Tuesday, February 1, 2011

2G Scam : 39 months of hunger

How do you know we are in 21st century? How about when your fingers are not enough to count the digits of swindled Rupees!

Lets take a look at the recent champion : 2G scam. The reports in media nonchalantly talk about "Lakhs of crores" and "Millions of Millions". Does the common man, or for that matter anybody, really understand what those figures exactly means to each of us?

Here is one breakdown.

  • The official tally of the money swindled from what could otherwise have been Government income, is 1,70,000 Crores. Or to put it in full, Rs 1,70,000,00,00,000.
  • Thats correct, it has thirteen digits.
  • Population of India is 115 Crores and there are two estimates for poverty numbers in India.
  • Going with Government of India's (GoI) estimates : 27.5% of the population lives below poverty line, meaning 32 crores of Indians are considered poor on paper. (Wiki Link)
  • Assuming a family of 4, 8 crore families are officially categorized as poor by the GoI.
  • If the 2G scam never happened, and if we had an ideal distribution system (Refer to Sponge Factor for views on distribution system), and lets say GoI decided to spend all the money on distribution of rice.
  • It would mean that each "poor family" can have an allocation of Rs. 21,502.
  • Estimates indicate that it costs Govt. approximately Rs. 18.5 to buy 1Kg of BPL/ration rice from the farmers. (Link)
  • At this rate, Government could have procured 1,162Kg of rice for each family below poverty line.
  • If Government decided to distribute the rice completely free of charge, then at consumption of 1K/day, each poor family could have survived for 1162 days or 39 months or more than 3 years.


So, what is the price of 2G scam to the nation?

Not going into technicalities of what is the best way to relieve poverty, I am just using the oft-used simplistic notion to shed light on the magnitude of theft at highest levels.

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