LETTERS

Issn 0012-9976
Ever since the rst issue in 1966, EPW has been Indias premier journal for comment on current affairs and research in the social sciences. It succeeded Economic Weekly (1949-1965), which was launched and shepherded by Sachin Chaudhuri, who was also the founder-editor of EPW. As editor for thirty-ve years (1969-2004) K rishna R aj gave EPW the reputation it now enjoys.

Laffaire Snowden in India

n a commendable editorial, quite properly entitled Big Brother Is Watching (22 June 2013), the EPW has put on the spot the Orwellian surveillance programme of the United States (US) government as a massive attack on the right to privacy of the American citizens, bravely leaked by Edward Snowden. It has also rightly denounced the Government of India for its acquiescence in this scheme. Similarly, The Hindu has, in a forthright editorial (3 July 2013), denounced the illegality of the US action of surveillance of the foreign governments, adding that the US government considers international law as applicable to others but not unto itself. For its part, the Government of India was denounced for reacting in a supine manner. To our knowledge, it seems the only political party in India to come out with a challenging, unequivocal statement on the whole affair has been the Aam Aadmi Party (Hindustan Times, 6 July 2013). It has squarely condemned the central government for denying asylum to Snowden, calling such an act as cowardly. It said,
As a country governed by a constitution which protects civil liberties it must stand up to the US government and offer political asylum to Snowden. Instead of honouring this hero who has alerted all to this massive violation of citizens as well as the nations rights of all countries including India, our government has meekly capitulated to US pressure and refused asylum to Snowden with great alacrity.

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How about the so-called Left in the country? There is not much to speak about the concerned people. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) CPI(M) appears to be the only communist party among the three which has publicly reacted to the affair. The leadership of the dominant communist party has, after some tergiversations, come out with a statement which only denounces, quite properly of course, the European governments for acting against the international law by denying permission for the plane carrying Bolivias president the airspace. Earlier its leading spokespersons Brinda Karat and Sitaram Yechury had upheld the partys traditional patriotic-nationalist ardour by severely taking to task the Government of India vis--vis the US rulers on the
september 7, 2013

question of surveillance. This same position was also vindicated by a well-known partisan of the CPI(M), Vijay Prashad in his op-ed in The Hindu of 3 July. Remarkably, contrary to the other critics, the Indian state communists nowhere mention the travails of Snowden, this brave young libertarian with working class origin ridiculed by the American Establishment for his lack of elitist education who has given up all his material privileges and singularly dared the Empire, and has forced a public debate on this serious issue, thereby rendering a great public service. Even in their criticism of the Indian rulers, the state communists, contrary to all other critics, very carefully avoided reproaching them for their summary dismissal of Snowdens application for asylum instead of granting it. However surprising this stand apparently is, it is, for those who have studied a little bit of history, quite consistent with the post-1917 anti-libertarian lineage of the state communists. These self-proclaimed followers of Karl Marx have never cared for the freedom of the human individual. They seem to be hardly aware that one way for Marx to study the evolution of human society has been to trace the changing situation of the individual in society from personal dependence to material dependence and then to free individuality neither personal nor material dependence (in his 1857-58 manuscripts and in his 1865 lecture to the British workers). In his master work he emphasises the value of the full and free development of every individual (chapter on Conversion of Surplus Value into Capital). The great internal witness of the Russian Revolution Victor Serge wrote in his Mmoires: Almost the entire history of the Russian Revolution is marked by the fear of liberty, which is fear of the masses.
Paresh Chattopadhyay
Montreal

MGNREGA: Alternative View

esigned to Falter: MGNREGA Implementation in Maharashtra by N C Narayanan and Nitin Lokhande (EPW, 29 June 2013) attempted to take a close look at the delivery mechanism of

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LETTERS

the Government of Maharashtras National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) programme. The observation that there is a decit in technical capacity is indisputable, and is supported by the eld-level experiences of many organisations such as ours. However, I would like to voice my concern over some points made in the paper. (i) The latest CAG report states that Maharashtra has utilised only about 20% of the funds allocated. The statement in the Comptroller and Auditor Generals (CAG) report is that Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and Maharashtra have 46% of the rural poor, but these states together have utilised only 20% of the total expenditure of NREGA. Maharashtras expenditure has steadily increased over the last three years from around Rs 300 crore to more than Rs 1,500 crore. (ii) The authors have a ve-criterion composite performance index to evaluate NREGA. The criteria are coverage and distribution of job cards; employment demanded and generated; wage payment through post ofces and banks; utilisation of funds; and accountability and transparency. Coverage and distribution of cards as a performance indicator is quite dodgy. A job card is a document for the record and not an eligibility or identication document for a NREGA labourer or household. The number of job cards issued is not equal to the number of people getting NREGA employment. Any adult living in a rural area can get a job card, unlike getting a ration card. Similarly, a person can get NREGA employment without having a job card that was previously issued. A job card can be issued in 15 minutes if a person demands work. Given this, the coverage is not the same as the number of job cards issued. Maybe a better way could be to count the number of NREGA households that have worked even for a day in the past, say, three years and then compare it with the present number of households that have got work. The next criterion is employment demanded and generated. There is data on demand. Only the demand that gets translated into actual works is recorded. Demand given in the management information system (MIS) is almost always not real; it is merely a record of the employment provided in the works
Economic & Political Weekly EPW

that were initiated. Hence using this unreliable data is irrelevant. Another criterion is utilisation of funds. To understand this, we need to understand fund ows. Wage payments to labourers are delayed by months across Maharashtra. The funds ow from the Government of India to the Government of Maharashtra and then to districts and blocks. If and when there are delays in this distribution, payments to labourers get delayed. So when we look at a single nancial years data, it could have payments of the last year passed on and some payments of this year spilled into the next year. Looking at just one year of utilisation can be misleading. It may be much better to have a longer period of, say, ve years to tide over this problem. (iii) Number of works in a year and its completion rate: The period of completion of work depends on what type of work it is. If it is a comprehensive watershed programme, it will take four to ve years by design. A farm pond, a well, a single loose boulder structure, and so on can be completed in a year, but roads or nurseries or afforestation programme are by design meant to be completed over a longer period. Commenting on all different types of works and on whether they are complete or incomplete within a year gives a misleading picture. To do this properly, we need to have data in the MIS with the expected period of completion in terms of time, in terms of persondays required, and in terms of the material required. It is only then that we can pass a judgment on the completion rate. (iv) On social audits: The authors had the opportunity to observe the pilot social audit conducted by the Government of Maharashtra through social audit agencies. The social audit agencies were civil society organisations invited for the purpose, just for that period. Since our organisation was a part of it, I had access

to the data of the social audit mentioned by the authors. While it is very important to bring irregularities and administrative lapses to notice, their magnitude is also important. Of the total, how many musters had fake entries? More importantly, negative comments without a sense of proportion create an unwarranted bad image for the programme. (v) Perception of the use of works: The quality and utility of works built under the NREGA has been used by critics to call it a dole or just another welfare scheme. We all feel the need to nd ways of ascertaining the usefulness and relevance of the works to villagers. But evaluating the usefulness of completed works is tricky. I am likely to nd a pond on my farm useful, but a farmer in another neighbourhood may not think so. If I realise a pond up the slope has helped increase water in my well, I will consider it useful even though it is not on my farm.
Ashwini Kulkarni, Pragati Abhiyan
Nashik

Corrigendum
The article Entrepreneurship or Survival? Caste and Gender of Small Business in India by Ashwini Deshpande and Smriti Sharma, published on 13 July 2013, contained some editing errors. These have been corrected and the corrected version of the article has been placed on the EPW website. The acknowledgements for the article were inadvertently left out of the print edition and are published in full below. We are extremely grateful to B N Goldar for his help and suggestions in decoding the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) data. We would like to thank the Ministry of MSMEs for providing us with the data. We thank Bhaskar Dutta, Parikshit Ghosh and Thomas E Weisskopf for comments on an earlier draft, and participants at the research students colloquium at the Department of Economics, Delhi School of Economics, and at the 7th IZA-World Bank conference on Employment and Development for questions and suggestions. Needless to add, we are solely responsible for all remaining errors and omissions.

Web Exclusives
The following articles have been uploaded in the past week in the Web Exclusives section of the EPW website. They have not been published in the print edition. (1) Second Wave of Neoliberalism: Financialisation and Crisis in Post-War Sri Lanka Ahilan Kadirgamar (2) The Dilemmas and Challenges Faced by the Rationalist Indian T V Venkateswaran Articles posted before 24 August 2013 remain available in the Web Exclusives section.

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LETTERS

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september 7, 2013

Economic & Political Weekly

320-321, A to Z Industrial Estate Ganpatrao Kadam Marg, Lower Parel, Mumbai 400 013, India Email: edit@epw.in, epw.mumbai@gmail.com
vol xlviII no 36
EPW Economic & Political Weekly