Inclusive democracy believes in inclusion of all social groups in every sphere of social life, including business. In a society like ours with full of diversities and many forms of discrimination, the State needs to ensure that there is enough scope of equal inclusion. Business is one of the largest sectors of employment and income generation of our economy, but for many historical reasons and continued discriminatory socio-religious systems, a number of social groups such as STs and SCs get insignificantly represented in such sector.
They were historically denied fair access to land, education, and business. The business sector is therefore monopolised by a few castes and communities.
In other words, there is no social diversity in business sector and many groups remain underrepresented which affects our collective participation in nation building and also sharing of resources of the nation in equal measures. It perpetuates inequality and weakens democracy and economic growth. The makers of modern India had thought of to address the many forms of inequality through affirmative State intervention in support of the left-out and underrepresented social groups but the experience of last seventy years of constitutional governance shows a continued picture of underrepresentation of many social groups who form a majority of the population. It is largely because of the political apathy of the ruling class and non-implementation of policy decisions.
When there is a major shift in approach of the Government towards business, it is time that the Government must come up with a policy for business. The market forces are not going to address inequality or discrimination in society or market. It is always the State which has to intervene in the issues of inequality and discrimination as part of its constitutional mandate.
Privatisation and the State’s withdrawing from business does not mean withdrawing from the responsibility of making business inclusive and discrimination free.
The rights over equal opportunity in matter of public employment also attracts the role of Government in eradication of caste based employment and ensuring employment /self-employment for all sections of people /social groups.
While the employment opportunity in agriculture and other traditional sector is drastically getting limited, so there is an urgent need for transfer of the manpower to other sectors such as business for income and employment openings. Take for example the number of national financial corporations set up by the Government of India with capital fund for promotion of business and self-employment among SCs, STs, OBCs, minorities and Safai Karmacharies.
In spite of decades -long existence of these institutions, the outcome has been discouraging. The declared venture capital remains unspent and the banks are not responding to the eligible beneficiaries due to lack of monitoring to meet the target. These schemes remain high sounding publicities of the ruling parties. It is being observed that these institutions often suffer due to lack of adequate capital fund required for the purpose and dedicated experienced staff to carry forward the execution process and above all there is lack of political will by leaders of governing parties to implement the action plan and ensure involvement of the people for whom these plans have been targeted.
The accountability, function and impacts of these institutions have never been discussed in public domain and the existing available infrastructure and experiences are also not being linked to new initiatives.
The elected representatives of the marginalised sections very seldom take up the issues of business and the participation of their constituencies in such endeavour. Though recently there have been a number of private initiatives such as Dalit Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry that help in growing business among the marginalised sections, but they have very limited presence to bring a desirable impact which only the Government initiatives can do in creating a wider impact.
Leaving aside dedicated institutions and schemes, there are general provisions made in the Reserve Bank on credit policy for SCs, STs and other deprived sections but these provisions are never properly planned, implemented or monitored at appropriate level.
The financial inclusion policy talks about priority sector lending and credit provision for weaker sections along with opening of braches in rural, backward and tribal areas to build access but the reality is something else in States such as Odisha. The State Level Bankers Committee never takes up issues concerning the interest of the SCs and STs and other marginalised sections.
Mostly the private and public financial institutions are largely managed and owned by the traditional dominant caste people in the country who have hegemonic control over decision making.
The branches in rural areas even discriminate against the women and marginalised sections while they are visiting banks. As such doing business in rural areas still has many caste based social taboos. In spite of policy and guidelines, the financial inclusion has not been up to the mark.
(manasbbsr15@gmail.com)