Daijiworld Media Network - Mangalore (SP)

Mangalore, Jul 31: In a release, Communist Party of India (Marxist) has informed that the party would be organizing a state-wide bundh on August 1, demanding that the state ministers who have been facing criminal charges, be dropped from the cabinet. The party says that 10 members of the state ministry are facing criminal charges and FIRs have been lodged against eight among them.

The party is also unhappy over the government's handling of the power situation. Instead of increasing power generation, the government has been increasing the load-shedding durations, the release, issued by CPM secretariat member Vasant Achari said.

The budget presented by the chief minister does not contain any industrialization-friendly policy and nothing has been said about helping out sick industrial units. Special grants have not been set aside for districts where human development indexes are low, the party criticized.

The party wants the government to supply rice to the poor at Rs 2 per kg as promised in the BJP manifesto and to increase the annual income level for below poverty line eligibility from the present Rs 12,000 to Rs 30,000. It has also exhorted the state government to properly utilize the central grants and implement national rural employment guarantee scheme effectively.

The district unit of the party will be holding a protest rally followed by a public meeting in front of the district deputy commissioner's office in the city as part of the agitational programme, the party has said.