Political kitchenette barbs?

The other day, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh did meet the Editors of various Channels. Starting from alphabet (a) Aaj Tak to (s) Sun TV, the venerable Editors who are the present King Arther and his Knights in their shining armour sat on a rectangle table for an inter-action. Each one of the Editors, was given one question to ask, but many made up their skill by posing compounded questions and putting supplementary. This crowd made of the top electronic media, represented the cream of the Fourth Estate.

As usual, contemporary topic prevailed. One or the other question related to this. All of you know that 2 G was the mother of all scams until ISRO-Devos scam surfaced. It was pegged at 2 lakh Crore. 2 G scam CWG was regaled to the back burner. But different agencies used different barometers to weigh the scams. Raja and Kapil said no revenue loss! Did they mean, we got no revenue hence no loss? CAG estimated the loss at Rs 1.76 lakh Crore. They worked their figures based on the sale of Spectrum in 3 G, and its equivalent frequency cost to 2 G. CBI estimated it at Rs 50,000 Cr.

While one varied with the other figure, and each differed widely on the basis of methodology, a question was put to the Prime Minister of India, during the Press meeting by an elite journalist. Prime Minister did not equate losses in the 2 G scam with the subsidies to the Poor. He asked the audience, if auctions don’t take place, how do you estimate or calculate a loss? We have a budget which gives subsidy for food, Rs 80,000 Cr/annum some people may say that these food grains should be sold at market place. Because it is not sold at market place, but given as subsidy, do you say it is a revenue loss? Queried the PM. That he used the comparison of Food subsidies made political parties, newspapers, and raise brouhaha. The Prime Minister compares the loot of a scandal to the Poor man’s bread. The PM used the comparison of food subsidies to drive home the point of allusion to facts and nothing more.

Suppose, you say that Revenue from Liquor is a major Central Excise levy. Government advertises people not to drink, and highlights the problems caused by drinking. Cigarette is revenue. Government is taking all actions to curb its use. Would you say that the Government is justified in popularizing that “Cigarette smoking is injurious to health”. There are people who barb that Corruption is in-separable in India, yet they are the first people who pay something to get something done. I am not for a moment suggesting that people like Raja or x should be left scot free. Law should take its own course. But while saying that he did not condone Corruption, which he said will be dealt with most seriously, comparison between an activity at one point of time and another activity at another point of time will not yield a realistic picture. Circumstance makes it so. When Arun Shourie dealt with the Policy of FCFS on Spectrum allocation, our country’s use of mobile phones was negligible. There was no demand. No mobile phones. When Reliance institutionalized its availability, telephony became very popular, and today, Spectrum price has gone up abnormally. Price rules the supply, and incessant demand chases supply. Every body knows that fancied Chinese goods won’t last. Yet, people buy it for fancy prices. Commerce Ministry which should have slapped dumping is sitting quiet. Our Prime Minister is a clean man, sitting between the ‘devil and the deep sea’. Let us not harass him.