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‘Talk of equality meaningless without economic freedom’
Daljit Singh Sra

STANFORD: "The agonizing circumstances and conditions that a common man has to face merely to scrape enough for meting his daily expenses and minimal needs is something that those advocating the reforms and economic liberalization do not even realize. 

The forces of globalization have virtually decimated the daily wagers and small time labourers." These were the views of Madhu Purnima Kishwar who spoke at the Stanford University here. The program was organized by Center for South Asia's International, Comparative and Area Studies Division on April 20. Kishwar presented a narrative of her organization Manushi's initiative to fight off the absurd laws and regulations governing the livelihoods of two of the most visible and numerically large groups of urban self-employed – poor-- street vendors and cycle rickshaw pullers – showing how needless bureaucratic controls trap the hard working poor in a web of illegality and make them victims of extortion rackets.  

A Senior Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies in Delhi, Kishwar is also the Founder President of Manushi Sangathan, committed to strengthening democratic rights and women's rights in India and founder editor of Manushi – A Journal About Women and Society, which has been published continuously since 1978. Presenting facts, figures, slides and clippings to build up her argument, Kishwar painted a picture of a society where the poor witness to government proclaimations of inducing social equality without equipping the people to earn their basic livelihood. "That is something like fighting a war by swinging swords in merely air," she said.The Indian For Collective Action and Maitri were also associated with the program. Kishwar's thesis revolved around an exposition of how political freedom has been understood very narrowly, without any regard to economic freedom. "Economic issues have been viewed largely through the prism of class struggle, with the state being projected as the sole 'protector' of the weak and vulnerable sections of society from the greed and exploitation of the rich and powerful. Neither our economists nor our political theorists have come to grips with the often predatory role of the State and how it works to wreck people's livelihoods and self-confidence." 

Obsessed with the political and electoral dimensions of democracy, our intellectuals and media tend to ignore the systematic and routine loot, extortion, violence, and indignities suffered by our people as they go about legitimate economic pursuits. The livelihood concerns of the vast majority of our people remain marginalized as even the agenda of economic reforms is focused on transnational corporations, the Indian corporate sector, and government- run public enterprises. 

Indian and foreign corporations and the PSUs together provide employment to no more than 3% cent of our population. As against about 10% who are selfemployed in Europe and America, more than 90% of people in India work in the unorganized and selfemployed sector.

23 April 2008
 

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