Alleging there was 'incontrovertible evidence of collaboration' between the Trinamool Congress and Maoists, leaders of Communist Party of India, CPI-Marxist, Revolutionary Socialist Party, Forward Bloc, Telugu Desam Party and Janata Dal-Secular submitted a memorandum to Union Home Minister P Chidambaram asking the government to 'spell out' how it proposed to deal with the TC-Maoist nexus.
After the meeting, CPI-M leader Sitaram Yechury asked the United Progressive Alliance, "Will you continue to allow TC to hobnob with Maoists to save your government at the Centre? It is a clear threat to national security. The UPA has to take a call."
"How can the UPA continue with the contradiction that when the prime minister describes Maoist violence as the gravest threat to the nation, his own cabinet colleagues actively collaborate with Maoists? They can't compromise national security to gain political mileage," he said.
The memorandum said that the responsibility of overcoming the impact of the Maoist violence is not the responsibility of the state governments alone; it is a phenomenon that spans across several states. Therefore, the Union government also has a responsibility.
Observing that it was earlier felt that charges about TC-Maoist nexus was being made by the Left for political considerations, Yechury said the memorandum and its annexure contained what leaders of TC and Maoists have been saying themselves. "It contains their views. In this memorandum, we have given evidence as we have collected it from one of TC's own members of the Lok Sabha, who has published a book detailing various meetings that have taken place before the Nandigram incident in West Bengal."
In a recent book, Trinamool member of Parliament Kabir Suman gives an eyewitness account of a meeting attended by TC chief Mamata Banerjee and Union minister Sougata Roy as well as two top Maoist leaders, who are currently in jail.
"The meeting discusses their intervention in Nandigram agitation," Yechury said, adding that the memorandum also contained a statement by a Maoist leader himself who has given graphic details of how they have not only worked together so far but would continue to do so in future.
On Chidambaram's response, he said the home minister described it as a very serious matter and assured us that he will look into it seriously and impartially. "We hope the government takes cognisance of it and the Minister lives up to the assurance," Yechury.
The Leftist leader also quoted an instance from Suman's book about a meeting the Trinamool chief had with political counsellors from the embassies of United States and Germany and the British High Commission in which the "future" political scenario in West Bengal is claimed to have been discussed.
"We have no objection to the meetings she had with these embassy officials. Our objection is to the content of the discussions which Kabir Suman has written about," Yechury said.
The memorandum said what was happening in the Jangal Mahal area and the forests of Purulia, Bankura and West Midnapore was an awakening, a popular mobilisation and mass resistance of the people against the murders, extortions, rapes, tortures and all such depredations of the Maoists.
CPI leader Prabodh Panda said their charges about the TC-Maoist nexus are not a matter of politics but that of internal security and we met, not a political leader, but the Home Minister of the country as the matter is of grave concern.
JD-S leader Danish Ali added, "The dual policies of politics cannot determine the way internal security of the country is handled. The Prime Minister should not delay in deciding whether he wants to continue to keep such elements with him."
