“Why” is a very hard question. There are many many reasons why our political system does not seem to furnish, what is clearly the obvious form of state failure. Politically, we don’t have the willingness to do it. Part of it is also poor execution of schemes. All of those are certainly there. The scheme is designed in some idealized reality in mind and in the world (it) works in a different way.
Sometimes you know the wrong thing will happen, but you let it happen because it benefits your cousin... there are all kinds of reasons. Any place I have looked at, I am constantly amazed how the government systems have poorly delivered.
Could you give us an example from your field experience on how a particular scheme has failed?
In Rajasthan’s Udaipur district, the district collector announced that on all Mondays the nurse practitioner in all health centres has to be there, on other days she can go to the field. On Mondays, the civil society organizations will monitor their attendance and report the results to the collector or the chief medical health officer. All of that was done, but basically the attendance rates remained at 30-35%. So 60-65% times, on Mondays, when they were told to come, they did not come. It is simply that nobody believes that the system is actually interested in punishing people who do not come to work. They don’t come to work, because nobody cares if they don’t come to work.
About the much talked about National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, what is your impression? Is it a success or a failure?
It is a hard question. In Rajasthan, it is working relatively well, (but) in other states it is not working that well. There is clear evidence of some amount of money vanishing one way or the other. On the other hand, every other government scheme is even worse. If I think about it relative to other government schemes that are around, it seems to be doing reasonably well. This scheme seems to be working less badly in states such as Rajasthan than in other places.
There is talk within the government for implementing a direct cash transfer scheme and education vouchers for the poor. Are you in favour of such innovations?
These are ideas certainly worth thinking about. But my big worry is, these will be implemented as usual without sufficient experimentation and without sufficient effort put in to come out with the right design. That is a big concern... make sure that they know how to do the cash transfer work without money being stolen. These are big issues. The country cannot afford another badly implemented expensive programme.
You must be interacting with bureaucrats in India. Is there a real concern among government officials towards making things happen? What is your impression?