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23 August 2024 at 9:59:04 pm

Fatal Negligence

Newborns dying in a fire inside a government hospital is a devastating indictment of a system that is supposed to protect its most vulnerable patients. The Amravati District Women’s Hospital tragedy, where a blaze killed three infants, joins a long list of preventable institutional failures. Thirty-nine babies were inside the three-compartment facility when the fire erupted after a ventilator in the neonatal unit caught fire. Thirty-six were eventually rescued. Parents and eyewitnesses have...

Fatal Negligence

Newborns dying in a fire inside a government hospital is a devastating indictment of a system that is supposed to protect its most vulnerable patients. The Amravati District Women’s Hospital tragedy, where a blaze killed three infants, joins a long list of preventable institutional failures. Thirty-nine babies were inside the three-compartment facility when the fire erupted after a ventilator in the neonatal unit caught fire. Thirty-six were eventually rescued. Parents and eyewitnesses have alleged that the fire alarms did not sound and the automatic sprinklers failed to activate even as the district administration has said the hospital underwent regular fire audits and had applied for this year’s audit. An audit is meaningful only if it establishes that equipment works when lives depend on it. Maharashtra has already witnessed the deadly consequences of fire-safety failures in public hospitals. In 2021, eleven Covid-19 patients died in a fire at the Ahmednagar district hospital even though a fire audit conducted months earlier had recommended a firefighting system. The Amravati tragedy demands more than the familiar ritual of a high-level inquiry, compensation and promises of “strictest action”. The announcement of ex gratia payments cannot compensate parents who have lost a child they had barely begun to know. The investigation must establish not merely what ignited the fire, but why it was allowed to become fatal. Was the ventilator properly maintained? Were electrical and medical devices routinely inspected? Did alarms function? Were sprinklers operational? Was the NICU appropriately located and equipped for evacuation? Were staff trained and drills conducted? And most importantly, who was responsible for ensuring that every safeguard worked? There is another troubling detail: the neonatal unit was reportedly housed on the third floor, rather than at ground level, and questions have arisen over whether the unit was part of the building’s original plan. The state has built an elaborate architecture of laws and child-protection standards which seldom matches the situation on ground. Whether in government hospitals, schools or anganwadis, safety has become a box to be ticked rather than a responsibility to be lived. The most vulnerable children are consequently left dependent not on systems, but on the vigilance and heroism of individual staff members. That is an appalling way to run the childcare infrastructure of one India’s most developed states. A NICU is perhaps the worst possible place for institutional complacency: its patients are immobile, medically dependent and extraordinarily vulnerable to smoke, heat and even brief disruption of life-support equipment. The government must ensure that the Amravati deaths do not become another entry in the grim ledger of hospital tragedies followed by inquiries, outrage and forgetting. The real test will be whether the state can prevent the next newborn from dying in a hospital that was supposed to save him.

Seven Streams, One Ambition

While Sapta Dhara offers a broad economic vision, its success will depend on whether the government can connect its engines to create jobs and enhance productivity.

AI generated image
AI generated image

India’s growth story has reached a point where we are no longer asking just how fast its economy can grow, but rather how broadly and sustainably that growth can be fostered. Referring to ‘Shakti ki Sapta Dhara’ - seven streams of strength including manufacturing, agriculture and food production, technology and innovation, Gati Shakti, defence, the green and blue economy, and soft power - in his Independence Day speech, Prime Minister Narendra Modi offered a roadmap for this next phase.


At first glance, these may appear to be seven distinct priorities. But they are, in fact, closely interconnected. Infrastructure, technology and skilled labour are essential to a competitive manufacturing sector; agriculture becomes more productive when connected to food processing, logistics and global markets; and India’s shift towards a greener economy will be increasingly reliant on innovation, infrastructure and indigenous technological capabilities. The success of Sapta Dhara will lie in bringing them together into a development paradigm that can raise productivity, generate employment and enhance global competitiveness.


One Development Strategy

What makes Sapta Dhara unique is not just the comprehensive nature of its seven pillars, but also the way in which these pillars reinforce and complement each other. Manufacturing is heavily dependent on efficient logistics and infrastructure if it is to remain globally competitive; technology and innovation need a robust industrial ecosystem for ideas to be translated into products; and agricultural transformation relies on food processing, storage, transportation and access to global markets. Even the transition towards a green and blue economy will demand technological know-how, infrastructure and new channels of investment.


This interconnectedness is particularly crucial for India, as its development challenges rarely exist in isolation. A factory may generate jobs, but its wider economic impact hinges on whether workers are adequately skilled, supply chains can efficiently transport inputs and finished products, and firms can access domestic and international markets. Similarly, an increase in agricultural productivity may not significantly raise farmers’ incomes unless agriculture is linked to processing, value addition and export-oriented supply chains. The Prime Minister’s emphasis on an integrated farm-to-export chain reflects precisely this need to create greater value addition across the agricultural economy.


‘Sapta Dhara’ is thus a set of interconnected and mutually reinforcing capabilities. The challenge is to ensure that these streams converge rather than develop in silos. For a nation aspiring to become a developed economy, the goal must be to translate investments in infrastructure, technology and productive capacity into higher productivity, better employment opportunities and greater global competitiveness.


However, for the ‘Sapta Dhara’ to translate into a meaningful development strategy, growth must ultimately translate into productive employment. India’s demographic advantage can become an economic advantage only if its growing sectors are capable of absorbing a large and increasingly aspirational workforce. This makes the employment intensity of growth as important as the growth rate itself.


The manufacturing sector is particularly significant. While technology-led sectors can create high-value employment, labour-intensive manufacturing, MSMEs and related supply chains have the potential to generate jobs on a much larger scale. The same is true for defence, where greater domestic production can contribute not only to strategic objectives but also to technological innovation, private investment and exports.


This is why skilling is a critical link across all seven streams. As production becomes increasingly technology-intensive, workers need to be equipped for a manufacturing-led economy; the green transition will create demand for new technical skills; and the growth of digital and innovation-led sectors will require a workforce capable of keeping pace with rapidly evolving technologies. Investment in physical capital, therefore, cannot be separated from investment in human capital.


The goal should be to build an economy in which output growth and employment growth reinforce each other. If Sapta Dhara can connect infrastructure and technology with productive enterprises, and productive enterprises with a skilled workforce, India will take another step towards a growth model that is not only faster, but also more employment-intensive and broadly distributed.


Global Competitiveness

Another important aspect of Sapta Dhara is the relationship between self-reliance and competitiveness in global markets. India’s quest for Atmanirbharta need not imply insularity or disengagement from the global economy. Rather, it can mean building domestic capabilities that allow India to enter global markets from a position of greater strength.


This distinction is particularly relevant to manufacturing and technology. Developing domestic capacity in critical technologies, strengthening supply chains and expanding indigenous production can mitigate vulnerabilities while also enabling Indian firms to become more competitive internationally. The same is true for defence, where greater domestic production can contribute not only to strategic objectives but also generate opportunities for technological innovation, private investment and exports.


Green and blue economy adds a further dimension to this transformation. As global demand shifts towards cleaner technologies and sustainable production, India can transition from being merely a large market for green products to becoming a producer and exporter of them. Here, technology, manufacturing, infrastructure and skilled human capital once again intersect.


The broader aim, then, should be to transform self-reliance from an alternative to global integration into a pathway towards it. By developing competitive domestic capabilities while remaining plugged into global value chains, India could make the vision of a more self-reliant India one that is also more globally competitive.


India’s next stage must be about translating its productive capacity and technological capabilities into jobs, competitiveness and broad-based prosperity. The real strength of ‘Sapta Dhara’ will not lie in the number of streams it encompasses, but in how effectively they flow together towards a common destination.


(The writer is an economics postgraduate from Jawaharlal Nehru University with research interests in economic policy, trade and global governance. Views personal.)

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