Bottom Of Pyramid Leg Up  Jan Dhan Yojana Completes 10 years With 54 Crore Accounts

 It is the 10^th anniversary of the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana (PMJDY), programme. It was announced by the prime minister from the ramparts of Red Fort on 15^th August 2014. As a scheme for financial inclusion and gradual financial literacy amongst people who were not allowed to own bank accounts before its advent, it is nothing short of revolutionary. It is designed to impart dignity to, and  empower the unbanked poor. It has, in practice, particularly led to the enthusiastic use of grass-roots women entrepreneurs. They have taken to the formal banking system in a big way. Because of their sense of financial responsibility/discipline, in their borrowing and payback habits,  they have been one of its biggest beneficiaries.

One could open a Jan Dhan Account, if necessary, with zero balance, no questions asked. All the public sector unit (PSU) banks participated in mission mode, responding to the call from the prime minister. Lakhs of accounts were opened in a single day under the programme when it was first introduced.

Once the bank accounts were open, they offered overdrafts and loans in due course to people with no collateral or references beyond their own track record.

After a decade of operations, there are 53.13 crore accounts, with Rs. 2,31,000 crores deposited in them. Some 55.6% of them are owned by women who did not need a father, a brother, a husband or a reference to open one. The average balance in these accounts is now Rs. 4,300 odd. Two-thirds of all the accounts are in rural and semi-urban areas according to the Ministry of Finance.

The overall financial inclusion rate, defined by owning and using a proper bank account, has gone up from 25% of the adult population in 2008, to 80% today. This achievement in just a decade is considered phenomenal, given that the adult population today is more than a billion people.

These plain savings accounts have been used, over the decade, for direct benefit transfers from the government without leakages caused by the middlemen of the past. They were used to distribute financial assistance during Covid. They are used for subsidies given under the PM-KISAN programme, for disbursing wages under MGNREGA. They are used in providing life and health insurance covers free of charge by the government.

The processes used are vastly aided by the government induced digital revolution of the last few years, RU Pay debit cards, some 36 crores of them were issued to these account holders. UPI transactions have shot through the roof, with over Rs. 13,000 crores in transactions. The ubiquitous Aadhar Card for identity verification is linked to the widespread use of mobile phones.

A number of other government programmes, such as MUDRA loans for the MSME Sector use the Jan Dhan accounts as the basis for transactions.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi points out that the Congress’ Indira Gandhi led government nationalised many banks, in the name of socialism, and ostensibly to help the poor, but the target audience remained unbanked for decades yet.

This NDA government, and the prime minister, are well-aware that some 80% of all employment in India is in the informal sector, with low wages, and inadequate benefits. However, there is a great aspiration to join the formal employment sector. The government is therefore laying great and fresh emphasis on apprenticeship and skilling, with an outlay of over Rs. 2 trillion in the recent union budget of July 2024. The money will provide internship funds and other incentives to both prospective employers and aspirants to formal sector jobs. These new initiatives, again in tandem with the Jan Dhan Yojana, are yeoman efforts to address the needs of those at the bottom of the pyramid.

The fact that the Jan Dhan Yojana is such a roaring success is admired and studied by other governments in various parts of the world. The out-of-the-box thinking and digitisation revolution that has made its success possible is enabling India to catch up to the developed West in many other ways too. The sheer numbers of people involved would make any manual process take decades, but implementing it via a biometric enabled identity card like Aadhar was the key.

That too was an early revolution under the Modi regime, leveraging India’s prowess  in IT led by the current Infosys Non-Executive Chairman Nandan Nilekani. It should not be overlooked that Nilekani has just coined a new term ‘Fininternet’, meaning a marriage of  real-time financial information from multiple sources and parameters, and the world-wide web. Why? For better informed decision-making, of course. How many Jan Dhan Yojana sophisticates, once the ignored, will use it when it comes?

(771 words)

August 29^th, 2024

For: Firstpost, News18.com

Gautam Mukherjee

 

The Perversity Of The Bhadralok Writ Large In Whataboutery

If it wasn’t for some quick student intervention, in support of outraged doctors and medical support staff,  the equally fast attempt at a cover up would probably have worked. Call it the Justice For Abhaya Movement.

The Kolkata intelligentsia, the vaunted and storied bhadralok, has lost its nerve in the face of lathi charges and tear gas. It sold out to the Mamata Banerjee government a decade ago and to the Communists who ruled for 34 years before that. The spine of the bhadralok, at the vanguard of leadership and reform in the 19^th century is broken.

So in the beginning of this protest it maintained a frightened silence and made only anodyne statements  days later carefully vetted to avoid giving offence to Mamata Banerjee and her cabinet. Perhaps they are more afraid of the TMC goon squads and the violence they can unleash.  They are probably wise to cower under the circumstances. Certainly, they are right to not expect any help or protection from the West Bengal police if they criticise the government or the party.

The Bengal BJP however is trying its best to attack the government via mega protest rallies. It is being stopped 4 km before  they can reach Swasthya Bhavan or the health ministry.

The handling of the latest ghastly rape and murder in Kolkata by the West Bengal police has shocked the whole nation in its blatant effort to destroy evidence, disturb the crime site, and protect the perpetrators.

But then, it was just as casual in its handling of the Sandeshkhali rapes of 2024 which they blamed on the BJP, the Hanskhali rape of 2022, the Kamduni gang-rapes of 2013 blamed on the Communists, the Park Street rape of 2012 where the victim was called a prostitute. Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee herself set the stage, with her bizarre if self- serving remarks in each instance, and the state police that reports to her, took their cue from it. But this time, they might, or might not, be able to keep control.

The swaggering young principal of the R G Kar Medical College, Dr Sandip Ghosh, is the main villain of the piece. He  was grilled by the CBI. Ghosh, familiar with cases like this from earlier in his career, is puffed up with state government backing. He tried to pass it off as a suicide at first. He might have got away with it by brow-beating the poor parents and withholding the broken body till they caved in. But things spiralled up rapidly.

 The other doctors and medical staff, and not just in this establishment, but from all over Kolkata, West Bengal, and elsewhere in the country, the students in Kolkata and nationally, the outraged social media, the Calcutta High Court that forced the state government to hand over investigations to the CBI, the Supreme Court that took suo moto notice of the savage gang rape, torture, and murder all played their part. The relentless media coverage also did its best to prevent the cover up and secure justice for the victim.

After Dr Sandip Ghosh stepped down, the other senior doctors at the college were initially retained to take his place, but were swept out and transferred to other government state hospitals in Kolkata, four of them in all, including the head of the department of Chest Medicine, the victim’s department, at the insistence of the student protesters. The swelling discontent is now asking for the resignation of Mamata Banerjee.

 The savage treatment meted out to a 31 year-old post-graduate trainee woman doctor, an only child from a poor family, in a leading Kolkata government hospital, was reminiscent in its brutality and callousness to the Nirbhaya gang rape, torture and murder in New Delhi more a decade ago in 2012. It is as if nothing has changed between Nirbhaya and Abhaya despite tightening of the rape laws.

But the Kolkata Bhadralok that should have jumped into the fray with fierce condemnation, were sorely wanting. West Bengal with its revered Durga Puja and Kali Puja coming up shortly and its pretensions to being cultured, was  once thought to be most respectful of women. But, if that ever existed in reality, it clearly does not exist now. The bhadralok, vociferous in support of various TMC initiatives, has nothing much to say in this instance. Instead, it is in agreement with the TMC line that horrible rapes followed by murders take place regularly in other states too. They are indeed unfortunate and tragic, but the West Bengal government and its police department were being singled out and unfairly targeted. Much of the opposition in the INDI Alliance echoed these sentiments too. On social media they point out the recent rape and murder in Dehradun. They are willing to wear black bands.

To compound the lack of empathy in most cases, some said the unfortunate victim must have done something to deserve it. She was allegedly about to expose corruption involving medicines, hospital beds, sale of cadavers, and this had angered a lot of people. Was she blackmailing some people? What was she doing in the conference room so late at night? Why had she accepted night shift work at all?

The students and fellow doctors and the odd outraged citizen protested, of course, and were threatened roundly by the TMC goons for their trouble. TMC ministers threatened to sack the protesting doctors and dock their pay till the Supreme Court said they will not be penalised.  One former female TMC member of parliament was threatened with rape online for supporting the protests. A twelve-year old boy was arrested for wishing harm to the chief minister.  Mamata Banerjee is also the home minister with the police reporting directly to her.

The police did such a clumsy cover up job that the three judge Supreme Court bench, including the CJI, holding live televised hearings of the proceedings was appalled. Why, for instance, was the FIR filed, not by the medical college, but the hapless father of the victim, after the post-mortem was conducted? Other reports say the FIR was filed some hours after the hurried cremation of the unfortunate victim.

The question in everyone’s mind is why is Mamata Banerjee and the TMC so keen to cover-up this affair? Why was the dissenting TMC functionary who spoke in favour of the victim hauled up? What was going on in RG Kar Medical College that the victim was likely to have exposed?

How many rapists and abusers were involved, and who are they, in addition to the sole person arrested, a totally remorseless Sanjoy Roy, who was apparently part of the erstwhile principal Dr Sandip Ghosh’s security team. He was allowed to live in the adjacent police barracks. This, even though he was only a volunteer and general tout.  Roy is said to be mentally disturbed and perverse, with a smart phone full of pornography. He was allegedly a frequent visitor to the Kolkata red-light district of Sonagachhi. Were the other perpetrators doctors too? Sanjoy Roy is not talking.

The CBI has submitted its findings in a sealed cover to the Supreme Court (SC), and the hearings are ongoing. However not only the Kolkata police but the West Bengal government has been criticised by the SC.

The West Bengal government is being represented by Senior Counsel Kapil Sibal and Abhishek Manu Singhvi, while the CBI is represented by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta.

The SC has now mandated that the CRPF will guard the RG Kar Medical College in addition to the Kolkata police going forward. The failure of law and order, a state subject, is clearly pointed towards. Right now, the Rapid Action Force has been brought in to control the protests.

Just like in Bangladesh, where the intelligentsia was in support of the Awami League and the erstwhile government of Sheikh Hasina, the Kolkata bhadralok is highly compromised.  As they abdicated all responsibility in terms of a vocal presence, it was up to the students and opposition BNP supported by the Islamists. It was they who took the  allegedly undemocratic Sheikh Hasina government down - with crucial help from the Bangladesh Army after the police failed the protestors. Will this volatile situation in Kolkata escalate into a popular revolt against the Mamata Banerjee government? It will surely be supported by the Bengal BJP which is the principal opposition. Meanwhile the crack downs against all protests continue while questions about democracy are raised, not by the bhadralok, but the media.

(1,412 words)

August 22^nd 2024

For: Squirrels.in

Gautam Mukherjee

 

 

Extradition Of Sheikh Hasina To Bangladesh Is Not Likely

While two or three murder, abduction, torture, genocide etc. charges against Sheikh Hasina have sprouted since well after her ouster from power and safe passage to India, they hardly qualify as legal challenges. They do not, as they stand, hold up under universal ‘burden of proof’ criteria. Or in terms of the much more pedestrian extradition treaty of 2013, between India and Bangladesh. Sheikh Hasina was deposed nearly a fortnight ago, on August 5th.

Sheikh Hasina was air-lifted to India, first to Assam, and then to near New Delhi, along with her family, in Bangladesh military air transports. She was accompanied by an escort of Bangladesh military personnel, and set flight after permission was obtained via the Indian ambassador to Dhaka and India’s external affairs ministry. The Bangladeshi military personnel along with their aeroplane left the Hindon Airbase near the capital, after a day, leaving Sheikh Hasina and her family behind in India.  

The nature of Sheikh Hasina’s departure from Bangladesh in a bloodless coup engineered by the Bangladesh military, suggests, as in other such circumstances, immunity from subsequent prosecution, probably in return for her immediate resignation.

Sheikh Hasina was the elected head of the Bangladesh government, whereas the current government is nominated by the military. Her present refuge in India is based on a long history of good relations with India. However, she is here temporarily, and has not sought either asylum or political refugee status.

Meanwhile, India is bracing for the possibility of a large influx of Bangladeshi Hindu refugees and other people from her Awami League Party that are facing hostility in Bangladesh. India is maintaining a vigil on the border and working with the current Bangladeshi government to stabilise the situation.

India is already host to crores of illegal Bangladeshi immigrants that have arrived over the years. They have not been pushed back in the interest of good neighbourly relations with Sheikh Hasina’s government. These include the dangerous and disruptive Rohingyas, originally from Myanmar. However, India’s attitude to harbouring all these Bangladeshi illegals could change, based on the behaviour and manifest attitude of the new government.

The murder and other charges against Sheikh Hasina were posted since her departure, mostly by affected citizens. All of them happened after she left the country, and could be interpreted as an afterthought. The Bangladeshi courts themselves are yet to admit any of these cases, let alone consider them.

The erstwhile Chief Justice of Bangladesh was also ousted and replaced through the action of a revolutionary mob. The current judiciary will be struggling to maintain its autonomy in the presently charged atmosphere.

The 2013 extradition treaty with Bangladesh was hardly designed to extradite former heads of state. It was a construct put together to apprehend mostly convicted criminals from India or Bangladesh who might have run away across the border.  How often it has been used is another question, given the many illegals found in all parts of India including the national capital. These illegals work as domestic helpers, construction workers, and at other humble jobs. Unfortunately, they also contribute to a fifth column, from those that are radicalised, to the criminal, flesh and drug trading cohorts, and the terrorist/rioting element. They have been caught more than once engaged in such practices.  

A reported three hundred people were killed in the recent unrest leading up to Sheikh Hasina’s resignation. This was hurriedly forced upon her by the Chief of the Bangladesh Army in person. However, these casualty numbers include a number of police and other security personnel, ordinary citizens, students, party officials and workers from the Awami League and BNP, people on both sides of the conflict. There was also extensive arson, illegal destruction of government property and monuments, private property, mob-lynchings, before and after the fall of the Awami League government.

Post the ouster, there was wilful slaughter of Awami League personnel, of minorities, particularly Hindus who were said to be backing the Awami League, rape and other atrocities. All this was largely unchecked by the Bangladesh security forces. These constitute human rights violations on the grand scale. The same sort of thing that the new mob accuses Sheikh Hasina and her people of.

However, one of the cases filed relates to an alleged abduction way back in 2015.None of them involve Sheikh Hasina personally, though the deaths and other actions have been attributed to her.

The interim government, cobbled together after Sheikh Hasina’s departure, is unelected, inexperienced, and no deadline has been announced for fresh elections. Some reports indicate that this unelected government may continue for a prolonged period.

The head of the advisory government is the 83 year-old Muhammad Yunus, a Nobel Laureate for his work with the Grameen Bank, a micro-lending institution. Yunus has come back from exile in Paris as he was not in favour with the Hasina government. He also faced a number of corruption charges.  

Does this largely advisory and de facto government, headed by Yunus and propped up by the Bangladesh Army, have the legitimate authority to conduct the affairs of state, let alone seek Sheikh Hasina’s extradition?

The de facto foreign minister Mohammed Touhid Hossain said on August 15^th, 2024 said his government will soon decide on the demand for Sheikh Hasina’s extradition based on inputs from its home and law ministers.

The students, central to the quota stir, have already announced they will be forming a political party of their own, to get away from the bipolarity of the Awami League and the Islamist backed BNP. So, this implies elections will be held eventually, or at least the students think so.

Hindus still constitute about 8% of Bangladesh’s 170 million population, down from nearly 20% at Partition in 1947. Their decline in numbers has been called a ‘drip-drip genocide’ by a commentator. Muhammad Yunus has assured India and the community of their safety. But more time must go by, amidst reports of blackmail and demands for extortion money to ensure their self-same safety.

The Bangladesh economy which was doing well under Sheikh Hasina must be stabilised by the new government. The challenge is to not descend in chaos in the name of religious fundamentalism, or fall under the sway of foreign entities keen on dominating in Bangladesh. It is important for Bangladesh to maintain cordial relations with nuclear weaponised India next door for the sake of its very economy and security. It would be well advised not to do anything provocative vis a vis India at the instigation of foreign agencies.

Demanding the extradition of Sheikh Hasina will not be acceded to by India. It is shortly, perhaps as early as the end of this fiscal, to become the 3^rd largest major economy in the world. India won’t buckle to Bangladeshi pressure. Souring of relations with India may be music to Chinese and Pakistani ears, but is not in the best interests of Bangladesh itself.

(1,145 words)

August 17^th, 2024

For: Firstpost/News18.com

Gautam Mukherjee