Hall of shame; Floundering Liz Truss; Protect your money
Opinion Watch
Hall of shame
Since October 2020, India is giving free grains to 80 crore population, which by now has cost about Rs four lakh crore, and still the country is ranked 107 in the Global Hunger Index for 121 countries. This must agitate all, for either the free gains scheme is not targeting the vulnerable or the states have not taken Mission Poshan (nutrition) seriously.
The government has indeed rejected the ranking, which is below the neighbouring countries such as Sri lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan. The Pioneer has headlined its Editorial ‘In the Hall of Shame’ on the index, which is jointly published by Concern Worldwide and Wealthungerlife, stating that it must be cause of alarm for the government t which is high on achievement claims.
The Pioneer has said that the “lopsided development taking place in the country has no meaning for the downtrodden”. The Noida-based daily also rejected the argument that Corona led to hunger, stating that this applied to India’s neighbours as well. It further stated that India has been given a score of 29.1 which is indicative of serious hunger.
The daily sticks to headline, and doesn’t deep dive to pinpoint the malaise. Scrapping the Planning Commission and unveiling of the NITI Aayog, which is a policy hole of Google copy-paste works, has demolished the architect of the Central monitoring of the performance of the states on social indicators. Now, the states are too busy buying votes with freebies to pay attention to issues such as hunger.
Floundering Liz Truss
The UK has been in the worst of economy and that’s also reflected in political instability in the country. Pound is bleeding, and the UK is in a firm grip of recession.
The Indian Express in its Editorial has opined that the markets forced the newly-elected British Prime Minister Liz Truss to course correct, firing first the Chancellor of Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng, who had with his mini Budget entailing large tax cuts and high public spending had sought to spur the sagging economy, but ended unleashing market rout.
The Hindu has also stated in its Editorial that the “UK is fast becoming a cautionary tale for how bad politics can lead to even worse economics”.
“Flipflops, U-turns and a lack of coherent long-term strategy for economic stability and growth have marred what little merit there might have been in her advocacy of policies to transform the U.K. into a high growth, low cost economy,” added the Chennai-based daily.
The move to abolish the 45 per cent top rate of income tax on incomes of £150,000 or higher along with plan to scrap an increase in corporate tax from 19 per cent to 25 per cent from next April, which would have burnt £45bn in government finances, sent treasury yields soaring beyond four per cent to spook the equity and the bond market, which has already been battered by the galloping global inflation.
Protect your money
For years, fraudsters have been making phone calls, sending e-mails, to pester people to part with sensitive personal information in their bids to steal money from the bank accounts. Yet, the irony of the world is that the law enforcement agencies remain clueless, and when the people call the police the standard answer is that such calls be not picked up.
The Times of India in its lead Editorial has stated that India accounted for the highest increase in the people losing money to such tricksters since 2018, while quoting the 2021 Microsoft Report on phishing. The daily further quoted from the data of the National Crime Research Bureau to underline that there has been an increase of 450 per cent, from 9622 in 2014 to 52974 in 2021, of cases of cybercrime. Worryingly, the daily stated that the police charge sheeting in such cases is just 30 per cent.
About The Author
Good coverage on Hall of shame – India rating on Hunger index. This does not seem to be a reliable data.
– Challenges for British PM will continue for long and no sign of short term recovery of economy.
– Frauds gaining access to people account and money is alarming for Govt to take a serious action.