Wal-Mart has an easy day
Government managers were quick to interpret the victory as proof of popular support to its reformist agenda. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said: “FDI policy that we have put in place has the approval of this House.” Foreign supermarket giants like Wal-Mart, Tesco and Carrefour can now set up shops in India, with the comfort of political backing to the policy.
Although two days of debate on the issue saw the ruling and opposition parties trying to score political brownie points, the SP and BSP, which stridently opposed FDI in retail but had remained ambivalent on their floor strategy, on Wednesday chose to walk out of the Lok Sabha debate “in protest” rather than vote against the government.
Still, a vote on the issue on Friday in the Rajya Sabha, where the government is rather precariously placed, gives reason for the UPA managers to remain on their toes. Although the vote on FDI in retail is only of symbolic value, Fema amendments to allow inflows of foreign money into the sector are indeed needed to implement the decision.
While government functionaries claimed
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