7/27/2019 Implementing Food Security

1/3july 27, 2013 vol xlviII no 30 EPW Economic & Political Weekly4

LETTERS

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Issn 0012-9976

Implementing Food Security

Apropos the article Lessons on Foodand Hunger: Pedagogy of Empathyfor Democracy by Anita Rampal, Harsh

Mander (EPW, 13 July 2013), I do agree

with the authors when they write, Withthe unprecedented stocks of foodgrains,

the paradox of high levels of hunger and

malnutrition in times of abundance.

There is a lack of planning and imple-

mentation not only in this case but

in many others. And that is why the

many different programmes of the gov-

ernment have not been able to bring

the poor above the poverty line. With-

out proper implementation, laws have

no meaning.

Take the Mahatma Gandhi National

Rural Employment Guarantee Act

(MGNREGA) as an example. It has been

designed meticulously but some officers

have been diluting its implementation.

There are many cases which illustrate

this. Jean Dreze in his article, Employ-

ment Guarantee or Slave Labour pub-

lished in The Hindu (20 September 2009),

put it well when he asserted, The delays

in NREGA wage payments are not just

operational hurdles they reflect a de-liberate attack on the Scheme. As a fac-

ulty member of the National Institute of

Rural Development, while visiting villages

across the country, I have observed that

many villagers are not well acquainted

with the MGNREGA and its provisions.

Those who demand their rights are often

attacked, as happened to Subal Mahato

of Bhatua village, in Bokaro district of

Jharkhand who was beaten to death for

seeking revised MGNREGA wages.

I would like to recount the experiences

of the Godavari Mahasamakhya in the

East Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh

regarding food security. Thousands of

rural families have gained from this

scheme meant mainly for fishermen

families and which works through the

women self-help groups (SHGs). This

food security scheme ensures essential

food items to the fishermen families

during the lean season and natural ca-

lamities, and is being implemented in thecoastal villages for the last three years. Es-

sential commodities like rice, dal, edible

oil, tamarind, chillies and iodised salt

are estimated at the SHG level for two

months for each family, purchased by

the village organisation (VO) committee

and distributed through the SHGs to

each member. The money is initially

spent by theVO to procure the food andthen collected from the members in six

weekly instalments by the SHGs, who, in

turn, pay back to theVO. While distrib-

uting the food items a little margin is

kept by theVO.

This programme has allowed poor

families to get the required quantity as

well as quality of food at a price lower

than the open market. It has checked

dropouts in school and helped scale

down child labour as parents are able to

procure assured food for their children.

Routing this through the SHGs has also

ensured that there is no risk that some

male family members misuse their income

by consuming liquor, etc. Our implement-

ing authorities should remember that we

require a more practical approach based

on real experiences of people and not

just a syllabus.

Shankar Chatterjee

Hyderabad

Make Lobbying Legal

The Disclosure of Lobbying ActivitiesBill 2013 was introducedas a privatemembers bill to regulate political lobby-

ing in India. Bhargavi Zaveri (EPW, 15 June

2013) has analysed various aspects of

this bill identifying provisions that will

have an impact on stakeholders. I want

to raise some further issues with regard

to implications for industry.

Industrial lobbying in India has existed

for a while now, undertaken by bodies

such as the Federation of Indian Chambers

of Commerce and Industry and the

Confederation of Indian Industry. How-

ever, we have lacked a law to regulate

it and ensure transparency and legiti-

macy. The recent bill asserts lobbying

as an integral part of democratic func-

tioning in India. It is important to

remember that lobbying by industries

consists of two dimensions politicalorganisation of an industry and then

the act of lobbying itself. It is however

7/27/2019 Implementing Food Security

2/3Economic & Political Weekly EPW july 27, 2013 vol xlviII no 30 5

LETTERS

Web Exclusives

The following articles have been uploaded in the past week in the Web Exclusives section of

the EPW website. They have not been published in the print edition.

(1) Gadar Party: The Centenary Year Chaman Lal

(2) Photocopying, Kunjis and the Public University Rochelle Pinto

(3) Human Footprint on theDevabhoomi Jayanta Bandyopadhyay

Articles posted before 13 July 2013 remain available in the Web Exclusives section.

difficult to assess whether lobbying

contributes to the strengthening of

democratic institutions. It is important

to examine how extensively lobbying

affects the political decision-making

process in India and whether industries

benefit economically from membership

of such groups.According to World Bank (WB) data

from 2005 the most active industries or-

ganised into lobby groups in India in-

clude sugar, rubber and rubber articles,

mineral processing, textiles, plastic and

plastic articles to name a few. What are

the factors that determine the likelihood

of an industry to organise itself into a

lobby? My own study suggests that while

political institutions can play a major

role, industrial characteristics such as

firm size, profits, employment and for-

eign ownership are significant for the

decision of an industry to organise itself

into a lobby group and also determines

the strength of such organisation.

Further, lobbying activity as defined

in the bill is the act of any communica-

tion with a public servant and payment

to a public servant done with the aim

of influencing a legislative or executive

action or the promotion of any person

for a position in a public office. Lobby-ing as a legitimate activity in countries

such as the United States consists of

special interests that advocate for spe-

cific legislation usually by means of

payments termed as campaign contribu-

tions. The bill also includes payment as

permissible lobbying activity. The WB

data suggests that on average, approxi-

mately, 6% of total annual sales across

all industries in India are used in such

communications. What is needed is a

clear definition of what would be legiti-

mate and then analyse the role of such

lobbying activity influencing govern-

ment policies.

Interest groups that engage in lobby-

ing are now a part of the political sys-

tem of most developing countries as

well, yet there is much ambiguity on the

distinctions between lobbying and cor-

ruption. It is often argued that indus-

tries are more inclined to resort to cor-

rupt practices at lower levels of develop-ment and tend to switch to lobbying

with higher development.

However, lobbying is yet to be ac-

cepted as a preferred means for exert-

ing political influence in developing

countries. Likewise, it has been cultur-

ally and politically tabooed in India.

As emphasised by Zaveri, the absence

of a provision for declaring lobbying as

legal, once the requirements prescribedunder the bill have been complied

with, is indicative of the same. How-

ever, it is time we begin the process of

legitimising lobbying in India. A good

place to start would be to seek answers

to the economic issues involved and

discuss the implications of concerted

industry-government interactions on

policy outcomes.

Amrita Saha

University of Sussex

United Kingdom

Adultery andthe Malimath Committee

This is in response to the commentby Amitabh Singh (Malimath Com-mittee Is Pro-Woman, EPW, 27 October

2012) on a part of my article Law and

Live-in Relationships in India (EPW,

29 September 2012). The commentator

suggests that I have argued that MalimathCommittees suggestion that a wife who

has sexual intercourse with a married

man should be held guilty of adultery is

vague and ambiguous. Without repeating

the detailed argument which is already

available in my article, I wish to offer

three clarifications.

Firstly, the said statement of the com-

mittee is inconsistent as, for a sexual

act to be considered adulterous, within

the existing legal provisions, the man,

who alone is treated as the guilty party,

need not be married. The point about

the statement not referring to generic

categories of man or woman was thus

made in the light of the existing defini-

tion of adultery, i e, an offence that a

man commits when he has sexual in-

tercourse with the wife of another man

without the consent or connivance of

the husband, which, it should be noted,does make a generic category of man

the offender, rather than only a married

man. Any attempt to expand the cate-

gory of the offender in this definition

is hardly captured by the statement

in question.

Secondly, my article does not suggest,

as implied by the commentator, that a

substitution of the word wife with

woman and married man with man

in the concerned statement would suffice

to amend the inconsistency and ambi-

guities involved. However as the problems

with the definition of adultery as well as

possibilities of alternative formulations

have already been discussed in detail in

my article, I will not labour this point

any further.

Finally and most significantly, the

commentator has entirely missed the

point that the actual recommendation of

the committee in this matter is not con-

tained in the above thoughtful state-ment. Rather, it is in the following,

hasty worded, statement: whosoever

has sexual intercourse with the spouse of

any other person is guilty of adultery,

the implications of which have also been

discussed in detail in the article and

hence do not bear repeating here. Last

but not the least, whether or not the

Malimath Committee is pro-woman

remains a moot point which was however

not the focus of my article.

Anuja Agrawal

University of Delhi

7/27/2019 Implementing Food Security

3/3

LETTERS

july 27, 2013 vol xlviII no 30 EPW Economic & Political Weekly6

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