Two former CPI-M MPs get ready to join Congress

Thiruvananthapuram, Feb 7 (IANS) After two former Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) Lok Sabha members seem all set to join the Congress, three more Left leaders are also getting ready to quit their party.

A senior Congress leader told IANS that the preliminary talks for induction of former CPI-M MPs K.S. Manoj and S. Sivaraman have begun.

'Now this has to be discussed at the party level and it is expected to take place when the committee meets next. Three more leaders of significance in the CPI-M are also expected to leave the party,' the Congress leader, who did not want to be identified, said.

The first to leave the CPI-M was two time former Lok Sabha MP from Kannur, A.P. Abdullah Kutty, who was expelled from the party last year. He is currently a Congress legislator from the Kannur assembly constituency.

In early January, former Alappuzha MP K.S. Manoj had quit the CPI-M on ideological grounds.

Manoj, a anaesthetist by profession, is understood to have had parleys with the Alappuzha district Congress unit and they have given the green signal for his induction.

Last week, it was the turn of Sivaraman, a CPI-M student leader, who was fielded at Ottapalam - a traditional Congress bastion - in 1993 and surprised everyone when he won with a margin of over 1.3 lakh votes.

While in the CPI-M and as a parliamentarian, his closeness to the present state Congress president Ramesh Chennithala had made the Left party jittery.

Sivaraman's entry has also been cleared by the local Congress unit in Palakkad district.

However, criticising the three, senior CPI-M leader and former MP T.K. Hamza said that all of them were those who got everything when they were in the CPI-M.

'The only job that Manoj knows is to 'make people faint'. If not for the party, would anyone have known a person like Manoj. Sivaraman is upset because our party did not defend him after his wife who works in a cooperative bank was alleged to have embezzled money. I myself became what I am today because of the CPI-M,' said Hamza, who left the Congress to join the CPI-M in 1984 and has served as four-time legislator and a state minister once here.

Buddhadeb slams Trinamool for 'backing' Maoists

Kolkata, Feb 7 (IANS) West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee Sunday launched a scathing attack on the Trinamool Congress for 'backing' the Maoists and other disruptive elements in the state.

Addressing a massive rally called by the state's ruling Left Front at the sprawling Brigade Parade ground here, Bhattacharjee said the Left parties will foil anti-Left Front forces' attempts to create trouble in the state along with the peasants and workers.

'The anti-Left Front forces want to foment danger. We take these efforts to foment danger as a challenge. Alongside peasants and workers, we are taking it as a challenge. We will stop them,' Bhattacharjee said.

The chief minister said his government will never surrender to the Maoist ultras who are a menace in West Midnapore, Bankura and Purulia districts. 'They are calling out our supporters from homes and killing them,' he said.

Calling the Maoists 'cowards', Bhattacharjee said though the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) central government was helping the state government in tackling the left-wing extremists, the Trinamool was 'backing' them.

'Because the centre wants to help us, they are sending the central forces to combat the Maoists. But the Trinamool is opposing that. This party is saying that no central security forces can be sent.

'Trinamool wants CPI-M (Communist Party of India-Marxist) men to be killed. They want bloodletting in the three districts. Why are they so sympathetic to the Maoists?' Bhattacharjee wondered.

Refering to the movements for Gorkhaland, Kamtapur and Greater Cooch Behar states in the northern parts, Bhattacharjee said his government will not allow anybody to break up West Bengal.

'The Trinamool is trying to create and fan disturbances. So it is not saying anything against these forces of disruption. In fact, they have joined hands with these forces,' he said.

Mentioning the Gorkhaland agitation in Darjeeling, he said the Left Front government was willing to give more autonomy to Darjeeling. 'They want to wean Darjeeling from our state. But we won't allow any partition of Bengal.'

The chief minister urged sections like Muslims, peasants, film artistes and singers to support the Left.

He called upon the Muslims, who have been supporting the Trinamool in recent times, not to let anyone disturb the communal amity in the state. 'They (opposition parties) are spreading poison. They are lying. They want to keep you in isolation.'

Modi compliments Chidambaram's fight against terror

New Delhi, Feb 7 (IANS) In a first from Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Sunday complimented Home Minister P. Chidambaram and his officials for their 'swift and positive' approach to fighting terror.

'The response of the home minister and home secretary is swift and positive whenever there is a demand from the states,' Modi told reporters on the margins of the chief ministers' conference on internal security.

The praise comes a day after Modi took a jibe at the central government over price rise.

BJP leaders have been targeting the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government for being 'soft' on terror.

The hostile attitude of 'our neighbouring country', Modi said, has made 'security an important issue which needs to be taken seriously'.

However, the Gujarat chief minister was critical of the central government for not giving the nod to his state's proposed anti-terror act - the Gujarat Control of Organised Crime (GUJCOC) Bill.