Modi govt policies to attract foreign investment will not work: Sitaram Yechury

He further added that the policies failed to fulfill the people's aspirations

The Modi government's policies to attract foreign investment and "humongous" tax concessions to corporates will not work because it will not create productive capacity and there is no purchasing power with the people, says CPI(M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury.

Its policies have given the opportunity to opposition parties to get together because it has failed to fulfil the people's aspirations the BJP had generated during the Lok Sabha election campaign and its steps have further worsened the situation, he said.

Yechury, who was recently elected the CPI(M) General Secretary, took on the government on its 'Make in India' slogan and said "the slogan should be 'Make for India', that is by India and for India".

"It (policies) cannot work. I will give you the reasons. You are giving concessions to attract more foreign investments. You are also giving concessions to Indian corporates to invest more.

"The logic given by the government, even the Manmohan Singh government earlier, is that greater investments will create new job opportunities and thereby greater economic growth. But there is a serious flaw in this argument, why this can't work," he told PTI in an interview.

Even if this investment comes in, it would be "meaningful only if it comes into productive sector and not to loot our resources and expand their profits, without creating productive capacities in India."

"If they produce goods, these need to be sold. But where will you sell them? There is global stagnation, our exports have declined by 26% last year. You can't sell these goods abroad, you can't sell them in India because the people's purchasing power is declining as a result of these policies and growing unemployment.

"So greater investment does not create greater growth, unless you economically empower our own people, which can only be done through a very high dose of public investment which has stopped for a long time," Yechury said.