Thursday, March 27, 2008

A Missed Call from the Government!

...Last month was the budget month and much has been talked about the 6000 Crore farm loan waiver. Much water has been drowned down the drain since then and people including the media are still euphoric about the funding from which the actual waiver is going to be provided from. Some people were even of the opinion that why should the finance minister take away the tax paying industry's money to fund the financial irresponsibility of some farmers, whatever may be the root cause for their suicides..

...one important issue that was set aside or rather given a look-away during this period involved the granting of the electromagnetic spectrum to the cell phone service providers. The story goes back to the time when Mr Jagmohan was the communications minister in teh BJP Regime...the government auctioned the cell phone licences, and invited tenders. People who made realistic bids lost to some big sharks who made thrice or four times the logical bid amount, for their call was simply outrageously huge to others. Naturally, after a while, the W found themselves in a position wherein they could not pay the pledged amount. Jagmohan, the firebrand from the Sanjay Gandhi era, he was, took the rightful step in cancelling the licenses of these firms. Thus the people who made logical bid amounts got a second chance as the gamblers had gone bankrupt... and it was all a fair-play game till now...

...the business media and papers took the stage and manipulated public opinion in such a way that Jagmohan was soon shunted out to the culture ministry. In came people who had the "wherewithal to bring in the communication revolution for the new age India". The media side by side .. suggested operators may not be made to pay for a blunder that the government did and also advocated a 'Revenue sharing licence fee model'.... Thus, the government waived off huge sums of that 'pledged money'...those who made logical bid amounts again lost out to the sharks, but now did not even have to pay the promised outrageous amount. One rule for the multi millionaires.. and another for the common man...Is this another of those paradoxes or double standards that we see in our plural India?

fast forward to 2008, and we are in the middle of the grant of Electro-magnetic spectrum for 3G services...government is allocating licences for the spectrum for 3G and Wi-Max services...UPA minister A Raja, learning from the earlier debacle.. decided that he will not go for an open bid process but on a FCFS (first come first serve) basis of allotment. within few seconds of the press note being issued inviting MoI, RComm came up with a ready-in-hand demand draft (so did RComm knew what the goverment how the govt was going about...) amounting to crores... thus, the very same day, RComm who till now was just a CDMA service provider, got licence to run GSM services and 3G. had the government gone in for an auction system, it would have got crores of rupees on the exchequer as earnest money and interests, but it simply choose to waive it off.

It is to be kept in mind that Electromagnetic spectrum is a rare, and fixed commodity a nation has, and has even got security ramifications. The excesses, BJP did during their time, the UPA is just following the same path, and the powers-be namely the Prime Minister and Sonia Gandhi, under whom the NAC functions have been a mute spectator to all this. The man who revolutionised the telecom sector during the 1980's Mr Sam Pitroda, advisor to Sonia Gandhi on such matters, too has been quite equivocal on this issue.


(Statistics & Other facts and figures, courtesy TRAI website and TRAI Open House Meeting)

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Inclusive? Not, Really!

Amidst all the hype and hoopla over the massive 6000 Cr farm loan waiver and tax soaps to the common man, the media and pundits alike seems to have missed the essential point. The Finance Minister's claim of his budget being "inclusive" doesn't really cut ice!
Though, I along with a minority, agree that the waiver is gonna benefit a whole lot of farmers (i am not disputing the numbers here, for numbers were always manipulated to suit one's objectives and points), this measure seemed to be a very short-sighted one (ie leaving aside the fact that general election are round the corner and UPA has started investing in vote-banks), this loan waiver is basically a temporary solution just because of the simple fact that it failed to address the core systematic issues plaguing the farmer, which inturn give rise to his indebtedness.
The agricultural sector, similar to all other core sectors is looking out for investments and inflow of money to prop it up. Today we have investments coming into all sort of such core sectors beginning from real-estate, infrastructure, airports, telecom, media and even cricket », but not agriculture. Statistics say more than 40% of india's agricultural produces become stale and perishable, by the time it reaches the market. (Blame it on the delivery systems, the as-usual-culprit, the paradox called india , just like thousands of tonnes of rice getting eaten by rats, while crores of people die of hunger) Why cant a country that launches satellites and aim to put man on moon devise a method wherein it can preserve the farm produces?
...The loss of his 'produce' is borne by the farmer by the way of a loan, and because he has lost his forthcoming crop to a draught or a flood, he cannot repay the debt. Attracting private investments or even Government funding into cold-storage or better, efficient, fast logistical chains would facilitate and help out more farmers than the proposed loan waiver. Quite unlike the Golden Quadrilateral project or the proposed plan to linking rivers, the government could have gone in for a linking of water canals and investments in local water-bodies like ponds and other water sources. Public investment on such localised projects already form part of the much successful NREGA programmes, and what was needed was just a thrust towards linking the NREGA with this Linking canal project. It could have further increased the industrial growth and more cash in people's hands, thus living with the Finance Minister's slogan of 'Inclusiveness'. That the Minister failed to see this point, paints a sad picture.
FootNote :-
(Cricket)
IPL Auction, made us, as a nation move ahead from being an implicit sellers of our past glory to one that buys out an glamorised future. If earlier, we used to say that money could buy out anything, today, with IPL auction, we saw it live on TV and what more, clapped too... No wonder, the blatant throw-away of money on people - that our idols have become products out for sale - provokes debates, introspections, celebrations, and even recrimination.
(NREGA)
The NREGA or national rural employment guarntee act provides a legal framework for 100 days of employment in every financial year to adult members, including women, in any rural household, willing to do unskilled manual work at the statutory minimum wage of not less than 60/- a day. The work mostly involves labor like builduing bunds, small scale dams, roads etc, and the Central Government directly pays the wage. All jobs are provided within 5 Kms radius of the household, and each adult member is given a job card. The scheme has been a huge success since its inception in 2006.

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