Patna, March 23: Opting out of playing to the gallery, the CPI(ML) today reminded the people of a different “Lahore fever” that had gripped the country exactly 73 years ago when Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru kissed the gallows at the central jail in the unified Punjab city — home tomorrow to the “finals” of the Pakistan-India ODI series.
At a function to release the CPI(ML)’s election manifesto, the party’s general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya said, “When I went to garland the martyr’s statue at a local park today, the gates were locked. So much for the sacrifice made by Bhagat Singh, whose popularity at one time was no less, if not greater, than Gandhi! The state government did not even bother to open the gates on his martyrdom day,” Bhattacharya said at a function where the CPI(ML)’s election manifesto was released.
The function coincided with a youth parliament organised by the All India Students’ Association, CPI(ML)’s student wing, whose firebrand president, Kavita Krishnan, promised to give jailed RJD politician Mohammad Shahabuddin a tough fight in the Siwan Lok Sabha constituency. She also criticised the “farce” being enacted in the name of jailing the RJD strongman.
“We have to avenge the death of Chandrashekhar, twice president of Jawaharlal Nehru University Students’ Union, who was murdered in cold blood in Siwan in 1997, by Shahabuddin’s henchmen. ,” Krishnan said.
Chandrashekhar’s frail mother Kaushalya Devi was also present at the function. Kaushalya had refused to accept “compensation” from the state for her son’s death.
The CPI(ML)’s performance in two parliamentary constituencies — Siwan (against Shahabuddin) and Purnea (against the other jailed politician Pappu Yadav) — will be keenly watched. The party has fielded CPM leader Ajit Sarkar’s widow Madhavi against Pappu Yadav.
Yadav is behind bars for his alleged role in Sarkar’s murder. The CPI(ML) will contest 65 seats across the country, 21 of them in Bihar alone.
The CPI(ML) general secretary said the party would present itself as an alternative to the BJP as well as the RJD. “We are not part of the ongoing power play. But wherever we contest we will give our opponents a tough fight,” Bhattacharya said.
The manifesto comes in the form of a 10-point “chargesheet” before the “people’s court” in which the NDA has been “indicted.” It describes the Gujarat genocide under Narendra Modi as NDA’s “worst crime against India”.
The “fratricidal clashes” in the Northeast, enactment of Pota, government’s “genuflection before American masters” and scams come next.
