The cost of relying on GDP markers alone

Inderjit Singh Jaijee

Modi says that he wants to double farmers' income by 2022 and he sees food export
as the way to doing it. Food export means processed foods. Processed foods don't go
to where people are hungry, they go to wherever they get the highest price.

Over the past few months, Parliament has approved the Model Contract Farming Act
and the Model Agricultural Produce and Livestock Marketing (Promotion and
Facilitation) Act.
The government says that the model acts are intended to smoothen the way for
"integrating farmers with agro-industries". "Agro-industry" could mean a halwai in
Phagwara or it could mean a transnational mega-corp. Think of companies such as
Carrefour, WalMart, Glaxo-Smith-Kline, Field Fresh Food, PepsiCo and Coca-Cola, not
to mention Indian corporations such as Reliance, Bharti Enterprises, Future Value
Retail and Spot Hypermarkets.
Both model acts are intended to allow trade in produce outside the ambit of state-
run mandis set up under the Agricultural Prices and Marketing Commission (APMC). It
require farmers to sell to licenced middlemen only in notified markets and was
meant to protect farmers from being forced into distress sales. The APMC system
will have nothing to say about agro contracts.
Another central initiative is eNAM (electronic National Agriculture Market). It is
claimed that this online all-India market will give farmers latest information and
the ability to make instant online transactions. eNam requires literate, tech-savvy
farmers. Like the model acts, the eNAM facility will also render traditional mandis
irrelevant.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi says that he wants to double farmers' income by 2022
and he sees food export as the way to doing it. Food export means processed foods.
That has necessitated the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Sampada Yojana aimed at creating
food processing infrastructure. Processed foods don't go to where people are
hungry, they go to wherever they get the highest price.
Speaking at the World Food India a few months back, the PM predicted that food
processing and export would "leverage an investment of $ 5 billion, benefit 2
million farmers and create more than half a million jobs over the next three
years."
The targets of Modi's pitch were multinational food corporations. Perhaps his dream
will come true, perhaps the farmer's income will double over the next four years.
By how much will profits of those international agro-corporations multiply? How
about the nutritional level of the non-elite citizens? Will that improve
drastically too?
Big private players will not put their money into India unless they are confident
that their investment is secure. The Government of India is bent on building
investor confidence. For instance, if the investors need land, the government
acquires the land and hands it over.
Good citizens have India's GDP uppermost in their thoughts; unfortunately some
people go on worrying about their next meal. Those who have for generations derived
their livelihoods from areas now coveted by big investors generally have to be
pushed off land they thought was theirs. They resist because they are under the
impression that the law protects their right to land and livelihood.
In mid-July, in the small town of Pakur in Jharkhand, 80-year-old social reformer
Swami Agnivesh was allegedly beaten by workers of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha,
the youth wing of the Bharatiya Janata Party. The right-wing activists accused the
swami of being hand-in-glove with Christians whom they see as trouble-makers.
Reports that appeared a few days after the attack noted that another issue was
simmering behind the apparent communal conflict, namely tribal resistance to land
acquisition. The reports quoted local people saying that the BJYM and its backers
want to weaken support for tribal land rights and to this end, the strategy is to
divide the tribal community, turning non-Christians against Christians.
Jharkhand tribal trouble has been brewing since last year when the state government
removed clauses protecting the land rights of tribal communities from two laws.
After coming to power at the centre, the BJP government passed an ordinance that
rolled back Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition,
Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, (LARR) 2013 and reinstated provisions of the
colonial Land Acquisition Act of 1894. The ordinance removed the necessity to seek
the consent of farmers and others dependent on land and did away with social impact
assessment. This facilitated the smooth takeover of land, tribal or otherwise.
Seven states (Rajasthan, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Jharkhand, Karnataka
and Odisha) have turned the Central ordinance into state laws. Under the laws, land
can be acquired whether it is irrigated and multi-cropped or dry, alkaline
wasteland. When land is acquired, the owners are compensated but nothing need be
done by way of rehabilitation and resettlement for non-owners who were none-the-
less dependent on the land. Naturally, mega-profits flowing from change in land use
flow to investors only. Neither is there oversight: land may be acquired for the
purpose of setting up of industry or special economic zones but if the land is
ultimately turned into a residential or commercial complex there is no penalty.
Obsession with driving up India's GDP has turned the government land-hungry. Oxfam
India recently published a report that found 73 per cent of the country's total
wealth in the hands of one per cent of the people. India's billionaires are sitting
on wealth that equals 15 per cent of India's GDP. It was just five cent of the GDP
in 2013.
With its model acts and ordinances and communal smoke-screens, the Central
government may succeed in driving up the GDP and whipping the annual growth rate
well past eight per cent. Will "We the people ..." bear the cost? Rural suicides
answer that question.