The bitter rivalry between the Left and the Trinamul Congress was evident within the Parliament House on Thursday. While Trinamul MPs sat on a dharna to protest against the alleged mobilisation of illegal arms by the Left parties in West Bengal, CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury raised in Rajya Sabha the issue of “patronising” of Maoists by “one of the ministers in Manmohan Singh’s government,” indirectly hinting at Trinamul chief and railway minister Mamata Banerjee.
Raising the issue during Zero Hour, Mr Yechury, without naming Ms Banerjee, said while on one hand Prime Minister had been saying that Maoists are one of the gravest dangers to the nation, one of his council of ministers is “patronising” Maoists and had even claimed that killing of one of the Maoist leaders by security agencies was actually a “murder.”
He said the minister even justified what she had said in defence of the Maoists. The CPI(M) member demanded an explanation from the government on the issue.
Earlier in August, Ms Banerjee while addressing a rally in Maoist bastion Lalgarh, had condemned the “manner” in which Maoist leader Azad was killed.
To this Trinamul leader and minister of state for shipping Mukul Roy objected, leading to a heated argument between Trinamul members and Left members. The main Opposition BJP also supported Left parties.
Intervening in the matter, parliamentary affairs minister Prithviraj Chauhan said he had earlier said that he would come back to the House on the issue after speaking to the minister. He also said that his findings had been that “all these (Ms Banerjee’s support to Maoists) are media reports and nothing happened on ground. So we cannot take action based on media reports”.
To this BJP leader Mr Ravishankar Prasad countered the assertion, by the CPI(M) member saying he had seen Ms Banerjee speaking on TV, leading to a heated argument between Left, BJP and Trinamul members.