For weeks heavy rains lashed out in many parts of Tamil Nadu. To heap more misery on the people of the state, the state government brought in the price hike of bus fares, milk prices and is proposing a further hike in electricity charges. These price hikes have put a huge burden on working people’s monthly expenditure. It is like rubbing salt on the wound, as the Central government had already raised the petrol prices repeatedly at regular intervals, which has already caused the spiralling effect on the prices of essential commodities.
Attack on the Poor & Working people
Bus fare was increased anywhere between Rs 3 to Rs. 12 all over TN except in Chennai. In the state capital of Chennai, the raise was between Rs 2 – 14 . Previously the so called subsidised monthly bus passes costed around Rs. 600, but now it is a whooping Rs 1000. It is not the rich and wealthy with their petrol/gas guzzling cars who are badly affected by the hike, but the poor & working people with their meagre income depend on the buses for their daily transport.
Government also increased the price of milk run by state-owned milk Cooperative – AAVIN, by increasing it by Rs. 6.25 per litre. Now Milk per litre price is Rs. 24. The government has also proposed to double the electricity usage charges in the very near future. The prices of vegetables and other food items are already sky rocketing due to the petrol price hikes.
The governments both at the centre and the states have utterly failed to check the price rise. Thanks to the aggressive neo-liberalism to which all the governments adhere without exception, it is the market forces that rule and not the elected governments.
As most of the working people’s earnings are spent on food, transportation, and electricity, these price attacks plus the total apathy by the private sector companies towards the demand of increasing the wages, has made scores of working people in the mostly unorganised sector vulnerable and without any hope.
TN government justified these price hikes citing the near bankrupt situation of the various state government corporations. Tamil Nadu government’s debts stand at a staggering level of more than 1 lakh crore today. The Tamil Nadu Electricity Board (TNEB) has a debt burden of Rs. 43,000 crore which is likely to go up to Rs. 53,000 by the end of this fiscal.
It is true that most of the state run, government corporations are in dysfunctional state. But it is also true that these state run corporation have been made dysfunctional by the nexus between the top-level management, private players and the state government to facilitate the entry of private players in the future. These price hikes will only indirectly help private companies to maximize their profit.
Another reason that the present Jayalalitha’s AIADMK led government cites, is the step motherly treatment of Congress led central government in starving the opposition held states of funds and investments. While the Congress at the centre is guilty of this in relation to number of states, but the governments in Tamil Nadu led by both AIADMK and DMK can in no way be painted as apostles of virtue and prudence.
Thanks to both these regional political parties who have made a mockery of electoral practices, their criminal practice of buying votes by engaging in freebies and goodies during the elections which is paid to by the state exchequer, it is no wonder that the treasury of the state is empty!
The governments through their own mismanagement and corruption are responsible for this crisis and are now trying to offload it on the working people. In Tamil Nadu, while governments keep changing every five years but people’s misery is constant.
Ultimately, it is the combined and unequal development under capitalism in neo-colonial countries like India that is responsible for this type of crisis. These price hikes are mere examples of how the increasingly crisis driven Indian economy, based on maximising profits of corporates and landlords, is unable to solve any one of the basic fundamental problems of society.
Pasumpon VN
Chennai
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