BJP, Left leaders come together to protest govt decisions

PTI9_20_2012_000126A_Kand.jpg.crop_display.jpg

Left and the Right were on the same page on Thursday with its leaders sharing stage to protest the UPA Government's decision to allow FDI in retail and hike in diesel price with both alleging that these were taken to 'please' US President Barack Obama and other western nations.

While Left leaders A.B. Bardhan and Sitaram Yechury shared the stage with BJP's Murli Manohar Joshi and Nitin Gadkari at a protest organised by traders, SP chief Mulayam Singh Yadav and TDP President N. Chandrababu Naidu kept away from it but appeared at a Left protest rally and courted arrest along with others.

Yadav attacked the Government for its 'anti-poor' policies and claimed farmers were the 'worst-affected lot' due to hike in diesel price.

Yadav, Naidu, CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat, former Prime Minister Deve Gowda, Bardhan, CPI MP D Raja and otherleaders courted arrest at the Parliament Street police station but were released later.

Karat demanded that the Government withdraw all its decisions and sought Yadav's support in 'keeping alive' this movement both inside and outside Parliament.

Yards away, Bardhan, Yechury, Joshi, Gadkari and JD-U chief Sharad Yadav tore into the Government's economic policies calling them 'anti-people and anti-national' while attacking Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for being hell-bent on 'pleasing his friend' Obama.
Bardhan said ideologies of Left and BJP might be different, but they 'are one' when it came to fighting for the people and even complimented Trinamool chief Mamata Banerjee for deciding to pull out her ministers from the Union Cabinet.

While Bardhan said Singh was trying to 'please' Obama, Joshi was more vocal in his criticism when he alleged that the Congress was trying to make traders and people 'slaves' of US and other western countries.

Gadkari termed as 'blatant lie' the Government's assertion that the decision to allow FDI will bring in more jobs, alleging that Chinese companies will have a 'backdoor entry' through Walmart and other brands who mostly sell Chinese products.

The BJP President alleged that the CAG has said that there has been a corruption of Rs 5 lakh crore during the UPA regime which, he said, could have been spent on empowering poor.

"This is just a beginning. We are all one in this and we are not fighting for us, we are fighting for the people of this country," he said.

Bardhan said brands like Walmart and Carrefour would 'squander' the wealth of the country and traders, while Yechury alleged that Prime Minister Singh does not set out on any yatra without 'performing puja' to Obama.

JD(U)'s Sharad Yadav asked Congress to remove Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia and Finance Minister P. Chidambaram if it has to get back to people.

"I am telling Sonia Gandhi that these decisions will affect her party badly in elections. Remove Chidambaram and Montek Singh. Only then you will understand the miseries of the people," he said.

Karat also said the Government's decision would just benefit companies like Walmart and that it would adversely affect traders in the country.

"We will tour the entire nation and listen to people's grievances and decide our strategy," Yadav said addressing the protesters.

Naidu said the government's policies are 'wrong' and the Congress has to understand this.

"All these are anti-people decisions and they need to be withdrawn," he added.

A nation-wide bandh has been called by NDA, Left parties and SP against the Centre's decision on FDI in retail, diesel price rise and cap on LPG cylinders.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/190090" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: &lt;a&gt; &lt;em&gt; &lt;strong&gt; &lt;cite&gt; &lt;code&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;ol&gt; &lt;li&gt; &lt;dl&gt; &lt;dt&gt; &lt;dd&gt;</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-b5d46bb80b0b189048500c7688391162" value="form-b5d46bb80b0b189048500c7688391162" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="85175830" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>

No Articles Found

No Articles Found

No Articles Found

I want to begin with a little story that was told to me by a leading executive at Aptech. He was exercising in a gym with a lot of younger people.

Shekhar Kapur’s Bandit Queen didn’t make the cut. Neither did Shaji Karun’s Piravi, which bagged 31 international awards.