When there is no longer a vast India Dull and Deprived

The framers of our Constitution have clearly laid down, ‘‘That State shall promote with special care the educational and economic interest of the weaker sections of the people, and in particular of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, and shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of exploitation.’’ The Parliament has, therefore, provided reservation for these sections in education and in jobs. This has benefited them to some extent.

But after 58 years of freedom, can it be said that they have reached the level of others? The fact is that even after such a long period, the literacy rates for the SC/STs continue to be much lower than the rest of the population. While the general literacy rate is 65.38 per cent (2001), it is 54.69 per cent for SCs and 47.1 per cent the same year for STs.

If this is the situation at the very base in terms of literacy, it cannot be better as we go up.

What empowerment can there be if they are not provided opportunities for education at higher levels? The commercialization of education and hike in the fees has denied them access to higher institutions, and the recent judgement of the Supreme Court has more or less closed all avenues.

What is the fate of an illiterate person in the modern world, where at every step you are called upon to read and write, deal with complicated technology and so on? What price the empowerment of such a person? With one-third of Indians illiterate even today, it suffers from a grave handicap. China, which was as backward as India, if not more 60 years back, took the first step of overcoming the illiteracy of its vast population.

Women suffer from discrimination in many respects. The gender divide in education stands out starkly. While the overall literacy rate is 65.38 per cent, it is 75.85 for male and only 54.16 for female. The difference is as much as 21.6 per cent. The discrimination against the female starts right from the womb of the mother. Female foeticide is so rampant that it has upset the demographic balance of the country.

For every 1000 males born, there are only 927 females on a national average. The worst situation is among those communities which are more affluent and even educated. Isn’t it the desire to perpetuate the family line and the family inheritance, here? It is a symptom of the preference for boys to girls in our society even today.

The gender parity index at the primary level works out to 0.91, i.e. 91 girls for every 100 boys in school. 39 per cent of primary school girls are out of school. The drop-out rate is also much higher in the case of girls.

That being so, the dice is heavily loaded against girls and also when they grow up as women. Healthwise too, India accounts for 25 per cent of women dying in child birth.

In the matter of education as well as health care, allocations made by the government are wholly inadequate. We spend only about 3.2 per cent of the GDP on education and about 1.3 per cent on health care. Unless there is more intervention by the state in the areas of education and health and in creating more employment opportunities for women, real empowerment of women will remain a distant goal.

The reservation of 33.3 per cent of seats for women in local bodies elections has laid a basis for involving them at the lower levels. But women and their organisations have been demanding 33 per cent reservation in Parliament and state Assemblies. It is a sorry state of affairs that for ten years this demand is in limbo because of opposition from some parties.

It has been seen that women are as capable as men, if not more, at the topmost jobs, including in politics and business. Yet, this has not brought a change in the outlook of male-dominated society towards gender relations. This society allows individual women to rise to the top (rather, it cannot prevent this), but not women in the mass to rise to their due place. The Hindu Inheritance Amendment and the Domestic Violence Acts are steps in the right direction. But much more remains to be done for the girl child and her progress through life as a woman than expressing occasional concern.

There is another obstacle to empowering the under-privileged sections. And that is, that they have been marginalized in the matter of owning productive assets in society. In the rural areas, it is known that the agricultural workers are generally landless, and they are mostly Dalits. That is at the root of their poverty also. Tribals in forests cultivate small pieces of land for which no ‘pattas’ have been granted by the authorities. They are always threatened with eviction. So also in urban areas, where productive assets are owned by a small group of people. The fate of slum-dwellers in the cities is well-known. Even the ownership of houses and lands is generally in the name of the male head of the family, rather than joint ownership in the name of husband and wife.

The weaker and deprived sections today demand not only a few seats in schools and higher institutes, and reservation in employment, but real empowerment. The foundation for that is full access to education and health care, as well as basic improvement in their economic and social status.

This is not only a compensation for past and continuing discrimination and injustices through the centuries, but a necessary condition for India’s empowerment. Certain steps undertaken in these years has raised India’s position in the world. But we have a vision of the future India.

There is a gradual shift in the power centre from the West to the East. The 21st Century should become Asia’s Century, with the two most populous countries, viz. India and China in the forefront. The strategic concept of India, China and Russia has to be built up for ensuring peace and stability in Asia and the World. An India empowered is surely able to achieve this and advance towards a better social order.