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| Congress, like NC, lost its credibility & face | | FDI No, AFSPA Yes | | Rustam
JAMMU, Dec 8: The nation and opposition parties, besides Trinamool Congress, DMK and at least five cabinet ministers belonging to the Congress party, have inflicted a crushing defeat on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his coterie who had arrogantly declared that the controversial cabinet decision on 51 per cent Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in multi-brand retail trade and 100 per cent FDI in single brand trade would be enforced in the country come what may. Finance Minister Pranab Mukharjee's December 7 Lok Sabha statement that "the decision to permit 51 per cent FDI in multi-brand retail trade is suspended till a consensus is developed among various stakeholders and that the "stakeholders are political parties and chief ministers without whose involvement this decision cannot be implemented" could be legitimately construed as a humiliating defeat of the Prime Minister and his men, including Shard Pawar of NCP and Farooq Abdullah of NC, who had planned to allow the American, British and French economic interests to jeopardize the Indian economic interests and hit the trading community and small and marginal farmers. It was their arrogance that made the parliament dysfunctional for no less than nine days. The people of the country know it.
The decision of the Union Government to suspend the cabinet decision has been described by the opposition as a "virtual rollback". Indeed, it amounted to rollback and great, great climb down. It is for the first time after May 2004 that the opposition and the nation responded uniformly to protect the nation's economic and sovereign interests, thus reassuring the common masses that the opposition would put its foot down in case of need and that it would not allow the likes of Manmohan Singh and the arrogant, unaccommodating and controversial Congress high command to ride roughshod and play with the country's paramount interests. The defeat the Prime Minister and the Congress high command suffered is not an ordinary defeat. It is major defeat and they know it. The fact is that the Prime Minister and the Congress high command have lost their credibility and face and that they have now realized that they just cannot impose their foreign-influenced and motivated decisions on the nation. Gone are the days when Manmohan Singh would put at stake his office, as for example, on the issue of Indo-US nuclear deal and come out of the exercise plus everything.
The Prime Minister and his coterie suffered a defeat of the type Chief Minister Omar Abdullah suffered only recently. Omar Abdullah had, like Manmohan Singh, announced without developing consensus that he would remove AFSPA before the Durbar move. He tried his best to give effect to his controversial and unilateral decision, but miserably failed. He was comprehensively defeated by his own coalition partner, by the Army and the responsible Defence Ministry. Conceding defeat he finally announced that he would move forward only after developing consensus. The nature of his isolation on this sensitive issue could be determined from the fact that he has not mustered courage till date to discuss the issue in the cabinet meeting. He has simply informed his cabinet colleagues as to what transpired between him and New Delhi. He knows that he has lost his credibility and face. He is as helpless as the Prime Minister. They themselves are responsible for the mess they are today in. It is a different story that they are still at the helm. Anyway, their future is uncertain.
The bottom-line is that the nation has said no to FDI and yes to AFSPA. Another bottom-line is that the socio-economic and political scene of the country is changing and changing very fast. It does augur well for the future of the Indian nation which has suffered immensely at the hands of the Congress and parties like the NC. |
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