Tough action

City's Mayor in Lithuania drove over a car which was parked illegally in cycle lanes. Click here.

 

The video was released to the public. After seeing the video no one dares to park illegally. Tough actions work and needed to tackle people who think they can get away with paying small amount of  fine.
 

MGNREGA should be scrapped?

After implementing Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) , there is modest increase in agricultural workers’ wages. This led to increase in input cost of agriculture. Farmers, mainly land lords who holds many acres, opposing the scheme during monsoon season. But this scheme has become a life line of the poor, stopped the migration of workers and given an opportunity to send their children to school. I feel there is no need to stop the scheme during monsoon for following reasons:

• Increase in wages is considered in calculating minimum supporting price – it’s the price at which government buys the produce from farmers. Moreover, the increase in wages is little compared to increase in other inputs cost. Diesel contributes 10 per cent of input cost. In the past 2 or 3 years, prices of diesel are increased by more than 100 per cent.

• If wages are increased,  it should be appreciated. Agriculture workers are usually poor and landless. This increase in wages increases their purchasing power.

• The scheme has empowered the women at the bottom by giving equal wages for both men and women. Women’ wages play huge role in poor families. Generally, in agriculture work, women get 20 – 30 per cent lower wages than men. Due to the scheme women getting equal wages in agriculture related work also. 

• In fact, this scheme can be used to rejuvenate the canals and other bodies like tanks, wells etc. Improved irrigation facilities will increase the productivity so the input cost can be recovered.

 

FDI in multi brand retail will not solve the problem

According to Economic survey 2010-11, inefficient logistics and supply management and, insufficient cold storage are the main attributes of current inflation. Government proposed FDI in multi brand retail to tackle the inflation assuming foreign retailers bring know -how in logistics and supply management. They also invest in cold storage. These cold storage will augment the existing government's storage houses. Strong argument for the FDI in multi brand retailer is that it eliminates the middlemen so it benefits both producer and farmer. But it's unlikely that everyone will get benefited from this investment.

• Lower prices at producer will not directly passed to the consumer. Prices at consumer mainly depends on supply and demand gap but not at which retailers buy from producer. Big retailers monopolize the market - they have their own terms. Prices may not be lesser than present prices at retailers and farmers may not get more than what they are getting today.
• Big multi brand retailers usually target middle and above middle class by providing high quality and processed food. During the processing and value addition around 10 - 20 per cent raw food is wasted. So it further increases the prices. Low income group people are the most affected.
• Processed food contains higher amount of salt to preserve the food for long time. Higher amount salt is not good for health.
• It's a myth that it increases the employment. It actually substitute the unorganized retailers by a few organized jobs. Overall unemployment increases.
• No one knows how their know-how in logistics and supply management will address the insufficient infrastructure in rural areas. 

This investment is wrong prescription to tackle inflation and other related issues. May be good for a section of the people but it badly affects the people in lower income category as this investment increases the prices outside retailers. Government should investment in cold storage and tackle the illegal holdings by structural reforms. Government should have released the surplus grains from the government godowns to address the inflation and inflation expectation. This is what was done in 1972 to address the inflation.
           

Why separate Telangana state?

Most of we are aware that the following are not the main reasons for the separate Telangana:

• Poverty
• Underdevelopment
• Unemployment

These issues are well discussed and documented in Justice Sri Krishna committee's report.

Valid reasons may be

1. Cultural imperialism - After merging Telangana with Andhra, there was dominance of the later's culture over the former. Successive governments failed to safe guard Telangana culture and their identity.
2. Exploitation - Relatively, people of Andhra and Rayalaseema are better educated and economically advanced. Almost every field was dominated by these two groups. There is feeling of exploitation among the people of Telangana. 

May be, language can not be a basis for the state but culture and socio-economic development!

Separate Telangana may be justified, but at this moment dividing the state is not a good idea. It is unlikely that two regions will get benefited out of the division. It will also have some implications on national security and integrity of the country as a whole.

 Why not something like Telangana Autonomous Body (TAB) similar to Gorkhaland Territorial Administration which gives a greater autonomy to the people of Gorkha but still it's a part of West Bengal ?

TAB will have elected representatives as members and Chairman will be elected from among the members. TAB will take decisions on Education and Culture, Agriculture, Women and Health, Natural resources such as mining, Skill development with special emphasis on entrepreneur and business skills development, and Local taxes.

I Can Almost See It That Dream I'm Dreaming, ....(Miley Cyrus)

 I can almost see it
That dream I am dreaming
But there's a voice inside my head saying
"You'll never reach it"

Every step I'm taking
Every move I make feels
Lost with no direction
My faith is shaking

But I gotta keep trying
Gotta keep my head held high ..