President promises price relief

President Pratibha Patil today outlined an aggressive economic agenda focused on checking inflation and corruption. The occasion was her address to the Members of Parliament.

The president addresses a joint session of Parliament at the start of the year’s first session. The speech is drafted by the government. The top priority of the government in 2011-12 “will be to combat inflation, in particular to protect the common man from the impact of rising food prices,” she said.

Patil said the government had taken steps to ensure equality with growth, beginning with inflation control. To check prices, she said, the import regime had been liberalised for critical items. At the same time, export of commodities like edible oils and pulses was banned, she said. The public sector units, she said, were asked to open more retail outlets to sell vegetables to consumers. “These steps have shown results,” she added. She attributed the spurt in food prices to unseasonal rain and high vegetable prices, which she said had started coming down.

The long-term solution, she said, would be to produce more. To ensure remunerative prices to farmers, state governments would be given some incentives so that farmers could sell to consumers “without impediments being placed on them,” she said.

She said economic reforms needed to continue and said the domestic environment would be made more conducive to all kinds of investments — foreign direct, public, private and domestic.
 

GOVT’S AGENDA

COMBAT INFLATION, protect common man from rising food prices

SUSTAIN GROWTH, ensure fair share to the poor

ENCOURAGE PUBLIC, private and foreign investment, particularly FDI

TO TACKLE black money menace

ADDRESS CONCERNS over lack of probity and integrity in public life

The speech acknowledged the importance of a food security law that would entitle every family living below the poverty line to cheaper foodgrain. But while the National Advisory Council (NAC) had given important inputs, “the states are being consulted, as the success...hinges on their commitment to reforms in the public distribution system”, she said. She was silent on the Rangarajan committee report that questioned some basic assumptions of the NAC recommendations. The president promised a slew of measures to counter corruption. “My government has also decided to ratify the UN Convention Against Corruption,” she said.

A national mission for delivery of justice and legal reforms would be announced soon, she said. Funds illegally stashed in foreign countries would be brought back to India and a multidisciplinary study had been commissioned to study the impact of illegal money on national security, she said.

The president also focused on some bottlenecks in growth. The speech promised concerted action on reforms in the power sector, “particularly in improving the financial and technical capabilities of electricity distribution companies in the states.” Modernisation of coal mines to meet the demands of the power sector was also envisaged, she said.

Interestingly, the president was equivocal on the issue of environment versus growth. “A developing country like ours must find ways to strike an appropriate balance between environmental imperatives and developmental needs,” she said, adding that there would be no dilution of ecologically-sustainable growth paths. The speech said nothing about land acquisition for industry.