Motion of Thanks On President's Address

Motion of Thanks On President's Address On 19 Mar 2012

Sir, the Address of the hon. President expected to place before the nation the critical issues being faced by different sections of the society and the path adopted by the Government to find solutions, but, unfortunately, the speech was reduced to blowing the trumpet of the ruling UPA by only highlighting the so-called achievements. Leaving aside the major issues being confronted by the nation, the Government opted to convey to this House through the highest authority of this country the number of passport offices that are being opened, the number of FM stations which are proposed to be started, and so on.

This is a clear index to show as to how seriously the Government is concerned about major socio- economic issues starring at the face of the country.

Sir, the entire country is yet to come out of the shocks inflicted by the scams relating to Commonwealth Games, 2G spectrum, Antrix-Devas deal, etc. The silence maintained about these issues in the President's Address gives me an impression that the Government does not consider them as worthy issues to be taken up or the Government is totally immune to all the scams. The people of this country, especially the youth lost their confidence due to various irregularities allegedly done by the Government officials both at the State level and at the Central level, and the Government owes an answer to the nation on this subject.

Sir, the Government boasts that it launched AADHAAR Scheme to improve service delivery and transparency. There are several reports that this is in total disarray and the process of registration and delivery of AADHAAR numbers is completely faulty and confusing. If this is the reality, how is the Government going to take it as a launching pad for delivery of services? I am also told that the CBI has ordered an inquiry. But the President's Address is totally silent about that.

Sir, there is a huge gap between the price at which produce is purchased from the farmer and the price at which it is sold to the end consumer. The Government cannot be a silent spectator of this robbery by the middlemen. Sir, the UPA Government has inherited the robust economy. I quote a few lines of the Economic Survey of July 2004. It says, "The economy appears to be in a resilient mode in terms of growth, inflation and balance of payment, a combination that offers large scope of consolidation of the growth momentum which continued macro level economic stability." These are not the words of any political party. This is the Survey presented by the then hon. Finance Minister, Shri P. Chidambaram, to the Parliament. Our economic growth rate has been between 8.75-9.25 per cent in 2011- 12 as per Economy Survey highlights for 2011-12, and is expected to top 9 per cent. But it has slowed down to 7 per cent this year from 8.4 per cent in 2010-11.

The Government talks about Skill Development Training to 800 million people at a cost of Rs. 13,000 crore in the Twelfth Plan. But there is no mention of its status and there is also no mention of the existing continued unemployment problem of educated people.

There is no commitment for quality and timely supply of farm inputs like seeks and fertilizers. Many of the political parties have been demanding a separate Budget for agriculture to deal with the problems of farmers. It is the need of the hour.

Let there be a comprehensive and sustainable plan for securing handloom industry instead of toying with temporary measures like cheap credit or temporary doles.

The Government talks of creating additional generation of power to meet the growing demands but fails to realize the fact that need of the hour is to strengthen renewable energy so as to save our natural resources and to reduce pollution. Most of the countries are fully engaged in promoting the concepts of 'Virtual Power Generation' and 'Green Energy' by adopting new generation LED lights, etc., but our Government is not looking at anything.

Sir, 85,000 villages and 300 million people of this country have no access to power and about 8.8 billion litres of kerosene is burnt every year for lighting leading to a huge problem of pollution and financial burden. Unfortunately, the Government has no clue to address this problem by promoting new generation of solar based solution.

Sir, mining mafia inflicted irreparable damage to local industry and committed fraud and amassed wealth but the Government is totally silent on this serious issue. Measures should be initiated to limit the activity of mining for captive consumption with the sole objective of strengthening our economy and preserving natural resources for our future generation.

The entire industry, which is dependent on iron ore, has been totally paralysed.

Sir, the Government has failed to respect the importance of our federal structure by unilaterally creating the National Counter Terrorism Centre without taking State Governments and major political parties into confidence.

The Government lacks vision and mission for better utilisation of our water resources. The Government is playing the role of a silent spectator in inter-State water disputes and no initiative has been taken to resolve them.

For the reasons stated above, I would like to say that the Government lacks vision and clarity and the policies adopted are without any direction and not based on ground reality and hence  cannot deliver well for betterment of the society. Therefore, I strongly oppose the Motion of Thanks.