What is needed urgently is the actual fulfillment of the Right to Food - never before has the violation of this right been felt as starkly as now, in the face of escalating prices(see box), growing hunger and widespread malnutrition.

India is unable to feed its people in this 21st century.  The Government of India is unable to ensure that all members of society actually enjoy the right to food.  Millions of children are going to bed hungry.  Pregnant mothers, infants and children are severely malnourished, working men and women eat just two rotis or a cup of rice with chillies and onions; even the onions have become unaffordable to many.  FAO data confirm that “no country comes close to India in terms of the absolute number of people living in chronic hunger.”

Ensuring adequate availability of food is not an insurmountable problem.  The production of certain grains, pulses and some other food crops need to be augmented and there has to a planned system of food production and distribution in the interests of ensuring that everyone is adequately fed.

The problem is that under capitalism, all production is driven by the greed of a minority for maximum private profits, and not by the general needs of society.  It is a feature of capitalism that there is over-production and accumulation of stocks, side by side with stark deprivation of millions of toilers and tillers. Even in the years when India enjoyed bumper harvests of rice, wheat, sugarcane or oilseeds, hunger and malnutrition did not decline all over the country.

Successive governments have mouthed the slogans of “jai kisan”and “garibi hatao” in the past, while allowing the rich to grow richer, including through hoarding and profiteering when food was in short supply. The present Prime Minister said in a recent speech in August, “bhook ko mitayenge”, translated in English as “in no case will we allow citizens to go hungry”.  However, he is championing the interests of the biggest speculators and monopoly corporations in India and the world, whose greed is responsible for the widespread hunger and malnutrition in the midst of plenty.

Ever since the first wave of liberalisation was launched when Manmohan Singh was the Finance Minister in 1991, the Government of India has completely abdicated its responsibility of managing the trade and supply of essential food items. It has expanded the space for large profit maximizing corporations to dominate and exploit the peasants through unequal trade, and to exploit the working masses through soaring food prices in the retail market. 

Secure intake of adequate food, with steady improvement in the nutritional quality of the diet, cannot be achieved as long as private profiteering is not curbed and eliminated from the sphere of food procurement and distribution.

Election Promises and Presidential Commitments

Running up to the 2009 general elections, several parties vied with each other in their promises to the electorate to deliver staple cereals at the lowest prices. The Congress Party, in particular, had promised that every family below poverty line (BPL) would be entitled by law to get 25 kg of rice or wheat per month at Rs 3/- per kg. When President Pratibha Patil addressed the people on the occasion of the constitution of the UPA II, she promised that a National Food Security Act (NFSA) would be formulated to fulfill the election promise of the Congress Party – thereby elevating a restricted supply scheme into a law that allegedly protects the right to food.

There has been much talk of the NFSA since, while a draft of the law is still awaited. The only available evidence of the thinking of the government is a Concept Note circulated on 4th June to all state governments by the Secretary, Department of Food and Public Distribution in the central Ministry of Consumer Affairs.  This Concept Note states the intention and aim of the government as: “to provide a statutory basis for a framework which assures food security for all.”

The Note begins with a definition of food security as “a situation that exists when all people at all times (emphasis added) have physical, social and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food … “.  However, the substantive part of the Note deals with the identification of the BPL numbers based on latest poverty estimates. There is much discussion on how to restrict the BPL numbers in the states and how the Centre will decide this for every state.   The promise of addressing “all people” is conveniently left in the shade.  The Note categorically states that “the Central government will not be able to guarantee distribution/supply of any quantity of food grains for the APL category from the Central Pool.” Such is the travesty of the intention of the government to fulfill its obligations towards it own definition of food security!

In 1997, the government formally dismantled the universal PDS that had been gradually allowed to disintegrate, and replaced it with a Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS). Under the TPDS, households were demarcated on the basis of an income criterion into “below-poverty-line” and “above-poverty-line” (APL) populations, with the two groups treated differently in terms of quantities and prices.

A grave deception that is practised daily by the two-timing government machinery of the capitalist class has been on the issue of who is poor and who is not.  One official commission after another and numerous expert groups have made proposals on how to define poverty. The government currently defines a discrete level of income as the Poverty Line, calculated as the amount of money required to purchase minimum calories of food required for survival of the human body.  Anyone who earns more than this is declared to be “non-poor”! This level of income does not take into account the needs of a household that would ensure a life of human dignity and quality in today’s context.

Under capitalism, the conditions of a large section of the population is extremely vulnerable to fluctuations, both in rural and urban areas. A season’s crop failure, a grave and sudden illness in the family, a job lost or the loss of the main breadwinner can all drastically alter the standard of living of a family.  It is absurd to define “poor” and “non-poor” on the basis of one year’s condition and extend that for the next five years, and make this the basis for deciding how many people will have access to guaranteed food supply through the public distribution system.

There is more than sufficient evidence to show that the TPDS actually excludes the vast majority of the poorest sections of the population and cuts them off from any access to even the barest essentials. The food distribution through PDS and the number of beneficiaries have fallen drastically since the TPDS model was adopted. Thousands of poor people were not given BPL cards (see Table). People have come to the correct conclusion that the intention behind the TPDS is wholly malafide, it is far from reaching out to the most needy.

Instead of recognising the universal right to food, access to guaranteed food supply has been turned into a favour that is distributed to some and denied to others, by those who hold local political clout.

Right to Food

The right to food is one of the fundamental rights of a human being, and in the 21st century, any government that is not able to guarantee this right is simply not fit to rule. The basis of this right is that in this day and age when modern means of production and distribution are available to a society, no one should have to go hungry or suffer from malnutrition. What is required to actually fulfill this right?

Firstly, there has to be a universal Public Distribution System and not one that will divide the population into BPL and APL. Division is created in society under the guise of “targeting” and those who must benefit are actually excluded. People are divided into many different schemes - TPDS, Antodaya, etc .under the guise of “ensuring that the poorest of the poor are covered”, and some who are more powerful get the benefits while others who are weaker do not.

Secondly, just distributing wheat and rice is not sufficient. Nutritional requirements demand cereals, pulses, milk, eggs, oils, vegetables, and clean drinking water. Therefore, discussion of 25kg or 35 kg of just rice and wheat is very inadequate in addressing nutritional requirements of any section of the population.

Thirdly, every individual should be covered under the PDS. If household is the unit, then the actual numbers of adults and children in the household have to be counted; a household cannot be defined by a standard number of members, when there are wide variations in the way households are constituted in India. For example, several families may be included within a single household because they live together.

Trade in food items must stop being driven by the interests of speculators and profiteers Futures trading in food items must be immediately banned. Wholesale and retail trade in food items must be organised by the government and subject to people’s control at the local level. The chain of retail distribution must be set up with convenient access for all people in a village or urban neighbourhood, and for a reasonable duration of time each day. The quality and quantities distributed must be open to inspection by neighbourhood committees; and mechanisms for prompt and effective redressal must be available.

People must keep up the struggle for realization of the Right to Food.  They must not be taken in by the fraud and hypocrisy that is currently practiced in the name of “food security” and Targeted PDS.

Right to food means nothing less than a legal guarantee and enabling mechanisms for ensuring the supply of all essential food items to all persons at affordable prices. The enabling mechanisms must include punishment of any official or private party that acts against this objective in any way. Such a right that is universal, unconditional and justiciable is the demand of the people.