Surging prices of essential commodities of daily consumption such as rice, potato, onion, mustard oil, vegetables and so on, at regular or long intervals has been a common phenomenon in our society over the decades. It comes about when both supply and demand go off from the equilibrium position. Whatever it may be, the fact of the matter is that every time the prices of many of these basic items soar, every time it is the common man who is hard-hit, simply because it creates some damaging effect on his shoe-string monthly budget with which is has to run his family.
