Thiruvananthapuram, Friday 11 December 2009: LDF convener Vaikom Viswan has accused the UDF of trying to hoodwink the people on the question of price rise by hiding the Centre’s responsibilities in the matter and ignoring all the efforts that the State government has made to hold the price line.

In a statement here, LDF convener said the government was trying everything within its power to ensure that the maximum number of people were shielded from the price rise.

It had already spent Rs.287 crore for market intervention efforts by the Kerala State Civil Supplies Corporation (Supplyco), Kerala State Cooperative Consumer Federation (Consumerfed) and the Horticultural Development Corporation of Kerala (Horticorp). In comparison, the previous UDF government had spent only a mere Rs.50 crore during the entire duration of its rule.

Vaikom Viswan said the prices of most essential commodities were low in Kerala as compared to those in most other parts of India. For instance, the price of parboiled rice was as high as Rs.22 a kg in Delhi, Rs.27 in Mumbai and Chennai, Rs.25 in Kolkata and Rs.26 in Bangalore, it was only Rs.22 a kg in the open market in Thiruvananthapuram and only Rs.14 in the Supplyco outlets.