Have you brought up the problem of cadres with the leadership of the CPM earlier?

It has been pointed out a number of times — during Singur, Nandigram. But there is unilateralism practiced by the CPM in dealings with other parties of the Front.

In Kerala, for instance, the CPM has been encroaching on the seats that used to be contested by other partners of the Left, the RSP and JD(S). It came down to the CPI too. We used to contest four seats, they wanted to cut it down to three. Through this method, the CPM, which used to contest 11 out of the 20 seats in Kerala, contested 14 this time.

On the question of the ban on the CPI(Maoist), it appears that in the Left, the party is at odds with the West Bengal Government. There are also differences of opinion within the Left Front in that state.

All Left parties, including the CPI and CPI(M), have the same view — that applying the ban is no solution. If the ban was to solve the problem, then Maoists should be weakened in Jharkhand and Orissa. They are not.

Secondly, the CPI(Maoist) does not function legally even today. They take recourse to illegal armed action. The ban only arms the police and administration with arbitrary powers to arrest and prosecute people.

This is exemplified by the arrest of the CPI(Maoist)’s Gaur Chakraborty. He was not arrested because he was carrying arms or was engaged in armed action in Lalgarh. He has been arrested in Kolkata, simply because he is a member of the CPI(Maoist).

... contd.