“Alternative front to focus on new socio-economic chapter” ---S. Sudhakar Reddy

TIRUPUR Calling upon the people to reject the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Lok Sabha elections, Communist Party of India general secretary S. Sudhakar Reddy said here on Monday that the alternative front, being mobilised by Left parties, would focus on opening a new socio-economic chapter for the ‘future of India’. “Apart from implementing general pro-people measures, we will explore more avenues for exports and end the looting by corporate bodies so as to rejuvenate the sagging economy,” he said addressing mediapersons on the sidelines of his party’s State Council meeting. Mr. Reddy clarified that the CPI was not against Foreign Direct Investment per se, but was of the opinion that it must be for productive purposes instead of speculative. To bridge the huge current account deficit (CAD), he suggested improving exports to markets in Asia and Latin America, instead of just concentrating on the U.S. and European markets. Blaming the UPA government’s wrong policies for the crisis in the monetary and fiscal fronts, he said the BJP too would not be able to offer any solution because it pursued an economic policy identical to that of the Congress. “The BJP and Congress are two sides of the same coin. The BJP is responsible for the wrong policies in telecom sector as was evident from the statement of former Union Telecom Minister A. Raja that he just continued the NDA government’s policies,” he added. Terming the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi a fascist leader and an arrogant person, Mr. Reddy alleged that Mr. Modi could not absolve himself of the pogrom that took place in Gujarat, post-Godhra incident. The country needed a balanced Prime Minister. Mr. Reddy ridiculed Mr. Modi’s claim to provide clean governance if the BJP was voted to power at the Centre, by stating that corruption was rampant during BJP regimes in Karnataka, Uttarkand and Himachal Pradesh. “People in those States voted the BJP out because of corruption,” he pointed out. Mr. Modi never corrected his mistakes. He did not regret the Gujarat massacre and also did not make corrections in public for the errors in the references he made in his speeches, such as ‘Takshila in Bihar’ and mentioning Syamaji Krishna Varma as Syama Prasad Mookherjee,” he added.