Unreasonable demand

In the latest edition of CPI(M) mouthpiece People’s Democracy, the party’s West Bengal unit secretary Biman Basu favours fresh dialogue to end the continuing impasse over land acquisition for Tata’s small car factory at Singur. He says that the return of 400 acres of acquired land a demand raised by the Trinamul Congress was “unreal and impractical” and argues that the factory will generate a lot of employment. “On the question of return of the land, Nirupam, our industries minister has already said how difficult it is to gather together scattered parcels of land and then find the owners, and then organise a fresh compensation — the task is an improbable one — the demand is being made for motivated reasons.” He added that the need of the hour “is not strife, not attack and counterattack, slandering and mayhem, harassment of the people, and distruption of development. Without peace and amity, no development work, especially pro-people development work can take place.”

MNC bias

In another article titled “Draining of EPF funds to favour companies”, CPM Central Committee member W.R. Varada Rajan talks about the Government’s decision to appoint private Asset Management Companies to manage the provident fund corpus. Although the central board of trustees of the provident fund administration had accepted in principle the idea of introducing competition in fund management with to explore avenues for maximising yield on investment, the issue of engaging private fund managers for the purpose was the farthest from its thinking. He claims that the three-member committee constituted by the labour minister to draw up a roadmap for introducing competition in fund management transgressed its mandate and unilaterally decided on the number of fund managers to be appointed. It also decided on the allocation of funds between multiple fund managers and set the threshold limit for prospective fund managers to participate in bidding at Rs. 10,000 crore, a move that resulted in exclusion of public sector banks other than the SBI from participating in the process.

Rajan says neither the central board of trustees nor its finance and investment subcommittee were privy to the whole process. “The UPA regime has chosen to drain the EPF funds to favour the MNCs and corporates, throwing all norms and propriety to the winds,” he alleges.

Caucasus causes

In the context of the Russia-Georgia conflict, the lead editorial argues that after having successfully engineered disintegration of former Yugoslavia fostering internecine conflict and instability in the Balkans, US imperialism aided by local chauvinistic outfits is now targeting the Caucasus. Claiming that Georgia is on the verge of joining the NATO and is considered very close to the US administration, it says “naturally, Russia would be wary of NATO forces on its borders.”

... contd.

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