Hence, for example, Wal-mart was brought in on the sly and therefore there has been no strategic linking with farmer groups, local artisans and others, say as in China. Indeed, the confusion over integrating producer associations and farmers’ groups in policy implementation is all-encompassing and quite compelling. I know at least one large corporate which has set up producer companies in Punjab and there are no sources of giving credit and working capital to them in spite of large promises.

This linking needs to happen. International agencies have demolished the concept that India is only a rural economy still strongly believed in by some of our anti-urban Ayatollahs, and have shown with geo-informatics and satellite pictures that its villages are integrated with small towns far more than in Europe and Latin America. But we are doing nothing to accelerate the process. That is how the aam aadmi focus of the Budget should be written.

The writer, a former Union minister, is chairman, Institute of Rural Management, Anand

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