People's Democracy

Tripartite Meeting On Darjeeling Hill Council On January 28

B Prasant

A tripartite meeting will be held between the state Left Front government, the union government, and the Darjeeling Hill Council on January 28 in Delhi. This resolution came in the wake of the meeting Bengal chief minister, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee had with GNLF supremo Subhas Ghising on January 21 at Sukna near Darjeeling town. The meeting will discuss the work done by the Hill Council, the laws governing the body, and look at the accord that had earlier been signed.

Ghising, badly isolated even amongst his own supporters, had of late been seen to indulge in separatist politics, calling for a separate ‘Gorkhaland’ and threatening to scuttle the elections due to the Hill Council, elections that his splintered group would surely lose.

The CPI (M) leads a four-party alliance to contest the Hill Council elections and it has already started to campaign following the conclusion of the Darjeeling district conference from where Sandopal Lepcha once more elected the secretary of the district unit of the CPI (M).

Following the half-an-hour-long meeting, chief minister, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee told the media that the agenda of the discussion included the overall situation in the hills as well as the various demands that Ghising had raised in between his separatist slogans in recent times. Later, Ghising went on to declare that ‘Gorkhaland’ remained his ‘political demand.’

Buddhadeb said that Ghising appeared ‘concerned’ over the ‘evolving situation in north Bengal’ and that he seemed to be worried over ‘developments’ in Nepal, Bhutan, and Sikkim. The state Left Front government had no objections, clarified the chief minister, over Ghising’s demand for a ‘CBI inquiry’ into the killings of GNLF councillors in the hills. [Those killed included C K Pradhan whose followers have since split the GNLF to set up their own and large unit which is called GNLF (C).]

In the wake of the chief minister’s meeting with Ghising, state secretary of the CPI (M), Anil Biswas told media persons at the Muzaffar Ahmad Bhavan in Kolkata that Buddhadeb’s discussions with Ghising never represented a bowing down to the GNLF’s demands. ‘We,’ said Anil Biswas, ‘would like to see a peaceful situation continuing in the hills of Darjeeling.’ Biswas iterated that Buddhadeb had but represented the view of the Party in this regard.

Sandopal Lepcha told newspersons in Darjeeling that the district unit of the CPI (M) was satisfied at the talks held between the chief minister and the GNLF supremo. Noting that there was no objection to the CBI inquiry into the GNLF councillors’ murder, Lepcha said that the principle demand of the CPI (M) was that elections to the Hill Council must be held in good time, and peace should prevail in the hill areas. (INN)