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Monday, May 18, 2009
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Left to be responsible Opposition

Special Correspondent

Each party to review the reversal individually

— Photo: R.V. Moorthy

coming to terms: Left leaders (from left) Debabrata Biswas (AIFB), T.J. Chandrachoodan and G. Devarajan (both RSP), and A. B. Bardhan and D. Raja (CPI) addressing journalists after a meeting in New Delhi on Sunday.

NEW DELHI: The Left front said on Sunday that it would work as a responsible Opposition in Parliament and continue to cooperate with the non-Congress, non-BJP allies.

General secretaries of the Left parties — Prakash Karat of the CPI (M); A.B. Bardhan of the CPI; Debabrata Biswas of the AIFB; and T.J. Chandrachoodan of the RSP — attended a meeting here, along with party colleagues Sitaram Yechury, Ramachandran Pillai, D. Raja and G. Devarajan, following the poll debacle.

Speaking to journalists after the meeting, Mr. Bardhan said that in the light of the outcome, it was decided that each party review the reversal individually.

Collective assessment

Following this, the parties would come to a collective assessment of the shortcomings and work out ways of overcoming them.

The CPI(M) Polit Bureau and the Central Committees of the Revolutionary Socialist Party and the All-India Forward Bloc are to meet here on Monday. The National Executive of the CPI will meet on Tuesday.

As for the CPI(M), Monday’s meeting will be a preliminary exercise. For a detailed analysis, the party plans to conduct reviews first at the State-level to find out what went wrong, besides assessing the organisational deficiencies both in West Bengal and Kerala. The findings will be presented to the Central Committee.

In view of the changed political situation, the meeting of the Third Front leaders, scheduled for Monday, will not be held. Mr. Biswas said there was no need for such an exercise. One of the factors that some Left leaders felt went against their parties was the fear of instability in the minds of the electorate. The suggestion was that the prospects of a hung Parliament, with a non-Congress leader heading the government, played a role.

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