Decentralisation
Fight Against Poverty 

NOBEL Laureate Amartya Sen wrote long back hypothesising that the famines and starvations do not occur in a democratic and independent country where free press is guaranteed. However, this has not always been the case in the South Asian countries, including Nepal, where free press functions. The role of press has been more or less found to be reactive, not proactive. And the governments seldom pay heed to the issues raised in the press, nor do views propagated in the mass media jolt the attention of the responsible authorities. Let us take the case of India first.

The independent mainstream media in India is now awash with stories relating to starvation deaths in Orissa. The issue has been discussed widely and government is blamed summarily for the poor state of the affairs only after the deaths did occur in Kashipur village of the Orissa state. The starvation death issue was taken to the Supreme Court of India reputed world wide for the seminal role it has played in upholding the socioeconomic rights of the people. The apex court censured the government -both centre and state-for failing to provide food to starving millions despite a sixty million tonne surplus of food grains rotting in godowns countrywide. Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee is reported to have remarked that democracy and hunger cannot to together. A hungry stomach questions and ensures the system’s failures to meet what is a basic biological need of every human being. There can be no place for hunger and poverty in a modern world in which science and technology have created conditions for abundance and equitable development.

Despite the fact that the government and its leaders at the helm are committed to alleviate poverty and end hunger, this is not happening in India. The reasons cited in the media for the poor results in the direction are callousness, corruption and apathy resulted from centralisation and bureaucratisation. Food corporation of India is a central government undertaking doing the job. Moreover, the government agencies are responsible for identifying people below poverty line and issuing cards entitling them benefits provided through targeted public distribution system. The target group is not identified properly leading ultimately to mismanagement of the resources.

Decentralised management and distribution of food grains has been suggested as a measure for correcting the distortions. In India there are three hundred fifty thousand Gram Panchayats-elected local government entitites at the village level. These Panchayats can be mandated to maintain good grains storage and also be properly mobilised for identification of the poorest of the poor in the communities. Local government institutions are in a vantage position to identity the poor and local people have easy access to them. In some states like West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh decentralised procurement of food grains has been started and it is giving good results. In Madhya Pradesh state of India a grassroot based solution has been devised for solving the problem. According to an article contributed by Gurucharan Dan in the Time’s of India recently, the democratic grassroot based solution has worked well. When a food for work programme is announced, all village adults assemble together, and vote for an asset they want to create in the village-a water tank, a school building or a road. Those who want to work in exchange for food come forward in the assembly. Although the Gram Panchayat executes the poverty project, the Gram sabha meets to ratify the Panchayat’s accounts. The incidence of corruption and mismanagement has declined substantially.

Let us take the case of our country Nepal. In our country starvation deaths are not reported. However, there have been allegation that people have died in the remote food deficit hills of Nepal due to insufficiency of food and malnutrition. Our press reacts only when the incidents occur. We have not been able to bring the truth to fore to alert the authorities so that they can take proper steps and measures. Ours is also the centralised way of tackling local problems. The food supply and distribution reaches to the target group if local bodies are empowered and equipped to handle the tasks and responsibilities. Local bodies should be made answerable to the local problems. This is the only way to address to the human problems like famine and starvation. Even the measures like and redistribution can be better handled if the local bodies are involved in the process. The local bodies have the actual information to identify the target groups.

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