Beware the FOMC.

"India's government instituted a 10% education-and-employment quota for Economically Weaker Sections (EWS) ineligible for the 49.5% of most public jobs and seats reserved for scheduled caste (SC), scheduled tribe (ST) and other backward class (OBC) applicants; and to qualify as an EWS candidate, the property owned by one's family had to be below certain size levels, with annual income from all sources under Rs 8 lakh (Rs 800,000)," Mint. In addition to annual family income below Rs 800,000, ownership of agricultural land must be below 5 acres and residence below 1000 square feet, cleartax. A study of data from the Periodic Labor Force Survey (PLFS) in 2018 and 2019 by Shamika Ravi and Mudit Kapoor revealed that of those households which do not belong to SC, ST or OBC categories, "99% of rural and 95% of urban homes earned under Rs 66,667 per month, the Center's EWS cap". If an average of 97% of people are economically weak because of earnings less than Rs 800,000 per year, why do we pay income tax on annual income in excess of Rs 250,000? IT Dept. After all many households have just one earning member. If millions are in the EWS category how do they choose the 10% who deserve help? Indians are going to be hit very hard financially. Fuel prices have remained unchanged since 4 November, NDTV, because of elections in 5 states between 14 February and 7 March, wikipedia. Now that elections are over, prices of petrol and diesel are expected to spike by Rs 15-22 per liter, BS. International price of Brent crude is $125 per barrel this morning, oilprice. After falling to 77 against the dollar yesterday, the rupee is firmer this morning at 76.75 to the US dollar, xe. It's a double whammy because, not only is the price of oil in dollars much higher, but since a dollar buys more rupees it multiplies the cost to us. "Western countries could face oil prices of over $300 per barrel and a possible closure of the main Russia-Germany gas pipeline if governments follow through on threats to cut energy supplies from Russia," ET. A $10 rise in the price of crude will raise retail inflation by 49 basis points (bps) and fiscal deficit by 43 bps of GDP, wrote Roshan Kishore in January. For some mysterious reason the Economic Survey 2022 based its projections assuming crude at $70-75 per barrel when Brent crude was already at around $90, moneycontrol. "The surge in edible and crude oil prices are bound to feed into headline inflation, which has already breached the upper tolerance limit of the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) 2%-6% target range," ET. "Central banks are in a bind - if they act aggressively to contain inflation which may perhaps subside as normalcy returns, they run the risk of setting in recession," said Governor of RBI Shaktikanta Das. Of course it will, but can you wait? India's retail inflation was 6.01% in January, BS, well before the Ukraine problem started. The RBI chose to sit on a negative real interest rate of 4% in February, TOI. The price of petrol in the US is over $4 a barrel, eia.gov. The Federal Reserve Open Market Committee (FOMC) will announce their Funds rate on 16 March, Fed, which may put further pressure on the rupee. Had the RBI controlled inflation earlier there would be no panic now. Just do your job. Don't blame others.