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‘Dissatisfied’ Opp stages walkout in RS
Dissatisfied with the Government’s defence on price rise, the Opposition — BJP, Left Parties, JD(U) and AIADMK — staged a walkout in the Rajya Sabha.
“We tried our best to have a constructive debate. You are in power for six years and this is the 7th... No structural changes could take place...So we are walking out from the House,” BJP Leader M Venkaiah Naidu said after hearing Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s long explanation about the reasons for rising prices. He was accompanied by members from the other Opposition parties.
While replying to the short duration discussion on price rise of essential commodities and how it was affecting common man, Mukherjee denied that the Government had failed to contain inflation and claimed that prices of 30 major essential commodities like rice, atta, tuhar dal, urad and moong have remained either static or fallen during the past two years.
The decline in rate of most commodities quoted by Mukherjee prompted Venkaiah to ask the Finance Minister the address of the market from where he was quoting those rates. All the people could go and shop for ration from that market, Naidu said taking a dig at Mukherjee.
Mukherjee retaliated by charging that inflation was a major issue during the Janata party Government and even during the NDA regime. The Finance Minister, who had to face the embarrassment of putting FDI in multi-brand retail on hold, launched a counter attack by reminding Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley that his party BJP had supported 26 percent FDI in retail in 2004 when it was in power.
My only request would be that do not leave the baby which you gave birth in bath water, let me carry it on to maturity because reforms are a continuing one, he said and sought cooperation from every stakeholder to check price rise.
According to the Finance Minister, mismatch between demand and supply of commodities, rising MSP of foodgrains and lack of infrastructure like cold chains and godown for storage were contributing to price rise. He said the Centre offered 50 lakh tonnes of food grain in July but the states have taken foodgrain meant only for BPL and not for APL families.
He also defended the frequent petrol price hike saying that the country depended on import and international prices are going up. Also the price of petrol was de-regulated during NDA regime, he pointed out and said that even States share the tax collected on petrol products.
Dissatisfied with the Government’s defence on price rise, the Opposition — BJP, Left Parties, JD(U) and AIADMK — staged a walkout in the Rajya Sabha.
“We tried our best to have a constructive debate. You are in power for six years and this is the 7th... No structural changes could take place...So we are walking out from the House,” BJP Leader M Venkaiah Naidu said after hearing Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s long explanation about the reasons for rising prices. He was accompanied by members from the other Opposition parties.
While replying to the short duration discussion on price rise of essential commodities and how it was affecting common man, Mukherjee denied that the Government had failed to contain inflation and claimed that prices of 30 major essential commodities like rice, atta, tuhar dal, urad and moong have remained either static or fallen during the past two years.
The decline in rate of most commodities quoted by Mukherjee prompted Venkaiah to ask the Finance Minister the address of the market from where he was quoting those rates. All the people could go and shop for ration from that market, Naidu said taking a dig at Mukherjee.
Mukherjee retaliated by charging that inflation was a major issue during the Janata party Government and even during the NDA regime. The Finance Minister, who had to face the embarrassment of putting FDI in multi-brand retail on hold, launched a counter attack by reminding Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley that his party BJP had supported 26 percent FDI in retail in 2004 when it was in power.
My only request would be that do not leave the baby which you gave birth in bath water, let me carry it on to maturity because reforms are a continuing one, he said and sought cooperation from every stakeholder to check price rise.
According to the Finance Minister, mismatch between demand and supply of commodities, rising MSP of foodgrains and lack of infrastructure like cold chains and godown for storage were contributing to price rise. He said the Centre offered 50 lakh tonnes of food grain in July but the states have taken foodgrain meant only for BPL and not for APL families.
He also defended the frequent petrol price hike saying that the country depended on import and international prices are going up. Also the price of petrol was de-regulated during NDA regime, he pointed out and said that even States share the tax collected on petrol products.
