Maoist party calls for 4-state bandh

New Delhi: After 14 people were killed in police violence in Nandigram, West Bengal is simmering and the heat is catching on in other states as well.

The CPI (Maoist) has called a bandh across four states — West Bengal, Bihar, Jharkhand and Orissa — on March 20.

"People in these states should realise that agents of imperialist forces have perpetuated the incidents at Nandigram and they should unitedly oppose displacement," PTI quoted the outfit as saying.

In its statement, the CPI (Marxist) alleged that the Congress, BJP and the Left parties were supporters of SEZs so that foreign and domestic companies could loot the country's natural resources.

Voices of protest over the police brutality in Nandigram are being heard from across party lines.

The Left Front has begun to distance itself from West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and and say they feel let down. The opposition parties, on their part, have called for his dismissal.

The violence over SEZs has also surfaced the queer political equations — Congress is an ally of the Left Front at the Centre but in West Bengal, the Congress opposes the CPI-M. On the other hand, Congress opposes the BJP all across the India, but in West Bengal, it is an ally of the BJP.

On the issue of opposing an economic reform-oriented Chief Minister, Minister of Parliamentary Affairs and Information and Broadcasting, Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi said that Nandigram is not the outcry of economic reform.

The real issue is that the CPI-M wants to expand their political empire by force and that has been questioned by the local people. “In Bengal, we need industry, but we don’t want industry without a rehabilitation package," he said.

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