Right here in the heart of the Capital, the Forward Bloc is planning to revive the politics of blood. Between January 23 and 31—during Netaji’s birthday week—the party will collect two lakh signatures, in blood.Party leaders want the youth to take a new oath in the name of Netaji, born on January 23, 108 years ago. The real objective is to revive the sagging political morale of a party surviving on the CPI(M)’s dole in West Bengal.The Forward Bloc’s revival ploy is not a new strategy in the context of Bengal politics. In the Eighties, the CPI(M) tried out its anti-Centre, anti-Congress political campaign with serious blood donation.They were raising money for the Bakreshwar thermal power plant—they said the Centre was not contributing enough—through blood donation. Not even 1 per cent of the funds required for construction of the power plant were raised through the massive exercise, wasting a large volume of blood.There are other reasons as well for the Forward Bloc to launch the blood signature campaign in Delhi this year. It is feeling threatened by the way the BJP has begun appropriating its icon Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose.In fact, to counter the BJP, the Forward Bloc had last year circulated Netaji’s speech in which he had distanced himself both from Veer Savarkar and Mohammed Ali Jinnah.The Forward Bloc was a party launched by Bose soon after he left the Congress, though he didn’t get time to nurture it. In the Fifties, the party started tilting to the Left and gradually became a proper ally of the Communists in the Sixties.The party had some base in Kerala but now its mass appeal is largely restricted to pockets of West Bengal like Jalpaiguri, Cooch Behar, North 24 Parganas and Howrah.Says the party’s senior leader and Rajya Sabha MP, Debabrata Biswas: ‘‘This campaign is to take a new oath in blood—an oath against gambling, alcohol, drugs, obscenity and vulgar films, which lead to social problems like the MMS crisis.’’ He added: ‘‘The oath in Netaji’s name will also be to fight the four Cs—communalism, casteism, corruption and criminalisatin of politics.’’Biswas said this is not the first time the Forward Bloc is talking about blood. ‘‘Even Netaji had once said: ‘Give me blood and I will give you freedom’.’’ The Forward Bloc MP also assured that new syringes would be used to collect every drop of blood.Whatever Biswas’s views, this is the only way the Forward Bloc can keep itself in the political limelight before the Bengal and Kerala state polls due next year. While the campaign may not get a good response in Delhi, it is likely to bring in signatories to the party’s camps in these two states apart from Tripura.Probe goes on and on.The one-man-inquiry panel headed by former SC judge M K Mukherjee into the mystery of Netaji’s ‘‘disappearance’’ has received fresh support from the UPA govt. Last week, Home Minister Shivraj Patil told Forward Bloc leaders that he would allow Justice Mukherjee to carry out his inquiries in Taipei and Bangkok. He could not only complete his probe in Vietnam and Singapore but even make a trip to Russia this spring.
