Karat calls for building Left-democratic alternative force

KOZHIKODE: Charging the Congress and BJP with harming the country’s interests by pushing neo-liberal policies, the 20th CPI (M) party Congress began here today with a call to build an alternative of Left and democratic forces to address the problems being faced by the country and people. “People are looking for an alternative. The Left and democratic parties alone could provide such an alternative,” CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat said inaugurating the party’s all-India meet being attended by over 700 delegates. Stressing that opposing neo-liberal policy would be a “central task” of the party, Karat said both BJP and Congress were pursuing the same policies and there was nothing to choose between them as far as corruption was concerned. Both the Congress-led UPA and BJP-led NDA have “failed” to address vital issues like price rise and food security and their economic policies had cast a huge burden on common people in the last two decades, the CPI(M) veteran said. “We, with other Left and secular democratic parties, will be launching joint struggle against these policies”, he said. He said the foreign policy of the Manmohan Singh Government of fostering strategic alliance with the US as its focus was “inimical” to the country’s sovereign interests. Referring to the electoral reverses suffered by the party in West Bengal and Kerala, he said the party Congress would examine and identify the faults and correct them.