My friend, Montek Singh Ahluwalia (MSA), Deputy Chairman of the Planning
Commission that has the responsibility of planning our future, is a
very intelligent person. There is abundant evidence of his IQ being sky
high.
Unfortunately, an intelligent person is not necessarily well informed,
and this seems to be the case with MSA. For example, he does not seem to
be aware that we have a scientific organisation called the Indian
Council of Medical Research (ICMR), which also happens to be the oldest
research body in India and one of the oldest in the world. It was set up
as Imperial Research Fund Association in 1911. The Director-General of
ICMR is, today, also the Secretary of the Department of Health Research
in the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare of the Government of India.
The flagship laboratory of ICMR is the National Institute of Nutrition
(NIN) located in Hyderabad. This institution has from time to time
brought out tables of minimum nutritional requirements of Indians. The
last publication in this series appeared in 2010 and was titled
“National Requirements and Recommended Dietary Allowance for India”.
This publication is used as a reference book all over the world.
According to this publication, the minimum requirements of a moderately
active man are 400 grams (gm) of cereals, 300 gm of vegetables, 100 gm
of fruits, 30 gm of oil, 80 gm of pulses and 40 gm of sugar. In
Hyderabad, which is nowhere near the costliest city in the country, the
above will cost, as of today, on an average, Rs.12.88, 5.22, 2.50, 1.95,
5.60 and 1.52, respectively, which totals to Rs.29.67.
MSA has said, even in a submission to the Supreme Court, that if a
person spends Rs.32 in an urban area (and Rs.26 in a rural area) a day
on all his requirements, he is not poor. What I have said in the
preceding para means that if a person living in an urban area takes care
just of his minimum nutritional requirements (with ice cream, cake,
laddu, and the like, totally out of bounds), he would be left with Rs.32
minus Rs.29.67 = Rs.2.33 a day (that is, Rs.69.90 per month or
approximately Rs.839 per year) to take care of his requirements of salt
and spices, fuel for cooking, house rent, milk, footwear, clothing,
transport, education of children, and health care, leave aside any
entertainment or even a cup of tea or coffee. Would any reader agree
that, even for the most thrifty, it is possible to meet the above
expenditure in Rs.2.33 a day – that is, Rs.69.90 per month – anywhere in
the country? A bus pass for one person for one month in Hyderabad costs
Rs.555 a month (that is Rs.18.50 a day).
As there is no questioning MSA's high level of intelligence, there is
only one conclusion that we can arrive at: that he is unaware of the
existence of ICMR, NIN or the above-mentioned publication of NIN. And
from all other accounts one has, this may be just the tip of the iceberg
of ignorance.
Should not we, therefore, have a test for the Membership of Planning Commission with a special paper for its Chairman?
కామెంట్లు లేవు:
కామెంట్ను పోస్ట్ చేయండి