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A way at
last Farce
called poll |
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Punitive
censorship
Terrorists’
targets
Bridge
of love
Unorganised
sector evading VAT Inflation
worries beset China Inside Pakistan
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A way at last TAMIL NADU Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi’s latest statement on the Sethusamudram project has a lot to commend itself. While stressing the importance of the Rs 2500-crore project for Tamil Nadu in particular and India in general, he said at no point of time did he insist on any particular alignment. All he wanted was to make the Palk Straits navigable for big ships. He never said that the Ram Sethu should be destroyed. It is a very sensible statement in that it gives a way out for all the parties concerned. It is more than a century since the idea of dredging the sea between India and Sri Lanka to allow big ships to pass through, instead of having to circumnavigate the island nation, has been mooted. But for one reason or another, the project could not make any headway. When the National Democratic Alliance government led by the BJP cleared the project after elaborate studies of its cost benefits and environmental impact and the UPA government started the actual dredging work, a pseudo-religious issue was raised over the possible damage to the underwater Ram Sethu. And to make matters worse, a mischievous affidavit was filed by the Archaeological Survey of India unnecessarily questioning the historicity of Ram and other characters in the Ramayana. It caused greater damage to the project than all the cries of “Ram Sethu in danger”. A once-bitten-twice-shy Central government not only withdrew the contentious affidavit, it also sought three month’s time from the Supreme Court to suggest alternative alignment to complete the project. In retrospect, three months are good enough for the government to come up with a proposal that will not only fructify the plan to make shipping faster and cheaper from the west coast to the east coast and vice versa but also address the concerns of the religiously inclined. Instead of insisting on apology from all and sundry, including Mr Karunanidhi, Leader of Opposition Lal Krishna Advani should let bygones be bygones and allow the Sethusamudram project to come up. Statesmanship is all about give and take in the best national interest. After all, Mr Advani should not forget that the BJP is the progenitor of the project. He and his party cannot allow it to be abandoned after considerable money has already been sunk into it merely to please those who live in the mythical past.
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Farce called poll A FARCE is always a step away from degenerating into tragedy, and the next few weeks in Pakistan will be a severe test for the aspirants of democracy there. Even as one institution, a resurgent Supreme Court, struggles to come to terms with and test the limits of its own new-found power, another one, the Election Commission, has been deftly manoeuvred into announcing a poll date. True to form, President General Pervez Musharraf has not waited for niceties like the outcome of a case the court is hearing on Musharraf’s eligibility to contest while still in uniform, and holding the post of army chief. The opposition has already warned that it would quit the assemblies, which will vote for a new president on October 6, when the general files his nomination. The president is evidently confident of getting the votes he needs, and has offered to his people the disingenuous proposition that he would quit the general’s post if he wins, but retain it if things do not go well for him. And indeed, the general is hardly in an enviable position. Al-Qaeda’s Osama bin Laden has declared “war” on him, and urged Pakistanis to oppose him. Even as Islamists and sundry hardliners target his regime and mock him as “Busharraf” for his supposed toeing of the American line, many in the West are deeply sceptical of both his commitment and ability to fight fundamentalists within Pakistan’s many troubled regions, amongst whose targets are also neighbouring Afghanistan’s Karzai government. As for Pakistan’s people, there is clearly a yearning for change. While the media and the judiciary struggle for democracy, it is as yet not clear what the priorities of the people are. Musharraf has already made two mistakes this year. The sacking of the Supreme Court chief justice backfired badly on him while his dithering and double games on the Islamists inside the Red Mosque ended only when the crisis exploded in his face. But the old commando considers himself a veteran of many a tough battle, never mind that most were losing ones, and he will be prepared to slug his way out. The outcome for the democratic institutions of Pakistan and its struggling people will unfold quickly from here.
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Punitive censorship THE one-month ban imposed on Live India, also known as Janmat, television channel by the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting for its alleged fake sting operation in New Delhi is unjustified and uncalled for. In doing so, the Centre has not only overstepped its limits but also raised the question of its legitimacy and propriety in taking such an action when the Delhi High Court is already seized of the matter. It is nobody’s case that this channel should go unpunished. This newspaper has been maintaining that fake sting operations have no place in a civilised society and those channels violating the code of conduct must be punished in public interest. Moreover, the ban was unwarranted because the correspondent in question and his accomplice, an aspiring journalist, who carried out the fake sting operation, have already been arrested. The victim, Uma Khurana, a Delhi school teacher, has also said she was exploring the possibility of filing a defamation suit against the channel. Clearly, when the Delhi High Court has been monitoring the case and when all the parties involved are exploring legal options under the normal law of the land, the Centre had no business to peremptorily ban the channel. This action can be viewed as yet another attempt by the government to browbeat the media. The media’s strong reservations over the Broadcasting Services Regulation Bill should be viewed in this context. Apparently, through this Bill, the Centre may muzzle the Press and clip the wings of investigative journalists to safeguard its own interests. There is a distinct difference between the Centre’s ban on Live TV and its earlier action against FTV and AXN channels. While the ban on FTV and AXN was justified because of their showing pornographic content despite warnings, it was flawed in the case of Live India. Surely, when the issue is on the judicial scanner, the Centre ought to have left it to the court’s wisdom and jurisprudence to adjudicate and punish the erring channel, instead of transgressing its limits and circumventing the due process of law.
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Ethical living is the indispensable condition of all that is most worthwhile in the world. — Ernest Caldecott
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Terrorists’ targets
Twin-bomb
blasts at Hyderabad, which took a toll of more than 40 innocent lives, once again exposed the incapacity of the country’s security apparatus to contain the awesome threats posted by determined terrorist groups. There is now a shrill and loud cry of intelligence failure. Many political leaders as well as the media have roundly blamed the intelligence agencies for their failure to provide timely, precise and actionable intelligence to alert the police of the strike plans of the jihadi terrorists. The Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh says that the intelligence provided by the Central intelligence agencies was of a general nature and of very little help to the state police authorities to foil the strike plans of the terrorists. Criticisms of intelligence agencies, though understandable, are not always very fair and correct. Collection of intelligence about the plans and operations of well-organised and motivated terrorist outfits is an extremely difficult job. It requires careful planning and long preparation. Today’s terrorists do not constitute one single homogenous and hierarchical group. They are divided into small, centrifugal groups. The smaller the group, the more radical it is likely to be, more diverted from rational thought and also more difficult to detect. The wide range of potential threats, random nature of attacks and the absence of standard operating procedures make it difficult to get reliable advance warnings about terrorist attacks. There are few early warning indicators. Modern terrorist groups also devise elaborate anti-infiltration procedures and ruthlessly weed out informers from their ranks. Covert human intelligence is the most useful source of information of terrorists, but raising a source in place and handling it successfully is a time-consuming and daunting job and requires elaborate preparation. There are no instant successes. Unfortunately, today police intelligence outfits in most of the states are in a bad shape and filled with people who lack professional expertise as well as motivation. Collection of intelligence retarding the plans of transnational terrorist outfits and their Indian collaborators is minimal. Indeed, this work has not received proper attention. No wonder, many cases of terrorist bomb blasts are remaining undetected. Even when hard intelligence is available, robust follow-up action is not taken on cosiderations of vote-bank politics. It is known that there was credible intelligence that 8 kg of military-grade explosives were delivered to an HUJI operative in Hyderabad. But this piece of intelligence was not vigorously followed up. Had this been done, perhaps the tragedy in Hyderabad could have been averted. It is also a hard fact that the police forces in many states have become completely politicised and incapable of acting freely and independently due to constant extraneous pulls and pressures. There are now clear indications that the twin-blasts of Hyderabad were the handiwork of the outfit called the Harkat-ul-Jihad-e-Islami (HUJI) whose indoctrinated cadres are drawn from groups like the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Jaish-e-Mohamad, who have links with Al-Qaeda. The bomb blasts show the participation of determined groups with committed local Muslim support. Without such support these well-organised strikes would not have been possible. Operatives can come and slip out of Hyderabad easily. According to intelligence estimated, there are a number of organisations working in India who generate a sence of alienation among Muslim youths and suck them in the global whirls of jihad. This collusion of local Muslims with the jihads widens the scope and magnitude of terrorist threats in the country. There is credible intelligence that terrorist modules with operatives and sleepers have been formed in different parts of the country and the action so far taken to dismantle them has not been encouraging. The imperative need of the hour is to fashion a resolute and no-holds-barred policy of ruthlessly dealing with the terrorists and dismantling their networks. Transnational terrorism can be crippled if the structure, responses and capabilities of the terrorists are destroyed by force. Indeed, India can draw lessons from the Homeland Security in the US which, with a variety of alert measures and drills, has ensured that after 9/11, despite many efforts by Al-Qaeda and its sympathisers, there have been no terrorist attacks in the US, although it is true that even with the best of efforts some terrorist strikes cannot be prevented. For the success of counter-terrorist operations in a democracy the need for stiff anti-terrorist laws cannot be overemphasised. Stringent anti-terrorist laws should not be scrapped because they have been misused in some instances. On the other hand, steps have to be taken to ensure that law enforcers who misuse the provisions of stringent laws are adequately penalised. After 9/11, the US Congress passed a draconian anti-terrorist law, the Patriot Act, which allows intelligence and law enforcement agencies to go into the places of worship, investigate the works of charities, and scoop on the telecommunications of the suspects. Some of these provisions can and have been abused. After terror bombings in London, Britain is now also contemplating emergency laws to deal with the threat of terrorism. The police and security services there have further requested that detention before the charge could be extended from the current 14 days to three months. Similarly, stringent anti-terror laws have been passed by most of the European countries who have not suffered even one thousandth of the casualties which have occurred in India. Maharashtra and Karnataka have preventive detention laws that have helped the police to tackle organised crime and terrorist operations. The United Nations has also mandated that all states must adopt necessary legal instruments to prevent terrorism and strengthen international cooperation in combating terrorism. After the scrapping of POTA the existing Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) is hardly adequate to freely tackle organised terrorist activities with transnational links. As it is becoming difficult to get witnesses to depose against the dreaded terrorists, confessions before the police under certain safeguards firmly as recommended by the Malimath Committee and now the Administrative Reforms Commissions headed by Mr Verappa Moily should be admissible as in the case of evidence. Without scare-mongering one can safely say that more terrorist attacks are inevitable and perhaps round the corner. General Musharraf’s domestic travails are further encouraging pro-jihadi hawks to plan devastating terrorist attacks, and India, a soft state, has become the target. In adopting a resolute policy of zero tolerance against terrorism, in a democracy it is also necessary to make people aware of the magnitude and dimensions of terrorist threats and steps that have been taken to counter it. The key to success in anti-terrorist campaigns is to make people aware of terrorists, goals and supportive of the much-needed measures taken by the government.n The writer is Senior Fellow, Institute of Social Sciences, and a former Director-General, National Human Rights Commission.
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Bridge of love WE, a group of journalists from India, were going from Colombo to Bentota for a conference when our host A.S. Panneerselvan of Panos South Asia ‘showed’ us Adam’s Bridge. Despite straining my neck, I could not see any bridge. All I could see was a vast expanse of seawater. Panneerselvan, who was one of those who conceptualised Sun TV, having been an advisor to former Union Communications Minister Murasoli Maran, has an encyclopaedic knowledge of things South Indian. “The underwater bridge is known in Sri Lanka as Adam’s Bridge while it is known as Ram’s Bridge or Ram Sethu in India,” he explained. Having read two versions of the Ramayana - Ezhuthachan’s and Tulsidas’s - I knew the bridge story well, particularly the humble squirrel’s role in its construction. However, I had no clue of the bridge’s connection with Adam, the First Man as portrayed in the Bible and the Koran. Almost everybody knows the story of Adam and Eve, who were thrown out of the Garden of Eden when they disobeyed God’s command that they should not eat the forbidden fruit. The Bible is silent on what happened to the First Couple after their banishment. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints believes they went to Missouri in the US and lived happily thereafter. The popular belief is that they went somewhere, made love and begot children. Gnostic and Islamic traditions have it that after his banishment and separation from Eve, Adam reached India’s shores and crossed the Palk Strait using the bridge, which was intermittently over the water, to reach what is now Sri Lanka. In Sri Lanka, he climbed a hill and did penance by standing on one leg for as long as 1,000 years. It is today known as Adam’s Peak. To give credence to the story, there is a hollow mark, resembling a single footprint on the peak. At the end of the penance, God was pleased with his devotion and He forgave him for his disobedience. The story has a beautiful ending as Adam and Eve were united again. I have found Hindu scriptural stories far more fascinating than that of any other religion, including Christianity and Islam. The drama, the intensity, the conflict and the denouement that are integral to any Hindu myth are missing in Biblical stories. Turning water into wine, curing a leprosy patient, giving life to the dead or restoring the sight of a blind man that Jesus is believed to have done comes nowhere near the feats accomplished by a Hindu god who drank all the waters of all the oceans or who brought a whole mountain on His palm, instead of the medicinal plant He had gone to pluck. Of course, the Old Testament has stories like Moses turning a stick into a snake or dividing the ocean into two to give passage to his people but they come nowhere near what Krishna or Hanuman did routinely. Small wonder that the Mahabharata and the Ramayana are considered epics in the true sense. In terms of endurance, depth of feeling and devotion, Adam’s accomplishment is truly remarkable for it measures up to man’s imagination of love that can verily move mountains. A comparable love in the Hindu scriptures is that of Parvati who does tapas for thousands of years to attract the attention of Siva. In Adam’s case, he had no choice, for God had not created another woman. Adam bhaktas, too, have a case against dredging the bridge, named after him, for it would destroy forever the proof of the First Man’s love for the First
Woman.
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Unorganised sector evading VAT Despite
booming consumerism and good purchasing power of the people, poor VAT collection in the state is a worrying situation for the state Finance Minister. Though sales tax officials have been assigned 25 per cent enhancement targets in VAT during the current fiscal, it appears to be a distant dream. VAT revenue in Punjab, which was Rs. 4164 crores in 2005-06, the first year of adopting the new tax system, rose by 14.4 per cent to Rs 4,767 crores in 2006-07. The targeted receipt for 2007-08 is pegged at Rs 5,516 crores, 15.7 per cent higher than the previous year. But the ground reality which emerged from the returns of the first quarter are very discouraging, showing a meager increase of less than 3 per cent over the same period of the previous year. Jalandhar-I circle, which collected Rs 137.6 crores during the first quarter of 2006-07, has shown the collection of Rs 141.6 crores for the same period in 2007-08, a poor increase of 2.91 per cent. Similar trends are reported from the other circles of Punjab. Though the collection improves in the later three quarters, still the noted hike makes the target seriously doubtful. Compared to Punjab, some other states are showing encouraging results in revenue collection post VAT regime. The neighboring Haryana collected Rs 5,604 crores from VAT in 2005-06 and improved it by 20.44 per cent in 2006-07 by mopping up Rs 6,750 crores. The target for 2007-08 is Rs 7,832 crores, 16 per cent higher than the previous year. The current target of Haryana is 1.5 times to that of Punjab. Similarly, Andhra Pradesh, which had VAT collection of Rs 13,804 crores in 2003-04, nearly doubled it to Rs 25,256 crores in 2006-07. Their target for 2007-08 is Rs 31,399 crores, 24 per cent up from the previous year’s figure. Similar trends are noticeable in Gujrat, Maharashtra, Karnatka and even Himachal Pradesh. Though the per capita income of Punjab is not far below compared to Haryana and Andhra Pradesh, per-capita VAT collection is way behind. Taking the budgeted revenue from VAT for the fiscal 2007-08, the per capita VAT collection in Punjab comes to Rs 2,269. In the case of Haryana and Andhra Pradesh, it is Rs 3,711 and Rs 4,147 respectively. This is indicative of VAT evasion on a massive scale. A close scrutiny of facts reveal that 80 per cent of total VAT collection in Punjab comes from the organised sector and hardly 20 per cent is contributed by the unorganized one. Contrarily, business-wise, it is other way round and unorganised sector wields 80 per cent of the total sales in Punjab. The massive VAT evasion is thus from unorganised sector. As an example, Haveli, a food restaurant on the outskirts of Jalandhar, paid more than Rs 1 crore as VAT during 2006-07, but a nearby dhaba, which is an equal crowd puller and earns almost the same as Haveli, paid nothing on account of VAT. Even in the organised sector, all is not rosy and very little is being contributed by some big names. Hotel Kamal Palace, a three star hotel in Jalandhar paid Rs 2.78 lakh as VAT last year. Four others, namely, Country Inn, President, Grand Windsor and Maya paid Rs 23 lakh, Rs 18 lakh, Rs 46 lakh and Rs 22 lakh respectively, which, even when combined, falls short of the Rs 1.25 crores paid by McDonald’s alone. There is another lacuna due to which some of the assesses are contributing ‘negative VAT’, i.e. instead of paying to the department, they are getting refunds from it in the form of higher ‘input credits’ on the purchases made. The number of these kind of assesses is quite sizeable. Technically speaking, their purchases are higher than their sales, and they get more ‘input credits’ on the purchases made than the VAT deposited by them. For example, in Jalandhar-I circle, there are 6800 registered assesses, but only 1253 of them paid VAT during the last year, a mere 18 per cent of the total registered assesses. The other 82 per cent claim higher input credits and pay virtually nothing. At the end they save themselves by showing higher stock-in-trade in godowns, justifying higher purchases and lower sales. Sales tax authorities have no power to verify their stocks. The number of these kinds of assesses must be much bigger in the whole of Punjab. Another VAT avoider is the trade through railway bookings, carried by railway agents, who on behalf of traders book and receive their goods. Railway is concerned with its freight without bothering about the identity of the buyer or the seller. The Railway agents book goods on fictitious names and addresses and then deliver or receive the same, bypassing the sales tax department. They even pose themselves as the authorised men of Railways and do not allow the sales tax people or search or verify the goods brought or sold by them. Many other lacunae and flaws exist in the system and need to be corrected with a firm hand. To make the tax compliance better some bold and harsh steps have to be taken. To begin with, the tax net needs to be widened by setting aside the prevalent provision of a minimum Rs five lakh annual turnover, necessary for VAT registration, and all the shopkeepers should be compulsorily registered for VAT. According to a personal survey, it has come to the fore that even the fruit sellers on rehries have a daily sale of Rs 3,000 to Rs 5,000, making their yearly turnover between 10 lakh to Rs 15 lakh. Similarly, some grocers and readymade garment sellers have a daily turnover in the range of Rs 50,000 to Rs 75,000, but hardly any of them issues a bill to collect VAT. Consumer attitude is also negative and when the vendor demands additional money as VAT, he prefers to take the goods without bill. This can be overcome by making computer billing compulsory for all traders and shopkeepeRs For better compliance, flying squads need to be formed to spot those vendors who sell goods without bills and should be heavily fined when found guilty. The consumer should also be motivated through professionally designed and convincing advertisements, appealing him to pay taxes in the larger interests of the state. Last but not least, political intervention in the matter of tax collection should not be allowed at any level.
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Inflation worries beset China
Inflation
is a major fear for the government of China today. In July 2007, the Consumer Price Index rose by 5.6 percent-the highest so far. Goods that tourists normally buy have all gone up in price since 2005. Items like silk, clothes, leather items, curious are all more expensive today than two years ago. It is food prices and mainly higher pork prices that are driving up the price level. The rate of inflation may be controlled by increasing the supply of meat and if the yuan does not appreciate further against the dollar, mild inflation may not be reflected in export prices and Chinese exports may be able to retain their competitiveness in the US market for some time. The other factor pushing up inflation is the fact that banks are flush with liquidity and money supply is growing fast. But banks are able to keep high interest margins between the deposit rates and lending rates. This has led to the cheaper credit availability from banks to business and is behind China’s rapid export growth. Some of the cheap loans are also going for speculation in real estate which is causing the overheating of the economy. Chinese wages, which were stable for years, are also slowly rising causing concern for enterprises engaged in exports. Labour productivity however is still much higher than in India. (In 2004-05, India’s labour cost in manufacturing was $1,192 per year and for China, it was $729.) China is still exporting more labour intensive goods whereas in recent years, India has been exporting more resource-based and knowledge based goods. India’s exports are mainly raw materials based items like iron ore, copper, organic chemicals, slag, ash, plastics, gems, or knowledge based goods like software, biotech and pharmaceutical products. Clearly, China has an advantage over labour intensive manufactures vis-à-vis India. Manufacturing of expensive garments (at the higher end of value chain) has become a veritable specialty of China. A famous American brand name has a factory outside Shanghai with Chinese collaboration. In an impeccably clean interior, more than a thousand workers are sewing padded winter jackets with leather collars and cuff trimmings, every day. These sell for $350 or so in New York. The manager said that the cost of labour was only $8.50 per jacket to which the raw material cost could be added. Even if we add $100 for the foam, cloth, trimmings, the supply price would work out to be very low as compared to the final price tag. The multinational brand has no option but to buy from China as such a low price supplier cannot be found elsewhere. ‘Quality and low prices’, is how Chinese manufacturers are capturing the markets abroad. By insisting on strict quality control, keeping wages low and in organising different production efficiently as well as the timely shipment of products to the US, are the reasons for China’s success. The workers are mostly young women who are trained to work with an eye for detail. The work environment is clean and quiet and there is no congestion on the factory floor. It does not have the usual chicken coop environment that South East Asia is known for. The high level of adult literacy of 91 per cent helps a lot. Care for workers is also important for the work done. All the women workers eat in the premises and keep their utensils in lockers. A peep into the factory utilities like toilets revealed a clean environment. Apart from such model factories, Shanghai also has a super fast train between the city centre and Pudong airport. The train , which is magnetically driven (with German technology), reaches a maximum speed of 461 KM per hour. It cost over a billion dollars to be installed and again it is obvious that China wants to flaunt the latest and the best in technology to the world even though it is so costly, and the side effects of such a train going through a crowded township are still not fully known. There are fears of radiation which are being looked into. China is worried about its environmental problems and is working on more fuel efficient technology. Vehicular pollution is serious in Beijing already. It is trying out various energy options though like India, coal is the most easily available and used still quite extensively in factories. The Chinese, despite their spectacular progress with 11.9 per cent GDP growth and $2.8 trillion economy, want to proclaim themselves as a developing country. Its prosperity however is visible everywhere and in its foreign exchange reserves which are at $1.33 trillion, can cause the dollar to crash if China wishes to unload it in the market. In case China wishes to sell off the huge holding of US Treasury bonds, there would have to be rise in the rate of interest in US immediately to keep them afloat but which would cause deep economic recession. The Chinese business is thus now more confident and though the main drivers of fast growth remain exports (at $1.17 trillion) and foreign investment (at over $60 billion), the Chinese consumers are becoming important for the expansion of the domestic market.
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Inside Pakistan In
his efforts to get re-elected as President of Pakistan, General Pervez Musharraf has damaged considerably the reputation of at least one democratic institution of his country. The way he has forced the Election Commission to change the rules governing the presidential election has put a big question mark over its ability to conduct any such exercise in a fair manner. It should not be surprising if the commission comes out with a measure to justify General Musharraf’s re-election as President on October 6 even if most of the opposition members of the National and Provincial Assemblies submit their threatened resignations. According to The Frontier Post, the people are “miffed at it (Election Commission) not just because his … candidacy is in dispute at the high judicial forums but no lesser because of some damning reports that have surfaced in the media. These reports have it that this notification was, in fact, written in some obscure official quarters and that the commission had had no hand in its drafting; it simply issued it.” The commission, as The News (Sept 20) pointed out, has “shown itself to be working in a manner not entirely akin to being independent of the executive. First came its notification of a change in the rules governing the President’s re-election....” Then it came out with another amendment, “which curtails the power of returning officers to reject, on the basis of Article 63, the papers of a candidate who stands for President. This shows an ulterior motive and brings the independence of the Election Commission itself into question”, the paper added. Benazir’s new moves The announcement to hold the presidential poll on October 6 with the present assemblies as the electoral college and with General Pervez Musharraf remaining the Chief of Army Staff has come without the expected deal between the General and Ms Benazir Bhutto. In such a situation, the claim of the ruling PML (Q) that it has the necessary strength to ensure victory for the General even if the All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) goes ahead with its plan of en masse resignations by its assembly members carries no meaning. Things may be clear only when Ms Bhutto’s party members also submit their resignations along with the APDM members as she has threatened. According to Daily Times (Sept 20), “President Musharraf’s inability to reach an understanding with the PPP has forced the latter into stiffening its attitude. Now it says it ‘will not vote for General Musharraf as President from this parliament either in uniform or after leaving the post of Chief of the Army Staff, believing that he is barred from contesting unless there is a constitutional amendment’.” Ms Bhutto, who took a major risk by attempting a deal with General Musharraf, “has to tread carefully as the slopes are slippery”, as Ashfaq Hussain Shah says in an article in The Nation (Sept 19). “It may be possible that the pre-presidential election time … witnesses a new alliance emerging” between Ms Bhutto and Mr Nawaz Sharif, expected to make another attempt at homecoming after the presidential poll. Roti “a luxury” “Wheat flour is either not available in certain areas or is being sold at around Rs 20 per kilogram. If the rise in wheat price persists for some time, the most basic commodity could go beyond the reach of poor people, who constitute about one-fourth of the total population” of Pakistan. This is how Business Recorder (Sept 21) commented on the wheat crisis, which threatens to open a new front for the government struggling for its survival. It is basically the miscalculation of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture about the wheat yield for 2006-07 that has caused the crisis. The inflated provisional figures were used to propagate the government’s achievements on the agricultural front. But the actual yield was far below the projected figures. The private sector had sensed the reality and started hoarding the commodity. The result is that even “roti” is about to become a luxury. According to The News, the situation has worsened also because of the large-scale smuggling of wheat to India, Afghanistan and the Central Asian republics. “Smuggling of wheat to India is going on because the price of wheat is almost double in India compared to that in Pakistan”, the paper quoted an official as saying. “If the existing trend persists, the price of a roti will touch Rs 5-6 a piece after a couple of months”, the daily added.
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