Bharat Bandh

I first came across this “Bharat Bandh” in a telugu movie title. And I believe, it works only in those movies. It really had no effect on me, except that it made me work on last Saturday. Coming to petrol deregulation, there are two groups of people in this issue.

1. Cry inflation, petrol price rise will further fuel it, so let’s protest against it and sit for Bandh.
2. Enough pampering. Let’s do away with the subsidy. Deregulation will give way for private players to come up with something innovative. Like they did in telecom. Well, it has already started.

I think I belong to the second group, seriously believing the advisors sitting in the ministry, like the one below.

“Though the immediate impact of this policy will be to increase inflation, in six to nine months we will have lower prices than
would have happened in the absence of this much- needed reform,”
Kaushik Basu, chief economic adviser at the finance ministry

Padichavanga solranga!