Comparing India and Pakistan 2010

[Jade]

Poverty is part of India's story


I can see that my recent analysis of ‘India at 60′ has upset a few people. Too relentlessly gloomy apparently – even “senseless” according to “scullerz”. “Go and find some positives to write about,” seems to be the message.

India’s rural poor have been shamefully overlooked
I can think of several reasons why writing about India’s very real poverty causes such anger and offence, particularly among India’s middle classes.
The first is nationalism. India’s well-to-do are having a ball right now and don’t like to be reminded about the ground realities. They are rightly enjoying India’s new-found place in the world and don’t want to be reminded of “inconvenient truths”.
So bravo to Dr Singh, I say, for not letting them get away with it at his Independence Day speech which noted the “national shame” – strong words indeed – of India’s malnutrition rates.
The second is racism of a peculiarly inverted kind. “Even if it’s true that India is mired in poverty,” runs this argument, “it’s wrong that a foreigner, and particularly a Brit, should write these things. It’s just ‘India Bashing’ dressed up as liberal sympathy.”
Well, I can’t defend myself from being a foreigner – I am – but I believe if you read what I’ve written in toto these past four years, you’ll see that the allegation is pretty unfair.
However it is the third rationale against highlighting India’s poverty that is the most worrying and I encounter it from both wealthy Indians and foreigners alike. To this group India’s poverty is just plain boring, it’s ‘old hat’.
“Can’t you just shut up with your carping and celebrate,” runs this argument, “India has always had lots of poor people, but things are getting so much better. Why are you too mean-spirited and short-sighted to celebrate that fact?”
It is at this point that I start to get angry.
Two particularly pernicious views are embedded in this third attitude to India’s poverty.
The first is that India’s poor are an unalterable fact of life. I’m reminded of the government health official who once told me that “these people don’t need toilets”.
This is a nasty manifestation of the caste system which still prevails in India and says that people are irrevocably bound to their lot. It is their ‘karma’, their place in life.
Well, I’m here unapologetically to tell you that it’s not – or at least it shouldn’t be. If India’s poor had toilets and clean water less of their children would die unnecessarily. The UN estimates that currently 500,000 Indians a year die from lack of clean water, which puts the recent floods in perspective.
Allied to this view is the sense – and foreigners are the worst for this – that somehow India’s poor are “happy” in their lot. I’ve lost count of the number of foreign visitors to India who say blithely as they peer through windows of their luxury cars, “isn’t it amazing how happy the poor people look?”.
I must beg to differ. In my experience India’s poor are far from happy in their lot and to my mind it is patronising, complacent and offensive to suggest they are.
Of course wealth is relative. What makes an Indian villager happy is different from what makes a middle class Indian or westerner like me happy. A new car, a cappuccino at the coffee house, a decent salary rise are not on the average Indian villager’s wish-list.
And this is not to say that all of Indian village life is miserable. There are, as in all lives, days of happiness, days of sadness. But offer a poor Indian healthcare, education, land and a dignity and I suspect he’s unlikely to say, “You know what, I’m happy as I am. You can keep your food and medicine.”
An Indian villager is, lest we forget, a human being and should be entitled to the same fundamental human rights and dignities as the rest of us.
When an Indian villager is beaten up for offending a higher caste, he feels the same pain, anger and humiliation as you and I would.
When his daughter dies for want of 20 rupees worth of antibiotics, he feels loss.
When the elder one is raped by a higher caste man and the cops ignore his complaint – you can have the rural sex-crime figures by going on the UNICEF website – he feels powerless and angry.
When he can’t pay his debts he feels worthless to the point of suicide. (If 1,000 Indian farmers commit suicide annually, how many, I wonder, feel like doing it?)
When a villager looks at his son and grandson and finds them as illiterate and landless as himself, he feels empty, resigned and – a terrible emotion this – hopeless, in the true sense of that word.
And believe it or not, when a villager doesn’t have enough to eat he even feels hungry. Funny that.
Forgive the sarcasm, but writing about India’s poverty, however inconvenient, is a necessary fact of being a foreign correspondent in India.
Indeed, given that two-thirds of Indians remain dirt poor, the amount of column inches that I and other foreign journalists devote to India’s richer classes is disproportionately huge.
The aim is not to lament the mere fact of India’s poverty – that is ‘old hat’ – but rather to scream and yell about how little is being done to alleviate it.
Dr Singh talks bravely about eradicating malnutrition “in five years”, but lets see what the government actually does about it. Talking is not doing.
For most of the first five decades after Independence you could argue that India really wasn’t in an economic position to lift its masses out of poverty, but that is no longer the case.
With India’s new-found economic power come new responsibilities. I believe that India really does have the means – if not sadly the will – to make things better for all of its people and not just a self-satisfied middle class minority.
And if I’m guilty – along with Dr Singh – of pointing out where India, as a civilised society, is disgracefully neglecting those responsibilities, then I plead my guilt without a shred of apology.

Poverty is part of India's story – Telegraph Blogs

You are again wrong. Anything you post doesn’t upset any Indian. So keep your work going

 

[Windjammer]

You are again wrong. Anything you post doesn’t upset any Indian. So keep your work going

Lest you noticed, it's not my POV......

 

[Windjammer]

Quit India? And a Zillion Reasons (also Visas) to Escape from Mera Bharat Mahaan?
Posted by Sushmita Bose on Sunday, January 18, 2009


Okay everyone, I am confused and disturbed. But I have to tell you the story chronologically, so bear with me. Over the last week, I did quite a bit of research on Indians who are illegal immigrants in the United States. This was for my KT column. See, what happened was, starting the second week of January, British citizens who visit the US will have to fill up an electronic form at least 72 hours before they travel. This is part America’s heightened national security effort. Earlier, anybody with a British passport could enter the US at will; now, that freedom will be curtailed somewhat.
There is a big hue and cry in Britain, with people saying this move is bound to “put off” people from travelling to the US. All very well. But my column’s point was that we Indians take such a lot of crap from the US Embassy each time we apply for a visa — especially if it is a first-time tourist visa. Yes, right, there is a HUGE number of Indians who settle down there illegally (and the number is growing at breakneck speed), but what about PEOPLE LIKE US who DON’T WANT TO SETTLE ILLEGALLY IN THE UNITED STATES? Isn’t it funny that the number of illegal immigrants to the US is growing – which means that for all their visa rules and regulations, they are actually getting in the wrong people? And, in the process, those who have no intention of escaping from India (and want to visit the US for purely touristy reasons) face huge harassment — and then a rejection of the visa?
Those of you — like Pawandeep! — who’ve already read my KT column, I’m sorry, but I need to rehash some portions of it because the memory of being rejected for the US ‘tourist’ visa still haunts me. This was a couple of years ago, but I’m told things haven’t really gotten any better. In the KT column, I wrote about my encounter with a dreaded visa official at the American Embassy in New Delhi because I wanted to showcase how little angry Britons will have to go through actually, compared to what we Indians undergo. Foolishly, I had thought I was a perfect candidate for US tourism, so even though I had many friends and family members there, I didn’t ask for sponsorships (also, that would have required a lot of paperwork — which I ABSOLUTELY HATE!): I had a duly-filled up form with every detail in place; I held no criminal record; I was financially solvent and had a bank statement to prove so; and I had a letter from my editor stating that I worked for his newspaper and that I’d be given exactly three weeks’ leave.
EVERYBODY told me I would NOT get a tourist visa if I applied this way. I should pull strings. Call up the media handler in the US Embassy, somebody said. So-and-so’s uncle is good friends with the American ambassador, someone else suggested, ask him to help you out.
I didn’t do any of the above. Reason number one: I was plain lazy, I didn’t really want to call up the media handler and seek an appointment or talk to my friend’s uncle. And more importantly, there was number two: I had no idea just how bad the process of getting an US visa — in the normal manner — could be. I was — and I think I still am — an optimist, and had faith in ‘the system’.
At the US Embassy in Chanakyapuri, there were hordes of people waiting in line for a visa — and they all looked as though they are awaiting a verdict as to whether they’d test positive for a terrible terminal disease. When my turn came, the gent at the counter asked me if I could show him proof that I owned an “immovable asset”, like a house or an apartment. Well, I kind of have one, I muttered, but it’s not technically mine since I hadn’t paid back the bank loan (I wouldn’t for the next 20 years). Not good enough, I was told. But if I could present papers that proved I had a share in my parents’ house, then, that would do too. I thought that was ridiculous: why did I need to prop up parents’ house as my own?
So, I decided to take the plunge and ask him the following: “I have a good job in India (which roughly translated into my NOT being desperate to become an illegal immigrant in the US and work in a gas station), I love my life here, I want to come back home as soon as the three weeks are over — so why won’t you give me a visa?” And yes, I’m not even a terrorist but, of course, I couldn’t tell him that.
The visa officer looked me in eye and actually told me that my problem was that I wasn’t married. “If you had a husband to show, I’d give you a visa, no problems.” Would a husband qualify as an immovable asset, I wondered absently, while the gent started talking – again — about how I could get papers to prove that I am part owner of my parents’ house. At that point, I turned on my heels and left. (And since then, whenever I have passed the US Embassy — like I did when I go for momos to Sikkim House, that’s just down the road on Panchsheel Marg — I have always seethed at the sight of the fortress.)
Right after that, one of my friends (also a journalist) not only had her US visa rejected but her passport stamped — which meant she couldn’t apply for an US visa for the next two years. This was when she told the visa officer – she was applying for it from Bombay — the reason why she was wanted to visit the US: her cousin was getting married in Boston. “What if you meet someone at the wedding and decide to get hitched yourself — and thereafter stay back in the US?”
Now that my rant is over, let’s think about it logically. A recent report from the Department of Homeland Security shows that the numbers of Indians who are illegal immigrants in the US jumped 125% in 2008 since 2000, and it now stands at 270,000 (by comparison, numbers from Mexico, from where most illegal immigrants originate, rose only 37%). Some other institute research says that the number of illegally settled Indians is actually double the Homeland Security number.
Who should I be angry with: the visa officials and the US rules – or the illegal immigrants, who are giving all of us a bad name?
As I grapple with that, I came across a blog called A Zillion reasons to escape from India. ‘A Zillion reasons to escape from India‘ the site proclaimed, along with this strap: “Echoing an ordinary dream of 900 million poor people of India, who are ruled by 280 million corrupt, impotent, sick, feudal, brahmin and caste maniacs.” Then, there was, “Ever wondered why Indians migrate to another countries but no one comes to India for a living?” The blogger goes by the name of CyberGandhi, and there is a staggering number of hits on the site. I was almost on the verge of being angry again: being away from India makes you feel more patriotic.
Then, I had a look at the stats. See, the things is we all know about these stats. But we live with them on the fringes of our consciousness. It just makes you sit up when someone compiles the data together. Check out these facts:
1) India accounts for 40% of the world’s poor (more than in the whole of Africa) and its fiscal deficit is one of the highest in the world. India ranks way down at 96 among 119 developing countries included in the Global Hunger Index. 34.7 % of the Indian population lives with an income below $ 1 a day and 79.9 % below $ 2 a day.
2) According to CIA world fact book, the Current account balance of India is -10,360,000,000 (minus) while China is the wealthiest country in the world with $ 249,900,000,000 (Plus). India listed as 152 and China as no.1.
3) The Human Development Report for 2007-08 released by the UNDP ranked India 128 out of 177 countries, working it out through measures of life expectancy, education and income.
4) India has over 35 per cent of the world’s total illiterate population. According to reports, 35 per cent schools don’t have infrastructure such as blackboards and furniture. And close to 90 per cent have no functional toilets. Half of India’s schools still have leaking roofs or no water supply. Japan has 4,000 universities for its 127 million people and the US has 3,650 universities for its 301 million, India has only 348 universities for its 1.2 billion people.
5) In India, wealth of 36 families amounts to $ 191 billion, which is one-fourth of India’s GDP. In other words, 35 elite Hindu families own quarter of India’s GDP by leaving 85 % ordinary Hindus as poor!
6) India is also one of the most under-banked major markets in the world with only 6 bank branches per 1,000 sq kms, according to the World Bank, and less than 31% of the population has access to a bank account.
7) 25 % of Indians paid bribe to obtain a service. 68 % believe that governmental efforts to stop the corruption as ineffective. More than 90 % consider police and political parties as the worst corrupt institutions. 90 % of Indians believe that corruption will increase within the next 3 years.
Crime against Dalits occur every 20 minutes in India. Every day 3 Dalit women are raped, 2 Dalits are murdered and 2 Dalit houses are burnt down! These figures represent only a fraction of actual incidents since many Dalits do not register cases for fear of retaliation by the police and upper-caste Hindu individuals.
9) India has the highest number of street children in the world. There are no exact numbers, but conservative estimates suggest that about 18 million children live and labor in the streets of India’s urban centers. Mumbai, Delhi and Calcutta each have an estimated street-children population of over 100,000. The total number of Child labor in India is estimated to be 60 million.
10) The level of child malnutrition in India is among the highest in the world, higher even than some countries in sub-Saharan Africa.
11) On an average one Indian woman commits suicide every four hours over a dowry dispute. Rape is the fastest growing crime in India. Every hour Indian women face two rapes, two kidnappings, four molestations and seven incidents of cruelty from husbands and relatives
12) Women to men ratio were feared to reach 20:80 by the year 2020 as female fetus killing is rampant. Ten million girls have been killed by their parents in India in the past 20 years.
13) Economic Crime continues to be pervasive threat for Indian Companies, with 35 % of the organizations reporting having experienced fraud in the past two years.
14) Recently, a national report on the employment situation in India has warned that nearly 30 percent of the country’s 716 million-strong workforce will be without jobs by 2020. Government of India doesn’t have the resources or political will to find jobs for such a large population.
15) India is spending more than $400 million (£200m) to polish Delhi’s image as a first-rate capital, a difficult task for a city that seems to exist between the first and third worlds. A third of the capital’s 14 million-plus people live in teeming slums. According to crime statistics of 2006, Delhi continues to be the undisputed ‘crime capital’ of the country for the past 5 years in a row.
There is much more stuff on the site. This I thought was particularly interesting: Sixty years ago Indians asked the British to quit India. Now they are doing it themselves. To live with dignity and enjoy relative freedom, one has to quit India! With this massive exodus, what will be left behind will be a violently charged and polarized society.
I think all of us should go through the blog. Please let me know your views on this matter.
And also please go through the comments that have poured in for CyberGandhi: there is no chest-thumping about how one is ‘Proud to be Indian’, just acceptance that things are going from bad to worse. Here are a few:
1) “What would be the quality of citizens left in India in the next decade? Are we thinking about this?”
2) “Indians (including me) must be taught immediately the very definition of humanity.”
3) “India may produce a few billionaires and post good economic growth, but must also frame policies to include its over 836 million people who live in poverty with just Rs 20 a day.”
4) “Every Indian must read this, and avoid giving themselves delusions that they are a super power!!”
5) “Since the 10th Lok Sabha in 1991, Indian MPs have wasted nearly 700 working hours and an unbelievable 63 crore rupees.Each minute of a session costs whopping 25,000 rupees. This is the precious money that taxpayers eke out of meager earnings, in order to help maintain the procedural flow of governmental functioning.”
Like I said, let me know your thoughts.
Jai Hind.

Quit India? And a Zillion Reasons (also Visas) to Escape from Mera Bharat Mahaan? : Still Single in the City

 

[karan.1970]

Poverty is part of India's story – Telegraph Blogs

No doubt most of the above is absolutely true... sad, but nonetheless true.. But then how does this find a mention in a India-Pakistan 2010 comparison thread. Doesnt compare anything does it?? Or is the expectation that an Indian member will post a similar article talking about gender issues in Pakistan or its dismal Infant mortality or girl illiteracy rate or how despite all the hoo ha Pakistan features lower than India in overall score and most of the individual parameters of the Human development index.. But that has already been done.. so the arguement is futile...As one of my favourite lines that I learnt on this forum goes...

Poor Innovations can not be nurtured....

 

[Jade]

Lest you noticed, it's not my POV......

I noticed, and you misunderstood me. I was saying about your posts

 

[karan.1970]

Quit India? And a Zillion Reasons (also Visas) to Escape from Mera Bharat Mahaan?
Posted by Sushmita Bose on Sunday, January 18, 2009

Since we are comparing..

Net migration rate

India
-0.05 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)

Pakistan
-3.13 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)

Seems like people want to leave Pakistan much more than people want to leave India.. Wonder why??

 

[RiazHaq]

Now that we are comparing numbers and statistics, here's some that show the other side of the coin....

[Data from CIA World Fact book]

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/pk.html
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/in.html

Net migration rate
India
-0.05 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)

Pakistan
-3.13 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)

Seems like people want to leave Pakistan much more than people want to leave India.. Wonder why??

Infant mortality

India
50.78 deaths/1,000 live births

Pakistan
67.36 deaths/1,000 live births

India is so undernourished, but wonder why more children die under the age of 1 in Pakistan


Literacy

India
61%

Pakistan
49.9%

One out of every 3 illiterates in the world is an indian (because of our large population) but it looks like Pakistan is much worse off

GDP growth
Pakistan

India
2007 9%
2008 7.4%
2009 6.5%

2007 6%
2008 3.4%
2009 2.6%



Surprised?? Any one?? Didnt think so...


GDP Per Capita PPPIndia

$3,100 (2009 est.)
$2,900 (2008 est.)
$2,800 (2007 est.)


Pakistan
$2,600 (2009 est.)
$2,500 (2008 est.)
$2,500 (2007 est.)


more Poverty in India.. hmmm??....Also looks like India is getting better.. Pakistan??


Unemployment

India
10.7%

Pakistan
15.2%

If India has such a poverty problem, wonder what will be the situation in Pakistan with 50% more unemployment..

Investment Gross

India
32.1% of GDP

Pakistan
18.1% of GDP

One of the reasons for growth (in case of India) or lack thereof in case of Pakistan


Inflation

India
10%

Pakistan
15%

Coupled with lower growth and higher unemployment, wonder what this does to the supposed to be more literate and less hungry population of Pakistan...

Industrial production growth rate: India

7.6% (2009 est.)

Pakistan
-3%


Wonder why??


Reserves

India
$287 billion

Pakistan
$15.68 billion

Self explanatory


External Reserves to External Debt Ratio (I love this one)

India
1.29


Pakistan
0.3

If all of India's external debt is called in, India can pay so from its existing reserves and will still have money to spare. Pakistan on the other hand can only pay 30% of its external debt. Riaz.. Dude.. Familiar with Chapter 11 .. someone??

If India is so great, then why is it that it still has the world's largest population of the poor, the hungry, the illiterates, the malnourished by all accounts from UN and related international agencies?

Why is it that Indian planning commission member Syeda Hameed acknowledges that Pakistan and, even Bangladesh have done a better job in terms of nutrition for their population?

Why is it that WHO-UNICEF study shows 665 million Indians defecate in the open?

Why is it that Lizette Burgers, chief of water and environment sanitation of the Unicef, recently said India is making progress in providing sanitation but it lags behind most of the other countries in South Asia, including Pakistan, Bangladesh and even war-torn Afghanistan?

Why is it that, according to FAO, Indians get only 33% of their calories from non-food grain sources while Pakistanis get about 50% from non-food grain sources?

Why is it that India ranks 66th on the 2008 Global Hunger Index of 88 countries while Pakistan is slightly better at 61 and Bangladesh slightly worse at 70. The first India State Hunger Index (Ishi) report in 2008 found that Madhya Pradesh had the most severe level of hunger in India, comparable to Chad and Ethiopia. Four states — Punjab, Kerala, Haryana and Assam — fell in the 'serious' category. "Affluent" Gujarat, 13th on the Indian list is below Haiti, ranked 69. The authors said India's poor performance was primarily due to its relatively high levels of child malnutrition and under-nourishment resulting from calorie deficient diets.

Why is it that , according to Werner International, Pakistan's per capita consumption of textile fibers is about 4 Kg versus 2.8 Kg for India. Global average is 6.8 Kg and the industrialized countries' average consumption is 17 Kg per person per per year.

Wake up and smell the rotten veggies!

Haq's Musings: Food, Clothing and Shelter in India and Pakistan

 

[desiman]

If India is so great, then why is it that it still has the world's largest population of the poor, the hungry, the illiterates, the malnourished by all accounts from UN and related international agencies?

Why is it that Indian planning commission member Syeda Hameed acknowledges that Pakistan and, even Bangladesh have done a better job in terms of nutrition for their population?

Why is it that WHO-UNICEF study shows 665 million Indians defecate in the open?

Why is it that Lizette Burgers, chief of water and environment sanitation of the Unicef, recently said India is making progress in providing sanitation but it lags behind most of the other countries in South Asia, including Pakistan, Bangladesh and even war-torn Afghanistan?

Why is it that, according to FAO, Indians get only 33% of their calories from non-food grain sources while Pakistanis get about 50% from non-food grain sources?

Why is it that India ranks 66th on the 2008 Global Hunger Index of 88 countries while Pakistan is slightly better at 61 and Bangladesh slightly worse at 70. The first India State Hunger Index (Ishi) report in 2008 found that Madhya Pradesh had the most severe level of hunger in India, comparable to Chad and Ethiopia. Four states — Punjab, Kerala, Haryana and Assam — fell in the 'serious' category. "Affluent" Gujarat, 13th on the Indian list is below Haiti, ranked 69. The authors said India's poor performance was primarily due to its relatively high levels of child malnutrition and under-nourishment resulting from calorie deficient diets.

Why is it that , according to Werner International, Pakistan's per capita consumption of textile fibers is about 4 Kg versus 2.8 Kg for India. Global average is 6.8 Kg and the industrialized countries' average consumption is 17 Kg per person per per year.

Wake up and smell the rotten veggies!

Haq's Musings: Food, Clothing and Shelter in India and Pakistan

lol see karan what did i tell you

 

[desiman]

wow windjammer and Riaz Haq on the same thread lol India bashing to the max lol Mr.Haq you have finaly found a friend on this forum lol Same old crap again and again, quite boring now.

 

[riju78]

see guys mr.haq came up again with his favourite toilet malnutrition and poverty and what reference does he give . His own blog. The man will never answer ur questions. What really annoys me is that all this from a man in his 50s. He is old enough to know better. I asked this to desiman before.. Maybe someone should put few questions in bullet point and c if he answers. I dont think he would. Jai hind

 

[RiazHaq]

Since we are comparing..

Net migration rate

India
-0.05 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)

Pakistan
-3.13 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)

Seems like people want to leave Pakistan much more than people want to leave India.. Wonder why??

People want to leave India in droves, and that's why the world is worried. Countries like US have imposed quotas, and yet illegal immigration from India to US is rising dramatically.

There are an estimated 270,0000 illegal Indian immigrants in the United States, according to 2006 figures from the US Department of Homeland Security. With 125% percent increase from 2000 to 2006, India represents the fastest growing source of illegal immigrants to the United States, reports San Jose Mercury News, a major Silicon Valley newspaper. In absolute numbers, Central and South American nations account for the bulk of the estimated 11.5 million illegals, with India a distant second with 270,000 in 2006.

Haq's Musings: Illegal Immigration From India Jumps 125 Percent

 

[Jade]

If India is so great, then why is it that it still has the world's largest population of the poor, the hungry, the illiterates, the malnourished by all accounts from UN and related international agencies?

Why is it that Indian planning commission member Syeda Hameed acknowledges that Pakistan and, even Bangladesh have done a better job in terms of nutrition for their population?

Why is it that WHO-UNICEF study shows 665 million Indians defecate in the open?

Why is it that Lizette Burgers, chief of water and environment sanitation of the Unicef, recently said India is making progress in providing sanitation but it lags behind most of the other countries in South Asia, including Pakistan, Bangladesh and even war-torn Afghanistan?

Why is it that, according to FAO, Indians get only 33% of their calories from non-food grain sources while Pakistanis get about 50% from non-food grain sources?

Why is it that India ranks 66th on the 2008 Global Hunger Index of 88 countries while Pakistan is slightly better at 61 and Bangladesh slightly worse at 70. The first India State Hunger Index (Ishi) report in 2008 found that Madhya Pradesh had the most severe level of hunger in India, comparable to Chad and Ethiopia. Four states — Punjab, Kerala, Haryana and Assam — fell in the 'serious' category. "Affluent" Gujarat, 13th on the Indian list is below Haiti, ranked 69. The authors said India's poor performance was primarily due to its relatively high levels of child malnutrition and under-nourishment resulting from calorie deficient diets.

Why is it that , according to Werner International, Pakistan's per capita consumption of textile fibers is about 4 Kg versus 2.8 Kg for India. Global average is 6.8 Kg and the industrialized countries' average consumption is 17 Kg per person per per year.

Wake up and smell the rotten veggies!

Haq's Musings: Food, Clothing and Shelter in India and Pakistan

India is great because it allows people to decide their own future.

India is great because India comes before religion, region, caste, language, and ethnicity

India is great because Indians believe in unity in diversity

India is great because we are Indian, and you should not be asking this question to an Indian

 

[RiazHaq]

Here's a sad story of people in Bihar who have been expelled from Dubai recently, according to BBC:

The impact of the global financial downturn has been felt keenly in the Middle Eastern emirate of Dubai - and that in turn is affecting the remote Indian village of Akhopur in the state of Bihar, from where Amarnath Tewary reports.

In August 2008, Bharat Bhushan Tiwari - from Akhopur village in eastern Indian Bihar - took a loan of 71,000 rupees ($1,500) from a village moneylender to pay a local agent who had arranged a job for his son in Dubai.

Mr Tiwari - who runs a small shop - was hoping for better days for his family of five by sending his second son, Jay Kumar Tiwari, to the Gulf country.

Jay Kumar had got a job as a carpenter in a Dubai-based construction company and had big dreams - he wanted to earn a lot of money to pull his family out of grinding poverty.

But last month, their dreams came crashing down when Jay Kumar was asked by the company officials to quit by 6 March 2010.

'Cruel joke'

Dubai has been hit by an unprecedented financial crisis and the tremors are being felt in far away Bihar.

"This has been a cruel joke on our fate," Bharat Bhushan Tiwari told the BBC, trying to fight back his tears.

His other two sons are also unemployed and the Tiwari family now prays that the situation improves in Dubai.

"Whatever money we had, we gave it all to send Jay Kumar to Dubai and now we are plunged into severe debt," Mr Tiwari said.

He is not alone in his misfortune, over 30 families in his village are suffering the same fate.

His two nephews, Rajan and Rakesh, have also been given notice to quit their jobs in Dubai.

Another villager, Shatrughan Sah, 28, says the future looks increasingly gloomy.

In November 2008, he took a bank loan of 88,000 rupees ($1,880) to find a passage to Dubai where he worked 15 hours a day as an iron-fitter in an Indian construction company.

Mr Sah earned 575 dirham ($156) and sent about 450 dirham ($122) home every month.

With no agricultural land, a thatched house and virtually no means of livelihood in the village, the Sah family survived on this money.

"Starvation faces the family now," Mr Sah said.

"I returned in October 2009 and since then I've been waiting for their phone call. I do not know how we have survived... Sometimes I feel like committing suicide," he told the BBC.

Non-existent

The village of Akhopur is in the district of Siwan - from where about 75,000 people work in the Gulf. Most work as masons, helpers, carpenters, fitters and drivers.

They often labour in abysmal conditions with little or no facilities, but many say they can at least earn a living since opportunities back home are non-existent.

But now, the flow of returnees is ever growing.

BBC News - Indian migrants face bleak future in Dubai

 

[RiazHaq]

India is great because it allows people to decide their own future.

India is great because India comes before religion, region, caste, language, and ethnicity

India is great because Indians believe in unity in diversity

India is great because we are Indian, and you should be asking this question to an Indian

Does India have direct democracy? Or is it a representative democracy that favors the corrupt and criminal incumbents in India's parliament, regardless of their party affiliations?

Do the majority Indians decide to be poor, hungry and illiterate? Is that so great about India?

Do you know that more than a third of Indian MPs are criminals?

Just prior to the vote on India-US nuke deal, the BBC reported as follows:

"Normally they (Six members of India's Parliament) are in jail, serving time for crimes ranging from extortion and kidnapping to murder. The Indian constitution allows them out on bail to attend important parliamentary votes. But the sight of convicted murderers entering the parliamentary chamber won't be the most edifying of spectacles."

This nexus of crime and politics in India developed in two stages - in the first stage, Indian politicians used criminal elements and gangsters to control polling stations and intimidate their rivals; this gave legitimacy to these people and they decided to contest elections for themselves rather than merely act as mussel men (baahubali) for other politicians. There are many examples of this pattern, such as Munna Shukla and Shahabudin in Bihar, Raju Bhaiyya in U.P and Arun Gawli of Mumbai.

Do you know that the Indian politicians are enriching themselves at the poor people's expense?

Most Indian politicians have used their election wins to significantly enrich themselves, according to their own pre-election declarations of assets. For example, the comparison of assets of candidates who won in 2004 and sought re-elections in 2009 shows that the wealth of UP politicians has grown by 559%, over five times, in five years, second only to their Karnataka counterparts who registered a growth of 693% in the same period, according to Sulekha.com.

Haq's Musings: Challenges of Indian Democracy

Haq's Musings: Is Indian Democracy Overrated?

 

[Windjammer]

Since we are comparing..

Net migration rate

India
-0.05 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)

Pakistan
-3.13 migrant(s)/1,000 population (2009 est.)

Seems like people want to leave Pakistan much more than people want to leave India.. Wonder why??

I merely posted the article as it was written by none other than an Indian, who also happens to be living in India, again i could have posted the cyber Gandhi article mentioned by the author but i leave that for your own judgement. My argument is you posted a comparative detail assessed by none other than the CIA, the same organisation which generated the prophecy of Pakistani nuclear weapons being stolen on Mule trains and has been repeatedly resetting the doomsday clock ticking over Pakistan, and the same organisation which supposedly can read a car's number plate from space yet needs Pakistan's help to find America's most wanted. !!!
Indeed the article doesn't portray a definitive comparison but then again your disclosure is not worth an argument in the sense.
Alas one wonders, which side has drawn a bigger line.