2 Observations

1) I was musing about something which caught my eye and I am still thinking whether to laugh or cry at this. You decide.. :)
Recently, I saw this in a tamil weekly journal. The person was talking about the 1 kg rice for 1 rupee. He was mentioning, how (thanks to Honble CM(sic)) he was able to avert his hunger with this scheme. But as with all human beings, he had a complaint to make. His point was that it took as little as 1 rupee to feed himself. On the contrary, the charge for relieving themselves(shitting, to put it crudely) was at 3 rupees in public toilets. He is wondering why he should pay 3 bucks to sh** if he pays only 1 buck to eat. If the tax payers of this country are reading this, please be careful and try to oppose any schemes, which entitles people to sh** with your hard earned money.
2) Its been more than 60 years since the great Leaders(sic) got(brought?, bought?) freedom for us from the imperial British. Elections happen with unfailing regularity(barring the few (!?) irregularites). I was not alive during the first few elections. But I realise that the electoral promises from the great Indian politicians still are centered around food, clothing and shelter. Something which we should be ashamed of. I wonder if anyone is.

Freebies

The Election commissioner must include one more point in the Model code of conduct for Elections. Which must be obvious by now, seeing the title.. No Freebies.. Nobody wants the tax money to be squandered on freebies like loan waivers, tractor loans, free Televisions, mobile phones(recent BJP's promise). Nobody as in, the Mr. Nobody who hardly matters in the Election process.

Instead of wasting money on populous but useless schemes like free Television, free mobiles and loan waivers, money could be spent on Infrastructure. Vast majority of the 1 billion population is in poverty. If the various statistics are to be taken in to account, atleast 25 million people in India alone are in dire poverty and countless millions are just on the brink of poverty. Developing the infrastructure alone would generate enough jobs to pull several millions out of poverty. The improved infrastructure is going to pay off with more jobs by attracting more investment inside the country.

The crux of the issue is about teaching a man to fish, rather than giving him fish. If I can think of something like this, I wonder why the enlightened leaders of our nation are not able to do so. And i thought I was a bit thick in the skull.

God save my country.

A small suggestion from an amateur.

This year, the exit budget by the government is blamed as being lack lustre. It is accused of not having any boosts or sops or much needed investment injection in to an economy which is in presently in unchartered waters, due to the current global scenario.

One reason which is stated is the lack of funds. Given the weak fiscal position of the nation, providing more freebies and cuts would only adversely affect the sagging coffers. Usually when a party comes in to power, the first thing which they do is, increase the tax burden on the very few tax paying citizens. no more tax increase is made for the remaining 4 years, and the party trumpets to the world that it has not burdened the common with much tax increase.

While it is understood that tax is a very important source of income for the Government with which they plan the budget, it should be observed that the Budget for the country is common for every one and almost everyone in the country is impacted by it. But the policy of RoI since its birth in 1947 has been to overburden the limited number of people who pay taxes. Or should i put it as, those whose taxes are deducted @ the source.

While every Government, tries ingenious methods to increase tax income, what irks is the fact that no Government has been successful in bringing the farmers and traders and millions of others who successfully evade the tax net using loop holes.

There are farmers who drive BMW cars and own villas in Gurgaon and still dont pay taxes. There are wealthy merchants who never pay a paise in tax, citing Loss in business. There are many well-to-do entrepreneurs, who run businesses without even showing a whiff of their money to the IT department. There are traders who play in the share market and rake fortunes under the name of their unemployed wives/parents making all the money tax free.

Why is that a billion strong nation having the best and the brightest minds graduating from IITs/IIMs not been able to create a effective tax net. Is it because of lack of ideas(not possible) or the lack of political will?