MyVoice: Views of our readers 21st May 2021

LDF govt 'left' with explaining to do

No matter what the party - the CPI (M) - says, the exclusion of K K Shailaja Teacher from the new Council of Ministers headed by Pinarayi Vijayan has hung heavy on the occasion of the swearing-in of the CM and his Cabinet colleagues. It has taken some shine off the ceremony. The claim that it was the party's collective decision and not Pinarayi Viyajan's is very far-fetched. We are all aware that Pinarayi Vijayan wields enormous power within the party and no one dares voice objections to what he wishes. The LDF could have done without changing horses midstream.

One hopes that the new health minister Veena George proves equal to the challenge of leading the Covid-19 fight as her predecessor did. The new faces in the Cabinet are all up-and-coming leaders; they represent the state's rich cultural ethos; they are promising; they are sure to do their best for the people to fulfil their aspirations and realize their potential. Captain Vijayan should nurture the young Ministers without centralizing power in the CMO.

What is politically more substantive and significant is that a left front committed to secularism assumes power for one more term and consecutively at that. It is expected that the Pinarayi Vijayan government's policies will be people-centric and focus on welfare and development. We are confident that it will do all that it can to improve the quality of life of the state's impoverished people.

We have to look at the new government in the wider national context. It will be a bulwark against right-wing Hindutva forces and resist the attempts to implement the Hindutva agenda. It will seek a relationship with the Centre based on 'cooperative federalism'. Most importantly, it will preserve the state's famed social amity.

G David Milton, Maruthancode

Spread vaccination efforts

It is of topical interest to note that the Bombay High Court told the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation that if the Centre did not permit door-to-door vaccination, the Court would grant the civic body permission to do so. In these days of widespread pandemic, it is all the more necessary to adapt the door-to-door vaccination .This is all the more essential in respect of those aged about 75,bed-ridden and wheelchair bound. I would urge the Telangana Government to consider this suggestion and implement the same at the earliest.

Seshagiri Row Karry, Hyderabad

A little sensitivity needed

Your Editorial "Indifferent administration hurting people" (THI, 20 May) mirrors the present day reality where the politicians in power are doing very little to mitigate the pandemic induced miseries of people but are presenting a false narrative of their performance through their boastful and high decibel rhetoric which amounts to self-deception.

Millions of hapless and distraught people are immensely angered by the unresponsive and irresponsible political leadership that is investing all its capital for garnering votes and winning elections with no concern for the plight of people caught in the vortex of unprecedented health crisis where the callous and cavalier approach of rulers facilitated indiscriminate fleecing of millions of Covid-19 patients through black marketing of drugs and other corrupt practices with regard to accessing ambulance services, allocation of hospital beds and even getting time slots in crematoriums. People are indeed frustrated by the ruling classes unwilling to take any sort of accountability for their flawed administration that shattered the lives and livelihoods of people like never before.

Apparently, wisdom of ruling classes often gets reflected through revisiting and reviewing their missteps and going for course correction. When every rupee counts for government to ramp up healthcare infrastructure to halt the deaths caused by shortage of medical facilities, nothing is more insensible than going ahead with the construction of Central Vista Project at a huge cost.

A landslide electoral victory and a brute majority in Parliament shouldn't be taken as a license to embrace a political discourse devoid of economic prudence, financial discipline, wider consultations, legislative debates and political consensus. In the backdrop of mounting criticism against the controversial Central Vista project, the government needs to make amendments to its policy in this regard. Egoistic tendency to not retreat may further make the already fragile economy still worse jeopardizing the pandemic control endeavours. The Centre needs to navigate carefully in the troubled waters of ever increasing financial constraints in light of people being hit hard multiple times by the mutating microbe where the limited financial resources have to be utilised judiciously and with right priorities. Political interests shouldn't take precedence over people's interests. It is high time the political leadership demonstrated dexterous political management to rise to the occasion during these most challenging times by renouncing a political discourse that seeks to promote the image of the top leader at the cost of wellbeing of people.

Narne Raveendra Babu, Hyderabad