New panel set up to monitor UPA govt

An institutional mechanism for political and administrative co-ordination between the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) and the Left parties was yesterday put in place.

The co-ordination committee with two permanent members from the Congress (Congress chief Sonia Gandhi and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh) and six members of the Left parties will meet at least once a month""more often if necessary ""to discuss the government's decisions and plan the tasks ahead.

The committee will summon UPA ministers and political leaders to its meetings from time to time, depending on issues raised by either the Congress or the Left. "Each meeting will be so structured that a few issues are taken up for discussion," according to a statement issued after the meeting.

Briefing reporters, CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury said no specific issue was discussed on Wednesday, but a broad understanding was reached between the government and the parties supporting it on the common minimum programme (CMP) for the implementation of the programme.

yesterday's meeting lasted three hours and was attended by Finance Minister P Chidambaram, Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee and Ahmad Patel, political secretary to the Congress president. It was preceded by a meeting of the Left parties, where the issues they would raise at the larger forum was decided.

"We want the government to run in a certain direction, that is, as per the common minimum programme. Hence, we should know in advance what they are going to do on major policy matters so that we do not react later," said CPI leader AB Bardhan. Drought, flood and the plight of farmers would be taken up at the co-ordination committee meeting, Bardhan added.

The Left parties would like the government to take up issues relating to land reform and tribals' rights on land and forest produce. The Congress would like to push more economic liberalisation through. Airport privatisation is anathema to the Left.

The prospect of labour law amendment, high duties on petroleum and diesel, Employees Provident Fund  interest rates and the low returns on small savings are the issues that have been agitating the Left. But Left leaders concede that nothing is non-negotiable. "The signal should go that the government thinks of the downtrodden and that it is we who have compelled the government to think in this way," a CPI leader said before the meeting.

The panel was a mechanism for sorting out differences, said RSP leader Abani Roy. "We have our concerns and we will work out how to solve them," he remarked.

The Left has its own problems. Criticism has already begun in many quarters that because it is supporting the UPA, it has "gone soft" on the government on many issues. ML Pandhe, leader of the Centre for Indian Trade Union,  had demanded cut motions on the Union Budget that failed to materialise.

Considerable maturity is required to handle the tricky ties. Left leaders said they hoped the panel, which would be "consultative in nature" would address these issues so that the Left was not taken by surprise. HS Surjeet, Sitaram Yechury, Prakash Karat and D Biswas attended the meeting on behalf of the Left.