected in the spread of the supermarket culture? It is true that in 1996, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram, under pressure from some constituents of the Deve Gowda government and its Left allies, put a complete ban, by law, on foreign direct investment (FDI) in retail trade. In India, more than 20 million people are small retail traders and the average size of the shop run by an Indian trader is less than 500 square feet.
In 2004, the Congress party solemnly promised in its election manifesto to create “legal space in the cities and towns for hawkers, vendors, food-sellers and all such informal sector service activities that enrich urban life, so that they are spared the risk of extortion, eviction, confiscation and harassment”।

Supermarket culture
In spite of the laudable promises given by the Finance Minister in 1991 and the Congress manifesto of 2004, and despite the fact that FDI in retail trade is banned, giant international corporations are entering India, overtly and covertly, through the long chains of retail shops established in the names of big Indian trading groups.
Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries, with assets worth $43 billion (Rs.18,57,600 crore), has planned to invest Rs.25,000 crore in 15,000 retail shops across the metros in India. It has tied up with the second largest international retailer, Carrefour (of France), whose annual income in 2006 was €72,737.7 million (Rs.4,67,679 crore). Sunil Bharti Mittal of Airtel, with assets worth $12 billion (Rs.5,12,400 crore), is entering the retail trade in India with the world’s largest supermarket chain Wal-Mart with an annual revenue of $388 billion (Rs.1,67,46,480 crore).
Tata Industries plans to establish retail trade with the backing of Woolworth, and other big business houses in India are competing with one another to get international partners for organising their retail trade in India।

Unrestrained invasion
At a cramped primary health centre, which functions in the panchayat office building at Pichanoor near Tirupattur in Tamil Nadu's Vellore district. The combined budgetary allocation for health by the Central and State governments has only marginally increased from 1.2 per cent in 1990-91 to 1.36 per cent in 2007-08.
The United States has 85 per cent of its retail trade organised against India’s 4 per cent. Departmental stores and supermarkets cater to the higher income groups in large cities; India has 70 per cent of its people in rural areas with very low income. It is calculated that every departmental store employing 40 persons will make 400 retail traders unemployed. Against the unrestrained invasion of powerful foreign giants with the help of national business barons, the future of 21 million retail traders of India and their families is bleak. Unless the government takes effective steps to create alternative employment facilities for all retailers thrown out of job, India will witness growing unemployment and poverty will prove to be a great disaster for the country.
East India Company came as a trading group to India and built a political empire. At the present, from all directions, India is being invaded by more powerful corporate giants. Under the globalised economy, the gap between the developed and the developing countries has increased, and between the rich and the poor within countries.
India, according to its Constitution, is a sovereign, socialist and democratic republic. It is the largest democracy in the world, but in terms of human development index, it occupies the 128th place in the list of 177 countries of the world. According to the 2007 World Development Indicators of the World Bank, 34 per cent of the population of India subsists on an income of less than $1 a day 80 per cent on less than $2 a day. Politically, India is a free country but economically it has become utterly subservient to foreign domination.
The per capita income of an Indian is $3,460 at purchasing power parity (PPP) value whereas the per capita values of GDP of the U.S. is $41,890, Norway $41,420, France $32,153 and the United Kingdom $33,238.
It cannot be denied that economic inter-dependence at the global level has come to stay. While the globalised economy has certainly added to the economic development of India in respect of national income at the macro level, the government has failed miserably to achieve its stated objective of alleviating poverty and backwardness through its new economic policy.
India has failed to impose strict restrictions on the area and extent of domination available to giant corporations, whether Indian or foreign। In many countries, there are significant market access restrictions on foreign investments in retail trade, on foreign equity ownership, on purchase or renting of real estate, on practices of service suppliers and on forming joint ventures with local suppliers।

Restrictions
Whenever there is an application for setting up a supermarket store, the Ministry concerned in Japan first ascertain the possibilities from local authorities and find out the views of the local small-scale retailers. As a policy the Japanese government does not to allow foreign traders to deal with the sale of rice, prepared food, liquor, tobacco products and soft drinks that are normally available in small retail shops.
If there is an application for setting up a supermarket with a space of 300 square metre or more, the French government accords permission only after getting the approval of the local authorities and consulting the local traders.
In the U.S., the local authority impose restrictions while allowing a supermarket to establish a branch in its area. Wal-Mart, which has its headquarters in the U.S., was not allowed by the New York City to open even a single retail store in New York. New Yorkers objected to Wal-Mart on the grounds that it paid low wages and provided deplorable health benefits to its employees. Wal-Mart does not allow any union to be formed by its employees. In several counties and cities, the local authorities, by law and in some places by referendum, banned Wal-Mart from setting up its stores in areas under their control.
For instance, the world’s biggest retailer could not get the permission of the local authority to set up a super centre in Inglewood, California. Under the law there, Wal-Mart appealed for a referendum. In the public opinion taken in April 2004, 61 per cent of the people gave a big rebuff to Wal-Mart’s efforts to open a store in their area.
In India, there are no legal restrictions or limitations on the allotment of space to the retail giants or on the variety of commodities to be sold by them. Nor is there any consultation with the local authority or the retail traders in the area concerned.
It is wrong to assume that farmers and producers will benefit much by selling their products to supermarkets. The truth is that global retailers have been competing with one another to place bulk orders from the low-cost markets of the world where cheap labour is available. Owing to low costs and abundant supply of labour, China has become the biggest sourcing location for world retailers. It is estimated that Wal-Mart purchases $12 billion worth of goods from China for its stores all over the world and Carrefour gets 61 per cent of its purchases from China. Larger than governments
It may be noted that the annual income of Wal-Mart in 2007 was $388 billion (Rs.1,67,46,480 crore). The total revenue of the Central, State and Union Territory governments in India in 2007 was Rs.8,84,765 crore.
Regarding the grim impact of globalisation on developing and poor countries, Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate in Economics, stated that “globalisation has unleashed market forces that by themselves are so strong that governments, especially in the developing world, often cannot control them. Governments that attempt to control capital flows may find themselves powerless to do so, as individuals find ways of circumventing the regulations.” (Making Globalization Work, 2006, page 20.)
It is very difficult for anyone to pinpoint correctly the extent of the benefits that India or any other developing country may be able to get by being part of the globalised economy, but it is abundantly clear that the present arrangements accepted or imposed on India have totally failed to bring about sustainable development or to contribute to the process of equitable distribution of benefits to all sections of society.
The globalised market economy introduced in India is concerned only with consumerism, attracting high-income groups that mostly live in the cities. The agricultural sector, the rural economy, basic social requirements, decent employment and standard of living are all out of focus in the present strategy of growth under globalisation.
How much damage, politically and economically, the globalised economy has caused India was openly admitted by Manmohan Singh, as the Leader of the Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, to Thomas L. Friedman, a noted American journalist, who met him in 1998. In his book Lexus and the Olive Tree, the author reports the anguish and distress felt by Manmohan Singh by the process of globalisation in India:
“We learned that there were advantages in having access to international capital markets, [but] the government’s ability to deliver and control shrank the more it opened to the world…We have a world where our fates are linked, but [India’s specific] concerns and aspirations don’t get taken into account…If you are operating an exchange-rate policy, or monitory policy, your policies become an adjunct of what Allan Greenspan [chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve from 1987 until his retirement in 2006] does. It reduces your degree of freedom, even in fiscal policies…I have a friend from a neighbouring country who also became a Finance Minister. The day he got his job, I called to congratulate him. He said, ‘Don’t congratulate me. I am only a half minister.
Shoppers at The Wal-Mart store in Fairfax, Virginia. In a referendum held at Inglewood, California, in April 2004, 61 per cent of the voters gave a big rebuff to Wal-Mart's efforts to open a store in their area.
The other half is in Washington' " (page 108, April 2000).
This was the startlingly sad confession of Manmohan Singh who, as Finance Minister in 1991, was responsible for introducing the globalised market economy. After having gone through the bitter experience of loss of freedom and ability to ensure a free economic development, he bewailed the fate of a Finance Minister in a developing country. It will be interesting to know his assessment of the present status of the Prime Minister or the Finance Minister of India under the globalised economy.
Era Sezhiyan is a former Member of Parliament and presently a Senior Fellow of the Institute of Social Sciences, New Delhi।

Source : FRONT LINE

http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/stories/20081107252210500.htm

LEADER ARTICLE: Don't Ignore Poverty Data

Robust economic growth in the first few years of the 21st century has helped reduce poverty worldwide. But new numbers show that the actual extent of
deprivation in India and elsewhere is far greater than previously thought। This insight does not question the role of growth in improving livelihoods, but it spotlights the need for much greater inclusiveness in the growth process in the face of the scale of poverty. Sustained growth remains a high priority. But it is not just how fast a country grows; crucially, it is also how it grows. Widening gaps between the rich and the poor dampen the impact of growth on poverty. Countries such as Brazil or Mexico have historically had a much higher income inequality than India or Indonesia. But disparities have been rising in recent years in the large Asian countries, while they have been falling in major Latin American nations. The new poverty estimates from the World Bank incorporate the finding that living costs are actually higher than estimated before, reflected in a global poverty line of $1.25 a day. These calculations suggest that as of 2005 there were 1.4 billion people worldwide living in extreme poverty. One-third of them would be in India, signifying the largest number of poor compared to other countries — and even relative to the country's own past by these measures. Rapid growth has helped reduce India's percentage of people in poverty, though far slower than in East Asia. And when coupled with high population growth, the numbers of the poor, which is what matters, show an increase. What's striking is how close to the poverty line tens of millions live in India, making for a large change in the poverty numbers from a small shift in the chosen threshold. Even modest shocks can push millions below the poverty line. How well do these poverty measures mirror deprivation and its changes? For one thing, they do not adequately reflect access to schooling, health care, water and sanitation, or other public services that mark people's well-being. Nor do they capture crime and violence or environmental destruction, which are especially serious in low-income localities. Across countries, some of these attributes — especially those affecting the underprivileged — have improved in recent years, but others have taken a turn for the worse. But regardless of the precise numbers, the urgency is clear in India for achieving more inclusive growth. Experience across countries tells us that it is important to get at inequalities, but in ways that do not derail growth. In this respect, generating opportunities and jobs for the poorer segments of the population would seem to be the best way forward. Policy leaders and policy documents in India recognise the directions needed: the key would be to spur actions and achieve results. High on the agenda for greater inclusiveness would be actions to address disparities in education that contribute to large earning differentials. Compared to Korea or Russia, education inequalities are large in India or Indonesia. What matters, of course, are not only greater access to schooling, but also the relevance and quality of the education — and learning outcomes that determine its usefulness in the workplace and contribution to growth. Narrowing earning gaps also calls for efforts to address the growing skill differentials, worker mobility and the functioning of labour markets. A second issue concerns rural-urban and regional differences in incomes. Expansion of agricultural productivity, complemented by the construction of all-weather rural roads and rural electrification, would have important impacts on rural poverty. Systematic differences in income levels across states and sub-regions also merit attention. In China and India, the poorer states or provinces have, in general, grown slower than the richer ones, while it has been the other way around in some other middle- and high-income countries. A third policy area for inclusion involves improved ways to provide income support to the poor. Many countries have relied on the provision of subsidies for consumer items, but the programmes have seldom been well targeted or effective. On the other hand, conditional cash transfer programmes have looked promising. Mexico and Brazil provide cash support to poor families conditional on children attending school and going to clinics for check-ups. These approaches have shown encouraging results in reducing poverty today, and improving education and health that help sustain future growth. And then there is the new danger that is affecting all: climate change and natural disasters wreaking havoc in the lives of people, especially the poor who are most likely to be in harm's way. The Indian Ocean tsunami left more than 10,000 people dead and about 5,600 missing in India alone. The fury of the Kosi river affected 2.5 million people in 1,600 villages in Bihar, and 70,000 people in the immediate shock in Nepal. If combating damages to the environment was once considered a diversion from growth, its neglect now represents a central threat to growth. The poverty data reminds us that it is not enough to grow, it is also vital that increasing numbers of people benefit from the growth. India can generate high growth with a far greater impact on poverty through policy actions. As it turns out, inclusive growth is not only key to social progress, it is indispensable to sustaining growth itself. The writer is director-general, Independent Evaluation Group, World Bank. Views expressed are personal.
Source: Times of India
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Editorial/LEADER_ARTICLE_Dont_Ignore_Poverty_Data/articleshow/3605527.cms

Child labour prevails in northeast, but not in official data

Calcutta News.Net
Thursday 16th October, 2008 (IANS)

Even though activists say it is easy to spot children scrubbing pots and pans and doing other work at streetside restaurants in the northeast - like in the rest of the country - the labour ministry data paints a shockingly different picture.

Following queries filed under the Right to Information (RTI) Act by the Bachpan Bachao Andolan (BBA), an NGO working on child rights, ministry data revealed negligible incidence of child labour in the region.

In Arunachal Pradesh, the number of inspections carried out from October 2006 to April 2008 was just nine, in which six cases of violation were detected. However, there were no figures on the number of prosecutions filed or rescued children rehabilitated.

'In Manipur, Sikkim and Meghalaya, 39, 60 and 24 inspections were carried out respectively in the 19 months, according to the documents. However, the rest of the information - on the violations et al - had been left blank. Does this mean that there are no children employed in dhabas and restaurants in these states?' asks Bhuwan Ribhu, a lawyer and national secretary of BBA.

Two years ago, on Oct 10, 2006, the government banned the employment of children as domestic helps and in streetside restaurants. Violators can be jailed for up to two years and fined Rs.20,000.

However, to queries filed under RTI by BBA, the labour ministry said a mere 8,105 violations of the ban were detected across the country between October 2006 and April 2008.

'Children working in 'dhabas' anywhere in the country is rampant. Despite that if this is what the officials have to say about the number of child workers in the country then it just reflects their mindset - of refusing to take it as a serious crime.'

For some northeastern states like Mizoram and Nagaland, all the space for information on inspections carried out, violations detected, prosecutions filed or children rehabilitated had been left blank.

Sangeeta Borah, an activist working on child rights in Assam, said: 'These figures hardly indicate the real picture. Children continue to work in small restaurants on the roads and as domestic helps everywhere.

'What the figures state is hardly uplifting, it's scary. It indicates negligence to the problem which will only encourage the crime instead of eliminating it.'

Assam is the lone northeastern state where, according to the document, a prosecution has been filed. In 19 months, 1,261 inspections were carried out, of which 46 violations were detected.

Forty-five rescued children were sent back to their parents' homes.

Highly dissatisfied at the response and the discrepancies in the figures, the BBA is planning to file an appeal with the labour ministry.

'We will soon file an appeal as we feel there are several discrepancies in the data given to us. We had four definite queries: the number of child labourers statewise, number of rescued children, number of employers prosecuted and the kids rehabilitated. However, the figures given are very misleading and confusing,' Ribhu said.

'At this rate, child labour will never be eliminated from our society. It is time we started treating it as a serious crime,' he added.

Source: Calcutta News.Net

http://www.calcuttanews.net/story/418993

Child labour: Condemned but not eradicated!

CHOTTU, A nickname usually for the pampered child of the family; and Chottu is also the nickname used while addressing the thousands of boys working in tea stalls, dhabas, etc. What an irony! This incongruity exists in a country like India where child labour is a crime; but the fact is, despite all the efforts made, exploitation of child labour has become a full-fledged and profitable business.
The law against child labour clearly states that “no child under the age of 14 can be made to work”. Infringement of this law can lead to a fine or even imprisonment. But the outcome is there for all to see. Thousands of minors are still working in unhygienic and unsafe conditions -- in carpet manufacturing, bidi making, paint manufacturing and leather manufacturing units and brick kilns. The list is endless, but the plight of the bonded labour is palpable. Child labourers work endlessly and are paid meagrely.
A recent UNO report says that India is home to around a third of the world’s malnourished children. This is an eye opener, but who cares? People are too busy exploiting precious childhood to make instant gains. Mr. Prime Minister, in fact this is a matter of national shame; in a nation which gave birth to people like Chacha Nehru and Kaka Kalam, poor children are being deprived of their childhood!
The million dollar question is: A beginning has to be made but where? Right under your nose gentlemen and beautiful ladies; please don’t employ minors as your household servants. Instead try to be a little humane by giving them a chance to survive with honour and dignity. Let us put this into practice immediately so children like Chhotu are no more exploited to generate income for the family or slog for the rich for a pittance.
Just look into his eyes He is also innocent and very niceHe wants to play and study wellHe wants to run and go ahead Don’t make his childhood a living hellHe wants to be recognised And wish his real name to be spelled।He too has dreams He too has desiresJust help him and See how he admires Your good gestureAnd realise his dream for a bright future.
Source: Meri News
http://www.merinews.com/catFull.jsp?articleID=144067

Poverty is terrorism too

Is there a direct relation between poverty and social angst? What happens when newspapers give a daily dose of page three luxuries, champaign parties and new desirable products launched in the land where one third of the world's poor live? It sows seeds of revulsion and revolt। See how people went berserk to get a packet of food in Kosi flood affected area. If it doesn't create a pain and anguish in your heart, you must get your level of human feelings checked up. Like volcano is a natural phenomenon, eruption of public angst against injustices and unfair system too is. There has to be a social upheaval against the pot-bellied politicians and officials living sinfully luxuriously and boasting of a new, powerful India in business forums keeping their eyes wide shut on 30 crore Indians living in abject poverty and 25 crores going to bed hungry every night. Poverty is as vicious and deadly as terrorism that seeks to eliminate the unyielding. Though we worship god and bask in the glory of our scriptures that say-serve humanity, our priorities remain hooked somewhere else. The highest number of terrorist outfits and anti-national movements are being launched in areas that are reeling under abject poverty and neglect. It may be true that the most dreaded terrorists come from highly educated regime, yet their foot soldiers are found amongst the disadvantaged and the poor. Nation's gravest threats emanate from areas of tribal density and unfathomable poverty like Bastar, Telangana, Orissa and North-East. There is a plethora of reports corroborating the link between poverty and social unrest. In its update on 'International Comparison Programme', the World Bank has revised it's international poverty line norm from $1 a day to $ 1.25 [approx. Rs 55/-] a day. Based on this, the World Bank said that "out of an estimated population of about 100 crore in 2005, the number of poor people living below $1.25 a day has increased from 42.1 crore in 1981 to 45.6 crore in 2005. This is the biggest challenge facing India." The study also pointed out that even as the number of people living on the earlier poverty line norm of less than $1 a day had come down, there was still a large number of people living just above this line of deprivation and their numbers were not falling. On Wednesday, August 27, the Asian Development Bank offered a new measure of poverty - earning of $1.35 per day on purchasing power parity which puts more than half of India's 1.1-billion populations [54.8%] in the category of poor. Thousands of families in India do not find enough to feed themselves and in a moment of complete dejection they commit suicides collectively. In Bihar, a story appeared that a labourer was furious to find his meals salt-less and in a fit of anger he beat up his wife causing an instant death. Moments later his daughter returned with one rupee and fifty paisa in her hands and stated her mother had sent her to market to fetch some salt, but the shopkeeper had asked her to bring more money-Rs. 1.50 was not enough to buy salt. But by that time the anger had taken life of an innocent poor lady.
Source: THE TIMES OF INDIA
http://timesofindia।indiatimes.com/Opinion/Columnists/Tarun_Vijay/The_Right_View/Poverty_is_terrorism_too/articleshow/3427209.cms

Conversion, re-conversion and the Constitution

Conversion, re-conversion and the Constitution
Dignity is a basic human right and if this is denied by one set of beliefs, then the victim will seek it elsewhere, argues FAIZAN MUSTAFAReparession of and discrimination against minorities is as old as recorded history itself। Thus what is happening against Christians in India is not surprising. It seems we no more believe in what Supreme Court of India had said in the famous National Anthem case: "Our tradition teaches tolerance, our philosophy preaches tolerance, our constitution practices tolerance. Let us not dilute it."In spite of six advisories by the Union Government to the Government of Orissa, as things are not improving at all, "reverse proselytisation" or "homecoming" or "re-conversion" is fast emerging as the only safe bet for the persecuted Christian minority. They are embracing Hinduism in a desperate bid to bury the communal hatchet and return home.As a matter of fact, poor Christians living under terror have no choice but to change faith. Re-conversion ceremonies are taking place at several places in the remote villages, of course away from the media glare. The ceremony normally involves eating basil leaves, drinking cow dung mixed with water, and tonsuring of the head. A big parvartan utsav (transformation day) to ensure mass re-conversion is likely to be organized soon. The term conversion is as old as religion itself. The history known to us connotes that it was used primarily in Judaism and Christianity. Change of religion is mainly a product of propagation and missionary activities. The great living proselytising religions are Christianity, Islam and Buddhism. They aim to bring a social transformation and revitalization of purpose sparked by spiritual impulses.The metaphysical-moral vision induces a passion for transcendence that intellectually, morally and emotionally frees its adherents from local deities and cults, from familial, tribal, clan, caste or ethnic loyalties, from fixed political, economic conditions and from traditional paganisms. They lay a new foundation and give a new discipline, one that liberates from evil and falsehood and binds the good with the truth. Each conversion indicates a desire for change i.e. a change from the existing cruelties to recognition of individuality and self- respect.Hinduism represents a special and exceedingly complex case, for while it is similar to non-missionizing traditions in many respects, and while it seems to have spread essentially by a process called Sanskritization, the gradual adoption of Vedic practices and Brahmanic authority by non-Aryan people does indicate that it too has had periods of vigorous missionary activity. But the broad consensus is that Hinduism is a closed religion. Gandhiji and Radhakrishnan did assert that Hinduism is not a proselytizing religion. As a matter of fact rejection of proselytism is an important and essential part of tolerance. Thus ISKON (Hare Krishna) is just an exception. But the Shuddhi movement is a militant re-conversion movement that actively seeks to win back to the Hindu fold Christians, Muslims and others. It is indeed an actively proselytising movement involving also the conversion of those who had never been Hindus.Historically, most conversions in India, from the ranks of the economically poorest and socially most defenseless Hindus, to Islam and Christianity, took place under the influence of Muslim and Christian conquerors. This is the context in which the converts, converters and the conversions, were seen by the vast majority of Hindus, who had remained faithful to their religion despite defeat in battle. They saw the converts as people who had betrayed the nation by going over to the side of the conqueror, and they saw conversions as the conqueror's device, oiled through coercion and lure, for subverting Hindu society by dividing it against higher Hindu castes, which had resisted what many Hindus saw as a religio-cultural invasion by foreign conquerors. Therefore, it is not a coincidence that the conversions were condemned most and re-conversion to Hinduism was mostly preached by organizations which prided themselves on their nationalism. Conversions, it has been argued, most virulently by the extreme right among other groups, are generally coercive, involuntary and singularly subversive. However, voluntary conversions have also not been taken to kindly and have brought many social tensions in their way.As the converts mostly belonged to the lowest castes and converted to escape the notorious oppression of the higher castes, the conversions further accentuated the demarcations between castes. Political affiliates of the higher caste Hindu parties, therefore, are the bitterest about original converts and most aggressive in trying to reconvert their descendants and bring them back into the folds of caste Hinduism. Thus, the threads of conversion lead to many fault lines in India's polity and society.To the historical divides of castes, to the trauma of the historical conquests and their contemporary fallout, to the divide between the poor, rural, tribal people, and the grabbing of their land and other resources by their richer, urban, non-tribal neighbours and above all they lead to the justifiably jealous concern for the country's unity and integrity.Article 18 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) explicitly states that everyone has the right to freedom of thought; this includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching; practice, worship and observance. UDHR though is not a binding treaty; yet its universal acceptance signifies its importance in International Law. The Indian Constituent Assembly while drafting its Constitution was naturally influenced by the broad principles of UDHR.India is the world's most complex and inherently pluralistic society harboring a variety of races, tribes, castes, communities, languages, customs and living styles. The words "profess, practice and propagate" of the Indian Constitution, therefore assume immense importance in Article 25 (1) of the Constitution which guarantees freedom of religion. To profess a religion means the right to declare freely and openly one's faith. To practice means performance of acts in pursuance of religious beliefs. Rituals and observances, ceremonies and modes of worship considered by a religion to be an integral and essential part of it, are also secured. And finally, propagation means to transmit or spread one's religion by the exposition of its tenets. It is interesting to note that the visionary framers of Indian Constitution conferred the right to propagate not only on Indian citizens but also on foreigners as the words used in Article 25 are "all persons" and not "all citizens." Thus, constitutionally speaking, we cannot complain against foreigners for indulging in the propagation of Christianity because this is the right they have under our highly liberal Constitution. Where propagation ends and conversion begins is difficult to say. But the law as it stands today because of the apex court's controversial decision is quite clear that propagation does not include conversion. At the same time we need to remember that term 'conversion' was dropped from Article 25 because the visionary members of our highly enlightened Constituent Assembly in their wisdom thought that there was no need to specifically mention this word as the term propagation is already too wide. Is not "choice" central to democracy and if yes then this choice surely includes right to choose one's religion.However, in the scramble for conversions and re-conversions and the ensuing debates on immediate circumstances, one forgets to ask some basic questions. Why do individuals/communities convert? Missionaries succeed in their task not because Christians are more philanthropic but because Hindus are discriminating of their co-religionists by following the corrosive and anachronistic tenets of the caste system. If feudal landlords block well water to dalits, who should be blamed for conversions? As long as tribal people are not treated as equals, there will be a strong incentive for many to escape by embracing a faith that at least ideologically, does not perpetually condemn them as inferior.Dignity is a basic human right and if this is denied by one set of beliefs, then the victim will seek it elsewhere. While recognizing that conversions are a complex issue, which also happen sometimes starkly involuntarily and sometimes less-apparently involuntarily like taking leverage of a person's economic situation or superstitions etc., it is safe to say that as long as caste-based discrimination continues, so will the motivation for conversion. It is high time to initiate social reforms on the lines of Jyotiba Phule and Narayan Guru.While the extreme right openly asserts that the current violence is all about conversions, Christian organizations forcefully deny the allegation. It is indeed somewhat strange that despite the rule by Christians for nearly two centuries, Christian population in the country is less than 3 per cent and is further declining. The reason probably lies in what St Paul said in his first epistle to the Corinthians, "For Christ has sent me not to baptize but to preach the Gospel". Thus missionaries have the mandate to merely evangelise not proselytise. A number of states, including Orissa, have already enacted the anti-conversion law and now there is a demand to make the rules more stringent. But even though Orissa has had the Anti Conversion law for more than 40 years, one is tempted to ask how many cases of forced conversion due to coercion or inducement were filed in the last four decades? What is the conviction rate?We need to ask ourselves why laws banning bonded labor, rural indebtedness and abolishment of untouchability have not been implemented in full force in interior areas. No missionary can be blamed for these problems. Those with a vested interest in the poverty of the dalits and tribals use the Hindutva façade to continue perpetrating the cycle of poverty. Any improvement in the lives of the people then becomes a threat to them. It is to be noted that Christian missionaries succeeded in areas where the government failed to provide good education and health facilities to the marginalized. It is necessary to remind ourselves about the India Mahatma Gandhi dreamt of. He said, "I do not expect the India of my dream to develop one religion, that is, to be wholly Hindu or wholly Christian or wholly Mussalman, but I want it to be wholly tolerant, with its religions working side by side."
Source: The Statesman
http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=4&theme=&usrsess=1&id=226775

India tightens child labour laws

India tightens child labour laws
By Geeta Pandey BBC News, Delhi

Thousands of children work in roadside food stallsA new law in India bans children under 14 from working as domestic servants or on food stalls.
It also prevents children from working in teashops, restaurants, spas, hotels, resorts and other recreational centres.
PM Manmohan Singh has urged Indians to support his government's efforts to end child labour. People found breaking the law could face two years in prison.
India has more than 12.6 million child workers, many of whom are employed in the food and hospitality sector.
'Firm action'
In his appeal, on the eve of the law coming into force on Tuesday, Mr Singh said: "Our nation has solemnly pledged that children in our country are not engaged in any form of work at the cost of their right to education.
"As a major step in this direction, I call upon each one of you to stop employing children as workers and actively encourage children to join schools."
The prime minister warned that "the government will take firm action against those violating the law".

Many factories where children work are hidden from public view
Officials say the ban on employing children in homes and roadside food stalls will affect 255,000 children.
But activists say these numbers could be as high as 20 million.
A senior official in the Labour Ministry, SK Srivastava, said: "The technical advisory committee on child labour regularly surveys the risk factors involved in any industry and depending on our findings we have taken this decision."
The committee, while recommending the ban, warned that children under 14 were vulnerable to physical, mental and even sexual abuse.
Laws 'ineffective'
Mr Srivastava said that anyone found violating the ban would be penalised under the Child Labour Prohibition and Regulation Act of 1986.
Punishment could range from a jail term of three months to two years and/or a fine of 10,000 to 20,000 rupees ($225 to $450).
But child rights activists are sceptical about the effectiveness of the ban.
They point out that although India bans the use of young workers in hazardous industries, thousands of children continue to work in firecracker and matchstick factories or are involved in carpet-weaving, embroidery or stitching footballs.
They say the laws have remained ineffective in curbing child labour.
Many parents say crippling poverty forces them to send their children, sometimes as young as five or six, to work in other people's homes or in factories.
Most of these children are made to work in unhealthy conditions for long hours and paid poorly।

Source: BBC News

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6034335.stm

Reinert uses the historical experiences of the rich countries of Europe, as also of the U.S., to critique the contemporary dogma of free trade.

ERIC REINERT’S book is best described as a counterpoint to the dominant Anglo-American doctrine of globalisation, popularised and propagated by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, that the route to the prosperity of nations is free trade and hence opening up their boundaries to international trade is what countries that desire material progress should do.
The author, for many years a development consultant in Latin America, Africa and Asia, is now Professor of Technology, Governance and Development Strategies at Tallin University of Technology, Estonia. He places before the readers what may be called a Continental perspective, relying largely on the writings of European scholars who, long before Adam Smith wrote his famous book Wealth of Nations, studied how European centres and countries had broken away from centuries of low-level economic performance and become rich. Reinert uses these historical experiences of the rich countries of Europe, as also of England and subsequently of the United States, to critique the contemporary dogma of free trade, said to be premised on the writings of Adam Smith in the late 18th century and of David Ricardo in the early 19th century. His approach, therefore, is both historical and theoretical.
Take any country that is considered rich today, says Reinert, and examine how it got rich, and you will find that it was not free trade that made it rich. On the contrary, the present-day rich countries got rich by appropriately regulating trade with other countries. The clearest example is none other than the U S.. The American War of Independence, after all, was directed against the attempt of Great Britain to retain the American settlements as its colonies, supplying raw materials (cotton, primarily) to feed Britain’s rising industries. And from the time the colonies declared themselves to be the independent United States of America late in the 18th century until the end of the Second World War about the middle of the 20th century, America protected its economic interests and growth by strong tariff walls. So, would not it be right to say that it was not free trade but protected or regulated trade that made America rich? And, this is crucial too, once America became rich and powerful, it started preaching the gospel of free trade while still protecting some of its vulnerable economic segments.
Actually, in this America was doing exactly what Great Britain itself did earlier. If the Corn Laws allowing the free flow of corn into the island marked the beginning of the free trade regime, it happened only in 1848, long after Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations was published (1776) and even many years after Ricardo put forward his theory of international trade based on the principle of comparative advantage (1817). By 1848, Great Britain had emerged as the richest country of that period.
And, of course, it is widely recognised that European countries industrialised themselves by effectively protecting themselves against Great Britain and that the theoretical rationale for it was provided by Friedrich List’s ‘Infant Industry Argument’.
This historical evidence shows that rich countries became rich by restricting trade, but they started peddling the doctrine of free trade after they became rich. So Reinert’s counter doctrine is that free trade may be good for the rich and the powerful, but it will only keep poor countries poor. However, this is not Reinert’s main argument. His thesis is that countries can become rich only by shifting out of nature-related primary economic activities (agriculture, fishing and so on) into technology-driven industrial activities, and protective trade is a necessary enabling condition for this transition or transformation.
Why is this so? Here Reinert falls back on standard economic theory. Economic activities based on natural resources are subject to diminishing returns, and thus increasing costs, but industrial activities can benefit by increasing returns to scale and the decreasing costs that result from them.
A general conclusion that Reinert arrives at is that economic development is activity-specific and he demonstrates this by going back into history again. Historically, the first to become rich were not countries, but cities. And it happened long before Adam Smith wrote Wealth of Nations, and indeed, even before national sentiments became significant factors in the determination of economic activities. The period is the early 16th century when the widely prevalent socio-economic order was feudalism and the predominant economic activity was agriculture and pasturing, both land-related. In 1500, points out Reinert, the city of Venice (in the territory known as Italy) and the cities of Holland were centres noted for wealth primarily because they had very large and diversified manufacturing and craft sectors. The cities of Holland had invented a process of preserving fish as early as the 14th century, which enabled them to have monopoly over fish trade in the neighbourhood and overseas. “Wealth had been created and maintained behind huge barriers to entry created by superior knowledge,” says Reinert, “by possessing a large variety of manufacturing activities that created systemic synergies, by market power, by low costs created through innovations and increasing returns …” These same factors, applied on a larger territorial area, enabled England to become a wealthy country a few centuries later. Other countries followed the same formula and got rich subsequently.
The general lesson that Reinert draws from these historical examples is that today’s poor countries can get rid of poverty only by getting out of primary activities and taking up industrialisation. Industries become creators of wealth because they rely on increasing returns to scale which reduce costs, they open up scope for innovation and technical progress, and they lead to diversity of economic activities which enables realisation of systemic synergies. The net result will be to raise labour productivity and hence real wages. In sum, structural transformation resulting from industrialisation is the only way for today’s poor countries to become rich.
How is this to be achieved? Reinert’s prescription for poor countries is: Don’t do what rich countries ask you to do; do what they did. Rich countries (as also international institutions which reflect and defend their economic interests) now tell poor countries that this is the age of globalisation and that in that context the best way to become rich is through global trade, which implies opening up their borders to let commodities and capital from the rest of the world to come in freely. They will invoke David Ricardo who proved (so it will be argued) that if each country specialises in the production of goods in which it has comparative advantage and enters into global trade on that basis, all countries will benefit.
Don’t do this, Reinert warns poor countries, especially those in Africa. He tells them that the colonialism of the past has reduced them to producers of primary goods, even just a single primary good (be it copper or coco), and the advice that they now receive from the rich countries is to continue the same pattern. Premature opening up, says Reinert, will lead them into “primitivisation” and the perpetuation of poverty. Primitivisation occurs when a labour market no longer has the core city activities and human beings are retained or forced back into diminishing returns activities, he points out.
Reinert cites Mangolia as a glaring case. In the Cold War period of 50 years until the early 1990s, Mangolia had slowly but successfully built a diversified industrial sector, bringing down the share of agriculture in the national product from 60 per cent in 1940 to about 16 per cent in the mid-1980s. But soon after the Cold War ended, in 1991, Mangolia was “advised” to accept the World Bank-IMF “reforms” and open up its economy, which it did. And half a century of industry-building was virtually annihilated over a period of only four years from 1991 to 1995. Large-scale unemployment followed and many people were forced to return to their ancestral nomadic way of living: nomadic pastoralism, where the country, with vast areas of land, had its natural advantage, its external experts pointed out. But, says Reinert: “The nomadic economy, however, was unable to sustain the same population density as the industrial system, and the outcome was a combined ecological, economic and human catastrophe” by 2000.
The Mangolian example shows the fallacy of applying the theoretical model of David Ricardo’s principle of comparative advantage to real-life situations without taking note of its simplifying assumptions. The model that Ricardo had used of England and Portugal specialising in the production of goods where each had its comparative advantage, cloth in the former and wine in the latter, was built on a number of abstract assumptions, one of the crucial ones being that labour is just a qualityless quantity. Can it be applied to a world where workers in one country are engaged in software production while those in another are herding animals, is Reinert’s question. To put it differently, does it make a difference whether a country specialises in computer chips or banana chips?
The point is that today’s rich countries have reached a high level of productivity through industrialisation, technological upgradation and higher levels of knowledge, all leading to much higher real wages compared with the rest of the world. At the same time, in the poor countries much of the labour force, with restricted skills, is made to depend on activities that are technologically dead ends. The asymmetry can be summed by stating that rich countries have come to specialise in man-made comparative advantage, while poor countries have been left behind in nature-made comparative advantage. Under these conditions free trade can only lead to a perpetuation of the gap at best. A widening of the gap is more likely because of the dynamic conditions in the former.
Reinert is not recommending autarchy as the solution. But he is pointing out that globalisation has become the new process of colonisation, and that a colony’s role has always been to produce raw materials. He is asking the poor countries to do what the rich countries did in their early stages and continue to do even now – to restrict trade in the national interest. His own country, Norway, had a protectionist regime until 1960 with total prohibition on the import of clothing combined with severe restrictions on the transfer of funds out of the country until 1956. He suggests that poor countries, particularly those in Africa, should take lessons from the historical examples of China, South Korea and India, which followed a largely closed economy policy initially to diversify their economies and build up enough of a base to sustain the growth of non-primary economic activities before opening up to the rest of the world.
That, surely, is an oversimplified policy prescription. How many of the poor countries of the early 21st century have the policy options that some countries of the mid 20th century – poor, but with continental economies – had to face the rest of the world? The real problem that most poor African countries face today is that because of their colonial past they have become so precariously dependent on international trade even for the livelihood of their people. They cannot exercise the option of delinking themselves from international trade. Even the rich countries are aware of this as can be seen by the many attempts, including the Millennium Development Goals and the Monterrey commitments, to transfer some resources from the rich to the poorest countries. Reinert is right in characterising such aid as “welfare colonialism” because the rich countries through trade take away more than what they pass on as aid. He is also right in saying that the “free trade” that the rich countries now propagate is one where they set the rules.
That being the case, it is surprising that Reinert’s treatment of global trade is little more than anecdotal. He makes only passing references to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and has hardly anything to say on how a trade regime that is fair to the poor countries can be brought about that will enable them to bring about the structural transformation that he so eloquently recommends. He also does not consider the role of finance capital, controlled by large oligopolistic multinational corporations, in actually setting the terms of the so-called free trade. Hence it is too facile to suggest that poor countries of today should emulate the strategies of a distant past.
In spite of these limitations, those interested in development strategies will find it helpful to go through Reinert’s writing because it calls for reviewing many familiar propositions and their underlying presuppositions and draws the attention of the readers to a rich literature on development issues

Source:Front Line

http://www.flonnet.com/stories/20081024252107300.htm