People's Democracy

‘Maoist’-Trinamuli Goons Kill

Three CPI(M) Workers

B Prasant

THE recent spate of people’s movements in the jangal mahal across three western Bengal districts has set panic among the ‘Maoist’ killers and their Trinamuli scouts leading to their desperation.

The assassins set afoot plans to disrupt the vanguard role of the CPI(M) and the toiling masses in the jangal mahal area, as elsewhere once again – and the gruesome murder in broad daylight on the morning of 23 January at Rameswarpur Chak village in the Bhimpur locality of Salboni of three CPI(M) workers bear a tragic testimony to the desperation of thinking of the ‘left’ terrorists.

The role of the Trinamuli goons of the locality in the ghastly deed was clear and plain for all to see.  Three comrades, Karamchand Singh Mahato, Uttam Singh, and Kashinath Palmal, had sat down for cups of tea in the wintry fog of the morning, and it was some minutes past seven.  A motorcycle drew up – on the riding seat and on the pillion were three Trinamuli goons.  They looked hard at the three comrades and sped away.

Being devoid of the criminal’s sense of survival, the three comrades (who had been out of their home-hearth for a long time and had just come back) had a quiet laugh at the way the Trinamulis fled, and continued to sip tea.  Then, ominously, a second and bigger, motorbike approached the stall, and on it were three men, faces swabbed in towelling material. 

The killers kept the motorbike engine ticking over as they braked to stop, and then took aim -- and let loose a hail of bullets from automatic weapons that left riddled the three comrades, whilst leaving others in the tea stall wounded.

Within hours of the ghastly murder, the jangal mahal thudded under the determined footfalls of hundreds of men and women who took to the roads and the bridle paths to raise ringing slogans to protest the killings and to condemn the assassins.  The Trinamuli who led in the grievous act of a pointsman for the ‘Maoists’ has since been identified as the block-level Trinamuli leader at Salboni. 

In a statement, CPI(M) state secretary Biman Basu appealed to all democratic-minded people to come forward in complete condemnation of the killing spree that the ‘left’ executioners had let loose afresh in the recent weeks.  Biman Basu blamed not only the ‘Maoists’ but also the Trinamulis as equally responsible for the violence unleashed on the poor in the jangal mahal, targetting CPI(M) workers in particular, but aiming at creating fear and barbarity as the assembly polls approached.

Biman Basu pointed out that in the wake of the unfortunate incident at the Netai village (where the High Court has ruled out, for the time being, against handing over of the investigation authority from CID to the CBI in this case), opinion mobilised from different interested quarters had encouraged the ‘Maoist’-Trinamuli elements and had led to the fresh spate of violence in the state. 

Apart from the killings, the assassins had let loose increasing attacks on the rural poor and forced thousands to leave their places of residence.  Biman Basu pointed out that in the jangal mahal itself the last one-and-a-half years witnessed the killing of 266 Left Front workers.  From the date of the last Lok Sabha elections, the anti-people killers had slayed 372 left Front and CPI(M) workers.  A total of 155 rural poor, too, had died in the hands of ‘Maoist’-Trinamuli assassins.