The ASEAN Free Trade Agreement and the Centre’s negative attitude towards the State dominated the valedictory function of the week-long 63rd anniversary celebrations of the Punnapra-Vayalar revolt at Vayalar, near Cherthala here, on Tuesday.
Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan, inaugurating the function, said the hopes of the Centre and the Congress leaders in the State to deceive the public by claiming protection to the State in the name of a negative list for products from Kerala had been shattered by the revelation that such a list never existed.
Right from Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Union Commerce Minister Anand Sharma, everyone at the Centre were lying all the time, while the Congress leaders here were merely lip-syncing with their high command, he said.
Communist Party of India (Marxist) State Secretary Pinarayi Vijayan said the revelations on the negative list had only spelt out further the difference in attitude of the Centre and the Left Democratic Front towards the public.
While the Centre was threatening the very existence of farmers through the FTA, the LDF was helping farmers by hiking the paddy procurement price and various other farmer-friendly measures.
Similarly, while the Centre was planning to privatise public sector units, the LDF was showing that PSUs could indeed make profits.
While a Union government cheating a State government itself was unpardonable, the lack of political will on part of the Centre and the UDF was a graver threat to the State, he said.
Mr. Vijayan pointed out that the Vatican’s official newspaper L’Osservatore Romano had cited Karl Marx’s teachings in a recent article and noted that these ideas were relevant even in these times.
Thus, quarters which had criticised the same ideology that inspired the Punnapra-Vayalar martyrs in earlier days were now praising them, he said.
Ministers M.A. Baby and C. Divakaran, CPI Assistant State Secretary K.E. Ismail, CPI leader C.K. Chandrappan, former MP C.S. Sujatha, Punnapra Vayalar veteran P.K. Chandranandan and others also spoke.
Rally held
The meeting was preceded by a colourful procession by thousands of cadre from both the CPI(M) and the CPI. Earlier in the morning, Mr. Achuthanandan lit a torch from the Martyrs Memorial at Valiya Chudukad in Alappuzha to flag off a rally that took the torch to Vayalar.
