Union budget fails to address 'urgent' spending needs in social sector: Oxfam

Counterview Desk
Even as calling Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman’s budget “historic”, top international NGO Oxfam, pointing towards “some gaps” in it, “especially while addressing inequalities on the lines of caste, class, gender and occupation”, has regretted that the budget “does not address the urgent spending needs in the social sector, especially in health and education.”
In a statement, Oxfam India quotes CEO stating that “the Union Budget 2021 has failed to address inequality and offer redistributive justice to those whose lives were disrupted by the pandemic.”

Text:

The focus on Inequality is completely missing from the Finance Minister’s Budget Speech and the Budget. Oxfam India’s recent report highlights that India’s 100 top billionaires saw their fortunes increase by Rs 12,97,822 crore during the crisis at the time when 84% households saw a fall in income.
No commitments were made to bring in a wealth tax or ensure growth was equitable and inclusive.
The budget failed to tap into this potential source of revenue at a time when the recent Fight Inequality Alliance survey suggests that 78% people were in favour of imposing a 2% Covid cess on individuals earning more than Rs 2 crore per annum. It would be critical to note that the budget has a 80,000 crores shortfall to meet expenditure targets which it proposes to meet through market-borrowing. Instead, the budget offered several incentives to start-ups and businesses such as Rs1.97 lakh crore in next 5 years for Postal Life Insurance (PLI) schemes in 13 Sectors and extended tax holiday for start-ups.
The budget does not address the urgent spending needs in the social sector, especially in health and education. The overall budget has increased only by 1 percent from the revised estimate of 2020-21.

Health

Despite the much touted emphasis on health, health ministry budget has increased only by Rs 7000 crore from Budget Estimates of 2020-21 and declined by 9.8% from revised estimates of 2020-21. While the commitment of a 137% increase is welcome, this is spread across the next six years. Allocation of Rs 35,000 crore for Covid vaccination might be insufficient to ensure free, universal and timely vaccination given that it would cost Rs 52,000 crore.

Amitabh Behar

The allocation for National Health Mission, however, has witnessed a 4.4% increase. Despite frontline health workers such as Anganwadi and Asha workers being at the forefront of the Covid response, the Budget fails to allocate funding for ensuring minimum wage and insurance for all frontline health workers.

The Union Budget 2021 has failed to address inequality and offer redistributive justice to those whose lives were disrupted by the pandemic -- Amitabh Behar, CEO, Oxfam India

If India’s top 11 billionaires are taxed at just 1 percent of their wealth, it would pay the average wage of nine lakh accredited social health activist (ASHA) workers in the country for 5 years.

Education

At a time when India experienced an unprecedented once in a century disruption in the education system, allocations for school education has declined in real terms. No efforts are visible to make schools ready for reopening or take the steps needed to bring India’s dropouts back into school. The Budget proposes strengthening 15,000 schools to include all components of the NEP; this constitutes barely 1% of the total government and government aided schools in the country.
Instead of addressing privatisation of education, it proposes roping in private companies and NGOs for setting up Sainik schools, hitherto solely run by the Ministry of Defence. The government fails to meet the target of 6% GDP allocation to education in line with its NEP commitments.

Migrant workers

On the back of the pandemic, livelihood for informal, especially migrant workers, needed a significant boost. No new schemes and provisions have been provided for migrant workers. Announcements of One nation, One Card and free food grain supply, made during the Atmanirbhar package have remained.

The announcement of all workers coming under the ambit of minimum wage and social security is certainly well received. So is the Rs 1,000 crore allocation for the tea workers of Assam and West Bengal. An urban employment guarantee scheme was anticipated from the government; however, no such scheme has been introduced.

Schemes for India’s women and marginalized communities

Centrally sponsored schemes for development of minorities, vulnerable groups, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes has increased by almost Rs 3000 crore. While the budget speech mentions the focus on women empowerment, gender budget does not witness an increase in priority; it remains at around 4.3% of total budget. The “Mission for Protection and Empowerment for Women” scheme witnessed a drastic decline from Rs 1,163 crore to a mere Rs 48 crore, while unpaid care work has still not been addressed at all.

Comments

Buddhist shrines were 'massively destroyed' by Brahmanical rulers: Historian DN Jha

Nalanda mahavihara By Our Representative Prominent historian DN Jha, an expert in India's ancient and medieval past, in his new book , "Against the Grain: Notes on Identity, Intolerance and History", in a sharp critique of "Hindutva ideologues", who look at the ancient period of Indian history as "a golden age marked by social harmony, devoid of any religious violence", has said, "Demolition and desecration of rival religious establishments, and the appropriation of their idols, was not uncommon in India before the advent of Islam".

Examples of support to Hindu temples, scriptures, saints by 'Muslim' rulers galore

Siya Ram coin issued by Akbar By Bharat Dogra* At a time when the country as well as the world are passing through very difficult times leading to more urgent need for strengthening national unity for meeting several big challenges ahead, unfortunately disputes relating to religious places have been allowed to raise their ugly head once again. It is well-realized by now by many people that it is not historical facts but narrow considerations of political gain and spreading of fanatic ideas of intolerance which are behind such mischief, but due to the increasing threat of mob violence and patronage available at higher levels to groups spreading intolerance many people are reluctant to openly and fearlessly express their views. Hence there is urgent need for broad-based peace committees with wider social support to spread the message of communal harmony and to appeal against the dangers of spreading false messages regarding places of worship which can ultimate

Gyanvapi case: Use of 'illegal' lawfare to keep the communal pot simmering

By Venkatesh Narayanan, Bobby Ramakant, Manoj Sarang* With a steady drumbeat of bad news for the lives of ordinary citizens -- inflation at a multi-year high , rupee at an all-time low , negative job creation and when all forward indicators as seen by industry leaders point to recessionary clouds on the horizon , what’s a serially-incompetent government to do? Dust out their time-tested-citizen-distraction playbook. The Gyanvapi-Masjid case is all of this -- as a weapon of mass distraction. This zeitgeist of our times is best captured by a recent opinion piece : "The idea is to keep the pot on a perpetual boil, simmering at the top, whirling feverishly beneath. A restless society forever living precariously on the precipice arouses distrst, uneasiness, fear and discomfort, That is a toxic panoply for manufacturing rage, which can then be effortlessly mobilized at short notice. BJP is creating an eco-system of real-time instant delivery of hate-mongers. That is how we are sudde

Targeting mosques, churches: 'Roadmap' for 2025, RSS' centenary year?

416 years old Our Lady of Health Church, Sancoale, Goa By Fr Cedric Prakash SJ* Fascists use manipulative strategies aimed at whipping up sympathy and support from the majority community, to which they normally ‘belong’. They do so in a variety of insidious and subtle ways. In the past few months, they have gone overboard in their efforts to denigrate and demonize minorities in India, particularly Muslims and Christians. They have spewed hate and divisiveness through their venomous speeches; incited people to violence and have effectively used officialdom to further their vested interests. The results are there for all to see: greater polarisation of the majority community in a country which prided itself for its pluralism and diversity. Their meticulously planned agenda is in order to gain absolute power of the country in the 2024 national elections. More so it is also a roadmap towards 2025 when the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) will complete one hundred years of its existence.

This varsity succumbed to extra-academic mobocracy, 'ignored' Hindutva archives

By Shamsul Islam* Open letter to Sharda University vice-chancellor Sub: Discarding a Question on Linkages of Hindutva with Nazism/Fascism is blatant Academic Dishonesty! Dear Professor Sibaram Khara Saheb, Namaskaar! According to your esteemed University’s portal: “The name of University, 'Sharda' is synonymous to 'Goddess of knowledge and learning-Saraswati'. She is identified with 'veena', an Indian musical instrument and the ‘lotus’, where she resides. The lotus in our logo symbolizes the seat of learning that the University is created for. "Variety of colours signify the variety of disciplines the university offers and the overlap between petals creating new colours demonstrate the ethos of collaboration between students and teachers of different programme, nationality, creed and colour working towards creating new knowledge…the University's cherished mission to provide education beyond boundaries and to facilitate the students and faculty to achie

Whither climate goal? Increasing reliance on coal 'likely to worsen' India's power crisis

By Shankar Sharma* Recent news articles, How to shock-proof India’s power sector and Power minister points finger at states for worsening electricity crisis , have highlighted a few current problems for the ongoing power sector issues as in April 2022. However, there is a lot more to it than a few temporary solutions as indicated in the articles. It should also be emphasised that it is techno-economically impossible to completely shock-proof a highly complex and geographically wide-spread vast power network, such as the one in India, which is only getting more and more complex with the passage of each year due to some irrational policies/ practices in the sector. A business-as-usual (BAU) scenario, wherein more and more of conventional technology power plants, including coal power plants, will be added in the near future, will also necessitate the increased complexity in the integrated national grid, and as a result the instances of power shortage/ disruptions can only escalate for

Swami Vivekananda's views on caste and sexuality were 'painfully' regressive

By Bhaskar Sur* Swami Vivekananda now belongs more to the modern Hindu mythology than reality. It makes a daunting job to discover the real human being who knew unemployment, humiliation of losing a teaching job for 'incompetence', longed in vain for the bliss of a happy conjugal life only to suffer the consequent frustration.

A former Modi ally, Prashant Kishor wanted to enter Congress 'on contract, as trader'

By Anand Sahay* The Congress Party and the election campaigns specialist Prashant Kishor, whose company has done strategic communications for a host of political parties across ideology, should both count themselves lucky that they could not reach an agreement for Kishor to join the party. News reports suggest that the Congress rejected Kishor’s terms. This is not wholly unexpected. People join a party because they are attracted to it, and wish to serve it in any capacity that the party may see fit. But that isn’t Kishor at all. He gave the impression of entering into a contract, as a trader might. If news reports are to be believed, he sought freedom to report directly to party chief Sonia Gandhi, and sought untrammeled control over party communications. When such ideas did not find favour, the consultant withdrew. It is clear he has no particular love for the Congress, and its ideas, ideology and politics. In contrast, look at the key personae in G-23. They

Govt of India 'compromising' on mandate to regulate gene technologies, protect nature

Counterview Desk In a letter sent to the Union Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEFCC) and other related ministries and departments, the Coalition for a GM-Free India has raised "serious concern" over the guidelines notified for Genome Edited Organisms, in which major exemptions from regulations have been offered to certain categories of Genome Edited Organisms/Plants and products. A letter signed by Sridhar Radhakrishnan and Kapil Shah, co-convenors of the NGO network, addressed to Union Minister for Environment, Forest & Climate Change Bhupender Yadav, said, the Office Memorandum, dated May 17, 2022 of the Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science & Technology about Safety Assessment Guidelines, which follows the Office Memorandum dated March 30, 2022 of the MoEFCC, said, the move "essentially amounts to entry of risky GMOs through the backdoor. Text : Coalition for a GM-Free India is a national volunteer-driven platform of hundre

A Marxian trend that queries undemocratic customs and traditions of capitalism

By Bhabani Shankar Nayak* A very well-meaning comrade called me a pluriversal Marxist with a wild smile full of English irony, while chairing my book release function in the Marx Memorial Library, London. I dedicate this piece to her… There is no other philosopher who is more abused and misunderstood like Marx. There is no other philosophy like Marxism which is more demonised on a regular basis. The mindless vilification campaign against Marx and Marxism continues without any form of reason. The propaganda and portrayal of Marxism as a devilish doctrine signify its importance as a philosophy of human emancipation from the very forces who demonise it. Marxism is a philosophy of praxis which helps us to understand the centrality of creative power of labour in producing socially meaningful value. It helps us to analyse the laws governing production, distribution, consumption, exchange, market, profit, pricing and private property in the development of class-based society. As a humanist p

Counterview

Search This Blog