India
India is the most ancient living civilisation in the world. As per estimates made on the basis of archeological findings there existed about 84 ancient civilisations in the world. All the 83 out of 84 civilisation have no trace except ruins. However one civilisation stands out which has evolved and retained its old insignia as was found in the 9000 years ruins.xixThe site is at Mehrgarh in Sindh, Pakistan. The name of this civilisation is Indus Valley Civilisation.
The earlier discovery of civilisation was on the banks of Indus river but recently the new discoveries has broken the myth and now it is clear that this civilisation existed all over India. Many of the symbols found in this civilisation are continued to be used in present day India. This makes India the only living civilisation which was not assimilated by any other civilisation, inspite of efforts by repeated invaders for last 1300 years.
Ayurveda, the system of life style medicine, Yoga and Meditation are part of same Vedic civilisation.
India in Time Shift
India is the country always in time shift like travelling in time. It is like a very long train travelling into future. The speed of train is unpredictable but it is always moving. The Engine has taken a few compartments into future. India reached Mars in 2013 but in the same year it's about 18000 villages in India had no electricity. Those villages living in 17th century moved into 19th century in the year 2018 and it's Engine had touched a new harbour of time by successfully integrating it's Army with Inter Continental Ballistic Missile with range of 5000 Km or so disclosed, in preparation of the never ending war for it's survival.
From 1947 to 1980 India was like present day North Korea but under more acceptable and charming leaders. It went on to become an openly authoritarian state between 1974 to 1977 under Indira. In 1980'sit started to open up and public was offered some imported consumer goodies not available earlier. In 1991, it was opened up with big bang reforms. Dr. Manmohan Singh was the savior of mother land in 1991 who later spit on her during 2004 to 2014.xxSanjay Baru (infra) called his conduct as "promising loyalty to hereditary succession is a monarchical attribute, not a democratic one"
More about this politics in later chapters but first lets know India in numbers which will be crunched and more statistics to be rolled out in this chapter. Those who hate numbers can turn to next chapter.
Geologically India is situated entirely on the Indian Plate, a major tectonic plate that was formed when it split off from the ancient continent Gondwanaland (ancient landmass, consisting of the southern part of the supercontinent of Pangea). The Indo-Australian plate is subdivided into the Indian and Australian plates.
India is the seventh-largest country in the world, with a total area of 3,287,469 square kilometres (1,269,299 sq mi). India measures 3,214 km (1,997 mi) from north to south and 2,933 km (1,822 mi) from east to west. It has a land frontier of 15,200 km (9,445 mi) with total area of 3.2 million kms.
Comparison of size
The total size of India is about 3.2 million (or 32 lacs) Kilometers. Compare it with Australia which has just 3.2 crores of population but an area of 8.3 million (83 lacs) Km.
Africa hasten times of the area of India with 30+ million (3 crore) kilometers and about 121.61 Crore of population divided in 56 countries (53 recognised and 3 unrecognised).
India with comparable population of 1.3 billion (130 crores) is equal to population of USA (30 Cr.) and Europe (50 Cr.) with the latter to be added twice to make the right match.
In short, India is way too different to be compared in size and population with any other country.
Indian Ocean
Hind Mahasagar or Indian Ocean is only ocean in the world which is named after a country. India has a coast line of 7,516.6 km (4,671 mi). As per International Law, India's territorial waters extend into the sea to a distance of 12 nautical miles (13.8 mi; 22.2 km) from the coast baseline.
India's southernmost part is in Nicobar islands which is 1200 km. away and which makes things complicated for the whole World but in immediate neighbourhood it makes Myanmar, Thailand and Indonesia our maritime neighbours. The complication is that India's territorial water extends to 1213.8 miles from coast line. Something which China wants to replicate in South China sea by creating artificial island.
Demography
What made Modi, the Prime Minister was a number of events, circumstances, his party and above all the electorate. Yes, the people of India. Would they repeat their verdict in 2019? To answer the question we have to understand the India, the elections, the players and above all the people of India.
When the British rule ended in India in the year 1947 the literacy rate was just 12%. Over the years, India has changed socially, economically, and globally. After the 2011 census, literacy rate India 2011 was found to be 74.04%. Compared to the adult literacy rate here the youth literacy rate is about 9% higher. Though this seems like a very great accomplishment, it is still a matter of concern that still so many people in India cannot read and write. The numbers of children who do not get education especially in the rural areas are still high. Though as per law every child under the age of 14 is entitled to free education, the problem of illiteracy still exists.
People of India
India has 29 official languages, each with many dialects and roughly with 3000 other languages. It has almost all religions of the world and with all sects of these religions. India has people of all possible skin colours and culinary habits so diverse that it is impossible to discern an Indian, unless a person has lived here in India, for sufficiently long period of time.
At the time of independence in 1947, the population of India was one fourth of today's 1.3 billion but mainly on the backdrop of lowest mortality rate and better nutrition and health facilities it crossed the billion mark. Presently 50% of population of India is below 25 years of age. And 65% of population is below the age of 35. The eligible age for marriage for boys is 21 but eligible age for voting for all genders is 18 years. In short it is a country of young electors who are inexperienced in democracy or it's history. Every year, a staggering 4% of the population in the eighteen–nineteen age group becomes eligible for voting. The potential of these is, however, far from realised, as reflected in the low registration and turnout of young voters.xxiSee https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2019/02/dr-s-y-quraishis-the-great-march-of-democracy-decodes-the-process-of-self-governance/
Households
As per CensusxxiiSee http://secc.gov.in/welcome of population carried out in 2011, India has 244,921,406 (24.5 Crore) households situated in 640 Districts. These Districts have 4460 Towns and 644,648 villages. The total number of households in rural areas is 179,787,454 (17.98 Crore) and the total number of households in urban areas is 65,133,952 (6.5 Crores). Thus 73.41% of households are in rural India. Therefore the 3/4th of India is in villages not in cities.
Urban Population
The urban population of India is about 29.9 Crores out of which Male Population is 15.65 Crores (52.19%) and female population is 14.33 Crores (47.79%).
48% of Urban household own the accommodation, they reside in. 22% live in rented accommodation. About 19% or Urban households have accommodation exceeding 3 rooms.
Interestingly about 48.34% household have refrigerators. Which is the same number as households owning accommodation.
80% households have mobile phones but 9.7% have no phone at all. Just 2% have only land line phones but 8.51% have mobile and land line both.
86.29% urban households have male head of family and 13.69% have female head of family but 0.60% has minor running the household.
Rural India
It is often said that in India there are two countries. One is India and other is Bharat. The modern urban India does not represent the backward rural Bharat. The disconnect between these two is too deep. Yet the majority of people who live in Bharat actually decide and elect the Government. Most often the rag tag combination of parties of tom, dick and harry, is elected from this rural India. Why?
Narendra Modi government has consistently repeated need to help farm sector which is in rural India which has over 74% of population of India. Some more details about sources of household income, in rural India may explain the urgency for reforms:
1. Total Rural Households17.97 Crore
2. Cultivation5.41 Crore (30.10%)
3. Manual Casual labour9.20 Crore (51.18%)
4. Part time or full time domestic service44.87 Lakh (2.50%)
5. Rag picking, etc. 4.10 Lakh (0.23%)
6. Non Agricultural own account enterprise28.88 Lakh (1.61%)
7. Begging/charity/alms6.69 Lakh (0.37%)
8. Others (including government service, private service, PSU employment, etc.)2.51 Crore (13.97%)
Thus over half of rural households are casual labour. That is a staggering number. They are people without any job security.
Out of the 17.97 Crore rural households, 7.07 Crore (39.35%) are considered affluent on one or more of the following criterion:
i. Motorised 2/3/4 wheeler/fishing boat. ii. Mechanised 3-4 wheeler agricultural equipment. iii. Kisan credit card with credit limit of over Rs. 50,000/-. iv. Household member government employee. v. Households with non-agricultural enterprises registered with government. vi. Any member of household earning more than Rs. 10,000 per month. vii. Paying income tax. viii. Paying professional tax. ix. 3 or more rooms with pucca walls and roof. x. Owns a refrigerator. xi. Owns landline phone. xii. Owns more than 2.5 acres of irrigated land with 1 irrigation equipment. xiii. 5 acres or more of irrigated land for two or more crop season. xiv. Owning at least 7.5 acres of land or more with at least one irrigation equipment.
Poor and Deprived households
Thankfully just 15.95 lacs or (0.89%) people suffer from extreme poverty with one of the following factors:
i. Households without shelter. ii. Destitute, living on alms. iii. Manual scavenger families. iv. Primitive tribal groups. v. Legally released bonded labour.
But there are a large number of poor people who are counted as deprived sections of society: These are:
All these heterogenous mix of population have one thing in common. Poor or rich, middle class or casual labour, each person has one equal right that is right to vote. This right to vote would be meaningless if it is not guarded properly or if it is not exercised properly. To ensure it, through free and fair elections India has another unique institution called Election Commission.
Who does not marvel at the prospect of India going to the polls? The Economist, one of the most respectable magazine referred to the poor of India pejoratively and wrote:
"Starting on April 7th, illiterate villagers and destitute slum-dwellers will have an equal say alongside Mumbai's millionaires in picking their government. Almost 815m citizens are eligible to cast their ballots in nine phases of voting over five weeks—the largest collective democratic act in history."xxiiiSee https://www.economist.com/leaders/2014/04/05/can-anyone-stop-narendra-modi
There can not be any worse misunderstanding of elections of India. Far from the implication of Economist, the illiterate, the poor, the slum dweller understand the democracy better than educated. That may sound contrary to popular logic, but the history tell us that this 'illogic' was proved to be true, time and again.
Electricity
We are in a modern world because of electricity. Switch of electricity and everything vanishes. Our world disappears. India produced 1,160.10 billion units (BU) of electricity–one BU is enough to power 1 crore (10 million) households (one household using average of about 3 units per day) for a month–in financial year (FY) 2017. Electricity production stood at 1,003.525 BU between April 2017-January 2018, according to a February 2018 report by India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF), a trust established by the commerce ministry.
With a production of 1,423 BU in FY 2016, India was the third largest producer and the third largest consumer of electricity in the world, behind China (6,015 BU) and the United States (4,327 BU).
With an annual growth rate of 22.6% capacity addition over a decade to FY 2017, renewables beat other power sources–thermal, hydro and nuclear. Renewables, however, made up only 18.79% of India's energy, up 68.65% since 2007. About 65% of installed capacity continues to be thermal.
As of January 2018, India has installed power capacity of 334.4 gigawatt (GW), making it the fifth largest installed capacity in the world after European Union, China, United States and Japan. The government is targeting capacity addition of around 100 GW–the current power production of United Kingdom–by 2022, as per the IBEF report.xxivSee http://www.indiaspend.com/cover-story/india-produced-34-more-electricity-last-year-than-2010-now-third-globally-76993
India has 22 nuclear power plants with a power generation capacity of 6,780 megawatts. Majority of them are spread in southern states of Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, and western states of Rajasthan, Gujarat and Maharashtra.
Power supply situation got improved due to a considerable increase in the nuclear power generation capacity over the years. Some of it has come from foreign collaboration with countries like Russia, but most of it is the result of India's indigenous efforts.
Gross Domestic Product
Gross domestic product (GDP) is a monetary measure of the market value of all the final goods and services produced in a period of time, often annually. India'sis the fifth highest GDP with about 2.6 Trillion USD. In terms of purchasing power parity or PPP, it is the third economy after USA and China with GDP of 9.5 trillion USD.
GDP of India, composition, by end use:
Household consumption: 59.1% (2017 est.)
Government consumption: 11.5% (2017 est.)
Investment in fixed capital: 28.5% (2017 est.)
Investment in inventories: 3.9% (2017 est.)
Exports of goods and services: 19.1% (2017 est.)
Imports of goods and services: -22% (2017 est.)
GDP of India, composition, by sector of origin:
Agriculture: 15.4% (2016 est.)
Industry: 23% (2016 est.)
Services: 61.5% (2016 est.)
If India's GDP is compared with USA, in terms of sector-wise product: in 2017 it was 69% personal consumption, 18% business investment, 17% government spending, and negative 5% net exports. Totalling about 12 trillion USD.
Expenditure on Elections
With so much poverty indicated in the above figures, can any body guess how much India spends on elections?
USA had spent 7 billion dollars (Rs. 42,000 Crores) 0nit's presidential elections in 2012. India, in 2014 raced towards it by spending about Rs. 30,000 Crores on elections in 2014. This include all the expenses of Election Commission and the parties etc.xxvSee https://www.ndtv.com/elections-news/rs-30-000-crore-to-be-spent-on-lok-sabha-polls-study-554110
Parties are required to submit details of expenses incurred by it on elections. According to the expenditure report filed by BJP, it spent Rs. 7,14,28,57,813 (714 Crore or 7 billion plus) on this elections.xxviSee https://eci.gov.in/files/file/7806-bharatiya-janata-party/ It's nearest rival, the Congress Party spentxxviiSee https://eci.gov.in/files/file/7812-indian-national-congress/ Rs. 5,16,02,36,785 (516 Crore or 5 billion plus) in these elections which was about 2/3rd of the winning BJP. If BJP got 282 seats to achieve the zenith of it's career, the rival Congress hit the bottom with just 44 seats.
It is a very heavy price to pay for democracy. But India learnt it's lesson in 1975 when Indira established autocratic dictatorship and hundreds were arrested and many dozens lost lives. But more about that later.
But look at the expenditure from a positive note. It is spent on air travel, posters, flags and what not. All this create jobs. People are actually paid for the work done. So election expenses may not be that bad, as it looks.
Let's first discover about Election Commission of India in next chapter, which is responsible for conduction of Elections.
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