Strongly protesting the decision to open up the retail sector to FDI, Left parties today termed the move as "unprecedented" and said the government should have discussed it first in Parliament .
Strongly protesting the decision to open up the retail sector to FDI, Left parties today termed the move as "unprecedented" and said the government should have discussed it first in Parliament before taking the decision.
"It is unprecedented. When Parliament is in session, a major decision was taken outside Parliament. It has never happened," CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury told reporters outside Parliament House.
"We will not discuss the FDI issue in Parliament unless government revokes the decision. We will oppose it in the House and outside also," he said.
Attacking Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress' "contradictory" stand, Yechury said, "On one hand, they are allowing the Cabinet to clear the FDI proposal, on the other they are protesting the decision in the House."
Dubbing the decision as "anti-people", he said it would render many people jobless and increase unemployment.
CPI National Secretary D Raja termed the move as "most unwise" particularly when Parliament was in session and said it would lead to the displacement of millions of people from jobs, adversely affect the service sector and seriously harm the small and marginal farmers.
Maintaining that the livelihood of 50 crore people were dependent on the retail sector, he said it was "really an anti-people decision which has been taken as the government is toeing the line given by the multinational corporations".
"The Government seems to be more eager to meet the demands of the US and other Western governments and serve the interests of the MNCs like Walmart, Tesco and Carrefour, rather than protect those of its own people," the CPI(M) Politburo said, calling upon all political parties to "unitedly resist" the decision to allow FDI in retail.
Noting that it would destroy the livelihood of crores of small retailers and "lead to monopolization of the retail sector by the MNCs", it said the move came in the backdrop of persistent high inflation, growing joblessness and agrarian distress.
"This decision shows the utterly callous and anti-people character of the UPA Government. ... The UPA-II government has now fully succumbed to those pressures from vested interests," it said, adding that the opposition from Left Parties had prevented the UPA-I government from taking this move.
Noting that the MNC retailers and foreign governments have been "pressurizing" the Centre for opening up this sector since long, the CPI(M) said the conditions imposed by the government were "insignificant and will not provide any effective safeguard to any section".
The investment floor of Rs 520 crore was "insignificant for giant retailers like the Walmart, Tesco and Carrefour which are multibillion dollar companies.
"The restriction of foreign retail outlets to cities of over 10 lakh population is also meaningless because those are precisely the places where the MNCs want to go, to tap the lucrative segment of the market. The big cities are also where small retailers are mostly concentrated," it said.
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