India dished out Rs597 billion between 2004-2010 to nine countries

LAHORE: It is a widely-acknowledged fact that while successive Pakistani governments have been running disgracefully with a deep begging bowl in hand since the country’s inception, India’s total donation budget between 2004 and 2010 alone stands at around Rs 597 billion (over 312 billion Indian rupees).
In a bid to expand its activities as a donor and to reposition itself as an emerging power, New Delhi currently provides loans and grants to nine countries. According to AidData, a distinguished online portal established by the US-based Brigham Young University, the College of William and Mary and the Development Gateway (sponsored by World Bank and 21 world governments), India provides aid to Ghana, Mali, Myanmar, Nepal, Ethiopia, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, Sudan and Bhutan.
A research conducted by The News International shows that as compared to Pakistan, which has been extremely good at holding aid-seeking conferences both at home and abroad to apprise the international philanthropists of the damage caused by the October 8, 2005 quake and the devastating 2010 floods, India had declined international assistance after both the 2004 Tsunami and the 2005 earthquake in Kashmir.
Though it is a day younger than Pakistan, India has been donating since 1958, making its presence felt. It was 53 years ago that India had dished out Rs 200 million as multi-year grants to Myanmar and Rs 100 million under the same head to Nepal, one of the key reasons why New Delhi’s influence in these two countries is unmatched.
This was the time when the then Pakistani President Iskander Mirza was preparing to abrogate the Constitution and declare the first Martial Law in the country. There is little evidence Pakistan has done anything to analyze what India has achieved over the years by financially supporting both Nepal and Myanmar.
The table in this story, taken from an Indian economic expert Dweep Chanana’s July 2010 article “India’s transition to global donor: limitations and prospects,” shows India’s foreign aid budget allocations between 2004 and 2010.
This article was published by the Spain-based Elcano Royal Institute of International and Strategic Studies. Dweep Chanana wrote in his article that he had sought these statistics from Indian budget documents, a fact confirmed by The News International during a random cross-checking exercise.
Dweep Chanana, who is an advisor to private and institutional philanthropists with a Swiss private bank, had viewed in his article:” India has expanded its aid programme over the past decade, emerging as a serious donor in certain countries.
Like most emerging donors,India’s aid-related activities do not follow the traditional definition of the Development Assistance Committee. Rather, an alternative definition can be considered: spending that furthers India’s standing as a donor.”
Economist Chanana further writes:” There are three parts to that spending, namely grants and preferential bilateral loans to governments, contributions to international organisations and financial institutions, and subsidies for preferential bilateral loans provided through the Export Import Bank of India. Today the Indian foreign aid is less than 0.3 per cent of GDP. Seven years ago India announced that it would only accept bilateral development assistance from five countries (Germany, Japan, Russia, the UK, and the United States) in addition to the EU. Now it appears that the list is dwindling. India also declined international assistance after both the 2004 tsunami and the 2005 earthquake in Kashmir.”
Having the world’s second largest labour force of 478 million, the economy of India is today the 10th largest on the planet in terms of nominal GDP and the fourth largest by Purchasing Power Parity (PPP).
Numbers collected from sources like the IMF and World Bank show that India’s per capita GDP (PPP) is $3,339 billion, its exports rest at $ 201 billion, imports stand at $ 327 billion, Gross external debt is $ 237.1 billion, total Foreign Direct Investment is $ 35.6 billion, revenues total $ 170.7 billion, expenses are $ 257.4 billion and the country’s FOREX reserves are calculated at $ 310 billion.
On the contrary, Pakistani economy’s far more dismal numbers might make many Pakistanis bow their head in utter disdain, if not shame. Pakistan’s economy is the 47th largest in terms of nominal GDP and the 25th biggest vis a vis the Purchasing Power Parity numbers.
Its per capita GDP (PPP) is $ 464 billion, its exports stand at $ 24 billion, imports rest at around $ 29 billion, labour force is 56 million, net external debt is nearly $ 60 billion, revenues are touching the $ 23.21 billion mark, expenses are hovering over $ 30 billion and the FOREX reserves are calculated at approximately $ 17 billion.
In Afghanistan, where many Pakistani government functionaries and members of the establishment have long been claiming to hold sway, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had announced an additional $500 million aid package very recently in May 2011.
During Indian Premier’s last visit to the war-torn mountainous country, various global media outlets had reported that India has spent $1.5 billion (Pak Rs 130 billion) here to help build highways, hospitals and electricity networks.
India is now the fifth largest donor to Afghanistan (with commitments of over $1 billion since 2001) and is increasingly seeking out new recipients. On the other hand, United States has constantly been reminding Pakistan that it has not done enough despite taking $ 20 billion in aid from it since 2011.
Pakistan does donate too, but its gesture is as rare as a blue moon. For example, in February 2011, Islamabad provided Rs 11 million donations to Sri Lanka when floods had lashed the island. The aid stock included dry rations and clothing only.
India, as a donor, is giving aid to Africa also. Its assistance for the African continent has grown at a rate of 22 per cent annually over the past 10 years.
And see what it is getting in return! Bilateral trade between India and Africa has experienced a 15-fold increase from 2001. While the bilateral Indo-Africa trade soared to $ 46billion in 2010, it is expected to reach $ 70billion by 2015.
India is now Africa’s second major trading partner after China, with investments in oil, pharmaceuticals, gold, diamonds and information technology.
Indian Telecom giant Bharti Airtel, according to a BBC report of May 24, 2011, “had spent $ 10 billion in 2010 to take over mobile phone operations across Africa from the Kuwaiti firm.”
To cite another example, India has recently signed a deal with 19 education institutions in Africa and plans to build a diamond processing facility in Botswana.
According to the afore-mentioned BBC report, the Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was at the May 23, 2011 Africa-India Forum Summit in Addis Ababa (Ethiopia), where he had pledged a $ 5 billion credit to the African nations to help them meet development goals.
BBC wrote: “India’s commerce with Africa is worth $ 40 billion (£ 25 billion) a year.”
Shashi Tharoor, a former Indian minister of state for external affairs and United Nations under-secretary general, has recently written an article “India’s emergence as a global donor” in “The Gulf News” of June 15, 2011.
Shashi, who is currently a member of the Indian parliament, wrote,” The recent India-Africa summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, at which the Indian government pledged $5 billion (Dh18.35 billion) in aid to African countries, drew attention to a largely overlooked phenomenon - India’s emergence as a source, rather than a recipient, of foreign aid. For decades after independence - when Britain left the subcontinent one of the poorest and most ravaged regions on earth, with an effective growth rate of 0 per cent over the preceding two centuries - India was seen as an impoverished land of destitute people, desperately in need of international handouts.”
He stated,” Many developed countries showcased their aid to India. Norway, for example, established its first-ever aid programme there in 1959. But, with the liberalisation of the Indian economy in 1991, the country embarked upon a period of dizzying growth, averaging nearly 8 per cent per year since then. During this time, India weaned itself from dependence on aid, preferring to borrow from multilateral lenders and, increasingly, from commercial banks.”
Shashi Tharoor continues observing with a lot of pride:” Today, the proverbial shoe is on the other foot. India has begun putting its money where its mouth used to be. It has now emerged as a significant donor to developing countries in Africa and Asia, second only toChina in the range and quantity of development assistance given by countries of the global South.
In addition, India has built factories, hospitals, and parliaments in various countries, and sent doctors, teachers, and IT professionals to treat and train the nationals of recipient countries.
Concessional loans at trifling interest rates are also extended as lines of credit, tied mainly to the purchase of Indian goods and services, and countries in Africa have been clamouring for them.”
The eminent writer still has a lot to ink:” In Asia, India remains by far the single-largest donor to its neighbour Bhutan, as well as a generous aid donor to Nepal, the Maldives, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka as it recovers from civil war. Given Afghanistan’s vital importance for the security of the subcontinent, India’s assistance programme there already amounts to more than $1.2 billion (Pak Rs 112.8 billion) - modest from the standpoint of Afghan needs, but large for a non-traditional donor - and is set to rise further. India’s efforts in Afghanistan have focused on humanitarian infrastructure, social projects, and development of skills and capacity.”