Haryana’s Byzantine law

Reference to ‘75% jobs for locals’; Haryana owes its economic progress to its ability to provide high-class streamlined infrastructure to national and global companies. By enacting a law to reserve jobs for locals, the government is creating barriers in Modi’s agenda of ease of doing business. This is a retrograde step and is an admission by the state of its inability to skill its youth and thereafter erect hurdles in labour mobility. It is also against the federal spirit of our Constitution. The country is moving towards unified fiscal and economic policies, while Haryana is turning the wheel in reverse. It should not be allowed to go ahead with the Byzantine law. Public employment cannot be given on the basis of domicile, then how can private jobs?

Rajiv Boolchand Jain, Zirakpur

Right to block movement

Our Constitution provides for a series of rights that can be exercised as and when the situation so warrants, but we fail to realise that no right is absolute. The right to protest in a peaceful way is taken as the right to block the movement of people or goods indefinitely. This was witnessed in Delhi in earlier days of the year and is being practiced in Punjab for the past couple of weeks. The government must ensure that the common man is not deprived of his right to movement.

SL Singhal, Noida

Economic policy

Apropos of the encyclopaedic piece on the journey of economics thought, ‘The perils of banking on business economics’; the writer has depicted important points of evolution of economic theory and policy. The world has become too complex and business economics alone cannot unravel the mysteries of unexplained phenomena. Pure economics will have to liberate itself from the unrealistic assumptions like well-behaved production functions or economic man as a calculating machine.

Rakesh Sudan, Kurukshetra

Decision too late

Some governments have banned the use of crackers to avoid air pollution, particularly during the pandemic. The decision is good but the intimation could have been given at least a month before Diwali. Many small shopkeepers have bought crackers from factories for selling. Retailers were already incurring losses due to the lockdown. Since Diwali is one of the biggest festivals in India, strategic planning should have been done in the past months.

Raghav Singla, by mail

Undue haste

Refer to ‘Jan Manch programme to be resumed’, why is the HP Government in so much hurry to organise Jan Manch, while the Covid cases are still rising in the state? In the Jan Manch programme, there will be a gathering and maintaining social distancing won’t be an easy task. This will lead to rise in infection. The government should organise e-JanManch, in which MLAs, ministers or local officials concerned listen to the grievances of people through video-conferencing at a designated place.

Ritish Pandit, Dehra Gopipur

Drug racket

Refer to the arrest of a proclaimed offender and a Punjabi film producer, both reported to be connected to Bhola’s drug racket; the government must come out with a White Paper on this racket so that the public can know about those involved. Families have been ruined monetarily and have lost their sons to drugs. The involvement of people from Punjabi film industry is shocking, as was the reported involvement and investment of certain gangsters in the kabaddi league. The government has succeeded in breaking the supply chain, but large consignments of contraband drugs are still confiscated on the border regularly. Coordinated efforts by the Centre, state government and the people of the border state are a must.

BRIJ BHUSHAN GOYAL, LUDHIANA

Hookah culture

Many new shops are selling tobacco in Kaithal district. These shops are run by jobless youths. Shops are situated mostly at village bus stops, crossings and tri-junctions. These shops are promoting tobacco use and providing hookahs. Many young people and students are seen smoking at these shops throughout the day. These shops have become open hookah bars. This is dangerous for our youth. The Haryana health authorities must take prompt action.

Kuldeep Kundu Titram, by mail

Golden writing tool

‘Love for the fountain pen’ brought back memories of schooldays. I won accolades from my Urdu teacher for the efforts put in by the golden pen with a metal nib. Smooth flow and a good handwriting were the hallmarks of these pens. It was on Gandhi’s insistence to make swadeshi products that jeweller Kasuri Venkat Ratnam, hailing from Andhra Pradesh, made an indigenous pen, ‘Ratnamson’, in 1933. Gandhi continued to use it until his last. From Nehru, Rajendra Prasad, Ambedkar and Indira Gandhi to Modi, these locally developed pens have struck a chord.

Vijay Singh Adhikari, Nainital

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