Marked as a "Day of Protest against Price Rise", June 23 saw various trade unions of Delhi stage a joint protest against price rise at Jantar Mantar. The unions demanded that the prices of the various petroleum products which had been hiked up by the Congress led UPA government be reduced.
Marked as a "Day of Protest against Price Rise", June 23 saw various trade unions of Delhi stage a joint protest against price rise at Jantar Mantar. The unions demanded that the prices of the various petroleum products which had been hiked up by the Congress led UPA government be reduced.
On the occasion of the "Day of Protest against Price Rise", workers organised huge demonstrations in various industrial areas, state capitals and financial centres.
Addressing the meeting on behalf of the Mazdoor Ekta Committee, Bijju Nayak pointed out that prices had reached a new peak. People are already suffering from the high prices. In such circumstances, by raising the prices of petrol, petrol, cooking gas and kerosene, the Congress led government has acted against the interests of the people. We should not forget that our political economic system is capitalism. Every policy of the government is made keeping the interest of the capitalists. From the natural resources of our country to the public sector units, which were constructed with the aim of fulfilling a social need, every resource is being privatized and handed over to the bourgeoisie. Earlier the electricity distribution was privatized. Now the government is hell bent to privatise the water supply in Delhi so that a natural resource like water, to which people have a right, can be exploited to make profits. The experience of the past 60 years shows that the capitalists of our country have become so big exploiting our labour that now they are challenging the capitalists on the world scale as equals. At the same time, the working class of our country is struggling to come out of this very difficult situation. We condemn the existing rule of the capitalists, which is not responsive and answerable to the people. Whether it is the UPA government or the NDA government or some other government, it has been working in the interest of the capitalist class. The aim of our struggle must be to establish a rule of the working class.
All the speakers from the trade unions who addressed the meeting said that when the people were already suffering from high prices, raising the price of petrol-diesel was extremely condemnable. They demanded that the price rise should be immediately rolled back and not allowed to increase in the future. They said that the higher price of petrol-diesel and cooking gas will inevitably lead to higher food prices, which will adversely affect the standard of living of the people.
The participants of the dharna consisted of Mazdoor Ekta Committee, INTUC, AITUC, CITU, AIUTUC, AICCTU, UTUC, TUCC.