Indian legislators need to cut down on wasteful living
A study reflects that in terms of per capita GDP which is just US 3,176 dollar in India, our MPs will cost 68 times to the country much higher than the ratio in Western Europe and Japan where it is less than 10 times the country's per capita income.
LOK SABHA has passed the bill to hike salaries of members of Parliament (MPs) by over three times from Rs 16,000 to Rs 50,000 and allowances by two times by raising the constituency and office allowance by Rs 5,000 each. The advance for purchasing a vehicle is increased from one lakh rupees to four lakh rupees with minimal interest on the loan. As per estimation, the effective salary of an MP per month is now five lakh rupees including allowances. In terms of 'Cost to Company', an MP’s cost to the nation goes up 60 lakhs a year. The new hike in salary, daily allowance and pension would involve a recurring annual expenditure of Rs 103.76 crore while arrears, incurred on salary and pensions, will be Rs 118 crore. The constituency and office allowances would involve an annual recurring expenditure of Rs 38.50 crore. Considering 795 MPs together in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, a total sum of Rs 477 crore will be spent annually for maintaining the lavish life-style of Indian MPs. When compared with cost to the nation in other countries, our MPs’ package is amongst highest in the world ahead of Singapore, Japan, Italy (who pays highest to their legislators) and five times more than what is paid in Pakistan. A study reflects that in terms of per capita gross domestic products (GDP) which is just US 3,176 dollar in India, our MPs will cost 68 times to the country much higher than the ratio in the Western Europe and Japan where it is less than 10 times the country’s per capita income.
The most questionable part of this remuneration-package is whether MPs, legislators and politicians of our country deserve this package. Before the hike, the effective package for an MP in terms of cost to the nation was 32 lakh annually where an MP’s monthly salary was only Rs 16000. Despite the average value of assets of Lok Sabha MPs is as high as 4.5 crore which sounds highly uncomfortable and therefore the country seriously moan when our elected representatives are going to receive executive class remuneration now. What worsen the mood of the country are indistinct qualification for the job of legislators, absence from house, non-performance and poor output from our legislators. Some of our legislators are criminals-turned-legislators and politics is used as tool for patronising crime and all other illegal deeds. Most of our politicians are highly corrupted and their activities are destructive to healthy progress of the country. Large number of our legislators do not turn up in Parliament and assemblies while they also don’t visit constituencies regularly. When our legislators are attending Parliament and assemblies, they are mostly found involved in unruly scenes and disrupting the healthy and normal proceeding of the house. For these attributes of our legislators and for terrible contribution to the country’s progress, anyone can describe the huge remuneration-package of our legislators exorbitant and ridiculous.With 50 per cent of the world’s hungry (more than in entire Africa and around 500 million) living in India, alarming poverty (India is predominantly poor and has ranked 66th on Global Hunger Index among 88 countries) and its fiscal deficit is among highest in the world (the World Bank lend USD 9.3 billion to India in the 2009-10 fiscal, more than the aid committed by the US and the European Union), spending huge on aristocratic-living of legislators and also of bureaucrats is shocking as well as unpardonable. Noted industrialist Premji recently observed that our government comes with policies and decisions that are totally detrimental to the common mass and the country as a whole. His article fittingly expresses that our legislators are inept (and of course they are corrupt too), who raised original budget of Delhi Commonwealth Games’ from Rs 655 crore to Rs 28000 crore on total Games spending; objecting seriously. He said that how can the people of this country forget Rs 28,000 crore which could have been used to establish primary schools and health centers in tens of thousands of villages. Do we live to ignore a malnourished child, who looks at us in the eye for some food? A very simple answer for our callous behaviour to sufferings of common masses lies in the ambience set by our legislators and politicians, who continue to misuse public funds, meant for common welfare of mass of this country. Horrendous scams in multi-billion dollars projects in the name of public welfare and country’s prestige by our legislators have instilled insensitiveness towards sufferings and issues before the country. As our legislators seem quick in race of embezzling huge public fund and laundering those amounts abroad, people of this country, living in the ambience of insecurity, too feel joining the race of misusing public funds and set examples for non-performance.The country must cut down expenses on all types of extravagances whether they are cricket tournaments or other sports events, conferences and meetings of ministers, bureaucrats and scientific-academic communities. Ceremonies concerning ministers’ participation and tours, meetings and tours of bureaucrats cost hundreds of crore rupees every year. Normally an international scientific conference organised by any Indian institute has a budget of crores of rupees and a big share is spent on sumptuous meals. There are hundreds of such scientific and academic conferences which can be accountable for another waste of hundreds of crore rupees. Considerable steps should be taken to avoid unnecessary expenses in these events. Money spent on organising exorbitant ceremonies of cricket tournaments and other sports events should be better utilised and directed toward welfare of malnourished children and impoverished sections of our society. The country can definitely save few hundred crore rupees by cutting profligate lifestyle of our legislators and bureaucrats. Savings here can contribute several thousand crore rupees towards charitable functions in the country which primarily and seriously need billions of dollars and regular attention from government and all sections of the society in terms of budget-hike and contributions. No doubt, the country and common masses are tired of current legislators and politicians. The country laments at the remorseless extravagance of few hundred people with poorest academic and professional expertise, whose symbolic attributes are corruption and non-performance.
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