An economic think-tank on Thursday said the feel good in the economy claimed by the National Democratic Alliance government was "fragile" and listed out 30-point deficiencies, saying nearly half of the country's population did not have access to basic healthcare.
Making certain "startling" revelations, the Indian Institute of Planning and Management wondered "Is India really shining" with nearly 24 crore (240 million) Indians going hungry every day and about 30 crore (300 million) people living below the poverty line.
In its Economic Review 2003-04, IIPM found that Rs 50,000 crore (Rs 500 billion) worth of food grains were wasted in the country, which was in excess of what Australia produced.
It also said while the Budget for 2003-04 promised to cover only 50 lakh (5 million) families under the Antoyadaya scheme, 52 million tonnes of food-grains were rotting in go-downs.
Lamenting that the government's claims of India Shining and feel good factor had been "sheer luck" with certain positive economic factors -- soaring agricultural output, rising forex reserves and Sensex, IIPM founder director M K Chaudhuri said: "Peeping deep into the 8 per cent growth rate, one finds that all these factors are fragile and short-lived, which are not sustainable for a long period."
IIPM said only 25 per cent of the consumers' rupee reaches the farmers as compared to 50 per cent in developed countries, indicating the extent of pilferage through middlemen.
It also said the per capita availability of land has been declining over the years and that the country was spending a paltry 0.3 per cent of agricultural GDP in R&D as compared to 2.8 per cent in the United States and 4.02 per cent in Australia.
There were over 100 million hectares of land classified as wastelands and about 65 per cent of the rain water was wasted, over 80 per cent of the livestock was unproductive and about 50 per cent of forests were denuded, while 55-60 per cent of the rural people were unemployed, IIPM said.
Rather painting a gloomy picture on foreign investments, it said: "India figures in the category of under performers" in FDI and added that FDI inflows had not exceeded $5 billion in any year.
"India is able to attract only 2.2 per cent of the FDI inflows in Asia, which as per cent of the GDP is at a low 0.5 per cent," it said.
On the industries, the Delhi-based institute said its concentration was highly "skewed" and the states like Bihar and Orissa have remained industrially backward despite abundant natural resources.
IIPM said the average power tariff for industries was above Rs 4 per unit while it was Rs 1.8 in the US, Rs 1.2 in China, 80 paise in Saudi Arabia and Rs 1.7 in most European countries.
About infrastructure, it said a large section of the respondents to its survey found that transport, power and water supply continued to be "problematic" and investment in the power sector alone has to be in excess of Rs 1,00,000 crore (Rs 1,000 billion).
About healthcare, it said there were only 43 doctors available for 10,000 people in India.
The size of healthcare industry was just 5 per cent of the GDP and of these, the government spending constituted just 1.5 per cent and the remaining from the private sector, it said, adding that 52 per cent of the referral units had no gynaecologists and 78 per cent had no anaesthetists.
Highlighting that India was the "worst" affected nation after South Africa, which homes 3.97 million HIV infected people, it said "55-60 per cent of people living with AIDS in India also have TB, which kills approximately 4,60,000 people annually."
Though there was an "urgent" need for 80,000 bed speciality hospitals, IIPM said: "Only 4,000 beds are added each year."
The economic think-tank also brought out discrepancies in the domestic airfare vis-a-vis international tariffs, making the "domestic travellers opt for foreign destinations."
It said airfare from Delhi to Kochi costs more than a complete package of airfare and six nights of hotel stay in Maalysia or Thailand.
As far as the government expenditure on tourism was concerned, IIPM said India ranked 150 out of 160 nations and spent only 0.9 per cent of total budget as compared to 5.1 per cent by Malaysia and 3.8 per cent by China.
