Tuesday, Apr 09, 2002
Tuesday, Apr 09, 2002 |
| Southern States | ||
|
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary | Southern States
-
Andhra Pradesh
By Our Special Correspondent
Addressing the regional training camp organised for party workers at Paritala near here on Monday, Mr. Mukherjee came down heavily on the NDA Government at the Centre and non-Congress Governments in the States for "borrowing indiscriminately leading the country into a debt trap". The economy has been reduced to such a shambles that it would be difficult for any future Government to rule. The Congress, which is poised to come to power at the Centre, should ponder over the difficulties from now itself. Mr. Mukherji contended that the non-Congress Governments had distorted economic reforms and the GATT, causing problems to farmers and leading to unemployment due to their inefficiency and blamed the Congress unnecessarily for their failure. The total borrowings of the country had gone up to a staggering $ 91 billion and the Centre was required to spend 51 per cent of its total revenue on debt servicing alone leaving very little for development of irrigation, power, roads, communications etc and consequently the unemployment problem and also extremist and insurgency problems have been aggravated. The growth rate has come down from seven to 2.5 per cent in the last six years, industrial production from 10 to three per cent, export growth from 20 to four per cent. The NDA Government had been able to create only 50 to 70 crore jobs a year against 80 to 90 crores by the Congress Government. Referring to the criticism that the economic reforms initiated by the Congress were responsible for the "ills" plaguing the nation today, he said the NDA had grossly distorted them. The Congress had never envisaged denationalisation of banks. It permitted private banks to provide competition to nationalised banks. It wanted private and public sectors to coexist. Similarly, the Congress never wanted disinvestment in profit-making public sector units. It wanted the Government to have 51 per cent equity even in PSUs that are likely to make profit in future. Giving a go-by to these guidelines, he alleged, the NDA Government had been selling away all the 208 PSUs, built up with public money of Rs. 2 lakh crores over 40 years by the successive Congress Governments. The Congress did sign the GATT but with several conditions to discourage imports. The Government could impose an import duty up to 100 per cent on wheat and rice, up to 150 per cent on sugar and 300 per cent on edible oil up to 2005. So, no imports took place when the Congress was in power. But Mr. Chidambaram reduced the import duty on wheat to 45 per cent while the Union Finance Minister, Yashwant Sinha, further reduced it to 30 per cent, encouraging imports and causing problems to domestic farmers. Andhra Pradesh was a model State in fiscal discipline, power management and investment in education till six years ago but lost its eminent position now, he said. The former Finance and Power Minister, K. Rosaiah, regaled the audience on how the TDP Government lived on borrowings ruining the economy and development of the State. The former MP, P. Upendra, presided.
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail
News:
Front Page |
National |
Southern States |
Other States |
International |
Opinion |
Business |
Sport |
Miscellaneous |
|
|
|
The Hindu Group: Home | About Us | Copyright | Archives | Contacts | Subscription Group Sites: The Hindu | Business Line | The Sportstar | Frontline | Home |
Copyright © 2002, The
Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of
this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of
The Hindu
|