NEW DELHI : The Government was committed to high growth and low inflation and would take every step to contain the price spiral, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram told the Lok Sabha on Tuesday.

He asked the States to take strong action against hoarders and blackmarketeers to ensure that supply channels were not choked. If need be, they should also invoke the Essential Commodities Act (ECA) to deal with the situation. Mr. Chidambaram argued that at times the prices of essential commodities rose due to choking of supply channels.

In the Rajya Sabha, he told members that the Government would ensure adequate supplies of essential commodities such as sugar and pulses, and, whenever deemed necessary, it would not hesitate to import.

Assuring members that prices would be kept under check by containing inflation, Mr. Chidambaram said: "We expect to contain inflation between four and five per cent this fiscal too. Last year, the Reserve Bank of India had indicated inflation at five per cent but we were able to keep it below five per cent."

However, not satisfied with his reply, the Opposition, led by former Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha staged a walkout.

Elaborating on the price situation in the Lok Sabha, he said inflation had to viewed in the context of the overall economic scenario. "In a developing country like India, with a high growth of eight per cent, some inflation is inevitable. When there was low inflation, the growth was also low. When credit expands, it impacts prices," he said.

Mr. Chidambaram noted that in the last couple of years, the prices of some commodities declined while in certain other items, they went up. As of now, the Government's immediate concern was to devise ways of tackling the rise in the prices of pulses, as there was a mismatch between demand and supply.

Hinting that the options before the Government were limited, he said "the production of pulses has stagnated over the years at 14 lakh tonnes, mainly because these are still grown on marginal land that is rain-fed. Only 50 per cent of the land under pulses is irrigated... As most of the pulses grown in India are specific to the sub continent there are very few options to import them."

As for sugar, the price increase was owing to the hike in international prices, mainly because cane was being diverted for producing ethanol.

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