Make Hay while the Sun shines

The abnormal spurt in the prices of veggies has propelled the Budget of the Indian households into a disarray. The Common man on the street is struggling to make his ends meet by trying all sorts of Permutation and Combination before deciding the menu on his plate. The lower middle Class which forms a substantial part of the Population has found that their disposable Income has dwindled by a huge margin akin to a Cut in salary, as their monthly budget has gone for a toss .
The Sub continent has witnessed a huge turnaround in the Climatic conditions in the past year when rains simply refused to relent even in the month of November. Some Crops like Onion and Grapes were badly affected because of the Prolonged deluge.
The states of Maharashtra and Gujarat which account for almost 20% of the total Onion's Produced in the Country bore the brunt of the Nature’s fury but certainly the Price rise doesn’t match the fall in Production which certainly is the handiwork of the middlemen involved and the Agriculture Minister who time and again puts his foot in his mouth by blurting out some illogical and misleading comments.
Even today the Lasalgaon market is flooded with Onions where the farmer makes only Rs.4/- Per KG which is later on sold for Rs.80/- Per KG after the same is ‘‘mishandled’’ by the growing bunch of scrupulous middlemen in the guise of traders.
The bureaucrats relaxing in their plush Govt suites cum offices got a rude jolt when the Citizens along with some of the reliable vigilant media in tow went hammer and tongs at their inaction against the hoarding of essential commodities which is the root cause of this fiasco.
The CAG should take stock of the situation and raid the govt controlled FCI Godowns which is stocked with agricultural products with hardly any honest steps being attempted to release them in times of hoarding which gives ample time to the perpetrators to wriggle out of such situations.
The PMO (Prime Minister’s office) too awakened from its slumber after the huge public outcry and initiated steps to arrest the abnormal price rise. The result was evident and the whole sale prices have started to slide South ward.
The retail prices though would take its own sweet time as many fruit sellers and routine road side pedlars have resorted to this new- found TRADE ( being a vegetable vendor) which is giving huge returns – as high as 500% on their investment in the shortest possible time.
The comments of our astrologer cum agriculture minister cum ICC Chief too fuelled the Price rise as he predicted that the Prices will stay till March 2010.
The common man is happy that his prediction turned out to be as accurate as that of our Weather bureaus churning out their routine forecast.
The fund collected during the Lok sabha Elections have to be refunded to these Mafia and this is one way of repaying them without raising any suspicion blaming the unseasonal rains and the unpredictable weather.
I vaguely remember the poem learnt during my childhood- Make Hay while the Sun Shines by Stewart Gideon which emphasises that you have to make optimum use of resources available at your disposal in the current scenario so as to avoid the disadvantages that might set in at a latter stage.
Here the middlemen are hell bent to extract the maximum out of the current situation which might fizzle out once the Govt steps in to stem the rot that has set in.