Opinion SLOT MACHINE PANEL

The editorial criticises the recommendation of the expert panel headed by Parthasarathi Shome to abolish the capital gains tax and decries many of its other suggestions. The editorial refers to the Shome panel as a “slot machine” committee (where you get the report you want) and notes that Shome,a former IMF employee,is currently the director of the “most overtly neoliberal institute” in the country,ICRIER: “The Shome Committee has expectedly produced a report… which recommends that the introduction of GAAR should be kept in abeyance for three more years — until April 1,2016!”

It argues that the panel’s suggestion to abolish the capital gains tax altogether is “scandalous” since even “true-blue bourgeois theorists draw a distinction between ‘enterprise’,which they laud,and ‘speculation’ which they decry.” It concludes that this “the absurdity of the Manmohan Singh government’s thinking. It is so keen to start another stock market ‘bubble’ which it thinks will stimulate growth,that it wishes to make every possible effort,no matter how bizarre it may sound,to attract speculative finance capital into the country. And it sets up ‘slot machine’ committees to legitimise every such effort,no matter how outlandish and how ethically repugnant such effort may be”.

CAMPAIGN FOR FOOD

An editorial in CPI journal New Age discusses the Left’s campaign for food security and its decision to observe September 12 as National Food Security Day. “The campaign for food security is essentially one of the ways to fight the shameless pursuance of the policies of neoliberalism to which most of the bourgeois political parties are committed. Universal PDS is our alternative to mitigate the miseries of the people crying under the weight of unprecedented price rise,” it says.

On the monsoon session of Parliament,the editorial claims that neither the ruling Congress nor the main opposition,the BJP,were interested in Parliament holding a serious debate on urgent socio-economic issues. “Actually,both the Congress and BJP are bent upon pushing back such issues… In such a situation,the only alternative for the people… is to come out on the streets and organise concerted struggle,” it adds.

SENSITIVE PM

The CPI(ML) weekly ML Update focuses on the Washington Post article on PM Manmohan Singh and the government’s reaction to it. It claims that the government’s “overreaction” only painted the PM in a worse light.

“What made the PMO so sensitive to an article in a daily paper? Why did [he try… to gag the views of a journalist of another country,and try to extract an apology from him? Above all,the question arises — why was Manmohan Singh so sensitive to this particular article,when similar observations about his role appear regularly in the Indian press?” it asks.

It observes that Singh is “especially sensitive” to criticism from any US quarters including the US Press. “He finds it unbearable to be termed an ‘underachiever’ by Time magazine or a ‘tragic figure’ by Washington Post,whereas the same criticism in the Indian press does not bother him. Manmohan Singh’s sensitivity to American criticism is the natural fallout of his excessive concern to get praise and pat on the back from the US,” it claims.

It alleges that US approval has been the PM’s guiding principle in policymaking. “He openly supported the US establishment when its credibility was at an all time low,and feels let down that US public opinion now is not reciprocating,when his own credibility is in tatters and he is the target of public ridicule and anger among the Indian people,” it concludes.

Compiled by Manoj C.G.