While West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee on Sunday reiterated that Bengal “cannot be divided”, Central government-appointed interlocutor Vijay Madan is convinced that the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) engineered the incident in Dooars on February 8 which led to the death of three persons.
Addressing a rally of the Left Front at the Brigade Parade ground, the chief minister said, “The people of Bengal do not want a division of the state. We will not allow the division of Bengal. The Trinamul Congress is silent ‘because of votes’. They (Trinamul Congress and GJM) are new friends.”
Meanwhile, after holding separate meetings with the senior officials of Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri districts and top leadership of GJM on Saturday, Mr Madan returned to New Delhi on Sunday.
“After the meetings, Mr Madan was fully convinced that the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha had instigated the violence in a bid to save its loss of face before the people of Darjeeling.
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NCM to seek Karmapa info from MHA
PARUL CHANDRA
NEW DELHI
Feb. 13: Amidst the controversy surrounding the 17th Karmapa, Ugyen Trinley Dorjee, following the recovery of huge amounts of unaccounted for foreign currency from his monastery in Himachal Pradesh, the National Commission for Minorities (NCM) plans to speak to the Union home ministry to find out details of the probe against him.
The NCM chairman, Wajahat Habibullah told this newspaper that the Commission has received several representations from members of the Buddhist community regarding the on-going inquiry against the Karmapa. While noting that “the intelligence agencies have got facts and figures which require inquiry”, Mr Habibullah said that given that he is a spiritual leader for Buddhists, needs to be given a “degree of respect and added that “discretion is required”.
The latest twist in the sace has come with chief minister Prem Kumar Dhumal’s statement denying that the Karmapa has been given a clean chit.