The Left parties on Friday accused the United Progressive Alliance government of working to demolish the economy's strong fundamentals through acts like approving an insurance Bill that seeks to raise foreign direct investment cap in the sector to 49 per cent from 26 per cent now.
"Ever since the Left parties withdrew support, the Congress-led UPA is moving more and more rightwards. Despite the global financial crisis and its impact on India, the prime minister and the finance minister are determined to implement right-wing neoliberal economic policies," CPI national secretary D Raja told PTI.
He said the prime minister and the finance minister have claimed in Parliament that the impact of the global financial crisis had not impacted the Indian economy due to its strong fundamentals.
"The strong fundamentals are due to our public sector banks and insurance companies. But the Finance Minister is destroying and demolishing the strong fundamentals by opening up the insurance sector to foreign direct investment," Raja said.
The Communist Party of India Marxist, the largest among the Left parties, said the increase in FDI cap would lead to the outflow of Indian people's savings to lubricate speculative profits.
It maintained that the Left had not allowed the UPA to take this decision for the past four years.
Raja said it was the same Congress party which had 'shamelessly collaborated' with the BJP during the Natioonal Democratic Alliance rule to get a Bill, which raised the FDI cap to 26 per cent, passed.
The Union Cabinet on Thursday night approved the much-awaited
However, the Bill is unlikely to be passed by this Parliament due to lack of time, Finance Minister P Chidambaram said.
Maintaining that the insurance and banking employees were already on a 'warpath' against the government policies, Raja said the Left parties would strongly oppose the government decision when it comes to Parliament.
The CPI-M Politburo said the Left did not allow the government for the past four years to take such a step.
The Left's opposition was based on the understanding that 'in the interests of India and its economic fundamentals, the hard earned life-long savings of the Indian people in the insurance sector should not be put at the disposal of international finance capital that thrives on the basis of speculation.'
The CPI-M said it was due to 'Left's Opposition that India has been able to withstand, to some extent, the complete onslaught of the current global crisis of international finance capital.'
Asserting that the Left parties would oppose the move when it comes to Parliament, it appealed to other parties to join them in opposing the measure 'which will only provide greater profits to speculative capital at the expense of the
Indian people.'
Demanding a roll back of the decision, Forward Bloc secretary G Devarajan said the move showed that the government has not learnt lessons from the recent global meltdown.
"This increase in FDI cap should be rolled back as the decision will create more problems for our economy," he said.
