Vice-President Hamid Ansari today said that though poverty in the country has declined substantially, yet there were challenges that remained to be addressed. Delivering the 2015 Indira Gandhi Memorial Lecture of the Asiatic Society on national integration in Kolkata, Mr. Ansari elaborated on the challenges, saying that historical fault lines along gender, caste and religious boundaries remain persistent. He added that besides, global forces widening the disparities between big cities and villages and between more advanced states and those mired in economic doldrums.
He said, despite some noteworthy achievements, public institutions in most parts of the country have failed in delivering basic services. Mr. Ansari further said the ingredients that would help promote equality remain undelivered in many cases and unevenly distributed in others.
The Vice-President said that though participation of registered voters in elections has steadily increased, the actual functioning of the legislatures has decreased. He said, a saner course may be is to be receptive to the complexities of the Indian reality and its contradictions, respond to it in all its diversity and refrain from a priori solutions not embedded in ground realities.