WEST MIDNAPORE: Lalgarh bond for Morcha

BY AMIT UKIL

Lalgarh (West Midnapore), Feb 19 : The tribal leaders of the south and the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha leaders of the north today shook hands and pledged support to each other’s movements.

At the invitation of Chhatradhar Mahato, the leader of the People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities, Morcha general secretary Roshan Giri and media and publicity secretary Binay Tamang attended as chief guests a public meeting called to condemn the torture of tribal villagers in the hands of police and CPM supporters.

After a little over an hour of closed door conversations, the leaders of both sides emerged from the forest rest house to the venue nearby, where over 5,000 tribal villagers had gathered to hear them.

“The Morcha fully supports your movement against the CPM and the police, who are not allowing democratic rallies in the Dooars. The CPM is creating a divide between the Adivasis and the Gorkhas. But we are with the Adivasis in the Dooars and Terai and want the closed tea gardens to open so that the tribal workers get back their jobs,” Giri said.

“Party chief Bimal Gurung could not attend as he is in Gorubathan heading a similar movement against the CPM and for the tribal people of the Dooars. But he will speak to you over the mobile phone,” Giri said while connecting the number. “We are against the police atrocities in Lalgarh. Our movements are similar; we must be united in the struggle. We are with you,” Gurung said over the phone, held to the microphone.

Tamang was a bit more vehement. “The Left Front sees the Adivasis and Gorkhas as animals. The condition of the tribals in the Dooars gardens is very bad…If needs be, we will paralyse life in north Bengal with your support,” he said.

Joydeb Mukherjee, the secretary of the All-India Legal Aid Forum, said the Lalgarh protests were the “semi-finals”. “The finals will be when you block the whole district if the chief minister himself does not come here to apologise for his policemen’s atrocities,” he said.

Chhatradhar later told reporters he had accepted the invitation to go to Darjeeling when the Morcha plans a similar rally there.