Admission to Industrial Training and Teachers’ training institutes

In the past those who passed 8th Standard were admitted in the Teachers’ Training Institutes. After training they were eligible to be posted in schools to teach students in classes 1 to Classes 5. Most of these teachers discharged their duties to the satisfaction of educational authorities and parents. In states like Tamilnadu, 8th passed persons are not admitted to teachers’ training institutes.  There is a  view that 8th standard passed candidates should be admitted to teachers’ training institutes. For teachers to teach in classes 6 to 8, the educational qualification can be 12th standard and for those to teach classes 9 and 10, the educational qualification  may be graduation.

Similarly the minimum qualification for admission to Industrial Training Institutes in the past used to be 8th standard for almost all trades. Now it is mostly 10th stabdard or 12th standard. This also should be changed.

Similarly for jobs for which minimum educational qualification is 8th Standard, in some cases graduates are appointed. These officials may tend to feel that the job is not commensurate with their qualification and tend to neglect their work.

Automatic compulsory  promotion of students upto 10th standard in some states  is also not good. Every student should study hard and get minimum of 35/50% marks to be promoted to the next higher class.

Why do we need to adopt capitalist economy

We need to adopt capitalist economy, as it releases the full potential of the individual. Socialism locks the potential of the individual. Socialism does not motivate people to put in their best efforts in their work.To take an example, the state government owned and run transport corporations run at loss whereas private bus transport organizations run at profits. It is common to see that a government bus goes empty, while private bus running a few minutes earlier or a few minutes later goes fully packed. The govt. owed Steel Authority of India (SAIL) runs at huge loss while privately owned Steel plants run at huge profit. It is good for the country, to privatize government owned companies so that they start earning profit and the money realized from sales of government owned companies can be used by government for government expenditure particularly for productive purposes

Tamilnadu Population

Population of Tamilnadu in 2011 of 72.1 million accounts for about 5.9% of India’s population of 1210 million. Tamilnadu is the 7th largest state in the country. However, the population of children of Tamilnadu of 0-6 years, is only 6.89 million which works out to only 4.3% of the total child population of 158.7 million. It ranks 9th largest in the country. In the normal course, Tamilnadu’s population would also in future come to around 4.4% of India’s population. But this level of population will not be able to maintain the fairly large industry, agriculture and service sector in the state. There will naturally be migration from densely populated states like Bihar, UP, West Bengal and low income states like Orissa. To sustain the industry, agriculture and service sector development, government would have to devise ways and means to permanently absorb the population from other states by creating necessary conditions like extending education in mother tongue to the migrant children, providing all facilities and concessions to them as are being given to local population like free rations, clothing, house sites, houses etc. Additionally, people will also have to be encouraged to have more children

welfare measures

Party for capitalist economy would believe that:
Restricting welfare measures only to those earning up to a certain level will make people not to strive to earn more for fear of foregoing the benefits. This will make people remain in poverty perpetually.
The governments would look after not only the poor people but also those with good income and therefore, welfare measures in our government would be for the entire community and not for those with low income only
Substantial number of people are poor mainly because of their or their fore fathers’ expensive and avoidable habits, like consumption of liquor, smoking, spending much on cosmetics, indulgence in luxuries, consumption of high cost items etc. Instead of extending special favours to such people, they would be persuaded or given free of cost treatment for giving up addictions to alcohol, smoking etc.
Similarly it is not correct to conclude that rich people have become rich by exploiting others or at others’ expenses. Many people are rich because of their frugal habits, savings, simple life, low consumption, avoidance of luxuries etc. They should not be discriminated against, by denying them governments’ welfare measures.
Governments’ efforts would be to provide necessary skills free of cost and facilitate employment to all the able bodied people and thereby make them earn for their needs. This is the main welfare measure of the government.
In the name of welfare measures, the government will not take away the duties and responsibilities of parents for their children, of adults and middle aged people for their parents. Conducting marriages, valai kappus etc. giving gold, cash at the time of marriage etc. will be discontinued. However loans by the banks on govt security will be encouraged so that the couple can settle in life by purchasing their requirements of furniture, utencils, dress,jewellery etc.

North Indian Tamil Propagation Society

On the lines of Dakshin Bharat Hindi Prachar Sabha,there should be an organisation for propagation of Tamil in North, West and East India. Tamil has rich literature and it is necessary to bring this to the knowledge of non-Tamilians. Thanks to the Prime Minister Thiru Modi talking often about Tamil language and quoting from Tamil literature, there is a genuine interest in non-Tamil areas of India in Tamil language and literature. Further, there are speakers of other Dravidian languages like Kurukh, Gond etc. in several states in
North, East and West India who may like enrich their languages by borrowing words from Tamil and other Dravidian languages.

Utilisation of foreign exchange reserves

Foreign Exchange Reserves of India has recently been raising and has reached nearly US$ 600/- billion. This is deposited by Reserve Bank of India in foreign Central Banks, used in buying foreign government bonds, for buying gold etc. The return on these investments is very low at 1-2 % per year.

India;s imports of goods and services is around US$600/- billion, Generally, it would be sufficient if the foreign exchange reserve covers 3 months imports.

India’s external debt is mostly by private sector and the foreign exchange required to service the debt is also not much.

Indian Overseas investment is also considerable.

It appears that , to start with an amount of US$100 /= billion out of US$600/ billion can be withdrawn by RBI and lent to Government for undertaking large infrastructural projects which will eliminate unemployment and enlarge GDP.

India -Budget 2021-22

Budget estimates of total expenditure during 2021-22 is Rs.3483236 crores compared to Revised estimates of total expenditure of Rs3450305 during 2020-21, The increase is only about 1%,. However compared with actual expenditure of Rs.2686330 crores in 2019-20 , the increase in 2021=22 is Rs,796906crores which is about 30% which is good. But taking into account the inflation, the expenditure estimated in 2021-22 is not enough to achieve high growth in GDP.

Usually, the growth in GDP is directly proportional to growth in govt. and private sector spending. Since the govt expenditure is low, government should permit and facilitate higher investment by private sector. Divestment is one important tool to increase private investment but then govt.investment would be reduced.

Government should encourage higher consumption of only essential items but also luxury items like air conditioners, refrigerators, vacuum cleaners, microwave ovens, etc by facilitating easy loans. Government should also permit private investment in generation and distribution of renewable energy, investment in railways, roads, transport, water storage and distribution, education, health etc

In the alternative, government could borrow money from Reserve Bank of India and spend liberally. An additional spending of Rs.20,00,000 crores will ensure very high growth in GDP. The loan can later be monetized. There will be inflation but this will be easily borne by the people with the additional working members and higher wages.

Padma Awards

7 Padma Vibhushan, 10 Padma Bhushan and 102 Padma Sri Awards have been announced for this year (2021). Of the 102 Padma Sri Awards, as many as 34 (33% of the total) awards are for those in the field of Arts,, 25(25% of the total) awards are for those in the field of Literature and Education, and 15 (15%) are for those in the field of Social work. But only 4 awards are for those in the field of agriculture. Considering the importance of agriculture for the country and the innovations that are taking place -organic farming, hydroponic farming, lesser use of water terrace gardens, terrace gardens,etc- around 10% of the awards could be allocated for agriculture. Similarly considering the equally important field of trade and industry, another 10% of the awards could be allocated for the field of trade and industry against 5% of the awards given this year. These increases need not lead to cut in awards for other fields. These increases may come from additional number of awards.

Economic Development after bifurcation of Andhra Pradesh

Andhra Pradesh was bifurcated in June 2014 into Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. After bifurcation both Andhra Pradesh and Telangana registered higher economic growth than fast growing states like Maharashtra, Gujarat, and Tamilnadu. According to Reserve Bank’s Handbook of Statistics on Indian States, per capita Net State Domestic Product(NSDP) of Maharashtra state increased by 44% from Rs. 132836 during 2014-2015 to Rs,191736 during 2018-19.During this period, Gujarat state registered an increase of 54% from Rs.127017to Rs,195845, Tamil Nadu registered an increase of 50% fromRs.129494 to Rs.193964,The NSDP of Andhra Pradesh increased by 61%fromRs.93903 to Rs.151173 while Telangana registered an increase of 65% from Rs.124104 to Rs, 204488.

In fact Telangana which was behind Gujarat, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu, forged ahead of these states in 4-5 years. In a few more years, Andhra Pradesh will catch up with the advanced states. Among the 33 states and union territories Andhra Pradesh and Telangana respectively moved up from19th and 13th position to 16th and 8th position. Telangana has overtaken Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Kerala, Gujarat and Uttarkhand.

This reinforces the view that smaller the states the more efficient the administration. Perhaps it is time to set up another States Reorganization Commission for recommending division of large states with population of more than 5crores.

Alternate sources of water

Like in energy, there are a few alternate sources of water, of which some are expensive and some are cheap, Fog harvesting is cheap and is undertaken in many countries like Chile, South Africa etc. Places near the sea and near the hills are suitable for fog harvesting. In India several places have been identified as suitable for fog harvesting. There is a need for setting up the fog harvesting research centres in atleast 10 places in India.

Cloud seeding is another alternate source of water. When there are clouds over particular places, salt is sprayed over the clouds from aircraft. The clouds cool and results in rainfall. This was experimented in India as long ago as late sixties. It is resorted to in many countries. In Indonesia , it is practised to control floods, by making water fall in the sea before the wind reaches the land, thus avoiding heavy rainfall over land

The other source is resorting to desalination of sea water, This is resorted to by many West Asian countries where rainfall is low. This is however expensive. Extracting water from atmosphere is another way of solving water problem.

There is need for research in alternate sources of energy and for setting up pilot projects.