By IANS,
New Delhi : The Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Wednesday accused the Planning Commission of refusing to approve the Kochi Metro and sought Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s “immediate intervention”.
The CPI-M said in a statement that the Planning Commission wanted “a private party brought into the Metro Project on a Private-Public-Partnership (PPP) model … on the lines of the now controversial Hyderabad Metro project.
“The Hyderabad Metro project and the way the Planning Commission pushed it is a prime example of how India’s economic policy establishment is promoting private capital even at the cost of public interest,” it said. “The Planning Commission has been trying to impose the Hyderabad Metro model on to Kerala, which is a prime example of crony capitalism.”
The CPI-M urged the prime minister “to ensure a speedy approval of the Kochi Metro Rail Project on the basis of the funding pattern suggested by the Kerala government”.
It said the Kerala government wanted to implement the Kochi project on the lines of the Delhi Metro project where 30 percent of the project cost was to be borne by the state and central governments on a 50:50 basis. The balance amount was to be raised as debt from lending agencies.
The detailed Kochi project report was prepared by the Delhi Metro Rail Corp Ltd (DMRC) and the central ministry of urban development had approved it, the CPI-M said.