The Hindu : National : Left unhappy with Government's attitude

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Friday, Nov 26, 2004

National

National

Left unhappy with Government's attitude

By K.V. Prasad

NEW DELHI, NOV. 25. After four rounds of meetings with the top leadership of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), the Left parties are concerned over the attitude of the Government in addressing the sensitivities of the parties supporting the Government from outside.

The general feeling among the Left parties was that the Manmohan Singh Government was ``not much bothered'' in addressing their concerns they had been raising from time to time, sources in the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Communist Party of India and the All India Forward Bloc said today.

The impression was that while the Coordination Committee of the Left parties and the UPA has held four rounds of talks, the Congress-led UPA appeared more willing to grant concessions to big businesses and addressing foreign investors, than taking steps to help the poor and downtrodden.

The sources said the Left leaders did not mince words during the Wednesday meeting and cited instances of how the Government preferred to keep aside the Left demands of not to raise prices of petroleum products and go ahead with raising of caps on foreign direct investment.

``We are supporting the UPA Government and attending the coordination committee meeting. The message going out is that we are supporting the steps being taken by the Government when in reality that is not the case,'' the AIFB general secretary, Debabrata Biswas, said here.

While the Left parties were satisfied with the decision of the Government not to hike the price of domestic cooking gas each month, the basic demand of lowering diesel price remained.

Freight charges

The decision today to raise the freight charges by Railways has been criticised by the left. The CPI national Secretary, D. Raja, said the move would result in a sharp increase in transportation and have an all-round affect. The UPA Government did not bother to consult the Left before deciding to hike.

Apparently there was a bit of showdown between the UPA Ministers and the Left leaders. In one case, remarks that the fiscal deficit situation and reigning oil prices had compelled the Government to raise the prices led to a retort that it was not just question of economics but politics too.

``The price rise has not gone down well with the people,'' remarked a Left leader even as a senior Congress leader pointed out that the manner in which a CPI Member of Parliament went public criticising the cutting down of the Parliament session did not bode well for the Government's credibility.

One major complaint was that the Government did not appear to be serious in implementing the Common Minimum Programme, which, they felt was more to elicit the Left support. The Left leaders said several points in the Programme had not even been touched upon so far.

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