BJP is anti-poor and incompetent
- Income levels are falling, even when they say electricity, gas, roads, toilets are being built
- proportion of rural malnutrition has increased
- Government is manipulating economic data
- No data on Covid deaths, Migrant labor
- National Statistical Office experts are fired
- International Institute of Population Studies report contradicts Govt. data on open defecation, etc...
- Growth rate is irrelevant because there is very high Inflation. RBI has said "inflation is high"
- Deteriorating in Global Hunger Index; criticisms of "faulty methodology" are not correct; Govt. extending free Rations for 82 crore people for 5 years proves there is a "situation"
- In last budget, we see that allocated fund for MNREGA was used up in first 6 months; there is a feeling of hopelessness; Govt. trying to filter down MNREGA recipients using Bureaucratic hurdles like Aadhar-linking, etc...
- India has one of the highest youth unemployment in the world, at 24%; we are along war-torn/sanctioned countries like Iran, Syria, etc.. in this; Bangladesh only has 12%
- Public debt has increased by 100 lakh crores in 9-10 years
- Domestic Savings contracted; Domestic Investment has come down
- Indirect Taxes (GST) increased; Corporate Taxes decreased; so burden is shifted onto the poor
- Destruction of Federalism, Supremacy of Central/Hindi/Hindu Govt.: Leaked video of Niti Aayog CEO saying Modi pressured him to reduce share of States' income; accompanied by actual effective reduction in states' portion by the use of cess taxes
- Thus promoting BJP state Govts only
- Fake promises: 2 crore employment generation every year
- Govt gives huge freebies to Ambani and Adani, aiding corporate loot
- shooting the economy in the foot by demonetisation
- half of the gas beneficiaries say they can't afford another cylinder
- half of the toilets built, are dysfunctional
- half of the budgets allocated for these projects, are used in advertisement/publicity alone
Youth Unemployment Crisis
"42% unemployment rate among young graduates under 25 years old"[Article](2023)
“The situation is worse than what the unemployment rate shows”: CMIE MD
"In 2022, India's youth unemployment rate was significantly higher at 23.22% than Pakistan (11.3%), Bangladesh (12.9%), and Bhutan (14.4%). In the same year, China had an unemployment rate of 13.2%.": World Bank [Article](2023)
Unemployment Crisis
- Results of Consumer Expenditure Surveys 2022-23, 2023-24 Only After 2024 Elections: Report - Article (2023)
In 2019, senior government statisticians ... said ... government ... withheld unemployment data for release till after the polls. Both had resigned from the government-funded National Statistical Commission, that checks the quality of India’s official data, in protest.
Some of the withheld data was eventually leaked to the Business Standard. It had revealed that unemployment in June 2018 had been at the highest level in 45 years.
India’s Unemployment Rate At Record Low, Says SBI Research - Article (2023)
- Educated youth struggle for jobs in India as unemployment among graduates soars, study finds - Article (2023)
The more educated you are, the less is the possibility of you getting a job.
In 2018, the UP police advertised for 62 posts of telephone messengers, whose job was to carry documents from one police station to another on a bicycle. Anyone who had passed the fifth standard was eligible. As many as 93,000 persons applied. The selection board was shocked to find that there were 50,000 graduates (even BTechs), 28,000 postgraduates (even MBAs) and 3,700 PhDs among them.
The same year, the Railway Recruitment Board advertised for about 63,000 ‘Level 1’ vacancies — the lowest level, including posts such as gangman, gateman and porter — the eligibility for which was having completed tenth standard. As many as 1.9 crore applied, most of them graduates and postgraduates. In 2019, 12 of the 13 waiters selected for a Maharashtra government canteen were graduates. The minimum qualification was fourth standard. The job profile included cutting vegetables, cleaning tables, washing utensils, and sweeping the floor.
We are living in a paradox in which the economy is expanding but employment is shrinking.
The number of people employed in the manufacturing sector decreased from 5.1 crore to 2.7 crore, almost by 50%, between 2016-17 and 2020-21.
The CMIE-CEDA study found that during the four years between 2016-17 and 2020-21, the number of people employed in agriculture went up. People employed in agriculture included not only the uneducated, but also the educated who got no jobs or were laid off by the manufacturing sector.
It is clear that the Indian economy is going in the wrong direction. Instead of becoming more and more labour-intensive (more labour, fewer machines) as the economy in a country with the world's greatest ocean of labour should, it is turning more and more capital-intensive (more machines, fewer labour). Even the Make-in-India and the Production-Linked Incentive schemes encourage capital-intensive manufacturing.
Hunger Crisis
Govt Minister claims 0 hunger death in 10 years - Article(2024)
- Five kids in Gujarat's Kutch district died of malnutrition in a single week - Article (2023)
"Gujarat woman and child development minister informed the state assembly this March that 1,25,707 children are malnourished in 30 districts of state as on December 21, 2022."
- India ranks 111 out of 125 countries in Global Hunger Index - Article (2023)
"Globally, the share of people who are undernourished, which is one of the indicators used in the index, actually rose from 7.5% in 2017 to 9.2% in 2022, reaching about 735 million."
- "With enough food to feed everyone, 690 million people go to bed hungry, including 189.2 million in India." - Article (2023)
Decrease in Calories Consumption
Proportion of Rural Poor who cannot afford 2200 calories/person/day:
1993-94 : 58%
2011-12 : 68%
2017-18 : -data hidden by govt- estimated ~ 80%
[Source: Prof. Prabhat Patnaik - Lecture]
Why Govt's accusations on Hunger Index methodology are problematic:
Report Makers Reject Indian Government Objections - Article
FAQ by the Authors - Site
- Govt stopped the release of "Consumer Expenditure Survey"
Results of Consumer Expenditure Surveys 2022-23, 2023-24 Only After 2024 Elections: Report - Article
In 2019, two senior statisticians had quit positions over data having been similarly withheld 'with polls in mind.'
Government did carry out a similar exercise in 2017-18, it withheld the results citing “quality issues”. However, leaked results from the 2017-18 survey indicated a rise in poverty levels, which many believe as the reason for the government to withhold results.
In 2019, senior government statisticians P.C. Mohanan and J. Meenakshi had said that the government had withheld unemployment data for release till after the polls. Both had resigned from the government-funded National Statistical Commission, that checks the quality of India’s official data, in protest.
Some of the withheld data was eventually leaked to the Business Standard. It had revealed that unemployment in June 2018 had been at the highest level in 45 years.
GDP-centred Growth
- India is not doing well economically - Article (2023)
Nehru’s socialism was mostly rhetorical, bearing little resemblance either to Soviet socialism or to European social democratic practice.Education and health expenditures have lagged behind world averages for a very long time.... origins of notorious ‘license-permit raj’, quoting from I.G. Patel’s memoirs:Import licensing was simply an ad hoc response to dwindling foreign exchange reserves in late 1956 and early 1957 due to the heavy import demands of the second five-year plan. It took on a life of its own and soon led to industrial licensing, and to many creative opportunities for lobbying and political contributions by businesses in pursuit of their interests.
... the answer to the simplistic question: is India doing well economically? Mody’s book says it is not ...But then, how does one square this with the lived experience of many Indians? They see the six-lane expressways, Vande Bharat trains, malls, shiny airports, gated multi-storied apartment buildings (with separate lifts for the help), UPI and a hundred-plus unicorns. They are only dimly aware of another India in which people are struggling to find jobs while battling the spiralling cost of living, poverty, deprivation and social injustice.... middle or upper class ... dominates the political and media discourse, and thinks that the country is doing just fine. The remaining two-thirds of the population is struggling, in one way or another.
... origins of notorious ‘license-permit raj’, quoting from I.G. Patel’s memoirs:
Import licensing was simply an ad hoc response to dwindling foreign exchange reserves in late 1956 and early 1957 due to the heavy import demands of the second five-year plan. It took on a life of its own and soon led to industrial licensing, and to many creative opportunities for lobbying and political contributions by businesses in pursuit of their interests.
... the answer to the simplistic question: is India doing well economically? Mody’s book says it is not ...
But then, how does one square this with the lived experience of many Indians? They see the six-lane expressways, Vande Bharat trains, malls, shiny airports, gated multi-storied apartment buildings (with separate lifts for the help), UPI and a hundred-plus unicorns. They are only dimly aware of another India in which people are struggling to find jobs while battling the spiralling cost of living, poverty, deprivation and social injustice.
... middle or upper class ... dominates the political and media discourse, and thinks that the country is doing just fine. The remaining two-thirds of the population is struggling, in one way or another.
- The ‘What’ and ‘Why’ of India’s shrinking middle class - Article (2023)
According to pewresearch.org the share of Chinese who are in middle-income group jumped from 3% to 18%, however, the share of Indians middle-income group remain unchanged during most part of this century.
- Inequality has crossed pre-independence levels
On Development/Infrastructure projects
- NSO Survey Debunks Govt Claims of Open Defecation-Free India - Article
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