An appeal from a common Indian-28 Rs a Day Life

Dear PM,

Chairman, Planning Commission.

I know you are a big economist, who took our country out of some financial debt crisis in early 1990’s. I am sure that India must be progressing very well, I heard that the all India poverty ratio declined from 37.2% in 2004-05 to 29.8% in 2009-2010, good job, but I am still hungry. I still cannot manage a decent meal. To prove the progress through numbers seems a good idea: If you cannot take people out of poverty line, it’s better to lower the poverty line. But the reality still remains the same. Please come to real life, stop making fun of me.

I am not an economist, neither do I have any sense to calculate the poverty line based on numerous complex parameters, which are supposedly more "inclusive". I am not learned enough to understand the intricacies and complications of a democracy. But as a common man it makes complete sense to me or any other sane person surviving on this planet, that it is impossible for me to live on 28 Rs.

Last year Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia said that “Rs 32 a day poverty line not all that ridiculous”, I guess you are making genuine efforts to make it ridiculous. There were calorie norms to define poverty, I don’t know what happened to them, I guess they were ridiculous as well. This miserable sum of 28 Rs is supposed to take care of not only my food but all non-food essentials as well like clothing, fuel, lighting, education, transport, medical, house rent etc. Wow! Do you think there is still margin from being ridiculous?

The BPL census that started in 2011 depicted equal awesomeness of your smartness, it had a questionnaire which was smart enough to exclude me from the BPL*. Sir, I am not that smart. It’s beyond my comprehension that due to some supply chain management problem, you can allow the grains to rot but you cannot give them to me to eat. You have thousands of schemes and acts and bills and policies for my upliftment, but I am still unable to rise a millimetre. There must be some problem.

Sir, I am just another common man, living in a village, who feels happy to hear the stories of India shining. I struggle to live every day, earning a single piece of bread for me and my family is my only purpose of life. I do not dream of going to big malls, watching cinema, shopping expensive perfumes, but I do dream to live a healthy life with pride. Our constitution gives me a “right to life”(article 21), it is my fundamental right and your duty to provide me that. I am not trying to stop you from your work, but do come to my home some day, I will always welcome you with a smile, India might be shining but Indians are not.

-Just another Common Indian. 

* (Interested readers can read this brilliant article http://www.hindu.com/2011/06/09/stories/2011060955451000.htm)

   Rs. 32 a day is not that ridiculous (http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article2529285.ece)