Lokmat National Conclave: Unemployment has increased in our country

General secretary of Communist Party of India (M) Sitaram Yechury has said that government should stop giving tax benefits to the big corporates and instead make efforts to increase investment in government sector for job creation because it has been found that inspite of giving tax sops to corporate sector, the production and demand are not increasing.Yechury was speaking at the Lokmat National Conclave function in New Delhi on Tuesday. He was interacting with senior journalist Raj Chawla during the conclave. 

At the outset, both Sitaram Yechury and Raj Chawla were welcomed by Chairman of Editorial Board of Lokmat Media Group and former member of Rajya Sabha, Vijay Darda. Yechury rued that demand is not increasing because purchasing power of the people is going down due to inflation.Though government has done massive spending on infrastructure, data shows 25 million youths are still jobless, he further said. 

In response to a query, he said democracy is losing maturiy in the last nine years, because it is limited only to voting and elections without any accountability to people.

Giving an example, he asked why the government is not forming JPC on Adani-Hindenburg issue, which clearly means that the government is staying away from accepting responsibility.

In Tripura, though BJP lost 14 seats, it still managed to form government, so was the case in Meghalaya. With only two seats in its kitty, BJP could still share power in the state.

When asked if Opposition could take on the ruling BJP in 2024 polls when its own house is divided, Sitaram Yechury said any viable alternative comes up only after polls. There are many regional parties whose influence is more than national parties, he said.

The opposition parties are being  targeted without reason, he said in response to a question. 

Though probes are being conducted on a massive scale against Opposition, yet the conviction rate from such probes is only 0.5 per cent, he opined.

When democracy was in danger during Emergency , the Opposition united and today when democracy is again in danger, the opposition is  getting united again, he further said.