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G. Srinivasan

AMIABLE and graceful, Mr Prakash Karat, General Secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), is firm in his conviction, and an ideologue steeped in the Marxist orthodoxy. Lending crucial outside support to the Congress(I)-led United Progressive Alliance Government, the Left parties' opinion carries weight on issues of public policy that directly affect the common man.

The Congress had to agree to a National Common Minimum Programme (NCMP) to accommodate the ideologically diverging views of various parties that formed the UPA. But the original reformer's inherent tendency often translates into moves not quite in line with the thinking of the other partners, especially the Left. Periodically this boils over, exposing the differences among the allies.

For the Left, in general, and the CPI(M), in particular, the slightest deviation from the NCMP is anathema. So, when the Government mooted the idea of disinvesting a 10 per cent stake in BHEL, the Left parties decided to stay away from the UPA Coordination Committee meetings, normally chaired by the Congress President, Mrs Sonia Gandhi.

"We have just suspended our participation. We have not decided to wind up our participation. All that we have said is that since BHEL disinvestment issue is a breach of the CMP and the coordination committee was set up for implementation of the CMP and if that is not served, we are not there. If the issue is resolved, we will go back," said Mr Karat, who had taken time off his busy schedule to talk to Business Line, at A. K. Gopalan Bhavan in the Capital.

To the criticism that the Left parties implement in their own States what they oppose at the Centre, Mr Karat quipped: "West Bengal is part of India. It is not an independent republic of West Bengal. All over the country in the economic policy domain, the Central government is calling the shots.

If State governments have more resources, they will be doing something for the poor. Within the limited resources, we had land reforms, rural development and, of late, there is industrial growth. Our approach to the public sector is that we are trying to restructure the PSUs and those that are totally unviable, we are disposing of. Let the Central government adopt this. We have no problem."

Excerpts from the interview:

On the NCMP and the Government's deviations from it:

When the UPA Government was formed last year, we were clear that it would have its own approach to economic policy. We did not expect it to accept the Left's economic policy. But on the basis of the CMP, which they accepted, we decided to extend our support.

Now the deviation from the economic policy of the CMP is known. It is for continuation of reforms... But after discussions, certain were qualifications made, and there is now a thrust towards increasing public investment in agriculture, employment guarantee, increase of flow of credit to farmers, increase in public expenditure in health, education and so on and so forth. Also, we looked at the policy of dismantling the public sector and privatisation that had happened previously; so some of these elements are there in the CMP and meet some of the Left concerns.

We are not expecting the Government to change course; What we are expecting is that the Government will implement economic policies keeping in mind the parameters set out by the CMP. We don't expect the Left programme to be the government programme. So there is no question of either we having a problem with the Government following its policies, or the Government thinking that the Left will determine the policies. We intervene when the CMP is not followed or some thing is outside the framework of the CMP... There are some matters where we have a viewpoint and we convey this to the government. One of the issues is the disinvesment policy; it is there in the CMP and not something outside it.

On the question of privatisation/disinvestment:

What the CMP says is a matter of discussion between the Government and us. We would like the Government to pursue the economic policies, keeping in mind the experience of past few years when there was an obsession with only GDP growth without equity. We would like growth and economic development but it should be married to equity and social justice.

On the assessment of performance of the Government:

Overall, in the last one year, more has been done on the policy sphere which is meeting the concerns of, and benefiting, international finance capital and big business in India, and comparatively less within the CMP framework, and in the interest of the common people, including the farmers.

Now that the National Rural Employment Guarantee Bill is coming up — and it is in the CMP — and if the Government enacts it and starts implementation, it would meet the employment needs in the rural areas and provide some relief to the poor. It is an important measure. But in real terms there has not been much of a rise in public expenditure; the outlay on rural employment, health and education is very nominal in rupee terms and the Government must pay more attention to this.

On labour militancy in Gurgaon and its repercussions:

The root cause of the problem that erupted in Guragon is the same phenomenon as in Faridabad, Ghaziabad and various North-West region and that is the unwillingness of employers to have unions.

First, the authorities don't even register trade unions. I know cases where unions have not been registered for 2-3 years under the pressure of the management or, some times, the government itself.

There is a well-known example of the cycle industry in Ludhiana which employs thousands of workers. Some 20,000 workers unionised themselves for two years but the Punjab government has not registered the union and this creates unrest and the management also puts pressure on the administration not to register the unions.

When you cannot provide the elementary right of having the union, what is the use of talking about reform of labour laws. We are fighting to see that the unions are registered.

On the unification of the two Left parties:

As Communist parties, after the split of 1964, we evolved in two separate organisations because of certain basic ideological and political differences. But many of the issues which divided us have got resolved since. Some remain.

When our party is seeking closer cooperation and unity between the two parties, what we call strengthening of Left unit, this cooperation and joint working will strengthen and, in course of time, many of the political and ideological differences will also be resolved. But the process had to be gone through and it cannot be fast-forwarded.

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