Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Prakash Karat on Saturday said the party had identified the measures needed to remedy the situation that led to reverses in the last Lok Sabha elections in West Bengal and Kerala.
In his inaugural address at the extended central committee meeting that began here, he said the party should do its utmost to see that the people of West Bengal and Kerala renewed their faith in the party and the Left-led alliances there.
He said the firm stand of the party in its consistent opposition to neo-liberal policies and the strategic tie-up with the U.S. had drawn the ire of the ruling classes and imperialists, with the attack being concentrated on the CPI(M) and the Left Front government in West Bengal.
“For the right wing forces, for those who draw their sustenance from imperialism and for the corporate media, the bloody violence against the CPI (M) and the Left Front in West Bengal is of no concern,” he said, citing the killing of 255 members and supporters of the party by political rivals. He said such violence and attacks presage an authoritarian trend, which bodes ill for the country.
The Maoists, he said, had exposed their vicious and anti-democratic nature through the targeting of the CPI(M), as also the attacking of innocent people, seen in the sabotage of the Jnaneswari Express. “Such actions should dispel the illusion some sections of the intelligentsia have about the Maoists,” he said.
