The ongoing race between the rupee and petrol prices to cross the century-mark ruthlessly exposes the sheer unpreparedness of the government in managing the fuel price situation. At the time of writing, petrol prices are nearing Rs 90 per litre in Mumbai and diesel is retailing at near Rs 80 per litre. Until now, the Central government doesn’t seem to have a solid plan to contain the fuel price hikes.
At record-high levels, high petrol and fuel prices are creating nothing but panic among the general public that will exacerbate the situation when consumption spikes in anticipation of future hikes and Opposition parties use the opportunity to throng streets with protests, creating further panic. As far as petrol prices are concerned, the government has to come up with any solutions to hold back the price rise.
Instead, the ruling party has circulated a ridiculous bar chart to justify the government performance on fuel price management and create confusion. On Monday, the BJP’s official Twitter handle the fuel price hike that gave an impression of decline, at least going by the plotting of bars in the graphics, by showing a downward arrow to depict a rise in prices of petrol and diesel.
It wanted to show the percentage increase in fuel prices during the UPA era as being higher than in the NDA era — which is correct, but by putting a lower bar to show a higher price, the graphics appeared ridiculous and conceived as if to give a false impression to the audience that there is actually a decline in the fuel prices during the Narendra Modi tenure. Logically, the misrepresentation has come under heavy attack by Opposition parties and social media users. This is cruel joke to tell the common man reeling under the pressure of high fuel prices.
