Bureaucrats & Technocrats have Ruined Bihar

Bureaucrats and technocrats have ruined Bihar. It appears to be beyond repair especially in a system where only politicians are held accountable every five year. The mess in Kosi basin illustrates it. The urban planning, public transport, education system, health system and criminal infested justice system in the state reveals the colossal failure of the bureaucracy and technocracy. There are 25 lakh power connections in Bihar, but only 15,000 are for industries. Out of these, 12,500 are for small-scale industries. And out of 2,500 non-SSI units half are closed, says K P S Kesri, former president, Bihar Indusries Association.

Notwithstanding a 52.76% increase in tourist inflow in 2008-09 from 2004-05, the percentage of tourists availing the company’s accommodation facilities remained quite low in the range of 0.43-0.51% for domestic tourists and 0.60-3.73% for foreign tourists.

In such a backdrop, Bihar Vidhan Sabha witnessed massive uproar and demonstration in its last session prior to this year's October election on the report of the Comptroller and Auditor-General of India (CAG), which found discrepancies of over Rs 11,000 crore by the Bihar government, had stated the expenses incurred were “not in tune with the spirit of formation of contingency funds... provided (under) the Constitution.”

Patna high court has ordered a CBI probe against chief minister Nitish Kumar, deputy chief minister Sushil Kumar Modi and health minister Nand Kishore Yadav, among others on the basis of this report.

The court noted that “on several occasions, expenditure incurred were not to meet unforeseen and emergent expenditure, but for pay and allowances, TA, LTC, office expenses, purchase of vehicles, etc”.

The report adds: “These were not in tune with the spirit of formation of contingency fund provided in the Constitution.” The departments which have the biggest amounts yet to be accounted for include rural development, health and education. The Bihar government has now directed all drawing and disbursing officers (DDOs) from each and every department to deposit all the detailed contingency (DC) bills to the office of Bihar’s accountant-general in Patna.

The total number of pending bills, according to the CAG report, is 46,809. The report states: “Rules were disregarded by the DDOs and circle officers.”

It adds, “Scrutiny of records revealed that out of total withdrawals of Rs 11,924.44 crore on advance contingency bills, detailed contingency bills for only Rs 511.90 crores were submitted to the accountant-general in Patna, and no DC bills for the remaining amount of Rs 11,412.51 crores during the years 2002-03 to 2007-08 were submitted.”

CAG has criticized Bihar government for “failing” to tap its tourism potential due to a lack of planning and professional approach. In its latest report, the CAG pointed out that the Bihar State Tourism Development Corporation Limited (BSTDC) failed to meet the challenges despite immense tourist potential. It recommended the formation of a state tourism policy and the preparation of a long-term perspective with clear targets.

“Though tourism is recognised as an industry, the government has not laid down any tourism policy for the state,” the CAG report tabled in the Bihar Vidhan Sabha.

Despite a 52.76% increase in tourist inflow in 2008-09 from 2004-05, the percentage of tourists availing the company’s accommodation facilities remained abysmally low in the range of 0.43-0.51% for domestic tourists and 0.60-3.73% for foreign tourists.
Efforts should be made to infuse professionalism in management with a view to provide qualitative services, CAG report said.

It also advised the state to undertake serious efforts to improve the process involved in planning and execution of infrastructure projects with an aim to avoid procedural delays and complete the projects in due time. The report said that the targeted occupancy level of 60% could not be achieved in almost all the hotels between 2004-05 and 2008-09.

The occupancy target was never reviewed by the board and further non-achievement of the minimum targeted occupancy levels resulted in a potential loss of revenue of Rs5.15 crore in 2004-09, the CAG report reveals.

The corporation receives fund from the ministry of tourism, Centre and the state government for development of infrastructure.

The utilisation percentage of available funds ranged between a dismal 1.34% and 23.52%, it said. Despite availability of funds, the company failed to commence projects.

October 2010 State Elections on the anvil

Bihar Assembly passed three bills on March 29, 2010. Bihar Agriculture (Amendment) Bill 2010 for opening a new Agriculture University at Sabaur in Bhagalpur district, Registration (Bihar Amendment) 2010 and Bihar Finance Bill, 2010 has been cleared.

While power is one of the most key requirements for industrial investment and per capita power consumption remains the lowest in Bihar (76 units compared to 612 units for all-India (2005 figure)), the power struggle for Bihar assembly election 2010 has commenced. The election is due in October 2010. Only 10.3% houses are electrified in Bihar as against the national proportion of 55.8%.

Even as the election draws nearer, the JD(U) has raised the issue of special state category status to Bihar for ensuring its all-round development. There is no denying the fact that there is merit in the demand for special state category status but all through the tenure of the JD (U)led government there wasn't much effort made to press for the same. The resolution to launch the campaign was adopted at a state council meeting attended by Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and state party chief Vijay Kumar Choudhary.

The ruling JD(U) also resolved to wage a struggle against the Centre for its "gross injustice" being meted out to the state in providing central assistance and clearance of projects for manufacturing ethanol out of sugarcane juice, hindering the progress of the state to a great extent. The meeting also criticised the Centre for not giving coal linkages for setting up thermal power plants in Bihar.

As per new CII-KPMG study, Bihar's Educational Development Index (EDI) remains the lowest in the country.

At a recent meeting of Bihar Chamber of Commerce (BCC) and the state’s top police officers in Patna, the Economic Times reported that instead of law and order Patna’s worsening traffic situation was discussed unlike five years ago.

OP Shah, a former chief of BCC, is today a franchisee partner in Bihar for Hindustan Unilever (HUL). Shah says he wouldn’t have taken up this partnership and opened a Rs 30-crore detergent plant in Hajipur if it was not for the restoration of law and order. HUL was scouting for a local entrepreneur for a detergent plant in Bihar since 1993.

Chief minister Nitish Kumar says that statistics on his side. In December 2009, Bihar topped the chart for cement consumption in the country with an annual growth of 36%.

The state economic survey shows that the construction sector grew by 83.58% in 2006-07 and 43.85% in 2008-09.

The new infrastructure being built, including roads, bridges and other public works, contributed 13.4% of the state GDP against 4.2% in 2003-04.

Truck sales grew by 150% in the seven months till October 2009 on a Y-o-Y basis.

Bihar government finally rescinded the contract with Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) for reopening the closed sugar mill at Motipur in Muzaffarpur district. This was announced in the state assembly by Gautam Singh, the Industry Minister. RIL was awarded the contract for reopening the sugar mill through competitive bidding. RIL deposited 10 per cent of the bid amount and the state government later issued a letter of intent to it. The repeated requests of the state government to RIL for starting the work failed to yield any response. Singh said that the government had cancelled the contract and would be floating fresh tenders for reopening of the mill. The state government had acquired 266 acre land for the Motipur sugar mill.

It has been reported that Reliance is not the first industry to back out from Bihar. Solanika Tractors, Gujarat Ambuja and several other industries came and went without making any investment.
Some say it is because of law and order situation requires further improvement.

Nitish Kumar had promised to carry out land reforms. In pursuance of the same he set up a Land Reforms Commission (LRC) under the Chairmanship of D. Bandyopadhyay. Bandyopadhyay is credited as a key architect of land reforms in West Bengal. The full report of the Commission was submitted to the Chief Minister in April 2008. The report was not made public.

When demands arose for immediate implementation of the Commission’s recommendations, another committee was set up to study the recommendations of the Commission.

The Commission has recommended “assignment of at least 10 decimals of land to shelter less household of 5.84 lac non-farm rural workers each who are in the state of semi-bondedness as they live on the land of other landowners”. But the government informed the Bihar Assembly that the government, only 3 decimal plots is being planned for the shelter-less people.

Ninty percent of the state’s population lives in villages and 74% workforce employed in agriculture. Agriculture accounts for only 33% of the state’s domestic product.

Marginal and small farmers constitute some 96.5% of total landowners own about 66% of the total land while medium and large farmers constituting only 3.5% of the landowning community own roughly 33% of the total land.

As per NSSO figures, the LRC report points to a reverse trend of land concentration: between 1992 and 2003, the proportion of large landowners has gone down from 0.2 per cent to 0.1 per cent, yet their share in total land area has increased from 4.44 per cent to 4.63 per cent over the same period!

The proportion of the landless or the near landless among the rural poor is steadily increasing – from 67% in 1993-94 to 75% by the turn of the century.

Between 1991 and 2001, outmigration from Bihar increased by over 200 per cent, whereas the average increase for all the Indian states stood at just 21.5 per cent.

Between 1991-92 and 1995-96, agriculture in Bihar grew at the negative rate of (-)2 per cent per annum, followed by a very sluggish 0.8 per cent rate of annual recovery for the next six years (when nationally agriculture grew at 3% per annum).

Inspite of “perhaps the most fertile soil in the world and copious water resources”, LRC finds it “evident that there is a structural bottleneck in Bihar agriculture due to a very queer pattern of land ownership and very extortionate system of tenancy at will which are causing great impediment to accelerated rate of agricultural growth.”

“As a predominantly agricultural state, Bihar would have no option but to take to effective land reforms to burst asunder the fetters and shackles which had been preventing its many splendoured advancement,” notes the LRC report.

The key recommendations of the LRC are threefold:

(i) to do away with the present system of classification of land into six categories with ceilings varying from 15 acres to 45 acres and enforce the uniform ceiling of 15 acres for all kinds of land,

(ii) to allot between 1 acre and 0.66 acre of ceiling surplus land to the lowest quintile of agricultural labourers consisting of 16.68 lac household each and assignment of at least 10 decimals of land to shelter less household of 5.84 lac non-farm rural workers each,

(iii) to enact a Bataidari Act to ensure secure and heritable right of cultivation to all tenants/share-croppers with 60% share of the produce (if the landowner bears the cost of production) or 70 to 75 per cent of the produce (if the bataidar bears the cost of production).

Land reforms are required and is possible provided villagers of all ilk are made aware of the full report and its implications. Following which the valid concerns of the affected land owners can be addressed as well. Currently, an atmosphere is being created without the perusal of the report as if all hell will break loose if Commission's recommendations are implemented.

Diverse Colours of Bihar by-elections

Counting for the seven seats in Bihar will be taken up on September 17 as by-elections for some other seats are to be held in Bihar on September 15. In Bihar, elections were held in Bochaha (SC), Aurai, Kalyanpur, Warisnagar (SC), Ramgarh, Chainpur and Chenari (SC).

On September 15, Assembly by-elections will be held for the Bagaha (SC), Nautan, Begusarai, Tribeniganj, Simri–Bakhtiarpur, Araria, Dhuraiya (SC), Munger, Phulwari (SC), Ghosi and Bodh Gaya (SC) seats.

Of the 15 candidates facing murder and attempt to murder cases in all, 13 are contesting from Bihar alone.

In fact, the highest number of candidates with criminal background - 7 — is in the fray from Begusarai in Bihar followed by six such candidates in Nautan, also in Bihar.

Congress is going it alone in the assembly by-elections to 18 seats in Bihar keeping an equidistant from both RJD-LJP alliance and the NDA. Congress is attempting to revive itself in Bihar under the tutelage of Jagdish Tytler and Sachin Pilot.

Congress has lined up several national leaders for campaigning in the 18 seats in two phases - on September 10 and 15.

While Lalu Prasad-led RJD is contesting 13 seats, Ramvilas Paswan's LJP has fielded nominees on five seats in the state.

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar has accused the Congress ministers at the Centre of misusing official position for political purposes. "The ministers are misusing official position for the sake of politics," he said.

Referring to Union Rural Development Minister C P Joshi's charge that the state failed to utilise Rs 8,000 crore fund allocated by the Centre under various development schemes, Nitish said, "I have no complaint against Joshi...But political platform should not be used for the purpose of electoral politics...It is improper to use official position at the time of elections.

This war of words between a minority government led by Congress at the Centre and a majority government in the state reveals the nature of mandate which is generally not discussed these days.

Nitish Kumar’s decision not to field the kin of elected party MPs in the bypolls is being appreciated by the rank and file of the JD(U). This has upset at least one of the newly-elected JD(U) MPs from Gopalganj (SC), Purnamasi Ram, who has fielded his son Ajay Kumar Ram on the RJD symbol from Bagaha (SC). The Bagaha seat was earlier represented by Purnamasi Ram, who on being elected from the Gopalganj (SC) Lok Sabha constituency, relinquished his Assembly seat.

State Congress president Anil Kumar Sharma has criticized JD(U)'s General Secretary, Shivanand Tiwari for holding the Congress responsible for the bifurcation of Bihar. He said that it was the BJP and power-hungry leaders of the RJD who were responsible for it. He said that the RJD had joined hands with the JMM because it ran a minority government in Bihar and it was instrumental in passing a resolution by the Bihar assembly recommending creation of Jharkhand.

Political parties have fielded several tainted candidates for the assembly by-elections in Bihar. Analysis of the data gathered for a National Election Watch study shows that Bihar also leads others in the final tally, with 36 per cent (45 out of 123) of its candidates for the September 10 and 15 assembly byelections facing criminal charges.

The study of the affidavits of 202 of the 329 contestants in the fray in all states has revealed 64 candidates with self-declared criminal cases pending against them.

Indian National Congress has given maximum tickets to tainted candidates for the coming byelections. Of its 31 contestants, 13 (42 per cent) are facing criminal charges. Lalu Prasad Yadav’s RJD comes a close second, having given tickets to 9 tainted persons out of 12 it had fielded.

BJP and JDU have fielded five tainted candidates each, making up 29.41 per cent and 45.45 per cent of the total.

On the front of fielding candidates with serious criminal charges, Congress leads the pack with six, followed by RJD and JDU at 4 each; CPI at 3, NCP, Lok Janshakti Party and CPM at two each.

Earlier, Hulas Pandey, younger brother of JD (U) suspended MLA and strong man Sunil Pandey, surrendered to the Patna police on 24 July, 2009 on the Bihar legislature premises soon after he took his oath.

A team of policemen was already deputed there to arrest him. Soon after courting arrest, in a reply to a question by the media that whom he considered his leader, he said it was known to every one ‘who was my leader.’ Hulas has been wanted in dozens of criminal cases including murder and kidnapping for ransom.

His name figured in a murder related case in 2003 in which he was made prime accused and the police believed Sunil as a conspirator along with him in the case.

Soon after he came out of the House, police took him in custody and produced him before the court concerned which remanded him to judicial custody.

Hulas is a named accused in the kidnapping of Patna-based neurosurgeon Ramesh Chandra in 2004 and for kidnapping a doctor from Muzaffarpur in north Bihar.

Hulas has become a member of the state legislative council after winning the recently concluded council polls. He is an Independent member. He defeated JDU's official candidate Bisheshar Ojha (a close relative of Munni Devi Ojha, Shahpur's BJP MLA)in the fray. It has been speculated that this BJP MLA supported the candidature of Hulas Pandey.

Bihar preparing for October 2010 Assembly elections

In the post-Mandal era, Lalu Prasad seems to have been replaced for good in Bihar. JDU led Bihar government has geared up for the upcoming assembly election due in October/November 2010.

The 42 months rule of JDU led government appears uneasy in its relationship but it needs the 55 MLAs to keep his government afloat. With another 18 months left in its five year tenure, the government has approved a Rs 815 crore ambitious project for Mahadalits (a separate category for 18 sub-castes of dalits). The steps taken for empowerment of extremely backward castes (EBCs), Mahadalits and minorities benefited Nitish led government in the Lok Sabha elections.

His focus on Pansmanda Musalaman (i.e. backward Muslim community) is also quite strategic in dividing the Muslim vote banks like he has divided Dalits and Hindus. Reopening of Bhagalpur riots also is aimed at the same.

He has got Ali anwar and Dr Ezaj Ali sent to Rajya sabha as well as a crucial signal to the Muslim community.

Nitish Kumar is seeking special category status for Bihar and has made it a huge public issue.

Ram Sundar Das, a former chief minister joined the JDU just before the Lok Sabha elections. He defeated Ram Vilas Paswan who had retained Hazipur seat in eight elections. Das had lost the chief minister’s job to Lalu Prasad Yadav in 1990. Janata Dal had won the most seats in Bihar Assembly. Lalu Prasad ruled Bihar for 15-year until Nitish led coalition defeated him 2005.

In the recently held Lok Sabha elections Ranjan Prasad Yadav of JDU defeated Lalu Yadav.

Nitish Kumar has focused on the EBCs (includes many poorest sub-castes), which account for over 20 percent of Bihar’s eight crore people. He has introduced a 20- percent reservation for them in village panchayats.

Meira Kumar: New Speaker or Bihar's future Chief Minister?

Sonia Gandhi's choice of Meira Kumar, daughter Jagjivan Ram, the former Deputy Prime Minister who had to walk out of Congress is meant to send a clear signal to Dalits across the country.

L K Advani, Mulayam Singh Yadav, Lalu Yadav recalled Jagjivan Ram's rift with the Congress party while claiming him to be their own. BSP was part of the chorus welcoming Kumar's ascension to the top chair. For BSP, likes of Jagjivan Ram has been the ‘co-opted’ used by Congress against Ambedkar.

Kumar has defeated both Mayawati and Ramvilas Paswan in the 1985 Bijnore by-election.

Bihar politics was yet again played out in LS, with JD(U) president Sharad Yadav and his bete-noire Lalu Prasad using the inauguration of Speaker Meira Kumar to settle scores with each other.

The newly-elected Speaker, who, like the other two leaders, too hails from Bihar, however, made a timely intervention, preventing the scene from getting uglier. She was constrained to issue her first directive as Lok Sabha Speaker soon after when she asked the House reporters to expunge parts of the exchanges between the two Yadav satraps. Meira Kumar is a Congress MP from Sasaram, Bihar.

Trouble arose when the former railway minister, in his speech welcoming Ms Kumar's election as Lok Sabha Speaker, deviated from the standard practice of hailing her elevation, and said her anointment on the post should not be seen as a mere tokenism.

RJD chief recalled the role of her predecessor Somnath Chatterjee, saying he had shown how a Speaker should be above party-affiliations. When the issue of nuclear deal arose, Chatterjee, he said, took a stand "which went against the Left parties. But he did not budge. A similar situation may arise before you and you will have to take tough decisions".

He sought to caution Speaker against the Opposition’s real gameplan. "All leaders have promised Speaker that they would cooperate in smooth running of the House. But I have my doubts whether these promises will be kept," Lalu Prasad said in his usual tongue-in-cheek style, evoking laughter from a section of the members.

What invited Sharad Yadav's interruption was his charge that the NDA government, when it was in power at the Centre, had refused to approve welfare schemes initiated by the then RJD government in Bihar for the welfare of SC/STs.

The JD(U) leader, at this juncture, sought to remind him that this was not the occasion to play politics. When interrupted again after some time, the RJD leader retorted by saying that Parliament was the platform from which politics was generally played out.

"We've come here to do politics. You may do Hari-Bhajan if you like," Lalu Prasad retorted as other members watched silently. Rather than joining issues with the irrepressible RJD leader, Sharad Yadav opted to remain silent after this. The newly elected Speaker later ordered portions of the exchange between the two Bihar leaders to be expunged.

Grapevine from Congress sources suggest that Meira Kumar would be the Chief Ministerial candidate in the next Bihar assembly elections. Isn't her refusal to resign from the membership of Congress Party even after assuming Speaker's chair pregnant with some such meaning?

Highlights of Bihar's Economic Survey

The Bihar government carried out an economic survey for the year 2008-09. The report of this survey was published in Feb 2009. It provides some interesting highlights of the economy in Bihar.

Some highlights:

1. Out of the entire Bihar population 89.5% stay in the rural areas

2. Population density is 880

3. Sex ratio is 919 girls to 1000 boys with Siwan having the best ratio of 1031 girls to every 1000 boys and Munger having the worst ratio of 872 girls per 1000 boys. Patna follows close behind with 873 girls to 1000 boys. (However the high ratios in Siwan is most likely due to emigration of the male population to other
states in India in search of work)

4. Gross enrollment of students from Bihar in higher education is 6.7% compared to the India average of 9.2%. While the male enrollment is better the female enrollment is only 3.5% against India average of 7.7%

5. Bihar has a very low density of higher education institutions. For e.g. Bihar has only 7 engineering colleges (with no new applications for engineering colleges pending). Compare this with 292 engineering colleges in Andhra Pradesh (with applications for 113 new colleges pending) and 286 engineering colleges in Tamil Nadu (with applications for 53 new colleges pending). Even UP has 125 engineering colleges with 43 new applications pending.

6. Reduced crime rate: As per the report there were 117.9 crimes per lakh of population for the year 2007 which is below the national average of 175.10. This placed Bihar at the 28th rank for crime with Pondicherry having the highest crime rate of 475.4 crimes per lakh population and Nagaland having the lowest crime rate of 54.4 crimes per lakh population. Source: World Bihari Forum

Bihar Assembly seeks special category status for Bihar

Does anyone have the text of the Bihar Assembly's unanimous resolution demanding special category status to Biahr? It was passed on April 4, 2006.

One must admit that the report/book titled "Special Category Status: A Case for Bihar" makes a compelling case for special category status to Bihar.

There is statistical evidence to show that Bihar did not become backward, it was made backward. There has been a deliberate effort that in terms of economic and social indicators of development, Bihar remains below all-India averages in most respects of human development.

Raekha Prasad reporting in May 2006 for The Guardian from Khagaul, her father's home town wrote, "The state of Bihar contradicts modern India's optimistic vision of itself। "Bihar" has become an expletive, a butt of derogatory jokes made by people in certain metropolitan circles who have never visited the place। Underlying the ridicule is a potent fear in the minds of many Indians that Bihar is a template of what this ascendant economic power could yet become. For India's burgeoning middle classes, Bihar is a byword for everything they most fear: feudal and caste cruelty, criminalised politics and grinding poverty." Backwardness of the state is at the root of the crisis that has been underlined.

While special category status to Bihar merits attention, does anyone know about the fate of the Bihar's Common School System Commission that had submitted its 313-page report in June 2007 calling “for a legislation underpinning the Common School System.” If this is done Bihar can show the right path especially with regard to education to the whole country. Has Bihar Government acted on its recommendation?