The Hindu : CPI(M) demands President's rule in Gujarat

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, May 25, 2002

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CPI(M) demands President's rule in Gujarat

By Our Special Correspondent

The CPI (M) general secretary, Harkishen Singh Surjeet, and senior leader, Sitaram Yechuri, at the Central Committee meeting in Bangalore on Friday. _ Photo : T.L. Prabhakar

BANGALORE May 24. The CPI (M) has demanded the dismissal of the Gujarat Government and imposition of President's rule in the State. The demand was made by the party's Politburo on Thursday and the Central Committee endorsed it at a meeting here today.

The CPI (M) has all along opposed the use of Article 356 to dismiss elected governments. But the Gujarat Government has ``set itself against the Constitution'' and no other State Government has acted with impunity ``supporting those who conducted pogroms against the minorities'', according to a press release by the Central Committee.

Prakash Karat, Politburo member, told presspersons that so far the CPI (M) and other Opposition parties had, so far, been demanding the removal of Narendra Modi from the Chief Minister's post. The Gujarat Government continued to ``brazenly violate the Constitution and was working in an anti-secular fashion''. The violence against minorities also continued.

The party planned to spend Rs. 1 crore on rehabilitation of the people affected by the Gujarat riots. Mr. Karat said the party had collected money from various States for the rehabilitation work.

He said the Committee discussed the situation at the party congress held in Hyderabad in March. The two-month period had seen continuing violence against the minority community, and the toll had risen far above official estimates. Over one lakh people living in relief camps had not received adequate relief.

The meeting decided to conduct an intensive campaign on the danger to national unity and communal amity.

The Committee had decided to call upon all democratic and secular forces to unite and conduct a peaceful campaign to mobilise all sections of people against the threat posed by the Gujarat events. The Politburo had been authorised to take steps to build such a broad-based movement.

The Committee strongly opposed the military collaboration of the country with the U.S. The recent joint exercise between the special forces of the U.S. and the Indian paratroopers at Agra marked a new stage in military cooperation. There were reports that the next joint exercise would be conducted in the North-East.

The U.S., with its close military and strategic ties with Pakistan, was unwilling to pressure the Musharraf regime to check the extremist, fundamentalist forces operating in Jammu and Kashmir.

By committing India to be a willing collaborator to advance the U.S. strategic interests in the region, the Vajpayee Government had ``put the country in a subordinate position where its strategic and security interests were ignored and disregarded''.

It called upon democratic and patriotic sections to realise the danger of such a military collaboration.

On the continued acts of aggression by the Israeli Government against the Palestinians, the committee decided to mobilise public opinion in support of the latter. It criticised the Vajpayee Government for refusing to condemn the Israeli action.

The meeting will continue tomorrow.

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