Foreign Aid Pouring in Resurgent India
In spite of all of the recent news about aid to Pakistan dominating the media, the fact remains that resurgent India has received more foreign aid than any other developing nation since the end of World War II--estimated at almost $100 billion since the beginning of its First Five-Year Plan in 1951. And it continues to receive more foreign aid in spite of impressive economic growth for almost a decade. At the recent G20 meeting, India has asked the World Bank to raise the amount of money India can borrow from the bank for its infrastructure projects, according to Times of India. At present, India can borrow up to $15.5 billion as per the SBL (single borrower limit)in soft loans fixed by the Bank.
After the increase of British aid to $500 million (300 million pounds) a year, India will still remain the biggest recipient of Japan's official development assistance (ODA) in the near future. Since Japan's first ODA to India in 1958, the country has received monetary aid worth Rs 89,500 crore (Rs 895 billion) so far, according to Noro Motoyoshi, Japanese consul general in Kolkata. In 2008, Japan's ODA to India was up by more than 18% compared to 2007 at Rs 6916 crore (Rs 69.16 billion).
Now, there is a BBC report about how India is using some of the British aid amounting to $500 million. It says "Last year Britain gave almost £300m (US$500m) to India in development aid. But India plans to spend more than US$1bn on its space programme next year". Here's the report:
International development aid is one part of the UK budget unlikely to be cut in a squeeze on public finances. But questions are being asked about how aid is used, and which countries need it. India last year got almost £300m from the UK, some of it spent on toilets in the country's financial capital, Mumbai.
The stench from the stagnant, fetid stream of the Queresh Nagar slum in Mumbai hits you as soon as you get out of the car.
The slum itself is bustling and vibrant. There is a line of shops with living quarters above. The stream is behind, the water a murky grey with insects buzzing on top. Some residents have rigged up ****** plastic covers at the back of their homes for privacy. But the children scamper around using the stream, or whatever ground they can find on the disused rail track behind, for a toilet.
"We have to live in these conditions," says La La Nawab Ali, who is showing me around.
"What can we do? You can see the state of it. This is Mumbai."
In another slum at Munjul Nagar, residents show letters, many signed with thumb prints, asking the authorities to finish building a toilet block that has been left half-finished. A similar stench pervades the air.
"It's an extremely difficult and helpless situation," explains Prasad Shetty, an urban planning consultant. "It's an extremely embarrassing undignified demeaning kind of experience for them."
Most of the funding for the sanitation project initially came from the World Bank and was then was taken over by the Mumbai government.
A small amount of British aid goes from the UK Department of International Development (DFID) through charities in England and India, mainly to train people to maintain their community toilet blocks. But many in the slums say they know little or nothing about it.
"You foreign people from over there, you keep on sending so much money," says one angry slum resident. "But the poor person sees nothing."
No water
Central to the scheme is building blocks of public toilets that can be used by the millions of people presently living with no sanitation.
Most of the blocks built so far work, but evaluators say there have been problems with about a third of them. Some have been built with no water supply. Some are not being maintained. One in the Queresh Nagar slum had to be pulled down because it was unsafe. The one in the Munjul Nagar slum has been left half-built because of objections from a developer.
"And somebody even sells the toilets," explained Jockin Arputham, founder of the National Federation of Slum Dwellers. "Sometimes they might have been sold to somebody for a premium."
http://www.riazhaq.com/2009/04/forei...-in-india.html
Foreign Aid Pouring in Resurgent India
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