WPCC to step up anti-Left campaign

Like him others also tell you: “It’s a rare occasion when the All India Congress Committee (AICC) will have its Plenary Session in a state where the party is out of power for the last 20 years, so you can always imagine the importance the State will be accorded during the session.”

But the question which haunts political observers here is how effective would the anti-LF resolution be? It haunts one and all not because of the WBPCC’s failure to arrest the LF’s growth all these years, nor because people see an element of truth in what Mamata said about the LF’s help for the event, but because the way some of the LF ministers spoke about the Plenary.

As if to prove Mamata and the critics right, the other day Public Works Department Minister Khiti Goswami said: “Helping the Congress Plenary is a matter of prestige for the State and we will extend all possible help.”

Without qualifying what he meant by help, Goswami said it was the responsibility of the State Government to see to it that the huge number of delegates, who are coming from far away places, have adequate drinking water, electricity and access to a proper traffic network.

“Or who else would be blamed than us! It would bring us disrepute,” he was candid enough to admit. Apparently, there much less to see through what he said in simple terms other than saying that it, in turn, became too polite a response to a political affair, “which is expected to expose LF’s two-decade of vandalism,” to quote no less a man than Bhunia, a senior WBPCC leader. But the story ends somewhere else.

As grape-vine has it, Mamata scored a point over the WBPCC by booking all the dharmashalas for her group leaders, who will come from remote villages for August 9 rally. She pushed the Pradesh Congress leaders to a tough time looking for guest houses for over 15,000 delegates who will come to attend the session. According to sources, the worked-up PCC leaders had sent a SOS to the LF government and not only got guest houses but also `got them cheaper than market rates.’

A non-political critic will tell you that the story doesn’t end here. Even the Netaji Indoor Stadium, the rent of which is astronomically high, has been given to AICC at a rate which is unbelievably low.

On another front the rumours are gathering moss. The way Communist Party of India (Marxist) is carrying out anti-Mamata campaign in its mouthpiece, Ganashakti, is also giving credence to the feeling that the LF has also joined hands to help Soumen Mitra faction.

Not surprisingly, thus, a section of people are beginning to believe that the anti-Left campaign at an official level would lose its edge and try the rhetoric on the BJP.