Cpi Defends Right To Criticise Govt

Amid growing criticism from other constituents of the United Front, the CPI has defended its right to criticise the government, even though it is part of the government.

Party general secretary AB Bardhan said his partys position had been that there would not be any government bashing, but we reserve our right to criticise the government because it was a separate party with different ideological leanings.

In fact, the recent CPI national council meeting in Mumbai passed a resolution specifying that criticism for the sake of criticising should be avoided, but that CPI leaders should point out where the government was deviating from the policies enunciated in the UF common minimum programme.

 

Bardhan was responding to statements of leaders of various UF constituents, asking UF leaders to refrain from publicly airing their differences with the government.

Among those who had pointed a finger, albeit obliquely, at the CPI was CPI(M) general secretary HS Surjeet. While justifying his partys criticism of the government, he said that for those who were part of the government there were fora like cabinet to express their reservations.

The matter came up for discussion even in the UF steering committee meeting on January 15. UF leaders felt that contentious issues should be discussed inside the committee and constituent members should refrain from airing thier differences openly.

The meeting decided that all UF constituents should work unitedly and maintain a greater degree of cohesion.

CPI secretary D Raja said since most of the major decisions were taken out of the steering committee, his party had everry right to criticise these decisions if they did not follow the braod framework of the UF CMP.

CPI leaders have expressed their reservations from time to time over some of the government decisions, specially with regard to economic pollicies. They criticised the governments move to disinvest PSU shares and privatisation of the insurance sector, and the liberalised FDI norms.

Recently, CPI leaders took strong exception to the governments reported move to curtail the powers of the CBI by mandating prior permission from the PMO before the investigative agency initiated investigations concerning serving and former ministers.