Reference Auto

So, after all methods failed (including that of our beloved Anna Hazare), slap (on Sharad Pawar this time) seems to be the only weapon in the hands of ‘People India’ to wake up the Indian polity and rid it of corruption.

But the latest slap on the agriculture minister will obviously not bring down the prices of food items or food inflation for that matter.

However, if this kind of disgruntlement comes out into the open, our political leaders and our honourable ministers will probably think, Will the next one be me?

Let’s first look at where lies the problem (in other words, why was Pawar slapped at all even though he is not entirely to be blamed).

When we go to the market to buy vegetables, we notice that the prices are at a level which is almost double of what they were just a year ago.

Even though our food inflation goes up and down, it does not reflect on vegetable prices as there is absolutely no sync between the two (just like our inflation, which is based on theoretical and archaic methods).

So, what is it that is jacking up vegetable, fruit and food item prices? Hoarding it is (the worst kept secret)!

When (this is a realistic example) we buy cauliflower from the bazaar for Rs 30-Rs 35, we tend to pin the blame on our poor agriculture minister (Sharadji) for the burgeoning prices.

But what we don’t realise is that there is a nexus between the retailer, the wholesaler and the middlemen who procure these from the farmers and hence the rise.

So, how much does your retailer pay to procure a cauliflower. Well, the truth is that the retailer pays the middleman Rs 5-Rs 7 for the cauliflower, which he sells for Rs 25-Rs 30, a neat five-fold profit, at least.

If proper steps are taken, prices can head well within the reach of the common man. But that’s not happening.

Therefore, even as hoarding goes on rampantly, our city or town administration and the home department of our state governments go into a slumber.

So, why slap the wrong man?

However, the situation is different in the case of fuel prices (petrol, diesel and kerosene). Our Central government clamours, saying if fuel prices are not raised, it will bleed our oil companies.

This is a scenario we see almost every other month.

Moreover, with petrol prices becoming market-driven (only god, oil companies and the government know what that means), prices have soared to unprecedented levels, prompting middle-class people, who aspire to buy basic variants of compact cars, to go for a rethink.

But how are oil giants bleeding? For the past few years, companies like ONGC and Indian Oil have regularly featured on the Forbes 500 list (which is a list of the 500 richest companies in the world). So, are they actually bleeding?

Now, take for instance the prices of petrol. In New York, it’s around Rs 40, in Karachi around Rs 44 but in India and it’s a whopping Rs 65!

So, how is this happening? Of the Rs 65 for petrol, for instance, the government is gobbling up nearly Rs 35-Rs 40 as duties and taxes. If petrol was tax free, it would come for around Rs 30.

However, the government scurries to give an explanation, saying if it didn’t do so, money for social sector schemes such as the rural job schemes would be exhausted.

But the government can easily set aside some amount from individual and corporate taxes. For instance, Mumbai pays an annual direct tax of Rs 150,000 crore. And this amount is not going into developing even Maharashtra.

Moreover, there are a lot of wasteful expenditures taking place such as ministers or politicians going abroad and wasting crores of tax payers’ money and the government paying Rs 45 crore on terrorist Ajmal Kasab’s security.

If such and many other wasteful expenditures are curbed, substantial amount of money can be generated and used for the social sector instead of extracting money by taxing users of fuel.

Taking all these into account, do we need a soothsayer to tell us on whom the next slap could fall on after Sharad Pawar?