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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Offices vandalized, CPM cries political vendetta by Romita Dutta

Offices vandalized, CPM cries political vendetta by Romita Dutta

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published Published on Jun 7, 2011   modified Modified on Jun 7, 2011

Sheikh Sajed Ali doesn’t dare leave the Jamshed Ali Bhawan party office in West Midnapore’s Keshpur. It’s the only refuge the sharecropper has been able to find since the Left Front led by the Communist Party of India-Marxist, or CPM, got wiped out in the recent assembly elections by the Trinamool Congress and its allies.

Ali is terrified to venture out. He says his family is being asked to pay `2 lakh as a penalty for voting for the CPM and is under threat to reveal his whereabouts, “so that they can thrash me dead”.

Just this one party office out of 101 in the area has been left relatively unscathed in the general onslaught of vandalism that has erupted against them since the polls.

“The CPM party offices were either attacked or whitewashed to erase all traces of the party symbol,” Ali said. He’s sheltering there along with 35 other people, all of whom say they are being hounded by the Trinamool Congress.

Swapan Mondal and Kanai Jana of Ronda, both full-time CPM workers, have already felt the wrath of their opponents and are nursing fractures. They are being treated at home, under the watchful eye of the Trinamool Congress, according to Sonai Palmal of Neradeul, who himself fled from home on 14 May, the day after the election results were out, to save himself from a group of 30 people who had changed their support overnight to the Trinamool Congress, he said.

CPM cadres are being framed on trumped-up weapons charges, said a worker in Bishwanathpur, requesting anonymity.

“They are moving on bikes… 15-20 people in a group. We are scared when they move at night, because they are dropping or stashing arms in the dark and bringing police in the morning for their recovery,” he said. “They are threatening us to surrender arms or pay heavy fines. I am an innocent worker of a self-help group. What do I know of arms? They have snatched away all the pass books and cash of several thousand.”

The irony is that the CPM’s Rameshwar Dolui won the Keshpur by 33,000 votes, one of the 62 seats that the Left Front got against the 227 that the Trinamool and its allies triumphed in, sweeping aside 34 years of Left Front role and the cue for old scores to be settled. Dolui himself is a prisoner in the neighbourhood of his home.

Keshpur has traditionally been a Leftist stronghold, often described by the opposition as a terror zone, where those who opposed the CPM were persecuted. Now, it’s the Marxists who find themselves cornered, even in bastions such as Keshpur.

Dolui’s movement is restricted to a 20km stretch— from his home in Nerajol to the party headquarters on the highway—Jamshed Ali Bhawan.

In the last 20 days, CPM strongholds have been taken over, party offices vandalized, supporters attacked or heavily fined and asked to give an undertaking that they won’t pick up the red flag again.

According to the erstwhile chief minister and politburo member Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee more than 5,000 party workers are homeless and several hundred party offices across the state have been forced to close, following what he said were attacks by Trinamool Congress members.
“I have managed to keep this office open at least once in a day,” Dolui said during his daily visit to Jamshed Ali Bhawan. The impressive two-storey party office at Anandapur in Keshpur, 10km away, has been locked up. It once used to be thronged by prominent party leaders and the narrow road leading to it would be clogged with expensive cars. There are no red flags fluttering on the route now—just the Trinamool Congress party flag with its twin grass flower emblem.

That the party has been unable to protect its property and keep the flock intact was apparent at the Kankabati local committee office in West Midnapore, the fortress of the party in the district till a month ago.

“A group of men stormed into the party office and plundered everything. The three men, who were last seen in the camp on Friday (13 May, the day of the result) could not be traced,” a resident of the area said on condition of anonymity. Sadhan Khila, a Trinamool Congress worker, was unapologetic about the incident, but said there was reason for the attack.

“Naturally, it was our target because it was a harmaad (goon) camp. Men in maroon uniforms moved in and out, terrorizing the locals. Arms were also being manufactured here. A loudspeaker would blare for most of the day to conceal the clanking sound of metals and welding for arms manufacturing,” Khila said.

The wheel of political intimidation seems to have come full circle in just a few days. Twenty years ago, the CPM and heavyweight leaders such as Dipak Sarkar and Sushanta Ghosh of Garbeta called the shots in this part of West Midnapore. Several thousands found themselves homeless for supporting other parties.

Now the Trinamool Congress is “paying the party in the same coin”, said Mohiuddin Ahmed, compelled to leave his home twice during the CPM regime and barred from cultivating his 30 bigha of land for four years as punishment for organizing the Trinamool Congress party in the area.

This is the anger of the people against the CPM, said Trinamool Congress Lok Sabha parliamentarian from East Midnapore, Sisir Adhikary.

“We and our leadership have asked people to keep restraint, but their response is spontaneous,” he said. “Natural, given the years of torture.”

Dolui has submitted a memorandum to the West Midnapore superintendent of police, but action is yet to be taken, he said.

“Police and Trinamool Congress men are jointly raiding our party workers’ houses. Arms are being recovered, wrapped up in party flags. One can imagine the conspiracy going on,” Bhattacharjee had said at a public rally in the area after the election.

The words and actions seem to be identical, with only the speakers having changed sides. Chief minister Mamata Banerjee brushed aside the allegations as “stray, isolated and being played up in certain media”.

The CPM state committee has now been forced to ask party cadres to stay away from party offices and preferably avoid leaving home after dark. Those in the disturbed areas of West Midnapore, Purulia, Bankura, Burdwan and Hooghly have been asked to lock up party offices and leave the area. They have been asked to stay united but refrain from aggressive party activities and organizing any meetings or processions.

Left Front chairman Biman Bose has asked supporters to lie low and keep away from the public glare.


Live Mint, 7 June, 2011, http://www.livemint.com/2011/06/06224518/Offices-vandalized-CPM-cries.html?atype=tp


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