Journal of Indian School of Political Economy

Nilakantha Rath ¹

Affiliations
1 Indian School of Political Economy, Pune-411016, IN

Abstract

The States Reorganisation Commission completed the task of reorganisation of the states in India on the basis of language. But, two other tasks remained: the problem of very large states, and the related problem of "one language, one state", instead of "one state, one language", which was what that Commission had created. Over time, discontent developed in many states about unequal regional development. The Fact Finding Committee on Regional Imbalance in Maharashtra identified imbalance on individual aspects of development, mainly with the district as a until, and formulated a step-by-step approach to its eradication by identifying the physical quantum of imbalance and successively bringing the lagging districts to the state average level. Unfortunately, this approach does not appear to have been properly followed in the last two and half decades. The lack of development of inter-regional social empathy, as reflected in the attitudes and concerns of the political entities, appears to have led to the persistence of the feeling of neglect. That can be a basis of separation. But, creation of one or two separate states by itself can not solve the problem of regional imbalance and neglect, unless persistent effort is made in that direction. Proper decentralisation of power and resources to the Zilla Parishads and lower levels alone can atone for this.

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Nilakantha Rath ¹

Affiliations
1 Indian School of Political Economy, Pune-411016, IN

Abstract

The redesigned rural co-operative credit institutions started in 1956 with massive state help, since rural savings were inadequate to meet the needs of planned rural development. But, as agriculture developed in different regions, the approach to rural co-operative credit institutions did not change to meet the new emerging situations. The result: by now the co-operatives in most states ere on their way to extinction. NABARD appears to have lost interest in co-operative credit institutions. It is time the co-operative credit institutions are rebom some what on the lines of the self-help co-operatives in Kazipeth and some adjacent districts of Andhra Pradesh.

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Nilakantha Rath ¹

Affiliations
1 Indian School of Political Economy, Pune-411016, IN

Abstract

This brief paper traces the changes in the Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers since 1991 till May 2008, and draws attention to the fact that the inflation during the last two and half years has not been as high as in most of the years in the 1990s,n or has it been higher during the first five months of this year compared to the same period in the previous two years. It lists the trend in per capita availability of foodgrains during the last two decades to suggest that its trend influences the price level. It discusses broadly the food and crude oil situation and suggests that the trend in the price of the latter is irreversible and the economy should be reoriented to take care of this.

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Nilakantha Rath ¹

Affiliations
1 Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune-4, IN

Abstract

I am very thankful to the members of the Indian Society of Agricultural Economics for doing me the honour of electing me to preside over this Annual Conference of the Society. I am fully conscious of the generosity and appreciation shown by fellow members to a loyal old member of the Society, which is the premier representative body of scholars of agricultural economics in India. I shall try to justify your affection and trust to the best of my ability.

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Nilakantha Rath ¹

Affiliations
1 Indian School of Political Economy, Senapati Bapat Marg, Pune-411016, IN

Abstract

This paper is in response to the circular by the Water Rate Fixation Authority of Maharashtra, inviting suggestions for the period 2013-16. The paper suggests the principle for determining the water rate in flow irrigation, saying that the water rate should be based on the maximum value product per unit of water provided. For this purpose it suggests the sources of information for calculation. It also suggests the basis for water rates for industry and household use.

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Nilakantha Rath ¹

Affiliations
1 Indian School of Political Economy, Pune-411016, IN

Abstract

Indian agriculture has undergone a change during the last two decades. Till 1991, the population censuses show, the proportion of the total population engaged in agriculture, either as cultivators on own account or as wage labour, was steadily declining. But the total number of people so engaged was continuously increasing. The 2001 census showed that the total number of people working as cultivators had, for the first time since 1991, declined in most states. Even the total number of persons working in the main as wage labour had also declined. Only the number of marginal farm workers, that is, workers who reported working for less than six months in the year, had increased. And, this was mainly due to much larger number of women working as marginal farm workers.

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Nilakantha Rath ¹

Affiliations
1 Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, Pune, IN

Abstract

Vinayak Mahadeo Dandekar, the first Editor of this Journal and the founder President of the Indian School of Political Economy, who died on 30th July, 1995, at the age of 75, was an unusual Indian Economist in many ways. He had no formal university training in economics beyond the undergraduate level. He studied statistics, a new subject in the Indian University set up at the time, in Professor P.C. Mahalanobis's newly fledgling Indian Statistical Institute at Calcutta and took the Master's degree of the Calcutta University with a gold medal. He obtained admission to the Ph.D. programme in statistics of the University of London. But he was one of the large number of Indian students booked by a steamer to London, who walked out of the steamer at Bombay as a protest against the treatment meted out by the Company, and that saw the end of his further formal education and trip abroad for the purpose. He spent a year as a statistician in the Government of Bombay before joining the Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics at Pune in its newly established Dorabjee Tata Section in Agricultural Economics. Here began a lifelong association with that Institute, and his career as a researcher in economics.

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