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Congress rallies behind Government on key issues |
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The Congress Working Committee which met in New Delhi on December 12, has come out in support of the Government position on major issues such as its agenda for the uplift and development of the Muslim community and the Indo-US nuclear deal. Reports say that the Muslim question was deliberated thoroughly in the light of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s recent call for ensuring a fair deal to the largest minority community. The Rajinder Sachar Committee had said in its report that the Muslims are lagging at the bottom of the heap on almost all development parameters.
The CWC meeting chaired by party president Sonia Gandhi was attended by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee and other top government functionaries and party leaders.
The CWC also backed the Manmohan Singh Government’s stand to go ahead with negotiations with the United States to wrap up the nuclear deal for civil nuclear cooperation, which will end over 30 years of India’s nuclear isolation in the international community.
The CWC meeting had been convened by Sonia Gandhi to keep the party’s leadership in the know of crucial issues.
The issue of the price rise also came up at the three-hour long CWC meeting. Party leader Janardhan Dwvedi later said, “the CWC told the government to take appropriate steps to check price rise.” Sources said the party leaders were concerned at the price rise as it could affect the party’s image in the Assembly elections due early next year. The Prime Minister said that his government was trying to check prices and will take further measures to do so.
The CWC welcomed the resumption of India-Pakistan composite dialogue and also discussed the Chinese President’s visit and related matters.
Another inter-action between the Congress and the Government came at the two-day meeting of the Congress Parliamentary party last week where MP after MP rose to emphasise that the Government needed to do more for the rural poor. Most of the Congress MPs were not impressed by the 9 per cent plus growth rate of the economy being talked about by Finance Minister P. Chidambaram and other government functionaries. They said that the people whose votes count the most, are outside this “feel good” factor. They said the high growth rate was only going to help a small minority.
Sources say that a despite a record second quarter growth rate of 9.1 per cent, the mood in the government is cautious. The recent growth figures are being seen in the Government as indicating the robustness of the economy. But at the same time, the agrarian crisis which has resulted in suicides by farmers in parts of the country is a distinct dampener.
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