More often than not, we wonder when a credible aspirant could not make it through the interview. And when this happens we look at the sample papers he/she has written before, to see what went wrong and compare the ones who got through.The answer we always found is simplicity. Both have written same content but the way it was represented , makes all the difference.
If we draw little analogy from famous yet brilliant movies , for eg:- Pulp Fiction(English) ,Sholay(Hindi) , Nayagan (Tamil) ,Godavari (Telugu) ,Gapa helebi Sata( Odia) , The Good Road (Gujrati) – Naagarahaavu (Kannada), Manichitrathazhu(Malaylam), Shwaas (Marathi) , Aparajita Tumi(Bengali) – the story line is not out of the box , but their representation was out of the box and that is why they got the success.A credible aspirant with incredible dedication when could not get the success – the reason behind this is simple – He/She has all the content , but the write-up was complex , superfluous and unnecessary adjectives make the reading cumbersome.
*The movies we have picked only for cause of explanation .
Civil services examinations are not there to show our literary skills , but to show the depth of our understanding. It has always been difficult to write the complex things in the simpler way.If you look at the best leaders – they have always followed simplicity. Their writing rarely have a wasted word, that means they have deeper understanding of things compared to other.
Another example would be , all of us would have come across editorials of Hindu newspaper, when a particular journalist or people from other profession writes a piece , more often than not we find it non-engaging .But when we come across an article written by serving/retired bureaucrats , we know how engaging it is.
One such inspiring article one would be this:-
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/pulling-a-village-out-of-poverty/article5797148.ece
In day-to-day life too, almost all of us use Google as our search engine. There were search engine before and after google, but there is only one google. Its algorithm is one the most complex , as we have heard.So while the background , or thoughts in our mind can be complex , it is essential to represent them in simple manner.Simplicity appeals to everyone, it helps you connect with the reader , not offend him/her with your literary arrogance (even though not intended) .
This exam does not demand greater skills ,it demands greater understanding .
“If you can’t explain it to a six-year-old, you probably don’t understand it yourself.” – Albert Einstein
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Petrol in India is cheaper than in countries like Hong Kong, Germany and the UK but costlier than in China, Brazil, Japan, the US, Russia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, a Bank of Baroda Economics Research report showed.
Rising fuel prices in India have led to considerable debate on which government, state or central, should be lowering their taxes to keep prices under control.
The rise in fuel prices is mainly due to the global price of crude oil (raw material for making petrol and diesel) going up. Further, a stronger dollar has added to the cost of crude oil.
Amongst comparable countries (per capita wise), prices in India are higher than those in Vietnam, Kenya, Ukraine, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Venezuela. Countries that are major oil producers have much lower prices.
In the report, the Philippines has a comparable petrol price but has a per capita income higher than India by over 50 per cent.
Countries which have a lower per capita income like Kenya, Bangladesh, Nepal, Pakistan, and Venezuela have much lower prices of petrol and hence are impacted less than India.
“Therefore there is still a strong case for the government to consider lowering the taxes on fuel to protect the interest of the people,” the report argued.
India is the world’s third-biggest oil consuming and importing nation. It imports 85 per cent of its oil needs and so prices retail fuel at import parity rates.
With the global surge in energy prices, the cost of producing petrol, diesel and other petroleum products also went up for oil companies in India.
They raised petrol and diesel prices by Rs 10 a litre in just over a fortnight beginning March 22 but hit a pause button soon after as the move faced criticism and the opposition parties asked the government to cut taxes instead.
India imports most of its oil from a group of countries called the ‘OPEC +’ (i.e, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Kuwait, United Arab Emirates, Russia, etc), which produces 40% of the world’s crude oil.
As they have the power to dictate fuel supply and prices, their decision of limiting the global supply reduces supply in India, thus raising prices
The government charges about 167% tax (excise) on petrol and 129% on diesel as compared to US (20%), UK (62%), Italy and Germany (65%).
The abominable excise duty is 2/3rd of the cost, and the base price, dealer commission and freight form the rest.
Here is an approximate break-up (in Rs):
a)Base Price | 39 |
b)Freight | 0.34 |
c) Price Charged to Dealers = (a+b) | 39.34 |
d) Excise Duty | 40.17 |
e) Dealer Commission | 4.68 |
f) VAT | 25.35 |
g) Retail Selling Price | 109.54 |
Looked closely, much of the cost of petrol and diesel is due to higher tax rate by govt, specifically excise duty.
So the question is why government is not reducing the prices ?
India, being a developing country, it does require gigantic amount of funding for its infrastructure projects as well as welfare schemes.
However, we as a society is yet to be tax-compliant. Many people evade the direct tax and that’s the reason why govt’s hands are tied. Govt. needs the money to fund various programs and at the same time it is not generating enough revenue from direct taxes.
That’s the reason why, govt is bumping up its revenue through higher indirect taxes such as GST or excise duty as in the case of petrol and diesel.
Direct taxes are progressive as it taxes according to an individuals’ income however indirect tax such as excise duty or GST are regressive in the sense that the poorest of the poor and richest of the rich have to pay the same amount.
Does not matter, if you are an auto-driver or owner of a Mercedes, end of the day both pay the same price for petrol/diesel-that’s why it is regressive in nature.
But unlike direct tax where tax evasion is rampant, indirect tax can not be evaded due to their very nature and as long as huge no of Indians keep evading direct taxes, indirect tax such as excise duty will be difficult for the govt to reduce, because it may reduce the revenue and hamper may programs of the govt.