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BJP outfits to hold anti-WTO rallies

Organisations affiliated to the Bharatiya Janata Party and Sangh Parivar on Thursday announced a movement to put pressure on the government to safeguard the interests of the farming community at the ongoing Doha ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organisation.

''We want to ensure that the government does not succumb to the diktats of the industrialised nations and support their proposals during the WTO meeting,'' Swadeshi Jagran Manch leader Ashwini Mahajan told a joint press conference.

Besides the Swadeshi Jagran Manch, the press conference was also attended by the Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, Bharatiya Kisan Sangh and Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad.

Mahajan said the outfits supported the government's porposal to the WTO after the Seattle conference and felt that it should persist with its stand during the conference.

Asked what they felt should be the Indian position during the negotiations, the leaders said implementation issues should be discussed but new trade negotiations should not be taken up till the developed countries agreed to bring down the subsidy.

They said there was no rationale behind the industrialised countries forcing the developing world like India to cut down on subsidy when they had been supporting such provisions.

A nationwide protest would be launched on Friday to put pressure on the government to stick to its proposals and safeguard the interests of farmers. A protest rally would also be held near the Parliament on Friday.

''If the government did not heed our demands, we would form a pressure group to make the ruling coalition see reasons,'' the leaders declared.

In a joint statement, the outfits also demanded that the government should review earlier WTO treaties on agriculture, greater market access to India's agriculture products in the European Union and the United States, free movement of labour abroad, visa for service providers, faster removal of US and EU quotas on textiles and more transparency in the imposition of anti-dumping duties.

They felt that if India's aspirations were not met in the WTO, walking out of the summit will go a long way to create a new trade block as a warning to the developed countries against treating the developing countries differently.

UNI

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