No deal on office-of-profit Bill: CPI

New Delhi, July 26: Irked by the UPA government's ''weak defence'' on price rise and the RBI hiking reverse repo rates, the Communist Party of India( CPI) today asked the Congress-led coalition to review both the decisions saying these would neither help contain inflation nor economic growth.

Talking to UNI, the top leadership of the party clearly said there was no question of the Left entering into a deal with the Manmnohan Singh government on the office-of-profit issue by giving concessions on the Pension Bill.

He refuted reports appearing in a section of the media that the Left parties had entered into a deal with the government by ''diluting'' its stand on the Pension Bill to save their 10 MPs from disqualification.

''We are not offering any concession on this issue. No deal has been struck.. We are not in the habit of striking deals,'' CPI General Secretary A B Bardhan said.

On Finance Minister P Chidambaram's ''weak defence'' in the Rajya Sabha, he said, ''Mr Chimbaram's defence is no defence at all. He has not responded to the suggestions made by the Left which include stopping forward trading in foodgrains, pulses and others by coporate houses as well as wholesale traders.'' He urged the government to start state purchases and ensure that coporate houses and wholesale dealers did not indulge in hoarding.

Party national secretary Shamim Faizi said if the government had responded to the Left's suggestions, prices would have been contained by now.

The CPI leaders also emphasised the need to streamline the Public Distribution System which they alleged, had been demolished after the previous NDA regime changed the policies to help traders.

On the RBI hiking reverse repo rate, the Left leaders dubbed this as a ''half hearted measure'' and asked the government to instead review its financial policy in a comprehensive manner.

''Lending rates have been increased while no concessions have been announced for the depositors, they added.

Commenting on Union Commerce Minister Kamal Nath's statment on failure of Doha-round of talks at Geneva on July 23 and 24, Mr Bardhan said, ''We had always said the talks should have been avoided.'' He said while developed nations, particularly the US, provided huge subsidies to the agriculture sector, they wanted India to bring down its tarrif rates.

He said, ''This is not acceptable to the developing countries'' ''Mr Kamal Nath should have realised this much earlier. He should now strengthen the G-20 to foil the plots of the US and the EU countries to protect our agrarain economy,'' Mr Faizi said.

Later at a press conference, the CPI(M) leaders- Sitaram Yechury and Basudev Acharia also made it clear that there was no question of entering into a deal with the government on the Pension Bill vis a vis the Office of profit. ''These are not acceptable to us.'' ''The huge Pension Fund managers should be the Public Sector companies and it should not find a way to the Stock market. The ball is in the goverment's court now, we have made our position very clear.'' They said the world experience showed that handing over the Fund in private hands and investment in the speculative market always hit the workers interests.

''Our view is that the Fund investments be made in public sector companies, the UTI mutual funds or several such options.

On the Banking Regulation Amendment, the Left leaders said they were opposed to the Bill as the government wanted to remove ten per cent cap on voting rights and investors with equity would get voting rights commensurate with their shares. They said even the NDA government retained the ''safeguard'' of voting rights being restricted to ten per cent.

On India's latest stand on the WTO, the CPI(M) leaders said, ''no agreement is better than the bad agreement.'' The leaders demanded that the government should bring in the long pending Women's Reservaiton, Unorganised Workers and Tribal bills in the ongoing session.

On the Tribals Bill, they said there were definitely ''some practical difficulties'' pertaining to the cut off date, the status of other communities and granting of recognition.

UNI