Left parties soften stand on Pension Bill

The Left parties were learnt to have made a marginal change in their stance on Pension Funds Regulatory and Development Authority (PFRDA) Bill at the UPA-Left Coordination Committee meeting held yesterday, although the two-hour long meeting failed to break the deadlock over the crucial issues of privatisation and deployment of pension funds in the equity market.

For the first time since the two sides agreed to discuss the contentious aspects of the Bill last November, the Left leaders told the government on Saturday that they had "no problems" with the proposal to turn pension into a contributory scheme, according to sources present in the meeting. Until now, the Left parties were completely opposed to turning the pension, a statutory benefit, into a contributory scheme.

As for the Banking Regulation (Amendment) Bill, which proposes to remove the cap on 10 per cent voting rights, Finance Minister P Chidambaram reportedly argued that there were very few profit-making private banks like the HDFC and the ICICI, while most others were running in losses.

He asked the Left allies if they were okay with Indian industrialists taking over these banks since they were not ready to allow foreign banks

As for the Left's opposition to private fund managers as stipulated under the Pension Bill, the FM argued that the LIC, the UTI and the SBI alone could not manage the huge pension funds.

The Left leaders said that they would talk to their respective trade unions and get back with their suggestions at the next UPA-Left Coordination Committee meeting, expected to be held about two weeks later, in which they would also discuss the government's reply to their note on the UPA regime's economic and foreign policies.

Left-backed trade unions, however, remain intransigent. Gurudas Dasgupta, who heads the CPI-backed trade union AITUC, said in a press conference on Sunday that there was "no common ground" between the government and the Left on these two Bills.

"We are opposed to any change in the existing pension scheme. The FM wants it to be a market forces-driven, while we want it to be a part of social security."