As part of the CPR’s larger interest in population policy, this study seeks to examine the role participation can play in family planning and the manner in which such participation can be built in the official and non-official programme with a view to bringing down the national fertility rate.
The book presents case studies of two models of participatory population control programme. It aims to give concrete shape to the theoretical and policy concerns through an examination of the nature and extent of citizen’s participation in family planning. The study is intended to develop specific policy options regarding the ways and methods of involving people with a view to bring down fertility rates on the basis of different kinds of experience in the country.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Dr. V.A. Pai Panandiker was Founding Director, Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi. He served for several years in the Government of India, in the Planning Commission, the Administrative Reforms Commission and the Department of Economic Affairs, Ministry of Finance. He was chairman of the Population Policy Group of the Planning Commission 1978-80 and chairman of the Study Team of the Expenditure Commission on the Ministry of Industry. He is also a Director of the State Bank of India, a Member, Governing Board of the National Institute of Rural Development, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, and several other bodies.
What is the nature of violence in India? Is it a major problematique of the India civilization as Prof Rajni Kothari states? What are its sources? And what are the practical policy options to deal with them?
These are some of the questions Shri P R Rajgopal explores in the book from a practical policy angle rather than from a wider academic point of view.
Shri Rajgopal examined violence in three essential dimensions in lndia: communal violence, violence arising out of socio-political change in India and lastly, organised crime and criminal justice. These have been published as three separate studies. The present study deals with the problem of communal violence as a police official sees it.
The book does not seek to project any theory on the subject of communalisrn. This exercise is primarily an attempt at abstracting the different practical, as distinct from theoretical aspects that characterise and contribute to the phenomenon of communalism, and the complexity and variety of causes that give rise to communal violence.
This volume brings to fruition the second phase of the Centre for Policy Research Project on Regional Cooperation for Development. The papers edited and collected for this volume were presented at athree-day seminar held at the CPR in March 1986.
The ten papers presented in this volume cover almost all the major aspects of the political economy of the countries in the Persian Gulf region and explore present and future prospects of developmental cooperation between these countries and South Asia.
Bhabani Sen Gupta was Research Professor at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, and foreign affairs columnist for a leading newsmagazine, India Today. He has been Senior Fellow and Head of the Disarmament Studies Division, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi; Senior Fellow for six years at the School of International Affairs, Columbia University, New York; a Rockefeller Foundation Fellow for the Study of International Conflict; and a consultant to the Human Rights Commission and the UN Disarmament Commission.
Biotechnology is receiving wide attention from policymakers, researchers, business houses, financial institutions and entrepreneurs. It is, however, still so much a part of laboratory research that its terminologies, techniques, processes and developments are still an enigma. And taming this technology as a business enterprise is proving complex and difficult.
In the present publication Prof P.D. Malgavkar has attempted to explain the intricacies of this technology so that these could be understood by a layman. Whilst indicating its possibilities in the field of agriculture, health, chemicals and energy, he has brought home the ethical issues and engineering challenges involved in its development and commercialization. He has suggested entry avenues in biotechnology business for both the existing business houses and new research entrepreneurs and has spelt out specific financial and marketing strategies suitable at different stages of the business venture.
The enunciation of a National Health policy by the Government of India in 1982 raised hopes among those concerned with India’s poor health that the government is serious about its commitment to provide “health for all”. Sceptics may hold that, like other proposals espousing equality and social transformation, the National Health policy is a Machiavellian stroke – that the Government does not at all intend to implement it. Others may view the policy as grandiose and over-ambitious-impossible to implement.
However, given the undeniable need for a massive and concerted attack on national health problems – which requires a departure from entrenched ways – the policy can act as a stimulus for health planners and practitioners to formulate a strategy for its implementation. This work aims to identify aspects of the policy which are crucial to national health, and discuss how these can best be implemented:
Industrial growth is a complex phenomenon and depends upon a host of factors. It is susceptible to financial and fiscal policies, social and political environment, international conditions, developments in other sectors of economy, etc. The present study restricts itself to the study of the industrial policy instruments and their impact on industrial sector.
Besides projecting industries sector, the study looks at the employment prospects in the year 2001, taking into consideration the population in the working age group and the labour force in the year 2001. The study suggests that in the year 2001 only 10 per cent of the people could be below the poverty line with the envisaged growth rate; and that non-renewable resources and energy may not be the constraints for development. The major area of concern would be water whose total precipitation over the sub- continent is finite whilst regional water shortages seem to be inevitable and are likely to increase, particularly in the arid and semi-arid areas.
The study concludes that though the per capita GDP of India would be small compared to the developed and affluent world, India will have the satisfaction to have moved out from the rank of low-income to middle-income countries and that it would have a more healthy, and educated population, with bright possibilities of reaching a net reproduction rate of one in the near future, its saving rate would be high, its ICOR would be reasonable, its technological progress satisfactory and it would be well poised to achieve accelerated progress and development.
P D Malgavkar started his career as a businessman, changed over to academics from where he joined the tribe of Government bureaucrats. Restless as ever, he had a stint as Research Consultant and Senior Fellow at the East-West Center, Honolulu. Back home in 1978, as Visiting professor at Centre for policy Research, New Delhi, he concentrated on development issues as he saw them.
The strides made by India in agriculture since Independence are undoubtedly impressive. To be self-sufficient in foodgrains over a short period of about thirty years is no mean achievement. How- ever, India’s population growth will not stabilise for quite some time. Further the need for both growth in production and employment in the agricultural sector will be unabated.
What should be our policy perspective on Indian agriculture? This is explored in the book by one of the country’s leading agricultural economists. Dr. Bhatia has prescribed a blend of policy shifts and high technology options to move towards agriculture in the twenty-first century. Dr. Bhatia’s policy recommendations deserve serious consideration by policy-makers, academicians in this sector and lay citizens interested in the future development of agriculture.
Dr B M Bhatia was Head of the Economics Department of the Birla Institute of Technology & Science (BITS), Pilani. He worked on the United Nations committees and wrote almost 20 books and hundreds of articles on the agrarian situation in India
Inadequate access to foodgrains has resulted in the poor of India often not having enough to eat–despite the fact that the country is producing enough foodgrains to sustain its entire population. Have policy makers failed those they are supposed to serve? Why does this inequitable situation exist and how can it be remedied? In this timely and thought-provoking study, Venugopal explores the inequities of food distribution and suggests remedies for correcting it. Among his findings, the author finds that those states that did not produce enough foodgrains were better at providing food for the the poor than those states with a surplus. Even those states that receive subsidies from the Union Government through the Public Distribution System (PDS), are not without problems of inefficiency and inequity. Venugopal argues that a major support strategy could be a well managed rural public distribution system, supervised by the people themselves with the involvement of voluntary organizations.
The civil service system of India at the time of Indian independence was universally acclaimed for its quality. Behind it lay an ancient tradition with the competitive examination added by the British. There is little doubt that the relatively smooth transition from British imperial rule to independent India was made greatly possible by the civil service system especially the I.C.S., the Indian Civil Service
Nuclear Proliferation: The US-Indian Conflict is a detailed account of the evolution of U.S. nuclear export controls over the decades and a history of the two countries’ discord on nuclear issues, rooted in the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and India’s so-called peaceful nuclear explosion (PNE) in 1974. That discord brought disputes over the U.S.-built Tarapur nuclear power plant in India to the centerstage.
