Action against hoarding or action against food security?

Another short sighted and intrusive decision by the government -

New Delhi, Aug 8 (PTI)Observing that the country was facing a "difficult situation" following delayed and deficient rainfall, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today said the Centre has adequate foodgrains and would not hesitate to take strong measures and intervene in the market if the need arose."Agricultural operations have been adversely affected in several parts of the country causing distress to farmers. A deficit of more than 6 million hectares has been reported in paddy, which is the worst affected crop," he said addressing the Conference of Chief Secretaries on the monsoon situation here.The government has enough cushion on account of bumper production in the previous two years, Singh said."We are in a position to ensure adequate availability of foodgrains in drought affected areas.

http://www.ptinews.com/news/218820_Take-action-against-hoarders-and-blackmarketers--says-PM


MY ANALYSIS -

Contrary to what we have been taught since our child hood days - hoarding and blackmarketing are not the same things and are 2 different situation resulting from different conditions.Blackmarketing - It is the phenomena that involves large scale commercial exchange without paying taxes to the government. Or it may be exchange of illegal goods such as imported products or banned products. Blackmarketing has a very nebulous definition and can be stretched to suit the need of the present day government. Importantly, blackmarketing is largest in the economies that are most restricted and least in the most liberal economies. Blackmarket exists because there is a need for those goods that the government has banned.

Now if there is a need for cereals and rice that the government cannot fulfill a blackmarket is created where people are willing to pay more to acquire those goods that are not available in the open market controlled by the government. Blackmarketing was rampant in the times of ration shops, but has reduced since then due to more liberal economy and market driven distribution system. But the present government is trying to kill the blackmarket which is supplying a legitimate need. This action will make it harder to find those productss (food in this case) not easier as the government is stating. The food will simply flow to the area where it commands a better price which may be another state in india or another country altogether.

Conclusion -
1. Blackmarket cannot be termeed bad just because the tyrranical government says it is bad.
2. Blackmarket is a government creation due to repressive policies and undersupply of goods in demand.
3. Banning the blackmarket will not make it go away.
4. Banning will make prices go up, the exacct opposite of what government claims will happen.


Hoarding -
I remember that in my 7th standard economics propaganda class (also known as Economics class) , i was taught that hoarding is bad and the people who do it a vile criminals who have no scruples. That these are people who feed off the soiety without giving anything in return and are basically leaches and parasites. I accepted this version happily since i afterall needed good marks in the tests and my horizon was only till my annual exams.

But upon further thinking, here is what "hoarders" really function. They purchase goods from a supplier by paying cash in full or part. The supplier who might be a farmer or usually a tier one supplier who has purchased from a farmer and processed the grains to a sellable condition, then takes the money and continues his commercial business, feeding his family etc. Anyhow, the "hoarder" now studies the current economic, social, weather conditions and predicts demand for this year and next year. He studies the available stock with him and tries to understand how much food grain he might be able to sell this year for a price so that he can make his payments and make a return on the enormous investmeents he has made in the product, infrastructure for storing it and administrative costs of running the setup.

To understand this better take an example of this year. With poor monsoons he knows that this years product is going to be lower in quantity. But he has some goods left from last year to cover for part of the shortage. But he also knows that a large percentage of the impact of poor monsoons will be felt not this year but next year. So the real shortages will be next year and keeping this in mind he keeps away some of the goods for selling next year wwhere they will not only fetch a better return on investment but also fulfill a need in the market. With this in mind he has now "hoarded" the goods. Keep in mind that the goods arent going to go waste, it is in his best interest to sell it as it costs him money to buy, store and sell the goods.

His actions have actually acted to smoothen out the vagaries in demand and supply. By keeping away good for the future he has done what every one of us do everyday, save for the unknown circumstances of future. The ""hoarder" is doing us a favor! Without his presense, we will eat our fill today and even throw away food but we will have severe shortages next year. so the Toor daal that costs 75 per Kg might go down to 65 a Kg this year but will be 120 per kg next year. and from whom will the government steal the next year??

There are lakhs of such "hoarder" taking risks, making profits, sometimes losses but are an essential part of the system of the economy that supplies is products. He workss not for the greater good of humanity or some vague things like that but for profit, just like me and many others in our respective jobs. By killing this system the government believes that it is smarter than the combined intelligence and local knowledge of these "hoarders". Who decides where the grain goes? Some fat beuracrat sitting in delhi who does know a thing about local needs in Kunigal town in Karnataka or a similar village in the North east.This short sighted action by the government will seriously jeapordise the food security next year but of course government is going to reap benefits in the short term in terms of vote.

Revitalising higher education

His next class act

While our army of the unemployable increases we suffer from crippling shortages of not just engineers, doctors and managers, but also of nurses, welders, electricians, plumbers, masons, carpenters, teachers and of course social scientists. Engineering, management and medicine at least have their IITs, IIMs and AIIMS. What brand name can Indian social sciences and the liberal arts boast of? They, in fact, have a bigger problem than lack of resources: lack of intellectual freedom, diversity of thought and opinion. The few social science centres that we have, therefore, produce clones. Usually these are clones of professors steeped in the heady ideologies of the ’70s incapable or unwilling to notice that the “revolution” has passed them by. JNU is a perfect example.

Excellent four part article by Radha Ranjan - must read

The articles dissect why the BJP lost and the current situation of the BJP. Also discussed are the relations of BJP with the RSS and the idealogy that inspires millions of SwayemSevaks of the RSS including yours truly.

Part 1 - When ambition overrode ideology

Part 2 - On parasites and spitting partners

Part 3 - Abandoning Kurukshetra before the war is won

Part 4 - RSS - unwilling parent

WHAT TRULY unites Zionism and Hindu nationalism

India and Israel: Diverse in a homogeneous world

There is a connection between the contempt for Hindu nationalism and the disdain for Zionism that exists in many circles. They are widely condemned for similar things. Both are accused of inventing a history for their people and religion. Both are accused of inventing and perverting archeology. Both are accused of being anachronisms in a world that is supposedly multicultural. Both are seen as militant and anti-Muslim.
But there is another connection that is often overlooked. Both were unlikely victims of Gandhi's sometimes misplaced pacifism. Gandhi condemned not only Zionism but also encouraged the Jews of Europe to voluntarily submit to Nazism and throw "themselves into the sea from cliffs" to please Hitler. Gandhi, a Hindu, penned an introduction to the Koran, a book that is deeply prejudiced against pagan Hinduism, and during the partition of India he excused the ethnic cleansing of Sikhs and Hindus in Pakistan, while encouraging India to protect her Muslim minority.

Existential struggle of the condemned Hindu continues

‘Revive Nepal as a Hindu State’

“A country with more than 80 per cent Hindus should not be declared a secular state”, the participants opined.
The participants also said that a nation-wide campaign needs to be organized to create awareness among the population to re-declare the country a Hindu state.

Pope visit stirs emotions in Israel

Pope’s visit upsets more than it pleases

Vaticans attempt at global hegemony continues..

The Pope's latest crusade

Spam the world with the Christian message


FORMER MEMBER of the Hitler Youth and now infallible Pope, Benedict XVI thinks it is a nifty idea for the yoof of today to spam others with Christian messages.
The Pope, who has offended right wing Jews by forgiving right wing non-Jews who don't believe that Hitler killed many of their relatives, and Muslims by quoting a 15th century Catholic saint, is now having a go at network managers who will have to unclog their networks from shedloads of Catholic spam.
Speaking at the Roman Catholic Church's World Communications Day, the Pope told young people to bear witness to their faith through the digital world. They should employ new technologies to make the Christian Gospel known, he said.
A Vatican website, www.pope2you.net, will be linked to the social network Facebook so that young people can send the Pope's message to their friends. This is assuming that they will still be their friends after getting a message from the Pope.
Fortunately few Catholics under the age of 40 listen to the Pope much any more as his doctrinal stances are increasingly less relevant to the problems of today's world. This means there will probably be few modern yoof willing to take part in the children's spam crusade. µ

Religion of Love might be loving a little too much

Thousands beaten, raped in Irish Catholic reform schools

The report found that molestation and rape were "endemic" in boys' facilities, chiefly run by the Christian Brothers order, and supervisors pursued policies that increased the danger. Girls supervised by orders of nuns, chiefly the Sisters of Mercy, suffered much less sexual abuse but frequent assaults and humiliation designed to make them feel worthless.
"In some schools a high level of ritualized beating was routine. ... Girls were struck with implements designed to maximize pain and were struck on all parts of the body," the report said. "Personal and family denigration was widespread."
Victims of the system have long demanded that the truth of their experiences be documented and made public, so that children in Ireland never endure such suffering again.
But most leaders of religious orders have rejected the allegations as exaggerations and lies, and testified to the commission that any abuses were the responsibility of often long-dead individuals.

SuryaPrakash analyses BJPs election defeat

BJP failed due to problems within

Why did the BJP fare so badly? The reasons are many, but here are a few. The first of these is that there is no indication that the party has learnt even a single lesson from its crushing defeat in 2004. There was no credibility in anything that the party said, be it on terrorism, corruption or relations with the US. Having released dreaded terrorists during the Kandahar crisis, it did not lie in the BJP’s mouth to attack the Manmohan Singh Government on 26/11. That is why the party could not convert even 26/11 into votes.Nor could the BJP encash the corruption of UPA Ministers: Of the 15 scamster MPs caught on tape taking cash to ask questions or sanction projects under the MPLADS Scheme, eight were from the BJP. This party also has the distinction of having an MP who was found involved in human trafficking. He was smuggling people into Canada on passports given to members of his family! The list is endlessIndiscipline at the top, with many leaders pursuing their own personal agendas at the cost of the party and the larger movement to which they belong, is yet another factor. Fourth, some of the most arrogant and conceited politicians can be found in this party. They lack the humility to listen to others and they are beyond learning. Last, there is no party high command, as in the Congress or the CPI(M), and therefore many party leaders are answerable to no one and are beyond party discipline. Is the BJP capable of sincere introspection and course correction? Given the party’s track record post-2004, I would not put my money on this.

BJP abandons idealogy and get a swift rebuke

BJP apes Congress, fails

During the latest campaign, the BJP downplayed ideology (except erratically in the Varun Gandhi incident) and betted all on ‘good governance’. Some BJP State Governments have provided that, to be sure, and in these States the BJP has been rewarded. But it could never be a decisive election-winner because Congress hasn’t done too bad in that regard either. Ever since Mr Manmohan Singh read out the 1992 Budget, the world sees his signature written all over India’s economic success. Even BJP contributors to that success, like erstwhile Disinvestment Minister Arun Shourie, won’t deny him that honour. In these circumstances, only a clear ideological profile, mature but distinct, could have won the election for the BJP. If it didn’t want that ideological distinctness and was content to remain the Congress’s B-team, the party could have learned from Mr Sarkozy to show this only after the election. Before, it should at least have kept up the pretence of being a party with a difference.

Provocation for Chickmangalur church attacks

‘Hurt sentiments led to attack on church’

Janakriram, a coffee grower, said that the hillock known as Rashi Gudda had a cave with a small opening. Hindus used to visit the spot, drop stones into the cave and listen the echoing sound.Later, Christian coffee growers bought the entire hillock and helped a church come up right at the place. The opening to the cave was closed and the hillock rechristened as ‘Shilibe Gudda, which hurt Hindu sentiments. This resentment led to attack on a church at Maagud near Aldoor, Janakiram told the Commission. The Commission also accepted the statement of N Shetroji Rao, a retired government employee.