The CPI(M) on Friday called for nationwide protests against rise in prices of essential commodities, saying the government policies were leading big market players and hoarders to make huge profits. As a result of the government’s policies, “some big trading companies as well as hoarders are making huge profits while the income of common people is being looted through high prices”, the party’s politburo said in a statement here.
It said that the UPA-2 regime has been “marked by its utter failure to control price rise”. The “contradictory statements of different ministries regarding steps to control the price of onions” like whether official agencies should import onions or not, were benefiting big market players, the party said.
As subsidies were given to big sugar exporting firms, the government also gave subsidies to onion exporting trading companies to export onions from September, thus “deliberately causing a shortage”, it said. It also noted that the deregulation of petrol prices had led to “a cascading impact” on the prices of other commodities. Further, the CPM said the Congress has started showing “symptoms of decay” and there was no realisation that the party was “steeped in corruption”.