PM mulls core group meet on April 8 to tame inflation

As Opposition parties prepare to step up heat on the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government over price rise, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh plans to call a meeting of his core group on tackling inflation on April 8 to discuss the issue.

This will be the first meeting of the group after it was formed at the chief ministers’ meeting in the first week of February.

The 13-member committee is headed by the Prime Minister and includes Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia and the chief ministers of Punjab, Haryana, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, West Bengal and Assam, among others.

The first meeting of this committee has been convened just a week before Parliament meets again for the second phase of the Budget session. The opponents of the UPA government (the Left and the Bharatiya Janata Party) have tied up with outside supporters of the alliance like the Samajwadi Party and Rashtriya Janata Dal to corner the government on price rise. Government managers, however, claim that the food inflation was coming down and inflation would further dip in the coming months.

According to top sources in the government, the Centre will again ask the states to take action against the hoarders and black marketeers. It will also ask the states to pick up their stakes of the 4 million tonne wheat it has released for them, but many of them are yet to pick up.

The issue of strengthening the Public Distribution System (PDS) is also likely to figure during the meeting and the Centre may discuss the various aspects of its flagship Food Security Bill with the chief ministers. While the Manmohan Singh government has decided to push its key social legislation, a lot of responsibilities have to be borne by the states.

Top UPA managers suggest the meeting will also deal with issues regarding removal of supply bottlenecks.

At his meeting with the CMs, the Prime Minister had formed the committee of central ministers and chief ministers to overhaul PDS and check price rise. The PM remarked that the scheme was “hopelessly outdated” and “needs a complete overhaul”. At the same time, he also asked the CMs to crack down on hoarders, sending out a tough message for hoarders of strict action under the Essential Commodities Act.

The Centre will be in a comfortable position while meeting the CMs as the food inflation dipped to a four-month low of 16.22 per cent for the week ended March 13. Food prices have witnessed a 0.08-percentage-point fall from the previous week.

The government expects further fall in the food prices once the Rabi crops arrive in the markets next month.