CPI(M) asks Centre to release flood aid for all States

Gulbarga, Aug 22: Appealing to the Centre to allocate funds to all the flood affected states on par without showing any discrimination, the CPI(M) today said his party would raise the issue in Parliament.

Talking to newspersons here, CPI(M) Central Committee member Suneet Chopra, however, denied the charge that the Centre was meting out stepmotherly treatement to Karnataka and pointed out that Rajasthan, despite being a BJP-ruled State, had been allocated funds.

He alleged that the wrong policies of successive Governments had led to the suicide of more than a lakh farmers in the country.

Dismissing the charge that the CPI(M) was remaining silent while their party Government in West Bengal was implementing privatisation and globalisation and borrowing money from the World Bank, the senior party leader made it clear that the party was watching the nature of agreements reached by the Government with the World Bank.

''The rules and regulations being set by the World Bank are different in West Bengal from other States because it is a Communist Government,'' Mr Chopra claimed.

Expressing displeasure over the Union rpt Union Government's ''anti-people'' policies, he alleged that land reforms were being reversed and rich agricultural land to be distributed to landless farmers were being given to multi-national companies in the name of industrial development.

Mr Chopra demanded that the Centre reduce the 57 per cent tax on petroleum products, instead of hiking fuel prices at frequent intervals. The CPI(M) would take the issue to the streets and launch agitational programmes against the ''anti-people'' policies of the Government in 200 places.

Taking exception to the BJP creating an uproar in Parliament, he said ''the BJP is discrediting our parliamentary system by stalling proceedings constantly.''

UNI