40 SOCIAL SCIENTIST But perhaps the government has a different picture in mind: the freeze combined with the other steps may bring down prices so swiftly and sharply that real wages may not after all fall very much. If this is the thinking, it needs to be elaborated and substantiated. That this could happen at all is doubtful; in view of what we have said before about the perceptible laxity in applying other concomitant measures, the doubt is still greater. But it may be objected, what about the recent stabilization in prices? Is that not an indication that we have turned the corner? Let us examine this phenomenon carefully. Price Stabilisation ? The prices of major foodgrains usually show a distinct pattern of seasonal movement. Rice prices for example reach their peak around September after which there is a fall as hoarders disgorge their stocks to make room for the new harvest; this fall is sustained by arrivals of the new grain on the market until about January, after which prices begin to increase. A similar phenomenon occurs in case of wheat; peak prices obtain usually around February, after which there is a fall until about May, when prices begin to increase. If the volume of stocks is increasing over time, this fact does not negate the seasonality of price movements; if anything it makes the seasonal movement in either direction more pronounced with a net upward twist to prices which makes them on average higher than what simple demand-supply considerations would suggest. We saw in section III the perverse behaviour of seasonal declines; that the declines were greater in 1972-73 than in 1971-72, a fact we attributed to speculative stock-holding in 1972. Similarly the subsequent seasonal increase was sharper in 1973 than in 1972, and in 1972 than in 1971. The curious thing however was that for the 1973-74 crop season, the seasonal declines did not take place as usual. After a slight fall in September, rice prices increased until November; there was a fall in December, after which prices rose steadily. Similarly, for wheat the usual fall after February did not take place in 1974; instead there was a sharp increase. We thus have a break in the seasonal pattern, the reasons for which need investigation: perhaps for rice the announcement of sharply increased procurement prices interfered with the seasonal fall, and for wheat the confusion surrounding the takeover of wholesale trade had a similar effect. This break however meant that producers and traders found themselves (a) overstocked, and (b) overstocked with relatively old grain. To talk of overstocking does not imply that stocks would not have increased, but perhaps for the various contingent reasons mentioned they increased faster than hoarders might have desired; what is more important, the mix between old and new grain was different from the desired one. A certain amount of destocking was therefore inevitable; it came when prices, themselves pushed up higher than they mi^ht have been owin^ to this possible overstocking, reached a plateau in September. The fall in rice prices in October of course coincides with the usual seasonal fall; for wheat it