By Vishal Bagla:
Darwin postulated a very famous theory of Biology known as “Survival of Fittest.” This theory states that out of all the individuals born on this planet, only those who are fit or fittest among them survive. This was hundreds of years back. But I feel, if he had postulated this theory in 21st century, it should have been somewhat like this: out of million of individuals on this planet, only those who have enough amount of money or those who are very rich, only can survive. I very much feel that this should have been the major feature of modern Darwin’s theory.
The problem of inflation has been the biggest concern for every economy in the world. The problem in India is no different. With every passing day, prices of each and every commodity are increasing. Prices of petrol and vegetables and fruits have sky rocketed. Petrol prices have touched whooping 65rs a liter and diesel prices have also been increased considerably in last hike. It has been difficult for a common man with average salary to sustain on even basic food i.e. “dal roti”.
RBI has increased interest rates 11 times in last 15 months in order to tame the inflation. RBI’s interest rate has risen from 4% in March 2010 to 9% in July 2011.in accordance with that all other interest rates have gone up; be it car loans or home loans and personal loans are no different. After its recent hike of 50 basis points on 27 July, around two dozen banks have raised their interest rates.
Rise in these interest rates have affected our economy directly. The economic growth has slowed down in past few months. The expected GDP has fallen down from over 9% to around 8.5%. Companies who were considering plans to expand their empire have dropped their plan considering the present scenario. This has slowed down our economic development. India is now ranked at number 14 in terms of FDI whereas it was at number 3 few months back. Government is unable to stop inflation and more and more scams about corruption and black money are getting unveiled. This has also fumbled the trust of foreign companies in investing in India.
Recently, when there was acute shortage of onion and its price went up to Rs 100 per kg, a person in Punjab died of heart attack after hearing the rate of onions.
It is high time, government and RBI should take effective measures to tackle this menace of inflation lest it affects the economic development made by our country in last decade. Other wise in no time a situation will come when people will start saving petrol in tanks in order to give it to their daughter on her marriage because cars will be much cheaper to buy than petrol.