The hungry are the poorest of the poor; the link between hunger and poverty is well-established.Food security can, therefore, be accepted as the main criterion for assessing a poverty-free gram panchayat.
In the Union Budget 2017, the government announced its plan to make 50,000 gram panchayats poverty-free by 2019. It is undoubtedly a very good idea in the era of competitive federalism as it would set in motion a competition among gram panchayats to get rid of poverty.
Can one find a similar programme elsewhere in the country? Of course, yes.
In Sikkim, which became the first fully organic state of India in 2016 and is the only open-defecation-free state in the country, the government has plans to become a poverty-free state in four years. Going by the track record of the Sikkim government, nobody would ever doubt that this ambitious programme would be accomplished. However, the plan of making 50,000 poverty-free gram panchayats across the country in three years invites apprehension and strong reaction, and raises issues.
One of the important issues concerns the criteria to be adopted for assessing a poverty-free gram panchayat, and also the architecture to be put in place for measuring and monitoring progress and outcomes.
Poverty indicators
Indicators can help monitor progress towards this ambitious goal. A sound indicator framework will turn poverty-free gram panchayats and their targets into a management tool to help develop implementation strategies and allocate resources accordingly. It can also help prepare a report card to measure progress and ensure accountability of all stakeholders.
There must be a framework for measurable indicators. This framework, which should have data disaggregation – by income, sex, age, race, ethnicity, migratory status, disability and geographic location or other characteristics, will be fundamental to the efficient and effective implementation of the indicator framework.
Poverty is multi-faceted and has many root causes. In this context, it is pertinent to explore whether poverty can be perceived in terms of a single quantitative or qualitative indicator alone.
Food insecurity can be both a cause and effect of persistent poverty.
One of the sustainable development goals reads, “End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture”.
In the United Nations document, Zero Hunger: Why It Matters, it has been argued that “extreme hunger and malnutrition remains a barrier to sustainable development and creates a trap from which people cannot easily escape”. This document further states that “hunger and malnutrition mean less productive individuals, who are more prone to disease and thus often unable to earn more and improve their livelihoods”. Additionally, it is said that “with hunger limiting human development, we will not be able to achieve the other sustainable development goals such as education, health and gender equality”.
In our fight against hunger and malnutrition, social protection systems have become an important tool. For promoting food security and nutrition, health and education, particularly for children, more than 100 countries implement conditional or unconditional cash transfer programmes.
Food distribution schemes and employment guarantee programmes also make significant contributions to tackling food insecurity. Assured, periodic and predictable cash transfers to poor households not only play a crucial role in bridging immediate food gaps but also improve their productive capacity.
It would thus be desirable that food security be accepted as the main criterion for assessing a poverty-free gram panchayat. It has to be appreciated that food insecurity in rural India continues to be a stark reality for a large number of households. Despite several successful policy interventions, the number of malnourished children and adults remains alarmingly high in rural areas. The hungry are the poorest of the poor; they have limited or no access to physical and financial assets, little or no education, and often suffer from ill health.
Dr A K Nigam and others (2016) in their study, titled ‘Hunger in Gram Panchayats of Banda District’, have classified all the gram panchayats in the district into three categories: (i) food secure (poverty-free); (ii) food insecure without hunger and; (iii) food insecure with hunger on the basis of MFAST which is a modified version of FAST (Food Access Survey Tools) and anthropometric measurements and related indicators.
The MFAST, with only nine indicators, can provide three types of food security status. The authors argue that mapping hunger would further enable zeroing down to the areas of concentration of deprived, hunger-stricken families. They also suggest that ‘Arc-view’ Geographical Information System software may be adapted for mapping food-secure (poverty-free) gram panchayats.
Food security, according to Nigam and others (2016), implies access, by all people at all times, to enough food for an active, healthy life.
Food security includes at a minimum (i) the ready availability of nutritionally adequate and safe foods and (ii) an assured ability to acquire acceptable foods in socially acceptable ways (i.e., without resorting to emergency food supplies, scavenging, stealing or other coping strategies).
In our endeavour to make poverty-free gram panchayats, the greatest challenge and opportunity would be to ensure access to food for the people who are living in extreme poverty and are most affected by hunger. This approach would not only enable the government to move forward in the path of ending hunger by achieving food security but also simultaneously contribute in a significant way in achieving other sustainable development goals such as in education, health and gender equality.
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In a diverse country like India, where each State is socially, culturally, economically, and politically distinct, measuring Governance becomes increasingly tricky. The Public Affairs Index (PAI 2021) is a scientifically rigorous, data-based framework that measures the quality of governance at the Sub-national level and ranks the States and Union Territories (UTs) of India on a Composite Index (CI).
States are classified into two categories – Large and Small – using population as the criteria.
In PAI 2021, PAC defined three significant pillars that embody Governance – Growth, Equity, and Sustainability. Each of the three Pillars is circumscribed by five governance praxis Themes.
The themes include – Voice and Accountability, Government Effectiveness, Rule of Law, Regulatory Quality and Control of Corruption.
At the bottom of the pyramid, 43 component indicators are mapped to 14 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that are relevant to the States and UTs.
This forms the foundation of the conceptual framework of PAI 2021. The choice of the 43 indicators that go into the calculation of the CI were dictated by the objective of uncovering the complexity and multidimensional character of development governance
The Equity Principle
The Equity Pillar of the PAI 2021 Index analyses the inclusiveness impact at the Sub-national level in the country; inclusiveness in terms of the welfare of a society that depends primarily on establishing that all people feel that they have a say in the governance and are not excluded from the mainstream policy framework.
This requires all individuals and communities, but particularly the most vulnerable, to have an opportunity to improve or maintain their wellbeing. This chapter of PAI 2021 reflects the performance of States and UTs during the pandemic and questions the governance infrastructure in the country, analysing the effectiveness of schemes and the general livelihood of the people in terms of Equity.
Growth and its Discontents
Growth in its multidimensional form encompasses the essence of access to and the availability and optimal utilisation of resources. By resources, PAI 2021 refer to human resources, infrastructure and the budgetary allocations. Capacity building of an economy cannot take place if all the key players of growth do not drive development. The multiplier effects of better health care, improved educational outcomes, increased capital accumulation and lower unemployment levels contribute magnificently in the growth and development of the States.
The Pursuit Of Sustainability
The Sustainability Pillar analyses the access to and usage of resources that has an impact on environment, economy and humankind. The Pillar subsumes two themes and uses seven indicators to measure the effectiveness of government efforts with regards to Sustainability.
The Curious Case Of The Delta
The Delta Analysis presents the results on the State performance on year-on-year improvement. The rankings are measured as the Delta value over the last five to 10 years of data available for 12 Key Development Indicators (KDI). In PAI 2021, 12 indicators across the three Pillars of Equity (five indicators), Growth (five indicators) and Sustainability (two indicators). These KDIs are the outcome indicators crucial to assess Human Development. The Performance in the Delta Analysis is then compared to the Overall PAI 2021 Index.
Key Findings:-
In the Scheme of Things
The Scheme Analysis adds an additional dimension to ranking of the States on their governance. It attempts to complement the Governance Model by trying to understand the developmental activities undertaken by State Governments in the form of schemes. It also tries to understand whether better performance of States in schemes reflect in better governance.
The Centrally Sponsored schemes that were analysed are National Health Mission (NHM), Umbrella Integrated Child Development Services scheme (ICDS), Mahatma Gandh National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SmSA) and MidDay Meal Scheme (MDMS).
National Health Mission (NHM)
INTEGRATED CHILD DEVELOPMENT SERVICES (ICDS)
MID- DAY MEAL SCHEME (MDMS)
SAMAGRA SHIKSHA ABHIYAN (SMSA)
MAHATMA GANDHI NATIONAL RURAL EMPLOYMENT GUARANTEE SCHEME (MGNREGS)