w elfare, literacy and w omen’s rights. For instance, fertility rates
have declined dramatically, and that’s almost alw ays a reflection of
w omen’s rights. I w as there only briefly, but I could easily see the
difference.
West Bengal is a much more complex area. Calcutta is a w reck—
although not more so than other Indian cities, as far as I could see.
(Based on w hat I’d read, I expected it to be w orse than it seemed to
be.)
T he Bengali countryside is quite interesting. T here’s a history of
peasant struggle in West Bengal, and it w as apparently very violent
in the 1970s. Indira Gandhi tried to put it dow n w ith a great deal of
brute force, but it survived. T hey’ve gotten rid of most landlord
control—maybe all of it.
I w ent to a part of West Bengal fifty miles or so from Calcutta. I
w as a guest of the government, accompanied by an Indian friend, an
economist w ho w orks on rural development, and a government
minister (w ho happened to have a PhD in economics from MIT ).
T he villagers didn’t know w e w ere coming until about 24 hours
before, so there w as no particular preparation.
I’ve seen village development programs around the w orld, and
this one w as impressive. It’s relatively egalitarian and appears to be
really self-governing. We met w ith the village committee and a
group of villagers, and they could answ er every question w e asked,
w hich is unusual.
In other programs I’ve visited, people usually can’t tell you w hat
the budget is, w hat’s planned for agricultural diversification next
year, and so on. Here they knew all that stuff immediately, and
spoke w ith confidence and understanding.
T he composition of the committee w as interesting. It w as
strikingly obvious that caste and tribal distinctions (tribal are usually
w orse) have been pretty much overcome. T he governing
committee w as half w omen, one of them tribal. T he guy w ho w as
more or less in charge of the committee w as a peasant w ho had a
little piece of land. Some of the people w ho spoke up w ere landless
laborers w ho’d been given small plots.
T hey had an extensive land reform program and the literacy level
has gone up. We w ent to a school that had a library of maybe thirty
books, of w hich they w ere very proud.
Simple tube w ells have been designed (w ith government support)
that can be sunk by a group of families. Women, w ho’ve been
ann
(Ann)
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