Excelsior Correspondent
JAMMU, Nov 17: Expressing concern over the multifarious problems being faced by the common man in the wake of demonetisation, chairman of the National Panthers Party (NPP) and former Minister, Harsh Dev Singh has called the Union Govt to appropriately address the crisis like situation by ensuring adequate flow of new currency notes.
In a press statement here Mr Singh said that with people’s anger over currency drought mounting with each passing day, it is was increasingly being felt that Govt should have chosen a better way to combat black money. He said that the scrapping of prevalent currency had a devastating effect upon the common man, farmers, labourers, small traders, truckers and those working in rural areas. He said that currency squeeze was taking a heavy toll on sowing, people were feeling harassed in paying for weddings, medical emergency and even for groceries.
Mr Singh said that while fight against corruption was welcome but the Govt could have explored other available options as well. He said that even the former RBI Governor Mr Rajan had disapproved of demonetisation on the grounds that it was “old fashioned tool” and that big black money hoarders would always find escape routes. He regretted that the better options of stronger tax administration and realigning taxes proposed by several economists had been down played and discarded by the Govt.
Pointing towards the political overtones of the demonetization move, NPP leader said that currency scrapping was largely aimed at countering the public taunting for Modi’s claims of Rs 15 lakh for every citizen account after bringing back the black money stashed abroad. He said that the only noticeable fall out of the demonetization exercise was the large scale conversion of currency notes into gold, dollars, real estate besides other forms of money laundering. He said that demonetisation had further been followed by opening large number of bank accounts with black money being deposited into them as well as in Jan Dhan Yojana accounts which were literally bought by the big hoarders from poor people.
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