How much more can we take?

People are being tested like never before with the high inflation. What is our threshold?

Prices have been rising in the last three years more than ever before. The dollar that was worth between Rs50-60 for almost seven years has now risen to above Rs85. Many food items cost two times as much as they did, say, five years ago. And in fact this applies not just to food but many other necessities of life. Take for instance clothing or housing. As far as the latter is concerned, one can just forget about purchasing a house – or even a flat – with today’s property prices. Ironically, all these items are included in the ruling party’s motto of ‘Roti, kapra aur makaan’.

A visit to the utility store, where food items are subsidised by the government, woke me up. I saw hordes of people waiting to purchase sugar for Rs61 per kilo, compared to twenty rupees or more in the market. I encountered one man, who told me that he had been waiting in line for six hours. He told me he worked in a small store and couldn’t afford to take time off for fear of being fired, but also cannot afford to buy sugar at Rs80.

My maid, who earns Rs6,000 per month, asked for eidee and we offered to give her either food rations or new clothes. She chose clothes, telling my mother that whatever she wore were hand-me-downs from the begums she worked for and that she hadn’t been able to afford new clothes in almost four years. “Do we eat or make new clothes?” she said, with astounding conviction that melted my mother’s heart.

People are being tested like never before with the high inflation. High prices mean a marked reduction in people’s lifestyle and a battle for survival that the lower economic classes seem to be losing. More and more people are taking their lives as a result of poverty – and this has been accompanied by a rise in petty crimes and begging. It is only a matter of how much more we can take. What is our threshold? How much more can we take? Beyond this is a nightmarish situation for not only the rulers but the country as a whole. The awam don’t seem to care about how inflation is to be brought under control, they just want it to be done – and want someone to do it sooner than later.

Having said that, it remains to be seen who will be able to do this. It seems that many people consider the present government not really in a good position to do this – so far they think it hasn’t done a very good job. Time, as they say, is running out the people of this country.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 7^th, 2010.