NEW DELHIâ€" Bhupinder Singh Hooda has been chief minister of Haryana since 2005, and is currently serving his second term. The state, which hugs India's capital, is said to be the site of the epic battle described in the Mahabharata; it is now home to just over 2 percent of India's people, some 25 million.
Lately, Haryana has been known for the triumphs and shortcomings of Gurgaon, the sprawling city that has become an outsourcing center, and as the home of the Maruti Suzuki auto plant that was recently wracked by violent strikes. While improving, Haryana's gender ratio, at 877 women per 1,000 men, is still well below the national average of 940, and a series of recent crimes has highlighted questions about women's safety there.
A Congress party stalwart, Mr. Hooda often refers to himself as the son of a farmer, one who attracted billions in investment to the largely agrarian state. The 65-year-old former tennis champion said he hoped to make Haryana an educational mecca by building numerous universities and partnering with international schools.
He spoke to India Ink recently from his New Delhi bungalow in a wide-ranging interview on topics including honor killings, crime and electricity. Â
Mr. Hooda said his surname's similarity to HUDA, or the Haryana Urban Development Authority, a state administrative body, has often amused people, so he has dubbed himself the “Haryana Overall Development Authority.â€
What have been the biggest challenges in your job as the chief minister?
The biggest challenge when I took over was the law and order situation prevailing at that time. Peop le lacked confidence in the system, the administration, power generation and employment opportunities. My state was at No. 14 among Indian states as far as per capita investment was concerned.
Basically my state is an agrarian state, to get more was a tough job. I brought in a new industrial policy, which was investment-friendly. For industry you need land, that was also a problem, so I came up with a new land acquisition policy, which was a pro-farmer acquisition policy. Being a son of a farmer, I know what it means to lose land.
I made a policy in which farmers were partners and they would get annuity for 33 years. I have further improved upon that and have come up with the land pooling policy. Out of one acre, the land owner will get 1,000 square yards of developed land, of his choice, in a residential area, in lieu of compensation, and 100 yards of commercial land so he could open a shop. I have made them partners in development and that is quite successf ul.
When I took over, the state's own power generation was 1,587 megawatts. And my state came into being in 1966. From 1966 to 2005 when I took over, only one thermal power station was added. From 2005 to 2009, in my last term itself, I added up to four new thermal power stations. I have raised the capacity from 1587 to 5,050 [megawatts].
Second, I have tried and am still trying to make a qualitative change in the education system. I introduced the semester system in schools, colleges and universities.
How does the semester system help?
There were many dropouts among the poor, since they could not afford the education. Haryana is the first state that came out with an innovative scheme: Any girl child or boy admitted to class one [first grade] in a government school receives scholarship - 150 rupees [$2.7] per month to a girl child and 100 rupees [$1.8] to a boy.
About 20 lakh [two million] students are getting these scholarships.
So, has this reduced the dropout rate?
Yes, considerably. I have opened bank accounts in the name of students and their parents, and students who attend get a scholarship every month. Education is free for the poor; in addition, scholarships are given, and separately they are also given uniforms.
[The chief minister's office, which supplied exact figures after the interview, says the dropout rate for first to fifth grade in government schools has gone down from 12.7 percent for the 2004-05 academic year to 1.3 percent in the 2011-12 academic year. From sixth to eighth grade, the dropout rate has dropped from 24.5 percent to 3.7 percent over the same period, according to Mr. Hooda's office.]
I have a dream to make my state an educational hub, of an international standard. I think I have succeeded in that to some extent. In the next five to seven years you will observe that it has become an educational hub.
You mentioned your pro-farmer land acquisition polici es. But how do you explain recent protests by farmers?
There is no unrest among farmers. You go to Gorakhpur [a village in Fatehabad district], where a nuclear power plant will come up. About a month back, there was news that it needs 1,500 acres of land. Politicians with vested interests went there to instigate farmers not to give up their land. But when I started the project, we had already compensated farmers for 1,344 acres of land and taken possession of it.
My acquisition policies are farmer-friendly. I am the son of a farmer. Â There is no unrest, we take farmers into confidence.
You said that the law and order situation in your state was out of hand when you took over as the chief minister. How have you changed that?
At that time people felt there were many criminals who were operating from jail. There was a criminal nexus that was being sponsored by the government, that's what people felt.
I gave no concession to lawbreakers. The firs t thing I did was to tell the police that every FIR [First Information Report] has to be registered and then investigate. If you don't take the first step, you can't reach the second step. In the previous regimes FIRs were not registered.
Recent crime statistics from the National Crime Records Bureau indicate that crime in your state has increased by over 11 percent in the last five years.
Crime has not gone up. The number of registered cases have gone up, because I said that every case has to be registered. Earlier they were not being registered.
From No. 14 my state now ranks No. 1 in per capita investment among the Indian states, and that is because of the law and order situation and the atmosphere in the state.
There is a perception that Haryana is a particularly difficult state to be a woman in - in terms of gender ratio and crimes against women.
No, it is just a perception. Previously orthodox thinking was there, but not any more. People are getting education. I have enrolled women in the police force, there is a separate cadre for women police constables, about 10 percent of the police constables are women.
We have set up special help lines for women as well. I have come up with many women-friendly schemes.
But still, the female birthrate is much lower than in many other states.
It is improving, in 0-6 [age group], with these policies.
What's the most important thing you introduced that you think helped in the improvement?
First, 33 percent of seats were reserved in teaching jobs for women. Second, I introduced the “ladli†[a Hindi term of endearment for a girl] scheme, to change the mindset of people.
Any couple having a second girl child gets a benefit of more than 5,000 rupees ($92) every year for five years. So that there is no burden of marriage on the parents when the girl turns 18.
In my state, the old age pension is given to both husband and wife, if they are 60 and above. But couples having only girls start getting a pension at the age of 45. Any electricity meter that is registered in the name of a woman gets a concession of 10 paisa [one-tenth of a rupee] per unit [of electricity consumed]. And any property registered in the name of women gets a 2 percent concession on stamp duty. There are several other schemes as well, such as reservation of seats for women in technical institutes.
What do you do about situations like the honor killings that we saw in your state recently?
That happens in Canada also. Why my state only, it's a mindset. As far as honor killing, I don't know why you call it honor killing. What you call honor killing is done by either a girl's parents or a boy's parents, the society has nothing to do with it. Nobody likes it. But such cases are not on the increase, I can say that. It is condemnable.
The recent violence at the Maruti Suzuki plant in Manesar echoed similar episodes of l abor unrest in the past. Why do such incidents keep recurring?
What happened in Maruti was unfortunate, but it did not occur because of labor unrest.
It happened because of a clash between two people due to a sudden provocation and it flared up. For that I have made sure that culprits are not spared. A special investigation team has been formed, a special prosecutor, Mr. Tusli [K.T.S. Tulsi], has been appointed.
The number of strikes in 2002 were 30, in 2005 there were 17, and in 2012 the number of strikes and lockouts in the state were three. The incidents of strikes in Haryana are among the lowest in the country.
Are you feeling pressure from Gujarat, which is aggressively trying to court business investment?
Every state tries. I have been all around the world to market my state and I have been successful. From 1966 to 2005, the total investment in Haryana was 41,000 crore [41 billion rupees]. But, from 2005 to 2012, 60,000 crore [60 billion r upees] investment has already come to the state and 100,000 crore [100 billion rupees] is in the pipeline.
From No. 14, I have become No. 1, said an ASSOCHAM [The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry in India] report, of September 2010. Haryana received 81 percent of the total investment that was pledged to India, much ahead of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. The state continues to be a preferred investment destination.
From the first day the management of Maruti was on record, there is no question, they are furthering their investment. Seventy percent of the total Japanese investment is in the state of Haryana. Every second car running on the Indian road is manufactured in Haryana.
The chairman of the Suzuki Corporation came and met me, he was very satisfied.
Are there new investments coming into the state?
Suzuki motorcycles is coming up with a research and development center, the biggest in India. Maruti is coming up with a third plant in Manesar. Hero is also there. Mitsui, National Panasonic, Asian Paints, textiles, footwear industry.
Some people might argue that your attempts to attract investment have been too successful. In a city like Gurgaon, which has been a big success, people who live and work there have been very frustrated because of the power problem, water problem and weak infrastructure.
The power problem happened this time as there was a drought-like situation in Haryana. So to save my crop I had to cut power to the industry to give it to farmers. And there were no rains, and coal was in short supply for thermal plants. Â But that has been resolved.
For water also, we have built a new canal from Gurgaon that is coming from Yamuna [river]. Drinking water is not a problem. I just passed a budget of more than 400 crore [four billion rupees] for Gurgaon.
Delhi and Haryana seem to have constant rows over water sharing. What is the problem?
Haryan a is a water-scarce state. The problem is this that water comes through Haryana, and when there are floods, Delhi starts saying that Haryana has released water. They do not understand, if water is released by Haryana, first it will flood Haryana and then Delhi. If it is in my hands, why will I let Haryana get flooded? Â
Water comes from the hills. Delhi is our national capital, it gets double its share at the cost of Haryana because of the Supreme Court order, and we are contesting that case. Otherwise, whenever there is an acute shortage of water in Delhi, we always try to help.
Are you getting the kind of support that you need from the central government?
The central government gives support to every state. The UPA government has done a lot of work for farmers and poor people, which has helped me develop my state. I thank the leadership of Sonia Gandhi and Manmohan Singh.
