Left seeks pro-poor changes in budget

Communist Party of India-Marxist general secretary Harkishan Singh Surjeet says the Left parties feel that certain changes should be made in the Union budget for 1997-98 and the Finance Bill keeping in view the interest of common people.

Addressing mediapersons after a meeting of the Left parties on Monday, Surjeet said the insurance sector should not be opened to private companies.

The Left parties also decided that disinvestment of shares of public sector units should not be allowed and the public distribution system strengthened, Surjeet said.

Opposing the concessions given to the corporate sector and the richer strata of the society, he said the affluent sections should not be given any concessions. Lowering customs duties on certain items would harm the domestic industries.

The leaders of the Left parties will soon meet Prime Minister I K Gujral to demand changes in the Finance Bill. They would also demand more allocations of funds for rural development and for poverty alleviation programmes, he said.

Communist Party of India general secretary A B Bardhan said on Saturday, ''A policy which showers benefits on the 100 million at the top echelon on the premise that this would lead to growth with justice would be to believe naively in the notorious trickle-down theory.''

Further, there has to be more positive action in meeting the promise of allocating six per cent of the GNP for education and for making available one primary health centre for every group of one thousand citizens, said CPI-M Politburo member Sitaram Yechuri.

The power sector, Bardhan said, could do with an additional Rs 20 billion. ''It would be suicidal to depend exclusively or largely on private sector investment as proposed,'' he said.

The two Left parties were firm that they would push as hard as they could to get the new United Front government to meet the promises made in the Common Minimum Programme. ''Short of bringing down the government we will do whatever is possible,'' said Yechuri.

''Squeezing the small-scale sector by raising the ceiling of their classification, de-reserving them drastically and imposing excise duties on the remainder is a sure way to open up large areas of Indian industry to multinational penetration,'' said Yechuri.

The CPI's push for enhanced allocations for agriculture, irrigation and rural development by at least another Rs 10 billion may prove difficult due to lack of across-the-board support in the Lok Sabha.

Bardhan admitted that given the situation there cannot be '' radical recasting'' of the Budget but added that it presented an opportunity for correcting certain shortcomings in meeting the ''alternative path of governance'' promised by the CMP.

UNI