India has taken quantum jump in wrong direction after 2014, says Amartya Sen

Eminent economist Amartya Sen said despite being the fastest-growing economy, India had taken a “quantum jump in the wrong direction” since 2014. As a result, the country was now the second worst in the region, he added.

“Things have gone pretty badly wrong... It has taken a quantum jump in the wrong direction since 2014. We are getting backwards in the fastest-growing economy,” Sen said during the launch of Bharat Aur Uske Virodhabhas, the Hindi edition of his book An Uncertain Glory: India and its Contradiction, co-authored with development economist Jean Dreze.

Twenty years ago, he added, of the six countries in the region — India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan — India was the second best after Sri Lanka. “Now it is the second worst. Pakistan has managed to shield us from being the worst.”

The economist said the government has deflected from issues of inequalities, caste system and schedules tribes.

There were a whole group of people, those who clean lavatories or sewage with their hands, he said, whose demands and needs has been neglected.

Taking a dig at the BJPled government, he added that during freedom struggle it was difficult to see that a political battle could be won by playing up the Hindu identity, but that has changed. “But that has happened. Which is why, at this time, the issue of Opposition unity is so important.”

“It is not a battle of one entity against the other (or) Mr Modi against Mr Rahul Gandhi, it is an issue of what India is,” Sen added.

Speaking at the event, development economist and activist Jean Dreze termed the soon-to-be launched Ayushmann Bharat health scheme a “hoax” as it was actually not as big as it was being claimed to be. “The budget (for the scheme) for this year is ~20 billion. Even if it is spent, it is less than ~20 per person,” he said.

It was projected as health insurance for 5 million people, but was virtually nothing, said Dreze, who helped draft the first version of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGA).