Holding the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government at the Centre responsible for rampant corruption and the unprecedented rise in prices in recent months, Sitaram Yechury, Polit Bureau member of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), has said that the current gloomy political and social realities have prevented the country from achieving progress to its potential.
“The rampant corruption at the highest level, the alarming price levels of essential commodities and the Union government's moves to surrender our economic sovereignty and thus downgrade India's stature to that of a junior partner to imperialistic nations have prevented creating a better India that we are capable of doing,” Mr. Yechury said here on Thursday.
He was here to deliver a speech on “Role of Left parties in Modern Indian politics” as part of a history seminar by the EMS Study Centre hosted by the Kasaragod district unit of the CPI(M). “The UPA government is now in the process of turning the people of India into IPL and BPL categories as the growth indices are indicating the ever-widening gap between the rich and the poor,” Mr. Yechury said, scoffing at the high-priced auction of cricketers ahead of the Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket matches, which, he said, has turned cricket in to a game of the affluent sections.
Expressing grave concern over the 2G spectrum scam, in which the former Telecommunications Minister A. Raja was arrested, he said the shocking disclosures had serious ramifications as such developments often prevented the government from mopping up funds for initiating welfare and development projects. The higher growth rate had only led to a widening gap between the miniscule rich and the poor. Clarifying his point, Mr. Yechury said a high-level committee chaired by UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi mooted the idea of food security for all in the country, the cost of which had been pegged at Rs.88,000 crore, which was exactly half the Rs.1.76 lakh crore the country lost in the 2G scam.
(courtesy The Hindu)
