Regional Disparities in India and the Five year Plans | UPSC Mains Essay Preparation PDF Download

Regional Disparities in India and the Five year Plans

structure

(1) Opening    —    The phenomenon of disparaties in the development of regions.

(2) Body    —    Balanced regional development.

    —    The delimitation of regions becomes a difficult proposition.

    —    Concept of homogenity is relaxed while identifyincg regions.

    —    India's Five Year Plans.

    —    Quote Gunnar Myrdal

    —    Magnitude of regional disparities in India.

    —    Causes of regional disparsties in India.

    —    Regional Planning Policy in India.

    —    Lack of genuine regional planning.

(3) Closing    —    Decentralization and Panchayat Raj will help reorient our plan priorities in favour of balanced regional development.

Differentials in the levels of achievement are inevitable. This is true of all aspects in which the term ‘achievement’ can be perceived and at all 

levels to which it can be attributed. For instance if we take the aspect of economic wellbeing at the level of individuals we will find differentials. Even if we take two ideal typical specimens—similarly endowed in all respects—yet circumstances dictated by their respective histories and their existential realities not to speak of unexpected windfall gains, will mitigate against any eventual equality of economic achievement. The phenomenon of disparities in the development of regions is only an extension of the above analogy. However, no government worth its salt can allow an unbridled perpetuation of such disparity.

Balanced regional development is the humane aspect of planning, yet ironically, the origin of this idea was not governed by any altruistic considerations rather it was mooted as a strategic measure. Stalin conceived the idea of balanced regional development as a measure to insulate the economic power of Soviet Russia against crippling disability in the event of occupation of any region of the country if capitalist powers were to invade her. Similarly, the benefits of regional dispersal of industries dawned on Britain in  the wake of debilitating German bombardments during the Second World War. Based on these and other more weighty considerations which we shall shortly enlist, the Indian planners sought to iron out regional disparities in the levels of development.

In a large country like ours where a myriad triads of diversity are encrusted into its being; the delimitation of regions becomes a difficult proposition. Theoretically, a region is a geographic or a real unit having definite boundaries. Regions are distinguished by homogeneities within and heterogeneities without. The boundary of a region may be a well defined line as in the case of a watershed or may be diffused to form a band or zone which is transitional between two regions. Regions may be defined on the basis of a single variable like crop regions, regions. Regions may be defined on the basis of a single variable like crop regions, rainfall regions etc. or a combination of variables like natural regions. A region is usually identified by the concept of homogeneity of one or more variables within the region.

Sometimes the concept of homogeneity is relaxed while identifying regions. Here the distinction is based on the linkages which exist within the system e.g., the state as a region, city as a region or regions marked on the basis of industrialization etc. then there are ad-hoc regions delineated with reference to certain special features e.g.: tribal areas, drought prone areas, mining regions etc. Thus, we see that a region is delimited by taking into account the physical and human factors.

Broadly speaking India's Five Year Plans have taken the State as a unit of region. This choice is perhaps dictated by our federal set up and the efficiency and care in implementing programmes based on this demarcation. However, we have several intervening and often overlapping Special Area Programmes like the Drought Prone Area Programme (DPAP), Integrated Tribal Development Projects (ITDP) meant for tribal areas and MNERGA etc. which also strive towards the goal of removal of regional disparities.

Regional development can play an important role in the rapid and smooth development of our economy while efficiently utilizing our resources and at the same time promoting larger employment opportunities. All these factors happen to be on top of the agenda of our plans.

Gunnar Myrdal has identified ‘strong backwash effects and weak spread effects’ as the principal cause of regional inequalities. The profit motive of entrepreneurs leads to concentration of economic and social overheads in certain regions thereby squeezing out the potential of other regions. A balanced regional development prevents such an occurrence and the entire economy depends on the development of all regions in keeping with their factor endowments. Decentralization, strengthens the ‘spread effects’ by securing maximum efficiency in the utilization of available resources and paving the way for different regions to be naturally helpful to each other by reaping the benefits of comparative advantage. Moreover, balanced regional development also avoids transport and supply bottlenecks and minimize inflationary pressures within the economy. The dispersal of industries and development of infrastructure in backward areas also promotes larger employment thereby increasing their per capita output and income.

Balaned regional development is a potent instrument to ensure political stability. The Bodo problem, Gorkha problem, Jharkhand problem and other such rise in regional aspirations owe their genesis to disparities in development. Equitable spatial development can also be used as a weapon to blunt the impact of social evils which stem from concentration of industries e.g.: over-crowding which prevents proper socialization of individuals because of the immense pressures on institutions (both primary and secondary).

Strategic considerations, as already discussed, may be provided as the last but not the least argument in favour of balanced regional development in India.

Ascertaining the magnitude of regional disparities is fraught with difficulties. Differences in per capita income are often highlighted to bring out disparities in different States. This is, however, not a suitable indicator of differentials in development because of two reasons. One, because it does not reflect the intra-state differentials and secondly, because development is a composite term encompassing the welfare realm which is not entirely reflected by per capita income alone. Hence, differences in industrial growth and/or agricultural growth, level of literacy, percentage of industrial workers, availability of medical help per thousand persons in the state and other such indicators have been evolved. Attempts have also been made to generate a composite index of all these indicators. However, we shall confine ourselves to inter-state disparities as reflected by some major indicators.

Taking per-capita income first we find that the states of Punjab, Maharashtra and Haryana have continuously maintained a considerable lead over other states. However, that strikes us is the fact that the backward States like Bihar, Orissa, Madhya Pradesh etc. have been continuously slipping behind the growth rates of the leaders.

In agriculture the disparities have been accentuated by the ‘region specific’ and ‘crop specific’ nature of Green Revolution. The advent of HYV seeds boosted agricultural growth in Punjab, Haryana and parts of Uttar Pradesh. The Central Dry Region comprising of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh does have some achievements to speak of while agricultural growth in the remaining states has been more or less stagnant.

There are glaring disparities in the industrial sector too. Maharashtra, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu and West Bengal have forged much ahead of others. Together they account for about half of the total industrial employment and approximately sixty percent of the total output in this sector.

Among the pre-Independence period causes, the interests of our colonial overlords stand out as most significant. The Britishers were interested in obtaining raw material to support their new industry in Britain therefore they paid attention only on those regions in India which provided these raw materials. Britain wanted raw cotton for her own cotton textile industry, therefore she made ample investments in the cotton tracts of Khandesh, Barar, Gujarat and Karnataka. They oriented the pattern of railway construction and freight policy towards foreign trade rather than internal trade. The four port towns were connected by rail while the internal trading centres remained uncluttered. The port towns were also given undue favour in industrialization, modernization and urbanisation. Thus, the seeds of disparity were sown.

The interventionist and active role adopted by the Indian state during the early plans unwittingly contributed to the phenomenon of concentration. The license permit raj somehow became an instrument in the hands of vested interests and the already industrialized states of Maharashtra, Gujarat, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu got more than their proportionate share of licenses. Even within these states there was concentration in the major cities like Bombay, Poona, Ahmedabad, Surat, Calcutta, Madras etc.

As already highlighted the selective nature of the ‘green revolution’ excerbated the disparities in development both-inter-regional as well as intra-regional.

Policy initiatives during the planning period have addressed themselves to industrial sector, agriculture and allied activities, infrastructure improvement, transfer of resources from Centre to States and special area programmes.

Policies aimed at industrializing the lagging regions sought to locate public sector projects in backward regions and also direct private investment to backward regions through a two pronged approach; use of industrial licensing policy and secondly by giving incentives like subsidies anD concessions finance from nationalised banks and financial institutions.

Irrigation, agriculture and allied activities were identified for being given a wider and deeper role. In order to overcome the regional disparities stemming from the impact of High Yielding Variety (HYV) seeds, emphasised on development of dryland rainfed farming and rice production programme has also been launched in the eastern region.

In recognition of the immense potential of rural industries in removing regional disparities and the low financial capital and human capital input required in setting them up, the government has raised rural industrialization in its list of priorities. The government has taken upon itself the task of establishing industrial estates selfsufficient in infrastructure particularly banking, transport and communication in backward regions.

The government had also launched special programmes for the development of backward regions like Hill Areas Development Programme (HADP), Drought Prone Areas Development Programme (DPAP), Desert Development Programme (DDP) besides special border area programmes.

However, despite these plan initiatives regional disparities in India have been on the rise. Perhaps this is because of lack of a genuine regional planning.

The models that form the basis of planning in India (e.g. : Mahalanobis model) are sectorial in character which do not have any regional variables. The justification of dispersal of industries does not emerge from these models themselves rather it is brought out as an appendage added by the plan formulators only to justify their claim that they are awake to the problem of regional disparities. No conscious efforts appear to have been made in the plans to evolve a linked pattern of hierarchy of different settlements (having Central villages, service towns, growth points, growth centres, growth poles etc.) and therefore no spatially integrated socio-economic organization could emerge.

Neglect of spatial factor and genuine regional planning can be attributed to a large extent to the highly centralized process of plan formulation. The structure of the planning machinery marginalises the role of the state in plan formulation while the lower units have no say at all. The role of the state in planning process is confined merely to ‘bargaining for more financial resources and higher allocations’.

The consequence of all this has been the emergence of an immensely distorted and lopsided pattern of urbanization and economic development. It is  hoped that the recent ‘mantra’ of decentralization and Panchayat Raj will help reorient our plan priorities in favour of balanced regional development.