Jan 11, 1999
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KERALA Big Bully Charge Allegations of financial irregularities plunge the ruling LDF into an internecine battle. By M G Radhakrishnan
The CPI is particularly irked by the manner in which PPP funds were allocated last year. "The programme has been only partly successful because of the CPI(M)'s partisan approach," charges CPI state Secretary Veliyam Bhargavan. Last year the Government transferred an unprecedented 40 per cent of the state's annual plan outlay (Rs 749 crore) to the local bodies (990 gram panchayats, 57 municipalities and three city corporations) to implement schemes of their choice. Bhargavan alleges that the CPI(M)-led local bodies received more money than the others. The CPI's ire is directed towards the state Planning Board. "Instead of confining itself to supervision the board has been meddling in the implementation process," accuses Bhargavan. The CPI feels the 15-member board has to be restructured as it is packed with CPI(M) representatives. Among its four non-official members are two CPI(M) state committee members -- Thomas Isaac, an economist with the Centre for Development Studies, and E.M. Sreedharan, a chartered accountant and son of the late CPI(M) supremo E.M.S. Namboodiripad, who fathered the PPP. "We have been requesting representation in the board from the beginning," says RSP state Secretary K. Pankajakshan, demanding a vigilance inquiry into the PPP implementation. On its part the CPI(M) feels its left partners are creating an unnecessary ruckus. "The Planning Board cannot be constituted on party lines. Isaac and Sreedharan are there on merit as economists," says the party's tough-talking state Secretary Pinarayi Vijayan. He charges the CPI with throwing all decorum to the winds. "It has never used any internal fora of the LDF to air its grievances. The present outburst is mysterious." Vijayan points out that the panchayat which received the maximum PPP allocation of Rs 3 crore was Munnar which is ruled by the CPI. "Out of the 990 panchayats only 40 per cent are led by the LDF and in that at least 15 per cent are led by the CPI or RSP. So how can we alone hijack the programme?" he asks. Marxist party politburo member and LDF Convener V.S. Achuthanandan accuses the CPI and RSP of "embarking on a nostalgic trip" -- to their anti-CPI(M) days of the '70s. Many observers feel the CPI's and RSP's growing disenchantment with the CPI(M)'s big-brother attitude has been aired through the PPP issue. In recent months the CPI has been complaining that the CPI(M) has taken major policy decisions without discussing it first in the LDF. "The latest is the decision to liberalise the liquor policy and issue licences to liquor bottling units," charges a CPI leader. For some time now both parties have been on a confrontation course in many districts. In Alappuzha and Kollam the trade unions of the two parties have been even involved in clashes. Violence flared up in Kollam when the CITU started a unit in a market which only had an AITUC union."The CPI(M) is consistently ignoring our demand to refurbish the Government's image with some bold policy initiatives. If this continues it would only be at the cost of cutting a sorry figure in the next elections," says a top CPI leader. The RSP's draft political resolution to be adopted at its state conference in January second week accuses the CPI(M) -- and in certain instances the CPI -- of being big brotherly and authoritarian. For the Opposition United Democratic Front (UDF), paralysed for long by ineffective leadership and factionalism, the differences within the LDF has come as a godsend. Its leaders too have jumped on to the bandwagon demanding the dismissal of the Planning Board. "There should be a judicial enquiry into the charges of financial embezzlement," says UDF Convener K. Sankaranarayanan. What has strengthened the argument of PPP's critics is the findings of the accountant-general that there have been financial irregularities in many local bodies. For instance, many local organisations which spent only 2 per cent of the allocated amount till the last month of the financial year used up the remaining amount in the last 15 days to fulfil the expenditure target. With the left partners blaming each other for the irregularities, the PPP, once considered revolutionary, has lost its sheen. For the ruling front, which planned to impress the electorate with its universally lauded decentralisation programme, it is a propaganda weapon lost. |
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One
of the rare achievements of Kerala's ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) in an otherwise
lacklustre two-and-a-half years in power has been the People's Planning Programme (PPP), a
massive decentralisation programme meant to provide unprecedented power and funds to local
bodies to oversee more than 1.5 lakh development projects in the state. But now the very
people who were patting themselves on the back for its successful implementation are
involved in an internecine war. Last week, the ruling front was clearly embarrassed as the
CPI and RSP launched a scathing attack on big brother CPI(M) for "hijacking the
programme to further its own interests". 
