Bigger the begging Better it works

Certainly there exist a set of beggars who are actually able-bodied but averse to work. Surely we should never sponsor this escapist lot. But I am sure Mr Dixit in his article ‘Say no giving alms to beggars’ (Herald, February 19) is not painting all beggars in the same indolent light as innumerable vulnerable persons (old as well as physically handicapped) and children have no other option but to beg. 

  Perhaps it would not be out of context if an article titled "Kinds of begging", written by the former diplomat and ex-Governor of West Bengal Gopalkrishna Gandhi, be recalled.

   In that article, Gandhi had referred to a classical essay of George Orwell titled "Why Are Beggars Despised". He had quoted the following paragraph from Orwell's essay: "Beggars do not work, it is said; but, then what is work? A navvy works by swinging a pick. An accountant works by adding up figures. A beggar works by standing out of doors in all weathers and getting varicose veins, chronic bronchitis, etc. It is a trade like any other .... He seldom extracts more than a bare living from the community, and, what should justify him according to our ethical ideas, he pays for it over and over in suffering". Orwell had concluded his essay with words : "In all the modern talk about energy, efficiency, social service and the rest of it, what meaning is there except 'Get money, get it legally, and get a lot of it'? Money has become the grand test of virtue. By this test beggars fail, and for this they are despised". 

  Gandhi's article revolved around an incident in Chennai where he had got into his car after refusing money to a man who had begged to have two idlis. After driving off, Gandhi was wondering what that beggar was thinking about him after the refusal. I quote Gandhi: "Perhaps he was thinking that this man bundling himself into his car has never known hunger, never known and while he will not spare a fiver for two idlis, has no problem with beggings of other kinds. Such as the begging by Make In India investors for loan or tax waivers, the begging by corporates for subsidies and rate-freedoms at SEZs, and, of course, airline defaults. Idli-begging is one thing, Mallya-pleading another. The bigger the begging, the better it works".