“The union government will do the needful to check spiralling prices of essential commodities,” Finance Minister P Chidambaram told reporters after his convocation address at the Women’s Christian College here.

The inflation has been hovering at seven per cent for the last few weeks and a part of it has been due to rise in the prices of food items.

For the week ended on April 12, the rate stood at 7.33 per cent from 7.14 per cent in the previous week.
However, government measures like banning exports of non-basmati rice and making imports of edible oil cheaper, have led to softening of prices of these items. Chidambaram also said the reservation in education for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, backward classes and women should be viewed as an affirmative action to democratise the education system.

Observing that India’s education system has been under performing at various levels, he said about 7.6 million children who ought to be in school were out of it.

“To effectively strengthen the education system, the outlay for the current year under ‘Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan’ had been increased to Rs 13,100 crore,” said the finance minister.

He added that in 2008-09, two lakh teachers were expected to be appointed and another two lakh class rooms would be built.

Enrollment ration

The government, he said, would also take steps to raise the Gross Enrollment Ratio, the proportion of school-leaving children admitted to a college or university, from 11.6 per cent to 15 per cent by end of the 11th five year plan.