With elections round the corner, the Left parties have decided to step up their campaign against price rise and the government’s insistence on linking several services and subsidies to the Aadhar card.
Leaders of the four Left parties met here on Tuesday evening to chalk out a strategy to present the Left as a viable alternative to the neo-liberal policies of the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party.
In a statement, the parties said the crushing burden of price rise affected all sections and “there is no respite in the upward spiral of prices of food items and essential commodities with food inflation reaching a record high of 20 per cent.”
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The UPA government was adding fuel to the fire by continuously increasing the prices of petrol, diesel, LPG and CNG. Other demands include restoration of the administrative price mechanism, an end to the policy of making Aadhar mandatory for delivery of services and subsidies to the people, and a universal public distribution system, the statement noted.
All State units of the four parties — the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the CPI, the Forward Bloc and the Revolutionary Socialist Party — have been asked to mobilise workers and carry out agitations across the country between January 15 and 31. Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury represented the CPI(M) at the meeting, while S. Sudhakar Reddy and A. B. Bardhan represented the CPI. Besides, there were Debabrata Biswas of the Forward Bloc and Abani Roy of the RSP.