Hungry India

The most beautiful sight in the world? A happy healthy child. That always has been my answer. Of course other than the rich circles in India, you do not get to see that sight. In fact the sight gets uglier and uglier when you move away from the economic centers. Our children are worse fed that some sub-Saharan African countries. That is fact that should weigh heavily on us. Despite of being a complete basket case, Pakistan can feed her children better than us. Why is that?

Poverty would be the easy and obvious answer but it is incomplete and almost incorrect one. By most economic indices, we are way ahead of Sub Saharan Africa and Pakistan. Is it poor grain production? Judging the last few years agricultural production, we have done well. Can't blame it on rain gods either. The real answer is wastage and abysmal distribution system. A very rudimentary example of this is illustrated by the following:

In the back of his faded red transport truck were 27.2 metric tons of pineapple, ripened and ready for sale. With temperatures approaching 50 degrees, the fruit might as well have been ferried in a broiler. More than 20 per cent would be tossed aside by the time he arrived, fought over by cows, dogs and the children from nearby slums.

Yes folks, the villain is mismanagement and wastage. Completely human errors. Our farmers, braving the elements and poor infrastructure (financial, distribution and lack of any scientific and technical help) are producing more than possible. They are keeping their end of the bargain. However, our nation is not ready with something as rudimentary as food storage yet. We can host Commonwealth games and make our urban areas swankier than ever imagined but we cannot build covered storage facility. Here is part of a very damning report:

By January, the Government was aware that it would be a bumper wheat crop this year. Yet, it failed to lift a ban on wheat exports. According to the Food Corporation of India (FCI), the Government has, as of June, a stock of 65 million tonnes of wheat while it has a storage capacity of just 62 million tonnes. Of that, only 57 million tonnes can be stored in covered areas. The monsoon has set in over much of the country and eight million tonnes of stored, uncovered wheat will almost certainly rot. The Government has invested little in increasing FCI's storage capacity.

This is just this year. Last year the situation was as bad. Grains rotted away in the rains. We do not have adequate buildings for grains or cold storages for perishables. The power infrastructure is so bad that we have to decide whether to keep ourselves cool or the food safe. With blackouts extending beyond major parts of the day, is anything safe?

Meanwhile poor people are hard-pressed to feed their kids one meal a day. In parts of UP children were eating clay because it tastes like "besan" (powdered grams). That seems to be because due to some bureaucratic mess, these kids are not classified as poor and thus not eligible for government help. Astonishing stuff that! Meanwhile the people who are eligible for help have been given ration cards with color coding. The poorer the person the cheaper the grain. Except, unscrupulous business people are loaning money to the poor in exchange for their ration cards and then selling the grains for the poor in the open market. Quite a vicious circle has been created for these unfortunate souls. What is the use of our prosperity if people have less to eat now that when we were mired in Nehruvian socialism. The following is quite an eye-opener:

Today, there is less food available for each Indian resident that there was 30 years ago. In 2008, the most recent year for which statistics are available, India produced 436 grams of food grains per person per day, a drop from 445.3 in 2006.

Since Congress has ruled the nation most of our independent existence, they have to shoulder most of the blame. However, what is galling is that the BJP did not do anything about it while they were in charge. At the very least they could have initiated the development of the food storage and distribution infrastructure (well, the Golden Quadrangle project could have improved the transportation which was initiated by the BJP but has since been stalled). Of course the corrupt neta - babu - businessman nexus have contributed greatly to this problem.

If we do not do something about hunger, then we may not have peace in the nation for too long. The hungry will eventually storm the citadel and ruin the party for the Indian Nouveau riche. Those Porches and Audis will not be fast enough to escape the wrath of the aam aadmi!

Meanwhile I would like to urge the readers of this blog to do your best to help out the needy. If hungry, feed to the best of your ability. If unable, teach them something they can use to feed themselves. We all need to pitch in. We cannot depend upon our politicians.

More is available from these articles:
http://www.hindustantimes.com/Not-enough-food-so-children-learn-to-eat-mud/Article1-527187.aspx
http://www.thestar.com/printarticle/1026114
http://in.news.yahoo.com/decline---stall-of-the-congress-empire.html