Dear men-who-matter,
India, as I am sure
you have now read, ranks 97th on the latest Global Hunger Index
published last week. Such top-line data
is provided by rather dubious organisations like the International Food Policy
Research Institute, with the obsessive intention of shaming us; never forget
that there are many envious folks who have looked at our GDP growth with increasing
despondency.
We are celebrating the
25th year of Economic Independence (liberalisation, privatisation
and globalisation, as the new wave was called), that has unleashed
entrepreneurial magic, created Gurgaon (though we do apologise for that) and
propelled the Sensex to twenty seven thousand (and counting). Our per capital GDP has grown from $324 to
$5730 and, among other accomplishments, we are now the diabetic capital of the
World.
It is critical therefore
that we ignore the myopic presentation by the IFPRI, sieve through this data
carefully and arrive at fair conclusions.
In other words, we must look at the resplendent bright side. So, here goes:
a)
There are
21 countries whose hunger is worse off than ours.
b)
One of
them is Pakistan.
c)
Liberia,
our biggest competitor for world market share in software services and business
outsourcing, is slightly behind us as well.
d)
Zambia,
which also got independence from England, though later, should have done much
better than us, because it is a smaller country. Their Hunger Index is 39 and we must cheer
that we are at 28.5 (the bigger the number, the worse the hunger), though we were about the same when liberalisation set off
in 1992.
e)
Mali, with
a GDP per capita (income per head per year) of about $2300 – which is less than
half of India’s – is only slightly better than us in hunger, not significantly better. Given that they have just waged a nasty war
with extremists, many hungry people must have died which improved the average,
else they’d be behind us.
f) The People’s
Democratic Republic of Laos – which is, in reality, neither democratic nor a
republic – has the same ratio of Hunger to GDP per capita, which should give us
much cause to cheer, because, you see, we are both a functioning republic and a
democracy. Our country is one where you
have unrestricted freedom to go hungry.
g) Rwanda has
(percentage-wise) fewer hungry people, but don’t look down on India. Our GDP is over three times theirs. We should focus on GDP per capita, not on
hungry people. Also, remember that we
belong to the BRICs trading block, while Rwanda can only have modest dreams of, at best, exporting feathers to South Africa. Another oft-forgetten point: we have a 5000-year old culture that has
included a form of hunger in it called fasting.
More people fast in India than go hungry in Rwanda and these things
matter – they add to the Hunger Index.
h)
You should
be relieved to hear that, despite the best efforts of DreamWorks, Madagascar’s
hunger situation is alarming. So is the
hunger in Zambia and Chad. Yes, don’t
forget Chad and thank your stars that you live in a country like ours which has
only 28.5 points stacked up on the Hunger Index. The only thing good about Chad is that it isn’t
Zimbabwe.
i)
So what if
Tunisia is only 5.5 on the Hunger Index; it’s a really dangerous country to
live in and you could die of other reasons than hunger (Travel Mortality Score
of 61.5). Likewise for Ukraine, that
just got part taken-over by Russia. In India, we are much safer and many only die
of hunger.
j)
Data
released by the Thai Rice Exporters Association suggests that India has beaten
Thailand to become the largest exporter of rice in the world. According to the
reports, India has exported 10.23 million tons of rice in the year 2015 as
compared to Thailand's 9.8 million tons. In terms of imports, China remains the
number one importer of rice. As
China scores only 7.7 on the Hunger Index, India has done much, no doubt, to
ameliorate hunger in that deprived country.
Other countries we have hugely helped are Nigeria, Iran, Malaysia and
some in the Middle East, all of which rank better than us in the Hunger Index.
k)
Djibouti –
which country's name we should all learn to pronounce correctly and learn more about, as it is one of our largest competitors
in laundering money – is much worse off as far as hunger goes, I am pleased to
report. They speak French there and are
not very good at cricket or kabaddi, and therefore, will stay behind us for a
while to come.
l)
At least
two countries that play cricket are worse off than us – Pakistan and Zimbabwe –
and, while, in the others, hunger is less prevalent, their Cricket Boards have
much less money than ours, which is something we should be deeply proud of.
m)
Mukesh
Ambani, who has been named India's richest person for the ninth year in a row
with a sharp increase in net worth to $22.7 billion, has a fortune that is equal
to Estonia's GDP, says Forbes India. Estonia scores less than 5 on the
Hunger Index, but that is pathetic in comparison to Mr Ambani – he scores 0 on
the Hunger Index. And, that is again something, we should all be proud of, but why does no one focus on these things and go on and on about hunger?
n)
We have
set one record that no international organisation - damn them - gives us any
credit for : as per the response of the Food Corporation of India to a request
for information, at least 1,94,502 metric tonnes of food grain was wasted in
India due to various reasons between 2005 and March 2013.
o)
We must
also be deeply respectful of the ability of the FCI’s bean-counters to keep
detailed information – down to the last tonne - of such wastage. Our records of people who have died of hunger
are sketchy and exaggerated though – the Iron Lady from Bengal is absolutely
certain that no tea garden worker in the closed gardens of North Bengal has
died of hunger or malnutrition. And,
since the Iron Lady is always right, those who recorded such data –
journalists, fact-finding missions and others –are liars, with mendacity bordering
on the criminal.
p) India has also engendered the most extensive body of original research on hunger, which has resulted in the most books published anywhere on the subject. Books such as "Hunger and Famine in Kalahandi: An Anthropological Study". Such research has provided valuable employment to a number of doctoral students.
If you are reading this, the chances are you do not know anyone who has
died of hunger. No one who has a Linked-in
or Facebook account in India has died of hunger as well. So, should we not wonder at IFPRI’s objective
in publishing this stuff?
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.