People's Democracy

NPMO Plans Campaign Against Fascistic Offensive

THE National Platform of Mass Organisations (NPMO) has called for observance of the fortnight from June 19 to July 4, as a Campaign Fortnight Against The Fascistic Communal Offensives. During this period, all the NPMO’s constituents will jointly organise mass meetings, rallies, demonstrations, conventions, etc, at the panchayat/mandal level in the countryside, at the ward level in urban areas and at factory gates, in industrial township, etc. The campaign will culminate with joint rallies at the district/state headquarters on July 4.

  The decision was arrived at a meeting of the NPMO held at B T Ranadive Bhawan, New Delhi, on May 20, to review the current situation in the country in context of the unabated genocide being perpetrated against the minority community in Gujarat. The aim was to chalk out a plan of united action to counter the communal offensive by Sangh Parivar outfits. A presidium comprising E Balanandan (CITU), K L Mahendra (AITUC) and R A Mittal (HMS) conducted the proceedings.

  The NPMO comprises central trade unions, employees’ federations and organisations of peasants, agricultural workers, women, students and youth and some other sections.

  The meeting was unequivocal in condemning the heinous incineration of a railway compartment with its passengers at Godhra and demanded that the guilty be brought to book and severely punished.

  The NPMO meeting also condemned the barbaric genocide and ethnic cleansing being perpetrated by the RSS, Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad since the Godhra incident on February 27. Despite the hypocritical claim the union home minister L K Advani made that the Narendra Modi regime brought the situation under control within 72 hours, media are replete with reports that Gujarat is still burning.

  The NPMO meeting noted with shock and anguish the recent reports confirming that the Parivar outfits had drawn up meticulous plans for carrying out their fascistic attacks against the Muslim minorities in Gujarat, with the active connivance of the Modi regime, six months before the Godhra incident. The NPMO, therefore, was of the opinion that the Gujarat massacre was not a reaction to the Godhra incident as claimed by Modi. Nor was it a riot between two communities. It was a preplanned and meticulously executed fascistic design of the Parivar outfits, aided by the Modi regime, having far reaching implications for the democratic, secular polity of our country.

  The NPMO meeting also lambasted the all-round failure of the central NDA government on the economic front, that has brought the country to the brink of ruination. This has evoked outright rejection of the BJP and its allies by the masses in most of the elections since 1999. It is in this background that the RSS-led combine is reverting to its communal agenda with a vengeance, and experimenting with this agenda in the BJP-ruled Gujarat. The NPMO said the majoritarian fundamentalism seeks to divide the country into two camps and physically liquidate the minorities. In the process, it is also feeding the minority fundamentalism, creating a fertile soil for them to gain ground among the terrorised minorities. This is leading to polarisation of our society, perpetuating the divide between the majority and minority communities. The situation is bound to turn volatile in future.

  The NPMO said these developments call for immediate united action on the part of all the mass organisations representing the democratic secular forces. They must mobilise the people in a big way to counter this majoritarian communal offensive and to keep the minorities away from the fundamentalist outfits.

  The NPMO constituents will also make elaborate preparations at all levels to organisationally strengthen the NPMO, chalk out programmes for the campaign, bring out campaign materials and the like. The NPMO will meet immediately after the end of the campaign’s present phase to decide on the further course of action as part of its sustained struggle against communal forces.