People's Democracy

MARCH 20 GLOBAL DAY OF PROTEST

Bengal To Witness Human Chain Programme

B Prasant

MEETING for one day at the Muzaffar Ahmad Bhavan in Kolkata on March 7, the Bengal unit of the CPI(M) has urged upon the people of the state to make an unprecedented success of the ‘human chain’ programme scheduled for March 20. 

The programme would remember in condemnation the same date of 2002 on which US imperialists launched a barbaric attack on Iraq.  The invasion has left hundreds of thousands of Iraqis killed and injured, cities razed to the ground with hunger, disease, and poverty stalking the country. The day is similarly remembered across the world for condemning US aggression on Iraq.

In this state, said CPI(M) state secretary, Anil Biswas, the Left parties were in discussion to detail out the programme in each of the districts.  In Kolkata, the human chain will extend from Tallah in the north of the city to Tollygunje in the south. 

The programme will be held between 5:00 and 5:10 on the evening of March 20 when people will clasp one another hand-in-hand across the whole state, protesting against the acts of commission of the US imperialists in Iraq and elsewhere.  The people have been requested to gather at the proper and identified locations by 4:30 and to make the programme a great success.

The state committee meeting also discussed other issues. It has been resolved to organise meetings and processions all over the state and to highlight the draft political resolution of the 18th Congress of the CPI(M) to be held in New Delhi over April 6-11.

The state CPI(M) has elected 175 delegates to the Party Congress; all members of the central committee of the CPI(M) from Bengal are delegates ex officio to the Congress. The Bengal delegation at the Congress will be led by state secretariat member of the Bengal CPI(M), Madan Ghosh; Rabin Deb will function as the deputy leader of the delegation.

The state committee meeting also discussed the elections that are due soon to the Kolkata municipal corporation and to 82 urban local bodies.  Booth-based election committees will be set up by April 5. Following the formation of the booth committees, the election campaign will commence.  The concerned units of the CPI(M) have been asked to initiate and finalise the procedure in time. Anil Biswas has said that the Left Front would emerge winner in the Kolkata municipal corporation irrespective of the Trinamul Congress and the Pradesh Congress fighting jointly or separately.

Asked by newspersons on the Bihar situation, Anil Biswas said that the emergent issue at the moment was to keep alive the unity of the UPA and that the Congress had a big role to play in this regard.  Biswas also commented to say that if the assembly was kept alive and President’s rule imposed, an opportunity would be created for horse-trading to commence.

The state committee meeting elected a 15-member state secretariat of the Bengal CPI(M). The members are: Jyoti Basu, Biman Basu, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, Anil Biswas, Mohd Amin, Benoy Konar, Nirupam Sen, Shyamal Chakraborty, Surjya Kanta Mishra, Madan Ghosh, Mridul De, Gautam Deb, Dipak Dasgupta, Amitava Basu, and Raghunath Kushari.

Chittabrata Majumdar, a member of the earlier state secretariat, is now engaged in all-India functioning as the general secretary of the CITU, and that is why he has not been included in the new state secretariat, noted Anil Biswas.  No new members have been inducted in the new secretariat this time. The state conference has already endorsed that the earlier secretariat has been functioning well and in a most responsible manner. Also, six new members had been included in the state secretariat during the time of the last state conference of the Bengal CPI (M), said Anil Biswas.