Bhubaneswar CC Meet

Against Power

THE Central Committee has condemned the massive hike in power tariff for all categories, in Orissa. Reminding the press that Orissa was the first state in the country to privatise the power sector, Sitaram Yechury undertaking this 'reform'under the plea of ending theft and increasing efficiency and power generation. Reacting to the hike the CC noted that power tariff in Orissa, this increase comes after a more than doubling of the tariff during the last six years. The present enhanced rate, Yechury noted, will only deprive the people of electricity. Already facing severe drought conditions and this massive new burden can only add to their already miserable conditions.

Maharashtra holds the biggest example in this regard. The State Electricity Board and the state are facing their biggest ever crisis - here power generated by the Enron firm costs Rs.7.80 per unit as against the Maharashtra Electricity Board power which costs just Rs.1.50 per unit. Forced to buy Enron power whether they require it or not, or whether they use it or not, MSEB has already had to increase tariffs four times in the course of the last three years - just as the Left was warning would happen.

In the coming days, in the build-up to the budget session of parliament, the country will witness united actions in which broad sections of the people will be mobilized to fight back the economic policies of liberalisation and privatisation. Privatisation of the electricity sector is part and parcel of these polices. No section of the working class and employees has been left untouched by strikes and struggles in the last six months. Whether it be the postal employees, bank employees, insurance employees, coal workers or other sections of workers, they have all come out opposing these policies and its effects, Sitaram underlined. It is these various streams of protest that will converge into a big movement, which, Sitaram predicted, wouild be one of the largest mobilization against these policies in the country.

Drawing attention to the current attacks against the Left in general and the CPI(M) unit in West Bengal and Kerala, in particular, Sitaram saw these as "part of the larger design by all reactionary forces both within the country and outside who have combined today, to try and seek to defeat the CPI(M) in the forthcoming assembly elections" in the two states. The murderous campaign being undertaken by the Trinamul Congress in West Bengal and the RSS attacks in Kerala, are aimed at disrupting peace, unleashing terror and creating conditions where by force and intimidation, the election process can be vitiated. Warning that all such efforts will not succeed, he said that the ire of the reactionary forces is because of the CPI(M)’s consistent opposition to the disastrous economic policies of the government.