Accusing the United Progressive Alliance government of failing to check rise in prices of essential goods and pursuing anti-people policies, the Communist Party of India-Marxist on Thursday said there was an imperative need for a third alternative, which would be debated at the party's coming Congress in Coimbatore later this week.

It is now an imperative need to find a third alternative at the Centre after the failure of the Congress-led UPA alliance and the Bharatiya Janata Party-led combine's potential of being a threat to the country's secular fabric, West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya said.

The issue would be vigorously deated at the CPI-M Congress beginning in Coimbatore on March 29, Bhattacharya, a party politbureau member, told a Left Front rally in Kolkata.

The UPA government's "failure" is most reflected in the zooming of prices of essential commodities and various "anti-people" policies, he said adding, "We want an alternative for the country."

"We have repeatedly told the UPA government to take lessons from its wrong policies in the past, but it did not pay heed and people throughout the country have protested against its anti-people policies," he said.

"The BJP-led alliance is dangerous for the country if it comes back to power and the UPA alliance has proved a failure," Bhattacharya said.

He said the need of the hour was to unite the Left forces in the country so that a third alternative became a viable political entity, Bhattacharya said.

The rally was organised to accord reception to Tripura Chief Minister Manik Sarkar for the massive victory of the Left Front in last month's assembly elections in that state.