Right to food for one-fourth of India!

governance now mag, aug 1-15

Sonia’s dream legislation is now just an improved PDS scheme.

This is what the Congress manifesto of 2009 said about the right to food: “The Indian National Congress pledges to enact a Right to Food law that guarantees access to sufficient food for all people, particularly the most vulnerable sections of society.” This then found mention in president Pratibha Patil’s address to the joint session of parliament.

One year down the line, that promise stands substantially diluted.
The high-profile National Advisory Council headed by all-powerful Congress president Sonia Gandhi decided on July 14 that this right will be restricted to only one-fourth of the “most disadvantaged districts or blocks” who will get 35 kg of food grains a month at Rs 3 a kg--an improvement from 25 kg at Rs 3 a kg that the Congress manifesto had promised.

In rest of the country, everyone will be entitled to 25 kg of grain and the socially vulnerable groups will get 35 kg at Rs 3 a kg, until 35 kg entitlement is universalised on some future date.

But the key lies in another decision taken that day which said, “There would also be a category that would be excluded based on transparent and verifiable criteria”. Now how many people would be excluded and on what criteria has not been decided yet. There are apprehensions that this exclusion would extend to the one-fourth districts/blocks which will have universal entitlement.

That is because the NAC has succumbed to the pressures from the ministries of finance, consumer affairs, food and public distribution, planning commission and the eGoM headed by Pranab Mukherjee—all involved in working out the right to food law.

Procurement, not production
These ministries and the planning commission in particular made a big hue and cry over the “availability” of food --which was taken to be 50-55 million tonnes--to restrict the amount of food grains to be made available under the right to food law. Planning commission also raised several other questions (see the box in the previous page). It simply didn’t occur to anyone that the “availability” figure is actually the amount of annual “procurement” of food grains, and not “production” of food grains. Our production is at least four times more than procurement--it was 234.47 million tonnes last year and is expected to be a bit lower at 218.20 million tonnes this year.

Why did NAC (and all others) rely on “procurement” rather than “production” and made it seem that the grain availability is not sufficient for universal entitlement?
Abhijit Sen, a key planning commission member involved with the exercise (though not in NAC’s deliberations) says: “At the moment, the assumption everyone is working with is our procurement of food grains is 50 to 55 million tonnes”. But why so? He explains: Expanding procurement has its consequences--a higher minimum support price assuming that all available grain is procured and need to pay more to get more), expansion of procurement centres and godowns and more people to manage all these; all of which means more money.

The issue of providing “nutrition” rather than just rice and wheat, also remains unaddressed. There is no mention of coarse grains popular with the poor, millets, pulses, oil and vegitables, let alone meat or fish.

NAC, though, says “comprehensive nutrition support schemes” will be initiated for vulnerable groups like, infants, pre-school children, school children, adolescent girls, pregnant women, street-children, homless, the aged and infirm, differentially-abled, those living with leprosy, TB and HIV/AIDS etc--alongwith community kitchens across the country.

But does it not reduce the right to food law to an improved version of the Antyodaya Anna Yojna?

No right in right to food
The right to food has to be, by definition, universal and is recognized as such by the Supreme Court (in the Shantistar Builders vs. Narayan Khimalal Totame in 1990). It is also inherent in the Directive Principles of State Policy (Article 47 says “the State shall regard the raising of the level of nutrition and the standard of living of its people..”)

Ironically, there is no “right” in the right to food law being prepared by the NAC. It is called the “National Food Security Bill”. Contrast this with the right to forest (The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act 2006) or the right to education (Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act 2009.

While one hopes that the NAC will consider these issues in its subsequent deliberations, it must keep in mind that a piecemeal approach won’t help. Food security calls for a holistic approach that will take care of food production, nutritional needs of the malnourished country and its distribution.