The entitlement state

In Budget season the emphasis always, and most especially at this juncture with our dependence on external capital being what it is, is on the numbers. Will the subsidy bill be appreciably lower than the 2.6 per cent of GDP at which it was pegged by the Kelkar panel in September 2012, before the first diesel price correction? The removal of the subsidy on bulk users like railways at the start of 2013 comes too late in the current fiscal year to make much of an impact, but it is an excellent move, and will hopefully lead to improvements in use efficiency.

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