Left opposes 'PSU stakes divestment' move

Left parties today demanded cancellation of the government's decision to divest up to 10 per cent of its shares in profitable public sector units (PSU), calling it a "patently anti-national step".

"(With this) the Congress-led government has laid out a road map for the privatisation of the public sector units, as it will require only a small step to bring down the government stake to a minority, that is below 50 per cent," the four Left parties in a joint statement.

Calling the government's plea of utilising the funds received out of disinvestment for social sector programmes an "eyewash", the CPI(M), CPI, RSP and Forward Bloc said it had gone back on previous commitments of not divesting 'Navaratna' companies.

They added the government was undertaking this measure under the "fraudulent pretext" of ensuring "people's participation" in the public sector. Further, the government has "committed not to utilise the corpus accruing through the sale of shares in the National Investment Fund, only the interest on the funds were to be utilised."

"Now with a sleight of hand, this has been suspended for three years, so that the proceeds from disinvestment can be utilised for meeting the fiscal deficit. The plea that this fund will be utilised for social sector programmes is an eyewash," the four parties said.

The Left parties said along with the disinvestment in PSUs, the government was taking measures to remove the FDI cap in various sectors, and open up more areas to foreign capital, including vital ones.

They appealed to all patriotic forces and political parties to demand cancellation of the disinvestment measures, and said the Left would chalk out plans to organise "strong resistance to the privatisation moves."

The Left parties would "actively mobilise and lend support to the struggles of the public sector employees and the working class against disinvestment", said the statement signed by general secretaries Prakash Karat (CPI-M), A B Bardhan (CPI), T J Chandrachoodan (RSP) and Debabrata Biswas (Forward Bloc).