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Journalism of Courage
Terming the decision to reduce import duties and impose curbs on exports to check inflation as knee-jerk reaction, Planning Commission member Abhijit Sen said government ignored early signals of rise in global commodity prices. “Some of these (steps taken by the government) were done in an extremely knee-jerk fashion,” Planning Commission member Abhijit Sen said yesterday while addressing the Monday Group, a Congress-backed think-tank, which has the blessings of Sonia Gandhi. Sen said the government tried to check inflation by raising import duties and imposing export curbs as if the global prices would not impact the domestic economy. The government, Sen said, started acting once the country was “suddenly hit” by inflation after presentation of the Union Budget in February 2008. A week after the presentation of the budget, he said, inflation went up to 5 per cent and thereafter rose to more than 11 per cent in June, touching a 13 year high record. Budget, he added, was the trigger point promoting the industry to take stock of the rising cost of raw material and revise the prices of finished goods. Sen added that unlike the impression given by the media, inflation was comparatively low in case of foodgrain at 5 per cent.
