By IANS,
Bhopal : The central government has created an artificial price rise for collecting poll funds, claimed Madhya Pradesh PWD Minister Kailash Vijayvargiya here Saturday.
Vijayvargiya told reporters that the people of the country had high hopes from the central government which has three leading economists of the country – Manmohan Singh, P. Chidambaram and Montek Singh Ahluwalia – in powerful positions but all their hopes have been shattered.
“I have no doubts about the fact that the steep price hike was artificial, created at the behest of the centre to benefit the middle man from whom the Congress party has to collect funds for the next general elections due in 2009,” alleged Vijayvargiya.
“Take for instance the case of price rise of sugar, which went up by Rs.300 per quintal just because of the less release of quota by the centre. After a week, the prices again went down when enough quota was released but the sugar lobby earned crores (tens of millions) during the week when artificial shortage was created,” he said.
Referring to the fuel prices, he asked: “Now when the prices of oil have gone down by 35 percent in the international market, why are the prices (here) not reducing in the same proportion?”