'Revadi culture' exists because poverty exists And poverty exists because government’s economic policy has delivered GDP growth but not jobs and incomes to the large masses of people Arun Sinha, AUG 25 2022, https://www.deccanherald.com/opinion/main-article/revadi-culture-exists-because-poverty-exists-1139367.html
There are two sets of actors in the revadi culture: the political parties and the target sections. The political parties distribute revadi to get the votes of the target sections. Why are people willing to barter their political choice for freebies? Because they do not have a decent income to fulfill their family’s needs and make savings to live with respect, dignity and financial security. Do the upper and middle classes want freebies? No. They might even feel insulted by a suggestion of it.
More than 75 per cent of the country’s farmers own less than a hectare (2.47 acres). They supplement their income from small fields by working as labourers. That is a huge part of the population. There are more than 110 million beneficiaries under the PM Kisan-Samman Yojana. Of them, 82.5 million farmer households (75 per cent) supplement their farm income with wage labour. That translates to 82.5 x 4 = 330 million Indians (taking 4 members to a family on average).
These 330 million Indians live extremely vulnerable lives. If the crop fails in one season for any reason, they slide into poverty. If even one working male of the family suffers long illness or remains unpaid for his labour for months, the family has to live hand-to-mouth. For lack of food and nutrition, other members might fall ill, and that means greater misery. Can we fault these 330 million Indians for seeking revadi?..
The onus to end the ‘revadi culture’ also lies on Prime Minister Modi, the BJP and the other parties. They have to rewrite the country’s economic policy to provide jobs with decent incomes to a large part of the population. That should be the next set of reforms the country must contemplate, design and implement. If people have good income and savings, they would stop seeking revadi, the revadi-for-vote market would shut down, and democracy would become freer and stronger.