Expressing deep anger on skyrocketing prices of essential commodities, Jharkhand Government's
Finance Minister, Dr Rameshwar Oraon, in an informal conversation with media persons at his
residence on Saturday attacked the Central Government led by BJP and said that the Government is
failed in controlling inflation.
Oraon said that the previous Congress-led UPA Government knew that if the price of petroleum
products would increase, so would the prices of essential commodities, especially food items and if
the price of food will increase, then the conditions will be uncontrolled, the life of the poor will
become difficult. Therefore, during the Congress regime, the prices of petroleum products were
controlled by giving subsidies, but the present BJP Government has not been able to control inflation
because the party is not giving subsidies.
Speaking on the occasion, State Congress Committee's Senior Leader, Alok Kumar Dubey, Lal Kishore
Nath Shahdeo and Dr Rajesh Gupta Chhotu were present on the occasion and they jointly said that
the BJP Government is anti-people and anti-poor.
“In the last eight years, the retail inflation rate is currently the highest at 7.79 percent, which is a
matter of great concern. The inflation rate on food items is the highest at 8.38 percent, while on the
other hand the data of the Government of India has said that inflation in rural India The rate is 8.38
which shows that inflation is more dominant in villages,” said Oraon.
The Finance Minister also said that the public’s lives are being destroyed by the ever-increasing
prices of petroleum products and food items. “The conditions will be uncontrolled and the life of the
poor will be difficult, so the Congress Government used to control the prices of petroleum products
by giving subsidies, but the BJP Government has completely failed to control inflation. When the
price suddenly increased, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit removed the shortage of supply by ordering
onions from Maharashtra and controlled inflation, but today the prices are increasing every day and
the Central Government is enjoying it,” he added.
Dubey said that the RBI has increased the basic repo rate by forty points, due to which the EMI of
the banks has become expensive, the price of the building construction materials increased by about
40 per cent in a year, which is powerful for employment generation. The medium is, work has been
stopped on about 400 projects out of 500 in Ranchi alone, he added.
Shahdeo said that children's milk has become expensive, toothpaste has become expensive, clothes
have become expensive, and on the other hand the price of flour, rice, lentils, potatoes, lemons,
onions, every essential item is increasing. Gupta said that domestic cooking gas, which was available
in 2014, is being available in Ranchi on May 14 for Rs 1000. The Congress government used to give
subsidies to control gas prices, but today the BJP government is giving zero subsidies, he added.