Home Page of Dr. Saumitra Mohan

Strengthening the Right to Information Saumitra Mohan It has been more than two years since the Right to Information Act (RTI) came into force in October 2005. Immediately after its enforcement, a concern was expressed in certain quarters about adequate efforts not being made by all those concerned to implement the Act in its true spirit. It was felt that vested interests were making an all out effort to sabotage the Act. Lot of hue and cry was heard when there was an attempt from within the government to water down certain portions of the Act by excluding the details of information contained in an official note sheet on the pretext of administrative necessity and for securing the officials against victimisation. But in this all, people failed to realise that the Act was in its infancy and would take its time before it starts working to its potential. And it was not very late before people actually started realising the import and power of the right emanating from this partic...

Bird Flue: Posing Threat to Economic Security *Saumitra Mohan It is the world of complex interdependence among members of the Comity of Nations. Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane told that much earlier. But still when the bird flue spectre was raging in our neighbourhood, we were busy basking in our 9 per cent plus economic growth rate as symbolised by a booming stock market. But it was not long before the monstrous H5N1 virus travelled the distance from South East Asia and Bangladesh to our shores. What appeared to be a stray and sporadic incident with the bird flue reports from Maharashtra and Manipur in February 2006 and July 2007 respectively has become a grim reality today with West Bengal in the thick of a raging bird flue crisis. The dreaded pestilence is said to have affected different isolated pockets scattered over the fourteen districts of West Bengal. And, now it seems to have spread its tentacles to ...

Securing Our Jails: The Context of Naxal Threat Saumitra Mohan Even while the country grapples with the growing law and order problems throughout the country in one form or the other, the naxals have been systematically ratcheting up their fight against a so-called bourgeois Indian state. They have found newer ways to organise themselves and make their presence felt. Today, they are not only better motivated and better organised, but are also better trained and better equipped, vis-à-vis a not-so-well motivated, trained and equipped police force. The Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh has termed the Naxalite insurgency as the greatest single threat to country’s internal security. The Central government is already busy coordinating with the affected state governments to work out a synergized policy to deal with the naxal menace including formation of a specialized anti-naxal force. But the naxals seem intent on upping the ante and...

Rehabilitating the Child Labour *Saumitra Mohan It is believed that there are more children under the age of fourteen years in India than the entire population of the United States. Children under fourteen constitute around 3.6 per cent of the total labour force in India. Of these, nine out of every ten work for their own family enterprises in the countryside. Nearly 85 per cent are supposed to be engaged in traditional agricultural activities. Less than 9 per cent work in manufacturing, services and repair workshops. Only about 0.8 per cent work in factories. Child labour is usually a natural consequence of a poor country afflicted by the sundry problems of underdevelopment. Government of India in cooperation with other state governments has been trying very hard for the eradication of child labour. National Child Labour Project (NCLP) is one of the important government interventions towards the realisation of this go...

Reforming the Electoral System Saumitra Mohan The regularity with which Pakistan keeps going back to martial law shows in stark relief the strength of Indian democracy which appears to be taking newer strides with each passing day. One principal reason for the same lies in the strong democratic foundations which are predicated on a very sound and effective electoral system. And our electoral system has been moving from strength to strength since the time of Mr. T. N. Sheshan, the redoubtable Chief Election Commission of the nineties. But there still remain many issues that need to be attended to fortify the gains already made for further solidifying our democratic base and one such important issue relates to our electoral system. The task of conducting elections in a billion plus country is really humongous and mind-boggling. It requires extra-ordinary preparations coupled with astute management skills. This becomes more important because these days elections have t...

National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme: How Effective? *Saumitra Mohan National Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (NREGA) has been in operation for over two years and is being implemented in half the districts of this country. And if the government’s declaration is to be believed, then NREGA is going to be extended to cover all the remaining districts from 1st April, 2008. NREGA is one of the flagship poverty alleviation programmes of the UPA government and has been taken very well across the country. However, the programme does require some structural and conceptual modifications to be better able to realise its objectives in the light of experience gained during its operation for over two years. It is very well known by now that almost all the selected districts where NREGA has been implemented have not been able to utilise the financial allotment made for the purpose. Not only ...

How To Win Your World? Hand Book of a Smart Man By Saumitra Mohan Saumitra Mohan Dedication To all the small-time people with big-time dreams. Acknowledgements There are so many people I wish to thank for having inspired me into writing this book. I am really thankful, first of all, to Sri Vijoy Sinha, a person who has been more than a mentor to me and whose unconventional and unorthodox ideas have always inspired my thinking. I also wish to thank my father, who through his thoughts and his ways of bringing me up in my salad days has left a lasting imprint on my psyche. I also wish to thank my other family members, colleagues and friends as my multi-layered and multi-dimensional interactions with them have also shaped my attitude and approach to life, both negatively and positively. Last but not the least, I wish to thank my dear wife Shweta who has been my ‘Muse’ right since our marriage and has been a party to all my trials and tribulations since then. Without her moral sup...