Date:19/06/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/06/19/stories/2006061904421200.htm

National

AIFB activists block Pranab Mukherjee's car

Special Correspondent

Centre criticised for rejecting M. K. Mukherjee panel findings

AIFB activists want Parliament to discuss M.K. Mukherjee Commission's findings

We wanted a discussion but BJP members disrupted proceedings: Pranab

KOLKATA: All India Forward Bloc (AIFB) students' wing activists on Sunday blocked Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee's car here and raised slogans against the Centre's refusal to accept the findings of the Justice M.K. Mukherjee Commission of Inquiry into the disappearance of Netaji Subash Chandra Bose.

The car was moving into the driveway of a city hotel where Mr. Mukherjee was to address a gathering when about 30 demonstrators blocked its way. Security personnel rushed to the spot and drove them out.

Later the Minister said the Government had "wanted a discussion on the subject but members of the Bharatiya Janata Party disrupted proceedings in Parliament." The AIFB activists were demanding that a discussion on the Commission's findings be taken up immediately.

They also threatened to stage a demonstration when Union Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunshi visited the city.

The findings along with the Government's Action Taken Report were placed in Parliament recently. The Centre did not agree with the Commission's contention that Netaji had not died in an air crash over Taiwan in 1945.

Countrywide movement

The AIFB has already announced its decision to launch a countrywide movement after consulting all parties, except the Congress, to put pressure on the Centre to accept the findings of the Commission.

Ashok Ghosh, secretary of the AIFB's State unit, said here recently that the panel findings were rejected by the Centre without any basis. He also alleged that the Congress had been engaged in a campaign since the days of Nehru to erase Netaji's image from the public mind by insisting that he had died in the air crash.