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Egalitarian Kerala losing much of its sheen?

T. Ramavarman

After having achieved admirable social progress despite its thin production base, Kerala appears to be moving backwards in the distribution of wealth. New inequalities are emerging in a society that has won worldwide acclaim for its efforts at egalitarian growth.

WORST SUFFERER: The agriculture sector in the State is facing near stagnation during this period of rapid economic growth.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Is the trajectory of growth that Kerala is currently pursuing forcing the State to forfeit some of its long-cherished values of equity? It may sound odd, but the answer to this from many experts is affirmative, though some aver that `incontrovertible' evidences are required to take such a position.

No doubt, Kerala's economy has been growing almost consistently from late 1980s. The agriculture and industrial sectors of the State were facing near stagnation during this period of growth. Service sector was singularly responsible for the turn around. According to economist K.P. Kannan, member of the National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector, Kerala economy has entered the `virtuous cycle of growth.' "This consistent growth in the economy has been the result of past investments we had made in sectors like education and public health," he says. However, according to Finance Minister T.M. Thomas Isaac, rapid economic growth in the times of agrarian and industrial stagnation has resulted in reversal of the egalitarian trends in the State. Nearly 20 per cent of the population engaged in the booming service sector has been flourishing. On the other side, 40 per cent people working in the agriculture and traditional industrial sectors have been pushed to distress. The sectoral, regional and household inequalities have widened sharply in the State in recent years.

The growing disparities have had disastrous consequences at the individual, family and group levels. Those who could associate with the high-tech sectors in their thriving phase of 1990s now possess comfortable surplus to indulge in opulence and ostentation. So is the case with those who have switched over to crops like rubber or could migrate to the Middle East in the early years of out-migration from Kerala. However, those placed on a different career route are seen struggling to make both ends meet in spite of hard work.

The peer pressure on the low income groups, both at the family and social levels, would be severe in a situation of growing inequality because the entire emerging infrastructure and accessories would be tailor-made to gratify the high-profile desires of the better-off. The lower income groups would naturally be seduced to possess those high-priced items, aggravating their economic stress and inequality. "The corroding impact of this uneven growth on individual and group psyche might be setting the broad canvas conducive for the high levels of suicides, mental ailments, liquor consumption, family discords and growing criminalisation in Kerala,'' points out psychiatrist K.S. Shaji of the Thrissur Medical College.

Economist K.K. Subramaniam of the Centre for Development Studies (CDS), Thiruvananthapuram, warns that growth unaccompanied by specific measures to ensure equity will not lead to `trickle down effects' at a desirable level. Mafia gangs and religious fundamentalists locate easy recruits in the marginalised youths. These youths, later, form gangs themselves and adopt the path of violence for their own benefits, points out Kerala Sastra Sahithya Parishad (KSSP) leader R.V.G. Menon.

The uneven growth process hits women at two levels: Women in the high-end career sector have to simultaneously bear the burden of the family and of the highly demanding workplaces. On the other side, this growth process has not yet evolved any mechanism to widen the employment scope of the large number of girls who have joined the mainstream education in the State. Also, we have to watch for some more time to assess the impact of the highly stressful but less creative IT jobs on women in the long run, says sociologist K. Saradamani.

According to some economists, it is difficult to assert that the rise in disparities along with high economic growth has pushed up the incidence of poverty in the State, both in the absolute and relative terms. Economist and Chairman of the Centre for Socio-Economic and Environmental Studies (CSES), Kochi, K.K. George points out that more than the income disparity it is the level of `vulnerability' of the people that has increased in the State. People might be surviving somehow in the normal course, but they are devastated in the face of an accidental situation like the death or disability of the breadwinner in the family, sudden job loss or the crash in price of an agricultural produce because of the vagaries of global market. People are being forced to take health care and education in the private sector at prohibitive costs because of the deep quality erosion in the resource-starved public infrastructure in those sectors and this jeopardises their financial equations. Also, there are pockets of severe deprivation in Kerala like the tribal areas or the coastal areas (in the off-season). What the State requires is micro-management systems to foresee such issues and take proactive measures. The decentralised system of governance now being tried in Kerala can make many meaningful interventions in these micro-level poverty management strategies, Dr George said.

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