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Letters

LPG Cylinders Dearer
It refers to steep hike of rupees 86 in cost of domestic LPG cylinders now making it at rupees 737. Such regular fluctuation in prices of petroleum products because of fluctuation in prices of crude oil in the global market disturbs household budgets of common people.

It is a usual phenomenon that prices once raised are never brought down with all benefit of lowering prices of petroleum products being grabbed by industry and owners of commercial vehicles. Prices of petroleum products should not be lowered in case of fall in global crude prices. Money so saved because of reduction of crude prices should be accumulated in a reserve-fund to overcome future rise in crude prices without raising further prices of petrol and diesel.

Central government instead of requiring people with annual income exceeding rupees ten lakhs voluntarily surrendering LPG subsidy, should instead make it compulsory to file affidavit about income-certificate of the family for availing LPG subsidy.

Union government should further save by merging all public-sector oil-companies into a single company to avoid unnecessary expenses on overheads and advertisements separately by different public-sector oil-companies. There should be uniform prices of petroleum products throughout the country in round figures like in multiples of rupees 50 for LPG cooking gas, and in complete one rupee for diesel and petrol avoiding problem of change.
Madhu Agrawal, Delhi

American Way
During his election campaign, Donald Trump vowed to subject all potential immigrants to rigorous screening, only those who share Americal values were to be allowed entry. But this is nothing new. Right from the McCarthy era, monitoring of un-American activities were in place, leading to the infamous trial of Bertolt Brechet. Even in the nineties, mentors quizzed their foreign graduate students about their political leanings. Students harbouring socialist, communist or Anarchist opinions were likely to be denied the possibility of landing a job in the USA upon gradutaion, leading to their ultimate eviction. White American students, who form a voluntary vigilante group, also zealously participate in this veiled interrogation technique. Since the USA is a formally democratic country, there is no official order asking the students in question to leave, but what books they read, what kind of music they listen to, what movies they watch, are silently watched. If a foreign student is suspected to be sympathetic to the black or latino community, so much the worse for him. In the highly regimented society of the USA, thought control has reached an unthinkable level, hence foreigners who had not been subjected to the American way [Amway] of life, are always suspect.
Azad Mahmud, Kolkata

A ‘Patriotic’ Father
Mohammed Sartaj, father of slayed Muslim ‘terrorist’, ‘Saifullah has disowned his son. Well-done and thanks to Indian Home Minister Rajnath Singh and main opposition party in Parliament, Congress for praising this a ‘patriotic’ father. But did India disown those ‘terrorists’ who executed 1984, 1992, 2002 and 2005 genocide of minorities to different parts of India? No, on the contrary many of these ‘terrorists’ were crowned as PM, Depury PM and Governors. When will India disown this lot!
Shamsul Islam, New Delhi

Frontier
Vol. 49, No.38, Mar 26 - April 1, 2017