The comrades are off-the-record happy that the “election budget" will help the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), and the Congress in particular.
NEW DELHI: There is gloom and glee in the Left camp. The comrades are off-the-record happy that the “election budget" will help the United Progressive Alliance (UPA), and the Congress in particular, check the rise of the BJP, but, at the same time, they are a bit worried about the Congress gaining at their cost in the Left bastions of Kerala and West Bengal.
They are pleased that some of their suggestions have been followed, but unhappy that some have been left out. Though the Left parties welcome the Rs60,000 crore waiver of farmers' loan, they suspect that the government may resort to disinvestment of public sector units to raise funds to meet the deficit as no new taxes have been announced.
"Chidambram, with all his exuberance, has announced everything except the election date," said Gurudas Dasgupta, CPI leader in the Lok Sabha, terming the exercise as an "election stunt".
CPI general secretary AB Bardhan said, "Chidambaram's budget seems to be an exercise for advancing general elections."
CPI(M) politburo member Sitaram Yechury said, "This is the last budget of the UPA government. The tone, tenor and content of the budget reflect that it is an election-eve one."
Their main grouse is that the government has not announced any concrete step to contain the rising prices or strengthen the public distribution system and food security and no change in the corporate tax structure. "The budget has only increased the disparity between the rich and poor," said CPI national secretary D Raja.
Even as Raja described the budget as a "positive step", he said the finance minister could have "gone further and done something more for the farmers", his party colleague Gurudas Dasgupta said, "it is a pro-capitalist budget. The government has not increased corporate tax.
"No steps to generate employment have been announced. It will widen the gap between the rich and the poor. The government has not accepted our suggestions to contain inflation."
Yechury also said, "The budget contains nothing at all to contain inflation.... This is the most burning issue today which has been completely neglected. Neither has anything been done to strengthen the public distribution system."
On the debt relief measures announced in the budget, he said no budgetary provision has been made for this purpose. "Probably, the government will issue bonds to the banks which waive the loans, but their health will also have to be taken care of."
Though loan waivers is a "welcome measure", this would affect only one-third of the farmers who have taken loans from national banks, cooperatives or other government institutions, he said, adding, "What about the two-third (of farmers) who took loans from private lenders at very high interest rates?"
Though the expenditure on education, healthcare and other social sectors has been increased, these fall far short of what was required or promised in the common minimum programme, he said.
Reacting to senior BJP leader LK Advani's allegation that the budget had "minority overtones", Yechury said, "Only Advani can recognise such things."
k_benedict@dnaindia.net
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