A few months after taking over my new position as the World Bank’s vice-president for the South Asia region, I spent a few days and nights with Bhavnaben and her young family of salt workers on the edge of the desert in the Little Rann of Kutch in Gujarat. Since that time, Bhavnaben has been my touchstone of progress in India’s booming economy, and I return every year to visit them. I go to see first-hand the life of India’s poorest citizens, to learn about their hopes and dreams, and to trace changes in their lives amid India’s rising prosperity.
In the four years that I’ve known the family, they have made many efforts to improve their circumstances. When I first met them in 2003, they farmed just one salt pan, barely enough to sustain their family of seven—two sons and three daughters. By the time I returned a year later, they had taken on another pan. They were now producing twice the quantity of salt, and that too of better quality. They should be much better off now, I thought.
But escaping the clutches of poverty is never easy. Little did I realize how vulnerable the poor are to exploitation from those who wield power over them. Now that the family farmed two pans, the water vendor who supplied drinking water while they camped in the desert had doubled his charges! As the sole seller of a vital commodity —albeit of dubious quality—he charged whatever he pleased. In this case, he based his charges on the number of salt pans they owned instead of the amount of drinking water they bought! Frustrated that others were benefiting from his hard labour, Mangabhai, Bhavnaben’s husband, said he didn’t see any incentive to expand his salt business further.
The cost of diesel—their major expense—had also gone up, while the price of salt had remained the same. In Ahmedabad, the state’s major city, I had heard talk about introducing solar or wind power on the salt flats since both have good potential in the desert. But I saw no evidence of anything being installed, so far.
Little did I realize how vulnerable the poor are to exploitation by those who wield power over them
One encouraging sign was that the family had begun to diversify their sources of income to reduce their dependence on their backbreaking ancestral occupation. They had set up a small shop selling basic supplies to others on the pans. The shop—looked after by the oldest son—also sold flour, which they now ground themselves using a new machine. In addition, they had begun to produce industrial salt which fetched a much higher price than the consumption salt they produced earlier. And the older children—none of whom went to school when I first met them—were now in school. They had learnt to read the vernacular alphabet and rattled off the names of plants and animals pinned up along the walls of the makeshift tent that served as their classroom. Things were looking up, I thought.