PRESS CLIPPING - 14
235. You exposed the growing danger of tyranny, father tells Snowden
236. MPs, MLAs will be disqualified on date of conviction: SC
237. Media houses losing to market forces, says Tariq Ali
238. The cost of surveillance in U.S.
239. Beyond the debate, govt. accepts 65% Indians are poor
240. BJP: poverty data, a Congress conspiracy against the poor
241. Vanishing poverty trick
242. Income disparity between rich and poor growing rapidly
243. ‘Can we send them to America?’
July 4, 2013
You exposed the growing danger of tyranny, father tells Snowden
Text of the open letter Lon Snowden, along with his attorney Bruce Fein, wrote toEdward Snowden
Edward Joseph Snowden
Moscow
Dear Edward:
I, Bruce Fein, am writing this letter in collaboration with your father in response to the Statement you issued yesterday in Moscow.
Thomas Paine, the voice of the American Revolution, trumpeted that a patriot saves his country from his government.
What you have done and are doing has awakened congressional oversight of the intelligence community from deep slumber; and, has already provoked the introduction of remedial legislation in Congress to curtail spying abuses under section 215 of the Patriot Act and section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. You have forced onto the national agenda the question of whether the American people prefer the right to be left alone from government snooping absent probable cause to believe crime is afoot to vassalage in hopes of a risk-free existence. You are a modern day Paul Revere summoning the American people to confront the growing danger of tyranny and one branch government.
In contrast to your actions, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper responded last March as follows to an unambiguous question raised by Senator Ron Wyden:
“Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?” Clapper testified, “No sir, it does not.” Wyden asked for clarification, and Clapper hedged: “Not wittingly. There are cases where they could inadvertently, perhaps, collect, but not wittingly.”
Director Clapper later defended his stupendous mendacity to the Senator as the least untruthful answer possible. President Obama has not publicly rebuked the Director for frustrating the right of the people to know what their government is doing and to force changes if necessary through peaceful democratic processes. That is the meaning of government by the consent of the governed. “We the people” are sovereign under the U.S. Constitution, and government officials are entrusted with stewardship (not destruction) of our liberties.
We leave it to the American people to decide whether you or Director Clapper is the superior patriot.
The history of civilization is a history of brave men and women refusing to bow to government wrongdoing or injustice, and exalting knowledge, virtue, wisdom, and selflessness over creature comforts as the North Star of life. We believe your actions fall within that honorable tradition, a conviction we believe is shared by many.
As regards your reduction to de facto statelessness occasioned by the Executive Branch to penalize your alleged violations of the Espionage Act, the United States Supreme Court lectured in Trop v. Dulles (1958): “The civilized nations of the world are in virtual unanimity that statelessness is not to be imposed as punishment for crime.”
We think you would agree that the final end of the state is to make men and women free to develop their faculties, not to seek planetary domination through force, violence or spying. All Americans should have a fair opportunity to pursue their ambitions. Politics should not be a football game with winners and losers featuring juvenile taunts over fumbles or missteps.
Irrespective of life’s vicissitudes, we will be unflagging in efforts to educate the American people about the impending ruination of the Constitution and the rule of law unless they abandon their complacency or indifference. Your actions are making our challenge easier.
We encourage you to engage us in regular exchanges of ideas or thoughts about approaches to curing or mitigating the hugely suboptimal political culture of the United States. Nothing less is required to pay homage to Valley Forge, Cemetery Ridge, Omaha Beach, and other places of great sacrifice.
Very truly yours,
Bruce Fein
Counsel for Lon Snowden
Lon Snowden — AP
______________________
MPs, MLAs will be disqualified on date of conviction: SC
(The court, however, said…)
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday struck down as ultra vires a provision of the Representation of the People Act which protects convicted lawmakers against disqualification on the ground of pendency of appeal against their conviction in the higher courts.
"The only question is about the vires of section 8(4) of the Representation of the People Act (RPA) and we hold that it is ultra vires and that the disqualification takes place from the date of conviction," a bench of justices A K Patnaik and S J Mukhopadhaya said.
The court, however, said that its decision will not apply to MPs, MLAs or other lawmakers who have been convicted and have filed their appeals in the higher courts before the pronouncement of this verdict.
The provision of RPA says that a lawmaker cannot be disqualified in the event of his conviction in a criminal case if he or she files an appeal in the higher court.
The apex court's verdict came on the petitions filed by Lily Thomas and NGO Lok Prahari through its secretary S N Shukla who had sought striking down of various provisions of RPA on the ground that they violate certain constitutional provisions which, among other things, expressly put a bar on criminals getting registered as voters or becoming MPs or MLAs.
The PILs had said that certain sections of RPA allow convicted lawmakers to continue in office while their appeals are pending and thus those provisions are "discriminatory and encourage criminalisation of politics".
__________________________________
CHENNAI, July 11, 2013
N. RAM
Media houses losing to market forces, says Tariq Ali
The Hindu(From left) The former Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu, N. Ram; writer, filmmaker and journalist Tariq Ali; and retired judge of the Madras High Court K. Chandru participating in a panel discussion in Chennai on Wednesday. Photo: S.R. Raghunathan
Key function of media is to “destabilise unjust policies,” says N. Ram
A range of issues concerning the media — from the growing corporate control to the explosion in social media — and the challenge of staying objective in the face of a decline in the “moral universe” were discussed by renowned journalists, acclaimed writers, and academicians here on Wednesday.
Underscoring the significance of total freedom for producers and directors of media houses, writer, filmmaker and journalist Tariq Ali said much of their success in the past was because they enjoyed the right to fail, while coming up with initiatives. With market forces coming into play, heads of departments no longer had that right and decisions were being made by managers. This was one reason for media productions looking so similar.
Mr. Ali was participating in a panel discussion on ‘New imperialism, new wars, new media and new Left’ organised by the Media Development Foundation (MDF) at the Asian College of Journalism. “Young people think getting involved with the original Left is not going to lead them anywhere.” What it resulted in are huge movements, participants of which occupy public squares but are not able to arrive at a set of demands, he said, citing his interactions with some ‘Occupy Wall Street’ protesters.
There could be no forward movement without some form of politics, he said, adding there was no clear solution either “for us or for the rulers” as they (politicians) had obstinately refused to change course and the Opposition did not know what to propose.
Kasturi & Sons Ltd Director and former Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu N. Ram said that apart from playing a credible information function and remaining investigative and apolitical, one key function of the media was to “destabilise unjust policies.”
Quoting economist Prabhat Patnaik, he said the change in the moral universe was behind the decline in the power of the media. It was due to a degree of confusion and uncertainty about what was right and wrong. So long as the media were on the same side as international finance capital, they appeared powerful, but when upholding humane values, they seemed powerless.
There was clear evidence that free speech was under threat, Mr. Ram said concurring with the retired Madras High Court judge, Justice K. Chandru’s view that Section 66A of the Information Technology Act was being misused to arrest and prosecute users of social media for even innocuous comments on political leaders.
Jawaharlal Nehru University professor M.S.S. Pandian said the new media had closed the possibility of people being in touch with ground reality. There was need to “reclaim the street.”
MDF Chairman Sashi Kumar noted with concern that the entry barriers to new television channels had increased. Also, growth in media did not mean growth in journalism. To cope with the competition from new media, reporters in traditional media were resorting more and more to editorialising.
CPI(M) leader M.A. Baby said Kerala, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh had models of television channels being publicly owned and run successfully. Citing the example of FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting), a media watch group in the U.S., he said a similar mechanism could be evolved in India to question media bias and force mainstream media houses to withdraw misinformation.
The discussion was moderated by art critic Sadanand Menon.
The participants included C.P. Chandrasekar, Ram Manohar Reddy, Venkatesh Athreya, K. Nagaraj, Milind Brahme, Geetha Ramaseshan, Gnani and Nityanand Jayaraman.
_______________________
WASHINGTON, July 10, 2013
The cost of surveillance in U.S.
How much are your private conversations worth to the U.S. government? Turns out, it can be a lot, depending on the technology.
In the era of intense government surveillance and secret court orders, a murky multimillion-dollar market has emerged. Paid for by U.S. tax dollars, but with little public scrutiny, surveillance fees charged in secret by technology and phone companies can vary wildly.
AT&T, for example, imposes a $325 “activation fee” for each wiretap and $10 a day to maintain it. Smaller carriers Cricket and U.S. Cellular charge only about $250 per wiretap. But snoop on a Verizon customer? That costs the government $775 for the first month and $500 each month after that, according to industry disclosures made last year to Congressman Edward Markey.
Meanwhile, e-mail records like those amassed by the National Security Agency (NSA) through a programme revealed by former NSA systems analyst Edward Snowden probably were collected for free or very cheaply. Facebook says it doesn’t charge the government for access. And while Microsoft, Yahoo and Google won’t say how much they charge, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) found that e-mail records can be turned over for as little as $25.
Industry says it doesn’t profit from the hundreds of thousands of government eavesdropping requests it receives each year, and civil liberties groups want businesses to charge. They worry that government surveillance will become too cheap as companies automate their responses. As the number of law enforcement requests for data grew and carriers upgraded their technology, the cost of accommodating government surveillance requests increased. AT&T, for example, said it devotes roughly 100 employees to review each request and hand over data. Likewise, Verizon said its team of 70 employees works around the clock, seven days a week to handle the quarter-million requests it gets each year.
Companies also began to automate their systems to make it easier. The ACLU’s Christopher Soghoian found in 2009 that Sprint had created a website allowing law enforcement to track the location data of its wireless customers for only $30 a month to accommodate the approximately eight million requests it received in one year.
Most companies agree not to charge in emergency cases like tracking an abducted child. They aren’t allowed to charge for phone logs that reveal who called a line and how long they talked such as the documents the Justice Department obtained about phones at The Associated Press during a leaks investigation because that information is easily generated from automated billing systems.
Still, the fees can add up quickly. The average wiretap is estimated to cost $50,000. One narcotics case in New York in 2011 cost the government $2.9 million alone.
___________________________
Published: July 24, 2013 16:50 IST | Updated: July 25, 2013 15:53 IST
Beyond the debate, govt. accepts 65% Indians are poor
The HinduRag pickers near a canal in Vijayawada. While the Opposition pillories the plan panel formula of poverty, the government has begun moving to a broader and more realistic de facto definition. File photo
Notional poverty line will stand at a per capita expenditure of around Rs. 50 per day in rural areas and Rs. 62 in urban areas
While the Opposition pillories the Planning Commission for using a formal definition of poverty that ensures the percentage of people below the poverty line is lower than what it ought to be, the government has begun moving to a broader and more realistic de facto definition that will include roughly 65 per cent of the population. This notional poverty line will stand at a per capita expenditure of around Rs. 50 per day in rural areas and Rs 62 in urban areas.
As first reported by The Hindu, the Planning Commission has revised the official poverty headcount ratio down from 37 per cent of the total population in 2004-5 to 22 per cent of the population in 2011-12.
These poverty rates come from applying the Suresh Tendulkar committee’s methodology for estimating poverty to draw a poverty line, and using the National Sample Survey Organisation’s consumption expenditure data for 2011-12 to see what proportion of the population falls below these lines.
While Planning Commission-derived poverty lines and estimates have been all-important in the past because they are used to draw up BPL lists and allot entitlements, their inappropriateness today is demonstrated by the fact that the government itself is now moving away from using these numbers altogether. Following the Union Cabinet’s clearing of the National Food Security Ordinance, the Planning Commission has estimated that subsidised foodgrain entitlements will cover 67 per cent of the population. Simultaneously, economists advising the Ministry of Rural Development have told The Hindu that the exclusion criteria to be derived from the ongoing Socio-Economic and Caste Census are likely to leave out the top 35 per cent of the population while the bottom 65 per cent will be considered BPL.
“This is a step away from the narrow definition of poverty we have been using, where the line is really what I call a ‘kutta-billi’ line; only cats and dogs can survive on it,” said N.C. Saxena, member of the National Advisory Council, who headed a Planning Commission panel on poverty that recommended automatic inclusion and exclusion criteria. Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh said last year that the government was moving towards universalising its social protection schemes, and the Public Distribution System and pensions remained the only schemes that still relied on BPL criteria, Mr. Saxena added. A World Bank study of India’s social protection schemes had shown that universal schemes were far better at actually reaching the poor than those targeted at the poor.
By covering 67 per cent of the population, the government is in effect drawing the poverty line 85 per cent higher than what it is currently drawn at, Planning Commission member Saumitra Chaudhuri told The Hindu. By 2011-12 consumption expenditures, this works out to roughly Rs.1,506 monthly per capita expenditure — or Rs. 50 per day — for rural areas, and Rs. 1,850 per month — or Rs. 62 per day — for urban areas. While India’s poverty line has usually corresponded with the World Bank’s definition of extreme poverty, which is $1.25 (in Purchasing Power Parity terms) per person per day, the new notional poverty line would correspond more closely with the Bank’s definition of moderate poverty. The $2 line corresponded with Rs. 45 per day in rural India and Rs. 57 per day in urban India in 2011-12, Bank representatives said on Wednesday.
“It’s important to remember that those who aren’t poor in our country can still be very disadvantaged,” Mr. Saxena said. The Hindu’s analysis of the new NSSO consumption expenditure data shows that 90 per cent of rural Indians spend less than Rs. 70 per day, while 90 per cent of urban Indians spend less than Rs. 154 per day.
____________________________
Published: July 24, 2013 14:52 IST | Updated: July 25, 2013 03:38 IST
BJP: poverty data, a Congress conspiracy against the poor
The HinduBJP spokesperson Prakash Javadekar. File photo
The Planning Commission’s data on poverty is a conspiracy of the Congress against the poor to deprive them the benefits of Below Poverty Line schemes, the Bharatiya Janata Party has alleged.
“The latest report showing a reduction in the number of people below the poverty line is a conspiracy of the Congress. This is the Congress mindset against the poor,” BJP spokesperson and Rajya Sabha member Prakash Javadekar told journalists here on Wednesday.
These poverty figures did not reflect the price rise. It was just a “political gimmick” to show more people were now out of poverty by lowering the benchmark. “We challenge the Congress leaders to show how one can survive on Rs. 34 a day... They want to show more people are rich by changing the definition,” he said. “The BJP denounces the anti-poor strategy of the Congress. With an earning of Rs. 34 a day, nobody comes out of poverty and the severity of poverty does not go.”
The government had hurriedly presented a “false and rosy picture” despite knowing well the findings of the Arjun Sengupta Committee, which had stated that 70 per cent of the people lived below the poverty line, he said.
On Tuesday, the Planning Commission said the number of people living below the poverty line had shrunk in both urban and rural areas. The number of people living below the poverty line had shrunk to 21.9 per cent in 2011-12 from 37.2 per cent in 2004-05 on account of increase in per capita consumption, it said.
_____________________________
Published: July 25, 2013 00:53 IST | Updated: July 25, 2013 01:39 IST
Vanishing poverty trick
In figures officially released this week, the Planning Commission claims that poverty incidence had declined from 37.2 per cent of the population in 2004-05 to 21.9 per cent in 2011-12. This 15.3 percentage points decline over a seven-year period amounts to an unprecedented annual decline of 2.2 percentage points in the poverty rate. If that trend is sustained, it would lead to an end to “official” poverty in India in a decade. The previous year for which a comparable estimate based on the Tendulkar Committee’s methodology is available, using data from a similar survey, is 2009-10. In that year, the incidence of poverty was reported at 29.8 per cent, reflecting a 7.4 percentage points reduction relative to 2004-05. A further 8 percentage points reduction over the next two years, when GDP growth in fact slowed, has substantially hiked the annual reduction rate.
The view that this evidence is not the outcome of a routine evaluation of the extent of poverty, but is politically influenced, is not without basis. To start with, despite the recent furore over the appallingly low level at which the Tendulkar committee set the “poverty line” (which works out to Rs. 33.3 in urban areas and Rs. 27.2 in rural areas for 2011-12), the government has chosen to stick officially with that line even though it knows that for all practical purposes the incidence of actual poverty is nearly three times higher. It knows, for example, that the calorie intake figures yielded by the same survey and hunger indices do not tally with the poverty reduction record that the Commission’s methodology yields. Second, the 68th Round National Sample Survey on Household Consumer Expenditure is atypical, if not abnormal, to say the least. From the early 1970s, till 2009-10, the “large sample” consumer expenditure surveys by the NSS were undertaken once in five years. If that schedule had been followed, the next large sample survey should have been in 2014-15. This, however, made the available poverty estimates politically irrelevant. They did not refer to the period after the UPA’s second term started in 2009. They would be superseded only in 2014-15, well after the next election. So in a sudden show of concern for more regular statistical information, the government decided on undertaking a large sample survey after just two years. It obviously knew that if combined with the Planning Commission’s methodology such a survey would point to a significant reduction in poverty. But even the Commission must have been surprised by the actual figure it finally got. The fact that the government is rightly unwilling to base its new food security initiative on these unrealistic numbers suggests the Planning Commission must rethink its formal methodology. But politics requires otherwise.
___________________________
Income disparity between rich and poor growing rapidly
The richest 10% of Indian society have seen highest growth while the poorest 10% have seen the slowest increase in incomes.
NEW DELHI: Everybody knows that there is a chasm between the rich and the poor. But can it be measured? And, more importantly, is this disparity between the rich and poor growing or coming down?
New data based on consumption expenditure surveys shows that income disparity is growing and at a rapid clip. Spending and consumption by the richest 5% zoomed up by over 60% between 2000 and 2012 in rural areas while the poorest 5% saw an increase of just 30%. In urban areas, the richest segment's spending increased by 63% while the poorest saw an increase of 33%. The effect of inflation was removed while making these comparisons.
Here's another way you can look at these disturbing results: in 2000, the average spend (or income) of the richest group in urban areas was 12 times that of the poorest group; in 2012, it had increased to 15-fold. In rural areas, the disparity between the haves and the have-nots increased from 7 times to 9 times in these 12 years.
These stark findings emerge from a comparison of data on household spending patterns for 1999-2000 and 2011-12. These are collected by the National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO). Consumption spending — that is, all possible expenditure done by an individual in a household on all aspects of life — is the closest measure of incomes available in the country.
Many experts argue that spending and hence income of the uppermost 5% is not completely reflected in NSSO surveys because those who do their surveys hardly manage to meet and fill out questionnaires of the super-rich households. In other words, the incomes of the super-rich are probably more than what is reflected in this data.
Growth highest for richest 10%, lowest for poorest 10%
The richest 10% of Indian society have seen highest growth while the poorest 10% have seen the slowest increase in incomes. The remaining 80% of the people have seen roughly the same levels of growth ranging between 35% and 40% in rural areas and between 40% and 50% in urban areas over 12 years. That means that for 90% of people, annual growth in income was just over 3% in rural India, and just over 4% in urban India.
Clearly, economic policy that resulted in high GDP growth for most of this period has not trickled down to the neediest. Rather, it appears to be benefitting the already affluent sections more.
In 2012, a person of the poorest segment in rural areas was spending just Rs 521 per month. So, a family of four would spend about Rs 2,084 per month. In the richest segment, a person spent Rs 4,481 per month which would translate into a monthly spend (or income) of Rs 17,925 for a family of four. In urban areas, monthly spending by the poorest segment was Rs 700 per person or Rs 2,802 for a family of four and for the richest group it was Rs 10,282 per person or Rs 41,128 for a four-member family.
Details of spending on different items provided by the report show that in urban areas, monthly expenditure per person on food was less than Rs 1,000 for 50% of the population while in the richest segment every person on an average spent Rs 2,859. Some of the food items showing vast disparity between rich and poor included vegetables, fruits, eggs, fish and meat, and milk products. The data blows the myth that poorer sections are consuming more of fruits, eggs, etc.
A similar multi-fold difference is seen in other key items of expenditure like education, medical and durable goods.
New data based on consumption expenditure surveys shows that income disparity is growing and at a rapid clip. Spending and consumption by the richest 5% zoomed up by over 60% between 2000 and 2012 in rural areas while the poorest 5% saw an increase of just 30%. In urban areas, the richest segment's spending increased by 63% while the poorest saw an increase of 33%. The effect of inflation was removed while making these comparisons.
Here's another way you can look at these disturbing results: in 2000, the average spend (or income) of the richest group in urban areas was 12 times that of the poorest group; in 2012, it had increased to 15-fold. In rural areas, the disparity between the haves and the have-nots increased from 7 times to 9 times in these 12 years.
These stark findings emerge from a comparison of data on household spending patterns for 1999-2000 and 2011-12. These are collected by the National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO). Consumption spending — that is, all possible expenditure done by an individual in a household on all aspects of life — is the closest measure of incomes available in the country.
Many experts argue that spending and hence income of the uppermost 5% is not completely reflected in NSSO surveys because those who do their surveys hardly manage to meet and fill out questionnaires of the super-rich households. In other words, the incomes of the super-rich are probably more than what is reflected in this data.
Growth highest for richest 10%, lowest for poorest 10%
The richest 10% of Indian society have seen highest growth while the poorest 10% have seen the slowest increase in incomes. The remaining 80% of the people have seen roughly the same levels of growth ranging between 35% and 40% in rural areas and between 40% and 50% in urban areas over 12 years. That means that for 90% of people, annual growth in income was just over 3% in rural India, and just over 4% in urban India.
Clearly, economic policy that resulted in high GDP growth for most of this period has not trickled down to the neediest. Rather, it appears to be benefitting the already affluent sections more.
In 2012, a person of the poorest segment in rural areas was spending just Rs 521 per month. So, a family of four would spend about Rs 2,084 per month. In the richest segment, a person spent Rs 4,481 per month which would translate into a monthly spend (or income) of Rs 17,925 for a family of four. In urban areas, monthly spending by the poorest segment was Rs 700 per person or Rs 2,802 for a family of four and for the richest group it was Rs 10,282 per person or Rs 41,128 for a four-member family.
Details of spending on different items provided by the report show that in urban areas, monthly expenditure per person on food was less than Rs 1,000 for 50% of the population while in the richest segment every person on an average spent Rs 2,859. Some of the food items showing vast disparity between rich and poor included vegetables, fruits, eggs, fish and meat, and milk products. The data blows the myth that poorer sections are consuming more of fruits, eggs, etc.
A similar multi-fold difference is seen in other key items of expenditure like education, medical and durable goods.
________________________
August 14, 2013
‘Can we send them to America?’
For lakhs in coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema, with Hyderabad everything will go
“The Andhra rich send their children to America. We sent ours to Hyderabad. Where do we send them now?” That’s N. Rama Rao, a two-acre tenant farmer in Davajigudam village in Krishna district. “The jobs, the schools, the colleges, the hospitals — everything is in Hyderabad. If we lose that, we lose everything. Do you think we can send our kids to America?”
Rama Rao’s dilemma confronts lakhs of other families across coastal Andhra Pradesh and Rayalaseema with members working or settled in Hyderabad. The possibility that many might have to return when Telangana State is formed frightens them. It’s an insecurity fanned by hostile words from leaders of the Telangana movement.
“What do they return to?” asks Sambasiva Rao, a small tenant farmer at Kesarapalli. “Most here are small tenant farmers in great difficulty. Farming is anyway in a mess. Divide the State, and there will be major conflicts over water.” And “what about the poorer ones?” asks Bappatla Veeraiah, back in Davajigudam. “Those whose children work there as painters, electricians, watchmen, security guards, canteen workers?”
Their concerns and fears are much the same as those expressed by the poor on the other side of the great divide: work and water. ‘Hyderabad’ itself is a proxy for jobs, income and security. Many poor families in Rayalaseema and coastal districts too have sent at least one member to seek a future in that city in the last 15 years.
“All our wealth is there,” is the refrain across the coastal districts and Rayalaseema. “Even Hi-Tech city is there,” says Sarat Chandra, an M. Tech student in Gannavaram. “Mr. Chandrababu Naidu [when he was Chief Minister] focused on developing that city.”
The division comes amid an acute agrarian distress. “Soon there will be no small farmers left,” says S. Pappa Rao in Krishna district. He owned three acres, but parted with two as dowry when his daughter got married. “It will be absentee landlords sitting in Hyderabad or America and over here landless and poor tenant farmers. The latter will be more like employees in pants and shirts than like farmers.”
Andhra Pradesh as a whole is among the States worst-affected by the agrarian crisis. The 2011 census shows a drop of over 1 million farmers in the State. But the number of agricultural labourers has risen by over 3 million. Many losing farmer status have likely joined the agrarian underclass. A farmer in Andhra Pradesh is three times more likely to commit suicide than anyone else in the country, excluding farmers.
A massive rise in tenant farmers brings its own issues. “We get 25-30 bastas (bags of 75 kg each) of paddy from an acre,” a group of tenant farmers tells us in Krishna district. “And we pay a lease rate of 18-25 bastas from that to the landowner. How long can this go on?” Agricultural labourers have it worse. “There are 20 days’ work now, and then no work for months,” says K. Jejakumari. “All prices are up,” she says. “But not our income. Vegetables cost two-and-a-half times more than they did a year ago.”
“Telangana will kill the Delta farmers,” says an angry S. Venkatappaiah. He’s a small farmer at Unguturu in Krishna district. “There will be no water for cultivation.” (In Rayalaseema that fear extends to drinking water).
“Things are already bad,” says 76-year-old Beemavaruppu Subba Reddy at Telaprolu in Krishna district. He has been “in farming for 60 years.” Electricity rates “have risen 100 per cent in a year. The main supports for small farmers have ended. The panchayat grants do not come because there is no government in AP. Now, with division of the State, water will go down, surely.”
In Siripuram village in Guntur district, John Syedulu, a seed salesman covering 30 villages, says the same things. “Hyderabad and irrigation.” Across Korrapadu, Dhulipala and Rajupalyam, the words recur: work and water. “All registration for the Andhra Pradesh Public Service Commission has stopped,” points out Mallikarjun Rao, a journalist in Rajupalyam. “Where those recruited will go is one question.” That sparks panic among thousands of job aspirants.
There is deep hurt among people in coastal Andhra and Rayalaseema over Telangana. Their State has been broken up, and they will punish someone for that. Yet, there were no words of hatred for people on the other side of the divide. Even among those firmly favouring a united State. Their focus, like their counterparts in Telangana, is on work and water. And there’s an underlying sense that securing those could see the explosive anger over division abate.
“Ms. Sonia Gandhi thinks Andhras are fools who will go along quietly with everything,” says Venkatappaiah. “What we are seeking is a fair solution to those issues. Sadly, that isn’t there. In coming days, you’ll see more farmers take their lives.”
