Left stands united in LS discussion

NEW DELHI: Barely a fortnight ago, the CPM’s allies in the Left Front — CPI, RSP and Forward Bloc — held the Marxist party solely responsible for the situation in Nandigram. On Wednesday, when violence in the area came up for discussion in Lok Sabha, it became apparent that the CPM had, in its characteristic way, reined in the allies to toe its line on the issue.

While the CPI came out in complete defence of the Buddhadeb Bhattacharya government, doing a pirouette from its earlier stand, the RSP and Forward Bloc made short carefully worded speeches.

Under the watchful eyes of big brother, the CPI appealed to the House not to “malign” the West Bengal government and instead turned its ire towards the Centre, blaming the Manmohan Singh government for delaying the deployment of CRPF in Nandigram.

“Is this the way the central government responds.... It has to support the states when in need. Why are you treating us, your allies, in this manner,” CPI’s Gurudas Dasgupta asked. The allegation was refuted by Shivraj Patil who said the Centre has only two CRPF battallions at its disposal.

Echoing the CPM’s line of defence for the Nandigram violence, the CPI leader said that for 11 months Nandigram was under seige despite the state government declaring that there would be chemical hub there. He also reiterated the CPM’s outsider theory and said sophisticated weapons were brought in with the help of “outside political forces”.

In an effort to dispel any notions of fissures with the Left Front, Mr Dasgupta said “there are bound to be differences but the Left Front is as united as before.” However, he admitted that public opinion about the Left has been hurt and friends of the Left were speaking in a “different” voice. “But, as ally of the Left Front, if we have lost something, we are sure to recover it. Its a passing phase,” he said.

RSP’s Sanat Mandal described what had happened in Nandigram is “atrocious” and appealed to all parties and the state government to restore peace and normalcy. Incidentally, RSP was so angry with the CPM that it had threatened to pull out its ministers from the Left Front government.

The Forward Bloc’s Subrata Bose said it was high time an all-party meeting was held to resolve the Nandigram issue. He said certain sections of the people have lost confidence in the state government and asked the chief minister to “restore this confidence”.