The CPI(M) has on Wednesday questioned the locus standi of Trinamul Congress chief Mamata Banerjee to be the mediator for peace talks as proposed by Maoist leader Koteshwar Rao, alias Kishenji.
Rubbishing his demand, CPI(M) state secretariat member Mohammed Salim said, “A mediator has to be someone who is impartial and non-partisan which Ms Banerjee is not because she has become the advocate of the Maoists.”
He claimed that Kishenji’s offer of talks was an episode of the “drama” which had begun with Ms Banerjee’s rally in Lalgarh. “Actually the people of Jangalmahal have how risen against the Maoists because they are fed up with the daily cycle of violence. The Maoists have become increasingly sidelined. Organising the rally at this juncture was surely aimed at strengthening their hands,” he claimed.
Targeting the Trinamul Congress chief for her comment that Maoist leader Azad was “murdered”, Mr Salim said that it was contradicting the statement of Union home minister P. Chidambaram who said that he was killed in an encounter. “If she was sceptical about the nature of death of Azad, then why she did not make a statement in Parliament saying that the Union home minister has misled the country?” he asked.
Rejecting Ms Banerjee’s defence that she had addressed the Lalgarh rally not as the railway minister but as the Trinamul Congress chief, he said: “If this was the case, then why did the railways deploy over 200 RPF personnel for her security on that day?”
The CPI(M) leader also tore into the Trinamul Congress’ charge that the intrusion of a lorry in her convoy on August 9 at Kolaghat was part of a conspiracy to eliminate her. Describing it as a drama, he said that it was enacted in order to save Ms Banerjee from facing the Parliament and the national media.
The CPI(M) which had been at the receiving end of the Trinamul Congress’ “conspiracy propaganda” has now decided to strike back. “Kishenji’s proposal has exposed the true colour of the Trinamul Congress chief and certainly her doublespeak,” he added. The party also wants the Centre to make its stand clear on the pre-conditions set by Kishenji.
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Punjab legal help for truck driver
AGE CORRESPONDENT
chandigarh
Aug. 18: Punjab chief minister Parkash Singh Badal has said his government would extend necessary legal assistance to Gurjant Singh, the Sikh truck driver who was arrested and charged with “attempted murder” after his vehicle hit a car in railway minister Mamata Banerjee’s cavalcade in East Midnapore on August 10.
Already struggling to make ends meet, the trucker’s family in Maurh village in Punjab’s Sangrur district now faces further predicament not having the financial resources to travel to West Bengal and pursue his case with the police and the courts. Gurbans Kaur, the 40-year-old driver’s wife, is praying for a “miracle” because there is virtually nothing else she can do amidst caring for Gurjant’s aged and ailing parents and her three children.