PM unveils plan to check prices
Tribune News Service

NEW DELHI, Nov 27 — The Prime Minister, Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee, today unveiled a multi-pronged strategy, including a review of the Essential Commodities Act and the creation of a special cell under the Cabinet Secretariat, to regulate the prices of essential commodities.

The strategy worked out at a conference of state chief ministers, convened by the Prime Minister, covers various aspects relating to availability, distribution and prices of essential commodities.

Announcing this after the day-long deliberations, the Union Food Minister, Mr Surjit Singh Barnala, said it had been decided to immediately review the Essential Commodities Act. The amendments would relate to how the state governments and the union territories could be empowered for effective action against hoarders of foodgrain, vegetables and edible oils.

A group of officials under the Cabinet Secretary would be constituted to make suitable recommendations regarding the amendments to the Act and the steps to improve the enforcement mechanism. Representatives of some of the states would be included in the group.

It was also decided that a special cell would be set up under the Cabinet Secretariat to monitor and analyse the price data and the trends of essential commodities. It would also serve the Cabinet Committee on Prices which would take decisions on imports and exports of essential commodities. The cell would establish a mechanism for obtaining crop price and production data from various centres in the country and share the information with the states.

The Prime Minister also directed the Agriculture Ministry to immediately set up a national crop forecasting centre. The Minister of State for Agriculture, Mr Sompal, said the Centre would make full use of satellite-based remote sensing capabilities of the Department of Space and the computer network set up by the National Informatics Centre covering all districts, for making forecasts relating to various crops and disseminating information thereof.

While the exercise to amend the Essential Commodities Act was going on, the states and union territories would take advantage whenever warranted, of the powers already delegated to them under the existing Act to take effective action for curbing malpractices relating to the essential commodities.

The Cabinet Committee on Prices would be restructured to make it more functional and enable it to carry out monthly reviews on prices and ensure corrective action. The state governments would also similarly consider setting up similar committees in their respective states.

It had been decided to set up a joint monitoring mechanism for prices and production under the chairmanship of the Cabinet Secretary which would hold quarterly meetings with the chief secretaries of states and the union territories.

The states and the union territories agreed to initiate urgent steps to implement a programme for the establishment of efficient and cost effective cold storages to minimise the high percentage of waste as well as programmes relating to the development of food processing industries. The Finance Ministry would examine the possibility of providing soft loans to the states and the UTs from the banking system for improving the facilities.

In the event of an abnormal increase in the prices of any perishable commodities, the states and the UTs would undertake market-intervention operations for the distribution of these commodities at reasonable prices till the situation was normal. To facilitate such market interventions, the Centre would provide the necessary funds on a matching basis. For the distribution of such commodities, the states and the UTs would use the existing mechanisms of the public distribution system.