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Journalism of Courage
After calling for a dawn-to-dusk Bengal bandh today in defiance of a Calcutta High Court order, a belligerent Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee said ‘‘strike’’ was a ‘‘fundamental right’’ and urged all political parties to join hands to protect their rights.
‘‘Strike or bandh is our fundamental right. We have only exercised our right,’’ Banerjee told newspersons.
The Trinamool Congress called the day’s bandh even though a court directive declared it ‘‘unconstitutional’’ and ordered it to be called off.
Asked if she was ready to accept punishment for defying the court order, the TC chief said, ‘‘I have not committed any wrong — where does the question of punishment come. The bandh was for a right cause’’.
‘‘I did not even come out on the street to enforce the bandh,’’ she said, adding that there was a Supreme Court ruling that a bandh was ‘‘illegal if enforced’’. ‘‘Today’s bandh was spontaneous,’’ she claimed.
‘‘It is time for all political parties to come forward to protect that democratic right,’’ Banerjee said, adding that the denial of such a right would require an amendment of the Constitution.
Hearing a PIL, the high court on November 30 had declared the Trinamool bandh ‘‘illegal and unconstitutional’’. The HC directed the party to call it off and asked the state government to make necessary arrangements.
Asked about the court’s directive, Banerjee said, ‘‘We have not received anything from the court. When we receive anything from the court, we will let you know. Now we are in the people’s court.’’
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We cannot accept court order: Basu
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• KOLKATA: Veteran leader Jyoti Basu said on Friday the Left parties can’t accept the court’s verdict on bandhs and that an appeal may be filed before the Supreme Court. ‘‘Whatever they (courts) are saying we cannot accept it but we don’t know if it will be contempt. We have to see what the courts want to say,’’ said Basu, after a weekly CPI(M) secretariat meeting. —PTI |
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Asked whether her party could call more bandhs, she said, ‘‘We don’t want bandhs, but when everything else fails we have no other alternative. Calling bandhs is not our profession.’’ She claimed that the bandh against the price rise of essential commodities as well as petro products, was ‘‘total’’ and received ‘‘spontaneous mass support’’. She accused the state’s Left Front government of trying to foil it, alleging that police lathi-charged and injured 25 other party activists and arrested over 10,000.
‘‘Police action was unprovoked,’’ she said. ‘‘It was a clear verdict of the people against the Central and the state governments…It is our moral victory.’’ Trinamool Congress, she said, would launch a law-violation programme in Kolkata on December 22 on issues against both Centre and state governments, to be followed by similar programmes in districts from January 7-20.
