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Self-start
to Kick-start The finance minister
has to cut government flab if the economy is to get a real boost.
 Finance ministers have buzzwords. Manmohan Singh talked about
liberalisation, P. Chidambaram was fixated on fiscal deficit, and newly anointed Finance
Minister Yashwant Sinha has made up for lack of a buzzword in his seven-month stint seven
years ago by adopting a set now: kick-start the economy. It would help to follow through.
As the two former finance ministers now know very well, words have no meaning without
figures, set targets no meaning without achievement. Even more important, kick-starting
must begin with the Government. "Reforming the reforms" will only work if
reforms begin at home. No amount of schemes to kick-start the economy will work unless
there is a fundamental change in the way government thinks and works.
Much of that has to do with controlling and cutting
government expenditure at a time when the fiscal deficit has risen to over 6 per cent of
GDP, or over Rs 90,000 crore, a figure that can pay for eight projects the size of Enron,
20 times the amount allocated for general education and a third of India's external debt.
Almost all of this deficit is caused largely by a bloated and inefficient bureaucracy,
numerous needless public-sector undertakings and unnecessary or badly directed subsidies,
among a host of government-sponsored and government-pampered institutions and schemes.
These have to be rethought and redirected, whatever the case may be, without further
delay. The finance minister has to -- in the few short weeks between his interim budget
and the formal one that will chart the course for the new financial year as much as a
newly energised economy -- envisage and enforce a bold blueprint that cleanses years of
sloth and eases the burden of debt which is increasingly choking a productive economy.
Certainly, government excess isn't the only reason for the economy being in a slump.
Equally, the Government cannot expect any real returns until it shows that it's serious.
If charity begins at home, so does taking charge.
Blackboard
Jungle
Kalyan's Anti-Copying Ordinance must tame the real terrors of the exam system.
 Mulayam Singh Yadav was being characteristically hyperbolic when he
proclaimed Uttar Pradesh's Anti-Copying Ordinance had been promulgated by Kalyan Singh's
"uncivilised government" and girls caught cheating as per this law would be
rejected by suitors. Whatever be the veracity of Mulayam's perception, it is apparent that
the public examination system in Uttar Pradesh is often farcical. There is a virtual
"fraud syndicate" at work, involving officials, teachers, students and even
local gangsters. Mobile phones, question paper leaks, marksheet forgers and plain terror:
every conceivable weapon is used. Only once previously has a stiff attempt been made to
curb such practices -- in 1992, during Kalyan's earlier term as chief minister. However,
it was the overzealous implementation of the Anti-Copying Act (1992) that contributed to
the defeat of the BJP in the 1993 elections. Subsequently, Mulayam's government revoked
the Act -- and duplicity returned to the classroom.
This time, Kalyan must tread with caution and undertake a
systemic cleansing of the state's educational mechanism. Arresting a nondescript Education
Department clerk or invigilator who abets cheating may not get him as much publicity as
taking a guilty student to the police station -- but it may be more effective. Further,
cheating cannot be truly obliterated without ridding campuses of pernicious politics. Till
even a few decades ago, Uttar Pradesh's schools and colleges were the pride of India.
Allahabad was perhaps the leading centre of learning east of the Suez. It will take more
than just the Anti-Copying Ordinance to turn back the clock. Nevertheless, the methods can
be fine-tuned only if the larger goal is clear. Uttar Pradesh has to ask itself if it is
happy wallowing in mediocrity -- or is willing to traverse the hazardous road to
enlightenment. |
