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using consumption distribution as a poor substitute, we actually have income distribution data.

What Ails the Statistical System?

The answer to this question may lead us to the complex issues of governance and is likely to attract controversy. Nevertheless, there are certain drawbacks of the system which stand out. First, the subject of statistics is not receiving the attention and importance it deserves in the hands of public administration. There are many departments of the government which do not appear to consider quality data as an essential need for policy. They are happy with half-baked statistics and they show no awareness of the drawbacks of this data. Even the issues of slackness in governance seem to be getting reflected in embarrassing statistical errors of a severe nature.

Second, the root of the malaise lies in the loss of development perspectives after economic liberalisation began in the 1990s. The flow of data as it existed in the controlled regime collapsed after liberalisation, but the reformers showed no enthusiasm for substituting the earlier controlled arrangement by a method befitting the liberalised environment. Year after year there has been only a steady deterioration.

Third, one of the key components of reform policy has been fi scal prudence and consolidation, and as a consequence the worst to be affected has been the social infrastructure. Statistics fell in this category and there have been steep reductions in staff strength in the government’s statistical establishments. In the mean time, the complexities in mobilising statistics in diverse fi elds have vastly increased and the training requirements have grown manifold.

Fourth, there has arisen a more fundamental issue of the loss of pride in statistics as a profession, particularly in public administration and public institutions like the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). It is found that the government and the institutions find it difficult to attract sufficient numbers of candidates and fi ll staff positions created after the regular attrition. Therefore, it is not a question of want of resources alone; it is also a question of the statistics profession being made more attractive intellectually.

Fifth, the drawbacks in the statistical system as well as the unattractive nature of the profession in general, have also arisen because there is a serious fl aw in the organisational set-up of the statistical system. The NSC was to be a statutory body with permanent members and with executive and fi nancial autonomy, but the government chose to appoint an NSC with part-time chairman and members and did not make the body a statutory one. As an initial effort, this was no doubt commendable, but no effort has since been made to place the NSC on a statutory and permanent footing. The purity and reliability of statistics can be ensured only when the system is governed by an enduring institutional structure and is conferred independence and autonomy. Due to the absence of such autonomy, we see the sorry spectacle of very many statistical units being treated as appendages to the ministries and departments of the Government of India. There is a strong case for making the statistical units in different departments autonomous entities that primarily report to the NSC. Also, the NSC has a major role of guiding, and collaborating with, the state statistical bureaux. The absence of a statutory commission has truly hindered improvements of statistics in the states based on the recommendations contained in the Rangarajan Commission Report (2001). In this respect, the two new schemes, namely, the IMF-supported India Statistical Strengthening Project (ISSP) and the Thirteenth Finance Commission grant of Rs 1 crore per district for strengthening the district statistical system, should go a long way in effecting an improvement, but this is also conditional upon the central system being able to provide training and other guidance to the state bodies to absorb the resources so provided.

Finally, India had acquired a commendable reputation for its sample surveys, but of late the survey units in the system have suffered a serious blow from a paucity of staff and the consequential dependence on part-time fi eld personnel. With a multiplicity of fi eld surveys expected of the National Sample Survey Offi ce (NSSO), the facilities for training of staff are found to be grossly inadequate. A recent World Bank report, “Modernisation of India’s Statistical System”, had placed the additional staff requirements for the systems at central and state levels at about 6,000. The introduction of information technology may have reduced that requirement, but the fact remains that the staff size, its quality and its training requirements have all been affected by a defective staff policy in the government. Various research papers have brought out how the sample sizes have been drastically reduced in diverse field surveys because of the inadequacy of the organisational strength at the NSSO or at the CSO level. As a result, both sample and nonsamples errors are feared to be high. Even statistical units in individual departments are deprived of adequate staff strength. Institutions like the RBI, which were involved in such surveys in the past, have taken a back seat and hence the required sample sizes have dwindled in relevant surveys.

The drawbacks of the system are attributable to both the neglect by the government and the academic community. There are very few studies focusing on data adequacy and quality in India. There is yet another flaw arising from the neglect, essentially by the academic community. This is an absence of social audit of the data put out by public agencies claiming success in public programmes. Even various professional organisations do not, except for some rare exceptions, address database problems in their seminar programmes. Therefore, a stage has come for the intellectual community to come together and form an India Database Forum (IDF), on the lines of the International Data Forum.4

The data issues raised at the international level are, of course, different from those we face in India, as enumerated above. The International Data Forum “aims to facilitate and coordinate international production and sharing of data for research in the social sciences”. However, one of the guiding principles set out for that forum, namely, to “act as a catalytic and visionary organisation to identify gaps in research data needs and to

Economic & Political Weekly

PERSPECTIVES

promote a research-driven data agenda” (www.internationaldataforum.org), establishes some similarity with the objectives propounded in this note for the IDF.

What Will the IDF Do?

The tasks of the proposed IDF will be twofold; promoting research and advocacy. It must be made clear at the outset that the intention here is not to create an institution for producing data on any sector of the economy. That is the exclusive job of the government. Against the backdrop of data issues posed above, concerted actions are called for on two fronts. First, the IDF should promote research on the Indian database issues. Though these issues have gained importance in a variety of ways, they are not being addressed by professional bodies at all, or if they are addressed, they are done as tailend subjects.

Second, there is the need, and ample scope, for advocacy work in matters relating to database issues. The statistical system is receiving stepmotherly treatment at the hands of the public administration. While the statistical cadre working in the government as well as in the statistical system in particular have a strong case for better attention from the government, they themselves cannot take up such issues. They cannot, for instance, deal with the problem of strengthening the statistical system, including the conferment of statutory status on NSC and making it an autonomous and independent institution. Likewise, there is a strong case for making statistical units in different departments and units autonomous and primarily reporting to the NSC. India is one of the few countries possessing no data on income distribution. Academicians and international organisations readily accept household consumption expenditure distribution as a surrogate for income distribution. Demands for undertaking such nation-wide integrated surveys on income, expenditure and savings have to be done in a concerted manner, and IDF can canvass for it in a systematic way. Likewise, there is the need for promoting research on green gross domestic product and generally on environmental issues.

In the same vein, another important flaw in all programmes intended for the informal sectors and the poor concerns the absence of regular social audit of the data put out by public agencies claiming success in public programmes. Very often the nature and quality of data published are also inadequate to make a critical assessment of the social programmes in question. Demands for such independent social audits of public programmes and the authenticity of statistics on the programmes can be made in research articles or otherwise by the IDF.

To correct the present malady, the IDF should galvanise the academic community to take interest in this subject, hold regular seminars, invite papers for workshops and conferences and produce a journal focusing on varied database issues. The universities and academic institutions should be goaded to introduce credit courses on the Indian statistical system and database issues at the MA/ MPhil and doctorate courses.

Thus, the five key functions envisaged for the IDF are: (i) encouraging and promoting research on the extent and quality of statistics in different areas; (ii) activism for strengthening the statistical system including of the NSC and canvassing genuine autonomy for this body;

(iii) seeking better focus on distributional issues in statistics gathering and dissemination while making public information and data policies on inclusive growth as well as on the scheme of financial inclusion; (iv) Demanding regular social audit of the data put out by public agencies, particularly in regard to claims of success in public programmes; and (v) encouraging universities to introduce credit courses on different types of data for their postgraduate, MPhil and PhD programmes.

Notes

1 Such concerns attracted the attention of the World Bank, which chose to fund a project called “Modernisation of the Statistical System in India” during 1998 but, as it was too ambitious requiring “high cost” and massive manpower with an additional staff of 6,000, the project was dropped in its original form. Beginning much earlier in 1972, the Indian Econometrics Society had held seven seminars on the Data Base of the Indian Economy during 1972 to 1997.

2 One of the most studied and extensive reviews was that of S M Vidwans (2002a, b, c), himself a member of the National Statistical Commission, in three serialised articles in EPW. He then wrote: “About the system itself, in the beginning of the 1980s, I had noted the start of its deterioration and pointed out to the top central government statisticians where it was heading. Even then, when reality progressively unfolded before me during the commission’s work, I was unprepared for the sorry state of the system and the weakening of its institutions, the superficial perception of the managers of the system of the maladies afflicting the system and, more worryingly, the inappropriate, and perhaps harmful, prescriptions they intended to administer to it” (2002a: 3819).

3 The earlier two studies of 1970 and 1980 were small-scale efforts by smaller committees (Ministry of Finance 1970 and Department of Statistics 1980). The series of efforts made by individual scholars associated with professional associations like the Indian Econometrics Society and the Indian Association for Research in National Income and Wealth (IARNIW) are sporadic, piecemeal attempts.

4 I profusely thank R B Barman for providing me with a copy of the background paper on the International Data Forum (2008) (A Proposal Prepared by the Founding Committee, June 2008; Revised November 2008). Barman was a member of the Founding Committee of that Forum.

References

International Data Forum (2008): A Proposal to Establish a New Structure to Promote Knowledge about, Access to and the Development of Data for Social Scientific Research (Prepared by the Founding Committee, June 2008: Revised November 2008), www.internationaldataforum.org

Srinivasan, T N (1994): “Data Base for Development Analysis: An Overview”, Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, Vol 44(1), pp 3-27, June.

– (2003): “India’s Statistical System: Critiquing the Report of the National Statistical Commission”, Economic & Political Weekly, Vol XXXVIII, No 4, 25 January.

Vidwans, S M (2002a): “Indian Statistical System at the Crossroads I: Ominous Clouds of Centralisation”, Economic & Political Weekly, Vol 37, Nos 37 and 39, 14 September.

EPW Index

An author-title index for EPW has been prepared for the years from 1968 to 2010. The PDFs of the Index have been uploaded, year-wise, on the EPW web site. Visitors can download the Index for all the years from the site. (The Index for a few years is yet to be prepared and will be uploaded when ready.)

EPW would like to acknowledge the help of the staff of the library of the Indira Gandhi Institute for Development Research, Mumbai, in preparing the index under a project supported by the RD Tata Trust.