NEW DELHI, Jan 16: Asserting their independent identity within the United Front, the Left parties today released a joint manifesto which criticises liberalisation and advocates ``pro-people economic policies.'' The manifesto covers several points of agreement among the United Front constituents, and also indicates the issues on which the Left has a difference of opinion or takes a stronger stand than the rest.This happens to be the first time Communist Party of India, Communist Party of India (Marxist), Revolutionary Socialist Party and All India Forward Bloc have issued a common manifesto ahead of a General Election.``The Left parties while striving to strengthen the United front and making it victorious wish to present before the people their alternative policies,'' the manifesto says. It stresses that the Left played a ``crucial role in the formation and consolidation'' of the Front.Talking to the Press, both CPI general secretary A B Bardhan and CPI(M) leader Harkishan Singh Surjeet dwelt on the place of the Left in the UF. ``We are the ones who kept the United Front together,'' Surjeet said.Bardhan said the Left was the `unifier' in the Front. He said if the Left was strengthened further in the coming elections, it will guarantee the implementation of the Common Minimum Programme (CMP) adopted by the Front.He cited the Women's Bill and legislation for agricultural workers as the two unfinished UF tasks to which the Left was committed.Sharply critical of the economic reforms since 1991, the manifest says liberalisation has meant a `bonanza' for big business houses, landlords, big traders and speculators. Under the IMF-World Bank dictated model, the priorities of economic growth were determined in the interest of a narrow affluent section.``By these policies, 10 per cent of population have enriched themselves at the expense of the remaining 90 per cent of the people,'' it says and goes on to criticise the policies of total deregulation of the economy, rampant privatisation, dismantling of the public sector, indiscriminate entry of foreign capital and exposing Indian agriculture to the vagaries of the international market.The Left advocates Land Reforms as the ``key to progress.'' It calls for the revival of sick industrial units, and is firmly against the privatisation of the insurance and the banking sectors. It wants the public distribution system strengthened, with lower foodgrain prices set for the poor.The manifesto calls secularism and federalism the cornerstones of Indian unity.
