Govt inviting trouble by violating CMP:Left

New Delhi, Apr 14: Anguished over the ruling UPA's move to invest Rs 10,000 crore of the postal funds in the stock exchange, the Left parties today said the Manmohan Singh Government might ''invite trouble'' if it continued to violate the National Common Minimum Programme (NCMP) in letter and spirit.

Describing the plan on investing postal funds in the stock exchange as 'anti-people', they said the move could further dent the credibility of the coalition.

In separate interviews to UNI, the Left leaders said the Manmohan Sing government, which completes two years in office next month, " will have to pay a heavy price for its acts of omission and commission if it does not mend its ways." The Department of Posts( DoP) will invest Rs 10,000 crore from its life insurance schemes in the stock markets for better returns. This follows the Uunion Finance minsitry allowing the Departments to park these funds with special deposits until it identified outside investment opportunities, including investments in the stock markets.

CPI General Secretary A B Bardhan in a lengthy interview, said," The UPA government, on the economic scene, is taking more and more steps which are guided by the new economic liberalism." Mr Bardhan, a veteran communist and freedom fighter, quoting extensively, said the Government was ushering in an era of privatisation bit by bit,ignoring people's growing resistance to economic reforms in France, Britain,Greece, Russia and the Latin American countries." The Income Tax department is also being privatised by the Manmohan Singh government. The Department has started outsourcing some of its jobs to private parties.'' The CPI leader said the Government's latest proposal to invest the postal insurance funds in stock exchange is" highly unjustified and irrational as this is the last resource of livelihood for the senior citizens in the old age. Besides, the Government was disinvesting the PSUs in parts, he said adding that it was also out to liberalise the labour laws.

"Even as yet it has not been able to liberalise because of stiff resistance by the Left and the Trade Unions, yet these are being openly flouted by the owners and the government machinery.. The Union Labour ministry has become non-functional in the eyes of the workers..

"On the foreign policy front, the government seems to become the stooge of the US government... I don't say India has given in completely in this regard because this is too big a country and its populace, being politically conscious, will never allow any government to do it."

UNI