 | « Back to article | Print this article |
The United Progressive Alliance government will have to face a tough time during the extended session of Parliament beginning Friday with the Left parties determined to take it on for "dispensing with the Winter session to cater to its political needs and failure on fronts of communal violence, terrorism and uncontrolled price rise."
The Left leaders said they will also take the government to task for "miselading" the nation about the impact of global meltdown, harassment of the youth in the name of fighting terrorism, partiality of the local police and administration and continued attacks on a particular religious minority by the frontal organisations of the Sangh Parivar.
Talking to UNI, top floor leaders of the Communist Party of India-Marxist, CPI and the Revolutionary Socialist Party said the Left parties will coordinate with all the friendly parties including the Telugu Desam Party, Janata Dal-Secular and the Bahujan Samaj Party and ask the government about what it had done to stop "harassment" of the youth in the name of terrorism and branding of a particular community as ''terrorists''.
While the CPI-M parliamentary group is to meet in Delhi at the party headqaurters A K Gopalan Bhawan on Thursday morning to finalise the party's strategy about the session, all the four Left parties are to hold a joint meeting on Friday afternoon.
CPI-M floor leaders in the Lok Sabha -- Basudev Acharya and Salim Mohammad -- said the convening of the session at an "unusual" time itself speaks volumes about the lack of moral courage, the political sense and respect for Parliament.
The last special session was closed with the bodyblow to the parlimentary democracy itself, a CPI-M veteran said, adding that the so called clubbing of the sessions and the skipping of the Winter Session is a serious departure from the parliamentary practices of the country.
"It was done to carry on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's one point agenda of singing the nuclear pact," he said.
CPI senior leader and floor leader in the Lok Sabha Gurudas Dasgupta said they would ask the government why the session's span had been curtailed.
"The government also owes an explaination to Parliament and the people on uncontrolled price rise and attacks on the minority community in Orissa, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and other parts of the country," he said.
On the growing terrorist incidents, the CPI leader questioned the failure of the intelligence wings of the home ministry.
CPI-M chief whip Rup Chand Pal said the financial crisis and its impact on the developing countries and India will also figure prominently in Parliament.
He contested the government's claims about the strength of country's fundamentals of economy saying the financial sectors, like the stock market, the banks, the depreciation of Indian rupee, the adverse impact on the small businesses, and the further weakning of the public distribution system had already witnessed such a trend.
Pal said the lay-off of as many as 1,000 employees by the Jet Airways is also a pointer towards coming times as result of the impact of global meltdown on India.
Acharya went on to the extent of saying that "it is most likely that the Congres-led coalition dissolves the House after two or three weeks of the session to pave way for early polls in the middle of February next."
RSP leader Abani Roy said the Left parties will talk to everyone other than the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party for better floor coordination and to take on the government for its anti-people economic policies that had made the life of the aam aadmi miserable.