Another area of ‘wasteful expenditure’ that this column has campaigned tirelessly against is government housing. If the prime minister moves his ministers into smaller bungalows on the vast grounds of Rashtrapati Bhawan, as I have suggested before in this space, he will free up some of the most expensive real estate in India. An acre of land in Lutyens’ Delhi has a market value of more than Rs 100 crore so if the government makes good use of this land it would probably pay our oil bill. The next move should be to bundle all our Members of Parliament into a hostel of some kind like the old Akbar Hotel. They have no business to be living in huge flats and houses at our expense, especially since the vast majority of the people they represent live in single-room tenements. This is all they can afford. Land prices in cities like Delhi and Mumbai are artificially high because politicians and officials are sitting on acres and acres of very expensive real estate.

Now that the prime minister has personally urged an austerity drive, let him tackle the big issues of ‘wasteful expenditure’. India has more than enough foreign exchange now so there is no reason for us to grudge our hard-working ministers a summer holiday in some exotic destination. It costs us nothing compared to what we spend on housing them and subsidising the standard of living they have grown accustomed to. The PM promised administrative reforms when he got his job four years ago. Here is his chance to deliver.