Mumbai companies have large sugar hoards: CPI(M)

Brinda Karat, a senior politburo member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), has accused the government of facilitating a scam in the sugar business, saying it had allowed ''some big Mumbai-based companies'' to make huge profits at the cost of farmers and consumers.

She said instead of ensuring a fair price to sugarcane growers, the Congress-led government continued to give incentives to some manufacturers up to December, and then allowed duty-free imports from January.

"Big players and big sugar refineries benefited, but not the consumers or the farmers. Some big sugar companies based in Mumbai made a killing. Their stock prices are doing very well, whereas other sugar companies are facing the impact of the recession. It is a sugar scandal in the offing,'' Karat said.

She said the government decided on a sugarcane procurement price of Rs81 a quintal instead of the Rs125 recommended by the agriculture prices commission, leading to a decline in production. It also facilitated exports by providing incentives.

There were no estimates of the imported raw sugar stocks in the country being held by big firms, sweet-making or cola companies, she pointed out.

Announcing a national convention on the right to food and price-rise on 26 August, the CPI(M) leader said the proposed food security act should universalise the public distribution system. It should be de-linked from central government poverty estimates, provide 35 kg of foodgrain at Rs2 a kg per nuclear household, include provision of pulses, sugar, cooking oil and kerosene at subsidised rates, incorporate the central government's food and nutrition schemes, and promote national self-sufficiency in production of foodgrains, pulses, sugarcane and oilseeds through public investment.

Karat said the national convention would lay out the party's position on the food security law, besides outlining the party's views on the price-rise. Tripura chief minister Manik Sarkar would inaugurate the convention, and CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat (Brinda's husband) would deliver the concluding address. The party has invited speakers from tribal and hill areas, the neglected north-east states, and the drought-hit states.

Partisan ad
Meanwhile, party supremo Sitaram Yechury has written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh protesting that an Indian Railways advertisement in Monday's newspapers on free monthly season tickets for students carried graphics ''alluding to the election symbol of the Trinamul Congress''.

Alleging that the advertisement was an example of a government department promoting partisan interests, Yechury said in his letter: ''Surely you will agree that this is a brazen effort at utilising governmental funds for promoting the political interests of a particular party which happens to be a member of the ruling coalition under your leadership.''