8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
1/60
A P L A T F O R M F O R P E O P L E , P R O J E C T S & P R O G R E S S
"Leading toTransforming India into
a Developed Nationby 2020
Dr. A. P. J. Abdul KalamThe president of India
Republic Day (January 26th) - 2005
Norway . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1
United States . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10
China . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .85
India . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .127
Bangladesh . . . . . . . . . . . . . .139
Kenya . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .154
Niger . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .177
HDI Rank 2005
EXPERIME
NTS
INDEVE
LOPM
ENT
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
2/60
The Global Organization of
People of Indian Origin
(GOPIO)A platform for over 22 million people of Indian origin living outside India
Chairman Secretary GeneralDr. Thomas Abraham (USA) Ashook Ramsaran (USA)203-329-8010 718-939-8194GOPIO@op tonline.net [email protected]
President Inte rna tiona l Coordina tor Exec. Vice President
Inder Singh (USA) Sunil Prasad (Belgium) Yesu Persaud (Guyana)818-708-3885 +32 2 469-2677 [email protected] omGOPIO-INTL@sbc globa l.net sunil.prasad @cod itel.net
Websit e: www.gop io .ne t Em a il: gop io@op tonline.net
Ma jor accomplishments of GOPIO:
1989 * GOPIO organization was formed at the first conven-
tion of PIOs. Passes 23 resolut ions inc luding PIO Card
and Dua l Citizenship for NRIs/ PIOs from Go vt. of Ind ia
and Concerns of rights violations in different c ountries.
1990 * Filed human rights violat ions petition in the U.N. on
beha lf of PIOs in Fiji
in 1990.
1992 * Filed huma n rights violations pe tition in the U.N. on
beha lf of PIOs in Sri
Lanka.
1993 * Sec ond Globa l Convention in New Delhi. GOPIO
ad op ted its constitution
and co nducted the first election a cc ording to the new
constitution.
1994 * GOPIO proposed PIO c ard to Govt. of India.
1995 * Held spe c ial meetings with various hea ds of states
with large Indian
population.
* Released the book "Indian Diaspora, Yesterday,
Tod ay and Tom orrow " in
New York.
1996 * Trinida d Investme nt Me eting w ith P.M. Basdeo
Pande y, New York.
1997 * Freedom -50 Conferenc es to c eleb rate India's 50th
Yea r of
Inde pendence a t New York - June, July and August.
* Held a Conference on "Changing Role of Indian
Women Worldw ide" at Mumba i in Novemb er.
1998 * Held c onference on Senior Citizens of Ind ian Origin,
New York, in Sep tem be r that resulted in the formation
of Na tional Indian Am erican Assoc iation for Senior
Citizens, Inc.
1999 * Conduc ted GOPIO's 10th Anniversary Celebrations
& GOPIO Conve ntion '99 at New York in Sep tem be r.
2000 * Inauguration of GOPIO Business Co unc il a t New York
in April.
* Held a conference on Soc ial Services for the Indian
American community at New York in May that result-
ed in the forma tion of South Asian Co unc il for Soc ial
Services.
* GOPIO Convention held in 2000 at Zurich,
Switzerland . Also carried a camp aign fo r Fiji Crisis since
Ma y 2000 and me t the U.N. Human Rights Co mm ission
on the Fiji Issue in July.
2001 * GOPIO g ot a cc redited b y the U.N. as an NGO to
pa rtic ipa te in the World Conference Aga inst Rac ism.GOPIO sent a delegation of ten people to the U.N.
Conference
* GOPIO's Solidarity Rally held against terrorism. Funds
raised to b ene fit Am erican Red Cross.
2002 * GOPIO's pays tribute to Dilip Singh Saund , first U.S.
cong ressma n of Indian origin in Janua ry.
* Third European Reg ional Conferenc e he ld a t Leiden,
The Netherland s in June.
* Hosted Third Glob a l Ind ian Entrep reneurs
Conference and Indian and NRI/PIO Economic sum-
mit on Sep tem be r 12-14.
2003 * GO PIO C onfe renc e, "Perspe c tives and Issues of PIO
Comm unities " held a t New Delhi on January 8.* Gaddar Movement Celebrations held on May at
Santa Clara, CA, USA.
* GOPIO - Belgium Conference - "Ind ia - Op po rtunities
Unlimite d" he ld a t Brussels Dec . 4.
2004 * Held GOPIO Convent ion 2004 a t New Delhi on
January 7-8.
* GOPIO Conference on Human Rights Experienc e a t
New York on Ma rch 20th.
* GOPIO Belgium Conference on India-EU
Trad e/ Investme nt a nd Role of PIOs, Europ e-India
Chamber of Commerce (EICC) formed at Brussels on
Oc t. 4th.
2005 * GOPIO Co nvention 2005 at Mumb ai on January 5-6,* GO PIO/ EICC Conferenc e on Ind ia EU Strateg ic Plan :
Enhanc ing Trade and Investment at the European
Parliam ent on Novemb er 9.
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
3/60
January, 2006(Relea sed during the fourth Pravasi
Bharathiya Divas, Jan 7-9)
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
4/60
Catalyst for Human Development An insight into the complex problems
of developing India and an attempt
to provide solutions.
Published by Dr. Vasundhara D. KalasapudiBharati Seva Sadan
Srinivasanagar Colony
Saluru- 535 591Vizianagaram District, A.P.
India
January 2006
For Copies, Contact:
2
Catalyst For Human Development
4
Team
Printed at: Kalajyothi Process (P) Ltd
RTC X Roads,Hyderabad - 500 020 (A.P.)
India
EDITORIAL TEAM
Dr. Bhamy V. ShenoyChief Ed itor
c hiefed [email protected]
Ms. Bharati KalasapudiMr. Nasy Sankagiri
Ms.Aarti IyerMr. Lakshman Kalasapudi
Ms. Padmaja Ayyagari
Mr. Rajesh SatyavoluDr. Srinivasa [email protected]
Advisory BoardDr. Thoma s Abraham
Dr. Nirupam BajpaiDr. Suri Sehgal
Mr. M. Chittaranjan
Ed itorial Boa rdDr. Abraham George
am ge orge@op tonline.net
Mr. Ratnam Chitturi
Mr. Anil [email protected]
Mr. Ram [email protected]
Mr. Balbir [email protected]
Mr. Yogi [email protected]
Dr. Raj [email protected]
Dr. Viral Acharyavac harya@lond on.edu
Dr. Rao V.B.J. ChelikaniBalaji Residency, 12-13-705/10/AB
Gokulnagar, Tarnaka
Hyderabad - 500 017, A.P.India
91-40-2717418991-40-55214993
Dr. Srinivasa Rao,
Association for HumanDevelopment
208, Parkway Drive Roslyn HeightsNew York,1157E-mail : [email protected]
Phone:
For all Communication please contact: [email protected]
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
5/60
5
Catalyst For Human Development
Contents
Profiles of Authors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 -7
Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8-10
Preface Dr. Bhamy V. Shenoy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
PRATHAM - Our Experiences Dr. Rukmini Banerjee . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12-15
Ekalvidyalaya Movement - Closing the
Digital Divide Through Education Dr. Basant K. Tariyal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16-17
Scaling up Primary Education
Services in rural India Dr. Nirupam Bajpai, Dr. Ravindra H. Dholakia and Dr. Jeffrey D. Sachs . . . . . . . .18-21
Indias Energy SecurityDr. Bhamy V. Shenoy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22-23
Addressing Rural Poverty in India Dr. Abraham M.George . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24-26
Health care in India Dr. B. S. Ajai Kumar and Sanchita Chakraborthy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27-29
Scaling up Primary Health
Services in Rural India Dr. Nirupam Bajpai, Dr. Ravindra H. Dholakia and Dr. Jeffrey D. Sachs . . . . . . .30-33
Cross-fertilization needed between
universities and scientific labs: Pitroda Dr. Raj Rajaram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34-35
Water Management In
21st Century - Policy And Planning Dr. Raj Rajaram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36-37
Rainwater harvesting (RWH) -Need of the Hour in India Ram Krishnan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38-39
Making a Difference - The Seghal Foundation Jay Sehgal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40-41
Food and Nutrition Security
Through Value Addition To Agri Resources Dr. V. Prakash and Dr. P. Ramesh Kumar . . . . . . . .42-44
Growth of Indian Economy Aarti Iyer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
NRI Pioneers
Catalytic Agents For Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46-49
Mobile Phone
A Catalyst for Development Lakshman Kalasapudi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Balasakhi - A Village Voice Sai Padma Murthy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Governance and Growth Dr. Jayaprakash Narayan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52-54
Ashas Vision for India D.P. Prakash . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Cartoons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .56
Need for Catalyst Dr. Srinivasa Rao . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
6/60
Catalyst For Human Development
Profiles
P R O F I L E S ofA U T H O R S
DR. BHAMY V. SHENOY
Dr. Bha my Shenoy, an IITMad ras grad uate with a Ph.D inbusiness administration fromUniversity of Houston, workedfor Conoc o in a ll pha ses ofInterna tiona l Petroleum Industryfor 21 years from 1966 till 1987.He too k ea rly retirem ent in 1987to return to India to g etinvolved in India's develop -ment. He ha s be en p articipa t-ing in various NGO a c tivitiesinvolving co nsumer p rotection,educ ation and environment.He contested election twice asan ind ep end ent. From 1997 till2003 he wa s involved in energysec tor reform in forme r Sov ietunion countries. He is currentlyan honorary ad visor to thenational oil co mp any inGeo rgia. b ham ysuma [email protected]
MR. R. JAY SEHGAL
Mr. R. Jay Sehgal is anExecutive Director of theSehg al Foundat ion, holds adegree in ManagementInforma tion System s from the
University o f Iowa , USA. Heworked in a leadingInformation technology privatesec tor com pa ny prior to join-ing Proag ro Seed Com pa nyLtd ., Ind ia, as the Direc tor ofInforma tion Tec hno logy. Heha s sixtee n yea rs of e xperi-enc e in IT. For the p ast fouryea rs he ha s be en involved inthe soc ial sec tor and ha satte nde d va rious wo rkshop sand semina rs within India andab road pertaining to theeffective functioning of Non-Profit Organizations. Email:
DR. ABRAHAM M. GEORGE
Abraha m Ge orge ho lds a Ph.D.in Business Ad ministra tion , ha swritten three books inInternational Finance, and wasa suc cessful entrep reneur in
the United Sta tes for more tha n25 yea rs. He is the found erand mana ging trustee o f theGeorge Founda tion, a cha rita-ble trust wo rking tow ardspoverty alleviation (www.tgf-world.org).His c ha rita ble w ork through TheGeo rge Found ation in India fo rover ten ye ars has focused onpoverty alleviation, empower-ment of wom en, health ca reand educ ation for the ruralpo or. Dr. Geo rge is the a uthorof a highly acc laimed rece ntbo ok: India Untouc hed : The
Forgotten Face of RuralPoverty. He c an b e c ontac tedat geo rge@op tonline.net.
RAM KRISHNAN
Ram Krishna n, aft er his gradua -tion from IIT, Ma dras, wo rked inthe US in the field o f Distributionan d Log istics. Afte r working inthis field fo r 15 yea rs, he fo und -ed a consulting and softwareco mpa ny to p rovide logisticsservice s for a not her 14 yea rs.Ram is now wo rking in ruraldevelopment in India. He hasmade 8 trips in the last 4 yearsand is working in a village clus-te r in Tutic orin District of Tamil
Nad u. He ha s playe d a keyrole in estab lishing India 's firstRain Water Harvesting center [email protected]
6
DR. JAYAPRAKASH NARAYAN
Dr. Jaya prakash Naraya n is aphysician b y training, a pub licservant b y choice and ademocrat by conviction.Jayaprakash Narayan thephysician we nt into the IndianAd ministrative Service in theaftermath of the Emergencyand failure o f the JanataExperiment. He w as a to pp er inthe IAS exam . During the 16yea rs of d istinguished publicservice in various capacities,
he ac quired a formidab le rep-utation in the State of And hraPrad esh. In spite of a n imp res-sive pe rsona l ac hieveme nt, Dr
Narayan's experience in gov-ernment c onvinced him thatfaulty governance process wasthe b igge st hurdle to India a ndIndians ac hieving grea ter suc-cess. In o rder to transla te hisvision into practical reality, heresigned from Servic e (IAS) in1996, and worked with like-minded colleagues for the for-
ma tion of Lok Satta and is cur-rently its National Coordinator.Afte r 7 1/2 yea rs of t irelesseffo rt, Lok Sa tta is now India'sleading civil society initiative inthe field of g overnancereforms. It has a wide reach,name rec ognition a nd c redibil-ity and enjoys the supp ort ofab out 30 - 40% of the p op ula-tion of And hra Prade sh.
DR. RAJ RAJARAM
Dr. Raja ram has worked inthe Mining andEnvironmental Fields in the USsinc e 1974. He set up Tet raTec h Ind ia Limited in 1996,
and that c omp any is provid-ing c onsulting service s inwa ter and solid/ hazardouswaste manag ement to gov-ernment and industry, froman o ffice in New De lhi .Since 2003, Ra jaram ha sbeen working on networkingindividua ls and transferring UStec hnolog ies to India. In2004, he and several othersstarted India DevelopmentCoa lition of Am erica to mo bi-lize NRIs for a ccelera ting rura lIndia's development.
GOPI BURUGU
34 years old , Gopi Burugulives in Connecticut, workingin SPN Sports Network as aSenior Systems Analyst. He isa freelance cartoonist, and ispub lished Ca rtoons wide lyinclud ing Rea der's Digest.Presently he is working ondeveloping a comic strip"Mixed Vege tab le Curry"dealing with immigrantIndia ns living in the US.
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
7/60
Catalyst For Human Development
Profiles
DR. NIRUPAM BAJPAI
Nirupam Bajp ai is a SeniorDevelopment Advisor at theCenter on Globalization andSustainab le Developm ent o fthe Earth Institute at ColumbiaUniversity and Direc tor of theSouth Asia Program. Dr. Ba jpa iworked at the Ce nter forInternational Development,Kenned y School o fGovernment at HarvardUniversity from 2000 to 2002,and prior to that at the HarvardInstitute for InternationalDevelopment from 1995 to2000. Currently, he is also anAssociate Editor of the journalAsian Eco nom ic Papers, pub -lished by MITPress. Dr. Bajpa i isthe author or co-author of
numerous articles on a varietyof issues relating to economicreforms in developing coun-tries. nba [email protected] ia.edu
RAVINDRA H. DHOLAKIA
Rav indra H. Dholakia isProfessor of Econo mics at theIndian Institute of Mana ge mentat Ahmedabad .
DR. JEFFREY D. SACHS
Jeffrey D. Sachs is the Direc tor ofThe Earth Institute, Que teletProfessor of SustainableDevelop ment and Professor ofHea lth Policy and Ma nagement
at Columbia University. He is alsoDirector of the UN MillenniumProjec t and Spe c ial Advisor toUnited Nat ions Sec reta ry-General Kofi Annan o n theMillennium Development Goals.Sachs is internationa lly renownedfor advising g overnments in LatinAmerica, Eastern Europe, the for-mer Soviet Union, Asia and Africaon eco nomic reforms and for hiswork with international a genc iesto promote poverty reduction,disease control and debt reduc -tion of po or countries, he wa srecently named among the 100most influential leaders in theworld b y Time Ma ga zine.
DR. BASANT K. TARIYAL
Dr. Basant K. Tariyal, an IITKharagpur graduate, is a tech-nologist in the field of FiberOp tics Tec hnology a nd ha sbe en a n ad visor to severalco mpa nies throughout thewo rld. He retired from Luce ntTec hno logies, as Op erat ionsVice President a nd ChiefTec hnology Officer in-cha rgeof the O ptical Prod uctsBusiness Unit in 1999. After serv-ing as the Nationa lCoordinator of theEkalvidya laya p rojec t in theUSA, he ha s now taken overthe responsibility as CEOEkalvidya laya G loba l.
DR. V. PRAKASH
Dr. V. Prakash, a Ph. D holderfrom Mysore University hasdone post-doctoral fellowshipsat Texas Med ical Ce nter andBrandeis University. He is
presently the Director ofCentral Food Tec hnolog icalResea rch Institute at Mysore.He is a fe llow of India nAca dem y of Science s andNational Academy ofAg ric ultural Sc ienc es. He hasmore tha n 160 pub lica tions tohis c redit. He is recip ient o fPad ma Shree, Shanti Swa rupBhatnag ar and the KarnatakaRajyo thsava aw ard s. He is cur-rently wo rking in the a rea ofProteins, Enzymes andPeptides. [email protected]
DR. P. RAMESH KUMAR
Dr. P. Ramesh Kuma r is a Ph.D. holde r from MysoreUniversity in biochemistry. Heis a sc ient ist in theDepa rtment of ProteinChem istry and Tec hnolog yat CFTRI, Mysore . Severa lresea rch were pub lished
Papers in National andInte rnationa l Journals. Hisma in resea rch inte rests are inthe field of struc ture- func-tion relationship of Proteins &Enzymes, Nutrition, FunctionalFoods and FoodBiotechnology with a focuson Food and NutritionSecurity.
7
AARTI IYER
Aa rti Iyer is a fifteen-yea r-oldstudying e leventh at the JohnCo op er Schoo l, in TheWoo d lands, Texa s. Her firstpublication was a letter to theed itor in the New York Times,whe n she w as twe lve yearsold . Since then, she has writ-ten numerous articles thathave bee n widely pub lished.She is also t he stud ent c olum-nist of the loc al new spa pe r,
the Villager.
SAI PADMA MURTHY
Thirty-two yea r old Sa iPad maMurthy is a g radua te in Law ,po st graduate in Comm erceand C omp uters. She haswo rked with several o rganiza-tions like Andhra MahilaSabha , ILO C ivil Soc iety . Sheis c urrent ly involved inVijayp ratha m-PRATHAM'sed uc ationa l initiative inViziana ga ram Distric t inAnd hra Prad esh. She ha spublished articles in various
journals.
SAM PITRODAMr. Sat yen Pitrod a is an elec -tronics engineer who he lpedrevolutionize the te leco mmu-nica tion ind ustry in India sinc e1985. He wo rked w ith thenPrime Minister Rajiv Gandhi tomake telecommunicationservices to all Indian citizens.Since 2004, he ha s be enwo rking w ith current PrimeMinister Ma nmo han Singh toimprove the Know ledg e insti-tutions in India, and isChairman of the Knowledg e
Commission set up by thePrime Minister.
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
8/60
8
Catalyst For Human Development
Message
FROMProf. Nirupam Bajpai & Prof. Jeffrey D. Sachs
THE Earth Institute a t Columbia University will convene the fourth biennial State of the
Planet Conference to discuss the feasibility of sustainable development for billions
worldwide.
Internationally renowned scholars and opinion leaders will lead discussions, present idea s
and outline research throughout this twi-da y forum, which seeks to explore the fundamen-
tal requirements of science, economy, governance and human behaviour in order toachieve sustainable development.
http://www.earthinstitute.columbia.edu
BEST WISHESBEST WISHES
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
9/60
9
Catalyst For Human Development
Message
NEGLECT OF WOMENS HEALTHWHAT A COSTLY MISTAKE!
Dr. Abraham George
WITH all the a ttention foc used on de ad ly infec tious disea ses, a far bigg er c halleng ein d evelop ing na tions is po sed by a lac k of ba sic hea lth c are.The World Hea lth Orga niza tion (WHO) lists the top 10 preventa b le hea lth risks as c hild -
hood and maternal underweight; unsafe sex; high blood pressure; tobacco; alcohol;unsafe water; sanitation and hygiene; high cholesterol; indoor smoke from solid fuels;iron d eficiency a nd o be sity.
These risks ac c ount for a bo ut 40 perce nt of the 56 million p reventa ble d ea ths that oc c urworldwide annually, according to WHO. In most developing countries, the number ofnew cases related to many of these health risks has increased over time, partly due torising populations.
Beyo nd infec tious d isea ses, the ma in c ause of ill-hea lth is ma lnutrition. Poverty, hung erand malnutrition are interrelated silent realities for a majority of people in developingcountries.
In India a lone, mo re tha n ha lf the c hildren und er the a ge of four suffer from ma l-
nutrition, 30 perce nt of the ne wb orns are signific antly unde rwe ight, a nd 60 percent ofwomen anemic. A recent World Bank report shows that malnutrition costs India at least$10 b illion (Rs.45,000 Crore) a nnua lly in terms of lost prod uc tivity, illness and dea th a nd isseriously retarding improvements in human development.
(From the 2005-06 Indian b udg et a t a glanc e, one c an see that the tota l expe nditure o fgove rnme nt o f India is Rs. 5,14,344 c rore. The fisc a l de fic it is Rs.1,51,144 Crore. If Ind iatakes c are of its wo men's hea lth, the produc tivity ga ined from that a lone c an a dd sig-nificantly to the budget)
http://www.tgfworld.org/
BEST WISHES TOCatalyst for Human DevelopmentTeam
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
10/60
10
Catalyst For Human Development
Mission
M I S S I O NM I S S I O N
To present people, ideas, news and
views periodically to readers to
promote networking among NGOs.
To publish peer reviewed professional
articles on NGO movement that can
promote sustainable development
and best practices are promoted.
To disseminate information on NGO
movement to improve communication
which in turn can catalyze human
development.
To provide a pla tform for all
concerned with sustainable develop-
ment to catalyze the process of
human development.
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
11/60
11
Catalyst For Human Development
Preface
ITis with high e xpec ta tions and a lot of op timism tha t we a re c om ing o ut with Cata lystFor Human Development with the sole objective of strengthening legitimate volun-tary service activity in India. Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) or Non- ProfitOrganization (NPO) movement has grown rapidly in the country during the last two
decades. According to one estimate, there are over one million NGOs in India and
mo re than a thousand NRI-op erated NGOs in the US, all trying to c ontribute the ir mite
- talents as we ll as fund s - for Ind ia's deve lopme nt.
We have plenty of information on every conceivable kind of NGOs through Internet
and the p ress. Som e a re either da rlings or de mo ns, of the m ed ia. But mo st are not
known even in towns they are located. However, in today's India the entire NGO
mo vem ent is under attac k even as it is ga ining m ore and mo re a dmira tion in the devel-
oped world. Working with NGOs while young is to increase one's chances of securing
admission into go od c olleg es in the we st a nd even to ge t b ette r job s lat er. But in Ind ia
peop le wo rking w ith NGOs ma y be looked dow n on with som e indifference or are like-ly to b e c onside red as wily ma noeuvrers who know how to c onvince the b enevolent
Indians or foreigners to donate funds in the name of the needy. Of course there are
a lso shining exce p tions to this genera l imp ression. But India ha s still no t developed a sys-
tem to we ed out the corrupt and honor the good amo ng the NGOs.
No scientific analysis has been done to study the NGO movement in India. Why a
nation with one b illion p eop le, grinding p overty, lea ding m ana ge ment and engineer-
ing institutions, seve ral c enturies of e xemp lary volunteerism and self-sac rific e ha s fa iled
so far to de velop NGOs like Oxfam , Greenpea c e or Amne sty Internationa l is a ridd le.
Most of the well known a nd e ffec tive NGOs in Ind ia a re lead er-c ente red and a re like-
ly to va nish onc e the y exit the sc ene .
Still there a re NGOs which have c ontributed signific antly to fighting the funda me ntal
problems of poverty, reducing the incidence of HIV/AID, protecting environment,
checking population growth, promoting education, combating child labour, gender
b ias and untouc hability and so o n. For every de serving c ause the re a re som e o ut-
stand ing NGOs. One should b e a ble to lea rn b oth from the suc c essful and the fa iled
NGOs. This pub lic a tion is intend ed to b e a n op po rtunity to share the experienc es of
NGO mo vem ent w ithin and o utside Ind ia a ssoc iate d w ith the c ountry's de velopment.
It is our ambition to fully support and publish articles about any solid voluntary work of
NGOs irrespective of whether they merit commendations or criticism. We want the
donor agencies to get a totally unbiased view of the NGOs. Our goal is to develop a
bo dy knowled ge d in mod ern mana ge ment, soc iology, psychology, anthrop ology etc
throug h a system atic study of the mo vement.
In bringing out this publication we are influenced by two great thoughts of two pre-
em inent Ind ian lea ders of yore. It wa s Swa mi Vivekana nda w ho tried to g et the atte n-
tion of the ed uca ted b y pointing out that he co nside red "every Indian who go t edu-
cated at the expense of the poor but does not heed to their poverty" a traitor.
Ma hatma Ga ndhi exhorted our countrymen to look into the eyes of the po orest of the
poo r and ask themselves how they c ould help them.
Dr. Bhamy V. Shenoy
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
12/60
Balwadi network
P
RE-SCHOOL coverage for univer-
salization of primary education
dominated Pratham's efforts in the
mid 1990s. Pratham's low cost and
repl icable model of community-
based pre-school provision led to a
rap id expansion o f the b alwad i (pre-
sc hoo l) net wo rk ac ross the slum area s
of the c ity of Mum ba i. In 1995, there
we re 200 Pratha m b alwa dis c ate ring
to 4000 pre-school age
children. By 1998, the
pre-sc hoo l network had
expanded extensively
across the city; throughapproximately 3000
balwadis, close to
55,000 children had
access to affordable
early childhood educa-
tion.
The m od el wa s simple:
first the need for a pre-
school centre in a
neighbourhood had to
be esta b lished . This wa s
usually do ne b y a loc al
Pratham activist withthe help of recruits from
that neighbourhood. If
there were at least 20
children in that slum
community in the age
group of 3 to 5, a pre-
school centre could be
sta rted . A loca l, ent husi-
ast ic and energet ic
young woman from the
n e i g h b o u r h o o d ,
becam e t he ba lwad i
instruct or. She rec eived
training, materials and
ongoing support from
Pratha m. Thoug h Pratha m provided
a nom inal stipend on a mo nthly basis,
she was also free to charge fees from
the children on condition that no
child would be turned away if the
family c ould not p ay. Children g ath-
ered together for two-and-a- half
hours at a mutually convenient time
in a free space that was close to
where they lived. Any a vailab le p ub-
lic place - empty rooms or accom-
modation in school buildings, tem-
ples, verandahs of public buildings,
op en spa c e in a p ark, even offic es of
political parties - was put to use for
balwadis.
Sustained actionFrom the beginning, Pratham's oper-
ating style ha s bee n ba sed on a co n-
viction that action is the best path
forward to understand and plan the
direction and nature of future activi-
ties. To b uild c red ibility a nd show
commitment to solving problems in
communities, demonstration of sus-
tained action and persistence is the
key.
Between October-November 1998,
a m assive exerc ise w as c a rried o ut toassess the extent of access to pre-
sc hool in Mumbai slums. The Pra tha m
network now stretched to almost
every low income community in the
city. In a dd ition there we re a numbe r
of pre-schools run by different agen-
cies. Apart from Pratham's balwadis
in slum neighbourhoods, there were
ab out 800 anga nwa dis as pa rt of the
central government's Integrated
Child Deve lopme nt Sc heme in the
city.
The assessme nt e ffort fa c ed seve ral
problems in matching child popula-
tion da ta in slum co mm unity with pre-
12
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
PRATHAM - Our ExperiencesDR. RUKMINIBANERJEE
From its ince ption in 1994 as a public charitable trust, ensuring that"every child is in school and learning well" remains Pratham's mainobjec tive. A founding principle wa s also that a ny model or strategythat was developed should be replicable and cost-effective. Animportant e lement in Pratham's strategy for universalization of primaryeducation is pre-school educa tion. This article narrates our experi-ences with pre-school education, especially with regard to coverageand access as well as content and learning.
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
13/60
sc hoo l co verag e figures. Still the d at a
that was collected provided a rough
sense of pre-school coverage in
Mum ba i in 1998. It sugg ested tha t c ov-
erage was about one hundred per-
c ent in ma ny of the selecte d w ards.
In a public rally in Kamgaar Maidanon Child ren's Day (14 Nove mb er 1998)
the Mayor of Mumbai announced
that in 10 wards of the city access to
pre-sc hool w as close to one hundred
percent. Many community-based
orga nizat ions a ttend ed the rally. This
was perhaps the first time in any of
India's meg a c ities that a c omm unity-
oriented effort had been made to
assess if universa l pre-sc hool c overage
had been reached and in support of
universalization of pre-school educa-
tion.
Community-ba sed assessmentThe c om munity-ba sed assessme nt o f
pre-school coverage was followed by
a school-based exercise in the follow-
ing yea r. In p rac tic ally eve ry municipa l
school in the city every child enrolled
in Std I in 1999-2000 was asked if he or
she had attended pre-school prior to
enrolling in primary school.
Approximately 95,000 Std I children
were tracked to see i f they hadattended any kind of pre-school. (Of
these, 12,347 children had been to
Pratham p re-sc hools or ba lwa d is.) The
main finding was that almost 49% of
c hildren in Std I c am e to reg ular
sc hool w ithout e xposure to any kind of
early c hildhoo d educ ation.
These find ings we re in co ntrast to the
100% coverage view that the earlier
assessment had generated. A quick
comprehensive study was done of
1500 Std I children in 1999-2000 in F-
North w ard. These c hildren ha d c ometo Std I without a ny kind o f pre-sc hoo l
expo sure. The survey indica ted tha t:
33% had migrated from the village
shortly before or had no fixed
plac e to stay.
29% felt that they did not ha ve e asy
access to a balwadi (or to an
afforda ble balwad i or to a ba lwa di
in their mother tong ue).
29% we re no t enrolled in a b alwa di
by pa rents for no pa rtic ular rea son;
and
9% had miscellaneous reasons such
as illness.
The c omb ined effec t of these two
assessme nt e xerc ises led Pratham to
refine pre-sc hool a nd ea rly c hildho od
ed uc at ion strateg ies. To e nsure tha t
every child in Mumbai who entered
Std I in June 2000 would have som e
pre-school background, two proac-
tive step s we re taken.
Sharply targeted coverage(a) Based on the gaps identified (in
terms of langua ge, location and co m-
munity) in the school- based tracking
study, a more sharply targeted (locali-
ty-language) balwadi coverage was
planned in 2000-2001 in areas where
there was still need for pre-schools.
(b) In June 2000, in co llab oration w ith
municipal authorities, Pratham placed
a balsakhi (teacher's helper/child's
friend) in eve ry Std I c lass in the m unic -
ipal school system that requested this
ad ditiona l help. Tog ether with the reg -
ular Std I tea c her, the b alsakhi imple-mented an eight-week school readi-
ness programme aimed at children
with no prior exposure to pre-school
education. During this period, the
focus was on games, stories and
songs, reading-writing readiness,
maths games and other activit ies,
colour-shape recognition, free play
etc. that are part of a pre-school cur-
riculum.
School-readiness for pre-schoolThese two interventions ensured tha t
by Dec em be r 2000 eve ry child in Std I
(in municipa l sc hoo ls) has had som e
13
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
14/60
ba sic sc hoo l-read iness for pre-sc hoo l
ed uc a tion. This me t one of the p ri-
mary objectives of Pratham - univer-
salization of pre-school education by
the year 2000.
How does pre-school help children
in primary school? Would all of thechildren attending Pratham balwadis
have enrolled in formal schools any-
way? How has Pratham's balwadi
ac tivity helped to b ring e very child to
school or helped them to learn bet-
ter?
In 2000-2001, a study sampled
approxima te ly 4000 Std I ch ild ren in
municipal schools across Mumbai
and compared chi ldren who had
exposure to early childhood educa-
tion with those who ha d none . The
study sugge sts tha t in this c onte xt the
rea l 'value-ad de d' o f pre-sc hools has
to do with attendanc e and ac hieve-
ment.
Better test performanceOverall, the d ata sugg est ea rly cog ni-
t ive ad vantag e of c hildren who have
been to pre-school. Children with a
pre-sc hool b ac kground sc ored signif-
ica ntly higher in the first te st in Std I in
langua ge a nd ma ths as co mpa red
to children without exposure to pre-sc ho ol. This is espe c ially true of
Marathi medium schools. Although
there may be problems with the
mea sureme nt of c hildren's ac ad emic
progress in school and questions
ab out the a cc urac y and reliab ility of
attenda nce da ta, analyses ba sed on
the school system's own figures do
show the comp arative adva ntage of
a child who has been to pre-school
before.
Designing curriculum and ensuring
effective teaching-learning in any
largescale programme is a chal-
leng e. Rap id expa nsion o f the b alwa -di netwo rk ad de d a further dimension
to this challenge. How has Pratham
fac ed these c halleng es?
In the mid-1990s, curriculum devel-
opment and training for Pratham's
balwadis was done by a number of
other institutions and agencies in
Mumb ai. But as the b alwa di netwo rk
grew, external help became insuffi-
c ient. This training had a strong foc us
on theoretical issues and was based
on a set o f assump tions ab out spa c e,
materials and duration of children in
a balwadi. Practical realit ies of
Pratham balwadis were that bal-
wa d is ran in too little spac es or in situ-
ations where there was meagre
teaching material available.
In-house training a nd curriculumThe b eg innings of a n in-house tra ining
and c urriculum tea m w ere initiate d in
1997. An ea rly childho od expert wa s
brought into the Pratham team.
Several outstand ing Pratha m ba lwa -di teachers with good communica-
tion and leadership skills were also
ad ded to the team. The team d evel-
oped a structure of pre-service and
in-service training and developed
training teams for each zone in
Mumb ai keep ing in mind the rea lities
faced by balwadi teachers in
Mum bai slums. The c onte nt w as more
practical: for example, how to make
maximum use of cramped spaces
wa s disc ussed . Ma teria l deve lopm ent
became a common feature of thetraining sessions. A modular theme-
based curriculum was developed so
that whether a child attended for a
few months or for the whole aca-
de mic yea r there were new a c tivities
introduced in the balwadis constant-
ly. Within the low-cost budgets avail-
able to the balwadi programme,
teaching-learning materials like
beads, blocks and clay were intro-
duced.
Even with ongoing rounds of pre-
service and in-service training,
there was still substantial transmission
loss. Orga niza tiona l c hanges we re
14
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
15/60
neede d to implement ong oing train-
ing and monitoring support.
Supervisors we re replac ed by trainer-
mo nitors. To follow through with wha t
was learned and demonstrated in
training, each zone's 'trainer-monitor'
visited balwadis to support and showhow activities were to be done, how
materials were to be used and how
time w as to b e effec tively orga nized .
Training-monitoringInte resting ly, the shift from 'sup ervision'
to 'training-monitoring' was visible in
the monitoring indicators too. In order
to keep track of the rapidly growing
network of balwadis, in 1997-1998, a
set of simple ind ica tors we re used . On
ea c h visit, the 'supe rvisor' ma rked the
ba lwa di on a number of observed cri-
teria. For example, marks were given
for display of materials, attendance,
cleanliness of the location, timeliness
of the t ea c her and so on. These m arks
were then aggregated each month
to come up with the number of bal-
wa dis who we re in the 'go od ', 'better'
and 'exc ellent' c ate go ries.
With the shift from 'supervision' to
'training-monitoring', the monitoring
indicators changed as well. Now the
c hec klists we re c losely linked to a c tiv-ities that had been stressed in tra ining.
These include d ga mes and ac tivities
for number readiness, reading and
writing read iness, physica l ga me s and
song s. So the m onitoring forma t ha d
questions like 'were m ost c hild ren c ry-
ing?' or 'did most children participate
in the games that the teacher was
conducting?'
The fo c us within the Pra tha m ne t-
work now turned to strengthening of
learning. Intensive experiments with
accelerated learning techniquesbegan in late 2001 and carried
through 2002 and forward. Within the
pre-sc hool netw ork as we ll there w as
a visible foc us on the de velopm ent of
early litera c y skills.
Book Bag projectIn 2000-2001, the M umb ai p rogram me
introd uc ed bo oks to b alwa dis. The
'book bag' brought simple picture
books into each balwadi. Each child
got a boo k for herself or himself. This
was an exciting new development in
the lives of these children many of
whom were from families in which
they or their parents were the first
ge neration lea rners.
The 'Boo k Bag' p roject w as a p recu r-
sor to the e volving 'Shishuva c han' pro-
gramm e fo r early literac y. A variety o f
different approaches are being tried
under the emerging shishuvachan
umbrella . The fo c us is on e arly lite rac y
with children (four-and-a-half years
and older) in which simple picture
bo oks with simple w ords and few sen-tenc es are used . The tea c her tells the
story and then read s aloud da ily with
her finger on the words as she reads
the sentence. Watching and listening
to the teacher daily encourages the
c hild ren to re-tell the story and to sta rt
reading. After a month or so the
ba rahkhad i chart is introd uce d.
Shishuvac han a pp roa c h
Variations of the shishuvachan
ap proac h are being experimented in
different parts of the Pratham net-
wo rk. The b asic idea is to p rovide arich literacy environment for children
in which books and reading play a
ma jor pa rt; there is an effort to reduc e
instruction and let children learn to
rea d o n their ow n.
Even in the initial years of Pratham
balwadis, instructors were encour-
aged to charge fees in consultation
with the groups of parents. While
Pratham gave the instructor a nomi-
nal stipend, she could keep the fees
that she c harged . The o nly c ond ition
was that no child should be turned
away if he or she could not pay the
fees. Over the years, many balwadis
in Mumbai have become 'self-sustain-
ing'. The instructo r no long er nee ds
the stipend from Pratham. In some
c a ses, the se b a lwa d is still use
Pratham's materials and training sup-
port.
In mo st urban and rura l loc at ions the
provision of p re-sc hool ed uc ation ha s
been in the hands of either the ICDS
or NGOs and p riva te nursery sc hoo ls.
Comprehensive or collaborativeattempts to assess pre-school cover-
age in communities and moves to
improve c overage and quality ac ross
the board have been few and far
be twe en. Struc tural links be twe en
pre-school and primary school have
not been conceptualized well in poli-
cy nor implemented effectively in
prac tic e in many pa rts of the c ountry.
The la st te n ye a rs of p re-sc hoo l
experience has taught us a lot. In
terms of coverage and access we
have learned a g reat d eal abo ut howto c reate , susta in and suppo rt a ma ss-
scale network. In terms of learning,
creating the basic building blocks is
essentia l. We continue to believe tha t
'every child in pre-school and learn-
ing' is an integral part of the drive to
universalize elementary education.
Sta rt early, bu ild ba sics and c reate
partnerships for suc c ess. I
15
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
16/60
INDIA has made well-documentedprogress in many fields. Economicreforms a re be ing implem ente d. It
has good telecom infrastructure and
is a world leader in the field of infor-
ma tion tec hnolog y. The ranks of sen-
ior exec utives in U.S. c orp ora tions,
including many entrepreneurs in
Silicon Va lley, are filled w ith grad ua tes
from the IITs, IIMs, and other ma jor
institutions of India. Medical doctors
from India are a crucial part of the
hea lthc a re systems of the U.S. This sit-
uation is paralleled in other devel-oped nations, such as Australia,
Canada, and UK, where Indians form
a crucial component of the econo-
my.
And yet much of India remains
impoverished. India has poor trans-
p orta tion infra struct ure. There a re
severe shortage s of p ow er and wa ter,
eve n in the c ap ital city of Delhi. The
c ountry suffers from pervasive c orrup -
tion in all aspe c ts of ec onom ic ac tivi-
ty, which, like a termite, quietly eats
into the ve ry founda tions of the c oun-
try. Terrorist violenc e p lag ues Kashmir,
portions of the northeast and central
Ind ia. The n a tion ha s p lentiful
resources, both natural and human,
but it somehow has been unsuccess-
ful in ta c kling the se p roblem s.
Eventhough the country produces
the third highe st numb er of tec hnic al
graduates in the world, primary edu-
cation has been neglected. Indians
face great difficulty in getting their
children admitted into good primary
sc hools. Triba l a reas suffer the mo st,
where decades of neglect have
resulted in pitiful literacy rates. While
the na tional literac y rates are 65% for
males and 40% for females, in tribal
areas the rates are 12% and 5%,
respec tively. The tribal b elt, which runs
from Gujarat in the west to Assam in
the northeast, and throug h the m idd le
of India, has 133,913 villages of which
only about 10% have schools.Therefore, reform is nee ded in the
field of education and the area of
education, which will yield the great-
est positive results, is primary educa-
tion, espe c ially in triba l area s.
One lakh single-teacher schoolsEkalvidyalaya is a m ajor movem ent in
Ind ia, ad d ressing the need for prima ry
education in tribal villages and other
remote areas. In fact, Ekalvidyalaya
has a p resenc e in every sta te o f Ind ia.
The mission o f Eka lvidya laya is to setup 100,000 one -teac her sc hoo ls in the
remote tribal vil lages by the year
2011. This w ill c ove r nea rly a ll the v il-
lages where schools do not exist
today. These sc hools offe r the stu-
dents five years of free informal pri-
ma ry e duc ation. The sc hoo ls are
de signe d to hand le up to 40 children
of 4 to 15 years each. All the children
of a villag e a re ta ught, irrespe c tive o f
their c aste, c reed or sex. The te ac her
is a specially trained local youth
(either from the villag e o r from one of
the surround ing village s) who w as for-
tunate enoug h to have rec eived a
16
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
Closing the Digital Divide
Through EducationDR. BASANTK. TARIYAL
E K A L V I D Y A L A Y A M O V E M E N T
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
17/60
17
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
high sc hoo l educ a tion. The c urriculum
includes basic language, science
and maths skills. In addition, great
stress is laid o n c ha rac ter b uild ing, c ul-
tural values, hea lth, and hygiene . The
students are taught through lectures,
demonstrations, storytelling anddrama and play sessions.
The c ost to run an Ekalvidyalaya is
ap proxima tely a do llar a d ay o r $365
a yea r. The villag ers c on trib ute
through their labor, by erecting a
schoolroom and performing daily
c hores, suc h as cleaning a nd m ainte-
nanc e. In ad dit ion to creat ing
schools, Ekalvidyalaya also ensures
basic health care education by train-
ing o ne o f the villag e w ome n in basic
health care, who then serves as a
resource for the other villagers. In
ma ny villages, Ekalvidyalaya also pro-
vides training on economic develop-
me nt. The o vera ll ob jec tive is to
empower the villagers, by providing
them with basic education, so they
are not as susceptible to exploitation
by outsiders or gove rnment officials.
Great roleThe p rogram is ma nag ed on the
ground level by Ekalvidyalaya
Foundation of India (EVFI), and vari-ous NGOs based in different sta tes of
Ind ia. A wo rld-c lass adm inistrative
infrastructure ha s be en p ut in plac e to
log istic ally impleme nt the program all
over India. India is divided into six
zones, Northe ast, East, North, Central,
West a nd the South. The zones are
then divided into states and each
state, depending on the need, has
one or more project areas. A project
area consists of one or two districts
and ideally has about 270 schools.
Project areas are then broken downinto c lusters of t hirty sc hoo ls ea c h a nd
further b roken d ow n into sub -clusters,
c onsisting o f ten sc hools ea c h. There
are training centers for the trainers,
sub-trainers and the tea c hers at ea c h
level and a team of administrators is
assigne d to e ac h level. Eac h tea m
has four basic responsibilities: (i) over-
all project coordination, (ii) training,
(iii) orga niza tional wo rk, and (iv) basic
office functions, including record
keeping, eva luations and feedb ac k.
The re a re siste r Ekalvid ya laya
Foundations (EVFs) based in other
countries, whose basic functions are
to raise the awareness of the need to
educate every child and to raise
funds from donors in those other
c ount ries. Initially, the EVFs ta rge t
audience is people of Indian origin
residing in those c ountries. Currently,
both EVF USA and EVF Australia areactive and functioning. EVF Honk
Kong, EVF Ca na da , RVF South A fric a ,
and EVF Singa po re are in the p rocess
of formation, and EVFs in Indonesia,
Tha ila nd , Duba i, Belgium a nd
Germa ny a re unde r co nsideration. In
the U.K. funds are collected through
the Three Rs Ed uc a tiona l Trust.
Ekalvidyalaya Global, registered in
the U.S., is responsible for helping form
EVFs in different countries and pro-
vides these EVFs with assistance after
formation.
EVF USA is the largest EVF outside o f
India and currently supports more
than f ive thousand two hundred
sc hools. The m a in do nor base c onsists
of Indian Am eric ans; howeve r, corpo -
rations and civic organizations, such
as the Rotary Club, have also spon-
sored sc hools.
We Indian Americans know the
value of education. We are the rich-
est e thnic sub -group in the USA (a nd
the wo rld ) tod ay. The primary reasonbehind our prosperity has been the
good education most of us received
in India. We reg ard the ed uca tion we
received in India to be practically
free relative to what we pay for our
c hildren's ed uc a tion in the U.S. Afte r
all, a four-year c olleg e d eg ree in the
U.S. can c ost upwards of $120,000.
Howeve r, the ed uca tion w e rec eived
in Ind ia wa s not truly free - the p eo p le
of India pa id for it. And the neg lec t-
ed tribals never received their fair
share of this educational investment.We, the p rofessiona l oversea s Ind ians,
are indebted to these long forgotten
children of India. By providing the gift
of educ ation - we repay that deb t.
Since the forma tion o f EVF Ind ia
and EVF USA, we have been success-
ful in starting over 15,000 schools in
India. As we ga in expe rience ,
Ekalvidyalaya Global plans to start
schools in other parts of the world,
where primary education is being
neglected. Our grand vision is to
eradicate illiteracy from the face of
the earth, and to d o our bit to reduce
the glob al digital divide .I
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
18/60
WEattempt to address two key
questions in this paper : 1) In
terms of state-wide scaling up of ruralservic es (in Utta r Prad esh, a nd
Madhya Pradesh) in the area of pri-
mary education, what wil l i t cost
financially and in terms of human
resources to scale up these services in
a ll the rural a reas of these two sta tes?
And 2) what policy, institutional and
governance reforms may be neces-
sary so as to ensure proper service
delivery? As is well known, merely set-
ting up more schools, for instance, is
not go ing to b e eno ugh; highe r pub lic
investments in these areas needs to
be ac co mpa nied by systemic reforms
that will help overhaul the present
service delivery system, including
issues of control and oversight, for
example.
While there has been a continuous
upsurge in the number of schools
established at the primary level, thus
increa sing p hysica l ac c ess to sc hoo ls,
the low q uality of ed uca tion provided
in the se sc hools rema ins a c ritica l issue
in India's educational system. Low
quality education implies that even
those children who have completed
five years of primary schooling may
not be functionally l iterate and
num era te . Thus, while an inc rease in
literacy rates is of significance, we
cannot overlook the fact that the
numbers may be misleading as to
what such literacy rates actuallymeans about the presence of effec-
tive literacy and numeric skills in the
children.
The q ua lity o f 'literat es' of the rural
sc hool system is very low . The a c tua l
quantity of schooling that children
experience and the qua lity of teac h-
ing they receive are extremely insuffi-
c ient to any m astery of ba sic literac y
and num eric skills.
Surprisingly, this seems to be true in
the educat ional ly more advanced
states as well. In Maharashtra, forinstance, community-based surveys
of twentyeight cities and eight rural
districts found that only 30 percent of
boys and girls in the age group 6-14
could read basic text fluently or do
simple arithmetic. In another study of
two d istric ts of Tamil Nad u, it wa s
found that m ost stude nts lac ked func -
tional literacy and numeric skills.
Similar results were also reported in
another survey of four North Indian
sta tes. In a stud y o f two d istric ts of M P,
it wa s found tha t in most sc hoo ls, few
c hildren c ould read ba sic texts fluent-
ly. Need less to say that w e to o found
18
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
Scaling up Primary Education
Services in Rural India
DR. NIRUPAM BAJPAI, DR. RAVINDRA H. DHOLAKIA ANDDR. JEFFREY D. SACHS
Public Investment Requirements and Policy Reform
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
19/60
simila r results during ou r field investiga -
tions in rural MP and UP. The em pha sis
c urrently is on rote learning and there
was little attempt in teaching activi-
ties to impart understanding or com-
prehension of the text.
Educational deprivation in Indiahas, among others, two crucial
dimensions: lack of schools and the
low q ua lity of teac hing. The latt er is
the outcome of a combination of
lack of school supplies, lack of
tea c her testing, very ineffec tive c on-
trol and oversight of their functioning
and weak links between the school
system and the soc iety. In India the re
has been a greater emphasis on the
provision of more schools ('quantity')
than on activities that actually take
plac e inside c lassroom s ('qua lity').
Insufficient classroomsAs noted earlier, most schools do not
have enough classrooms to accom-
moda te all children. Sc hoo l structures
also lack basic facilities such as run-
ning wa ter and toilets. These prob lems
are mo re a c ute in som e state s than in
others. A study of Uttar Pradesh found
that 54 percent of schools did not
have running water and as high as 80
percent of schools did not havelatrines.
The Tamil Nadu stud y of sc hools in
two districts found that of the twenty
schools the authors visited, only two
had toilets, of which only one was
functional and only two schools had
running water on their premises. Lack
of access to toilets and running water
reduce student attendance as stu-
dents have to go home to use these
fac ilities. The lac k of sep arate to ilets
for boys and girls also influences par-
ents' incentives to send daughters toschool.
Educational outcomes depend on
the number of teachers and their
qualifications, availability of teaching
and learning resources in schools suc h
as textbooks and blackboards and
their use made by teachers in actual
c lassroom ac tivities.
Educ ational outco mes also d ep end
on how m uch tea ching a ctually takes
place, which in turn depends on the
numb er of hours (and da ys) the sc hoo l
is operational, whether teachers are
present or absent, and for each stu-
dent, whether he or she attends
sc hool or not and for how long.
Low teacher ava ilability
Tea c her ava ilab ility in rura l areas co n-
tinues to b e low . Tea c hers po sted to
rural and remote areas usually apply
for transfers and in general their will-
ingness to be posted in such areas israther low. This lea ds to severe imb a l-
ances in the distribution of school
resources between rural and urban
areas and adds to the low teacher-
pupil ratios generally observed within
the sc hoo l system . Pup il-tea c her ratios
are ve ry high , espe c ially in rural area s
- around 63 students per teacher for
rura l Ind ia a s a whole. The a ll-Ind ia
average is around 46 students per
tea c her. The p upil-tea c her rat io for UP
(67 pe r teac her) is almost d oub le that
of MP (35 per teacher). Additionally,
given the large presence of single
and two-teacher schools, there is
mult i -grade teaching, a fact that
detracts from the quality of teaching
even further and not captured by
pupil-teacher ratios. Moreover,
teacher absenteeism is a pervasive
phenomenon, especially in rural
a reas. This effe c tively reduc es the
tea c her-pup il ratio even further. There
is little effective monitoring of teacher
attenda nce. A lot of teac hing time isde voted in many sc hools by tea c hers
to paperwork than in actual teach-
ing.
It is interesting to c om pa re the num -
ber of regular teachers employed in
the rural areas of some of the largest
Chinese provinces with those
em ployed in rura l UP and MP. In 2003,
for instance, in the Chinese provinces
of Henan, Shand ong and Sic huan,
the number of regular teachers
employed in their primary schools
were way above those in UP and MPrelative to their rural population of
sc hool-going c hildren.
The c entral Chinese p rovinc e o f
Henan with a rural population that
was around 77 percent of its total
po pulation of 92.5 million ha d a tota l
of 488, 490 full-time primary school
tea c hers. Of this, almost 77 perc ent or
374,936 were teaching in the rural
a reas. Simila rly, in the c oa sta l Chinese
province o f Shand ong whe re the rural
population was around 66 percent of
its total population of 90.7 million,
there were 380,066 full-time primary
school teachers, of which almost 63
perce nt o r 238,720 were serving in the
rural a reas. In the Sichua n p rovince in
southwestern China, almost 70 per-
cent of their province-wide primary
school teachers were located in the
rura l areas, tha t is, 221,109 teac hers.
As against these, in 2003, while ruralMP had 133,116 regular teachers,
rural UP had 228,779 teachers only,
lower than those in Shand ong , but
with almost double the rural popula-
tion o f Shand ong .
In ad dition to the m uc h larger num-
ber of teachers in these Chinese
provinces, it is also important to say a
few words about the functioning of
som e o f the rura l Sichua n sc hoo ls tha t
we visited in the o utskirts of C heng du
in 2004. By and large, all the state-run
p rima ry sc hoo ls tha t we visited (unan-
nounced) were functional, had fairly
well constructed buildings with
nume rous c lassroom s as most G rad es
from I through V ha d seve ral sec tions.
We rarely heard of complaints
regarding lack of teachers, teaching
ma terials, shortage s of d rinking wa ter
or bathroom fa c ilities that one c om es
across so often while visiting rural
schools in UP or MP. In fact, in some
rural schools we were pleasantly sur-
prised to see children in Grades IVand V being taught how to use co m-
puters, say wo rd p rocessing using M S
Word o r da ta entry using MS Exce l, of
c ourse in southe rn Mand a rin Ch inese.
The mo st serious prob lem tha t w e
c ame ac ross in rural Sichua n sc hoo ls
wa s the very poo r quality of tea c hing
English language. Of course, we
emphasize that the above descrip-
tion of the schools is based on our
observations in a small number of
schools that we visited and so these
characteristics cannot be general-ized for all of rural China's primary
schools.
Under the Law on Nine-Year
Compulsory Education, primary
sc hoo ls are tuition-free and reason-
ably located for the convenience of
children attending them; students
would attend primary schools in their
neighborhoods or villages. Parents
paid a small fee per term for books
and other expenses such as trans-
portation, food, and heating. Under
the education reform, students from
poor families received stipends, and
sta te enterprises, institutions, and
19
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
20/60
other sectors of society were encour-
age d to establish their ow n sc hoo ls.
The primary-sc hoo l curriculum c on-
sisted of Chinese, m at hem atics, phys-
ical education, music, drawing, and
elem enta ry instruction in nat ure, histo-
ry, and geography, combined withpractical work experiences around
the school compound. A foreign lan-
guage, often English, was introduced
in about the third g rade. The rural
schools generally operated on a flexi-
ble sched ule g eared to the need s of
the agricultura l sea sons. To p romot e
at tendance and al low the c lass
schedule and academic year to be
completed, agricultural seasons were
taken into ac co unt.
Parental apathyThe low qua lity of the sc hool system in
UP and MP contributes to parental
ap athy tow ards ac tually send ing the ir
children to school even when most
parents recognize the importance of
education as a means to social and
economic mobility for their children
and have strong educational aspira-
tions for their children. Tea c her ap a-
thy comes out very strongly in small
surveys conducted by research
teams with the aim to adjudge theteaching-learning processes as they
are taking place in schools. For
instance, the PROBE study reported
that there w as no tea c hing g oing o n
in half the sample schools visited by
the team, a problem further com-
pounded by dismal infrastructure,
overcrowded classrooms and lack of
teaching materials and resources.
The Tam il Nad u stud y found tha t in
nea rly 70 pe rcent o f the sc hoo ls visit-
ed in two districts of Madurai and
Villupuram, no instruction was takingplac e. Such severe tea c her ap athy
and lac k of com mitment undermines
the efficiency of the education sys-
tem drastically.
Key RecommendationsAs per our estimates of the financial
requirements of scaling up primary
education services in rural Uttar
Pradesh (UP) and Madhya Pradesh
(MP), additional public spending of
Rs.161 per capita is needed for UP
and Rs.65 per capita for MP. In 2004-
05, on a pe r ca pita b asis, the alloc a-
tion to the p rima ry ed uca tion sec tor is
almost the same in MP (Rs. 386) and
UP (Rs. 376). Thus, sc a ling up of p ri-
ma ry educ a tion in rural MP and UP on
a per capita basis amounts to
inc reasing the b udg et alloc ation by 8
percent in MP and 21 percent in UP.
Althoug h financ ially this is ac hievablein one yea r, a t least in MP, how eve r, it
may be spread over the next 3 to 4
years in both the states considering
implementation problems and delays
in co nstruction o f sc hoo l build ings.
MP need s to foc us more on two key
aspects: one, to get all the children
from the poor families and special
focus groups, such as girls and chil-
d ren from the SC a nd ST c om munities
that a re out o f sc hool and into sc hool
and two, to strive ha rde r to a ttain and
sustain higher levels of quality in their
p rima ry sc hoo ls. While the former m ay
require measures, such as higher lev-
els of financ ial inc entives for po or pa r-
ents to send their children to school,
improved quality and quantity of the
mid-day meals being provided and
wide-ranging awareness programs,
the latter may require drastic
c hang es in the learning m ethod s and
techniques, making classroom activi-
ties more experimental and enjoy-
able for the children, improvedteacher training, and of course
upgrading the school infrastructure.
By contrast, UP needs to focus more
on construction of more schools
(25,426 additional schools are need-
ed per our calculations) and hiring
more teachers, (314,839 additional
teac hers are need ed per our calcula-
tions) a reas where M P seems to ha ve
achieved a fair bit. Of course, UP too
need s to atta in higher enrollment lev-
els and improve the quality of teach-
ing.We rec omme nd the following areas
for much greater attention: school
infrastructure, func tioning, c urriculum
and instructional resources, stricter
control over and improved oversight
of teachers' improved and rigorous
teachers' training, and improved
qual i ty and quant i ty of mid-day
meals.
With regard to the Panchayati Raj
Institutions, (PRIs) and their ability to
deliver, the following questions need
to b e looked into: Has the p ow er and
authority that has been devolved to
the PRIs on paper actually reached
the pe op le? Do they und erstand their
duties/responsibilities on the one
hand and their authori ty on the
other? Do the PRIs have the c ap ac ity
to m ana ge sc hools? Are there reg ular
(on an on-going basis) and compre-
hensive capacity building programsin place? And are any measures
being undertaken to ensure that the
caste and patriarchy do not preju-
dice effective management at the
loc al level?
The syllab us and c onte nts of t he
textbooks used in Mathematics,
English and Environment studies in UP
need serious modifications and
improvements in style, relevance and
simp lifica tion. In MP, the te xtbo oks on
Environmental studies need to intro-
duc e G eneral Sc ience mo re intensely
than w ha t is done p resently. Like MP,
Eng lish should be forma lly introd uc ed
from Sta nd ard I in UP also.
Sc hools with fe wer room s should run
in two shifts making better use of
resource s. This is eq ua lly a pp lic ab le in
both MP and UP. There is likely to be
resistance from regular teachers, but
it has to be overcome, if needed, by
the use of para-teachers from the vil-
lage itself. If the timings of the classes
are decided in consultat ion withVillage Education Committees (VEC)
and the Ward Educ ation Committees
(WEC), the problem of early dropout
of children on economic considera-
tions ca n a lso be resolved . This will
improve the quality of education by
removing the congestion and over-
crowding due to simultaneous run-
ning o f c lasses in the same room .
There is an u rgent ne ed to c onsider
revision of the basic norm of a school
with only two classrooms and an
offic e room with a verandah to a m in-imum of three c lassroo ms. This will a lso
have implications on the revision of
financ ial norms. The c urrent financ ial
norms are based wrongly on econo-
mizing resources to compromise on
the qua lity of c onstruc tion. They result
in greater need for minor and major
repairs much before they should nor-
mally be d ue.
The ma intenance bud get ava ilab le
to schools annually needs substantial
increase. We have recommended
almost four-fold increase to improve
the c ond itions. Disc retion in the ha nds
of a p rinc ipa l of the sc hoo l for using
20
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
21/60
the maintenance budget and such
other day-to-day matters should be
increased. For every single and small
de c ision, he/ she should not b e m ad e
to seek app roval and c oncurrence by
the president of VEC o r the WEC.
There is a ne ed to a pp oint a c ook-cum-cleaner-helper in all primary
sc hools. Current ly, this is a respo nsibil-
ity of the villag e Pancha yat, but ha rd-
ly any Panchayats fulfill their obliga-
tions. As a result, it is the t ea c her who
cooks the midday meal, serves and
c leans up u tensils. If he finds any time
thereafter he may also teac h! If an
additional local help is regularly avail-
ab le a ga in on a n ad hoc ba sis, it c an
substantially improve the quality of
instruction in the class and also help
maintain cleanliness in the premises of
the sc hoo l. Every sc hoo l must ma in-
ta in a sma ll ga rden a s we ll. The helpe r
c an a lso look after the g arden.
The ince ntive sc heme s need be tter
target ing and mana gem ent. The
sc ho larship amount o f Rs.250 to Rs.300
is handed over to the students in the
be ginning o f the yea r itself. As a result,
the attendance in the class drops
sharply thereafter, having very
adverse impact on the performance
of the students. Instead, the scholar-ship amount should be divided into
mo nthly insta llme nts of Rs.30 and pa id
to t he studen ts ove r 10 mon ths with a
condition of satisfactory attendance
record during the previous month.
Suc h an imp lemen ta tion will have less
cha nces of abuse.
All sc ho larships or ca sh sub sidies
given to students of different cate-
go ries should b e o f the sam e a mount
for Classes I through III and should be
of progressively higher amounts for
Classes IV a nd V. Like a ll the c ash sub -sidies and school uniforms, the text-
books and stationary should also be
given only to the c hildren from the ta r-
get group, i.e. to the families below
the po verty line a nd SC/ ST c a teg ories.
There is an urgen t nee d to relax
approvals to the private schools, par-
ticularly in UP. The o fficia l p roc ed ures
and formalities to get an approval
and rec ognition for private aided and
non-aided schools should be simpli-
f ied a nd expedited.
State go vernment c an think of c ol-
lecting small fees from the non-target
group population to provide better
facilities like library, play ground with
toys and sports eq uipme nts, sma ll lab -
oratory equipments for conducting
experiments prescribed in their envi-
ronme nt textboo ks, etc .
In terms of furniture, the schools
need to b e b etter equipp ed. Theyshould have o ne steel cupb oard p er
classroom, a table and a chair per
classroom, and a table and three
c ha irs for the office room . Currently
none of these are available.
Moreove r, students in rural a reas may
not sit on be nc hes in the g overnment
schools, but can certainly sit on car-
pets. Similarly, sep a rate toilets for
boys and girls should be constructed
on a n urgent b asis in very sc hoo l.
Pa ra-tea c hers should b e g iven rigo r-
ous tra ining for 30 days in a yea r and
should be paid the same allowance
(Rs.70 / day) as the regular teachers.
Moreover, they should also be given
the teac hing c ontingenc y on pa r with
regular teac hers (Rs.500 p.a.) on c om -
pletion of one ac ad emic year.
Labor laws need to be reformed.
The to tal numb er of leaves in a yea r
that a reg ular tea c her is entitled to is
far in exce ss of wha t c an b e tolerated
in an e ssentia l servic e like prima ry
educ ation. Moreover, the prac tice o fhaving half-a-day casual leave also
doubles the number of casual leaves
effec tively. This c ontributes to tea c h-
ers' absenteeism, insincerity and irreg-
ularity ultimately discouraging stu-
dents and harming the ca use o f edu-
c ation. Suc h laws need imme diate
revision.
We suggest an education sector
strategy for India that is based on the
ob jec tives of t he Sa rva Siksha Ab hiyan
(SSA) no t only at the na tiona l leve l,
but a lso m ore importantly at the state
and d istric t leve ls. Sta tes and d istric ts
should strive hard to attain the goals
laid o ut in the SSA, espec ially for the
laggard states and districts, with par-ticular focus on the 150 most back-
wa rd d istric ts of the c ount ry. Based on
SSA's na tiona l go a ls, sta te go ve rn-
ments should announce targets for
educ ation to be met at the state a nd
district levels by the year 2010.
We also suggest that the central
government should plan to convene
a meeting of Chief Ministers and
Educ ation M iniste rs of a ll Ind ian Sta tes
in 2006 to discuss how the states will
mee t the ed uc ation ta rge ts of SSA.
This me eting will allow sta tes to p res-
ent t he ir most suc c essful initia tives, so
that all states can adopt "best prac-
tic es" in p ublic ed uca tion.
On November 14, 2005, Dr. Nirupam
Bajpai submitted this paper to his
Excellency Dr. A P J Abdul Kalam,
President of India and Honourable Dr.
Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister of
India and discussed the matter with
Dr. Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Deputy
Chairman, Planning Commission,
India. I
21
Catalyst For Human Development
Education
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
22/60
Terrorism Disrupts oil supplies
WITH the ever rising unrest in theworld as a result of global terror-ism, one c annot rule o ut the po ssibility
of crude oil production in the Middle
East d rop ping a nnually by a s muc h a s
10 MBD. International crude oil trade
was about 50 MBD in 2004. So, w hen
the Midd le East suffe rs a loss of 20 p er-
c ent in its prod uction, India m ay p ro-
portiona tely lose muc h more. Unlike
during the second
oil shoc k whe n Iran
attacked Iraq in
1980, today, with
del icately bal-
anced crude oi ls u p p l y / d e m a n d ,
any reduc tion in oil
production cannot
be c ompensated
by OPEC.
No one had
expected the
attack of Iran on
Iraq and also the
consequential dis-
ruption in oil pro-
duction. In the
developed coun-tries planners regu-
larly work on con-
tingency plans to
meet such scenar-
ios. One such may
be the overthrow
of the Saud i gov-
ernment. In the
event the world
ma y lose a c c ess to
10 MBD of oil for a
prolonged time. In
another scenario,
the terrorists may
blow up oil wells in
several Middle East countries to hit
production.
Memb ers of the Internat ional Energy
Agency have agreed to maintain
their imports for 90 days at any given
po int of time. Some have go ne far
be yond the requireme nt of 90 da ys. In
the case of India we are still at the
planning stage to build up some
meaningful strategic petroleum
reserves (SPR). Even C hina ha s sta rted
an ambitious SPR program. It is only
recently that India started to encour-
age its oil c om pan ies to explore for oil
in different parts of the world to
reduc e d epe ndenc y on impo rts.
Sudden jump in world oil pricesWhen crude oil prices suddenly shot
up four-fold from $3.00 per barrel to
$12.00 during the first o il shoc k of
1973/74 and three-fold to $36 to $40
per barrel in 1978/79, Ind ia's ec ono my
suffered. However, because of the
administered pricing mechanism, the
impact on consumers was not that
adverse. In 2005 eve n whe n there wa s
no major oil disruption, the crude oil
p ric es soa red to $71 pe r ba rrel. Som e
forecasts predict crude prices to riseto as high a s $105 pe r ba rrel. Suc h
increases will have a debil itating
impact on India's trade balance
upsetting energy security. One effec-
tive way India can face such situa-
tions is through demand manage-
ment.
Localized oil disruptionIn addition to the above scenarios of
India losing access to crude imports,
we may also have localized energy
shortages even when there is no dis-
rupt ion in oil imp orts. From time to time
lab our unions, petroleum and LPG
22
Catalyst For Human Development
Energy
India's Energy SecurityDR. BHAMYV. SHENOY
With India importing 81 million tons of oil in 2004, its oil dependency
was over two-thirds of its requirement. By 2020 India's oil dependencyis expected to be much more. Should we be perpetually reliant on oilimports on such a scale? Why not the nation have at least acontingency plan to face crises?
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
23/60
dealer associations, port workers,
among others, threaten to unsettle
energy supplies. Fortunately this has
not resulted in any prolonged supply
dislocation so far. But in the future
they may have a d evastating effect if
they disturb the flows over a longduration. With ever increasing share
of commercial energy sources meet-
ing the domestic fuel needs and LPG
replacing f i rewood and kerosene
even in rural areas, localized LPG
shortages can give rise to civil unrest.
LPG shortages and protests by con-
sumers in October of 2005 should be
viewed as a wakeup call. Although it
d id no t result in any suc h unrest, a ll the
commercial organizations involved in
LPG supply cha in should have c ontin-
gency plans to meet the demand in
any eventua lity.
Mega oil compa ny throughmerger?The Pet roleum Ministry see ms to ha ve
a plan to merge some of the
Navaratna oil companies to form a
mega company supposedly to face
global competition. From the energy
security angle, a decision to form
such a gigantic company may turn
out to b e a strate gic b lunde r.
Already Indian Oil has more than
half the market share. Even with the
entry of private companies l ike
Relianc e, Essar, She ll, BP et a l, Ind ian
Oil will continue to have a high mar-
ket sha re. We should learn from c oun-
tries such as Mexico and Indonesia
where they had just one national oil
company each and the employee
unions of those companies were the
cause of major disruptions in oil pro-
duc tion. In our c ase, labo r unions of amega oil company could even start
dic tating o ur energy p olic ies and dis-
rupt o il supp lies so a s to force the g ov-
ernment into accepting their wants.
What we need is not less number of
companies, but more.
The g ov ernm en t sho uld seriously
c onsider forming at lea st three or four
independent oil companies by split-
ting Indian Oil so tha t ea c h suc h c om-
pany will not have more than 10%
ma rket sha re. This be c ause hea lthy
c omp etit ion be tween a number of oil
companies will ensure greater energy
security.
STRATEGIES TO ENSURE
TIGHTER ENERGY SECURITY
FOR INDIA ARE;
1. Building up sufficient amount ofinventory of crude oil or crude oil
products for meeting import needs
for at least ninety days like IEA
countries;
2. Exploring the possibility of joining
IEA as a member-c ountry;
3. Encouraging ma rketing compa-
nies to have a minimum inventory
of products like gasoline, diesel
and LPG in 30 different parts of
India to meet at least 15 days of
that region's product require-
ments. We can consider this as
part of the strategic petroleum
reserves;
4. Acc ording highest priority to
strengthening of our railway trans-
port system to reduce use of
trucking;
5. Adopting a plan to improve public
transportation in all urba n areas on
a war-footing so as to reduce
depe ndence on private vehicles;
6. Slashing direc t subsidies on ener-
gy sources like electricity, petrole-um products and natural gas in a
phased manner and developing
more transparent and non-corrupt
ways of helping those in need of
energy;
7. Encouraging competition in down-
stream operations by promoting
more marketing companies. No
marketing company should have
more than 15% market share;
8. Eliminating government interfer-
ence in fixing petroleum product
prices;9. Boosting developme nt of bio-
diesel as a mission;
10.Promoting energy research in
leading R&D institutes, especially
in IITs and regional engineering
colleges on such topics as
advanced coal power plants, gas
hydrates, coal bed methane,
advanced exploration and pro-
duction technology, safer ways of
generating nuclear power, solar
energy, wind energy, bio gas etc;
11. Encouraging competition in gas
industry by promoting more com-
pa nies. Toda y we have just one
company, GAIL;
12.Putting greater emphasis on LNG
imports instead of gas imports
through pipelines;
13. An integrated strategy to collect
and disseminate information on
energy consumption, imports,exports, inventory etc. Accurate
Information gathering on petrole-
um products on a timely basis is of
great importance. We need to
learn from the experience of the
USA, Japan and Europe in this
regard to a dopt a sound system to
meet our requirements;
14.Gove rnment should rene w its
efforts to deve lop renewable ener-
gy sources like biogas, solar, wind
etc;
15.Lastly, the government may pro-
mote the use of nuclear energy.
Conclusion
There is nothing new ab out t he strate -
gies suggested above to ensure
Ind ia's ene rgy sec urity. It c an eve n be
c laimed that mo st of them are imple-
me nted . The o bvious question is doe s
any one feel confident that w e have
solved the problems of energy securi-
ty. In reality we have paid leastattention to most of the strategies. In
the case of strategies dealing with
demand management, we have a
long wa y to go. There is still no w ell
thought out plan to implement vari-
ous strateg ies to improve Ind ia's ene r-
gy security. It is here that we need
strong NGOs with expertise to put
pressure o n the go vernment to de vel-
op such strategic plans and imple-
ment them.I
23
Catalyst For Human Development
Energy
8/9/2019 2005 Catalyst Magazine
24/60
OF the six billion people inhabiting
the planet over two-thirds live inrural areas. In India alone, nearly 700
million oc cupy villages. The rural p op u-
lation is increasing at a faster pace
than their urba n c ounterpa rt, mostly as
a result of illiteracy, lack of access to
birth control measures, and poverty.
The ove rall de velop ment in most co un-
tries does not keep pace with the
needs of this increase. Moreover, urba n
industrial development does not trickle
do wn fa st enough to the rural areas.
Ac cording to the U.N. and the World
Bank, over one-third of the wo rld po pu-
lation subsists on less tha n o ne-d ollar-a-
da y income pe r head . Half of them sur-
vive on under $2 per day. Depending
on which of these two yardsticks is used
for measuring pove rty, there a re 2-3 bil-
lion poor people in the world - a stag-
gering number by any account. While
these poverty definitions have been
suggested by international agencies,
they do not c orrespo nd w ith the defini-
tions tha t individua l go vernments mightfollow . The o ffic ial count of p ove rty in
India closely reflects these world statis-
tics, but the real number of poor peo-
ple is muc h higher.
For example, at the higher end, the
U.S. Ce nsus Bureau has set the poverty
line for an individual at $9,500 per
annum (which works out to $26 per
day). For a family of four (with children
be low 16 yea rs of age ), the poverty line
is set at $18,800 or $51 per day. At the
other end of the spectrum, the Indian
government chose to define caloric
intake and its correspond ing c ost as the
measures by which poverty is to be
defined. It has adopted the ICMR
(Indian Council of Medical Research)
spe c ifica tion o f 2,400 K-ca lories per day
for an individua l living in rural areas, and
2,100 K-calories for an urban individual.
The p rob lem with the Indian go vern-
ment's ap proac h is in the de termina-
Catalyst For Human Development
24
Poverty
Addressing Rural Poverty in IndiaDR. ABRAHAM M. GEORGE
8/9/2019 2005 Catalys