ONIONS MAKE PEOPLE CRY PRISE RISE HITS INDIAN MIDDLE CLASS. GOVERNMENTS UNCONCERNED

By Firoz.T.Totanawala

The Bangalore Metro Reporter

15th January 2011 issue

                                   ONIONS MAKE PEOPLE CRY

PRISE RISE HITS INDIAN MIDDLE CLASS. GOVERNMENTS UNCONCERNED

The sky rocketing of prices of all essential commodities has made the life miserable for the common man. For the last two years, the common people are silently suffering the high prices of all essential commodities. The prices of onions, other vegetables, Food grains, oil, pulses etc. have crossed the roof, despite the bumper crops, and now there is another burden of fuel hike.

It is to be recalled that onions are consumed by people through out the country and neither the Centre nor the State Governments have done anything about this menace. In case of onions, the Government gives a lame excuse of destruction of standing crops due to untimely rains! It is true that there were unseasonable rains which damaged the standing crops and affected the production by 50%. But, the officials in the Agriculture Ministry were not dumb to foresee the shortage and take remedial measures. In fact, there is an inbuilt machinery and system in the agricultural ministry to monitor the food situation, rain pattern, possible shortage or excess food production, possibility of floods or famines etc., and to take remedial actions in case of shortages. But the machinery became defunct and lacked in their duty.

The Food Minister Sharad Pawar, is very busy in the affairs of the BCCI and its cricketing activities. He has no time to run the Food Ministry which has perhaps become his part time job. As such there is no monitoring system in place. In fact, Sharad Pawar had made an idiotic comment that prices will come down after the harvest. One does not need to be a minister or an expert to say that prices will come down once new crops flood the market.

Further, if the Central Government had wanted, it would have solved the problem by banning the export and importing large quantities of onions, other pulses and oils. Apparently, the market prices depend on the Government’s moves and policies but, the Government here followed the “hands off” policy which gave way to free and unrestricted trades where middlemen had the final say.

Besides, the Government did not use its overflowing buffer stocks of food grains for the last two years. Millions of tonnes of rice, wheat etc. are rotting in the Government warehouses for which the Supreme Court severely castigated the Government and directed it to distribute the stocks free of cost to people or at a nominal price! In case of price rise, the Government can release a part of its stock to the open market which consequently brings down the market prices. In case of oil, if the Government even announces about the import, the market reacts and the prices of oil comes down immediately. This is a time tested system which was used to perfection during Indira Gandhi’s regime.

Of course, it is not only the Central Government that is responsible for price control, the State Governments too is responsible in this regard. It is an open fact that the traders indulge in hoardings resulting in scarcity followed by price hike. State is thus responsible to take strict action against hoarders and black marketers. But, the State Government was least bothered about the common man. The available production of onions was monopolized by the middlemen by purchasing the same from the farmers.

Leading outlets and corporate bodies like Reliance, More, etc is another important factor for the scarcity of vegetables in the market. These outlets procure directly from the farmers through binding agreements, whereby the farmers cannot sell their products to any others. These companies have thus already captured at least 20% of the agricultural and horticultural markets and they decide the “price”! They also have the where withal to store the products in their cold storages and nobody has given any thought to this major factor.

The Delhi government has finally shown the way. It is selling onions through its distribution outlets at 50% of the market rates in its effort to bring down the onion prices. When onion is available at Government outlets, people will not buy it in the open market and that too at higher rates. Eventually, the market has to reduce the prices for its survival. Demand and supply becomes irrelevant with the Government’s intervention.

Unfortunately, our State Government acted as if the price rise is not its concern. The Chief Minister B.S Yeddyurappa who is always busy protecting his chair was more involved in making all out efforts to win the Taluk and Zilla Panchayat elections. The Horticultural Minister Umesh Katti made another idiotic statement asking people to bear with the situation as the prices will come down after the harvest season. As if we never knew that the prices of onions will come down when the crops will be harvested next year. It should be noted that when the Central Government under pressure from Sonia Gandhi banned the export, the prices of onions came down by almost 40%. Surprisingly, Umesh Katti strongly protested the ban! Does it mean that the interest of the hoarders and black marketers are more important to him than the interest of the common people?

Whatsoever, only after the Central Government pressurized the State Government to take immediate measures to control the prices, the Chief Minister called the meeting of the officials to take remedial measures! One should be thankful for B.S.Yedurappa for having realized that he has other works to do, other than enjoying power and fighting to survive in power.

The tragedy is that the both Central and State Governments have forgotten their basic duty of governing. It is time they learn to govern. It goes without saying that once they start governing, people can expect a fair deal.