Karat urges states to implement alternative polices to defeat BJP

CHENNAI: CPM politburo member Prakash Karat on Monday said that it was not enough to oppose the anti-people policies of the Narendra Modi government, but wanted the state governments run by the opposition parties to implement alternative policies in favour of the people and build widest unity to defeat the dangerous “corporate communal regime” of the BJP-RSS at the Centre.

“So in the coming days we are going to rally in the alternative platform, which we are putting forward and mobilise more and more people to come out in support of this fight against the anti-people policies of the Modi government to defend secularism, democracy and federalism in the country,” he said while addressing his party’s rally here.

Karat, who was former general secretary of the Marxist party, said that the Modi government and the BJP-RSS have launched a big attack on democracy and the democratic rights of the country. He said that all the opposition parties and opposition-run state governments, including the DMK in Tamil Nadu and LDF in Kerala are under attack.

“The Modi govt is doing everything to prevent these state governments from fulfilling the promises it made to the people during the elections. They are trying to deprive the states of resources that they are due under the Constitution. With the use of Good Service Tax (GST) itself, we have seen they have stopped giving compensation to the state governments, which was first promised for five years and then all the state governments have demanded an extension of the compensation, but they refused to do so,” he said.

“The Modi government is now taking away due rights of the state government in areas like education, in health policy and in language policy and in all areas there is an effort to centralise everything and deny the states the due powers and rights,” he added.

Stating that the Modi government is run by the “Hindutva Corporate Alliance,” he said that Gautam Adani who become World’s third richest person has seen his personal wealth and asset increase from Rs 2 lakh crore in 2014 when Modi came to power to Rs 11 lakh crore now.