On The Budget

The Finance Minister has failed to address the serious concerns on the fast deteriorating economic situation in the country under the impact of the global economic crisis. Instead the Finance Minister has made tall and misleading claims about the performance of the UPA Government over the past four and a half years. While under the pressure from the Left Parties, the UPA Government had to undertake some steps in the interests of the working people, the UPA Government has neither succeeded in addressing the key issues affecting people like the agrarian crisis, price rise and unemployment nor has it met the crucial promises made in the NCMP like spending 6% of GDP on education, 2-3% of GDP on health or universalizing the PDS. Even the Supreme Court directive on the universalization of the ICDS has not been implemented by allocating adequate resources.

The Indian economy is currently witnessing a slowdown, with job cuts and unemployment on the rise. The claim of being the second fastest growing economy in the world will not provide any relief to the millions of workers in sectors like textiles and garments, gems and jewellery, leather, construction etc. who are losing their jobs. Farmers of crops like cotton, rubber, coffee etc. are also facing sharp price falls.

The Interim Budget, which is necessarily an account of expenditure and revenues more or less in keeping with the Revised Estimates of Budget 2008-09, has further exposed the inadequate response of the UPA Government to the severe impact of the global recession on the Indian economy. Plan expenditure of around Rs. 2.85 lakh crore, which is less than 5% of India’s GDP, amounts to an extremely weak fiscal stimulus. Compared to the fiscal stimulus plans being announced by countries across the world, this is extremely meagre. China’s fiscal stimulus package amounts to 7% of its GDP for two consecutive years. The UPA Government has spent only around Rs. 40000 crore as Plan expenditure over and above what was Budgeted last year, which is less than 1% of India’s GDP. In fact Capital Plan Expenditure is to fall by around Rs. 4500 crore in 2009-10 according to the Interim Budget. Cutting Capital Plan Expenditure and relying upon private investment through PPP projects to boost infrastructure investments is an erroneous strategy in the context of a recession.

The alarming Rs. 60,000 crore shortfall of tax revenue collection in 2008-09 is a direct impact of the economic slowdown. The Finance Minister has tried to dress up the revenue shortfall as a part of the stimulus plan in terms of tax concessions. The reality is that such huge revenue shortfall will adversely affect public expenditure and constrain the spending plans of the next Government. This is already clear from the cut in allocations in the Interim Budget from last years’ expenditure (Revised Estimates) on Rural Development, especially the NREGA, as well as Urban Development and Food Subsidy. The Revised Estimates for Plan Expenditure on Agriculture and Social Services also show that the Government has failed to spend the amounts that were budgeted in 2008-09.

The claim of overflowing granaries due to record food production made by the Finance Minister sounds vacuous in the light of the steep cut of 73% in the allocation of foodgrains to the States under the APL category. The benefits of the increase in foodgrains production have not been passed on to the people in terms of adequate and cheap foodgrains available through the PDS.

In view of the global economic crisis and economic slowdown, the UPA Government could have announced at least its intention of providing relief to the people through massive increase in public investment in agriculture, rural development, social sectors and infrastructure besides steps to protect workers and farmers from lay offs and price crashes. Instead, what gets reflected in the Budget Speech is complacency and insensitivity towards the growing suffering of the masses.

Medical Causes of Maternal mortality:

Medical Causes of Maternal mortality:
1. The most common cause of maternal mortality is Bleeding- before, during, or after child birth. This may account for almost 25% of all deaths.. If anaemia is already there , the blood loss may be fatal.
2. Sepsis: Infections during the process of child birth accounts for some 15% of deaths. Early diagnosis and treatment with proper Antibiotics is life saving.
3, Hypertensive disorders of pregnancy accountfor 12% of maternal deaths. Good quality of ante¬natal care including routine measurements of blood pressure picks this problem up early when it is relatively easy to treat without affecting mother or child. Untreated at this stage, the woman may develop fits (eclampsia) which is life threatening to mother and child unless prompt skilled medical care and appropriate drugs (especially magnesium sulfate) are available. In some cases surgery may also be required.
4 Prolonged or Obstructed Labour accounts for about 8% of deaths and is due to unsafe abortions. This is much more in some states where there is less access to safe services for
medical termination of pregnancy (MTP).
5. Another large number of deaths (about 20%) are due to exacerbation of medical ailments occurring during pregnancy when the body's resistance is diminished. Anemia, is one of the most trequent and most preventable of such medical causes. Other causes are malaria in the high endemic areas, hepatitis, heart disease and potentially HIV infections too.
Pregnancies that are more likely to face complications and end up as deaths are termed high risk. For example first pregnancies are more likely to face complications; short women are more likely to have obstructed labour; underweight and undernourished women are more likely to have many of the above complications. However though these correlations exist, the number of women who apparently do not have any such risk factors but who still develop complications at child birth is so high that the advice now is to treat all child-births as being potentially risky. Thus when we estimate the requirement of services, a good thumb-rule is:
15 out of every 100 pregnancies are likely to face a complication requiring skilled assistance, 5 out of every 100 pregnancies would ideally need surgery (cesarean section surgery).
Thus, in a population of 100,000 there are likely to be 3000 pregnancies in a year, of which 450 would have complications and 150 would require surgery and we cannot truly predict which of the 450 or 150 they would be. Thus, unless all 3000 are able lo access skilled care, about 150 would be dying every year.

BRUTALITY IN NAME OF HINDU CULTURE

We condemn the brutal assault by members of the Sri Ram Sene on young women in a pub in Mangalore, Karnataka, on Saturday, 24 January 2009. We are shocked by the response of the State administration, police, and political leadership, some of whom have dismissed this as a 'minor incident', while others have blatantly justified the violence. We believe that such threats to the democratic freedom and human rights of citizens, cannot be treated as 'minor'. This incident, and the unabashed justifications of it are part of a larger trend to curb the freedoms of women in the name of a regressive and distorted notion of Indian culture and tradition.

To strongly condemn the disturbing trend of violence against women and 'moral policing' as a means to enforce a particularly regressive interpretation of culture, there will be a protest