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The Left Front in West Bengal is "under siege" senior Communist Party of India-Marxist leader Sitaram Yechury has said, claiming that a situation similar to the "anti-fascist terror" between 1972 and 1977 is emerging in the state.
"The Left Front including the CPI-M is under siege in West Bengal. With the unity between the Congress, Trinamool, Maoists and some NGO's creating a similar situation to the anti-fascist terror of 1972-77. The 'index of unity of opposition' is now virtually one," Yechury now on a visit to London told the Indian Workers' Association in Coventry this week. The CPM strongman gave a detailed analysis of the situation in West Bengal where, he said, the Left Front was 'under seige'.
The Indian Workers Association was formed in Coventry in 1938 and is the oldest Indian organisation in the UK. Yechury was welcomed by IWA members from Scotland and England. "For us West Bengal is of great importance to the class struggle and a question of life or death," Yechury said. According to him, the success of the Left Front in West Bengal during the last 33 years in land distribution of 13.1 million acres from the rich landed gentry to the poor equivalent to 18.5 billion pounds was another factor for the recent attacks on the Front.
The divisions and sub-division of this land between family members during two generations of Left Front rule had excited the opposition, who see the removal of the Left as an opportunity to reclaim the land, Yechury said. Yechury said the projection of the third alternative during the last elections lacked credibility with the people and the Left, as it was a combination of regional parties not having a presence outside their states.
IWA Vice President Avtar Sadiq thanked Yechury for the update and his commitment to take forward the issues of the Indian Diaspora. Representative from Birmingham Sohan Sandhu then presented a memorandum to the MP regarding the escalation of disproportionate charges being levied from people of Indian origin by the Indian Consulate.
The IWA also condemned the charges introduced by the previous Labour Governments on people holding non-British passports and the proposed introduction of immigration quotas and English language tests by the Tory-Liberal coalition government. General secretary Harsev Bains assured Yechury of IWA's support for proposed memorial for the late CPM leader Harkishan Singh Surjeet in New Delhi.