Date:30/03/2005 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2005/03/30/stories/2005033003801100.htm

National

Support to UPA Government not in perpetuity: Bardhan

By K.V. Prasad

CHANDIGARH, MARCH 29. Setting the pace for its 19th party congress, the Communist Party of India, today cautioned the United Progressive Alliance Government that the Left parties could part ways with it, if it continued to deviate from the Common Minimum Programme.

"We are supporting the UPA on the basis of the Common Minimum Programme and if you [the Government] deviate from it and pursue a path you wish to, a situation could arise when we can say goodbye," the CPI general secretary, A.B. Bardhan told a rally organised on the eve of the congress.

Outlining priorities and tasks, Mr. Bardhan said the CPI had not taken an oath to support the UPA for years onend. He said the decision to extend outside support to the coalition government was an "immediate" priority and described it as a "phase" and not a permanent arrangement.

Unity needed

The long-term goal, he said, was to establish a rule by socialist and working classes, which would be shaped with class struggles. It was in this context, Mr. Bardhan said, there was need for unity among the Left parties.

Describing the changed political situation in the country since the 2002 Thiruvananthapuram party congress, Mr. Bardhan warned that even though the Bharatiya Janata Party was "defeated, it is not broken." He said the Communist parties were now the target of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh.

Spelling out the party's approach in the political and ideological battle against the BJP/RSS, he said the CPI was sharpening its tools to take on these organisations. "You will not find the Communists lacking in taking them on," Mr. Bardhan said.

In his 45-minute address, the CPI general secretary did not spare the Congress. The strategies in Jharkhand and Bihar exposed the assumptions of the Congress leaders that the party had become strong enough after the Lok Sabha polls to capture power on its own in State after State. He admitted that the CPI too made mistakes in Bihar.

The CPI leader said the amendment to the Patents Acthad the potential to push the cost of life-saving drugs out of the common man's reach. Though not all of its amendments were accepted, the Left parties had strategically denied the BJP an opportunity to bail the Government out of the situation, he said.

The Punjab CPI leaders criticised the attitude of the Amarinder Singh Government and its decision to privatise power and introduce contract farming. Agitations in industries, the agrarian crisis, growing unemployment and drug abuse, they said, were signs that all was not well in Punjab.