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Can India afford such politicians?
Mon, 5 Jul Pre-Open

"This is a protest against the ruling government's indifference to the poor". Such was the explanation offered by a leading television channel to the nationwide strike called by the opposition party. State wide strikes (or 'bandhs' as they are called in Hindi) are common in India. Particularly in the northern and eastern states. As per Indian Chamber of Commerce, such strikes lead to loss of more than a dozen man days every year in these states. The economic loss for a 12-hour strike in the strike infested state of West Bengal was recently estimated by ICC at Rs5 bn. But who is bothered?

Inability to rein in inflation has been one of the few lapses on the part of the incumbent reform friendly government. And a huge opportunity for the parties opposing it. Rather than worrying about the economic loss caused by the strikes, they would instead prefer earning some political brownie points. Pretending to protest against the price rises would help them earn some vote banks.

How would this solve the problem of inflation if one may ask? Rolling back fuel price hikes would only push us closer to fiscal blunders. That will mean lesser funds to build schools and colleges. Lesser funds for rural employment. And lesser funds for roads and irrigation. Wouldn't that be too heavy a price to be paid by the poor?

More importantly, can economic loss be the solution to an economic problem? Achieving higher economic output requires a lot more than just resources. Probably a lot more determination to execute and achieve targets. Something Indians have been sorely lacking in. Such strikes only do their bit in aggravating the problem.

Terrorism, corruption, red tapism are the few causes that regularly come to our minds for poor business confidence in India. Politicians with vested interests seem to deserve a reckoning too. Can India really afford them? Let us know your views.

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8 Responses to "Can India afford such politicians?"

subhash

Jul 7, 2010

SUBSIDY ON DIESEL KEROSENE COOKING GAS GOES TO COMMON MAN MEANS (AAM ADAMI) REMEMBERED AT THE TIME OF ELECTIONS , WHERE AS 400000 CRORE GOES IN DRAIN IN THE NAME OF NAREGA,SHARED BY DISTRIBUTING AGENCY AND PEOPLE GETTING IT AS EMPLOYMENT ,OUT OF TAXES RECOVERED FROM AAM ADMI . IF OUR POLITICIANS ARE SINCERE TO THE CAUSE TO UPLIFT ECONOMY , WHY DONOT THEY TRY TO CREATE REAL PERMANENT EMPLOYMENT AND TRY TO INCREASE THE WATER RESOURCES FOR IRRIGATION AND DEVELOP INFRASTRUCTURES IN VILLAGES BY INDUCING SMALL AND COTTAGE INDUSTRIES AS WAS THE DREAM OF GANDHI JEE.WHY EATABLES ARE BECOMING HOSTILITY DAY BY DAY BY THE WRONG POLICIES OF GOVT. . IT IS A MISRULE OF THREE ECONOMISTS AND FINANCE MINISTER G O INDIA . LIP SERVICE WILL NOT MAKE ANY IMPROVEMENT IN ECONOMY .OUR AGRICULTURE MINISTER IS INTERESTED IN INTERNATIONAL CRICKET ONLY .OUR ECONOMY IS AGRICULTURAL BASED BUT POLITICIANS ARE MONEY BASED ONLY

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Sanjay

Jul 7, 2010

The high inflation should among other factors be blamed on Governament policies, corruption and ineffeciency in Govt. The taxes collected are not being properly utilised for the purpose that they should be. The end user - be it poor man, education, infrastructure develpment etc. dont get the benefit.

These taxes mainly go into the pockets of politicians, beurocrats etc. Sixth pay commission increased pay for babus and govt. employees without corresponding increase in productivity and efficiency, so how is it benifited the common man? This increased pay to the babus went from the common mans pocket without any corresponding benifit to them!

All and sundry politicians get Z-plus security. Such and other wasteful expenditures exhaust the money collected through taxes. i.e. taxes collected are not used for the intended purpose - for education, infrastructure etc.

And on top of this the bandhs by opposition parties - who are they trying to fool.

But we must understand that these politicians are representatives of the general public only.

Till such time, that whole population is not adequately educated, mentality is not changed - hero worship (celebrities, politicians etc.), the change in politicians ways and attitude will not happen

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padmanabhan

Jul 6, 2010

politicians are a rare breed that we will be happy if they become extinct,we definitely cannot affort such kind of politicians who are interested in filling their own coffers with least regard for the common man except when it comes to garnering their vote banks.

But the govt illtimed this price hike, they are quite comfortable having collected massive sums for telecom spectrum and with bouyant tax collections they could have tempered the price hike with reducing the taxes being levied on the petroleum products.

But strikes and bandhs are a waste of time and money with untold hardships to the common man, its a field day for the antisocial elements and political goons. Our Country can least afford this kind of protests.

padmanabhan

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Manish

Jul 6, 2010

Inflation can be solved only by two action

1) Change Key Respective P
2) Stop F& O for commodities

Then Inflation will fall like what we see in stock market during 2008 09

Stock analysis and life of common man is different.One day (Next Election) common man will win the game

Best luck Common Man...






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Prasad

Jul 5, 2010

Don't know about the politicians, but the common man wants some decisive action from the government on the inflation front. Petrol, diesel prices should be deregulated and linked with the international prices, but government got the timing totally wrong. It should be done when the inflation is at 3%, not when the food inflation is 17%. All the analysts in stock market are insensitive about common man's suffering. They are only worried about how the shares of HPCL, BPCL, ONGC etc would give them returns. Government has miserably failed to control black marketeers of food and the people who make liqour from food grains by intentionally rotting it. One day strike won't solve these problems, but that's the only way common man can protest and hopefully government will wake up from the misguile of it being a supply side problem.

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Shashikant

Jul 5, 2010

The politicians need to change and understand the necessity of real work to be done rather than cheap publicity option . Even opposition parties should be realistic in economic growth rather than just negativity for the sake of it .

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DR.SAIF

Jul 5, 2010

All these politician who want to incite the public and causes extensive loss to the nation must be barred from standing in elections.
The only aim of these kind of Cheap political gimmics is to exploit the poor and to have luxurious life for themselves.
They think Indian electorates are idiots to dance to their tunes. I am sure during the next election they will taste total defeat in the hands of Indian electorates.

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ajay

Jul 5, 2010

It is waste of time to talk about our politicians

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