Opinion PRICE HIKE

Basu also says that the “under recovery” is notional and is the difference between the retail price of a petroleum product and its trade-parity price. “The trade-parity price (is based) on many unincurred costs because oil companies do not import petrol or diesel and what they sell in (the) domestic market are fuels produced in their own refineries… But to pursue the pernicious agenda of global finance,the top brass of the Indian economic policy establishment is trying to dress up ‘under recoveries’ as virtual losses,and claiming to be subsidising them from the consolidated fund of India,” he says.

He contends that the subsidy “is arrived at by loading the cost price with several tax(es) and duties and then reducing by the subsidy amount and eventually selling at a profit. He concludes that the exchequer’s contribution to the petroleum sector is constantly growing and favours restructuring of taxes to provide relief to the people.

WATER POLICY

Another article discusses the Draft National Water Policy released by the government earlier this year. According to the article,the draft does not recognise the depth of the water crisis facing the country,which it claims will only be exacerbated by climate change.

The article says that the document evades the “significant and frightening reality” that per capita availability of water in India has reduced to about 33 per cent of the level available at Independence. It argues that the draft policy is torn between “viewing water as a public good,with water-related services therefore being a public service,and regarding water as an economic good whose supply and regulation are to be governed largely through fiscal measures.”

“(The) draft policy leans toward the latter approach while paying lip service to the former as a desirable principle but unable to work out how and where to draw the line,” it concludes.

FOOD ENTITLEMENT BILL

IN AN article in the CPI weekly New Age,Annie Raja criticises the Food Security Bill. She says that the legislation does not deal with production,procurement,storage and distribution,and hence cannot be called the food security bill. “The bill only deals with a certain quantity of rice,wheat and other grains for a certain amount of money. It is silent on nutritional security too. For these reasons the present bill can only be called a food entitlement bill,” she argues.

Raja claims that the bill offers food security to those targeted for welfare schemes,which makes it discriminatory. “Past experience shows that targeting caused exclusion… The lack of reliability of targeting based on (the) BPL list is evident from at least three national household surveys… all showing that about half of the all poor households in rural areas do not have a BPL ration card,” she says. She argues against the incorporation of the term “ready to eat meal” in the bill and objects to provisions for cash transfers and food coupons,claiming that such moves would be detrimental to agriculture.