Bangladesh is better off than India, not a poor, backward neighbour anymore

[SuvarnaTeja]

India has a lot to learn from Bangladesh especially in the area of micro financing.

Congratulations to Bangladesh.

 

[Jackdaws]

Good job Bangladesh. May you and your people prosper.

 

[khail007]

Bangladesh has come a long way since its independence in 1971, registering impressive performance on economic and social indicators.

New Delhi: India, the fastest growing major economy, is seen as the powerhouse of South Asia, but this may soon change.

Having already stolen a march over India on key social indices, small neighbour Bangladesh is now on the verge of establishing a lead on the economic front too.

According to the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Bangladesh is expected to post a growth rate of 7.5 per cent in 2018-19 against the 7.3 per cent projected for India.

India’s eastern neighbour saw a GDP growth of 7.28 per cent in the last financial year, according to the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS), while India grew at 7.1 per cent.

The country’s per capita income is also growing at a pace three times India’s: According to United Nations Conference on Trade and Development figures cited in a Dhaka Tribune report, while India’s per capita income rose by 13.8 per cent between 2013 and 2016, Bangladesh’s grew by 39 per cent.

According to some estimates, if the country continues to keep up its gross national income (GNI) and GDP growth at the same pace for the next two years, it will overtake India’s per capita income by 2020.

A long journey
Formed from the poorest regions of Pakistan, Bangladesh has come a long way since its independence in 1971.

The country’s GDP growth rate in 1972 was recorded at negative 14 per cent. Two years later, Bangladesh was steaming ahead with a growth rate of 9.6 per cent when a catastrophic famine, which killed an estimated 1.5 million people, brought the country on its knees again. The ensuing economic crash saw the GDP growth rate slip to a negative 4 per cent.

After the famine, the government started redeveloping the country with the help of international relief funds. NGOs also stepped up, and the introduction of high-yielding rice and wheat in the 1970s started to boost agricultural growth.

The country’s robust position today can partly be attributed to its stellar micro-credit system, which began to take root in the 1980s and stands as a model for developing economies. And then there is the fact that the government has been known to focus on women empowerment and prioritise health and education.

Talking to ThePrint, Jayshree Sengupta, economist and senior fellow at Observer Research Foundation (ORF), said the economic surge could be traced to growth in private sector investment and remittances from Bangladeshis abroad.

Exports, especially from Bangladesh’s burgeoning readymade garment industry, have played a massive role too.

Bangladesh is a labour-intensive country like India. However, it does not have strict labour laws like India does.

In 1947, before Independence, India passed the Industrial Disputes Act, which put in place a mechanism for the resolution of conflict that recognises the rights of employers as well as workers.

This law was inherited by Pakistan as well, but the country’s military regime repealed the law from what was then East Pakistan in 1958 following differences with trade unions.

Thus, when Bangladesh separated from Pakistan, it did not have the law.

This helped Bangladesh establish itself as a hub for cheap labour, and a base for its booming manufacturing industry.

The garment industry in Bangladesh is one of the strongest drivers of the economy, having given employment to almost 2.7 per cent (44 lakh) of the country’s 16.3 crore people. Nearly 70 per cent (30 lakh) of these are women.

China’s retreat from low-end manufacturing has helped cement Bangladesh’s position in the sector, and the country has been wooing global investors with its cheap work force.

India today
In India, high oil prices, weak exports and depreciation of the rupee due to a slowdown in capital flows have impacted the economy. Just this week, the rupee, Asia’s worst performing currency this year, fell to a historic low of 74/$ Monday.

“We saw an 8.2 per cent economic growth rate in the first quarter of this fiscal and that was largely due to the base effect of the previous year,” Abhijit Sen Gupta, a senior economics officer at ADB, told The Print. “In the next quarters, we are likely to see a sort of slowing down of growth.”

According to Sen Gupta, if India wants to keep up with its neighbour, it should focus on reducing bottlenecks in sectors such as infrastructure, manufacturing, services and exports, which are critical to quality job creation.

“The export engine, along with investment, needs to be fired to sustain high growth rate,” he said.

Social strides
Bangladesh has also made significant strides vis-à-vis social development indicators such as life expectancy, infant mortality and gender parity.

In a study on ‘human capital’ published in the medical journal The Lancet, India ranked a notch below Bangladesh.

The study aimed to measure the strength of human capital — described as the level of education and health in a population — in the world’s 195 nations between 1990 and 2016. The parameters included years lived, functional health status and educational leaning.

According to the World Bank, in 2017, Bangladesh recorded an infant mortality rate of 27, which means that these many children died on average within the first year for every 1,000 live births. For India, the rate was 32.

The average life expectancy for an individual in Bangladesh is 72.58 years, against 68.8 years in India.

What’s helped Bangladesh
Experts say that Bangladesh owes much of this progress to efforts made by non-government organisations like Grameen Bank and BRAC.

Grameen Bank, for one, is a globally renowned microfinance initiative that earned its founder Muhammad Yunus a Nobel Peace Prize and inspired replicas in more than 100 countries.

The initiative aims at poverty alleviation by giving loans to small-scale entrepreneurs who do not qualify to receive traditional bank loans. According to the bank’s website, it has “grown to provide collateral-free loans to 7.5 million clients…97 per cent of whom are women”.

This has helped boost financial inclusion in the country. According to World Bank data, 34.1 per cent of Bangladeshi adults with bank accounts made digital transactions in 2017, against the average of 28.8 per cent for South Asia.

Although Bangladesh’s health expenditure as a share of GDP is still lower than India’s, several initiatives taken by the government have helped boost education and women empowerment.

The government has made primary education free and compulsory, giving girl students stipends and scholarships for their entire school education. The government has a strong social safety net for women with initiatives such as four to six months of paid maternity leave, and allowances for divorced and destitute women.

Women now make up nearly 70 per cent of Bangladesh’s garment industry and over 60 per cent of fish farmers.

Bangladesh has set an example for developing economies with its women empowerment initiatives, with the World Economic Forum (WEF) ranking the country number one in gender equality among south Asian nations in 2017 as well as 2016.

It has also registered an impressive performance on reducing poverty, a parameter on which India has made significant advances as well.

Bangladesh was ranked seventh, a good eight slots ahead of India (15), in the political representation of women on the WEF gender gap index.

This is because 50 of the 350 seats in the Bangladesh parliament, roughly 14 per cent, are reserved for women. Meanwhile, in India, 62 of 543 MPs elected in 2014, or 11 per cent, are women, with a law on reservation yet to see the light of day.

Don’t forget the NGOs
“Bangladesh’s high economic growth can be attributed to the sustained investments that Bangladesh has made in enhancing people’s productive capacities, especially by way of promoting basic health and education,” said development economist Dr A.K. Shivakumar.

“That life expectancy at birth is higher and child mortality lower in Bangladesh today than in India, when it was not so during the early 1990s, is testimony to the better access that Bangladeshis have to basic social services,” he said.

“To an extent,” he added, “the high growth has also been fuelled by the social transformation brought about by the greater freedoms young girls and women enjoy in Bangladesh today.

“The growing employment opportunities for young women in the garment industry, as well as the collectivisation and empowerment of women brought about by the spread of the microfinance movement, has contributed to it as well,” he said.

Experts are also unanimous in crediting NGOs for the turnaround in Bangladesh’s fortunes.

“Non-government organisations have played a critical and complementary role to the state in reducing poverty and in expanding social and economic opportunities for a vast majority of Bangladeshis,” said Shivakumar.

ORF’s Sengupta agreed, even as she expressed scepticism about the government’s role.

“It is not a very nice picture in Bangladesh,” she said. “They have a very authoritarian government which has completely suppressed dissent. Women are working without wages.”

By 2017, Bangladesh was being lauded for becoming almost open-defecation free, a journey India is striving to complete. Between 2003 and 2015, Bangladesh’s open-defecation rates have fallen from 42 per cent to 1 per cent.

Meanwhile, the Indian government’s sustained fight to make the country open-defecation free with Narendra Modi’s pet ‘Swachh Bharat mission’ began only in 2014.

Under this mission, 76 per cent of India’s villages have been declared open-defecation free as of October 2018. India has taken a leaf out of Bangladesh’s Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS) model, introduced in 1999, which focuses more on generating demand for basic indoor toilets than releasing subsidies.

https://theprint.in/economy/banglad...not-a-poor-backward-neighbour-anymore/132363/

Definitely, BD advancements are remarkable as compared to other countries of area. Wish for more progress as an example for developing countries.

 

[Nilgiri]

Though im not interested in Bangladesh affairs. But im happy if it is progressing as an ally of India.
But @Nilgiri can brust the bubble.

Knock yourself out:

https://defence.pk/pdf/threads/world-bank-human-capital-index-2018-rankings.581274/#post-10854838

 

[Kaniska]

You should not become too optimistic. Bangladeshi illegal will go to India even if Bangladesh become 10 times richer than India. Our illegal prefer the poorest and most backward part of your country. Such as Assam, Manipur, Nagaland, Bihar, Orissa, Rajasthan etc. The poorer , the better for Bangladeshi illegal. If you give a Bangladeshi citizen a choice to move either to USA or Assam, he will choose Assam over USA. Because India is land inhabited by inherently peaceful Dharmic Hindu people. Bangladeshi people find Indian people as noble, helpful and very tolerant about other religion and ethnicities. Indians keep their country superbly neat and clean, people are very health conscious, a peaceful and festive mode always hangs on the air. A very welcoming culture. So Bangladeshi illegal migrant find India specially it's poorer but nicer part to be more cherished than artificial, soulless rich country like America. Bangladeshi illegals consider them to be lucky to be next to a great country like India where they can go to illegally and find their inner peace.

Sometimes, your sarcasm makes us happy too..

 

[randomradio]

You rarely hear the richer Dravidian states, which would make sense as migration destinations, complain about Bangladeshis.

Whatchu talking about? We have Bangladeshis here in the south as well.

http://www.uniindia.com/bjp-demands...bangladeshi-migrants/states/news/1053720.html

https://www.india.com/news/india/wo...ionals-to-be-deported-g-parameshwara-3209471/

http://www.rediff.com/news/slide-sh...igrants-crawl-into-indian-cities/20120907.htm

It's like an infestation.

 

[greenhawk]

Not sure where they got the numbers of GDP per capita growth for the two countries. Bangladesh GDP per capita growth between 2013 and 2016 was 29.9% not 39% and India's growth during those years was 15.4% (Im using World Bank figures). Very significant advances though, but one can say that's partially because Bangladesh is essentially only 3 years behind India in terms of per capita GDP so the difference is greater. Then again, this means that Bangladesh is essentially growing twice as fast as India for these parameters.

 

[lightoftruth]

As I have said multiple times India is a poor country,with no toilets, with limited resources and is a hellhole for muslim minorities.

Watching an economic giant bangladesh do its wonders is a privilege itself.We believe it is our duty to return many unfortunate people who idiotically immigrated to India ,just so they could have better future.

 

[Homo Sapiens]

Sometimes, your sarcasm makes us happy too..

It was not sarcasm, but true facts. Currently our people have no desire to migrate to Europe,America or Middle East. They dream to go to illegally to Assam, West Bengal, Nagaland, Manipur, Bihar, Rajasthan etc. Although whole India as a migration destination is very attractive , our migrants find those states of India which are comparatively poorer in socio-economic developments but has a rich culture, tradition, spirituality, hospitality are more attractive to migrate illegally. Those states are also very neat and clean, beautiful scenery, peaceful environment are just too tempting to ignore by Bangladeshi illegals. More and more Bangladeshi illegal migrants are realizing that, money is not everything in life, rather experiencing the hospitality of peaceful, tolerant Dharmic culture and people are more worth in life. So rather than blaming Bangladeshi people for illegal migration, Indians should feel proud for making their country such an alluring destination to migrate illegally.

 

[aman_rai]

Baki sab to thik h.. khub tarraki kre Bangladesh...
Magar yea nagin dance chor do... Bahut bezatti Hoti h

 

[Bilal9]

It was not sarcasm, but true facts. Currently our people have no desire to migrate to Europe,America or Middle East. They dream to go to illegally to Assam, West Bengal, Nagaland, Manipur, Bihar, Rajasthan etc. Although whole India as a migration destination is very attractive , our migrants find those states of India which are comparatively poorer in socio-economic developments but has a rich culture, tradition, spirituality, hospitality are more attractive to migrate illegally. Those states are also very neat and clean, beautiful scenery, peaceful environment are just too tempting to ignore by Bangladeshi illegals. More and more Bangladeshi illegal migrants are realizing that, money is not everything in life, rather experiencing the hospitality of peaceful, tolerant Dharmic culture and people are more worth in life. So rather than blaming Bangladeshi people for illegal migration, Indians should feel proud for making their country such an alluring destination to migrate illegally.

Don't forget the free training to do open air 'business' sans toilets and the opportunity to swill cow-ka-cola to your heart's content. Where else but in the holy abode of Go-Mata's sishwas and bhakts?

 

[thunderr]

Bangali needs to get rid of the b----h named as Haseena , she is slowly eating out banglaaa

 

[Homo Sapiens]

Don't forget the free training to do open air 'business' sans toilets and the opportunity to swill cow-ka-cola to your heart's content. Where else but in the holy abode of Go-Mata's sishwas and bhakts?

Do not mock open air toilet and Cow Cola. OK? Open air toilet is an ancient Vedic tradition related to Indian spiritualism. It keeps the mind very calm and peaceful if anyone do that in natural environment. And Cow Cola is scientifically proven to contain cure for at least 200 diseases. Most recently Ayurvedic research institute in Mumbai has discovered it's anti-cancer and anti-aging properties. More thorough research about cow urine can unlock the potential of a whole range of possibilities. Thank God, Indian scientists are working on this project tirelessly.

 

[UKBengali]

Do not mock open air toilet and Cow Cola. OK? Open air toilet is an ancient Vedic tradition related to Indian spiritualism. It keeps the mind very calm and peaceful if anyone do that in natural environment. And Cow Cola is scientifically proven to contain cure for at least 200 diseases. Most recently Ayurvedic research institute in Mumbai has discovered it's anti-cancer and anti-aging properties. More thorough research about cow urine can unlock the potential of a whole range of possibilities. Thank God, Indian scientists are working on this project tirelessly.

 

[manga]

Do not mock open air toilet and Cow Cola. OK? Open air toilet is an ancient Vedic tradition related to Indian spiritualism. It keeps the mind very calm and peaceful if anyone do that in natural environment. And Cow Cola is scientifically proven to contain cure for at least 200 diseases. Most recently Ayurvedic research institute in Mumbai has discovered it's anti-cancer and anti-aging properties. More thorough research about cow urine can unlock the potential of a whole range of possibilities. Thank God, Indian scientists are working on this project tirelessly.

See you started your cheap naagin dance too early, you know is going to happen in end , right ?