Talk of Amartya Sen - Nobel Laureate

Eminent economist Amartya Sen on Monday cautioned the country's political leadership that heady stories of growth and globalization would not mean much at the end of the day unless they impacted the lives of the marginalized. Delivering the first Hiren Mukherjee memorial lecture in the presence of the entire political establishment, the Noble Laureate said that a just society should be the "overwhelming priority" of the country. Sharing the dais with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and addressing senior leaders and legislators from the major parties in the Central Hall of Parliament, Sen said that despite the excellent reputation of the super speciality hospitals in Chennai, the majority of people did not have access either to basic medical facilities or primary education. "It is not a matter of political philosophy but a practical issue," he said claiming that the underdogs of society were still being pushed to the edges. In a brief reference to the interest generated by the debate over the Indo-US nuclear agreement, the Harvard professor, however, was emphatic that India as a nation should focus on rules, institutions and strategies to change the lot of the masses. "We have to ask what should keep us awake at night," he said. Recalling the days when the Prime Minister had been his colleague at the Delhi School of Economics, Sen shared Singh's concern for making the public delivery system efficient. Noting that private healthcare was still unaffordable for the ordinary people, he said that much of India's problems had been created by the inefficiency of the administrative structure. Dwelling on the theme of equity, he said that a government in a democratic country would have to respond to public criticism and tirades from its political opponents. Democracy in that sense insulates a society against extreme adversities like famines. He illustrated the point by recalling that while no major famine had visited India since Independence, in China millions of people died in the 1950s.