75 vs. 613: Electricity Consumption in Bihar and India

Bihar’s per capital electricity consumption, at 75 kilowatt-hour (kWh), is the lowest in India and far below the national average of 613 units according to a recent report titled Energy Injustice.

This is not unusual; Bihar falls below the national average on almost all indices of development and wellbeing. Yet the disparity between Bihar and the rest of India is way too high when it comes to electricity consumption and access to electricity. Consumption is more than 8 times lower in Bihar than the rest of India. Less than 10% households have electricity connection in Bihar and only 3% of farmers use electricity for irrigation. Half of the villages are yet to be electrified and even in urban areas, people pay Rs. 10-12/unit to private power generators to get 24 hours power supply.

Low consumption of electricity is not just a symptom of Bihar’s underdevelopment; it is a cause. Lack of power makes every economic activity–farming, agro-processing, manufacturing, service provision, education– uncompetitive; a hassle. I firmly believe that improving electricity supply will give a boost to Bihar’s economy like no other single intervention will. We need massive investments in electricity sector in Bihar; the returns will be very high.

From my great-great grandfather to me

In 1876, AP Mcdonell,  in his ‘Report on Food-grain Supply of Bengal and Behar’, recorded average rice yield to be 1000 to 1200 kg/hectare (ha) in Tirhut and 500 to 1700 kilograms/ha in Champaran (average being  979 kg/ha) in a good year. He reported double cropped area to be 30-32% of cultivated land (cropping intensity of 1.3-1.32). In some tappas of Champaran, cropping intensity was as high as 1.62. One hundred and thirty years later, in 2006—when the population pressure on land has increased five folds, most (84%) still cultivators and agricultural laborers just as in 1876; two-third of land has been brought under irrigation; and chemical fertilizers and hybrid seeds have become common—average rice yield is almost the same in these parts of Bihar, barely higher. Cropping intensity, now at around 1.4, has not increased by much either[1].

I want to know why.

---

[1] The picture is better for Rabi season. Wheat and winter maize are now grown over a much larger area and wheat yields are two to four times higher. But there is not a sharp increase in the total area under second crop. Wheat and maize have replaced coarse cereals and pulses whose yields have not increased over this 130 year period at all.

Economist’s Outlook for 2010

Thanks partly to the monsoon, manufacturing will overtake agriculture for the first time in India.

Survival off Stamp Size Plots

According to Agriculture Census 2000-01, two-thirds (64.34%) of the 11.6 million land holdings in Bihar are smaller than 2000 sq. meters (i.e. 0.5 acres). These sub-half acre holdings account for nearly 20% of the total cultivable area in the state and their average size is just 760 sq. meters (0.19 acres).  I wonder how the rice-wheat cropping system, predominant in Bihar, can be sustained on such stamp sized plots.

Elsewhere smallholders are diversifying to high value crops and crop based activities (like dairying) to eke out a living off their tiny plots. But that does not seem to be happening in Bihar. Here rice-wheat system continues to dominate agriculture. Rice-Wheat cropping on such small plots, with yields as low as they are in Bihar (rice+wheat<4 tons/ha), cannot provide enough food or employment. These 7.5 million smallholder families must be supplementing their incomes from other activities–like working in others’ fields and migrating to villages and cities of other states of India–just to survive. If so, then the claim that 3/4th of the working population in rural Bihar is employed mainly in agriculture becomes suspect. It may still be true, but it definitely requires closer scrutiny.

NREGA in The Economist and Times of India

The Economist says it’s working.  Rural job guarantees faring well. India’s grand experiment with public works enjoys a moment in the sun.

Tushaar Shah argues in an Op-ed in Times of India that replacing NREGS with a cash transfers program is a bad idea. NREGA is self-selecting while a cash transfer program will be completely hijacked by the rich and the connected.  Cash transfers is a flawed alternative to NREGS.

The Resource Curse: Salwa Judum in Chhattisgarh

Common people living in resource rich areas often end up paying dearly for the riches. Tribals in mineral rich Chhattisgarh are no exception.

This is from a government report:

….”The report is devastatingly frank about the collusion between government and big business, even accusing the two of funding and fuelling the Salwa Judum in Chhattisgarh. “This open, declared war will go down as the biggest land grab ever…. Tata Steel and Essar Steel…wanted seven villages or thereabouts…to mine the richest lode of iron ore available in India. (After) initial resistance from the tribals…the state withdrew its plans. A new approach was necessary…. (It) came about with the Salwa Judum…headed by the Murias, some of them erstwhile (Maoist) cadres. Behind them are traders, contractors and miners…. The first financiers of the Salwa Judum were Tata and Essar…640 villages…were laid bare, burnt to the ground and emptied with the force of the gun and the blessings of the state. (Some) 3,50,000 tribals, half the total population of Dantewada district, are displaced, their womenfolk raped, their daughters killed and their youth maimed. Those who could not escape into the jungle were herded together into refugee camps run and managed by the Salwa Judum…640 villages are empty. Villages sitting on tons of iron ore are effectively de-peopled and available for the highest bidder. The latest information being circulated is that both Essar Steel and Tata Steel are willing to take over the empty landscape and manage the mines.”

Why India Is Playing Hard to Get on Climate Change?

An interesting article from Time magazine that captures the West’s view of India’s intransigence in climate negotiations. Factual details of the article are less interesting than its tone. Read it for the tone, not for the facts. While the title suggests that the article will be about why India refuses to co-operate, that is not what it is. It is more about how “we” (the Americans) see India’s attitude and how pissed off we are at it.

“What is clear is that the first step in a successful outcome in Copenhagen will need to come from the U.S., the country responsible for nearly a quarter of the CO2 that is warming our planet. India and other developing nations will have to follow. It’s not exactly fair, but there’s nothing fair about climate change”.

There is some of “we are also responsible and we should act” type self-flagellation here that is typical of liberal America, also seen in its approach to WTO, world peace, and everything else. But it is more deception than sincerity. Like their European ancestors, they “want gold and slaves but at the same time they want statues put up to themselves too” as people who care a lot about the planet earth.

In climate negotiations, it is amazing how the past is being washed away; there is only the present and the future.

कुछ इश्क किया, कुछ काम किया : फैज़ अहमद फैज़

वो लोग बहुत ख़ुशक़िस्मत थे
जो इश्क़ को काम समझते थे
या काम से आशिक़ी करते थे
हम जीते जी मसरूफ़ रहे
कुछ इश्क़ किया कुछ काम किया

काम इश्क़ के आड़े आता रहा
और इश्क़ से काम उलझता रहा
फिर आख़िर तंग आकर हम ने
दोनों को अधूरा छोड़ दिया

पलकें बिछाए तो नहीं बैठीं: बालस्वरूप राही

कटीले शूल भी दुलरा रहे हैं पाँव को मेरे

कहीं तुम पंथ पर पलकें बिछाए तो नहीं बैठीं!

हवाओं में न जाने आज क्यों कुछ-कुछ नमी-सी है,

डगर की उष्णता में भी न जाने क्यों कमी-सी है,

गगन पर बदलियाँ लहरा रही हैं श्याम-आँचल-सी

कहीं तुम नयन में सावन छिपाए तो नहीं बैठीं।

अमावस की दुल्हन सोई हुई है अवनि से लगकर,

न जाने तारिकाएँ बाट किसकी जोहतीं जग कर,

गहन तम है डगर मेरी मगर फिर भी चमकती है,

कहीं तुम द्वार पर दीपक जलाए तो नहीं बैठीं !

हुई कुछ बात ऐसी फूल भी फीके पड़ जाते,

सितारे भी चमक पर आज तो अपनी न इतराते,

बहुत शरमा रहा है बदलियों की ओट में चन्दा

कहीं तुम आँख में काजल लगाए तो नहीं बैठीं!

कटीले शूल भी दुलरा रहे हैं पाँव को मेरे,

कहीं तुम पंथ सिर पलकें बिछाए तो नहीं बैठीं।

Ig Nobel 2009

Gideon Gono, the governor of Zimbabwe’s Reserve Bank, won the Ig Nobel prize for Mathematics in 2009. He was recognized for:

“giving people a simple, everyday way to cope with a wide range of numbers — from very small to very big — by having his bank print bank notes with denominations ranging from one cent ($.01) to one hundred trillion dollars ($100,000,000,000,000)”.

In 2008, Zimbabwe’s peak hyperinflation rate reached 79,600,000,000 %(79.6 billion %) per month. At this rate, nominal price of things would double every 24 hours. Hungary, in 1945-46, experienced inflation rate of 41.9 quadrillion percent (41,900,000,000,000,000)per month, a record unsurpassed: na bhuto, na bhavishyati.

Other Ig Nobel Prizes are just as interesting and deserving.

The PEACE prize went to Stephen Bolliger, Stephen Ross, Lars Oesterhelweg, Michael Thali and Beat Kneubuehl of the University of Bern, Switzerland:

“for determining — by experiment — whether it is better to be smashed over the head with a full bottle of beer or with an empty bottle”.

And the Economics Prize was awarded to the directors, executives, and auditors of four Icelandic Banks: Kaupthing Bank, Landsbanki, Glitnir Bank, and Central Bank of Iceland:

“for demonstrating that tiny banks can be rapidly transformed into huge banks, and vice versa — and for demonstrating that similar things can be done to an entire national economy”.