If there is one feeling, screaming out from the government’s Ehsaas document, it is this: PM Khan’s heart may be in the right place, but his policy statement for the poor is ill-thought out at the one end, and trivial at the other, with some good random points in between.
Let’s start with examples of the good. The government intends to “screen the PC1” of every development project for its impact on poverty and equality. Disregarding the fact that not every PSDP project is aimed at poverty or inequality reduction, screening is a step in the right direction. However, the real test lies in impact assessment during and after the completion of the project; at PC1 stage, rosy projections of poverty reduction could be made, but whether those projections materialise is another affair.
Likewise, the document promises a new policy to guide the use of development expenditure by parliamentarians to promote transparency, independent oversight and accountability. While parliamentarians’ spending was originally supposed to be dispensed with, one hopes the new policy will at least curb the growth in developmentally-useless, and politically-expedient projects.
Ehsaas also promises “a national strategy for the development of statistics” for strengthening quality and availability of statistics, and to ensure the independence of statistics from political/other undue influence. This item was sorely missed in the medium-term economic framework, and while the promise of independent statistics is good, poverty reduction should not be the only objective of a strong and independent statistics body.
They are also talking about a data accessibility and transparency policy, where for instance, there will be a District Development Portal in which poverty and other socio-economic indicators across Pakistan’s district will be available to policymakers and the public. This, as well as the promised “awareness drive aimed at article 25-A”, is seen as “an important accountability tool in the implementation of Ehsaas,” so that the disadvantaged become aware of their right.
These plans rest on the assumption that people have the right to ask questions in this country, and that civil society institutions are vibrant and well-funded by domestic sources because of course, sources of funding are a threat to national security.
The document also promises to house a “population task force” under the direct supervision of PM Secretariat “for ensuring universal access to family planning predicated on the understanding that population is the denominator of poverty alleviation”. Population is indeed important but largely ignored area, albeit, one wonders what great wonder can the PM office deliver when population is a provincial subject.
The policy also promises to facilitate electronic payments to promote freelancing and innovation challenge for start-up. Again, a right step, but it takes an imagination to pitch it as a pro-poor measure in a country where the poor are uneducated, and lack the skills needed for freelancing and start-ups.
Next stop, some examples of bad policy positions in Ehsaas.
For instance, Ehsaas promises “a need-based system in the framework of the new NFC Award”, and that “members of the Council of Common Interests will be encouraged to improve the allocation formula to achieve our common goal of making opportunities equal for all Pakistani citizens.” The PM would do well to remember that the CCI cannot be used to hammer out an NFC arrangement, whereas the federal government has only one vote in the NFC. Why make promises you cannot keep?
Likewise, they want to amend the constitution to move article 38(d) from the “Principles of Policy” section into the “Fundamental Rights” section. “This change will make provision of food, clothing, housing, education and medical relief for citizens who cannot earn a livelihood due to infirmity, sickness or unemployment, a state responsibility.”
This is again a promise which the PTI does not necessarily have the numbers to implement. Remember this is supposed to be a policy document not a wish list or a manifesto. A policy document that is not actionable, loses credibility. Besides, without thinking this through, this proposed amendment can create more problems for a devolved, fiscally constrained, and unresponsive state.
Much like the case of population, Ehsaas has abundant promises that lie in the provincial domain. For instance, registration of slum and Katchi Abadis residents to facilitate their transparent inclusion in the event of subsequent commercialization of the area; or initiative to address spurious and adulterated milk; or a policy to promote effective husbandry and hay and silage making.
Throughout the document, there is no discussion on how the wish list will be achieved; details of or even an emphasis on the strengthening of the CCI and the interprovincial coordination ministry are not even briefly mentioned when in fact the centre’s role in most of the poverty reduction measures enlisted in Ehsaas are provincial subjects.
Onto the strange bits that makes Ehsaas look like an exam copy of matriculation student who just wants to fill in the pages to impress the examiner. This include plans to earmark a share for poor in allocating Khokhas (cafés), tea shops, newspaper stands, shoe polishing booths in government offices and property; a “garbage collector challenge”; and the reinvention of traditional 'Thela'. These are too trivial items for a ‘national policy’; it only makes a joke of the document. Is it really Islamabad’s job to run a garbage collector challenge as a matter of ‘policy’?
In the final analyses, there is nothing new about Ehsaas. While there are one-word or single-line mentions (passing references really) of justice, rights, opportunity and accountability, Ehsaas essentially reflects old thinking through its motely of random ingredients of various endowments & handouts. This in turn, reflects a poor understanding of poverty on the part of its drafters.
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