Agriculture share in GDP is fast dipping                                                      !

                            By S.PARTHASARATHY • on MARCH 01, 2012

Agriculture is now only 14 per cent of the GDP!

Last year it was 15 per cent!

Yet, the share of the people dependent on the fast decreasing agri output is 47 per cent. So, where is the government’s promise of raising investments, in industry and agriculture and also generating productive employment?

It is becoming rather tiresome to criticise the government for its poor performance every time we talk of the economy or the government.

Whom we have to hold responsible for poor governance?

Governance so often talked about. The PM doesn’t tire of talking of giving good governance.

Now, it is neither good governance nor transparent governance.

Where is transparency? The government is saddled with so many scams, every day a scam. Now, P.Chidambaram is linked with Anil Agarwal’s Sesa Goa iron ore exports scandal. What is this?

The high profile colleagues are all caught in so many scams or exceeding their briefs. Salman Kursheed, one of the really clean ministers in the government is now caught up with criticising the Election Commission and also some other pronouncements for which he has been asked to appear before the EC! He is the law minister!

Other ministers, most of them in key ministries like transport, civil aviation and not the least rural development, either they are seen as total non-performers or  opportunists of the  first rate category, either they talk too much for sometime or they suddenly go off the radar for obvious reasons.

Sonia Gandhi is not surely well-served by some of their trusted colleagues.

Now, after Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi is drafted for the UP Assembly elections.

This is all too much of a deteriorating strategy to pull up the Congress fortunes. The Prime Minister either talks little or what he talks is now verging on the Orwellian language traps.  Indian development agenda is lacking in focus.

Yes, the need to accelerate investments is a crying need.

We need investments and massive investments. Every country of some significance, apart from the US and EU, from the Gulf countries to Japan are promising big investments. The Japanese Prime Minister was here and following him the Japan Transport Minister.

It is rightly said by both the ministers, from India and Japan that the further talks must be held at the Prime Ministers’ level. Yes, the Japanese can do wonders in transport and other construction activities. We need not just the funds but also the expertise.

We have to see the other Asian countries like Singapore and Malaysia to know what gigantic physical infrastructure these countries have built up.

Skyscrapers to long highways and massive urban assets.

These types of gigantic scale can be achieved only with the Japanese and Korean construction, not just machinery but also the expertise.

Indians and the Indian companies must be suitably engaged and integrated so that we in India get and develop this sort of expertise on a vast scale.

So too in Indian agriculture, we need not just FDI in wholesale, the time has come to think of retail FDI also.  Yes, there is some resistance in some quarters.

But these quarters must see what already the big Indian corporates have done in retail. ITC, Reliance and RPG have gone someway.

This process will only accelerate and we must accelerate by all means.

Agriculture decline is an opportunity. Agriculture can’t wait for the government handouts. In fact, what the UPA-II has done so far is just populist schemes. These might or might not fetch votes. Voters are also tired of this sort of symbolic schemes. The PM has a real handicap. His hands are tied with the Congress Party’s very peculiar handicap.

As for the Prime Minister, it is only wise we go for the time-honoured democratic process and elect a leader who enjoys the support of the Parliamentary party.

Please watch the developments in Pakistan. Also, here the Army Chief approached the court to resolve his age issue.

These are not happy times it seems.  Please change your thinking ways. Please think a bit seriously.  India is a large democracy, long standing democracy in Asia.

Everyone must play his or her role with humility and commitment to preserve our political heritage!

Source : Agriculture & Industry Survey