The West Bengal police on Tuesday interrogated top Maoist leader Kobad Ghandy in a New Delhi jail, after obtaining permission from a local court, in connection with a criminal case registered at West Midnapore district in 2008.Chief Minister of West Bengal Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and former Union Minister Ram Vilas Paswan had a narrow escape on November 2, 2008, when a landmine exploded within minutes of their convoy passing through Baroa near Salboni in Midnapore.
After two days of self-introspection, Karat, the party general secretary, retains his hold and instead the West Bengal lobby along with Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee will now be taking "corrective measures at the organisational and governmental level."
'When you have a village which is controlled by the BJP, who are the people likely to perpetrate the attack?'
Kerala Chief Minister and senior Communist Party of India - Marxist leader V S Achuthanandan will be removed from the party's politburo and the central committee, said sources in New Delhi. The octogenarian leader, who is currently in New Delhi, will leave for Kerala early on Sunday morning, said sources.Though some leaders from West Bengal had voiced their support for Achuthanandan, CPI-M general secretary Prakash Karat remained firm on taking action against the Kerala CM.
The two-day Communist Party of India - Marxist politburo meeting, held at the party headquarters in Delhi, ended on Sunday. Politburo member and senior leader Sitaram Yechury, while briefing media persons, said that the party has called for a special central committee meeting on July 11 and 12 to discuss the factional split in the party's Kerala unit.However, sources said that the two-day meet has decided to take action against Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan.
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) contention that capitalism was the only way to industrialise West Bengal has made Left Front partners aghast.
With no major elections round the corner, Prakash Karat-led Communist Party of India-Marxist will utilise its time to fight deviations from Left ideology both inside and outside the party.
The CPI-M, in its last Congress in Delhi, had decided to develop its independent strength and expanding its political base in new areas and among various sections of people, like Dalits, tribals, minorities, women and other downtrodden sections more vigorously. The two-day meeting of the central committee in Delhi will give final touches to the CPI-M's Political-Organisational Report, which would be adopted by the party's Congress slated in March-April at Coimbatore.
The Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Mohammed Salim has accused Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee of trying to be more "Leftist than the Leftists" by attacking the government over reforms including FDI in retail.
The Communist Party of India-Marxist on Tuesday categorically ruled out forging an alliance or a united front with the Congress in future.
The Communist Party of India Marxist Politburo has decided to meet in New Delhi soon to take an 'appropriate decision' if the talks between the Left Front and the United Progressive Alliance fail to end the logjam over the India-United States nuclear agreement.The party central committee, in its meeting in Kolkata last week, had authorised the politburo to take a final decision if the UPA government went ahead with the operationalisation of the nuclear deal.
Making it clear that the Left was not prepared to back down on the issue, Bardhan said it was up to the government to decide whether it wanted to continue or commit sati on the issue.
Caste census politics took centre stage on Thursday with the Congress terming the government's decision as a 'diversionary tactic' and a move for headlines management and the Bharatiya Janata Party saying it has exposed the difference between the Centre's 'true intentions' and the 'empty sloganeering' of the opposition party.
CPI-M leader W R Varadarajan said senior party leaders Harkishan Singh Surjeet and Jyoti Basu have requested the party to relieve them from politburo due to their advanced age and immobility. A decision on the request would be made on April 3. Both had urged the CPI-M to relieve them in the last Congress, but the party had requested them to continue as it felt their advice and guidance would be vital.
Leaders from other state units are coming to VS's aid ahead of the party's crucial Central Committee meeting even as some ministers of his Cabinet have refused to work with him.
Yechury briefed the prime minister about the deliberations of the CPI-M's central committee and the position taken by the party.
The State Election Commission on Friday informed the Calcutta high court that it has requisitioned 822 companies of central forces for the July 8 panchayat polls in West Bengal.
Terming as "rigged" the death sentence to ousted Iraq president Saddam Hussein, the Communist Party of India-Marxist on Sunday denounced the Iraqi High Tribunal verdict and demanded intervention by the UPA government to get it rescinded.
Expulsion from the party often entails a social boycott of the person by the members of the political family, say insiders, and this is not going to be easy for Somnath Chatterjee who has spent the best part of his life in the CPI-M.
As Kerala is set to go for assembly polls on April 13, the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist-led Left Democratic Front and the Congress-led United Democratic Front have to race against time as they are yet to finalise the seat-sharing exercise among partners and each component to work out the list of their contestants for before the filing of nominations begin on March 19.
The CPM will review its decision to support the UPA only if the govt operationalised the N-deal, leader Nilotpal Basu said. The CPI(M) also downplayed the apparent differences between the party's Bengal leaders and General Secretary Prakash Karat.
Three top leaders of the two biggest constituents of the Left bloc joined Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Subodh Roy a CPI(M) central committee member and former Lok Sabha MP and former CPI MLA Lal Babu Sahani pledged allegiance to the ruling Janata Dal-United.
On Wednesday, the Tripura chief minister said that famous Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore refused the Nobel Prize in protest against the English.
The decision was taken keeping in mind the party norm that no CPI-M leader can represent the party in the Upper House for more than two terms.
The committee headed by Bharatiya Janata Party MP Vinod Kumar Sonkar is meeting later on Thursday to adopt its draft report in what is likely to be hotly contested by opposition members of the panel.
The Congress was fighting the elections in a pre-poll alliance with National Conference and had fielded 32 candidates, mostly in Jammu region, compared to 51 by the regional party.
Josephine had courted controversy when she spoke harshly to a woman complainant of domestic violence during a live television programme of a Malayalam channel on Wednesday, causing embarrassment to the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist.
A veritable political `storm in a tea cup' has arisen over Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee's assertions on Wednesday that all in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh were "not bad" and there are many who "do not support the BJP".
The veteran Communist Party of India-Marxist leader is likely to undergo a few tests later in the day, which will help in ascertaining the severity of the infection in his lungs that landed him in the hospital on Saturday afternoon.
Yechury has dropped enough hints that a fight is in the offing at the Hyderabad conclave in April, where any member may move an amendment to the draft on the party's electoral line. Archis Mohan reports.
Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao-led Bharat Rashtra Samiti has pinned hopes on the development work his government undertook during the past ten years, while opposition Congress and BJP bank on anti-incumbency and the alleged failures of the incumbent.
A CBI court in Kerala sentenced 10 individuals to life imprisonment for the murder of two Youth Congress workers in 2019. Four others, including a former CPI(M) MLA, received five years in prison. The court found the accused guilty of murder and criminal conspiracy, citing political rivalry as the motive. The case involved the deaths of Kripesh and Sarath Lal P K, who were allegedly killed by CPI(M) workers in Kasaragod district. The verdict sparked reactions from both the Congress and CPI(M), with the Congress calling it a blow to the CPI(M)'s violent political culture and the CPI(M) challenging the verdict and claiming political motives in the CBI investigation.
While Yechury feels CPI-M should unite with others to fight the 'growing danger of fascistic forces', Karat camp says it should fight the BJP, but not have any leaning towards the Congress or other opposition parties.
While the major fronts, the CPI-M led LDF and Congress-led UDF have given three and one seat respectively to women, the BJP-led NDA has set aside five seats for their female politicians in the upcoming LS polls.
The 65-year-old leader had taken over as general secretary of the CPI-M from Prakash Karat in the 21st party congress, which was held in Visakhapatnam, in 2015.
Kerala Chief Minister VS Achuthanandan has been removed from the Communist Partyof India-Marxist politbureau but will continue in the Central committee and will hold the post of the Chief Minister till the coming assembly elections. This was revealed by a press release of the CPI-M central committee after the marathon deliberations at the AKG Bhavan in New Delhi.
89-year-old Chatterjee, who is suffering from a kidney-related ailment, was admitted to the hospital in a critical condition on Tuesday.
The Kerala unit of the Congress instantly gets a headache when Shashi Tharoor lets loose one of his observations showering flowers on enemy territory. With every such action triggering controversy within a nervous Congress party, some feel it is high time Tharoor showed a degree of solidarity with the ideals of his party, notes Shyam G Menon.
Local residents have stressed that land acquisition for rehabilitation must be completed promptly, as it has been delayed after estate owners challenged it in the Kerala high court.
