After Communist Party of India-Marxist, Left alliance partner CPI is willing to support any party or platform that challenges Bharatiya Janata Party, which it considers its main adversary, a top leader of the party's West Bengal unit said on Friday.
The development came just days after West Bengal Left Front chairman and CPI-M Politburo member Biman Bose in a change of stance had said the party is ready to join hands with Trinamool Congress to fight the BJP at the national level.
"Our central and state leadership had resolved during our last party congress that the CPI will support any party or coalition that treats BJP as the main threat and wants to overthrow it. It does not matter if in this endeavour we have to join hands with the Congress or any other regional party like the TMC," CPI state secretary Swapan Banerjee told PTI.
During an election review meeting of the party, it was again resolved by the CPI state unit that in the fight against the BJP at the national level it will not hesitate to join hands with the TMC, he said.
"But joining hands with TMC at the national level does not mean we will dilute our fight against it at the state level. But we have to accept the fact that BJP is the biggest danger the country is facing right now," he said.
The CPIM-led Left Front, Congress and the newly formed Indian Secular Front had cobbled an alliance and contested the state assembly election this year and had declared that both TMC and BJP are their principal enemies.
But for the first time since Independence, both Left Front and Congress failed to even open their account in the state assembly while ISF could manage to win just one seat.
Cracks seemed to have appeared in the Left Front with major allies like CPI, Forward Bloc and RSP going hammer and tongs against the CPI(M) over its decision to ally with the cleric Abbass Siddiqui's Indian Secular Front and blamed the "lopsided decision" for the Left's unprecedented electoral debacle in the state.
"The CPI-M was in a hurry to ally with ISF. They gave more importance to ISF than it deserved. Secondly, we should not forget that a cleric leads ISF and people didn't like it," he said.
"We are ready to work with any anti-BJP party. This has been our stance whenever the need arose for a big movement against divisive forces from Kashmir to Kanyakumari," Bose had said earlier this week to a question whether CPI-M will be with TMC to prevent the BJP from coming to power in the 2024 Lok Sabha election.
The Mamata Banerjee-led party came to power in West Bengal in 2011, ousting the 34-year-old Left Front government. The TMC has been ruling the state since then.
