By a recent visitor to Bihar

I am writing this for the benefit of the Non-Resident Biharis who have not had the chance of visiting Bihar for some time. While I was living abroad, I always felt the need to get similar impression to cross check and verify if indeed Bihar is moving in right direction. This is what I found based on my journey last week on road from Patna - Barauni - Kahalgaon - Munger and my brief stay in Barauni, Munger and Kahalgaon. I had the chance to observe the road infrastructure, power situation, law and order and people reactions to work done by Nitish Kumar government.

I saw a dramatic improvement in the quality of the road wherever I went except when I was traveling from Bhagalpur to Kahalgaon. Barring the Bhagalpur to Kahalgaon stretch, the roads had been paved and for the first time had lane markings. In Munger town to my utter surprise, I saw road studs in the middle of the road, which glows in the night to guide the driver. The drains were for the first time getting cemented walls as opposed to bare earth in earlier days. I found road directions in Patna and Munger. In Barauni, I found, where there used to be virtually no road left, there were well-paved road made to last long. Most of the roads I traveled, I felt they were repaired to last long.

The power situation outside Patna is still as bad as it used to be. But local people were aware that new power plants were being built and that they knew situation would improve.

While talking to people gathered for a marriage occasion, I observed a tremendous positive approval for the work done by Nitish government so far. While talking about Kosi disaster, they said that it was in the first time in their living memory (avg. age 60 years) that the Government help in good measure reached the affected population of a flood disaster. Some one else pointed out that the local Banks like SBI remains very crowded these days because poor people get the government benefits like 1500 rupees for a new baby etc from these banks. Banks are being used to distribute the government welfare money to stop the pilferage.

I talked to a Bihar government employee who was employed in agriculture department and asked him what changes he has seen in his work. He explained that his department has been flooded with money and they are facing great difficulty in spending them as the department has lot of vacancies. In Lalu ji days there was no money to pay the salary to employees even.

I talked to a person who campaigned for the JD (U) candidate in Munger about whether all these developments are translating into votes for NDA or not. He said people were still giving first preference to caste and only after that to the government performance. So if there was candidate from the own caste, the vote will go to him irrespective of the party. If there was no candidate from his or her own caste then vote is going for NDA.

As far as law and order is concerned, the kidnapping has become almost like history. There were very few kidnapping this year and in all cases the kidnapped person was traced back and kidnappers were brought to justice. Fast track courts have worked wonders to tame the criminals. Criminals have been either put behind bar or they are lying low. In some instances police has encountered dreaded or habitual criminals.

In summary, I gained lot of hope and felt that if Nitish continues in Bihar, then Bihar would soon catch up with the so-called developed states (word developed is a contradiction because compared to developed countries, these states and India as a whole are light years behind) of India.

Having said that, there are lot of areas crying for improvement which needs immediate attention of the government. One of the important one is the provisioning of drinkable water in towns and villages. Thanks to the previous state government neglect and our faltering democracy at the town and Panchayat level, the water treatment plants have become defunct. People are drinking ground water which are contaminated with all kind of chemicals and bacteria which is bound to affect their health. Public education needs better teachers. The recent hiring of primary teachers in a mass scale left lot to be desired. The system of recruitment where Panchayat representative were allowed to recruit teachers ensured that unqualified teachers were recruited. These teachers are not capable of educating children. They either need to be put through a rigorous teacher training program or replaced by a better lot of teachers.