We become poorer every time they promise to enrich us.

"On the 75th anniversary of India's Independence, Prime Minister Narendra Modi pitched for the country's transformation to newer heights, new levels of prosperity, world-class modern infrastructure, and access to quality facilities for all Indians irrespective of the region or class they belong in the next 25 years," The Indian Express (TIE). He announced a new 'Prime Minister Gati Shakti national master plan' which will be worth Rs 100 trillion "worth of infrastructure schemes that will generate employment opportunities". In an interview, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said, "Fuel prices will feed into inflation, all of us are aware of it." Crude oil prices were $90-$100 a barrel till 2014 and then dropped to $30-40 per barrel from 2015 onwards, macrotrends.net. In April 2020, the price of US oil turned negative for the first time in history, BBC. "Demand for oil has all but dried up as lockdowns across the world have kept people inside. As a result, oil firms have resorted to renting tankers to store the surplus supply and that has forced the price of US oil into negative territory. The price of a barrel of West Texas Intermediate (WTI), the benchmark for US oil fell as low a minus $37.63 a barrel." But this dramatic fall in the price of oil was not passed on to Indian customers. Why? "Yes, because we needed resources for the infrastructure and those were the times where we were very clearly coming up with a big plan for building the fundamental infrastructure," said Sitharaman. Eminently laudable. Why then are we forced to pay enormous toll tax to drive on so-called highways? Toll tax between Delhi and Jaipur is Rs 320 for a distance of 281 km, tollbetween.com. It takes 4hrs and 59 min to travel 281 km which means an average speed of 56 km/hour. What kind of highway is this? Distance between Delhi and Mumbai is 1415 km with 21 toll plazas on the way extracting Rs 1405 for one way and takes 1 full day, tollbetween.com. That is almost Re 1 per km. and these could be old charges. "The government would have easily given relief from high oil prices if it did not have to bear the cost of oil bonds that the previous government had issued to companies," said Sitharaman couple of days back. Actually, the previous government from 2014-2019 was also a Modi government with absolute majority, wikipedia. She means the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government led by the Congress Party which was in power from 2004-2014, wikipedia. They issued bonds to oil companies in lieu of cash to keep fuel prices under control when crude oil was around $100 a barrel. The total cost of oil bonds issued by the UPA government was Rs 1.34 trillion and repayment is not due till 2025-26. Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala alleged that the Modi government has "extorted" Rs 22. 33,868 trillion in the last 7 years and this "Modi Tax" on petrol and diesel will amount to Rs 4.53,812 trillion in 2020-21 alone, Economic Times (ET). He accused Sitharaman of lying. Is the stock market in bubble zone? "But it couldn't have sustained itself through 2020 Covid and through the second wave Covid and enter into the second half of 2021. So, it's not a blip is what I feel," she said. "I do not think fundamentally there is anything that you can talk about in this market because according to all fundamental metrics, the market is extremely overvalued. There is promoter after promoter selling their stake in their companies," said Rajat Sharma. "And I am not talking about IPOs, I am talking about listed companies where promoters are reducing their stakes." This is the same Ms Sitharaman who revealed a dramatic stimulus package worth an eye-watering Rs 20 trillion over 5 suspenseful days in May 2020, Times of India (TOI). Global securities research firm Sanford Bernstein termed it a "wasted opportunity", Hindustan Times (HT). Of the total of $280 billion, "credit guarantees were around $62 billion and liquidity support from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) around $108 billion. Government programs of $173 billion includes $132 billion of loans, $24 billion of fiscal support (0.9% of GDP)", the report said. Instead of Rs 20 trillion in stimulus they have sucked over Rs 20 trillion in taxes. Now Modi is talking of Rs 100 trillion. Terrifying.