Editorial November 2012

 Editorial      November 2012

                                          Thota Hanumaiah.                       

Resist unitedly the anti people policies and decisions of the Government.   

 Let us strongly condemn the unprecedented hike in the price of diesel and the limiting of cooking gas cylinders to six per family per year. The hike in the price of diesel will have a cascading effect of inflationary impact imposing greater burdens on the already suffering people. The Agricultural sector, farmers and working class will particularly suffer. The limiting of cooking gas cylinders will adversely impact on the livelihood condition of crores of families across the country. The sharp hike in diesel by Rs. 5 per litre has stoked inflation and in such a situation the limitation in subsidized gas cylinders and increase of it’s price is a serious attack on the budgets of ordinary families. The government has increased the price of subsidized gas cylinders by Rs. 11.40 and the price of urea by Rs. 50 per tonne in recent days. These callous measures will only further increase the burdens on the people. The UPA government is not bothered with the food inflation rate which has crossed 10 per cent.

 

The Government’s reasoning that such hikes are inescapable because of the `mounting losses’ of oil companies is an invented falsehood. The oil and natural gas giant, ONGC, declared a net profit of Rs. 25,123 crores for the year 2011-12.  For the next quarter ending June 30, 2012, it has reported a further growth in profit of 48.4 per cent.  The IOC has reported a net profit of Rs. 4,265.27 crores for 2011-12.  The Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) reported a net profit of Rs. 911 crores.  Interestingly, for the last quarter of the fiscal, January-March 2012, its net profit increased by 312 per cent.  The Bharat Petroleum has reported a net profit of Rs. 1,546.68 crores. Thus, the Government is playing a big fraud on the people of this country.

 

The people of this country have necessarily to go for strong protest actions against the imposition of such severe economic burdens on them to force the Government to roll back this unreasonable hike in the prices of diesel and limiting cooking gas cylinders and raising it’s price. 

 

The government has undertaken a series of measures which are meant to appease foreign finance capital and big business on the one hand and to squeeze the people and burden them with steps to increase price rise and cut subsidies on the other.

 

The decision to allow FDI in multi-brand retail, the disinvestment in profitable public sector enterprises and the efforts to increase FDI in the insurance sector and privatize pension funds are all meant to profit foreign capital and big corporates. 

In this regard, the Central trade unions gave a call for the movement against the anti-working class policies of the government and for the protection of the rights of workers. The Central trade unions also gave a call for a two-day strike on February 20-21, 2013. The railway men unions        should come together and ensure their participation in the ensuing protest actions and also in two day strike on 21^st&22^nd of February 2013.