Oxfam India to come out with country-centric inequality report in Feb

Study will show disparity among states and capture the govt's expenditure and its intent

Oxfam India, the Indian arm of Oxfam International, plans to bring out an exclusive report on inequality in India in February 2019.

“The report, which focuses primarily on India, will show disparity among states and capture the government’s expenditure and its intent,” said Akshaya Kumar Biswal, regional manager (Odisha), Oxfam India.

The report likely to be ready by February, will not only include data  but also capture the social aspects and qualitative analysis with case studies , he added.

India has been ranked  among the bottom 11 countries in a new worldwide index released on October 9, 2018, on the commitment of nations to reduce inequalities.

UK-based charity Oxfam International’s ‘Commitment to Reducing Inequality Index’ (CRII) ranks India at 147, just above Bangladesh among 157 countries analysed in the report, describing India’s commitment to reducing inequality as a “a very worrying situation”.

The index ranks governments on how well they are tackling inequality.  It assesses government action in three key areas - labour rights, social spending and taxation. These factors are critical to reducing the gap between rich and poor and provide a useful proxy for assessing a government’s overall approach.

“Oxfam has calculated that if India were to reduce inequality by a third, more than 170 million people would no longer be poor. Government spending on health, education and social protection is woefully low and often subsidizes the private sector”, said an official statement from Oxfam.

India also fares bad among eight south Asian nations in the CRII rankings, having been slotted sixth among the eight nations.

Oxfam India’s study shows that corporate sectors are getting huge amount of tax incentives and exemptions. But it is mostly ineffective to achieve the desired economic and social objectives.

“The government is incurring a huge amount of revenue loss due to these tax exemptions. The revenue foregone in 2017-18 amounted to 92 per cent of total social sector spending in the same fiscal year. These funds could have been effectively used to provide extensive and inclusive social protection schemes and fund health and education sectors.  The money that government of India is losing, could have been used for providing some basic services, keeping in mind the growing trend of inequality in India,” Oxfam said.

The tax structure, according to Oxfam, looks reasonably progressive on paper, but in practice much of the progressive taxation, like that on the incomes of the richest, is not collected.

On labour rights and respect for women in the workplace India also fares poorly, reflecting the fact that the majority of the labour force is employed in the agricultural and informal sectors, which lack union organisation and enforcement of gender rights, the advocacy group said.