Chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee finally broke his silence and voiced his anguish over the killings at Netai village in West Midnapore. “What happened in West Midnapore yesterday was not good. It should not have happened. Killing and violence must stop and all political parties should observe restraint,” he said. “We do not want killing. We must stop it at any cost. All parties must cooperate,” hr added. Mr Bhattacharjee was addressing a public meeting at Canning in South 24 Parganas.
Although Union home minister P. Chidambaram on Friday asked him to come to Delhi immediately, it was not clear whether Mr Bhattacharjee had any plans to visit the capital soon. Meanwhile, after remaining on the defensive for a day, the ruling CPI(M) on Saturday decided to hit back. Squarely blaming arch rivals Trinamul Congress, the CPI(M) said that it had hatched a conspiracy with the Maoists. In a rare development, senior party leader Shyamal Chakra-borty also went to West Midnapore only hours after Trinamul Congress chief Mamata Banerjee landed there. In the morning, he announced that he would also address rallies wherever Ms Banerjee would.