Heatwave in Maharashtra
Heatwave continued for the second day in succession and it scorched Vidarbha and other places in Maharashtra. Mumbai experienced a cloudy sky and hence it was somewhat sultry in the afternoon. The temperature continues to stay at 33 degree Celsius. Thus the cloudy city will sweat more and a partly cloudy sky may bring some relief by the evening. The nights are also sultry and people prefer use of air conditioners to beat the heat. Vidarbha is already reeling under water scarcity and this present condition will add more to the heatwave conditions in the state.
Subramanyam Swamy
Corruption allegation against Rajiv Gandhi
It refers to most downgraded politics during on-going poll-campaign where Prime Minister lost cool by making allegation of corruption on former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi just to counter repeated allegations by Congress President on Prime Minister.
Undoubtedly Rajiv Gandhi was most immature Prime Minister putting the country in big trouble at several occasions especially on wrong decision to send Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF) in Sri Lanka to fight LTTE which was trained in India. But there were no direct charges of corruption on him even though some of his closest aides were alleged to be linked with Bofors-controversy.
It would have been better if Prime Minister would not have compared himself with Congress President where there is a vast difference in maturity-level, age and status of the two.
Madhu Agrawal
Penalise traders for giving candies in place of coins
Presently with Reserve Bank of India and government-mints is facing a unique problem of storage of coins and mints at times working in just one shift rather than usual three, still many vendors are continuing with faulty practice of giving candies, chocolates and other such unwanted items in place of balance coins. Many retailers have made it a practice to give candies and chocolates in place of coins even though they have sufficient coins in their cash-boxes. It is a noble way to earn extra profit through such forced sale of unwanted items devised in the days when coins were in scarcity.
The Central Government should take steps to stop such anti-consumer tactics by making provision to impose fine on traders who give candies, chocolates and other unwanted items in place of balance coins to consumers. RBI should direct all private and public sector banks to ensure sufficient coin-bags of each denomination especially of rupees one and five at all their branches so that these may be available on demand to any one irrespective of being customer of the bank.
Production of coins of rupees two should be stopped by increasing production of one-rupee coins because it is quite often that one-rupee coin is not given back as balance of two-rupee coin due to unavailability of one-rupee coin-bags. Coins should only be in denominations of rupees one and five.
Subhash Chandra Agrawal
Herculean task
The 6th and penultimate phase of election during summer months in northern part of India is most tiresome one in General election history. Fifty nine seats were on for voting and it was a crucial one for the ruling party and the opposition. The turnout in the 5th phase was not encouraging and it should be compensated in this phase of election. Fortunately for the voters there is no rain to disrupt voting and there were no untoward incident. It is a herculean task to conduct elections in a peaceful way and that too in a democratic manner. The Election Commission deserves all praise and the team of officials who took part in the election process deserves all the accolades for doing the job in the best interest of the country.
C.K. Ramani
(The views expressed by the author in the article are his/her own.)
