The CPI(M) on Thursday lashed out against Trinamul chief and railway minister Mamata Bannerjee for spreading “false information’’ about 2011 West Bengal Assembly elections being pre-poned in the state. As Ms Bannerjee patted herself for drawing huge support at the Martyrs’ Day rally in Kolkata on July 21, CPI(M) central committee
member Mohammed Salim equated Ms Bannerjee with Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi in their efforts to come to power through violence. The CPI(M) leader said that Ms Bannerjee’s demand to the Prime Minister asking for the stopping of the joint anti-Naxal operations in Lalgarh, is a clear indication of her close links with the Maoists in West Bengal. Citing the example of the Godhra carnage, Mr Salim said that Ms Bannerjee is playing on the emotions of people and making use of violent means to win popular support.
Rejecting home minister P. Chidambaram’s reported statement that the CPI(M) is making false claims about the Trinamul-Maoist nexus, the CPI-M politburo member Sitaram Yechury said that the CPI(M)’s allegations are “based on revelations made during interrogations of senior Maoist leaders’’.
The CPI(M) central committee, which is meeting here over three-days, will be finalising a draft of the political resolution defining the party’s approach towards the Congress and BJP. The report is said to have incorporated the views of the party leadership in West Bengal that the Left parties’ got politically sidelined and lost support of its mass base due to the ill-timing of CPI(M) boss Prakash Karat to withdraw support to the UPA government in 2008 and his efforts to cobble up a Third Front in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls. The document also registers the views of the central leadership in New Delhi that the West Bengal unit of the party has been unable to reverse the trend of alienation with the people , a setback which may impact the party’s prospects in the forthcoming Assembly elections in the state.