BOOK REVIBW ^ that a monopolist is one who is the sole producer of any product, they have attempted to liberate most of the big monopoly houses from clutches of licencing authorities and Monopolies Commission. And secondly, they have advanced a vogorous plea for the relaxation of control over the whole range of monopolists and oligopolists - Under the pretext of increasing production to meet the current shortages and inflationary pressures, They have proclaimed that their measures are "only temporary to meet a temporary situation" ! But what they have really suggested are basic concessions which will have far-reaching and long-term repercussions. They recognise that there is considerable excess capacity in these oligopolistic industries partly on account of their tendency to maximise their gains by keeping production below capacity and partly due to shortages in basic investment goods such as steel and cement as well as power besides shortages ofimportant raw materials like cotton, oilseeds, sugar-cane, etc. Nevertheless, th^y are inclined to attribute the current shortages to faulty industrial policy and its application. They feel that the. lack of response of the corporate sector to the recent liberalisation of licencing measures aimed at the expansion and creation of capacity, is attributable to some "genuine question about industrial climate of which Indus* trial policy is one of the main determinants". This is rather a strange diagnosis. If excess capacity is due to shortages of investment goods and basic raw materials, the removal of these bottlenecks shoud have been the sheet-anchor of their policy prescription. Instead, they have used "industrial climate" as a launching pad for a series of concessions to monopoly/oligopoly firms. These concessions are in the nature of a strategic withdrawal which will have serious repercussions on the structure of industry over a long-period. For instance, by no stretch of imagination can licencing for new capacity be regarded as a short-term measure. Licences issued today will take a couple of years to mature into creation of additional capacity. Once capacity is created it cannot be liquidated— it should not be liquidated—even in the long run. The six economists cannot be oblivious of the long-term implications of liberalised licencing for expanded capacity. What they really mean, therefore, is to allow monopolistic and oligopolistic firms to grow over a long period in the name of dealing with current shortages in production. One might ask why production cannot be increased by encouraging small and medium firms. But the six economists do not believe that the small and medium firms can deliver the goods. Here again their position is ambivalent though they could not conceal their bias. On the one hand they appear to support the "policy of diverting existing lines of production to small/medium firms as also of encouraging them to take to new lines of production over a long-period". But they deplore that "there is no escape" from this policy. Their prejudice against the small and medium firms is, perhaps, based on their poor performance in the current crisis. They have not cared to analyse whether the shortages in investment