Be Mains Ready

Approach

• Write in brief about welfare centric approach in India.
• Differentiate between the two approaches.
• Write about India’s focus towards social protection.
• List drawbacks or loopholes in this approach.
• Write about capacity building approach.
• Conclude

Introduction

• The Preamble and the Directive Principles of State Policy (DPSP) of our Constitution establish a welfare state not only in principle but also through economic planning, thus securing to the Indian citizens justice—social, economic and political.
• In general, there are two approaches for welfare policies, viz. capacity building and social protection.
  
  • The capacity building approach accepts that people's abilities are affected by external factors coming from interaction with other people, social arrangements, access to infrastructure and public services, opportunities to participate, etc.
  • Social protection approach means a set of public programs designed to mitigate or cope with the adverse effects of risks to income security and physical well-being.
• India has focused disproportionately on social protection in the last two decades, expanding existing social protection programs and creating new ones. Schemes like National Social Assistance Programme (NSAP), Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), Ayushman Bharat saw higher public expenditures over the last decade.
• By contrast, the instruments of capacity building, such as primary education, public health, and water and sanitation, have languished.
• Probable reasons for India adopting this approach are:
  
  • Stronger electoral competition favors highly visible social protection programs. In comparison, improving public services is a long, arduous, and less visible task that might go unnoticed by the electorate.
  • Uneven economic growth led to renewed interest in redistribution, provided further justification for stronger social protection.
  • The scope of capability approach is quite vast, as it includes many factors like social and political processes, gender, inequality, discrimination of all types, social exclusion, disability, environmental conditions, personal and psychological factors, etc. With limited state capacity it becomes difficult to adopt a multidimensional approach of welfare.
• Having said this, there are many drawbacks with the social protection approach of welfare schemes:
  
  • Most of these initiatives depend on either land records or database based on the Socio-Economic Caste Census (SECC), which are often patchy or outdated.
  • There are issues like discrepancies in the set of data, under-counting of the poorest, vested interest overstating the extent of their deprivation, tensions between those who are excluded, politicians may abuse these programs by converting them into instruments of patronage, end-up being elite captured, Gender disparity, etc.
• While, the capability approach is more fundamental and comprehensive in nature as it shifts the focus from the means (resources) to the ends (human well-being), by putting the people in the center. Anti-poverty programs must not focus on reduction of income poverty alone. Enhancement of human capabilities must also go hand in hand with the economic growth for it to be sustainable.

Conclusion

• India’s approach is remarkable because in lower income countries, public services generally claim a much larger part of state resources than social protection does. It is only after universal provision of basic public services such as primary education, public health, drinking water and sanitation that most other countries embarked on an ambitious expansion of the welfare state.
• The state’s role as a capacity builder as well as provider of social protection is both complementary. They must go together.