800 millions poor people of India

The spectacular cricket victory in Twenty/20 match, Sensex touching a new high , the India@60 celebrations in New York , TATAs acquiring Arcelor , Mukesh Ambani becoming the 5^th richest Indian globally — all these things do not matter much for 800 million poor citizens of India working in unorganized sector and struggling to meet their both ends meals. Though unorganized sector constitute the largest work force in India but they are not represented by way any credible leader or unions , associations etc. . Left or other national parties do have workers unions but that too in organized sector which constitute only 5-6 % of total work force . These organized sector employees get all sort of benefits like bonus, medical , education etc. by doing just less than half of physical work against their counter part in unorganized sector. Frankly speaking nobody is there to hear their grievances and problems. When organized sector employees get regular pay hike with every increase in inflation rate those in unorganized sector are worst hit with no compensation whatsoever available to them from the government . Strangely speaking judiciary also has turned hostile towards them. Ironically, PIL, which started by trying to make justice accessible and fundamental rights real for the exploited and oppressed sections of society, today is being used to mount attacks on the poor and marginalized. Today, slums are being demolished on the orders of the court. In fact, the pleas of the executive and legislature to have a relief and rehabilitation scheme before demolition are brushed away and the courts are rendering lakhs of people homeless in an attempt to beautify cities for the elite sections of society. Thousands of workers are being rendered homeless by the apex court ordering the closure of industries. In each and every sphere the trend is clear. Postulating a people versus environment paradigm and evicting tribals from huge tracts of land in the name of sanctuaries, national parks and tiger reserves is also being done on the orders of courts.

The quality of India’s policies, institutions and governance , judiciary leave much to be desired. Other countries with such problems have often suffered bloody revolution , economic stagnation or collapse . Yet India has accelerated to 9% for four years, a feat rarely achieved in history. Textbook theories cannot explain this. But we can ill-afford to overlook the compelling needs of the 800 million people who remain poor and vulnerable even while we celebrate our new prosperity