Continuing its offensive on the United Progressive Alliance over its failure to curb the rising prices of essential commodities, the Communist Party of India-Marxist on Monday said it will stall the passage of the Forward Contract Regulation Amendment Bill, which will enable foreign direct investment and foreign institutional investment in the commodities market, in Parliament.
"Two weeks before Parliament met, the government promulgated the Forward Contract Regulation Amendment ordinance. This is an undemocratic move and we will not allow the passage of the Bill," party general secretary Prakash Karat said on the third day of the ongoing 19th party congress in Coimbatore.
Criticising the government for the price rise, he said some of its policies are detrimental to the efforts it appears to be making to tackle the issue. "This government has the strange habit of taking away with its left hand what it gives with the right hand. So, when it appears to be doing something to stall the rising prices, it is also adopting policies that will fuel price rise. If FDIs and FIIs are allowed, the prices of commodities will further rise," Karat said.
The party had on Sunday suggested a number of measures to handle the issue. "The Cabinet, I am informed, is meeting today to discuss this issue. We will wait and see what emerges from this meeting and then take things forward," Karat said.
He also said some political parties have approached the CPI(M) requesting it to join them and launch a nationwide agitation. "We are talking to some of the parties. Any party -- excluding the National Democratic Alliance allies -- is welcome to join us on this issue," he said.
The party also adopted a resolution on the public distribution system. PDS has been deliberately weakened, the resolution said, first by replacing the universal PDS by a targetted PDS in 1997 and then by gradually weakening the system of public procurement and cutting back on food grain allocation to the states.
'The impact of a weakened PDS is felt today, as prices of food and other essential commodities rise steeply. The government has failed to bring about any improvement in domestic food production and in public procurement,' the resolution said, stressing the need for the reintroduction of universal PDS.
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