MUKUNDPUR, KOLKATA: BIMAN BOSE GIVES AWAY MEMENTO IN THE STATE CAMP OF KISHORE BAHINI

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DR. ASHIM DASGUPTA, WEST BENGAL FINANCE MINISTER, CONFIDENT OF PRICE RISE DUE TO INCREASE IN FREIGHT CHARGES BY MAMATA BANERJEE

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SSKM HOSPITAL, KOLKATA: ALLEGED MOLESTATION OF PATIENT BY DOCTOR

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GOALTORE, WEST MEDINIPUR: MARSHALL MURMU BECOMES A HERO IN THE EYES OF PEOPLE OF WEST BENGAL

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JHALDA, PURULIA: MAOIST BUTCHERS HIRED BY MAMATA BANERJEE BRUTALLY KILL INDIAN JAWAN

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ARAMBAGH, HOOGHLY: FOUR CPI (M) WORKERS ABDUCTED BY BUTCHERS OF MAMATA BANERJEE. THEY STILL REMAIN UNTRACED.

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NABA BARRACKPORE PRAFULLA CHANDRA MAHAVIDYALAYA, NEW BARRACKPORE: COLLEGE REMAINS CLOSED FOR 11 DAYS DUE TO VIOLENCE OF MAMATA BUTCHERS

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KOLKATA MUNICIPAL CORPORATION: ILLEGAL APPOINTMENT OF GOONS OF MAMATA BANERJEE GOING ON

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DUMDUM: RALLY OF LEFT FRONT ON 26-12-2010

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DESRUCTION OF INDIAN RAILWAYS IN THE WHIMSICAL STYLE OF MAMATA BANERJEE

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URBAN REFORMS: AN EXPERIENCE OF VIJAYAWADA CITY - C H Babu Rao

MUCH has been said about the funds for the development of cities from the World Bank and the central government. The central government initially chose Hyderabad, Vishakapatnam and Vijayawada cities in Andhra Pradesh under the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) and said that later it would be expanded to other cities. It said that the face of the cities would change dramatically and gave hopes that there would be no dearth of civic facilities. But the experience of the last five years has proved to the contrary. Luring with the promise that it would provide funds, the central government imposed World Bank conditionalities, which adversely impacted the lives of people. For example, if we take the Vijayawada city itself, this city was brought under JNNURM in 2005-06. They promised there would be a deluge of funds. The central government was asked to provide Rs 7300 crore but it allocated only Rs 1422 crore. Of it, only 70 per cent would be borne by the central and state governments. Of the funds they give, 20-40 per cent would be given as debt. This has to be repaid with interest. But so far only Rs 470 crore has been given. Of it, Rs 205 crore would go for the construction of houses and only Rs 265 crore would be left for providing civic facilities. Of this, Rs 52 crore is the debt and only Rs 213 crore is the grant amount. This means that only Rs 43 crore is given on an average per annum in the last five years.

DEVELOPMENT STAGNATED

The state government has stopped giving grants which it was supposed to give under law on the pretext of central funds to the Vijayawada city. It has imposed additional burdens on people. It has stopped giving Rs 60 crore from the past four years which was due under professional tax, per capita grants and such other grants. The World Bank and the central governments have imposed a condition that the stamp duty be reduced from 13 per cent to 5 per cent for facilitating the big, foreign realtors. As a result of this reduction, there is a shortfall of Rs 50 crore to the corporation’s income. Contrary to the decision that the wages of all the municipal workers would be borne by the state government, in the name of JNNURM, Vijayawada has been excluded and this burden is being now borne by the city corporation. Apart from the sanction given for the construction of houses for the poor, an additional expenditure of Rs one lakh has been incurred for each house. This additional expenditure had to be borne by the state government but instead it shifted it onto the city corporation. As a result approximately Rs 100 crore additional burden was placed on the corporation for construction of 15,000 houses. On the whole, because of the reduction in grants, reduction in the share in the income, additional burdens etc the city corporation has lost Rs 250 crore. During this period only Rs 213 crore has been offered as assistance.

For these projects, 30 per cent of the funds (around Rs 420 crore) have to be borne by the city corporation. The central and state governments have not released even the funds that they have comparatively expended for the JNNURM. The state and centre owe Rs 150 crore to the corporation. Above it, the centre has stopped the last instalment of the funds stating that the user charges and other conditionalities have not been implemented in time. As a result, at present there is no money with the corporation even for wages. Money is owed to the contractors. Development works like drinking water supply, underground drainage, laying/repair of roads etc have been stopped midway, subjecting the people to severe hardships.

PEOPLE ON THE ALTAR OF REFORMS

The poor people have become scapegoats of urban reforms. Burdens have increased, while facilities were curtailed. Slums were neglected. In the name of minimum tax, around Rs 50-153 has been increased in the tax on the huts. As a result of privatisation of lavatories, poor people who do not have independent toilets are shelling out Rs 300-500 as user charges for utilising the public toilets. The fee for issuing birth and death certificates has been increased by Rs 5-50. Taxes were imposed on small vendors who sell their wares sitting on roadside. Fee was levied even on using the premises of municipal schools where the poor had an opportunity to hold their marriage and other functions by Rs 100-1000. In the name of providing underground drainage, huge donations were levied. The corporation has withdrawn from mosquito eradication programmes. Every day poor families are forced to spend Rs 5 for mosquito control. On the whole the reforms are playing havoc on poor people lives.

BENEFITING THE RICH

In the name of reforms, street lighting, maintaining public toilets, etc have all been privatised. Rich people have been given an opportunity to construct and sell apartments, hotels in the valuable lands of the government and city corporation. Priority is being accorded for providing facilities like drinking water, maintaining roads, etc in the colonies of the rich under the pretext that they are ready to share part of the expenditure through contributions. They are introducing a scheme to supply water 24 hours – 24x7 scheme – in these colonies. Parks are well maintained in these colonies. All facilities are provided to the wealthy. This is the reason why rich classes, contractors, corrupt officials, bureaucrats and politicians are very happy about these reforms.

BURDENS IN THE NAME OF CONDITIONS

The World Bank and the central government have imposed almost similar conditions in the name of urban reforms. They have issued a diktat that 100 per cent costs have to be collected from the people who avail civic facilities. Local bodies have to mobilise their own additional incomes for their share. As a result, in these five years severe burdens were imposed on the people of Vijayawada. Under the pretext of covering the losses from supplying drinking water, they are trying hard to fix water meters. Prices have been fixed for supplying water to the water distribution sheds run by voluntary organisations. Drainage charges were raised by 100 per cent for each toilet. They have not even spared garbage collection from income mobilisation. The state government has even issued a government order imposing Rs 8 crore ‘garbage tax’. Trade licence fee for the traders has been increased. In these five years, in the name of collecting interest, people have been burdened with Rs 4.65 crore. Rs 45 crores were snatched under the building penalisation scheme. On the whole, in the last five years an additional burden of Rs 190 crore has been imposed on the people in the name of taxes, fee and user charges.

DISAPPEARING LOCAL GOVERNANCE

All the promises for strengthening the local bodies and giving more powers to them through the 74th Constitutional Amendment proved to be empty words. Local bodies have been robbed of their power to take decisions under their purview and were degraded to just implementing agencies of the diktats and conditionalities of the central and state governments. Without the knowledge of the elected council, the commissioner has signed on urban development plan that has dangerous conditions. It was later unilaterally adopted by the council without any discussion as a mere formality. Only after the CPI (M) has exposed this fraud, the corporators and the people have been given the copies. The state government has issued orders rejecting the resolutions of the council on doing away with the garbage tax and on giving concessions to the poor for change of name in the property tax receipts. The state government did not pay heed to the unanimous resolution of the council demanding the non-removal of the huts of the poor constructed on the Krishna embankments. Dictatorial policies are being implemented on the pretext of reforms. These are not just confined to Vijayawada but are implemented in various stages in all the cities.

THEN AND NOW

Except for the CPI (M) all other parties welcomed the introduction of JNNURM in the Vijayawada municipal council. The ruling Congress stated that it is a boon for the city. CPI and TDP too supported it. Everybody thought that there would be a deluge of funds. CPI(M) was the only party that consistently opposed this move. It warned against the dangers of conditions. The ruling party had campaigned that CPI(M) is against development and that it is obstructing the flow of funds. Experience has vindicated the party’s stand. CPI and TDP too were now forced to join our party in the demonstrations against the burdens on the poor. Due to the protests organised by the party, brakes were applied on the implementation of the reforms. Fitting of water meters were stalled temporarily. Collection of garbage tax was being postponed for the last five years. It was proved in practice that these reforms can be stopped through struggles. This fight has to be taken further and conducted in all the cities.

Source: www.pd.cpim.org/

CPI (M) RUNS ANTI-CORRUPTION CAMPAIGN 'CONG MUST SPELL OUT REASONS FOR AVOIDING JPC PROBE'

ANDHRA PRADESH

THE non-Congress, non-BJP political parties have decided to take the issue of massive corruption in UPA regime among the people by holding rallies in major state capitals in the coming period. The first of these rallies will be held in Hyderabad, the date of which will be finalised shortly. They have also demanded that the Congress party and prime minister must spell out the reasons for preventing a Joint Parliamentary Committee probe into the 2G spectrum scam issue.

CPI (M) general secretary Prakash Karat, CPI general secretary A B Bardhan and TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu met in Hyderabad on December 15 and took stock of the national political situation in the wake of the stalemate in Parliament over the JPC probe into 2G spectrum scam.

Addressing reporters after the meeting in the CPI state committee office, Chandrababu Naidu said that talks are on with other non-Congress, non-BJP parties for finalising the dates of the rallies in the respective states. He said at least six rallies would be held before the start of the next session of Parliament. He said the nation is being rocked by unprecedented scams of 2G, CWG, IPL etc and that unless the guilty are punished the confidence of the people cannot be restored.

Prakash Karat said that the 2G scam is the biggest scandal in the history of the country with a sum of around Rs 1.76 lakh crore involved and with so many corporates caught up in this. He demanded that the Congress and the prime minister must make clear the reasons for refusing to hold JPC probe into this affair. “Parliament is the supreme body representing the people of the country. Why is the government refusing to allow such a body to investigate a scam of such gigantic proportions”, he questioned. He asserted that only a JPC probe can reveal the reasons why the prime minister did not take any steps to check blatant violation of norms and also why he did not act to recover the losses to the exchequer. Karat felt that this scam is an assault on the people of the country as it was public money that had been blatantly looted. He demanded that the huge sums of lost money must be recovered by canceling the licences and auctioning the spectrum again on the lines of 3G spectrum.

A B Bardhan in his brief remarks said that every holy cow in the system including the judiciary is enmeshed in corruption and a campaign needs to be launched among the people against this all pervading corruption. CPI deputy general secretary S Sudhakar Reddy, CPI state secretary K Narayana, CPI (M) central committee member P Madhu and CPI (M) state secretariat member Y Venkateshwara Rao were also present in the meeting.

Earlier, Prakash Karat released the Telugu booklet on corruption in UPA regime brought out by the Central Committee for campaign among the people at a press conference in M B Bhavan.

(N S Arjun)

DELHI

RESPONDING to the CPI (M) Central Committee’s call for countrywide campaign against corruption from December 5 to 11, the Delhi state committee of the party organised a protest dharna against corruption at Jantar Mantar on December 10. Hundreds of people participated in this dharna.

Mohan Lal, a member of the party’s state secretariat, presided over the programme. Addressing the gathering, CPI (M) state secretary P M S Grewal attacked the UPA government as being the most corrupt in the country’s history. He accused the prime minister of turning a blind eye to the plethora of scams which were going on in the UPA’s regime. He also accused the BJP of playing double standards on the corruption issue, citing their chief minister’s corrupt practices in Karnataka.

Sitaram Yechury, member of the CPI (M) Polit Bureau and Rajya Sabha MP, was the main speaker at the dharna. He said that it was for the first time in the country’s history that an entire session of the parliament could not function because of the government’s obdurate refusal to accept the demand for a joint parliamentary committee (JPC) to probe the 2G scam. He stressed that only a JPC could look into the details of how was carried out such a big scam like the 2G Spectrum scam, which involves money equal to almost 20 per cent of the country’s annual budget. Yechury reminded that the same Congress leaders, who are rejecting the demand for a JPC, did not allow the parliament to function for 17 days when the Tehelka issue came up during the NDA’s regime. He also accused the BJP of playing a double game and said the BJP too is neck deep in corruption and loot of the country’s resources.

Pointing out that the amount of money and resources which were being looted by the politician-corporate-bureaucrat nexus through corruption was more than enough to take care of the basic needs of the poor and suffering people in our country, Sitaram Yechury appealed to the people to intensify the campaign against corruption so that pressure could be built on the government to not only punish those involved in corrupt practices but also recover the looted resources. The CPI (M), along with other secular parties, would start a big campaign after the winter session of the parliament to expose the government, he informed.

CPI (M) state committee members Nathu Prasad and Sidheshwar Shukla also addressed the dharna.

HARYANA

IN Haryana, the CPI (M) took out an impressive procession in Fatehabad city on December 11 against the series of corruption scams exposed in the recent months. This was part of a week-long countrywide drive demanding the JPC probe into the 2G Spectrum mega scandal, recovery of the entire looted money, arrest of all those involved in these scams and more stringent laws to curb corruption.

Similar activities have been conducted all over the state according to the party state secretary, Inderjit Singh said while addressing the party gathering at Fatehabad. He also lashed out at the Haryana government for formalising and institutionalising corruption as it was clandestinely transferring huge amounts of money to politically favoured persons under the garb of public private partnership (PPP). Singh also stated that the all pervading corruption under the present UPA regime or under the erstwhile NDA rule was an inevitable consequence of the bankrupt policy regime of liberalisation, privatisation and so-called ‘reforms.’ He regretted that the prime minister, Dr Manmohan Singh had himself commented that our country could not afford crony capitalism but, on the other hand, he was refusing to take note of the corrupt nexus of big business, politicians and bureaucracy which was plundering the national wealth. Inderjit Singh declared that the CPI (M) would continue to focus its campaign against corruption which was infecting the very roots of democracy, threatening the rule of law, leading to the denial of equal opportunities to the weaker sections and posing a serious challenge to our national security.

The processionists later held a meeting at Jawahar Chowk where former CPI (M) MLA Harpal Singh and Ram Kumar Bahbalpuria addressed the gathering. A rickshaw decorated with popular cartoons against corruption attracted a lot of attention from the people passing through the main bazaars.

(As the Anti-Corruption Campaign Week of the CPI (M) is still continuing, more reports are expected next week.)

Source: www.pd.cpim.org/

CPI (M) ON INDO-EU FREE TRADE AGREEMENT

The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) issued the following statement on December 11, 2010.

THE EU summit in Brussels is being attended by a high level Indian delegation led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The CPI(M) notes with concern that the negotiations on the Indo-EU FTA till date have been conducted under a veil of secrecy. Our experience in the case of the Indo-ASEAN FTA shows that the government has, in the past, signed agreements that affect large sections of the country’s people adversely without making any efforts to consult parliament, other political parties or state governments.

There are several areas of concern in the texts being negotiated for the Indo-EU Free Trade Agreement. It is understood that the EU is demanding measures that go beyond TRIPS, and would affect the viability of low priced generic medicines in the country. The EU is also seeking accelerated access to Indian markets, particularly diary and agri-business, that could jeopardise the livelihood of farmers, fisherfolk and small businesses. The investment and financial services obligations being demanded by the EU would have detrimental effects on domestic industry, result in giant retail chains pushing out small vendors and trades people, compromise the government’s ability to direct credit into required areas and destabilise India’s financial sector at a time when the world is going through its worst financial crisis in recent memory. The EU has also made strong demands to open up the system of government procurement which, if accepted, would further jeopardise the country’s faltering public distribution system.

The CPI(M) reiterates firmly that the government does not have the mandate to negotiate the Indo-EU FTA without first having consulted diverse sections within India and discussed in the parliament.

Source: www.pd.cpim.org/