Achuthanandan drops bombshell over rice crisis

Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan's remark that the Centre seemed bent on starving Keralites has queered the controversy over the supply of rice to the state.

"The Centre would have the people of Kerala starve to death," Achuthanandan quipped while interacting with media persons in the state capital yesterday.

The Centre's assessment that Kerala had rice stocks to last until December was a cruel joke, he said.

On criticism that the state had failed to weigh in with 1,13,420 tonnes of rice expected of it, he said even a rice-surplus state like Andhra Pradesh was not contributing to the central pool.

Achuthanandan said the Centre's pro-globalisation approach was to blame for the situation where the common man was unable to afford rice.

Alleging that the Centre's policies were aimed at undermining the public distribution system in the country, he said the Left would organise protests to highlight the central government's failures.

Rice prices have become a contentious issue in Kerala particularly with the Onam festival season round the corner. While the state government has been blaming the Centre, the Congress-led opposition in Kerala has turned on the Left Democratic Front government.

Congress retort

Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee president Ramesh Chennithala and opposition leader Oommen Chandy say the state government has invited the cuts in ration quotas by going back on an agreement to deliver 1,68,000 tonnes of rice to the central pool.

Chennithala and Chandy's contention that the state government is distorting facts to blame the central government has further antagonised the Left parties which had fallen out with the Congress at the Centre over the nuclear deal with the US.