By H.H.Mohrmen
The Chief Minister hardly has time to breathe these days. He is on an inauguration spree. The press is full of news of the chief minister and the ministers laying the foundation stone of roads, school buildings, PHCs, CHCs, Sports events, and what have you. Conrad and his cabinet colleagues like procrastinating students have whiled away their time throughout the year and realised when it is almost too late that the examination is coming in a few months. They now are racing against time to try to complete the syllabus, but the result is already obvious, even if the MDA government manages to pass in the third division, the state and its people had lost five precious years.
Basin Development
When the Integrated Basin Development and Livelihood Promotion program was launched, this column was the first to criticize the plan, questioning the idea of developing basins, when almost all the rivers in Jañtia hills are dead. Meghalaya Basin Development Agency which promoted IBDLP was a brainchild of the MUA government under the leadership of Mukul Sangma. I had said this before and will reiterate that the Basin agency is a very innovative idea. The innovation is that the agency was created in such a way that it becomes a platform that the government can use to attract funds from international funding agencies and non-government agencies. Since then the Basin agency has had to implement development programs sponsored by international funding agencies and even funds that come from industries under Corporate Social Responsibility.
Doing away with freebies and grant culture
The main objective of IBDLP conceived by the Meghalaya Basin Agency was to do away with the “grant culture” that was prevalent in the state then. In an effort to help enhance the income of the farmers and improve the economy of the state, the MUA and the government before it initiated projects and schemes which involve the distribution of grants and freebies to citizens and farmers in particular. It was found that these grants and schemes do not have the impact that was expected and the people of the state continued to be poor. Community and rural development experts agreed that giving grants and providing freebies to help the poor and the needy section of the society in the state, even with good intentions does not normally bear fruit. The approach did not give the expected outcomes because; receivers consider grants provided by the government as something free and therefore not valuable. Because it was free there is also no ownership of the scheme by the individual or the community. IBDLP was introduced to do away with the grant culture and to change the mindset of the people.
Partners not Beneficiaries
The IBDLP approach not only tries to do away with the grant culture, but it even forbade its staff from using the term ‘beneficiaries’ when referring to the target groups they provide service to. The Basin agency came up with the concept of looking at the target groups as ‘partners’ which also gives the farmers or the group for which the project is intended, the respect that they deserve. This simple change in terminology we use while referring to our target groups is a radical mindset change for both the farmers and the staff who implement the projects. Using the term partner instead of beneficiary implies that the government is showing them respect and not treating them as somebody who only waits for largesse from the government. It also shows that the government treats its poor and needy as equal stakeholders in the development of the state.
FOCUS is a good project but wrongly implemented
Meghalaya Basin Management Agency and the MDA government under the leadership of Conrad K. Sangma, initially launched PRIME Rural program which was later renamed Farmers’ Collectivization for Upscaling of Production and Market Systems (FOCUS). The main objective is to encourage bottom-up collectivization to enable the farmer to obtain maximum value for their produce. It is seen as a multi-pronged approach to help farmers in rural areas and at the same time to tackle the unemployment problem amongst the youths of the state.
It is a known fact that the major problem the farmers in the state face is not being able to get a good price for their produce. They are being exploited by the middlemen in the market. One of the major thrust areas of the FOCUS project is to address this common issue the farmers encounter by encouraging them to form Producer Groups (PG). Promoting PGs is a good idea because it replaces Farmers’ Producers Organisation (FPO) promoted by MRD through NABARD which is a big farmers’ collective with a membership of not less than fifty farmers. Besides FPO is also expected to be registered under the company’s Act, which is a little over-ambitious for the farmers of our state. PG is however a small version of the FPO with a membership of not less than ten and not more than twenty members which are also conducive for the hill areas and the kind of farmers that we have in the state.
The other objective of the FOCUS was also to identify local Nano enterprises and service providers (SP) in the area. Nano enterprises are entrepreneurs who engage more than two employees in their production unit and service providers are trained para vets or barefoot veterinary assistants who will provide services in the area they live.
PG grouping according to major produce
in the block
When the project was introduced in the state, the major products in the respective blocks were identified and blocks were asked to come up with a list of three major products from the area. The farmers were encouraged to form a producers’ group according to the major crops they produce or the livelihood activities they are engaged in. The goal is to empower them and more importantly to give them bargaining power when they collectively sell their products in the market. The government on its part provides them a support fund of rupees fifty thousand per PG or five thousand per member. The members were also initially informed that the support fund is like a revolving fund that will cater to the needs of the members of the PG.
Reintroducing grant and freebies culture in the state
FOCUS is a good project or at least the intention was good, but everything has gone topsy-turvy when Conrad started using it as election propaganda. Since the beginning of this year, the government organized mega events to distribute dummy-cheques to the PGs in the different blocks of the state. There is nothing wrong with distributing cheques to deserving farmers but the question is how the cheque is distributed. Every government function is now a freebies distribution event, and from PGs to SHGs they all are waiting for the government’s generosity. The government purposely projected the distribution event to look like it is distributing doles to the farmers, even when the groups are not fully trained to utilize the funds. It looks like Christmas has arrived much too early for the farmers in Meghalaya and Conrad an early Santa Claus at the party.
Conrad Sangma apart from rechristening Meghalaya Basin Development Agency to Meghalaya Basin Management Agency has only managed to turn the main objective of the Basin agency upside down.
Freebies not only kill the piglets but the spirit too
It is no surprise that the piglets the government bought from outside the state and distributed to the farmers died. This is bound to happen. Any expert will tell you that the mortality rate in such cases will be high. The freebies and grant culture have not only killed the entrepreneurial spirit amongst the farmer but it has made them lethargic and lackluster and not want to work hard because the government will always come to their rescue. It also does not provide room for innovation and people expect that the government will always come up with schemes and grants to help them. Conrad has succeeded in making Meghalaya a freebie state and one wonders if the Government’s plan is to make people continually dependent on the government’s largesse.