In his column, ‘A Matter of Economics’, editor R. Balashankar argues that the “Americanisation of consumption is driving prices (up)”. He says, “Consumerism which the government and the private sector are promoting in a big way is a major driver of inflation. But the finance minister or the political leadership of the country will not ask the citizens to curb unnecessary spending”. After quoting extensively from a book, Inflation — A World-Wide Disaster by Irving S. Friedman, he narrates an incident. “I am reminded of an incident narrated by Z.K. Brzezinski, a former adviser to President of America when he visited the then Union HRD minister Dr Murli Manohar Joshi. Expressing his concern over the growing craze of consumerism, he said, one day his daughter told him that she was going shopping. Brzezinski asked her as to what she was planning to buy. His daughter replied that she would make a decision after seeing what all is available in the market. This, he explained, was not need driven demand but insatiable spending craze prompted by saturation advertising. This is what modern consumerism is driving people to.” He concludes the piece by saying, “By blindly following the Americanisation of consumption can India survive economically?”Marking 1857In the section ‘Sangh Samachar’, the RSS journal reports on the ‘Naman 1857 celebrations’. “The country came to a standstill at 6.57 pm on May 10 when numerous people across the country observed silence for 57 seconds to pay homage to the martyrs of the 1857 war of Independence. With this event, the 150th anniversary celebration of the 1857 war of Independence concluded. Prominently, three types of activities — lighting of 1857 lamps, observing silence for 57 seconds and singing of Vande Mataram — had been planned for public functions. At some places 150 lamps were lighted to mark the 150th anniversary.” For real justicePrashant Kumar in ‘Open Forum’ writes about the ‘The crippling effects of reservation’. “Except for a few glitches here and there, the extension of 27 per cent reservation to OBC candidates in central educational institutions seems to be more or less settled. Half a century after the framing of the Constitution, we still seem to be wrangling over the issue of who deserves what percentage of reservation. The ambit of reservation rather than constricting seems only to be expanding reservation based on caste, religion, income and so on.“Though there is nothing to suggest that state-of-the-art facilities should be made available in government schools and colleges, the disparity between standards of such institutions and similarly placed private schools necessitates serious action. Measures should first be taken to bridge this gap to the best possible extent. Reservation, if at all required, should be provided at the stage of schooling itself. Meritorious students from government or government-funded schools should be provided reservation in private schools in terms of admissions, fee waivers and so on”, says Kumar.
