LDF starts day-night stir on note issue

LDF activists organised sit-in dharnas at various centres in panchayats, municipalities and Corporation levels in protest against what the Front termed was the Centre's move to destroy cooperatives in the state under the cover of demonetisation.

Inaugurating the dharna, LDF convener Vaikom Viswan said the agitation was to 'protect' the cooperatives, on which the common man depends for daily needs, from the move of the Centre and BJP.

He alleged that demonetisation of Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 notes had pushed farmers and ordinary people to untold sufferings.

On the crisis in the cooperative sector, Viswan claimed that all transactions in the sector had come to a standstill and that depositors were not able to withdraw money.

"People are running helter-skelter to get funds to meet expenses connected with weddings," he said.

CPI(M) said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had declined to meet an all-party delegation from Kerala on the cooperative sector issue and had expressed strong resentment, with Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan dubbing it as an 'insult' to the state.

The delegation had sought time to meet the PM. Modi's decision not to meet the delegation had triggered protests from leaders of both ruling LDF and Congress led UDF Opposition.

A special Kerala assembly session convened on November 22 to discuss problems of the people and cooperative sector after demonetisation had passed a resolution asking the Centre to allow cooperatives also to exchange of old notes and accept deposits as in commercial banks.

LDF had also held a dharna, led by the Chief Minister, in front of the RBI office on the issue on November 18.

Meanwhile, the state BJP, which maintained that cooperative banks in Kerala were not following RBI norms of 'KYC' and charged that it was a 'hub of black money hoarders', said the State government itself was responsible for the present situation.