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States blast PMO for ignoring price-rise signals

George Iype in New Delhi

Even as the chief ministers met in New Delhi to take stock of the price situation in the country, the Prime Minister's Office has come under criticism for ignoring warnings from state governments and precipitating the price rise in the past six months.

Bureaucrats in the Union ministries of agriculture and food and civil supplies and the state government officials accompanying the chief ministers said the measures announced by Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to contain price rise were delayed by the PMO in past months.

They also accused the prime minister's Principal Secretary Brajesh Mishra of taking "ineffective action when the country was reeling under galloping prices of essential vegetables".

According to a senior official at the food and civil supplies office, the ministry had requested the PMO in June to urgently set up a special cell under the Cabinet secretary to monitor prices and availability of essential commodities and to restructure the Cabinet Committee on Prices.

Besides, the agriculture ministry had submitted to the PMO the weather forecasts to warn that the country was in for a severe food shortage and called for an immediate ban on exports of vegetables like onions, potatoes and tomatoes.

"But the principal secretary, who was on a whirlwind diplomatic tour across the world, sat on the files for months together and did nothing to control the price rise," an Indian Administrative Service officer told Rediff On The NeT.

After the Pokhran nuclear tests in May, Mishra has been the prime minister's chief diplomatic trouble-shooter who travelled to France, Britain and Russia to explain India's security concerns.

The official said a lethargic PMO under Mishra's control is directly responsible for not stopping the exports of essential vegetables like onions and potatoes and ordering immediate imports when the shortage hit Bihar, Delhi, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh.

"The PMO and Mishra always maintained that the rise in prices has been due to the very high fiscal deficit which went up to 6.1 per cent of the gross domestic product during 1987-98," the official added.

On Wednesday, Vajpayee conceded that the delayed decision on onions caused the steep price hike. The prime minister unveiled a five-point package to spur effective action to preserve food grains and to increase production of all essential commodities.

The measures included the setting up of a National Crop Forecasting Centre, establishment of cold storages across the country and also revamping the Essential Commodities Act to deal with black-marketers and hoarders.

But a state government official from Tamil Nadu said most of these measures have been pending with the PMO for many months now. "The Tamil Nadu government has repeatedly asked the PMO to give more teeth to the Essential Commodities Act. But the Vajpayee government at the Centre refused to listen to us as the Bharatiya Janata Party did not want to act against traders who are perceived to be their political supporters," the official told Rediff On The NeT.

He stated that the PMO -- in spite of repeated requests from various state governments -- remained a passive spectator when the prices of essential commodities began rising from June.

Many in the BJP also feel the rise in prices has taken a heavy toll on the party's performance in this week's state assembly election, especially in Delhi and Rajasthan.

Some BJP leaders are now said to be opposed to Mishra's continuance as principal secretary in the PMO for his ''lackadaisical approach'' towards domestic issues like rising prices.

"Issues like prices have the potential to throw out a government at the Centre. But the PMO has given the impression that it is meant to be dealing with only nuclear tests," one BJP official said.

While resentment against the principal secretary's handling of the PMO is rising, some believe the attempt is a smear campaign from the IAS lobby against Mishra who retired from the Indian Foreign Service nearly twenty years ago.

The principal secretary's post in the PMO is the most powerful office in the bureaucracy and the IAS fraternity is said to be upset that a former IFS officer is now in charge.

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