National Human Development Report: 2001 - Indira Gandhi Institute ...

NATIONAL HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPORT 2001 GOVERNANCE FOR HUMAN DEVELOPMENT 117India’s Governance — Recent Score CardAchievementsConcerns and ChallengesEconomic Governance• India is among the ten fastest growing economies of1990s;• Growth disparities across States have increased in 1990sas compared to 1980s;• Substantial forward movement in industrial, trade andaspects of fiscal policy reforms;• Implementation problems remain in many areas andparallel action is needed in most States;• Tax reforms — rationalisation of tax rates, exemptionsand simplification of tax administration;• Less than 0.5 per cent of population pays income tax,under reporting of income widespread;• Reasonable price stability;• Stagnating tax — GDP ratio;• Comfortable balance of payments, growing foreignexchange reserves;• Central and State Governments running unsustainableFiscal Deficits;• Significant decline in incidence of poverty;• About 260 million persons or about 26 per cent of• Self-sufficiency in food grains with unprecedented population still below the normative poverty line;public food stocks;• Pockets of hunger and acute deprivation still an• Steady improvement in most social indicators;unfortunate reality;• Impressive gains in demographic transition for manyStates.• Critical gaps remain, a little less than half of women stillilliterate, high infant mortality rates;• Population growth still high, unsustainable and persistingadverse sex-ratios in some States.Political Governance• A resilient democracy supporting the emergence of amulti-party polity at various tiers of government;• Recourse to competitive populism, the use of moneypower,particularly during elections, compromising• Politics of coalition and consensus is beginning to find decisive political action;its feet;• Absence of institutional framework for sustaining• Broad political consensus on nature and direction ofeconomic reforms and national foreign policy;(coalition) governments for their term, once elected tooffice;• Movement on decentralisation of power from the Centreto States, districts and villages;• Disruptions in parliamentary proceedings delaying timelyand informed legislative work;• Positive discrimination, reservation in political bodiesat grass-root level, social mobilisation of themarginalised and competitive elections have createdopportunities for popular participation in decision• Excessive compartmentalisation of the executive, intoministries resulting in a narrow development perspective,vested interests and preventing the rightsizing of abloated bureaucracy;making;• Criminalisation of public life, politics of vote bank,• Independent and a proactive judiciary on issues oflarger public interest.communal violence, and corruption are major challengesfor improving governance in the country;• Too much state presence in some areas, too little in others.Civil Governance• Primacy of basic human and civic rights;• In practice, some like women and deprived are less equal• Rule of law;than others, particularly, in their social and economic• Freedom of expression, free press and electronic media; rights;• Considerable non-governmental and civil society • Persisting law and order problems in some areas;initiatives in various spheres of social and public life; • Mobilisation of people for better work ethics, civic• Institutional framework/agencies for checking responsibilities and environmental protection;corruption in high public offices.• Poor conviction rates, delayed justice, backlog of cases,particularly in subordinate judiciary;• Distorted, perverse incentive structures in civil servicesencouraging mediocrity and corruption.