Congress should come out with clear statement, says Salim

Unable to bear the silence of the Congress high command over its decision whether to form an electoral alliance with the Left Front or not, CPI(M) central committee member Mohammed Salim on Monday said the Congress should come out with a clear cut statement on the issue. 

Salim was addressing a rally at Esplanade. This is for the first time when a CPI(M) leader has attacked the Congress for the inordinate delay. It may be recalled that the former CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee while flagging off the rally at Singur recently had also spoken about the alliance with the Congress.

Reacting sharply to Selim’s statement, WBPCC president Adhir Chowdhury said the party was not answerable to anyone. “We are not going to give any answer to anyone. The decision will be taken by our high command and we will follow it” he said. 

It may be mentioned that WBPCC leaders would meet Rahul Gandhi on February 1 to discuss poll strategy. Earlier, some PCC leaders had also pleaded strongly for the electoral alliance with the Left Front terming it as “the need of the hour”. But they are now on the backfoot after sensing that high command might not allow electoral alliance.  

Selim said the residents of Bengal were in favour of the alliance. But whatever the leaders of both the parties say about the alliance, the rank and file of the two parties are very skeptical.

While CPI(M) cadres consider Congress workers to be “arch rival” as many of their comrades were killed   between 1972-77, Congress workers on the other hand consider the CPI(M) to be the biggest opportunist party.

The CPI(M) had criticised Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi and was even engaged in character assassination, but now the party is trying to rope in Congress just to fulfill its dream of coming back to power. “We know how CPI(M) had  come to power in 1977 by using the Janata Dal and it is trying to use the same trick once again,” said a leader.