Supporters in front of the CPM office in Dharampur on Thursday. Around 7,000 party supporters led by CPM functionary Anuj Pandey claimed to have regained territory the party had lost to Maoists last year. (Samir Mondal)

The office after being set on fire by villagers egged on by Maoists in 2009. (File picture)

Calcutta, Sept. 2: The CPM today asked the Bengal government to tell the Centre that the party had been “compelled” to set up camps for its workers who had fled their homes in the face of Maoist attacks and that the bases did not store arms.

The move came a day after Union home minister P. Chidambaram “alerted” the state government to the presence of “armed” camps of CPM cadres in the state.

The two-day CPM state committee meeting that ended today discussed the Maoist problem and Chidambaram’s remarks.

“We also took note of the fact that 255 party workers have been killed by Maoists since last year’s parliamentary elections,” a source said.

“Chidambaram’s comment also came up during the meeting. After being briefed by the West Midnapore unit of our party, our leadership came to the conclusion that the camps had been set up to give shelter to our party workers and sympathisers who had fled their homes in the face of Maoist attacks.”

The source added: “The state government has been told to inform the Centre that we were forced to set up the camps. The state government is also planning to tell the Centre that the people living in these camps are gradually returning to their villages because the Maoists have begun to retreat.’’

Yesterday, the Union home minister had said: “It is generally agreed that there are some camps in some parts of West Bengal. There are cadres carrying arms.”

Chidambaram had prodded the Left Front government to take action by saying “law and order is a state subject and our (the Centre’s) job is to bring the issue to the state government’s notice”.

After today’s meeting, CPM state secretary Biman Bose said: “The state government will do and say whatever is needed to be done and said.”

He said: “Several CPM workers have been killed by Maoists since the Lok Sabha polls last year. Many of them were attacked and forced to flee their homes and stay in camps. There’s no question of stockpiling of arms in these camps.”

He said party workers were “putting up strong resistance against the Maoists and are getting the support of local people”. Bose added that the CPM “supporters (in Jungle Mahal) who had moved away from us are gradually returning to our fold’’.

Today’s CPM meeting also underscored the “need” to send “senior’’ party leaders to Maoist-hit areas to boost the confidence of local party workers and villagers who had “withstood the Maoist terror”, the source said.