Law In-Depth
Facade of food security
The pivotal need of food stands first among the basic needs of mankind. Food is not a trivial commercial commodity having diminutive social and political ramifications. It plays a monumental role in the societal arrangement. The Apex Court of India observed-“maintenance and improvement of public health have a rank high as these are indispensable to the very existence of the community [Vincent v Union of India AIR1987]”.
There is inextricable nexus among sweeping food insecurity, crippling poverty and perennial hunger in the society. In the international milieu the developed states use the food-aid as a Machiavellian stratagem to exploit the food-deficit countries. USPresidentHubert H Humphrey stated,“I have heard that people may become dependent on us for food. I know that was not supposed to be good news. To me that was good news because before people can do anything they have got to eat.”
Food security implies that all people have at all times physical and economic access to basic foods. TheWorld Food Summit 1996 has defined the food security as access by all people at all times to the food needed for an active and healthy life. The definition presupposes four conditions prerequisite to food security such as 1. Adequacy of food supply 2. Stability of supply 3. Access to food 4. Quality and safety of food. The Institute of Food and Development Policy of US incriminates not the scarcity of food but the unkempt allocation system as the baneful cause of food insecurity. In 1974 the whole of Bangladesh turned into an agonising spectacle of human tribulations. It was 1943 re-enacted. Amartya Sen argued-“whatever the Bangladesh famine of 1974 might have been, it was not a FAD (Food Availability Decline) famine… market power was used to command and snatch food away...” [Vide- Conflicts in access to food by Amartya Sen]
Bangladesh is a low-income and food deficit country with annual average of food grain imports of about 2 million metric tons. Approximately, half of the population live below the food poverty line and spend 70 percent of their household income on food. Among these, 28 million, representing 20 percent of the population are considered ultra-poor. Beyond that, there are another 35 million people living in urban slums and rural villages who are considered living below the poverty line but are not considered ultra-poor. Moreover the sky-rocketing exorbitant prices of the edible foods and dwindling income of the masses has further aggravated the already deteriorating food security posing a grave threat of blood-curdling silent famine in Bangladesh.
The qualitative aspect of food security is jeopardised by the macabre adulteration of edible articles leading to the cataclysmic catastrophe in the health sector. Adulteration demolishes the nutritious qualities of foods, inculcates venomous elements in the foods and thereby pulverises the luminous prospect of a healthy society. Some venal businessmen take resort to this heinous means for merely lucrative ends. A man has natural right to the enjoyment of healthy life. The Apex Court of Bangladesh observed that this natural right is torpedoed by this nefarious practice of contamination of foods.[Mohiuddin Farooque v Bangladesh 48 DLR 438]. In a welfare state the government endowed with the onerous obligation to elevate the nutrition level of masses cannot deviate from its sacred duty. The Indian Supreme Court observed-“A healthy body is the very foundation for all human activities ….in a welfare state it is the obligation of the state to ensure the creation and sustaining of conditions congenial to good health [Bandhua Mukti Morcha v Union of India AIR1984].”
The Constitution envisions an egalitarian society which presupposes the decimation of vicious manipulation causing perpetual poverty and perennial hunger. The Supreme Court observed that the people of Bangladesh have fought for ages to put an end to this appalling exploitation[Re Italian Marble Works Ltd 62DLR70] The whole edifice of the constitution is founded on the peerless idealism to establish economic justice. This noble aspiration is betrayed when a citizen is afflicted by piercing penury, distressed by corroding hunger and haunted by suffocating dejection triggered by unemployment fiasco.
The ambit of right to life, a non-derogant pillar of civilised society, articulated in Art.32 of the Constitution is ever expanding. The judiciary imbued by the sacred humanity and sacrosanct egalitarianism are coming forward tiding over crippling ambivalence and disabling obscurantism. A new vista was ushered in when the proactive judiciary in a penultimate move proclaimed the right to life encompasses something more than animal existence [Munn v Illinois US (1877)].
The nuance dividing line estranging the civil and political rights from the economic, social and cultural rights has been put aside by the intrepid judiciary. The obsolete plea of meagre economic capability to fulfill the economic, social and cultural rights has been retorted that the humane consideration and constitutional requirement cannot be measured by pecuniary standard [Jackson v Bishop, F. Supp]. The precursors of new era realised that in the absence of economic rights, the civil and political rights are illusory and nugatory. In a sanguine move the August Court of India proclaimed that the right to life in any civilised society implies the right to food [Chameli Singh v State of Uttar Pradesh AIR 1996].
Recently the government of Bangladesh is mulling to enact a law promising food security in pursuance of its obligation embodied in Art. 15 of the constitution. The very rationale behind this enactment is to put the destitute section of citizens under the umbrella of food security. The optimistic target may be shattered unless we ensure the providence of sufficient food at subsidised rate to the impoverished, gratis allocation of nutritious food to the pregnant mothers and pupils. To the end internal grievance redressal mechanism is prerequisite to reach the benefits at the doorsteps of the poor. There needs formation of national food commission to monitor the implementation of the food security law.To repel any opaqueness, all public distribution system related records shall be kept open for inspection by people.
The writer is a student of Law, university of Dhaka.
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