People's Democracy

LEFT FRONT APPEAL TO ELECTORATE

Defeat Opportunistic Trinamul, Congress & BJP

THE Bengal Left Front has released an Appeal to the electorate on the Vidhan Sabha elections. The Appeal calls upon the people to ensure a big victory for the Left Front in order to keep up the work of development in which the LF has been involved over the past 24 years, to mete out a resounding defeat to the anti-people and opportunistic parties, the Trinamul Congress, the Congress and the BJP.

Supplementing and updating the Election Manifesto which the Left Front had released a few weeks back, the Appeal summarizes the political and administrative misdeeds of the BJP-led union government and points out that the erstwhile votaries of Swadeshi were ready to sell the country’s economic sovereignty to the foreign corporate concerns while for the spokespersons of Suraj the realpolitik was to be found in the defence scams.

The document makes a scathing attack on the Trinamul Congress for initiating the cult of violence in the state in Midnapore and Bankura through its association with the People’s War Group, and in enabling the BJP to establish a toehold in Bengal.

It speaks of the opportunistic stance of the Trinamul Congress in coming out of the NDA in order to to join hands with the discredited and corruption-ridden Congress in Bengal. Just as, while in the NDA the Trinamul Congress had not opposed the anti-people policies of the BJP-RSS, even when they are supposed to be out of the alliance any criticism of the BJP-RSS is conspicuous only by its absence. In its election manifesto it also remains silent both on the union budget and on the scams and scandals in which the BJP is presently embroiled.

The document recalls that till date the Trinamul Congress has not sent any communication to the President of India regarding its disassociation with the NDA.

The ever-shrinking Congress has chosen to prostrate itself at the feet of the Trinamul Congress, and has pledged to be satisfied with a mere 57 seats in the unequal division of constituencies between what is euphemistically called a partnership.

The Appeal points out that the common point that seemed to attract the Trinamul Congress into the folds of an alliance of convenience seemed to be corruption. The Congress already possesses a formidable record in this matter what with the Böfors scandal sharing the public space with the sugar scam and the telecom corruption. The BJP’s track record stands fully exposed. the Trinamul Congress seeks to thrive politically in such august company.

As the Appeal points out, the key question in the election centers around the issue of development versus anarchy; the Left Front government stands by the former, the Trinamul Congress and its present and erstwhile partners seek to bring back the latter. The choice before the democratically-conscious people of Bengal is therefore clear-cut.

Briefing the media at the Muzaffar Ahmad Bhavan, on the release of the Appeal Polit Bureau member and Left Front leader, Biman Basu recalled that the Left Front had grown out of a series of political battles with the forces of reaction, and that the forum for this growth and consolidation of the Front had always been the pro-people and pro-development platform. "The Left Front does not need either the close confines of a five-starhotel or the luxury of the Nizam palace, to conspire machinations and try and win the hearts and minds of the people," said Biman Basu.

Biman Basu also drew attention to the constant supply of huge funds into the publicity campaign of the Trinamul Congress, the BJP and the Congress in the present Vidhan Sabha polls. These partners have become puppets on a string of those who are mobilizing such gargantuan amounts of financial backing. He also called for vigilance on the part of the people against the inevitable efforts that their right-reactionary combine will make to destablise the peace and amity prevailing in West Bengal.