CPI(M) wants White Paper on sops to investors during DMK rule

Chennai, Jul 22: The CPI(M) today (Jul 22) demanded that the state government present a White Paper, detailing the sops given to investors in the previous DMK rule, the ''losses incurred thereof,'' and the employment generated from the investments that came to the state in the past five years.

"The government should present a White Paper on the various Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) entered with different large corporates in the last five years (of the DMK regime). This should be presented before the Assembly and the facts debated upon," CPI (M) state unit secretary G Ramakrishnan said.

Addressing a press conference here, he said that the aforesaid demand among many others covering state's economy, agriculture and others had been presented to Chief Minister Jayalalithaa as a memorandum on Thursday.

"The details should include the investment made in respective sectors, the sops offered by the government and the losses incurred due to that, the number of direct and indirect employment opportunities that were generated and how the people of the respective districts (where the businesses came up) benefited from them," he said.

The previous DMK regime had made efforts to attract huge foreign investment in various sectors such as Automobile, Telecommunication and Information Technology a poll issue besides others.

Major international players such as Hyundai and Ford Motors (Auto), Nokia (Telecom) besides scores of major IT brands have invested in the state.

Ramakrishnan, who said that future investment and related activities should be "transparent," also demanded that the state enacted a new law to recognise trade unions, as there was no such provision in vogue at present.

PTI