Published On:Thursday 4 August 2011
“Confused is what I am (always),” Pranabda
Before the Parliament session
India's Finance Minister who hardly talks about finance and generally spends his time in patching up the alliance parties and who himself pronounce as Pronoboda asked his close mate before the press meet "I am confused what I am talking about. Can you help me understand where I was?" He said "sometimes I feel what irritating job I had selected by selecting Finance Ministry's portfolio. It's really hopeless. Tracking so much of data like every week inflation then every month growth and every quarter GDP and plus deficit figures also. The job is so much of numbers and boring as well."
The close mate said "Pranabda, all reporters have come now you will have to address them." Pranab gave an irritating look "What will tell them? References of same age-old theories, which I, myself don't understand. Tell me what is inflation exactly all about?" The close mate told him "it's a function of demand and supply." Pranabda "oh thanks buddy. Thank you very much."In the Parliament session
Defending the government against Opposition chorus that he stymies growth in order to check inflation, Paranabda told Parliament on Thursday that growth was necessary to moderate rate of inflation (DCFC reporter pulled his first hair out of his head as first time he understood that growth can moderate inflation… ha ha ha). DCFC reporter salutes you Pranabda.
Pranabda said there was no contradiction between growth and inflation and appealed to the Opposition to support finance sector reform Bills.
Pranabda said the government had brought down food inflation from 22% to 8%, rebuffing charges that his government was insensitive to the poor. However, Pranabda's calculations are wrong the food inflation came down automatically (not because of government's efforts as it was itself involved in raising minimum support prices) from 22% to 8% just because of base effect
He admitted the government was aware that more needed to be done to bring down prices. "Inflation is high and I accept it should be around five per cent, but it is beyond our control (ha ha ha)," he said. Don't worry Pranabda, it will automatically come down to 5% levels as there will be base effect next year. Yea it's great that you realized that it's beyond your control and under the control of somebody else (may be agriculture minister Sharad Pawar can throw some light).
Replying in the price rise debate, Mukherjee also said 'Hello India, goodbye world,' would be the new tagline, as opposed to BJP leader Yashwant Sinha's 'Goodbye India' dig yesterday. However, he didn't discuss the issue properly that how will he make the tagline work.
He told the Lok Sabha that under recoveries of public oil companies will be Rs1.22 lakh crore this fiscal, stressing he can consider luxury tax on diesel consumed by passenger cars but the mechanism needed to be worked out. DCFC research feels that estimated figures that how much can be generated out of luxury tax on diesel consumed by passenger cars will be interesting to see.
Initiating the debate yesterday, BJP leader Yashwant Sinha had warned the government against treating Lok Sabha as "talking shop". Sinha asked it to check rising prices. He cited an independent credit rating agency's recent report that claimed that households across the country were forced to incur an additional expenditure of over Rs6 lakh crore during 2008-09 and 2010-11 because of inflation.
Post Parliament session
Pranabda asked his close mate "how was my reply? Was I good?" The close mate said "good? You were brilliant. You know everything in economics. I am your fan now."