India, World, Non Aligned Movement (NAM) and its Significance in the Current Scenario

The ideologies of Nehruvian idealism are wondering with the non-aligned movement. He believed  that cooperation  and  mutual assistance  are possible in the international relations and he hold such a great  uniqueness of Panchsheel, it coupled  a situation in which  Indian  foreign  policy was formed  on the pillars of hopes and aspirations with the edges of cooperation as its fuel. The conflicting world situation after the world war made an arena of cold war and power blocks on the basis of conflicting ideologies and it prevailed a situation that both the power blocks wanted to add the newly emerged nations to their stocks.

Pic courtesy : peopleint.wordpress.com

Non align movement can be considered  as a vigor of India to pertain with cooperation rather than mutual  aggression,  she wanted to be the part of solutions for increasing problems  of the third world, thus she adopted  the policies of non-alignment with an embankment  that India won't  be the part  of power blocks and she believed  that power blocks are huge curses to entire community  because  it can plank a new war at any time. Thus the policy of India  concerned  with non-alignment  has a uniqueness  that it was well oriented with the sagas of planning as well as social commitments , India got freedom  and the drain  prevailed in the colonial era made India more poor and being the part of power politics  will  be a huge bottleneck for her development. Thus the adopted ways had the notion that India can have good engagements with both the power blocks and earn benefits from both of them.

Pic courtesy : www.flickr.com

Thus the policy pertained by India gained a lot of concurrence due to its pragmatism that India earned benefits from both of the powers and at the same time she had a lean to the USSR. The Indian foreign policy heard a lot of views that it is an aloofness from the international order and is like sitting on the fence. The policies  adopted  by her was not neutral or immoral because she adopted  the ways to deviate from the power blocks  and not from the international community and it can be seen that, in a lot  of situations  in which,  India  played  critical roles and she is very  active  with the international  order concerning third world.

Pic courtesy : www.stratfor.com

The collapse of Soviet Union made the notion of NAM in a special direction that the power blocks got ended and the bi-polar world order was shifted to the unilateral principles and due to Indian foreign policy in the past, it made India in the pillars of eroded segment. Thus the power politics ended and certain scholars believed that the relevance of NAM is over with the paramount notion of America. 

Pic courtesy : www.slideshare.net

The relevance of NAM will persist till there exists a situation in which poverty triumph, war exists, and such problems in the world arena persist. Thus the notion  of Non align movement  will not be shifted  to just power politics , it have a wide connotations  due to the increasing hurdles  of the world  arena and it can play a crucial  role  with that. The changed world order made the NAM to face various types of interference  that these days changed with the sagas of terrorism,  trans national  crimes,  fusion  of multinational corporations, cyber-crimes etc. coupled that  NAM will have to face  all of these rather than  just traditional anticipations.

Pic courtesy : globalhistorycullen.wikispaces.com

What is the relevance of NAM in the world of multi polarity? These  days have a significance  that  the  main player of it is currently a giant in economic as well  as military  ways and had a shift in the policies  of her from traditional  ways to  more concentrated ways on the bilateral  relations  with America with a happy ends for both and the NAM have  a special role in this scenario because, it can play a major  role in the world  of multiple choices of power.

Pic courtesy : voiceof.india.com

How much significant is NAM for world peace and mutual growth?

How India can play role of true world leader as the largest democracy of the world?

(Written by Vineeth V, an IPS aspirant pursuing graduation in Political Science at Trivandrum,Kerala)

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A Detailed Overview on Need of Reforms in Agriculture Education for Entrepreneurship Development !

“Education is the manifestation of the perfection already existing in man”

Pic courtesy : indianexpress.com

Education in present context largely aims at meeting global standard and making the student competent enough to face the challenges of global market. Education system in India has witnessed a substantial change in due course of time. In this era of globalization education is viewed as an instrument to develop cognitive qualities, tolerance and understanding of people, it should prepare younger generation to understand and face the realities of globalization. (Kulshestra, A.K. and Pandey, K. 2013)

Pic courtesy : capitalmind.in

Agriculture is the main source of livelihood for over 80% rural poor in India. It employs about 52% of the labour force and contributes 14.4% to GDP and 10.23% of all exports. India achieved a spectacular growth rate in agriculture sector since 1966. Today India is self sufficient in most of the food grain despite of the population increase. The food grain production increased from 51 million tons in 1950 to about 245 million tons in 2011-12. All these revolutions have brought prosperity for many farmers. Many factors are responsible for this achievement and one of them is agriculture universities. Researches that were carried out by these universities, Agriculture graduates and scientists of the universities contributed significantly in bringing green revolution in the country. G.B. Pant University of Agriculture & Technology was the first Agricultural University, in our country, established in the year 1960 and it is called harbinger of green revolution. It was set up with the vision where agriculture could be studied in a scientific way.

Pic courtesy : indianagriculture.info

At present there are 56 SAUs, five Deemed agriculture universities, one central agricultural university and four central universities with agriculture faculty. All these educational institutions are funded by ICAR, New Delhi. These institutions were established to produce confident and self motivated professionals that could generate employment not only for themselves but also for rural masses in field of agriculture. Agriculture universities impart education in various disciplines viz: agriculture, agriculture engineering, horticulture, forestry, veterinary and animal husbandry, dairy science, food tech, fisheries science, agribusiness management etc.

Recent data shows that over 11,900 graduates from agriculture and allied sector pass out every year. However only 2000 are able to find job in public and private sector, thus a reservoir of around 9,900 students are available for supporting the agriculture production process if viable business opportunities are available to them. But almost every graduate looks for a white-collar job preferably in public sector. Job opportunities in government sector are shrinking faster than the number of graduates coming out of educational institutions. According to an estimate (IAMR, 2001), 43% of the graduates and 23% of postgraduates (M.Sc.) find difficulty in accessing gainful employment.

One of the reasons for graduates’ unemployment seems to be lack of adaptability between graduates abilities and skills needed by labor and productive units (Shahbazi and Alibeigi, 2007). Lack of entrepreneurship skills among the agricultural students and graduates is another reason for unemployment in developing countries (Sabouhi, 2000). According to Zamani (2001), poor practical abilities of agricultural graduates, irrelevancy of university subjects and curricula with labor market needs, governmental limitations about providing opportunities of employment for agriculture graduates are some of the reason behind the deterioration of quality of agricultural education. As a result; it is becoming increasingly difficult for agricultural graduates to find jobs in the public sector. Consequently, graduates need to find employment in the private sector or be self-employed (Movahedi et al., 2011).

The future of agriculture relies on agriculture graduates. There is immediate need to assure the quality of agriculture education. Addressing the 11^th Agriculture Science Congress at Bhubaneswar, Dr. S. Ayappan, Director General of ICAR, had emphasized on the importance of innovation and entrepreneurship in agriculture that has potential to make agriculture more attractive as career option to agriculture graduates. But the question arises here is that how these students can be made competent and skillful. So, that they can take entrepreneurship as their career option. These qualities can be inculcated in the students through the sincere efforts of the educators and by changing the curriculum and pattern of agricultural education.

Entrepreneurship as a solution

The development of any nation depends primarily on the important role played by entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship on small scale is the only solution to the problems of unemployment, proper utilization of both human and non-human resources and improving the living conditions of the poor masses. During the last three decades, many countries of the world have experienced the need for entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship development has been accepted as a strategy to achieve the twin objectives of promotion of entrepreneurship, particularly among the educated unemployed youth and also for rapid industrialization of the economy (Mali, 2000).

Pic courtesy : slideshare.net

If young people cannot secure employment and fall into long-term unemployment, they can suffer from a range of problems such as low self-esteem, diminished levels of wellbeing and isolation from peers. Entrepreneurship is seen as powerful tool to overcome the psychological impacts of long-term unemployment among youth. (Macaulay 2007).

In a country like India with vast population directly dependent on agriculture as their primary occupation, agricultural entrepreneurship paves a way towards enormous opportunity of youth involvement in economically sustainable livelihood options. Moreover, agricultural development is an important foundation for the economic development of any country and the agricultural sector is undoubtedly the prime area of concentration for economic progress. Today, entrepreneurship programs have extended to the secondary and primary levels of education and it has become the focus of discussion among many scholars.  They believe that the introduction of entrepreneurship programs to the children should be at the lower level of education. It would enhance children’s attributes and further develop awareness of entrepreneurial opportunities and skills to form entrepreneurial venture.  It was also argued and discussed that the introduction of entrepreneurship program to preschool years is a crucial stage of the children cognitive and personality development imperative to entrepreneurial development.

The world needs graduates who are innovative, dynamic, smart, daring, efficient, determined, modern and employable or in one word, entrepreneurial. Making graduates more employable is a global challenge and universities around the world are putting more emphasis to generate entrepreneurial capabilities in students. But still a proper strategy and database lacks in context of employment generation through entrepreneurship.

Agriculture, agro-industry and agri-business are identified as prime sector to provide high employment to youth (Planning Commission, 2004). In the past years, there has been a growing interest in undertaking and intensifying actions promoting and supporting the idea of entrepreneurship as an attractive alternative to employment among students. So government and ICAR also took initiatives to make Agriculture education more competitive and promote agricultural graduates to take entrepreneurship as future venture. Hence, several efforts have been initiated to promote entrepreneurship among students. These are:

a) Agri-Clinics and Agri-Business Centers: Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India, in association with NABARD launched Agri-Clinics and Agri-Business Centers in the year 2002 for providing expert advice to farmers and employment to agriculture graduates. The multi-disciplinary expertise available within the group of young entrepreneurs was expected to help them to serve farm families in a holistic manner. Agri-clinics are envisaged to provide expert services and advice to farmers on cropping practices, technology, dissemination, crop protection from pests and diseases, market trends and prices of various crops in the market, etc. Agri-business centers provide input supply, farm equipments on hire and other services. Under the scheme, unemployed agricultural graduates are provided training at designated training centers and successful candidates can later apply for loans to start their agri-clinics and business centers in any specified venture. The loan repayment period can vary between five to ten years depending on the activities.

b) Agricultural Experiential Learning Programme (AELP): ICAR has recommended a new initiative called “Agricultural Experiential Learning Programme” in the recently revised curriculum for the B.Sc. (Ag.) degree programme, which came for implementation from the academic year 2007-08. The primary aim of this initiative is to remove the weaknesses in the earlier higher agricultural education system and to develop a cadre of skilled professionals who can create their own enterprises. ICAR has supported the establishment of 351 Experiential Learning units. The vast network of agricultural universities and colleges can play a leading role in cultivating self-confidence and capabilities in the students required for taking up agriculture as a profession.

c) Revision of Course Curriculum by IV Deans’ Committee: A major exercise was undertaken for the first time for post-graduate course curricula and syllabi in 95 subjects of agriculture and allied sciences and the revised curricula and syllabi implemented in all agricultural universities. A radical change in the existing course curricula by infusing more entrepreneurship development and agribusiness, management related courses and practice sessions to apply the knowledge. The revised under-graduate course curricula as recommended by the IV Deans’ Committee constituted by the ICAR has also been adopted from academic session 2007-08 by all the agricultural universities across the country. This is greatly helping in making higher agricultural education more utilitarian and relevant in tune with the scientific and technological advancements and the demands of the country’s growing economy.

d) Rural Entrepreneurship and Awareness Development Yojana (READY): Rural Entrepreneurship and Awareness Development Yojana (READY) has been proposed in the XII Five-Year Plan. This programme has three components i.e. experiential learning programme (ELP), Rural Agricultural Work Experience (RAWE) and in-plant training. Main objectives of this programme are to promote professional skills, entrepreneurship and marketing skills and knowledge through grass root experiences among the youth for development in rural and allied sectors. This programme will help them acquire management capabilities for development of project and its execution. Aim of this programme is to make students ready with grass root level experience and entrepreneurial skills.

Pic courtesy : techcombo.in

It is expected that such efforts will bring professionalism and practical work experience in real life situations to students. In order to bring in high quality entrepreneurship skills and commercialization of technologies, Agri enterprises have to be established and run by the students But majority of agricultural graduates still don’t want to go for Agri entrepreneurship. So, the need of the hour is to equip agriculture graduates with confidence and potential to emerge as agricultural entrepreneurs. This is possible only if agriculture graduates realize agriculture as a potential profession and get skillful to take agriculture as a potential business opportunity. These qualities can be inculcated in the students through the sincere efforts of the educators.

Pic courtesy : wikipedia.org

Educational Technology inculcating entrepreneurial and innovative behavior in University students through quality teaching

ICAR have initiated a project under which Educational Technology Cell are established in different SAUs. Although it is functional with different name in different agricultural universities but its main purpose is to modify instruction centric university to learner centric university. It is only possible when the faculty members are capable enough to address the requirement of the day ie; creating true learning situation in the classroom. The purpose behind Educational Technology Cell is to up-bring trained and committed educators in agriculture who have a vision of excellence in teaching with versatile pedagogical approaches that can produce more skillful and confident entrepreneurs.

Educational Technology Cell of GBPUA&T, Pantnagar: Functional units for quality education

The University has successfully initiated a dedicated unit to exclusively look into capacity building of university teachers and students around Educational Technology and Teaching Skills. The unit is running in the department of Agricultural Communication of College of Agriculture of the University, which is serving the University teachers nation-wide. Pantnagar has initiated short and long-term trainings of University Teachers to orient learning of students towards analysis and application of prevailing knowledge. Educational Technology Cell at Pantnagar brings stalwarts of Agricultural Education from across the country to mentor the participants of training programmes. These trainings have proved as an effective means for improving the capacity of university teachers in content management, inculcating versatile teaching methods in class room, integrating latest apps in classroom teaching, problem-based learning, project-based learning, self-assessment etc. Outcome of these efforts have been significant. Educational Technology Cell is also making continuous efforts for enhancement of employability and soft skills as well as learning behavior of University students. As a result the students are becoming capable enough to meet the global standards and competitive for the world market. ET Cell helps in cultivation of intelligence with dynamic equilibrium of scientific education and employability skills in students.

Pic courtesy : thehindu.com

Conclusion:

The future of agriculture relies on agriculture graduates and there is immense scope for them to be agriculture entrepreneur. These entrepreneurial qualities can be inculcated in the students through the sincere efforts of educators and by transforming agriculture curriculum according to current need. Educational Technology Cell has emerged as a platform that links agricultural education with entrepreneurship development.

What do you think about Indian agriculture educational and administrative systems? What reforms should happen for making it better and competent enough on the world level?

(Written by G.K. Arpana and Vibha Jantwal, pursuing M.Sc. at Department of Agricultural Communication, College of Agriculture GBPUA&T, Pantnagar, Uttarakhand)

References:

Kulshrestha, A.K and Pandey, K. (2013). Teachers training and professional competencies. Voice of Research, 1(4), 29-33.

Macaulay, F. 2007. Youth microenterprise and livelihoods: State of the field. In conference on Global Youth Microenterprise, Washington D. C. pp. 11-12.

Mali, D.D., 2000, Entrepreneurship through microfinance in North East India: A comprehensive review of existing literature. Information Management & Business Review. 4(4):168-184.

Movahedi R, Saadi H, Yaghoubi Farani A. 2011. Creating linkages between the labor market and agricultural higher education in Iran Strategies and mechanisms for partnership. Industry and higher education, 25(4): 307-317.

Sabouhi F. 2000. Surveying and analysis of unemployment reasons between graduates in Higher Education. Proceeding of need assessment projects on skilful human resources, institute of research and planning of higher education publishers, Tehran, Iran.

Shahbazi E, Ali-beigi A. 2006. The Required Competencies of Agricultural Graduates for Entering Job Market. Agricultural Extension and Education Science Journal, 2(1): 14-24.

Zamani GH. 2001. Knowledge and technology transfer, a case study: linkage between college and agriculture of Shiraz University and extension service in Fars province. Journal of Science and Technology of Agriculture and Natural Resources, 4(4): 57-65.

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Government of India Convenes All Party Meet on UPSC Civil Services CSAT Exam Issue !!

According to the latest release from Press Information Bureau (PIB), the Government today discussed the issues concerning the Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) with leaders of various parties in both the Houses of Parliament. The meeting was convened by the Parliamentary Affairs Minister Shri M.Venkaiah Naidu in pursuance of the assurance given by the Government during the last Budget session of Parliament. Home Minister Shri Rajnath Singh and Finance Minister Shri Arun Jaitely, Minister of State in PMO Dr.Jitendra Singh, Ministers of State for Parliamentary Affairs –Shri Rajiv Pratap Rudy and Shri Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi besides leaders of 26 parties represented in both the Houses of Parliament.

Shri Rajnath Singh and Shri Venkaiah Naidu said that the CSAT issue is a sensitive one and the Government would like to have the benefit of considered views of all parties.

A detailed presentation was made by Secretary (DoPT) on the origin and evolution of the civil services examination over the years being conducted every year by the Union Public Services Commission. Dr.Jitendra Singh sought the views of different parties on five proposals. This followed expression of views by leaders of various parties, who said they need to consult their party colleagues in the sensitive matter.

Shri M.Venkaiah Naidu informed the leaders that they will be circulated a detailed note in the matter in three days and suggested that may furnish their views in two weeks on the following five issues:

1. On continuation of English Language Comprehension Skills in Paper – II
2. Reduced weightage of analytical component
3.To make Paper-II qualifying
4. Revert back to Optional Paper
5. Any other alternative. Bottom of Form

Several leaders complimented the Government for its approach in the sensitive matter.

Let’s hope for the best outcome from this consultation among the different political parties of the India. We hope that this approach would solve all the problems in a positive way for the benefits of the larger mass logically at the same time maintaining the great legacy of UPSC Civil Services Exam.

What are your view/suggestions for the above mentioned 5 points?

( Official release from PIB )

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Prerequisites are Needed for a Strong and Acting Lokpal and for a Real Corruption-Free India !

I remember, once the Principal of my Secondary school said, लोकतंत्र मूर्खों का शासन है, अगर कुल सौ लोगों में ५१ मुर्ख हों तो वो ४९ बुद्धिमानों पर शासन करेंगे. 

This line has great philosophy hidden in it. Now coming back to lokpal, the main issue I would like to go is the root cause of corruption and then some constitutional reforms needed before establishment of Lokpal. After 1991, then FM and Ex-PM Dr. Manmohan Singh with full support from P V Narsimha Rao initialized liberalization. Government despite of doing business and production by itself started as a supporting hand to private firms. Government promoted them by helping in Land acquisition, power and other prerequisites to start a business. The idea was a hit then and our economy was booming and businesses were on a high. Getting full support from the government in establishing a certain business they only had to pay taxes to the government. Now the money that would have gone for spending in social and welfare policies, education of illiterate and upliftment of poor went to businessmen. They multiplied it by many folds in by expanding more and getting full support from the government. It created Jobs for middle class but money went to only a certain number of people. The gap was also increasing many folds and in proportionate with the growth rate now the money power enabled them to distort policies in their favor and political parties started getting funds from them. The policies were made to favor them, rich became richer and richer and poor became poorer.  

The cost of fighting an election and to survive in case of winning or losing was also increased tremendously. This started at management level of political party now for smaller members MLAs or MPs who is less known or doesn't hold any ministerial berth forced local traders, contractors and government agencies to fund them if they want to survive in business. It has penetrated to some very basic policies like Indira Awas Yojana, Swarna Jayanti Gram Swarojgaar Yojana, and MNREGA. Now poor who want to avail these facilities provided by government have to pay babus some percentage of money. If they refused to pay or don’t pay they have never been benefited by the policy.

Pic courtesy : Thehindu.com

This act of giving bribes which started from the top reached to blocks and panchayats and to maximum government policies and schemes which were made to alleviate poverty has failed to do anything. The irony is that people pay money to Mukhiya for getting an Indira Awaas, who was elected by the People only.

Now going back I would like to mention 3 points raised by Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar, mastermind behind our constitution. These points are the possible dangers to the democracy, first social and economic inequality, second the use of unconstitutional method and third hero worship. As first point is explained earlier I will jump to second one “when there was no way left for the constitutional methods for achieving economic and social objectives there was a great deal of justification for unconstitutional methods, but using them since that period was nothing less than anarchy, the sooner they are abandoned the better for us as a nation”. But he did not visualize the transition of power from freedom fighters to loyal or puppets, transition of power from national representatives to regional representatives as well as representatives from certain caste and certain religion. If such a thing happens then what people should do was not explained. If the power is trapped by few where should people go was not said. If we have candidates to be elected not competent enough than what should we do was not explained. If good and competent candidates do not have enough money to fight election then what should people do was not explained.

Pic courtesy : trak.in

His third point was his concern about “Hero worship”. He believed that “there is no harm in being grateful to a great man who has rendered lifelong services to the country, but there are limits to greatness. No man can be grateful at the cost of his honor and no nation can be grateful at the cost of its liberty”. He went on to add bhakti or hero worship in religion may be a road to salvation of soul but in politics bhakti or hero worship is a sure road to degradation and to eventual dictatorship. This has also happened in our great country.

Now by the ways suggested by Dr Ambedkar which is being said as constitutional ways, our voice could be heard. Land is acquired for industrial purpose but still Land Acquisition bill has not been passed after 20 years of Liberalisation.When everything under the Sun is being done by unconstitutional methods, how can we look towards Constitution expecting some change.

Pic courtesy : Indianexpress.com

As every policy is reviewed after a certain fixed term, every law should also be reviewed after a certain fixed time so that the loopholes that appeared in those years can be handled for effective governance. People find loopholes in many laws and enjoy the liberty on the basis of that; we need to fix those loopholes.

Pic courtesy : 20twentytwo.blogspot.com

There are certain reforms required and a debate must start on the whole election activity. How to restrict corrupt and incompetent people from reaching Parliament and to ensure that only capable hands are involved .Government should provide money to a candidate to fight elections. By these reforms we must ensure that best people should be elected to Parliament, and then only we can see effective implementation of government policies. Until then I don’t see Lokpal as a success.

Pic courtesy : iop.harvard.edu

What is your view on Lokpal? How corruption can be removed more effectively from each and every level in India?

How a normal citizen of India can contribute for making India fully corruption-free?

(Written by Bibhu Mishra, an alumnus of NIRD (National Institute of Rural Development), Hyderabad and currently working as a Project Coordinator at ICICI Rural Self Employment Training Institute,Jodhpur)

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India and Women Sterilization : Pathetic Condition of Government Medical Set-Up !!

Sumati Devi knew before she arrived at the grimy government clinic in northern India that she would be paid to be sterilized.

She didn't know that she would lie on an operating table with bloody sheets, that the scalpel used to open her up would be stained with rust or that she was supposed to first get counseling on other birth-control methods before giving consent to have her fallopian tubes cut and tied.

Pic courtesy : blogs.wsj.com

The main reason Devi had agreed to be sterilized at all was because the $10 she received -- equivalent to about a week’s wages for a poor family -- would help feed her three children.

“I did it out of desperation,” said Devi, 25, as she lay on the concrete floor recuperating at the clinic in the state of Bihar. “We’re so poor, we need the money. Health officials came to our home. They told us it would be best.”

Relatives mourning death of a relative

The incident cited in this Bloomberg article (published in June 2013) is just one horrific instance of what generally is a government sponsored program to lure economically backward Indians – mainly females, towards surgical sterilization. This trend exists despite global agreement on preferring modern and non-surgical methods of promoting demography and population control.

Last week, 12 women died and over 50 have been hospitalized with over 25 reported to be critical following surgery for laparoscopic tubectomy at a government-run camp in the Bilaspur district of Chattisgarh. Four health officials have been suspended and the Director of Health Services has been transferred. Incoming reports suggest a single doctor with his staff performed 83 operations in 5 hours!  Please note that Tubectomy is a full surgical procedure where the belly is cut open. It takes about 1.5 hours to sterilize the equipment after each procedure. The equipment used in this particular case was rusted even before first woman was operated upon on that day.

All of the 83 surgeries performed that day resulted into varying degrees of infections.

Under established guidelines, a doctor can’t perform more than 10 tubectomy surgeries in one day. Reportedly Dr R. K. Gupta performed 83. This clear breach of law was then topped by distributing rat poison infested anti-biotics to camped women.

Sterilization Camps are often under resourced

Media lapped up this story since the number of deaths were ‘unusual’. Deaths of one off patients while undergoing tubectomy procedure has never raised any enquiring eyebrows in our country. Message is simple, even if stark in its apathy – as long as you are able to meet the target numbers; one or two deaths here and there shouldn’t bother us. These sterilization programs are often driven top-down where doctors are under pressure to meet the target number of surgeries. So even this incident involving 83 women will find itself unable to start any grass root change and which can bring a paradigm shift in how women make informed choice about their lives and health. A shift that India has already claimed to have achieved back in 2012 by the way, on a global forum none the less.

Pic courtesy : www.ryot.org

Instances of such deaths caused by the callousness brought upon unsuspecting rural households – women to be more precise, have been aptly termed as medical homicide by Dr. Binayak Sen. But this will be one of the rare types of homicides which is state approved.

R K Gupta, who performed the fated surgeries, has been summarily dismissed from the job. He was earlier awarded by state government on 26^th January this year for performing record 50,000 tubectomies so far.

The antibiotics Ciprocin that were handed out to women attending sterilization camp were found to contain chemicals used for rat poison. The state government said it had seized 200,000 tablets of ‘Ciprocin 500’ and over 4 million other tablets manufactured by Mahawar Pharma. Let’s put that into perspective. There were 2 lacs tablets containing rat poison which were ‘already manufactured’ and ready to go to the market. This was medical holocaust in making. We don’t know how many other such shady pharma companies are manufacturing life-threatening medicines in the name of generic and affordable drugs.

The drug manufacturing company which is in the eye of storm, Mahawar Pharmacuticals, was banned by state government 2 years ago for selling ‘duplicate generic drugs’. It has a factory in a residential area of Raipur which doesn’t even bear a signboard. Yet the government continued to buy medicines from it.

It is easier to get lost in a debate of fixing personal accountability. But the issue at hand has much larger contours and firm tentacles in the corridors of power.

Women go under scalpel in torrid conditions in shockingly under resourced hospitals where surgeries are often performed by rogue practitioners. These practitioners see each patient as another step toward meeting the target prescribed by higher authorities. Root of this practice could be found in a 1952 announcement that was seen as an effective tool to ward off hunger related misery in India. It found further heft and became more overt during Indira era of 1970, when press was subjugated and constitution briefly suspended. ‘Forced’ surgeries might have waned in the decades since, but a factor of coercion is still present in almost all rural parts of the country. Women from poor households are lured for a paltry sum of INR 1400 – barely enough to support their families for a week, and are herded into shamble of a facility called hospital where they are operated in unsafe conditions in the name of population control.

Pic courtesy : thebreakthrough.org

A glowing irony then, is the fact that, despite such inhumane and coercive initiatives pursued by almost all governments since freedom, India has missed every target it set for population control. India will eclipse China by 2021 in population with the current rate.

So this method solves no one’s problems except for those looking to meet the ‘target’ numbers.

India sterilizes more woman surgically than any other country in the world - accounting for over 37% total such surgeries performed last year globally. Of 5 million sterilizations performed last year, 96% were performed on Women. Only 4% of total surgeries were performed on men.  This despite the fact that surgeries on men is relatively safer to perform.

Are even Indian medical practices sexist?

As an attempt to project a global image which is progressive and modern – India has boasted the paradigm shift in the way medical infrastructure has been revamped to cater remotest corners of the country. Infrastructure has indeed improved in past decades, but the medical services that are supposed to use this infrastructure to take the medical care to last mile have simply been stranded. Lack of any long term planning has ensured that women are not educated about other choices for birth control which is much safer compared to surgical procedure. Educating women and ensuring a constant flow of birth control pills and devices through state managed public distribution system has been deemed ‘expensive’ way of ensuring population control and so we have opted for cheaper and easier option of performing sterilization – Tubectomy.

These camps could be molded into the harbinger of medical portal – taking awareness and medical facilities to the door step of poorest of families. But in reality the doctors at these camps are mostly constrained by resources and are assigned untenable and unethical targets. Camps themselves are filled beyond capacity and often surgeries are performed while women lay in a queue on floor – separated by no more than an arm’s length. Surgical equipment are rusted and never cleaned up between two surgeries. Medicines are bought from dealers and manufacturers who hardly meet any regulatory standard for safety.

Pic courtesy : www.businessweek.com

So some of the pertinent questions for the state and union functionaries are looming large. Will they choose to see and act on these or will the questions be brushed under the carpet till we start to discuss yet another birth control camp mishap in another part of the country -where victims are almost sure to have a predictable profile. A young woman who comes from the poor household, who knows nothing better than risking her life for a remuneration that will support her family for a few days. And who hasn’t been informed about the alternate choices of birth control by medical staff that doesn’t have anything apart from rust induced surgical equipment waiting for her.

What is your view on medical facilities in government hospitals throughout the country? How it can be improved effectively?

Is sterilization is the best way for population control? What are your suggestions?

What do you think about prevailing imbalance in male sterilization vs. female sterilization?

(Written by Manish Jha, an Alumnus of IIIT Hyderabad and currently working with Microsoft as Program Manager. He is also associated with a social initiative 'Joy of Reading')

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