Food Security in India

There are people in the world so hungry, that God cannot appear to them except in the form of bread.

- M.K. Gandhi

Gone are those days of uncivilized feral nomads squandering their pastoral life through tempestuous wilderness of Paleolithic stretch.  Civilisation came. Neolithic Revolution paved the way for agriculture - the premier sociocultural clutch in human accomplishment. Cultivation of cereal crops and the domestication of animals found the clue to check the perpetuity of scarcity. Granaries were built. Authorities were installed on them to drive food from storage in times of shortage. Ancient prepossessions transformed into medieval prejudices. Feudalism ushered in. Darkness crept into. Famine, epidemic and war cramped the existing social stratification. Inequality rose. So did exploitation. Parched by the gruesome misery of hunger and malnutrition, people were enlightened by the notion of security - food security in particular - to inhibit the appetitive vulnerability. Age of Enlightenment unfolded ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity. Medieval kingdoms and communities metamorphosed into nation states. Constitutional governments were formed to take care of collective prosperity of their populace including the four dimensions of food security - availability, accessibility, affordability and stability of food to all people at all times. Food security acquired legal perspective as a consequence of modern society proclaiming the formative development as one of the foremost human rights.

The above commentary includes almost every social and economic clusters, better recognized as nations in the world, and India is not an exception.

Article 47 of Indian Constitution certifies ‘the right to food’ and features the ‘Duty of the state to raise the level of nutrition and the standard of living and to improve public health.’ Although the realization of food agglomeration and later distribution in times of need was felt quite early in the history. Early Mehrgarh residents used to store their grain in granaries. Gigantic granaries were discovered in Harappa. India, heavily dependent on summer monsoon in securing water for irrigating crops, has always been vulnerable to famines which remained as a grievous fate to its people. Kautilya, the great statesman of ancient India, in his extensive chronicle - collectively known as ‘Arthashastra’ - has advised the king to initiate public projects such as creating irrigation waterways, providing seeds and provisions and exempting taxes on those affected during the famines. Gradual evolution of an elaborate system vying to scrape off the dearth of foods was taken in later years. But sagacious treatises, merely treated as hollow rhetorics, failed to stall the following distresses. There were 14 notable famines between 11th and 17th century. Delhi experienced famine during the rule of Muhammad bin Tughluq. The sultanate offered no relief to the starving residents. Pre-colonial famines in the Deccan included the Damajipant famine of 1460. The 1629-32 famine in Deccan and Gujarat during the Mughal period was one of the greatest in India’s history. Needless to say, colonial India endured egregious famines more than ever before, viz. Great Bengal famine of 1770, Orissa famine of 1886 and so on. Bengal famine of 1943, marked as the lattermost instance of such adversities, preceded rapid decline in number of famines which had limited effects and had been of short durations. Furthermore, independent Indian government successfully contained famine threats of 1984, 1988 and 1998.

BUT, the wicked conjunction soundly turns every preceding contention inconsequential, India is ranked 100th out of 119 countries on Global Hunger Index. Fifty percent of world’s hungry live in India along with around 200 million food-insecure people. 10 million of people die every year of chronic hunger and hunger related diseases and obviously, India claims quarter of them. Astonishingly, the number of hungry people in India is always more than the number of people below the official poverty line.

SO, the pertinent adverb always follows the previous conjunction, eliminating famine does little to obviate hunger, and therewith brings out the inconsistent foundation of food security in independent India.

The first initiative to formulate a sustainable food polity was taken by a Food grain Policy Commission under the chairmanship of Sir Purushottam Das Thakurdas, one of the founders of FICCI, in 1947. Commission’s report conclusively emphasized that ‘imports were necessary to enable maintenance of central reserve to guard against crop failure.’ The Commission also recommended that ‘the indigenous food grain production should be increased till self sufficiency is achieved.’ Couple of more commissions, namely Food grain Investigation Commission of 1949 and Food grain Procurement Commission (1950), were introduced to enhance the underlying policy from time to time. The latter one stressed on ‘maintaining a reasonable level of food grains prices to ensure adequate supplies to customers.’ Furthermore, it recommended ‘rationing in all the towns with population of more than 50,000, informal rationing in other towns and some regulated supply of grains in rural areas.

The next important juncture was the establishment of the Food Corporation of India along with the Agricultural Prices Commission in 1965. The former, under the Food Corporation Act 1964, was to implement the following objectives: 

1.Effective price support operations for safeguarding the interests of the poor farmers,

2.Distribution of foodgrains throughout the country for Public Distribution System,

3.Maintaining satisfactory level of operational and buffer stocks of foodgrains to ensure  National Food Security,

4.Regulate market price to provide foodgrains to consumers at a reliable price.

The latter one, currently known as Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices, was established to maintain the recommended Minimum Support Prices to motivate cultivators and farmers to adopt the latest technology in order to optimize the use of resources and increase productivity.

The above-mentioned Public Distribution System, popularly known as Rationing System, was evolved around 1942 due to shortage of foodgrains during the Second World War. Government intervention in distribution of food was started from that time. Such intervention intended to distribute food grains in the food scarcity periods and, thereafter, continued in food deficit areas. The policy of Public Distribution System has been gradually improving owing to the presence of recurring Five-Year Plans. Particularly, the Seventh Five-Year Plan 1985-90, striving towards socialism, put thrust on agricultural development, increasing productivity of small and large scale farmers and full supply of food. It is difficult to deny that Indian Government fulfils certain objectives of food security through Public Distribution at an affordable price. However, presently, the said system struggles to meet the twin objectives of price support to the farmers for their products and maintenance of stocks.

Almost every governmental policy, legislated by the elected policy makers, bears certain political motivations tied to its manifolds. The National Food Security Act 2013 (or Right to Food Act) was such an instance. The incumbent UPA government, led by the National Congress party, enacted this act in consideration of electoral foothold prior to the national election. Nevertheless, this act ensured ‘access to adequate quantity of quality food at affordable prices to people to live a life with dignity and for matters connected therewith or incidental thereto.’ Salient features of NFSA includes monthly entitlement of sufficient cereals at lowest price, free and ‘take home rations’ for pregnant women, lactating mothers and children, redress mechanisms at state and district level and so on. The act confers authority to the eldest woman in every household to be the head of the household for the purpose of issue of rations card. Expectedly, the act ‘provides for penalty...to be imposed on public servants...if found guilty of failing to comply with the relief’ programme.

Midday Meal Scheme - school meal programme of the Government to improve the nutritional status of school-age students across the country, Integrated Child Development Service Scheme - to provide preschool education and primary healthcare to children under the age of 6 and their mothers, and several more noteworthy programmes are being included in the framework of the Food Security Act. 

Major state governments in India, viz. Tamil Nadu, Chhattisgarh and others launched their respective food security initiatives concurrently with the central one. Amma Unavagam’ or more commonly known as Amma’s Canteen, serves subsidised food at low prices in the state of Tamil Nadu. The Chhattisgarh Food Security Act of 2012 was enacted couple of years earlier than the National one.

Eventually it becomes necessary to explore the pros and cons of these security programmes which will help the policy makers to enhance their undertakings in years to come. Latest assessment criticized the government for remaining silent on the issue of stability of food supplies, although the other three dimensional aspects -  availability, accessibility and affordability - claimed appraisal. Experts felt the urgency to frame a ‘third generation’ food security law and recognise mainstream issues including climate change and natural disasters while devising needful policies. 

70 years of Independent India has freed itself from the tumultuous torments of incessant famines, though it is still struggling to break the shackle of heinous hunger. Pernicious poverty punctured the reputation of being one of the thriving economy in the world. Disparate distribution of food and competency in its performance conceal India’s other accomplishments. Even impoverished individuals are hardly aware of their essential rights, say, it’s either education or food. India is lagging far behind the developed as well as many developing countries in many prospects of food security and poverty alleviation. Military enhancement will hardly appreciate any help in this perspective. State alone can disburse welfare and prosperity. But, firstly, people need to put value on that what they claim to be their right. However, ‘if more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.’