NEW DELHI – Eminent economist Amartya Sen said that despite being thefastest-growing economy the country has taken a “quantum jump in the wrongdirection” since 2014.
He also said that due to moving backwards, the country is now second worstin the region.
“Things have gone pretty badly wrong… It has taken a quantum jump in thewrong direction since 2014. We are getting backwards in the fastest-growingeconomy,” Mr Sen said.
Twenty years ago, he added, of the six countries in this region — India,Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan, India was the secondbest after Sri Lanka. “Now, it is the second worst. Pakistan has managed toshield us from being the worst.”
The Nobel laureate was speaking in Delhi at the launch of ‘Bharat Aur UskeVirodhabhas’, the Hindi edition of his book ‘An Uncertain Glory: India andits Contradiction’ that he co-authored with development economist JeanDreze.
The economist said that the government has also deflected from issues ofinequalities, the caste system and the schedules tribes have been kept out.
There were a whole group of people, those who clean lavatories or sewagewith their hands, he said, whose demands and needs has been neglected.
While highlighting the recent report of a Dalit youth who was whipped forasking a salary hike from the manager of a petrol pump in Madhya Pradesh,he said they (dalit) are going around without any kind of certainty abouttheir next meal, healthcare or education.
Taking a dig at the BJP-led government, he added that during freedomstruggle it was difficult to see that a political battle could be won byplaying up the Hindu identity, but that has changed now.
“But, that has happened. Which is why, at this time, the whole issue ofOpposition unity is so important,” the 84-year-old economist said.
“It is not a battle of one entity against the other (or) Mr Modi against MrRahul Gandhi, it is an issue of what India is,” Mr Sen added
Also speaking at the event, development economist and activist Jean Drezetermed the soon-to-be launched Ayushmann Bharat health scheme a “hoax” asit was actually not big as it was being claimed to be.
“The budget (for the scheme) for this year is 2,000 crore. Even if it isspent, it’s less than 20 rupees per person,” he said.
It is projected as health insurance for 50 crore people, but it isvirtually nothing, said Mr Dreze, who helped draft the first version of theMahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGA).