about the shortage of basic needs in India,
esp about food, healthcare and education needs.
But so far, i have not seen anything on the second most important
of the basic needs : Clothing
there is too much data on nutriciton deficiency, malnutrition, crisis in
agriculture, farmers sucides, food production, etc. But so far nothing
about clothing.
Clothing and textile industry has been allowed to evolve into full
fledged capitalistic model with economies of scale, etc after LPG.
Hence there is no supply constraints and prices too have
faller drastically when compared to the 70s and 60s. the poorest of
the poor are now better
and fully clothed than ever before. I guess for those who lived thru 50s, 60s
and 70s, witnessed torn and old cloths worn by poor and middle class.
Clothing was a luxury and owning terlin shirt was a prestige issue. Now,
a poor labourer can buy a piece of cloth (s shirt or saree) with his/ her one
or two day wages. I guess it cost more than these wage rates in the
olden days.
Can we have an informed debate about this ?
and land ceiling acts prevented Indian agricultre into evolving into full
fledged large corporate farms of 1000s of acres of size (or collective
farms of communist states). Only coffee and tea plantations have
been exemtped because they will not be viable on tiny or small
scale. But the logic behind allowing very large farms of coffee or
tea equally applies to other agriculture farms like paddy, wheat,
sugarcane, fruits, etc.
Any inputs about the comparisons between these two vital
needs : Food Vs Clothing in India ? I guess the entry of Reliance
made a big difference in this field..
