CHANDREYEE CHATTERJEE, The Telegraph , Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Calcutta, Nov. 27: Incidents of violence against women are on the rise in India, with one act of sexual harassment being reported every 12 minutes, one rape every 28 minutes and one dowry death every 67 minutes. And these are just the tip of the iceberg, as most cases go unreported.
“In a situation such as this, we feel it’s time to actively involve men in the struggle to stop violence against women,” said Anuradha Kapoor, director, Swayam, a non-profit women’s organisation committed to ending violence against women and children.
Swayam is organising a campaign in Calcutta to stop violence against women, in association with DRIK India, an alternative media organisation, and International Association of Women in Radio and Television (IAWRT), an international forum for personal contact and professional development among women broadcasters.
The campaign is part of an international initiative originating from the first Women’s Global Leadership Institute, sponsored by the Centre for Women’s Global Leadership in 1991. It kicked off on November 25 with a mass awareness programme, including an exhibition of posters and performances by the theatre and music groups of Swayam.
The campaign ends on December 10, marking International Human Rights Day. “This period has a special significance. It coincides with the International Day against Violence against Women, World AIDS Day and World Disability Day,” said Kapoor.
Swayam’s campaign will feature workshops by artists and rights activists, photography exhibitions, panel discussions and film shows.
Showing posts with label India Facts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label India Facts. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Clashes in India among Ten' most underreported humanitarian stories of 2006 : MSF Report
New York - The staggering human toll taken by tuberculosis (TB) and malnutrition as well as the devastation caused by conflicts in Haiti, Somalia, Colombia, Chechnya and various parts of India, Sri Lanka and the Democratic Republic of Congo, are among the "Top Ten" Most Underreported Humanitarian Stories of 2006, according to the year-end list released today by the international humanitarian medical aid organization Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF).
Clashes in central India
Ongoing conflict in several parts of India - including northeastern Assam and Manipur states highlighted in last year's Top 10 Underreported Humanitarian Stories list - Report says that it has gone virtually unnoticed by the outside world for years. In central India's Chhattisgarh state, clashes between Maoist insurgents, Indian security forces and Hindutva sponsored militias, also known as Salwa Judum, has been occurring for more than 25 years, resulting in the displacement, sometimes reportedly forced, of more than 50,000 civilians.
Others flee into neighboring states while thousands of people have lost their livelihoods and have little access to their land, food, essential healthcare or emergency medical services. MSF provides medical treatment in camps for displaced people in Dantewada district, located in south Chhattisgarh. Medical teams also provide mobile health services and nutritional support to those in need in remote rural areas.
Surprisingly, the situation in Chhatisgarh is only one of several armed conflicts occurring throughout India for years, with civilians caught between various belligerent parties. As a consequence, many people continue to live in an atmosphere of fear and violence with little or no access to health care.
"We know that media coverage does not generate improvements on its own," said MSF (USA) Executive Director Nicolas de Torrente. "However, it is often a precondition for increased assistance and political attention. There is perhaps nothing worse than being completely neglected and forgotten." Many conflicts worldwide are profoundly affecting millions of people, yet they are almost completely invisible," said MSF (USA) Executive Director Nicolas de Torrente. "Haiti, for example, is just 50 miles from the United States and the plight of the population enduring relentless violence in its volatile capital Port-au-Prince received only half a minute of network coverage in an entire year."
According to Andrew Tyndall, publisher of the online media-tracking journal The Tyndall Report, the ten countries and contexts highlighted by MSF accounted for just 7.2 minutes of the 14,512 minutes on the three major U.S. television networks' nightly newscasts for 2006. Treating malnutrition, TB, and Chechnya were mentioned, but only briefly in other stories. Five of the countries highlighted by MSF were never mentioned at all.
The 2006 "Top 10" list also focused on the devastation caused by TB and malnutrition.
The frightening situation of worldwide TB became even worse in 2006 with the detection of extensively drug resistant tuberculosis (XDR TB), a strain that is resistant to both first-line antibiotics and to two classes of second-line drugs. At the same time, none of the TB drugs currently in development, however promising, will be able to drastically improve TB treatment in the near future.
"TB destroys millions of lives around the world every year, but we're not seeing the necessary urgency to tackle the disease," said Dr. Tido von Schoen-Angerer, director of MSF's Campaign for Access to Essential Medicines.
Hope is on the horizon, though, for malnutrition, with new strategies based on outpatient treatment that relies on ready-to-use therapeutic foods (RUTF), like Plumpy'nut, showing tremendous promise. Unfortunately, these strategies are not implemented as widely as they could be.
"Acute malnutrition contributes to the deaths of millions of children every year," said de Torrente. "New strategies in treatment of moderate and severe acute malnutrition have helped MSF treat more than 150,000 children in Niger over the past two years. Millions more children throughout the world could benefit if such strategies were more widely implemented."
While the conflicts in the Darfur region of Sudan and in eastern Chad garnered significant media attention in 2006, the steady focus did not translate into improved conditions for people caught up in the conflict.
"Even though there was more reporting about Darfur than about other crises, the situation continued to deteriorate to the point where MSF and other aid groups had to scale back their programs," said de Torrente. "We know that media coverage does not generate improvements on its own. However, it is often a precondition for increased assistance and political attention. There is perhaps nothing worse than being completely neglected and forgotten."
Read the complete Report at MSF website
Tuesday, February 6, 2007
Caste system is the greater barrier to social harmony in India, BBC Poll
71% say they're proud to be Indians
Rashmee Roshan Lall
5 Feb, 2007 TIMES NEWS NETWORK
LONDON: Nearly two-thirds of all Indians are fiercely proud of 'Mera Bharat Mahaan' but more than half of India believes the caste system is a "barrier to social harmony" and is holding the country back, according to a BBC poll to be published on Monday.
India-watchers expressed surprise at the poll's finding, the first for a nationwide 'attitudes' survey conducted by an international agency, that Indians still seem to have caste firmly on their minds in one way or the other, even though leading sociologists have long argued that urbanisation and industrialisation has helped break down caste-barriers.
The survey aims to itemise exactly how Indians view their own country, at a time when much of the world appears to have a view alternately on "emerging India" or "overheating India". The survey was conducted for the BBC World Service by the international polling firm GlobeScan.
The survey found that 71% are proud to be an Indian; nearly as many (65%) think it is important that India is an economic superpower; 60% think it's important India should be a political power and the same number believe it should be a military superpower. Just under half of all Indians said India's economic growth over the last 10 years had not benefited them and their families. The survey comes as part of BBC's ongoing 'India Rising' week of special programming that charts changes in different sectors of the Indian economy.
In a special message to the BBC's estimated 163 million listeners in 33 languages, President Kalam called for worldwide engagement with his vision of citizenship, notably a "three-dimensional approach involving education with value system; religion transformed to spirituality and economic development for societal transformation of all the nations." Kalam, who called upon BBC's global audiences to flood his website with suggestions and debate, was speaking on a special edition of the BBC's 'Discovery' programme, to be broadcast on Wednesday.
Monday's BBC survey concentrated on asking more than 1,500 Indians a series of questions focusing on social and political issues. It found that Indians overall, seven in 10 exhibited a positive sense of identity by agreeing to the statement, "I am proud to be an Indian." The survey found the view was uniform across all age, income groups, even though it differed among religious groups with Christians (73%) the proudest; Hindus (71%) close behind and Muslim pride in being Indian languishing at 60%.
The poll found that Indians' positive perceptions about their present also extended to the Indian marketplace. A 55% majority said the justice system "treats poor people as fairly as rich people"; 52% said "being a woman is no barrier to success" and just under half of all Indians (48%) declared they would rather "work for a private company than for the government." Interestingly, six in 10, or 58% said they believed India's security is "more in danger from other Indians than from foreigners" and 55% said the "caste system is a barrier to social harmony." 47% said "corruption is a fact of life which we should accept as the price of doing business." But a cheering 45% of 18- to 24-year-old Indians said they were less tolerant of corruption than the older generation.
On religious belief, 50% said "people don't take their religion seriously"; 40% lamented that "young Indians have lost touch with their heritage."
Rashmee Roshan Lall
5 Feb, 2007 TIMES NEWS NETWORK
LONDON: Nearly two-thirds of all Indians are fiercely proud of 'Mera Bharat Mahaan' but more than half of India believes the caste system is a "barrier to social harmony" and is holding the country back, according to a BBC poll to be published on Monday.
India-watchers expressed surprise at the poll's finding, the first for a nationwide 'attitudes' survey conducted by an international agency, that Indians still seem to have caste firmly on their minds in one way or the other, even though leading sociologists have long argued that urbanisation and industrialisation has helped break down caste-barriers.
The survey aims to itemise exactly how Indians view their own country, at a time when much of the world appears to have a view alternately on "emerging India" or "overheating India". The survey was conducted for the BBC World Service by the international polling firm GlobeScan.
The survey found that 71% are proud to be an Indian; nearly as many (65%) think it is important that India is an economic superpower; 60% think it's important India should be a political power and the same number believe it should be a military superpower. Just under half of all Indians said India's economic growth over the last 10 years had not benefited them and their families. The survey comes as part of BBC's ongoing 'India Rising' week of special programming that charts changes in different sectors of the Indian economy.
In a special message to the BBC's estimated 163 million listeners in 33 languages, President Kalam called for worldwide engagement with his vision of citizenship, notably a "three-dimensional approach involving education with value system; religion transformed to spirituality and economic development for societal transformation of all the nations." Kalam, who called upon BBC's global audiences to flood his website with suggestions and debate, was speaking on a special edition of the BBC's 'Discovery' programme, to be broadcast on Wednesday.
Monday's BBC survey concentrated on asking more than 1,500 Indians a series of questions focusing on social and political issues. It found that Indians overall, seven in 10 exhibited a positive sense of identity by agreeing to the statement, "I am proud to be an Indian." The survey found the view was uniform across all age, income groups, even though it differed among religious groups with Christians (73%) the proudest; Hindus (71%) close behind and Muslim pride in being Indian languishing at 60%.
The poll found that Indians' positive perceptions about their present also extended to the Indian marketplace. A 55% majority said the justice system "treats poor people as fairly as rich people"; 52% said "being a woman is no barrier to success" and just under half of all Indians (48%) declared they would rather "work for a private company than for the government." Interestingly, six in 10, or 58% said they believed India's security is "more in danger from other Indians than from foreigners" and 55% said the "caste system is a barrier to social harmony." 47% said "corruption is a fact of life which we should accept as the price of doing business." But a cheering 45% of 18- to 24-year-old Indians said they were less tolerant of corruption than the older generation.
On religious belief, 50% said "people don't take their religion seriously"; 40% lamented that "young Indians have lost touch with their heritage."
Thursday, January 25, 2007
46 per cent Indians believe ghosts exists, 24 percent consult a palmist
3 per cent Indians believe in God
Sanjay Kumar and Yogendra Yadav, Hindustan Times
New Delhi, January 24, 2007
Here are some common beliefs about religion — Indians used to be very religious but no longer are, religion is the domain of women and the elderly, and educated and urbane India has no time for religion.
If you also thought so, it is time you took a look at the findings of the HT-CNN IBN State of the Nation Survey conducted by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS). Every alternate respondent in this survey — 7,670 to be precise — was asked a series of questions about their religious beliefs, attitudes and practices. The findings are bound to surprise you.
The survey found that urban, educated Indians are more religious than their rural and illiterate counterparts. Yes, women are more religious, but metropolitan women are far more religious than rural women. Predictably, the youth are a little less enthusiastic about religion. But the point is: religion in the country is on the rise.
If there is one social group that is least enthusiastic about religious practices, it is the adivasis. And if there is one group that is more religious than any other, it is upper caste Hindus who have been exposed to modern life more than others.
Consider these facts:
1) 93 per cent believe in god; education makes no difference
2) 64 per cent visit a temple, mosque or gurudwara regularly
3) 53 per cent pray daily; the educated pray more regularly
4) 46 per cent believe ghosts exist
5) 24 per cent consult a palmist
6) 68 per cent participate or take interest in religious functions of other religions
Do you think these figures reflect the rise of the BJP? Not quite. The party gets a little more than average support from among the very religious, but so does the Congress.
So what drives people to religion? Sociologists tell us that the stress of urban living pushes people to search for anchors in their lives. Since they cannot go back to their villages, they recreate a community through religion. That explains the religiosity among those who live in big cities.
In the process, religion changes from a personal experience to something that is more public and congregational. Hence, the proliferation of jalsas, satsangs and ratjagas. Market and the media play a greater role in defining religion.
Religious programmes on television are the latest vehicle for religious communication.
(Kumar and Yadav are social scientists working with the CSDS, Delhi)
Sanjay Kumar and Yogendra Yadav, Hindustan Times
New Delhi, January 24, 2007
Here are some common beliefs about religion — Indians used to be very religious but no longer are, religion is the domain of women and the elderly, and educated and urbane India has no time for religion.
If you also thought so, it is time you took a look at the findings of the HT-CNN IBN State of the Nation Survey conducted by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS). Every alternate respondent in this survey — 7,670 to be precise — was asked a series of questions about their religious beliefs, attitudes and practices. The findings are bound to surprise you.
The survey found that urban, educated Indians are more religious than their rural and illiterate counterparts. Yes, women are more religious, but metropolitan women are far more religious than rural women. Predictably, the youth are a little less enthusiastic about religion. But the point is: religion in the country is on the rise.
If there is one social group that is least enthusiastic about religious practices, it is the adivasis. And if there is one group that is more religious than any other, it is upper caste Hindus who have been exposed to modern life more than others.
Consider these facts:
1) 93 per cent believe in god; education makes no difference
2) 64 per cent visit a temple, mosque or gurudwara regularly
3) 53 per cent pray daily; the educated pray more regularly
4) 46 per cent believe ghosts exist
5) 24 per cent consult a palmist
6) 68 per cent participate or take interest in religious functions of other religions
Do you think these figures reflect the rise of the BJP? Not quite. The party gets a little more than average support from among the very religious, but so does the Congress.
So what drives people to religion? Sociologists tell us that the stress of urban living pushes people to search for anchors in their lives. Since they cannot go back to their villages, they recreate a community through religion. That explains the religiosity among those who live in big cities.
In the process, religion changes from a personal experience to something that is more public and congregational. Hence, the proliferation of jalsas, satsangs and ratjagas. Market and the media play a greater role in defining religion.
Religious programmes on television are the latest vehicle for religious communication.
(Kumar and Yadav are social scientists working with the CSDS, Delhi)
Wednesday, December 6, 2006
India is a poorest one in Per Capita Household Wealth : UN Report
The richest 2% of adults in the world own more than half of global household wealth according to a path-breaking study released today by the Helsinki-based World Institute for Development Economics Research of the United Nations University (UNU-WIDER). Under the study, India's average per capita net worth was only 24.7 per cent of the world average, and its GDP was 29.2 % of the world average.
India is categorized under the last group consists of 64 low-income countries. This group's collective household net worth on a PPP basis amounted to 8.3 per cent of world wealth, compared to 39.9 per cent of the world’s population and 11.3 per cent of world GDP.
Of the 13 countries for which we have the pertinent data, the US again ranks first in net worth per capita, at $143,857, followed on a PPP basis by Australia at $101,597, and Japan at $91,856. In this group, India is last, at $6,513 on a PPP basis and $1,112 on an exchange rate basis, preceded by Indonesia, at $7,973 on a PPP basis and $1,440 using official exchange rates. China appears to be about twice as wealthy as India, having per capita net worth of $11,267 on a PPP basis or 2,613 using official exchange rates.
Download the full study: WIDER WDHW (PDF 1,167KB), Powerpoint presentation (PPT 7,003KB)
$144,000 per Capita household wealth in the USA
$1,100 per Capita household wealth in India
The US is the richest country, with mean wealth estimated at $144,000 per person in the year 2000.4 At the opposite extreme among countries with wealth data, we have India with per capita wealth of about $6,500 in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms. The two low income countries in our sample, India and Indonesia, stand out as having particularly high shares of non-financial wealth.12 This is no surprise since assets such as housing, land, agricultural assets and consumer durables are particularly important in many developing countries. In addition, financial markets are often poorly developed. In India, the only low or middle income country for which we have some detail on financial assets, most of the financial assets owned by households are liquid.India is categorized under the last group consists of 64 low-income countries. This group's collective household net worth on a PPP basis amounted to 8.3 per cent of world wealth, compared to 39.9 per cent of the world’s population and 11.3 per cent of world GDP.
Of the 13 countries for which we have the pertinent data, the US again ranks first in net worth per capita, at $143,857, followed on a PPP basis by Australia at $101,597, and Japan at $91,856. In this group, India is last, at $6,513 on a PPP basis and $1,112 on an exchange rate basis, preceded by Indonesia, at $7,973 on a PPP basis and $1,440 using official exchange rates. China appears to be about twice as wealthy as India, having per capita net worth of $11,267 on a PPP basis or 2,613 using official exchange rates.
Download the full study: WIDER WDHW (PDF 1,167KB), Powerpoint presentation (PPT 7,003KB)
Monday, December 4, 2006
India lost 181.82 crores because of strikes and lockouts
Sutirtho Patranobis, Hindustan Times
New Delhi, December 4, 2006
The numbers are worrying. India lost 13.75 million man-days and incurred Rs 181.82 crore as production-related losses because of strikes and lockouts in the first nine months of 2006, data with Ministry of Labour and Employment has revealed.
The Ministry, however, says the lining of hope is the reduction in the number of strikes and lockouts as compared to 2005 or even 2004. The total number of strikes and lockouts till September 2005 were 397. The corresponding figure for this year is 346.
Minister of State for Labour and Employment Oscar Fernandes told Lok Sabha on Monday that there was no proposal to review the existing mechanism; to avoid strikes as the Industrial Disputes Act of 1947 provides a mechanism to maintain harmonious relationship between employer and employee.
The Act provides a framework for investigation and settlement of the Industrial disputes. It also seeks to regulate illegal strikes and lockouts, and provides protection to the workmen in case of lay-off, retrenchment and closure of establishments.
The declining trend in strikes and lockouts was around 4 per cent in 2005 compared to 2004. During 2004, the rate was 13 per cent as compared to 2003.
West Bengal, though its government is considered to be a progressive one at present, is an easy first among states in terms of losing out on man-days. In 2005, West Bengal was responsible for the loss of 13.99 million man-days or 60.15 per cent of the total man-days lost. In 2004 too, West Bengal led accounting for 17.56 million man-days.
A Ministry official said the definition of a man-day may vary from one company to the other, but on average it comprises a working day of eight hours. He added that while employees trigger strikes, the employer puts lockouts in force. ``Reasons for a lockout could vary from weakening demand of the company's product, resulting losses or indiscipline on the part of workers,'' he said.
The official said the last few years have seen comparative industrial peace with none of the major strikes - with the possible exception of state bank employees' strike that lasted for a few days - having an impact on general life.
New Delhi, December 4, 2006
The numbers are worrying. India lost 13.75 million man-days and incurred Rs 181.82 crore as production-related losses because of strikes and lockouts in the first nine months of 2006, data with Ministry of Labour and Employment has revealed.
The Ministry, however, says the lining of hope is the reduction in the number of strikes and lockouts as compared to 2005 or even 2004. The total number of strikes and lockouts till September 2005 were 397. The corresponding figure for this year is 346.
Minister of State for Labour and Employment Oscar Fernandes told Lok Sabha on Monday that there was no proposal to review the existing mechanism; to avoid strikes as the Industrial Disputes Act of 1947 provides a mechanism to maintain harmonious relationship between employer and employee.
The Act provides a framework for investigation and settlement of the Industrial disputes. It also seeks to regulate illegal strikes and lockouts, and provides protection to the workmen in case of lay-off, retrenchment and closure of establishments.
The declining trend in strikes and lockouts was around 4 per cent in 2005 compared to 2004. During 2004, the rate was 13 per cent as compared to 2003.
West Bengal, though its government is considered to be a progressive one at present, is an easy first among states in terms of losing out on man-days. In 2005, West Bengal was responsible for the loss of 13.99 million man-days or 60.15 per cent of the total man-days lost. In 2004 too, West Bengal led accounting for 17.56 million man-days.
A Ministry official said the definition of a man-day may vary from one company to the other, but on average it comprises a working day of eight hours. He added that while employees trigger strikes, the employer puts lockouts in force. ``Reasons for a lockout could vary from weakening demand of the company's product, resulting losses or indiscipline on the part of workers,'' he said.
The official said the last few years have seen comparative industrial peace with none of the major strikes - with the possible exception of state bank employees' strike that lasted for a few days - having an impact on general life.
Friday, December 1, 2006
India’s growing epidemic
Sanchita Sharma, Hindustan Times
New Delhi, November 30, 2006
By the end of 2006, 39.5 million people would be living with HIV/AIDS around the world, 5.7 million of them in India. Within two decades of being first detected in Chennai in 1986, HIV has spread rapidly within India, making it home to the highest number of HIV positive people in the world.
Women, mostly monogamous, account for 38 per cent of those infected, getting the virus from their regular partners. Parent-to-child infection is the leading cause of infection among the 65,000 children under 15 years living with HIV.
Only 125,000 people in India know that they have HIV, and just over 48,000 people get free treatment for AIDS under the government programme.
New Delhi, November 30, 2006
By the end of 2006, 39.5 million people would be living with HIV/AIDS around the world, 5.7 million of them in India. Within two decades of being first detected in Chennai in 1986, HIV has spread rapidly within India, making it home to the highest number of HIV positive people in the world.
Women, mostly monogamous, account for 38 per cent of those infected, getting the virus from their regular partners. Parent-to-child infection is the leading cause of infection among the 65,000 children under 15 years living with HIV.
Only 125,000 people in India know that they have HIV, and just over 48,000 people get free treatment for AIDS under the government programme.
Wednesday, November 29, 2006
India : A rape in every 28 Minutes
CHANDREYEE CHATTERJEE, The Telegraph , Tuesday, November 28, 2006
Calcutta, Nov. 27: Incidents of violence against women are on the rise in India, with one act of sexual harassment being reported every 12 minutes, one rape every 28 minutes and one dowry death every 67 minutes. And these are just the tip of the iceberg, as most cases go unreported.
“In a situation such as this, we feel it’s time to actively involve men in the struggle to stop violence against women,” said Anuradha Kapoor, director, Swayam, a non-profit women’s organisation committed to ending violence against women and children.
Swayam is organising a campaign in Calcutta to stop violence against women, in association with DRIK India, an alternative media organisation, and International Association of Women in Radio and Television (IAWRT), an international forum for personal contact and professional development among women broadcasters.
The campaign is part of an international initiative originating from the first Women’s Global Leadership Institute, sponsored by the Centre for Women’s Global Leadership in 1991. It kicked off on November 25 with a mass awareness programme, including an exhibition of posters and performances by the theatre and music groups of Swayam.
The campaign ends on December 10, marking International Human Rights Day. “This period has a special significance. It coincides with the International Day against Violence against Women, World AIDS Day and World Disability Day,” said Kapoor.
Swayam’s campaign will feature workshops by artists and rights activists, photography exhibitions, panel discussions and film shows.
Filmmaker Goutam Ghosh, actor Rahul Bose and others will speak on issues like violence against women and the need to involve men in the attempt to eradicate the menace.
Calcutta, Nov. 27: Incidents of violence against women are on the rise in India, with one act of sexual harassment being reported every 12 minutes, one rape every 28 minutes and one dowry death every 67 minutes. And these are just the tip of the iceberg, as most cases go unreported.
“In a situation such as this, we feel it’s time to actively involve men in the struggle to stop violence against women,” said Anuradha Kapoor, director, Swayam, a non-profit women’s organisation committed to ending violence against women and children.
Swayam is organising a campaign in Calcutta to stop violence against women, in association with DRIK India, an alternative media organisation, and International Association of Women in Radio and Television (IAWRT), an international forum for personal contact and professional development among women broadcasters.
The campaign is part of an international initiative originating from the first Women’s Global Leadership Institute, sponsored by the Centre for Women’s Global Leadership in 1991. It kicked off on November 25 with a mass awareness programme, including an exhibition of posters and performances by the theatre and music groups of Swayam.
The campaign ends on December 10, marking International Human Rights Day. “This period has a special significance. It coincides with the International Day against Violence against Women, World AIDS Day and World Disability Day,” said Kapoor.
Swayam’s campaign will feature workshops by artists and rights activists, photography exhibitions, panel discussions and film shows.
Filmmaker Goutam Ghosh, actor Rahul Bose and others will speak on issues like violence against women and the need to involve men in the attempt to eradicate the menace.
Thursday, November 23, 2006
India downs five, 148th in football rankings
Indo-Asian News Service
New Delhi, November 22, 2006
India slipped five places to be 148th while Brazil continues to top the list in the latest FIFA world football rankings released on Thursday.
India, which was 143rd in last month's list, dropped 24 points to slip down the list following its 1-2 defeat to Yemen in Sanaa´ on November 15.
India has 112 points. The country is, by comparison, even below the tiny island nation Mauritius, which is 139th with 151 points.
Maldives, another small island, also is much better placed than India, a country of more than 100 billion people. Maldives is 146th with 115 points.
Brazil tops the list with 1,588 points - an increase of 28 points in the last month - while World Cup winners Italy, which has maintained its second position, has 1,560 - an increase of 20 points.
Former World Cup champions France has moved one place up, to third, and now has 1,551 points.
View the full report from here The official FIFA world Cup Rankings
New Delhi, November 22, 2006
India slipped five places to be 148th while Brazil continues to top the list in the latest FIFA world football rankings released on Thursday.
India, which was 143rd in last month's list, dropped 24 points to slip down the list following its 1-2 defeat to Yemen in Sanaa´ on November 15.
India has 112 points. The country is, by comparison, even below the tiny island nation Mauritius, which is 139th with 151 points.
Maldives, another small island, also is much better placed than India, a country of more than 100 billion people. Maldives is 146th with 115 points.
Brazil tops the list with 1,588 points - an increase of 28 points in the last month - while World Cup winners Italy, which has maintained its second position, has 1,560 - an increase of 20 points.
Former World Cup champions France has moved one place up, to third, and now has 1,551 points.
View the full report from here The official FIFA world Cup Rankings
Wednesday, November 8, 2006
Why should you move your business out of India?
Tuesday, 07 November 2006
A recently publised World Bank report on Business Friendliness data from 175 countries around the globe honour India as:
* The world's most extensive tax administration system.
* India's taxation law contains 9,000 pages to protect the corrupted life style of caste clad civil servants.
The report says that an Indian medium-size company should pay a total tax rate of 81.1% on profit and will eat 264 hours of administrative burden and cause 59 steps for submission.
Even though such a high rated tax system is in place, the tax revenue receipts have remained below 10 per cent of GDP of Indian economy due to corruption of the civil service regime.
Enforcing commercial contracts in India is not an easy job. It can take 56 procedures and 1420 days and will cover only up to 35.7% of the debt!
The time to resolve bankruptcies in India take 10 years. Import and export procedures in India is a very hard process due to the restrictions of security regime. This part is rated at 139.
In India,the number of steps entrepreneurs can expect to go through to launch of a new business is 11 and it takes on average 35 days, and the cost required as a percentage of gross national income (GNI) per capita is 73.7%.
Dealing with licences in India take 270 days and the number of procedures counted as 20. It requires an amount closer to of 606 % GNI (Income Per Captia).
The World Bank's Doing Business Project assesses how many obstacles the tax system puts in the way of a business in every one of 175 nations on earth. The aim is to encourage faster administration, leading to more profitable business activities and hence economic growth. Reduced paperwork and lower taxes are the hallmark of wealthier nations, the World Bank notes. The bureaucrats of India are in love with tax rules.
Over all, India is ranked with a low rating of 134.
Corrupt practices are most likely to be found in the highest taxing nations, as entrepreneurs find themselves forced to bribe officials in order to cut through red tape or just to operate outside of the official economy altogether.
Middle Eastern states such as the United Arab Emirates and Asian locations like Hong Kong come in the top five of easy tax locations. The place on earth with the most difficult tax regime is the former Soviet republic of Belarus.
Report on India
Friday, October 27, 2006
Worldwide Press Freedom Index 2006 : India remains at one of the lowest position, 105
26 October 2006
War, the destroyer of press freedom in Israel, Lebanon and the Palestinian Authority
France and the United States slip further The Arab world affected by row over Mohammed cartoons
New countries have moved ahead of some Western democracies in the fifth annual Reporters Without Borders Worldwide Press Freedom Index, issued today, while the most repressive countries are still the same ones.
“Unfortunately nothing has changed in the countries that are the worst predators of press freedom,” the organisation said, “and journalists in North Korea, Eritrea, Turkmenistan, Cuba, Burma and China are still risking their life or imprisonment for trying to keep us informed. These situations are extremely serious and it is urgent that leaders of these countries accept criticism and stop routinely cracking down on the media so harshly.
"Each year new countries in less-developed parts of the world move up the Index to positions above some European countries or the United States. This is good news and shows once again that, even though very poor, countries can be very observant of freedom of expression. Meanwhile the steady erosion of press freedom in the United States, France and Japan is extremely alarming,” Reporters Without Borders said.
The three worst violators of free expression - North Korea, bottom of the Index at 168th place, Turkmenistan (167th) and Eritrea (166th) - have clamped down further. The torture death of Turkmenistan journalist Ogulsapar Muradova shows that the country’s leader, “President-for-Life” Separmurad Nyazov, is willing to use extreme violence against those who dare to criticise him. Reporters Without Borders is also extremely concerned about a number of Eritrean journalists who have been imprisoned in secret for more than five years. The all-powerful North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, also continues to totally control the media.
Northern European countries once again come top of the Index, with no recorded censorship, threats, intimidation or physical reprisals in Finland, Ireland, Iceland and the Netherlands, which all share first place.
Deterioration in the United States and Japan, with France also slipping
The United States (53rd) has fallen nine places since last year, after being in 17th position in the first year of the Index, in 2002. Relations between the media and the Bush administration sharply deteriorated after the president used the pretext of “national security” to regard as suspicious any journalist who questioned his “war on terrorism.” The zeal of federal courts which, unlike those in 33 US states, refuse to recognise the media’s right not to reveal its sources, even threatens journalists whose investigations have no connection at all with terrorism.
Freelance journalist and blogger Josh Wolf was imprisoned when he refused to hand over his video archives. Sudanese cameraman Sami al-Haj, who works for the pan-Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera, has been held without trial since June 2002 at the US military base at Guantanamo, and Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein has been held by US authorities in Iraq since April this year.
France (35th) slipped five places during the past year, to make a loss of 24 places in five years. The increase in searches of media offices and journalists’ homes is very worrying for media organisations and trade unions. Autumn 2005 was an especially bad time for French journalists, several of whom were physically attacked or threatened during a trade union dispute involving privatisation of the Corsican firm SNCM and during violent demonstrations in French city suburbs in November.
Rising nationalism and the system of exclusive press clubs (kishas) threatened democratic gains in Japan, which fell 14 places to 51st. The newspaper Nihon Keizai was firebombed and several journalists physically attacked by far-right activists (uyoku).
Fallout from the row over the "Mohammed cartoons”
Denmark (19th) dropped from joint first place because of serious threats against the authors of the Mohammed cartoons published there in autumn 2005. For the first time in recent years in a country that is very observant of civil liberties, journalists had to have police protection due to threats against them because of their work.
Yemen (149th) slipped four places, mainly because of the arrest of several journalists and closure of newspapers that reprinted the cartoons. Journalists were harassed for the same reason in Algeria (126th), Jordan (109th), Indonesia (103rd) and India (105th).
But except for Yemen and Saudi Arabia (161st), all the Arab peninsula countries considerably improved their rank. Kuwait (73rd) kept its place at the top of the group, just ahead of the United Arab Emirates (77th) and Qatar (80th).
War, the destroyer of press freedom
Lebanon has fallen from 56th to 107th place in five years, as the country’s media continues to suffer from the region’s poisonous political atmosphere, with a series of bomb attacks in 2005 and Israeli military attacks this year. The Lebanese media - some of the freest and most experienced in the Arab world - desperately need peace and guarantees of security. The inability of the Palestinian Authority (134th) to maintain stability in its territories and the behaviour of Israel (135th) outside its borders seriously threaten freedom of expression in the Middle East.
Things are much the same in Sri Lanka, which ranked 51st in 2002, when there was peace, but has now sunk to 141st because fighting between government and rebel forces has resumed in earnest. Dozens of Tamil journalists have been physically attacked after being accused by one side or the other of being biased against them.
Press freedom in Nepal (159th) has shifted according to the state of the fighting that has disrupted the country for several years. The “democatic revolution” and the revolt against the monarchy in April this year led immediately to more basic freedoms and the country should gain a lot of ground in next year’s Index.
Welcome changes of regime
Changes of ruler are sometimes good for press freeedom, as in the case of Haiti, which has risen from 125th to 87th place in two years after the flight into exile of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in early 2004. Several murders of journalists remain unpunished but violence against the media has abated.
Togo (66th) has risen 29 places since the death of President Gnassingbe Eyadema in February 2005, the accession to power of his son and internationally-backed efforts to make peace with the opposition.
A coup in Mauritania in August 2005 ended the heavy censorship of the local media and the country has risen to 77th position after being 138th in 2004, one of the biggest improvements in the Index.
Improvement in North Africa, except for Tunisia
Things got better in Algeria and Morocco, where the authorities treated the media better than in previous years. Reporters Without Borders was also allowed into Libya for the first time ever to meet regime officials.
The lessening of restrictions by the royal family and the opening up of broadcasting moved Morocco up 23 places to 97th position. But two independent weeklies, Tel Quel and Le Journal hebdo, were sentenced in 2006 to pay huge fines after being found guilty of libel.
Algeria (126th) was up three places and Libya up 10 (152nd). Algerian journalists got a break with President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s partial amnesty in July 2006 but no structural reform was made to expand press freedom. The Libyan regime allowed more access to news, especially online and through Arab and other foreign satellite TV stations, but still cracked down just as hard on all criticism of the government.
In Tunisia (148th), seizures of newpapers, unjustified dismissals of journalists and suspending them without pay were common. The November 2005 World Summit on the Information Society in Tunis was a farce. Several foreign journalists covering it were closely and openly spied on by the secret police. Just before the Summit opened, a journalist of the French daily Libération was beaten up and stabbed, a Belgian RTBF TV crew roughed up and two journalists of France’s TV5 harassed.
Repression continues in Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia (161st), Syria (153rd) and Iran (162nd) were again among the bottom group on the Index, as they have been for years since they have no independent media, only organs that spout government propaganda. The rulers of these countries keep a tight grip on the news and have set many red lines journalists must not cross. Self-censorship remains the best protection for journalists. Foreign journalists can only rarely get entry visas.
Newcomers to the top ranks
Two countries moved into the Index’s top 20 for the first time. Bolivia (16th) was best-placed among less-developed countries and during the year its journalists enjoyed the same level of freedom as colleagues in Canada or Austria. But the growing polarisation between state-run and privately-owned media and between supporters and opponents of President Evo Morales could complicate the situation.
Bosnia-Herzegovina (19th) continued its gradual rise up the Index since the end of the war in ex-Yugoslavia and is now placed above its European Union member-state neighbours Greece (32nd) and Italy (40th).
Ghana (34th) rose 32 places to become fourth in Africa behind the continent’s three traditional leaders - Benin (23rd), Namibia (26th) and Mauritius (32nd). Economic conditions are still difficult for the Ghanaian media but it is no longer threatened by the authorities.
Panama (39th) is enjoying political peace which has helped the growth of a free and vigorous media and the country moved up 27 places over the year.
http://www.rsf.org/IMG/pdf/cm2006.pdf
War, the destroyer of press freedom in Israel, Lebanon and the Palestinian Authority
France and the United States slip further The Arab world affected by row over Mohammed cartoons
New countries have moved ahead of some Western democracies in the fifth annual Reporters Without Borders Worldwide Press Freedom Index, issued today, while the most repressive countries are still the same ones.
“Unfortunately nothing has changed in the countries that are the worst predators of press freedom,” the organisation said, “and journalists in North Korea, Eritrea, Turkmenistan, Cuba, Burma and China are still risking their life or imprisonment for trying to keep us informed. These situations are extremely serious and it is urgent that leaders of these countries accept criticism and stop routinely cracking down on the media so harshly.
"Each year new countries in less-developed parts of the world move up the Index to positions above some European countries or the United States. This is good news and shows once again that, even though very poor, countries can be very observant of freedom of expression. Meanwhile the steady erosion of press freedom in the United States, France and Japan is extremely alarming,” Reporters Without Borders said.
The three worst violators of free expression - North Korea, bottom of the Index at 168th place, Turkmenistan (167th) and Eritrea (166th) - have clamped down further. The torture death of Turkmenistan journalist Ogulsapar Muradova shows that the country’s leader, “President-for-Life” Separmurad Nyazov, is willing to use extreme violence against those who dare to criticise him. Reporters Without Borders is also extremely concerned about a number of Eritrean journalists who have been imprisoned in secret for more than five years. The all-powerful North Korean leader, Kim Jong-il, also continues to totally control the media.
Northern European countries once again come top of the Index, with no recorded censorship, threats, intimidation or physical reprisals in Finland, Ireland, Iceland and the Netherlands, which all share first place.
Deterioration in the United States and Japan, with France also slipping
The United States (53rd) has fallen nine places since last year, after being in 17th position in the first year of the Index, in 2002. Relations between the media and the Bush administration sharply deteriorated after the president used the pretext of “national security” to regard as suspicious any journalist who questioned his “war on terrorism.” The zeal of federal courts which, unlike those in 33 US states, refuse to recognise the media’s right not to reveal its sources, even threatens journalists whose investigations have no connection at all with terrorism.
Freelance journalist and blogger Josh Wolf was imprisoned when he refused to hand over his video archives. Sudanese cameraman Sami al-Haj, who works for the pan-Arab broadcaster Al-Jazeera, has been held without trial since June 2002 at the US military base at Guantanamo, and Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein has been held by US authorities in Iraq since April this year.
France (35th) slipped five places during the past year, to make a loss of 24 places in five years. The increase in searches of media offices and journalists’ homes is very worrying for media organisations and trade unions. Autumn 2005 was an especially bad time for French journalists, several of whom were physically attacked or threatened during a trade union dispute involving privatisation of the Corsican firm SNCM and during violent demonstrations in French city suburbs in November.
Rising nationalism and the system of exclusive press clubs (kishas) threatened democratic gains in Japan, which fell 14 places to 51st. The newspaper Nihon Keizai was firebombed and several journalists physically attacked by far-right activists (uyoku).
Fallout from the row over the "Mohammed cartoons”
Denmark (19th) dropped from joint first place because of serious threats against the authors of the Mohammed cartoons published there in autumn 2005. For the first time in recent years in a country that is very observant of civil liberties, journalists had to have police protection due to threats against them because of their work.
Yemen (149th) slipped four places, mainly because of the arrest of several journalists and closure of newspapers that reprinted the cartoons. Journalists were harassed for the same reason in Algeria (126th), Jordan (109th), Indonesia (103rd) and India (105th).
But except for Yemen and Saudi Arabia (161st), all the Arab peninsula countries considerably improved their rank. Kuwait (73rd) kept its place at the top of the group, just ahead of the United Arab Emirates (77th) and Qatar (80th).
War, the destroyer of press freedom
Lebanon has fallen from 56th to 107th place in five years, as the country’s media continues to suffer from the region’s poisonous political atmosphere, with a series of bomb attacks in 2005 and Israeli military attacks this year. The Lebanese media - some of the freest and most experienced in the Arab world - desperately need peace and guarantees of security. The inability of the Palestinian Authority (134th) to maintain stability in its territories and the behaviour of Israel (135th) outside its borders seriously threaten freedom of expression in the Middle East.
Things are much the same in Sri Lanka, which ranked 51st in 2002, when there was peace, but has now sunk to 141st because fighting between government and rebel forces has resumed in earnest. Dozens of Tamil journalists have been physically attacked after being accused by one side or the other of being biased against them.
Press freedom in Nepal (159th) has shifted according to the state of the fighting that has disrupted the country for several years. The “democatic revolution” and the revolt against the monarchy in April this year led immediately to more basic freedoms and the country should gain a lot of ground in next year’s Index.
Welcome changes of regime
Changes of ruler are sometimes good for press freeedom, as in the case of Haiti, which has risen from 125th to 87th place in two years after the flight into exile of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in early 2004. Several murders of journalists remain unpunished but violence against the media has abated.
Togo (66th) has risen 29 places since the death of President Gnassingbe Eyadema in February 2005, the accession to power of his son and internationally-backed efforts to make peace with the opposition.
A coup in Mauritania in August 2005 ended the heavy censorship of the local media and the country has risen to 77th position after being 138th in 2004, one of the biggest improvements in the Index.
Improvement in North Africa, except for Tunisia
Things got better in Algeria and Morocco, where the authorities treated the media better than in previous years. Reporters Without Borders was also allowed into Libya for the first time ever to meet regime officials.
The lessening of restrictions by the royal family and the opening up of broadcasting moved Morocco up 23 places to 97th position. But two independent weeklies, Tel Quel and Le Journal hebdo, were sentenced in 2006 to pay huge fines after being found guilty of libel.
Algeria (126th) was up three places and Libya up 10 (152nd). Algerian journalists got a break with President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s partial amnesty in July 2006 but no structural reform was made to expand press freedom. The Libyan regime allowed more access to news, especially online and through Arab and other foreign satellite TV stations, but still cracked down just as hard on all criticism of the government.
In Tunisia (148th), seizures of newpapers, unjustified dismissals of journalists and suspending them without pay were common. The November 2005 World Summit on the Information Society in Tunis was a farce. Several foreign journalists covering it were closely and openly spied on by the secret police. Just before the Summit opened, a journalist of the French daily Libération was beaten up and stabbed, a Belgian RTBF TV crew roughed up and two journalists of France’s TV5 harassed.
Repression continues in Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia (161st), Syria (153rd) and Iran (162nd) were again among the bottom group on the Index, as they have been for years since they have no independent media, only organs that spout government propaganda. The rulers of these countries keep a tight grip on the news and have set many red lines journalists must not cross. Self-censorship remains the best protection for journalists. Foreign journalists can only rarely get entry visas.
Newcomers to the top ranks
Two countries moved into the Index’s top 20 for the first time. Bolivia (16th) was best-placed among less-developed countries and during the year its journalists enjoyed the same level of freedom as colleagues in Canada or Austria. But the growing polarisation between state-run and privately-owned media and between supporters and opponents of President Evo Morales could complicate the situation.
Bosnia-Herzegovina (19th) continued its gradual rise up the Index since the end of the war in ex-Yugoslavia and is now placed above its European Union member-state neighbours Greece (32nd) and Italy (40th).
Ghana (34th) rose 32 places to become fourth in Africa behind the continent’s three traditional leaders - Benin (23rd), Namibia (26th) and Mauritius (32nd). Economic conditions are still difficult for the Ghanaian media but it is no longer threatened by the authorities.
Panama (39th) is enjoying political peace which has helped the growth of a free and vigorous media and the country moved up 27 places over the year.
http://www.rsf.org/IMG/pdf/cm2006.pdf
Thursday, October 26, 2006
India flunks UNESCO test in child education
Toufiq Rashid, Indian Express,October 26, 2006
NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 25: While the Sachar Committee report highlighted the worsening education indices for the Muslim community in India, a Unesco report released in Paris has more bad news for the education sector in the country.
The report gives India minus points (-1.7) in reducing the number of illiterates among adults above the age of 15 years in the country. According to the Education For All (EFA) Global Monitoring report, while India had 27,30,66,000 illiterates in 1990, the number marginally reduced to 26,84,26,000 in 2004. This number is the highest in the world. This despite increasing literacy rate from 49.3% in 1990 to 61% in 2004.
India figures along with three other countries — Ethiopia, Nigeria and Pakistan — which account for a significant proportion of the world’s out-of-school children. The report says the children comprise child labour; children who cannot afford school fees; hard-to-reach groups such as those living in small settlements or remote areas where no schooling is available; children of migrant families; children in coastal fishing communities; those with special needs; Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe children; urban deprived children; and children from minority groups (read mostly Muslims).
India also tops in terms of gender disparity in education — for every 100 out-of-school boys, there are 136 girls. The numbers are comparable to Arab states (134), South and West Asia (129), Benin (136). Only Yemen (184) and Iraq (176) are worse than India.
On the EFA development index, the report gives India a score of 0.7. While 90 per cent children get enrolled in primary schools, only 79 per cent study till Class V. Only 71 per cent of these children enroll for lower secondary and 40 per cent for upper secondary. For tertiary education, the percentage enrollment is just 12.
Referring to a survey commissioned by the Government of India in 2005 (Social and Rural Research Institute), the report says a nationwide survey showed that 13.5 million children were out of school. The percentage for the 6-13 age-group was nearly 7 and for the 6-10 age-group, 6.1.
The analysis focuses on results for the 6-13 age group, in line with the practice by the Centre and state governments in India. The highlights are:
• The 7% rate of out-of-school children reflects 6.2% for boys and 7.9% for girls
• The 7.8% rate in rural areas is significantly higher than 4.3% in urban areas
• In urban areas the rates for boys and girls are similar while in rural areas they are 6.8% and 9.1%, respectively
• The variations across social groups were much larger than those across gender and place of residence — 10.0% for Muslims, 9.5% for Scheduled Tribes, 8.2% for Scheduled Castes, 6.9% for Other Backward Castes and 3.7% for the remaining social groups
• Among the states, the rates are highest in Bihar (17%), Jharkhand (10.9%), Assam (8.9%), West Bengal (8.7%), Madhya Pradesh (8.6%), Uttar Pradesh (8.2%) and Rajasthan (6.9%)
• By contrast, in the south, some states appear to have virtually achieved universal schooling for the age-group — Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu record out-of-school rates between 0.5% and 2.1%
• Surprisingly, the number of SC and Muslim boys who are out of school are higher than those for girls. This is not the case for Other Backward Castes or STs
The only positive remark is about the India’s Open Basic Education (OBE) programme of the 1990s, which has targeted neo-literates who have successfully completed literacy and post-literacy programmes.
NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 25: While the Sachar Committee report highlighted the worsening education indices for the Muslim community in India, a Unesco report released in Paris has more bad news for the education sector in the country.
The report gives India minus points (-1.7) in reducing the number of illiterates among adults above the age of 15 years in the country. According to the Education For All (EFA) Global Monitoring report, while India had 27,30,66,000 illiterates in 1990, the number marginally reduced to 26,84,26,000 in 2004. This number is the highest in the world. This despite increasing literacy rate from 49.3% in 1990 to 61% in 2004.
India figures along with three other countries — Ethiopia, Nigeria and Pakistan — which account for a significant proportion of the world’s out-of-school children. The report says the children comprise child labour; children who cannot afford school fees; hard-to-reach groups such as those living in small settlements or remote areas where no schooling is available; children of migrant families; children in coastal fishing communities; those with special needs; Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe children; urban deprived children; and children from minority groups (read mostly Muslims).
India also tops in terms of gender disparity in education — for every 100 out-of-school boys, there are 136 girls. The numbers are comparable to Arab states (134), South and West Asia (129), Benin (136). Only Yemen (184) and Iraq (176) are worse than India.
On the EFA development index, the report gives India a score of 0.7. While 90 per cent children get enrolled in primary schools, only 79 per cent study till Class V. Only 71 per cent of these children enroll for lower secondary and 40 per cent for upper secondary. For tertiary education, the percentage enrollment is just 12.
Referring to a survey commissioned by the Government of India in 2005 (Social and Rural Research Institute), the report says a nationwide survey showed that 13.5 million children were out of school. The percentage for the 6-13 age-group was nearly 7 and for the 6-10 age-group, 6.1.
The analysis focuses on results for the 6-13 age group, in line with the practice by the Centre and state governments in India. The highlights are:
• The 7% rate of out-of-school children reflects 6.2% for boys and 7.9% for girls
• The 7.8% rate in rural areas is significantly higher than 4.3% in urban areas
• In urban areas the rates for boys and girls are similar while in rural areas they are 6.8% and 9.1%, respectively
• The variations across social groups were much larger than those across gender and place of residence — 10.0% for Muslims, 9.5% for Scheduled Tribes, 8.2% for Scheduled Castes, 6.9% for Other Backward Castes and 3.7% for the remaining social groups
• Among the states, the rates are highest in Bihar (17%), Jharkhand (10.9%), Assam (8.9%), West Bengal (8.7%), Madhya Pradesh (8.6%), Uttar Pradesh (8.2%) and Rajasthan (6.9%)
• By contrast, in the south, some states appear to have virtually achieved universal schooling for the age-group — Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu record out-of-school rates between 0.5% and 2.1%
• Surprisingly, the number of SC and Muslim boys who are out of school are higher than those for girls. This is not the case for Other Backward Castes or STs
The only positive remark is about the India’s Open Basic Education (OBE) programme of the 1990s, which has targeted neo-literates who have successfully completed literacy and post-literacy programmes.
Friday, October 20, 2006
It's official: India's dazzling growth fails to dent poverty
Mahendra Kumar Singh, 19 Oct, 2006 TIMES NEWS NETWORK
NEW DELHI: Economic growth may have been spectacular since 1993 — that is, post-economic reforms — but it seems to be trickling down rather slowly.
A soon-to-be-released official report has estimated that poverty declined by a mere 0.74% during the 11-year period ended 2004-05. Although there are signs of things moving a little faster, at 0.79%, between 1999-2000 and 2004-05, going by another measure, the number of people below poverty line may have remained unchanged.
National Sample Survey Organisation’s (NSSO) findings show the number of people living below poverty line (BPL) at 22.15% in 2004-05, compared with 26.09% in 1999-2000. In the same period, the country’s GDP grew at around 6%.
This mismatch between growth and its distribution is politically worrying as it indicates a rise in economic disparities. Economists say uneven growth often leads to social unrest which, in turn, can cause problems for politicians.
Anyone consuming less than 2,100 calories in urban areas, and 2,400 calories in rural areas, is classifed in the BPL category.
The NSSO study also shows that poverty declined the sharpest in the poorer states.
Study: BPL population up in Delhi, Maha and Haryana
NEW DELHI: A National Sample Survey Organisation’s study suggests that while economic growth is trickling down very slowly, poverty has declined the sharpest in the poorer states.
Leading them were Assam and the north-eastern states, where people below the poverty line decreased by nearly 4% annually, followed by Jharkhand (2.51% a year during the five-year period), Chhattisgarh (2.15% a year) and Bihar (1.69%). Apart from the slow reduction of poverty, government also seems worried about a lower decrease in poverty ratios in urban areas, compared to rural areas. BPL population in rural areas decreased 4.68% between 1999-2000 and 2004-05, which was over twice the pace of the decrease in urban centres, estimated at 2.12%.
The trend of slower poverty reduction in urban areas, say economists, could be due to migration of the poor from rural areas. But they wonder whether if that is indeed the case, then the rate of actual decline of poverty in rural areas could be over estimated.
The NSSO findings also reveal an increase in BPL population in Haryana, Maharashtra, Delhi, Rajasthan and Goa. This is possibly because migrant labour is moving out of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand to these states in search of jobs.
There are also fears that dipping state growth rates, as witnessed in the case of Maharashtra, have added to the increase in the BPL population. Among the poorer states, Orissa has the highest proportion of poor — nearly 40% of its population is below the poverty line. The population of poor in Orissa’s villages decreased 8.36% during the five-year period while the urban BPL population fell 1.2%.
Next in line is Jharkhand, which had a marginally higher BPL population of 47.40% compared to Orissa’s 47.15% in 1999-2000. At the end of June 2005, Jharkhand’s poor constituted 34.83% of the state’s population. Bihar remained in the third spot with 32.57% population under BPL.
The estimates were prepared using monthly consumption expenditure of individuals during 365 days on clothing, footwear, education, durables in addition to their medical expenses. This method is called the Mixed Reference Period Method (MRPM). Going by the other measure used by NSSO — Uniform Reference Period which measures poverty based on every consumption for the last 30 days of the survey — BPL population accounted for 27.81% in 2004-05, compared with 35.97% in 1993-94. Economists, however, believe that the methodology is suspect as consumption during 30 days is not the right measure and the government, too, prefers MRPM.
NEW DELHI: Economic growth may have been spectacular since 1993 — that is, post-economic reforms — but it seems to be trickling down rather slowly.
A soon-to-be-released official report has estimated that poverty declined by a mere 0.74% during the 11-year period ended 2004-05. Although there are signs of things moving a little faster, at 0.79%, between 1999-2000 and 2004-05, going by another measure, the number of people below poverty line may have remained unchanged.
National Sample Survey Organisation’s (NSSO) findings show the number of people living below poverty line (BPL) at 22.15% in 2004-05, compared with 26.09% in 1999-2000. In the same period, the country’s GDP grew at around 6%.
This mismatch between growth and its distribution is politically worrying as it indicates a rise in economic disparities. Economists say uneven growth often leads to social unrest which, in turn, can cause problems for politicians.
Anyone consuming less than 2,100 calories in urban areas, and 2,400 calories in rural areas, is classifed in the BPL category.
The NSSO study also shows that poverty declined the sharpest in the poorer states.
Study: BPL population up in Delhi, Maha and Haryana
NEW DELHI: A National Sample Survey Organisation’s study suggests that while economic growth is trickling down very slowly, poverty has declined the sharpest in the poorer states.
Leading them were Assam and the north-eastern states, where people below the poverty line decreased by nearly 4% annually, followed by Jharkhand (2.51% a year during the five-year period), Chhattisgarh (2.15% a year) and Bihar (1.69%). Apart from the slow reduction of poverty, government also seems worried about a lower decrease in poverty ratios in urban areas, compared to rural areas. BPL population in rural areas decreased 4.68% between 1999-2000 and 2004-05, which was over twice the pace of the decrease in urban centres, estimated at 2.12%.
The trend of slower poverty reduction in urban areas, say economists, could be due to migration of the poor from rural areas. But they wonder whether if that is indeed the case, then the rate of actual decline of poverty in rural areas could be over estimated.
The NSSO findings also reveal an increase in BPL population in Haryana, Maharashtra, Delhi, Rajasthan and Goa. This is possibly because migrant labour is moving out of Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand to these states in search of jobs.
There are also fears that dipping state growth rates, as witnessed in the case of Maharashtra, have added to the increase in the BPL population. Among the poorer states, Orissa has the highest proportion of poor — nearly 40% of its population is below the poverty line. The population of poor in Orissa’s villages decreased 8.36% during the five-year period while the urban BPL population fell 1.2%.
Next in line is Jharkhand, which had a marginally higher BPL population of 47.40% compared to Orissa’s 47.15% in 1999-2000. At the end of June 2005, Jharkhand’s poor constituted 34.83% of the state’s population. Bihar remained in the third spot with 32.57% population under BPL.
The estimates were prepared using monthly consumption expenditure of individuals during 365 days on clothing, footwear, education, durables in addition to their medical expenses. This method is called the Mixed Reference Period Method (MRPM). Going by the other measure used by NSSO — Uniform Reference Period which measures poverty based on every consumption for the last 30 days of the survey — BPL population accounted for 27.81% in 2004-05, compared with 35.97% in 1993-94. Economists, however, believe that the methodology is suspect as consumption during 30 days is not the right measure and the government, too, prefers MRPM.
Thursday, October 19, 2006
GDP walas misleading world : Rise of China used to make India slave of America
October 2006, Dalit Voice
Judging a country’s growth and its “economic development”, based on GDP, may give a fairly accurate picture but in this hierarchically arranged casteist “Hindu India” built on the ascending order of reverence and descending degree of contempt it will present only a misleading if not a totally false picture.
Because India’s upper castes, forming the apex of the caste pyramid (Hinduism), sucking the blood of the entire Bahujan Samaj (85%) have become stinking rich. We know that their filthy wealth triggers stock market boom, lavish lifestyle and unending demand for goods and services. True.
But, please note, those suffering from this bursting wealth are a micro-minority of 15% who are also directly causing the pauperisation of the rest of the population (Bahujans).
This is India and its reality. How then the growing wealth of its ruling class can be called the growth of entire India? The upper caste rich are no doubt galloping but the rest are shrinking — if not collapsing. This is what is happening today.
India not a “nation”: Therefore, GDP will not and cannot present a true picture of India’s growth — if we have to be sincere to ourselves. When over 85% of India’s 1,000 odd million population is in great pain how can it present a picture of health, wealth and happiness?
Our GDPwalas are deliberately misleading the world.
India is not a “nation”. It is a country of several warring “nations”. A small part of this multi-national country comprising the upper castes (Hindus) — who themselves are not a single nation — may be jumping with joy after stealing the wealth and exploiting the innocent “lower castes”.
How can the ill-gotten wealth of this tiny patch of population be taken as the growing affluence of India as a whole?
This GDP is utter humbug.
PM bluffing: There is a mania among Western writers to boast that India is tailing China in economic upsurge and the two Asian giants are rising, the balance of economic power in the world is shifting from West to Asia and the two countries are to be watched. Nonsense.
As India’s original inhabitants and partners in the country’s socio-economic-cultural struggle we don’t agree with this tendency to put India just behind China. We are not able to understand how these economic pundits can club India with China. Yes. China is galloping. And enough has been said in DV itself quoting reliable sources. But what about India?
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister Chidambaram are bluffing the world by using India’s GDP figures. The GDP calculators, who belong to the (upper caste) Brahminical ruling class, are juggling with figures and thus misleading the world.
Brahminical people packed in the World Bank and IMF are misguiding the Western people to put India immediately behind China in GDP growth.
Can we take GDP as the real, genuine indicator of India’s growth? When over 85% of India continues to be still deprived, how can the skeleton be called a muscleman?
Bulging stomach: Those who depend upon GDP figures have not taken into account the state of the 85% of the country’s deprived population comprising its SC/ST/BCs (65%) and Muslim/Christian/Sikh (20%). Their GDP figures are based on the rising riches of the 15% upper castes whose stomachs are bulging.
Yes. They are drinking more, eating more, dancing more, sleeping more, buying more. They may also constitute a staggering 15-odd crore out of India’s 100-odd crore population. This 15 crore is no ordinary population. It has enormous purchasing capacity. In some cases each upper caste family has more than one car.
This 15% upper caste rulers hide themselves under a confusing name called the “middle class” — though in fact it is the topmost class — the ruling class of India.
The Manmohan Singh-Chidambaram-Ahluwalia ruling trio is boasting about India’s burgeoning GDP without disclosing the fact that the other 85% is sinking in debt and penury. (V.T. Rajshekar, Development Redefined, DSA-2006).
Two reasons for China’s rise: It is this ruling class economists encouraged by the trio are putting India immediately behind China to deceive the outside world that India is also fast catching up with China. There is no bigger falsehood than this.
China galloped for two basic reasons:
(1) It is a communist country which has abolished god and religion while protecting minority religions like Islam and Christianity. But India has 330 million gods and millions of godmen all busy converting “Hindus” into intoxicated monkeys.
(2) In China, there is no right to property which is owned exclusively by the state. India’s reigning Hindu religion gives the highest value to property because its ruling Brahminical castes are the biggest property owners. That is why the govt. in India can take no step towards economic advancement because the right to property blocks the passage.
These are the two basic causes that serve as a grindstone round the neck of Hindu India keeping its population under perpetual superstition, karma theory confusion, endless litigation causing frequent physical violence resulting in huge waste of time in its Hindu religiosity — the sole purpose of which is to keep Muslims and Christians as the target of violence.
How can such a country be put along with China which is a revolutionary country?
India made enemy of China: The bid to put India behind China is done consciously knowing full well that India is rotten to the core but hiding the reality under concocted GDP statistics.
The Western leaders and media know the truth but they are hiding the truth of India’s gloom and doom. (DV Edit April 1, 2006: “Defeated in anti-Islamic war, US shifts focus on China: India joins clash of civilisations?”).
The rise of China has actually helped the West to make India a slave of America and even enemy of China.
GDP-mongers in their enthusiasm to promote their jatwalas have actually harmed the country. We have to pay a heavy price for selling the country to America and converting India as enemy of China.
To repeat, GDP is not a real genuine indicator to decide a county’s health and happiness. Particularly in the case of India. India is already a failed state if social indicators are taken as the deciding factor. In the field of health, infant mortality, education, infrastructure, housing, agriculture, employment China is miles and miles ahead of India. Corruption at the top is rampant. Caste system has made India a sick country. Persecution of Muslims, Christians and Dalits has made it the world’s most violent country.
Now by jumping into the American bandwagon, India’s rulers have further harmed the country.
GDP walas are warned.
Judging a country’s growth and its “economic development”, based on GDP, may give a fairly accurate picture but in this hierarchically arranged casteist “Hindu India” built on the ascending order of reverence and descending degree of contempt it will present only a misleading if not a totally false picture.
Because India’s upper castes, forming the apex of the caste pyramid (Hinduism), sucking the blood of the entire Bahujan Samaj (85%) have become stinking rich. We know that their filthy wealth triggers stock market boom, lavish lifestyle and unending demand for goods and services. True.
But, please note, those suffering from this bursting wealth are a micro-minority of 15% who are also directly causing the pauperisation of the rest of the population (Bahujans).
This is India and its reality. How then the growing wealth of its ruling class can be called the growth of entire India? The upper caste rich are no doubt galloping but the rest are shrinking — if not collapsing. This is what is happening today.
India not a “nation”: Therefore, GDP will not and cannot present a true picture of India’s growth — if we have to be sincere to ourselves. When over 85% of India’s 1,000 odd million population is in great pain how can it present a picture of health, wealth and happiness?
Our GDPwalas are deliberately misleading the world.
India is not a “nation”. It is a country of several warring “nations”. A small part of this multi-national country comprising the upper castes (Hindus) — who themselves are not a single nation — may be jumping with joy after stealing the wealth and exploiting the innocent “lower castes”.
How can the ill-gotten wealth of this tiny patch of population be taken as the growing affluence of India as a whole?
This GDP is utter humbug.
PM bluffing: There is a mania among Western writers to boast that India is tailing China in economic upsurge and the two Asian giants are rising, the balance of economic power in the world is shifting from West to Asia and the two countries are to be watched. Nonsense.
As India’s original inhabitants and partners in the country’s socio-economic-cultural struggle we don’t agree with this tendency to put India just behind China. We are not able to understand how these economic pundits can club India with China. Yes. China is galloping. And enough has been said in DV itself quoting reliable sources. But what about India?
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Finance Minister Chidambaram are bluffing the world by using India’s GDP figures. The GDP calculators, who belong to the (upper caste) Brahminical ruling class, are juggling with figures and thus misleading the world.
Brahminical people packed in the World Bank and IMF are misguiding the Western people to put India immediately behind China in GDP growth.
Can we take GDP as the real, genuine indicator of India’s growth? When over 85% of India continues to be still deprived, how can the skeleton be called a muscleman?
Bulging stomach: Those who depend upon GDP figures have not taken into account the state of the 85% of the country’s deprived population comprising its SC/ST/BCs (65%) and Muslim/Christian/Sikh (20%). Their GDP figures are based on the rising riches of the 15% upper castes whose stomachs are bulging.
Yes. They are drinking more, eating more, dancing more, sleeping more, buying more. They may also constitute a staggering 15-odd crore out of India’s 100-odd crore population. This 15 crore is no ordinary population. It has enormous purchasing capacity. In some cases each upper caste family has more than one car.
This 15% upper caste rulers hide themselves under a confusing name called the “middle class” — though in fact it is the topmost class — the ruling class of India.
The Manmohan Singh-Chidambaram-Ahluwalia ruling trio is boasting about India’s burgeoning GDP without disclosing the fact that the other 85% is sinking in debt and penury. (V.T. Rajshekar, Development Redefined, DSA-2006).
Two reasons for China’s rise: It is this ruling class economists encouraged by the trio are putting India immediately behind China to deceive the outside world that India is also fast catching up with China. There is no bigger falsehood than this.
China galloped for two basic reasons:
(1) It is a communist country which has abolished god and religion while protecting minority religions like Islam and Christianity. But India has 330 million gods and millions of godmen all busy converting “Hindus” into intoxicated monkeys.
(2) In China, there is no right to property which is owned exclusively by the state. India’s reigning Hindu religion gives the highest value to property because its ruling Brahminical castes are the biggest property owners. That is why the govt. in India can take no step towards economic advancement because the right to property blocks the passage.
These are the two basic causes that serve as a grindstone round the neck of Hindu India keeping its population under perpetual superstition, karma theory confusion, endless litigation causing frequent physical violence resulting in huge waste of time in its Hindu religiosity — the sole purpose of which is to keep Muslims and Christians as the target of violence.
How can such a country be put along with China which is a revolutionary country?
India made enemy of China: The bid to put India behind China is done consciously knowing full well that India is rotten to the core but hiding the reality under concocted GDP statistics.
The Western leaders and media know the truth but they are hiding the truth of India’s gloom and doom. (DV Edit April 1, 2006: “Defeated in anti-Islamic war, US shifts focus on China: India joins clash of civilisations?”).
The rise of China has actually helped the West to make India a slave of America and even enemy of China.
GDP-mongers in their enthusiasm to promote their jatwalas have actually harmed the country. We have to pay a heavy price for selling the country to America and converting India as enemy of China.
To repeat, GDP is not a real genuine indicator to decide a county’s health and happiness. Particularly in the case of India. India is already a failed state if social indicators are taken as the deciding factor. In the field of health, infant mortality, education, infrastructure, housing, agriculture, employment China is miles and miles ahead of India. Corruption at the top is rampant. Caste system has made India a sick country. Persecution of Muslims, Christians and Dalits has made it the world’s most violent country.
Now by jumping into the American bandwagon, India’s rulers have further harmed the country.
GDP walas are warned.
Sunday, October 15, 2006
India ranks 3rd from bottom of the world on malnourished kids
Sonu Jain, Indian Express,October 14, 2006
NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 13: Yet another report confirms India’s losing battle against hunger. In the Global Hunger Index, India ranks 117th for the prevalence of underweight children. Only Bangladesh and Nepal are worse-off.
Overall, India is ranked 96th out of 119 countries covered by the index, which doesn’t paint a rosy picture per se. But India comes off far worse in its record for malnutrition in children, as measured by body weight.
The proportion of children found underweight in India, according to the latest figures is 47.5 per cent, which makes it worse than conflict-plagued, drought-stricken Sub-Saharan Africa, where the figure is some 30 per cent on average. India’s figure is also worse than that of individual Sub-Saharan countries.
These findings are from a report released globally today by the Washington-based International Food Policy Institute (IFPRI).
The Global Hunger Index combines three indicators: child malnutrition, child mortality, and estimates of the proportion of people who are calorie-deficient.
The index has been calculated for 1981, 1992, 1997, and 2003. The latest round ranks 119 countries, of which 97 are deemed “developing” and 22 “in transition.”
Speaking to The Indian Express on phone from Washington, the report’s lead author Doris Wiesmann said the two major factors for India’s low ranking were that per capita food availability did not increase from 1997 onward, and that child malnutrition rates remained at very high levels, with more than 46 per cent of children under five years being underweight.
India is a different story from Sub-Saharan Africa. A higher proportion of the population (33 per cent) is calorie-deficient there than in India (21 per cent) or South Asia as a whole (22 per cent). The sub-text to India’s dismal showing is malnutrition in children under five.
“Mothers, who are usually children’s primary caretakers, and their education, nutritional knowledge, well-being and status in families and communities are particularly important in this respect,” said Wiesmann.
The results are a direct fallout of the low status of women in Indian society, several earlier studies have pointed out.
“In India, women eat the last and the least, increasing the chances of anaemia,” she explained. This practice partly explain why 83 percent of women in India suffer from iron deficiency anaemia, as opposed to about 40 percent in sub-Saharan Africa.
Not surprisingly, one-third of the babies born in India are born with low birth weight, compared to one-sixth in sub-Saharan Africa.
“It has been observed that the women who have a say in the family, allocate more resources to their children’s nutritional needs. Men have other priorities,” she said.
There have been other studies that have explained India’s presence as a hotspot despite its growing GDP.
Lisa Smith, a IFPRI research fellow, and Usha Ramakrishnan, Associate Professor at Emory University, identified three factors contributing to the nutritional status gap between South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa in a recent study.
The first, making by far the greatest contribution among the three, is women’s status, followed by sanitation and urbanization
The implication for policy is clear: in the interests of improving child nutrition, women’s status should be raised.
The study also concluded that in regions where women’s status is low, programmes to improve child nutritional status would have more lasting impact when combined with efforts to improve women’s status.
India has a large programme that aims to provide supplementary nutrition for children called the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS).
Studies have shown that preventing child malnutrition in the most critical phase of child development between six months and two years is more effective than targeting children under the age of five once they have become malnourished.
By the time a child has developed signs of malnutrition, the damage may already be irreversible.
Thursday, October 5, 2006
Indian companies are most corrupt on Transparency Bribe Payers Index
Wednesday, October 04, 2006
NEW DELHI: In a global recognition to the "Much Merited Upper Class Rule", India has been ranked as the worst performer by Transparency International on its global Bribe Payers Index, which is based on the propensity of companies from the world's 30 leading exporting countries in bribing abroad. India has been ranked at the 30th position in the Transparency International 2006 Bribe Payers Index (BPI), with a score of 4.62. A score of 10 indicates a perception of no corruption, while zero means corruption is seen as rampant. India's major weapon supplier, Israel also ranked as one of the most bribing nation, with a score of 6.01. Israel accounted for 0.4% of global trade in 2005.
Upper castes — that is, Brahmins, Kshatriyas, and Vaishyas — constitute less than 20 per cent of the Indian population but controles the business and civil service sector of the country. They claim perhaps 80 per cent of the jobs in the new economy, in sectors such as software, biotechnology, and hotel management. The large corporates and MNCs in India prefer candidates come from the upper caste families, so that they can get their jobs done using their contacts and networks. The scores of corruption among these groups explain why they want to shut every door for the Dalits and backward communities in the name of 'Merit'.
The BPI Index results draw from the responses of more than 11,000 business people in 125 countries polled in the World Economic Forum’s Executive Opinion Survey 2006. In first place Switzerland scored 7.81 points out of a possible 10 in the BPI. Israel tied with Hong Kong with 6.01 points (Hong Kong accounted for 2.8% of global trade in 2005). The US, which accounts for the 8.9% of global trade, the highest proportion, received a score of 7.22 points. China, with 5.5% of global trade, and India, with 0.9%, closed the list.
Under BJP's rule, India became Israeli arms industry's prized market and there were also reports in 2003, of the Israeli defense establishment dispatching "scores of agents" to persuade the Indian armed forces in to buying weapons resulting in large scale bribes among civil servants and politicians. The ideological bond between Zionism and Hindutva made India as the second largest trade partner for Israel in Asia, after China. It is currently working hard with their old "Hindutva bureacrats" to make India as their "biggest trade partner". Since the advent of Hindutva's grip on the Indian elite castes, every visit by a delegation of Israeli officials either preceded or followed the cementing of ties involving the purchase of weapons, or the training and/or expansion of cooperation between Israeli armaments interests and their Indian counterparts.
In 2005, Israel has achieved a four-fold increase in the bilateral trade with India which stood at $2.4 billion. Business Week reported in 2005 that India became Israel's largest importer of weapons the previous year, accounting for about half of the $3.6 billion worth of weapons exported by that country. Not coincidentally, that year also proved to be the second best recorded year for the Israeli weapons industry, making Israel the 5th largest weapons exporter in the world and accounting for about 10 percent of the world's weapons trade. Obviously the Israeli armaments industry values India as a major new market for its weapons, and as such has much to gain from maintaining and deepening the appetite for arms by the Indian state.
The international corruption watchdog on Wednesday said overseas bribery is still common among the world's export giants despite the existence of international anti-bribery laws, while companies from emerging export powers India, China and Russia are the worst performers. Switzerland has been ranked at the top slot with a score of 7.81, followed by Sweden, Australia, Austria and Canada at the top five positions on the index. The US and UK have been ranked at 10th and sixth positions respectively.
Transparency International said that Switzerland has managed a leading score of only 7.8, which is far from perfect. This indicates there might be variations here but there are no real winners, it added.
According to the report, businesses from India, China and Russia, who are at the bottom of the index, have the most propensity to pay bribes.
This year's BPI data shows that leading exporters are undermining the development with their dirty business practices overseas, while the foreign bribery by emerging export powers is disconcertingly high.
Companies from the wealthiest countries have been ranked in the top half, but they still routinely pay bribes, particularly in developing economies, it added.
"In the case of China and other emerging export powers, efforts to strengthen domestic anti-corruption activities have failed to extend abroad," the report said.
"Bribing companies are actively undermining the best efforts of governments in developing nations to improve governance, and thereby driving the vicious cycle of poverty," said Transparency International Chairwoman Huguette Labelle.
"It is hypocritical that Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) based companies continue to bribe across the globe, while their governments pay lip-service to enforcing the law," Transparency International CEO David Nussbaum said.
"The enforcement record on international anti-bribery laws makes for short and disheartening reading," he added.
"Domestic legislation has been introduced in many countries following the adoption of the UN and OECD anti-corruption conventions, but there are still major problems of implementation and enforcement," he added.
The index has been prepared on the basis of responses of more than 11,000 business people in 125 countries polled in the World Economic Forum's Executive Opinion Survey 2006.
The watchdog said that India consistently scores worst across most regions and sub-groupings, while China is the world's fourth largest exporter and ranks second to last in the Index.
Transparency International Chairwoman said, "With growing influence comes a greater responsibility that should constitute an opportunity for good."
"This is the right time for Russia, China and India to commit to the provisions of the OECD Convention against bribery and contribute to the vitality of tomorrow's markets. In doing so they will become part of the effort to make corruption history."
Transparency International says the countries can be divided into four groups. In the first group - those whose companies are least likely to pay bribes - are Switzerland (which came top in the survey), Sweden, Australia, Austria, Canada, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, the US and Japan.
In the second group - somewhat more likely to bribe - are Singapore, Spain, the United Arab Emirates, France, Portugal and Mexico.
The third group - even more likely to bribe - are Hong Kong, Israel, Italy, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, South Africa and Malaysia.
Finally - and most likely of all to pay bribes - are Taiwan, Turkey, Russia, China and India (which came bottom in the survey).
Before countries near the top of the list start patting themselves on the back, it's worth noting that their companies often apply different standards, according to where they are doing business. "Companies from the wealthiest countries generally rank in the top half of the index, but still routinely pay bribes, particularly in developing economies," Transpency International says. It continues:
Even high scorers are in major need of improvement. The behaviour of the Australian Wheat Board in the UN oil-for-food programme is just one example.
In March of this year, German-US motor company DaimlerChrysler admitted that an internal probe confirmed allegations of "improper payments" made by their staff in Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe.
Turkey, in 27th place, is nearly at the bottom of the BPI. This is a crucial result as the country pursues its bid for European Union membership. The poor score also raises troubling questions about the country's commitment to the OECD (Organisation of for Economic Cooperation and Development) Anti-Bribery Convention, which entered into force there in 2003 ...
The United States, which blazed new trails with its Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977, ought to be leading the way, but ranks behind many OECD countries.
The United Kingdom has demonstrated minimal enforcement of the Convention, despite scandals implicating firms such as British Aerospace.
Companies often try to shrug off bribes as a way of fitting in with local customs and practices, and there is a popular notion that the recipient, not the giver, is the guilty party. Apart from the fact that such payments are often illegal, they undermine any efforts to promote good governance in developing countries. Bribes also have a corrupting effect on the firms that pay them. Often, the payments are made by local subsidiaries - allowing parent companies to pretend that their hands are clean.
Transparency International warns:
Multinationals cannot be absolved of the corrupt activities of their foreign branches, subsidiaries or agents, and they must conduct due diligence before engaging with joint venture or alliance partners. The purchasing, export, and marketing and sales departments remain the business functions most vulnerable to bribery and corruption.
It adds:
The cost of a tarnished image "back home" can be immense. And companies with a culture of bribery overseas face a heightened risk of being undermined by the unethical acts of their own employees. In the long run, it pays for companies to take proper measures to end corrupt practices.
About 150 years ago, there were no Black Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) in the US, there were no rights for Blacks and there was no cultural influence from Blacks. But now, 75 Black CEOs are working in major US companies. On the contrary, there are no Dalits as CEOs in any private company in India today.
In 1930, the IBM Company in America gave reservation to Blacks, and at present almost all business houses there are accommodating Blacks, Native Americans, and Hispanics. Since the intention of our Govt. is not to empower Dalits otherwise on similar lines how US had done for Blacks and others, Dalits can be given participation in govt. contracts and the supply-chain of different articles. After millennia of oppression, it was the British in 1932 which gave reservation through the historic Poona Pact. English and public school education in India is undoubtedly out of reach for Dalits, and this is resulting in lack of English knowledge which is blocking Dalits to take up high profile jobs.
In India, the perception is that if you are a Backward then you do not deserve anything. And the worst is that the Backward is being touted as the hurdle to the ushering in the era of competitiveness. The reservation policy is only to deceive the rest that we have been properly taking care of the Backwards. But India is absolutely clueless about what results have been achieved through the huge money allocated and the policies being pursued for the development of SC/ST/BCs over the last 50 years. According to NSSO, Census of India and NFHS-II, 37 percent of Dalits living below poverty in India while 45 percent them don't know how to Read and Write. When any insurgent or terrorist strikes, the ready answer is: "foreign hands bent upon to destabilizing our social fabric and economy". If the reservation is introduced, our industrial giants would put the blame on reservations.
The Govt. of India protected our industry from foreign direct competition. Are they not reservations? If they talk of survival on the basis of "merit" then let the Indian market be open to foreign companies.
Who is to blame for the dismal performance of PSUs or their closure? Why do we forget that "meritorious" professionals are heading most of the PSUs since their inception? Why only PSUs enjoying a monopoly in the Indian economy are doing well? In whose interests a few PSUs (even the profit-making ones) are forced to either close down or are sold to private parties at a paltry sum?
When a person born Untouchable as per the Hindu caste system is condemned to carry the cross then why is this bogey of "merit" raised constantly by the educated elite? Let us not forget that a caste-ridden society like ours hardly provides a level playing field for a large section of Indian society. A person's station in life is largely determined by birth. In such a system, there is little space for "merit" and efficiency. The recruitment practices in the private needs scrutiny. The upper castes have been enjoying unstated birth-based reservation since centuries. And extending the benefits of reservation to Backwards at any cost can only neutralize this. When can we see 17.5% IAS officers from Dalits, 27.5% from backward communities and 7.5% from tribal?
Someone who is familiar with the Indian social fabric know the age old doctrine of exclusion legitimised and sanctified by the Brahminical ideology. This upper caste elite controles the Business and Civil Service structure in India, by culminating "Bribing" as a ‘routine matter’ in India's daily life. Transparency International's BPI Index proves how this dangerous ideology of "self purity and pollution" has extended its wings to the "Globalization of Corruption."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tehelka's three rules of graft for arms-dealers.
1. If it's a bit dodgy, do it in cash.
2. If it's unethical, outsource it.
3. If its totally illegal, do it through the MOD's licensing procedure.
Download the Transparency International Report from
http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/bpi_2006
NEW DELHI: In a global recognition to the "Much Merited Upper Class Rule", India has been ranked as the worst performer by Transparency International on its global Bribe Payers Index, which is based on the propensity of companies from the world's 30 leading exporting countries in bribing abroad. India has been ranked at the 30th position in the Transparency International 2006 Bribe Payers Index (BPI), with a score of 4.62. A score of 10 indicates a perception of no corruption, while zero means corruption is seen as rampant. India's major weapon supplier, Israel also ranked as one of the most bribing nation, with a score of 6.01. Israel accounted for 0.4% of global trade in 2005.
Upper castes — that is, Brahmins, Kshatriyas, and Vaishyas — constitute less than 20 per cent of the Indian population but controles the business and civil service sector of the country. They claim perhaps 80 per cent of the jobs in the new economy, in sectors such as software, biotechnology, and hotel management. The large corporates and MNCs in India prefer candidates come from the upper caste families, so that they can get their jobs done using their contacts and networks. The scores of corruption among these groups explain why they want to shut every door for the Dalits and backward communities in the name of 'Merit'.
The BPI Index results draw from the responses of more than 11,000 business people in 125 countries polled in the World Economic Forum’s Executive Opinion Survey 2006. In first place Switzerland scored 7.81 points out of a possible 10 in the BPI. Israel tied with Hong Kong with 6.01 points (Hong Kong accounted for 2.8% of global trade in 2005). The US, which accounts for the 8.9% of global trade, the highest proportion, received a score of 7.22 points. China, with 5.5% of global trade, and India, with 0.9%, closed the list.
Under BJP's rule, India became Israeli arms industry's prized market and there were also reports in 2003, of the Israeli defense establishment dispatching "scores of agents" to persuade the Indian armed forces in to buying weapons resulting in large scale bribes among civil servants and politicians. The ideological bond between Zionism and Hindutva made India as the second largest trade partner for Israel in Asia, after China. It is currently working hard with their old "Hindutva bureacrats" to make India as their "biggest trade partner". Since the advent of Hindutva's grip on the Indian elite castes, every visit by a delegation of Israeli officials either preceded or followed the cementing of ties involving the purchase of weapons, or the training and/or expansion of cooperation between Israeli armaments interests and their Indian counterparts.
In 2005, Israel has achieved a four-fold increase in the bilateral trade with India which stood at $2.4 billion. Business Week reported in 2005 that India became Israel's largest importer of weapons the previous year, accounting for about half of the $3.6 billion worth of weapons exported by that country. Not coincidentally, that year also proved to be the second best recorded year for the Israeli weapons industry, making Israel the 5th largest weapons exporter in the world and accounting for about 10 percent of the world's weapons trade. Obviously the Israeli armaments industry values India as a major new market for its weapons, and as such has much to gain from maintaining and deepening the appetite for arms by the Indian state.
The international corruption watchdog on Wednesday said overseas bribery is still common among the world's export giants despite the existence of international anti-bribery laws, while companies from emerging export powers India, China and Russia are the worst performers. Switzerland has been ranked at the top slot with a score of 7.81, followed by Sweden, Australia, Austria and Canada at the top five positions on the index. The US and UK have been ranked at 10th and sixth positions respectively.
Transparency International said that Switzerland has managed a leading score of only 7.8, which is far from perfect. This indicates there might be variations here but there are no real winners, it added.
According to the report, businesses from India, China and Russia, who are at the bottom of the index, have the most propensity to pay bribes.
This year's BPI data shows that leading exporters are undermining the development with their dirty business practices overseas, while the foreign bribery by emerging export powers is disconcertingly high.
Companies from the wealthiest countries have been ranked in the top half, but they still routinely pay bribes, particularly in developing economies, it added.
"In the case of China and other emerging export powers, efforts to strengthen domestic anti-corruption activities have failed to extend abroad," the report said.
"Bribing companies are actively undermining the best efforts of governments in developing nations to improve governance, and thereby driving the vicious cycle of poverty," said Transparency International Chairwoman Huguette Labelle.
"It is hypocritical that Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) based companies continue to bribe across the globe, while their governments pay lip-service to enforcing the law," Transparency International CEO David Nussbaum said.
"The enforcement record on international anti-bribery laws makes for short and disheartening reading," he added.
"Domestic legislation has been introduced in many countries following the adoption of the UN and OECD anti-corruption conventions, but there are still major problems of implementation and enforcement," he added.
The index has been prepared on the basis of responses of more than 11,000 business people in 125 countries polled in the World Economic Forum's Executive Opinion Survey 2006.
The watchdog said that India consistently scores worst across most regions and sub-groupings, while China is the world's fourth largest exporter and ranks second to last in the Index.
Transparency International Chairwoman said, "With growing influence comes a greater responsibility that should constitute an opportunity for good."
"This is the right time for Russia, China and India to commit to the provisions of the OECD Convention against bribery and contribute to the vitality of tomorrow's markets. In doing so they will become part of the effort to make corruption history."
Transparency International says the countries can be divided into four groups. In the first group - those whose companies are least likely to pay bribes - are Switzerland (which came top in the survey), Sweden, Australia, Austria, Canada, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, the US and Japan.
In the second group - somewhat more likely to bribe - are Singapore, Spain, the United Arab Emirates, France, Portugal and Mexico.
The third group - even more likely to bribe - are Hong Kong, Israel, Italy, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, South Africa and Malaysia.
Finally - and most likely of all to pay bribes - are Taiwan, Turkey, Russia, China and India (which came bottom in the survey).
Before countries near the top of the list start patting themselves on the back, it's worth noting that their companies often apply different standards, according to where they are doing business. "Companies from the wealthiest countries generally rank in the top half of the index, but still routinely pay bribes, particularly in developing economies," Transpency International says. It continues:
Even high scorers are in major need of improvement. The behaviour of the Australian Wheat Board in the UN oil-for-food programme is just one example.
In March of this year, German-US motor company DaimlerChrysler admitted that an internal probe confirmed allegations of "improper payments" made by their staff in Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe.
Turkey, in 27th place, is nearly at the bottom of the BPI. This is a crucial result as the country pursues its bid for European Union membership. The poor score also raises troubling questions about the country's commitment to the OECD (Organisation of for Economic Cooperation and Development) Anti-Bribery Convention, which entered into force there in 2003 ...
The United States, which blazed new trails with its Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977, ought to be leading the way, but ranks behind many OECD countries.
The United Kingdom has demonstrated minimal enforcement of the Convention, despite scandals implicating firms such as British Aerospace.
Companies often try to shrug off bribes as a way of fitting in with local customs and practices, and there is a popular notion that the recipient, not the giver, is the guilty party. Apart from the fact that such payments are often illegal, they undermine any efforts to promote good governance in developing countries. Bribes also have a corrupting effect on the firms that pay them. Often, the payments are made by local subsidiaries - allowing parent companies to pretend that their hands are clean.
Transparency International warns:
Multinationals cannot be absolved of the corrupt activities of their foreign branches, subsidiaries or agents, and they must conduct due diligence before engaging with joint venture or alliance partners. The purchasing, export, and marketing and sales departments remain the business functions most vulnerable to bribery and corruption.
It adds:
The cost of a tarnished image "back home" can be immense. And companies with a culture of bribery overseas face a heightened risk of being undermined by the unethical acts of their own employees. In the long run, it pays for companies to take proper measures to end corrupt practices.
About 150 years ago, there were no Black Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) in the US, there were no rights for Blacks and there was no cultural influence from Blacks. But now, 75 Black CEOs are working in major US companies. On the contrary, there are no Dalits as CEOs in any private company in India today.
In 1930, the IBM Company in America gave reservation to Blacks, and at present almost all business houses there are accommodating Blacks, Native Americans, and Hispanics. Since the intention of our Govt. is not to empower Dalits otherwise on similar lines how US had done for Blacks and others, Dalits can be given participation in govt. contracts and the supply-chain of different articles. After millennia of oppression, it was the British in 1932 which gave reservation through the historic Poona Pact. English and public school education in India is undoubtedly out of reach for Dalits, and this is resulting in lack of English knowledge which is blocking Dalits to take up high profile jobs.
In India, the perception is that if you are a Backward then you do not deserve anything. And the worst is that the Backward is being touted as the hurdle to the ushering in the era of competitiveness. The reservation policy is only to deceive the rest that we have been properly taking care of the Backwards. But India is absolutely clueless about what results have been achieved through the huge money allocated and the policies being pursued for the development of SC/ST/BCs over the last 50 years. According to NSSO, Census of India and NFHS-II, 37 percent of Dalits living below poverty in India while 45 percent them don't know how to Read and Write. When any insurgent or terrorist strikes, the ready answer is: "foreign hands bent upon to destabilizing our social fabric and economy". If the reservation is introduced, our industrial giants would put the blame on reservations.
The Govt. of India protected our industry from foreign direct competition. Are they not reservations? If they talk of survival on the basis of "merit" then let the Indian market be open to foreign companies.
Who is to blame for the dismal performance of PSUs or their closure? Why do we forget that "meritorious" professionals are heading most of the PSUs since their inception? Why only PSUs enjoying a monopoly in the Indian economy are doing well? In whose interests a few PSUs (even the profit-making ones) are forced to either close down or are sold to private parties at a paltry sum?
When a person born Untouchable as per the Hindu caste system is condemned to carry the cross then why is this bogey of "merit" raised constantly by the educated elite? Let us not forget that a caste-ridden society like ours hardly provides a level playing field for a large section of Indian society. A person's station in life is largely determined by birth. In such a system, there is little space for "merit" and efficiency. The recruitment practices in the private needs scrutiny. The upper castes have been enjoying unstated birth-based reservation since centuries. And extending the benefits of reservation to Backwards at any cost can only neutralize this. When can we see 17.5% IAS officers from Dalits, 27.5% from backward communities and 7.5% from tribal?
Someone who is familiar with the Indian social fabric know the age old doctrine of exclusion legitimised and sanctified by the Brahminical ideology. This upper caste elite controles the Business and Civil Service structure in India, by culminating "Bribing" as a ‘routine matter’ in India's daily life. Transparency International's BPI Index proves how this dangerous ideology of "self purity and pollution" has extended its wings to the "Globalization of Corruption."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Tehelka's three rules of graft for arms-dealers.
1. If it's a bit dodgy, do it in cash.
2. If it's unethical, outsource it.
3. If its totally illegal, do it through the MOD's licensing procedure.
Download the Transparency International Report from
http://www.transparency.org/news_room/in_focus/bpi_2006
Saturday, September 9, 2006
India an 'all-rounder' in sex trade : UN Report
September 8, 2006
New Delhi - India has the dubious distinction of being a sort of 'all-rounder' in the sex trade. It is one of the very few countries in the globe that rank high as origin, destination as well as transit points in this murky business.
Among the others which are both major sources and destinations are Pakistan, China, Cambodia and, not surprisingly, Thailand.
This shameful fact emerges from State of the World Population 2006, a report by the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) released on Wednesday.
The report, which focuses on migration, lists trafficking as one of the greatest risks to women during the process of migration.
According to the report, though the trafficking industry's revenue is globally estimated to be about $7 billion to $ 12 billion, the traffickers probably netted an additional $32 billion from re-trafficking and from the labour of the trafficked victim.
Southeast Asia and South Asia, the report says, are home to the largest numbers of internationally trafficked persons.
In Asia, most of the trafficking takes place within or from the region, which explains why India, Pakistan China, Thailand and Cambodia double up as both destinations as well as source areas for traffickers.
India and Pakistan also serve as transit points for trafficking into the Middle East, according to the report.
Though the report does not give any precise country-wise data on trafficking, there are two different colour-coded maps showing destination countries and origin countries for trafficking.
The five Asian countries figure in the "high" or "very high" category on both counts. In most other cases, countries that are major origins - like Russia or Brazil - rank as "very low" or "medium" when it comes to being destinations.
Similarly, major destinations like the US or Japan report either low or negligible numbers of outward movement of sex workers.
Tuesday, August 22, 2006
Fraud risk higher in India: survey
Tuesday, 22 August 2006
A survey of Ernst & Young says fraud levels in India are considerably higher at 42 pc against global average of 27 pc
PTI
New Delhi: As India Inc steps up to expand in the global arena, it faces the risk of stumbling on frauds, the levels of which were far higher compared to global levels, according to international consulting firm Ernst and Young.
A survey by E&Y in emerging markets has revealed that fraud levels in India are considerably higher at 42 per cent than the global levels of 27 per cent.
“The growing focus on cross-border expansion, high levels of growth with internal processes not keeping pace and large number of new employees joining the organisation are making most companies vulnerable to greater fraud risk in recent times,” Ernst and Young national director, risk and business solutions, Sunil Chandiramani said.
The study said as many as 42 per cent of the Indian companies believe that internal collusion, corruption and bribery have skewed up fraud levels in India.
About 14 per cent of companies admitted experiencing ‘significant’ fraud in the last two years.
The survey said the actual number may be higher due to various reasons, including non-disclosure of fraud and non-discovery of significant frauds among others.
As many as 36 per cent of the responding companies considered internal collusion with third parties as the greatest fraud risk, followed by corruption and bribery, considered as a fraud threat by 29 per cent, it said, adding only 14 per cent of the respondents considered financial statement fraud as the greatest fraud risk.
Compared to 59 per cent of respondents globally, 24 per cent of in India viewed corporate security prevention and detection; corporate culture ethics; documented formal processes; legislation or raising employee awareness and training as important for determining success towards fraud prevention and detection, it said.
“Many organisations are still not considering appropriate fraud risks while designing their controls systems and procedures. Though robust internal controls remain the first line of defence against fraud, anti-fraud controls are not always integrated under an anti-fraud programme and monitored for compliance,” Chandiramani said.
A survey of Ernst & Young says fraud levels in India are considerably higher at 42 pc against global average of 27 pc
PTI
New Delhi: As India Inc steps up to expand in the global arena, it faces the risk of stumbling on frauds, the levels of which were far higher compared to global levels, according to international consulting firm Ernst and Young.
A survey by E&Y in emerging markets has revealed that fraud levels in India are considerably higher at 42 per cent than the global levels of 27 per cent.
“The growing focus on cross-border expansion, high levels of growth with internal processes not keeping pace and large number of new employees joining the organisation are making most companies vulnerable to greater fraud risk in recent times,” Ernst and Young national director, risk and business solutions, Sunil Chandiramani said.
The study said as many as 42 per cent of the Indian companies believe that internal collusion, corruption and bribery have skewed up fraud levels in India.
About 14 per cent of companies admitted experiencing ‘significant’ fraud in the last two years.
The survey said the actual number may be higher due to various reasons, including non-disclosure of fraud and non-discovery of significant frauds among others.
As many as 36 per cent of the responding companies considered internal collusion with third parties as the greatest fraud risk, followed by corruption and bribery, considered as a fraud threat by 29 per cent, it said, adding only 14 per cent of the respondents considered financial statement fraud as the greatest fraud risk.
Compared to 59 per cent of respondents globally, 24 per cent of in India viewed corporate security prevention and detection; corporate culture ethics; documented formal processes; legislation or raising employee awareness and training as important for determining success towards fraud prevention and detection, it said.
“Many organisations are still not considering appropriate fraud risks while designing their controls systems and procedures. Though robust internal controls remain the first line of defence against fraud, anti-fraud controls are not always integrated under an anti-fraud programme and monitored for compliance,” Chandiramani said.
Saturday, August 19, 2006
India has 60% of Asia’s HIV-infected
WASHINGTON, DC: A new World Bank report on HIV-AIDS prevalence and prevention could set the alarm bells ringing in India. The report, released at the 16th International AIDS Conference in Toronto, Canada, on Monday says that even though India has made considerable progress in slowing the spread of AIDS, it still has between 55 lakh and 60 lakh HIV-positive individuals accounting for nearly 60 per cent of Asia’s 1 crore infected. It also classifies the prevalence of AIDS in India as a “severe epidemic”.
The report says that, in fact, just eight states — Maharashtra, Goa, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram, Karnataka and Manipur — account for 70 per cent of all of India’s HIV cases. One of the prime reasons for the rapid spread of HIV infections is homosexuality, according to the authors of the report. Drug usage by injections and prostitution are the other main reasons for India’s high HIV prevalence, the report said.
Julian Schweitzer, director at the World Bank’s South Asian Region’s Human Development Division said, “Very little of India’s national resources are being directed to high-risk groups such as men having sex with men, drug users and female commercial sex workers.”
Co-author and epidemiologist Dr David Wilson said, “We can avert further spread of the epidemic by protecting high-risk, vulnerable groups.” He commended India for stabilising the spread of the disease, especially in Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, saying, “Some of the work initiated in Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra 15 years ago is bearing fruit. There is also an affidavit filed in one of India’s High Courts to legalise homosexuality. Once that happens, we will be able to focus our energies on this often ignored, yet high-risk group.”
Sujatha Rao, director general of the New Delhi-based National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), agreed. “The main three high-risk groups — homosexuals, drug users and commercial sex workers — are outlawed in India,” she said. “Therefore, the legal impediments are severe. We need to come upfront on these.” She added that homosexuality is a crime according to Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, and gay men are often the subject of police brutality which prevents some of the HIV-positive individuals to report the infection. “We also need to work on increasing the capacity of our NGOs on this front.”
Part of the capacity issue is money. While the World Bank has lent $380 million to India’s AIDS initiatives, the US-based Gates Foundation, led by Microsoft chairman Bill Gates is looking for the right AIDS projects in India to donate part of its $3 billion endowment it has to spend this year alone according to US law.
Wilson said that the report, while making people aware of the scale of the epidemic, also suggests that a great amount of progress has been made to reduce its spread. “We have localised epidemics, not generalised ones,” he said. “The good news is that we are facing a preventable epidemic.”
Sachin Kalbag, DNAINDIA.COM, Wednesday, August 16, 2006
The report says that, in fact, just eight states — Maharashtra, Goa, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram, Karnataka and Manipur — account for 70 per cent of all of India’s HIV cases. One of the prime reasons for the rapid spread of HIV infections is homosexuality, according to the authors of the report. Drug usage by injections and prostitution are the other main reasons for India’s high HIV prevalence, the report said.
Julian Schweitzer, director at the World Bank’s South Asian Region’s Human Development Division said, “Very little of India’s national resources are being directed to high-risk groups such as men having sex with men, drug users and female commercial sex workers.”
Co-author and epidemiologist Dr David Wilson said, “We can avert further spread of the epidemic by protecting high-risk, vulnerable groups.” He commended India for stabilising the spread of the disease, especially in Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, saying, “Some of the work initiated in Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra 15 years ago is bearing fruit. There is also an affidavit filed in one of India’s High Courts to legalise homosexuality. Once that happens, we will be able to focus our energies on this often ignored, yet high-risk group.”
Sujatha Rao, director general of the New Delhi-based National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO), agreed. “The main three high-risk groups — homosexuals, drug users and commercial sex workers — are outlawed in India,” she said. “Therefore, the legal impediments are severe. We need to come upfront on these.” She added that homosexuality is a crime according to Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code, and gay men are often the subject of police brutality which prevents some of the HIV-positive individuals to report the infection. “We also need to work on increasing the capacity of our NGOs on this front.”
Part of the capacity issue is money. While the World Bank has lent $380 million to India’s AIDS initiatives, the US-based Gates Foundation, led by Microsoft chairman Bill Gates is looking for the right AIDS projects in India to donate part of its $3 billion endowment it has to spend this year alone according to US law.
Wilson said that the report, while making people aware of the scale of the epidemic, also suggests that a great amount of progress has been made to reduce its spread. “We have localised epidemics, not generalised ones,” he said. “The good news is that we are facing a preventable epidemic.”
Sachin Kalbag, DNAINDIA.COM, Wednesday, August 16, 2006
Thursday, August 17, 2006
213 million Indians will be unemployed by 2020
NEW DELHI (IANS) August 16,2006
A national report on the employment situation in India has warned that nearly 30 percent of the country’s 716 million-strong workforce will be without jobs by 2020.
The report prepared by the recruitment agency TeamLease Services said that the shortage of employment in India can trigger many social security problems as the bulk of the unemployed - 85 to 90 per cent - will be in the age group of 15-29.
The study titled India Labour Report presents the shortage of jobs as the flip side to the much-touted young workforce in the country. It said 213 million Indian without jobs would be a huge task for the government to manage.
It said the quality of those employed in the future is not very encouraging as only 88 million will be graduates, while another 76 million will have passed their senior secondary level.
The bulging population and the expanding workforce will require about 15 million new jobs every year, against the 10 million new jobs being projected by the government.
The scarcity of job opportunities in the organised sector is likely to create a major shift towards the unorganised sector, which is already expanding and absorbing additional workforce.
Of India's 402 million-strong workforce, only about 7 per cent is in the organised sector.
The unorganised sector is absorbing more labour and has improved upon its '80s pace of 29.62 per cent growth to 30.29 per cent in the '90s.
The organised sector, which is under the purview of labour laws, remains more rigid than the unorganised sector, which remains outside the reach of most labour laws.
The report estimates the annual financial "damage" to the exchequer due to the unorganised sector's leakages in terms of tax revenues at 32 per cent of the total manufacturing sector GDP at Rs 162,000 crore (Rs 1620 billion).
"Unfortunately, labour legislation has been hijacked by a small minority of organised labour," says Manish Sabharwal, chairman, TeamLease Services. The report lays stress on reducing unnecessary state intervention and over-legislation in the field of labour.
A national report on the employment situation in India has warned that nearly 30 percent of the country’s 716 million-strong workforce will be without jobs by 2020.
The report prepared by the recruitment agency TeamLease Services said that the shortage of employment in India can trigger many social security problems as the bulk of the unemployed - 85 to 90 per cent - will be in the age group of 15-29.
The study titled India Labour Report presents the shortage of jobs as the flip side to the much-touted young workforce in the country. It said 213 million Indian without jobs would be a huge task for the government to manage.
It said the quality of those employed in the future is not very encouraging as only 88 million will be graduates, while another 76 million will have passed their senior secondary level.
The bulging population and the expanding workforce will require about 15 million new jobs every year, against the 10 million new jobs being projected by the government.
The scarcity of job opportunities in the organised sector is likely to create a major shift towards the unorganised sector, which is already expanding and absorbing additional workforce.
Of India's 402 million-strong workforce, only about 7 per cent is in the organised sector.
The unorganised sector is absorbing more labour and has improved upon its '80s pace of 29.62 per cent growth to 30.29 per cent in the '90s.
The organised sector, which is under the purview of labour laws, remains more rigid than the unorganised sector, which remains outside the reach of most labour laws.
The report estimates the annual financial "damage" to the exchequer due to the unorganised sector's leakages in terms of tax revenues at 32 per cent of the total manufacturing sector GDP at Rs 162,000 crore (Rs 1620 billion).
"Unfortunately, labour legislation has been hijacked by a small minority of organised labour," says Manish Sabharwal, chairman, TeamLease Services. The report lays stress on reducing unnecessary state intervention and over-legislation in the field of labour.
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