An ultra-Left students' outfit, RSF, has triggered a row by symbolically naming the venue of its state conference after Maoist leaders killed by security forces. The conference was held at Jadavpur University.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who will complete a year in office on May 20, has claimed that her government has been able to restore peace in Junglemahal with not a single death reported so far this year.
Virtually throwing a challenge to West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who has given a seven-day deadline to them to lay down arms, the Maoists on Wednesday called a 24-hour bandh in Junglemahal on October 22 - the day the deadline ends.
After giving a call to Maoists to lay down arms, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday turned her attention to the poorest of the poor in 'Junglemahal' by announcing that all tribals in the three districts would be included in the below poverty line (BPL) list.
Scores of teenagers in Maoist-hit Junglemahal have picked up the football instead of the gun, thanks to a soccer enthusiast. Indrani Roy visits a stadium in Salboni to witness a team of young girls focus on their goals, quite literally.
For the first time, seven hardcore Maoists from junglemahal, including slain Kishenji's bodyguard, on Wednesday surrendered with firearms before West Bengal police chief in West Midnapore district.
The People's Committee against Police Atrocities called for a 24-hour bandh on September 10 in Junglemahal area in protest against the arrest of secretary Manoj Mahato and the killing of one of its members in an encounter.
Senior Indian Police Service officer Manoj Kumar Verma was appointed the new Kolkata Police commissioner, replacing Vineet Goyal, on Tuesday, a day after Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee held a meeting with agitating junior doctors and agreed to their demands in a bid to resolve the more than a month-long impasse over the RG Kar hospital incident.
Tribals constitute 7-8 per cent of the state's population, and are a deciding factor in 47 assembly seats and seven Lok Sabha constituencies spread across the Junglemahal districts of Purulia, Paschim Medinipur, Bankura and Jhargram in southern Bengal and Jalpaiguri and Alipurduar in the north.
The war of words between Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee on Saturday touched a new low with the chief minister alleging she was a 'liar' and the Trinamool Congress chief accusing him of being responsible for spurt in Maoist activities.
In a revival of Maoist violence in junglemhal after a year-long lull, two Central Reserve Police Force personnel were shot dead by the ultras during an encounter in West Bengal's West Midnapore district on Monday.
The arrest of a person 20 days ago put the joint forces hot on the trail of top Maoist leader Kishenji who had called the shots in junglemahal and foxed them for over two years.
Reaching out to politically crucial Kurmi caste population of the Purulia district, Shah promised jobs for their every family and education in their language.
Four days after Trinamool Congress heavyweight Suvendu Adhikari resigned from the state cabinet, Trinamool Congress leader Abhishek Banerjee and election strategist Prashant Kishor on Tuesday met him, following which the party claimed that 'all the issues have been resolved'.
Over 1.54 crore voters in the eastern states of West Bengal and Assam will exercise their franchise in the 1st phase of polling
West Bengal, which is governed by the Trinamool Congress, became the second state after Congress-ruled Punjab, where such a resolution has been tabled and passed.
Claiming that Maoists were planning to kill her, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee Wednesday dared them to touch her, saying they can't scare her with guns.
There were concerns among industrialists about direct land acquisition after the present government stated it would not acquire land anymore for industry.
Signalling stepped up operations in junglemahal after withdrawal of the offer of ceasefire by the Maoists and the killing of two Trinamool Congressmen, the West Bengal government has recalled senior Indian Police Service officer Manoj Verma as superintendent of police, counter insurgency force.
West Bengal government-appointed interlocutors on asserted that the dialogue process with Maoists to restore peace in the 'junglemahal' area is on even as the offensive against the rebels continued.
According to the sources, he wrote to TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee apprising her of his decision to resign from the party's primary membership.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who had given a call to Maoists in Junglemahal to lay down arms and hold talks, on Friday issued a stern warning to the ultras saying the peace initiative should not be mistaken for weakness.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday asked Maoists to join the mainstream by laying down arms and promised that her government would provide them compensation and take care of their families.
'Killing 40, 50 or 100 Maoist leaders will not solve the issue. If there were no Maoists tomorrow it does not mean that violence will go away. And that is what the government should worry about,' says Rahul Pandita, author of Hello, Bastar: The Untold Story of India's Maoist Movement.
Yug Chaudhary, counsel for co-accused Sudha Bahrdwaj, then told the court that the War and Peace that the court had referred to on Wednesday was a collection of essays edited by one Biswajit Roy, and was titled War and Peace in Junglemahal: People, State and Maoists.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Wednesday said the wrong policy and non-functional police of the Left Front government in West Bengal were responsible for the rise of Maoism in the state. "The Left Front government should be blamed for the rise of Maoists in West Bengal. Their wrong policy and non-functional police have allowed the Maoists to enter the state and strengthen their base in Junglemahal," the senior Congress leader told an election rally at Harishchandrapur.
"I am slogging like a demon," Banerjee said recently. What she left out was that she's made sure that everyone at Writers' the red-bricked colonial structure that houses the state secretariat is doing the same.
Adhikari joined the BJP amid Shah's two-day visit to West Bengal ahead of the assembly elections in 2021.
Claiming that the Trinamool Congress is not perturbed over desertions by some leaders, she said politics is a solemn ideology and philosophy and one cannot change these everyday like clothes.
It's a political gambit aimed at the BJP's Suvendu Adhikari who won the seat in 2016 as a TMC candidate, while also retroceding to the land movement that catapulted her to power.
As the West Bengal chief minister was busy containing the fallout of an internecine feud in her TMC following a rebellion by a redoubtable Suvendu Adhikari, the Centre shot off a fresh letter to her government to immediately relieve three IPS officers for central deputation.
The brewing discontentment in the party may adversely impact the TMC's prospects in the next assembly polls due in April-May next year.
As state minister Suvendu Adhikari, along with other functionaries, openly air grievances against the Mamata Banerjee-led dispensation, senior leaders are frantically looking for ways to pacify the rebels.
There is a "high probability" of political leaders coming under a Chhatisgarh-type attack during their panchayat poll campaign in Maoist-hit Jangalmahal in West Bengal, intelligence sources here have indicated.
BJP chief Amit Shah had set a target of winning 22 Lok Sabha seats out of 42 seats in West Bengal.
One hundred and thirty-three candidates will try their luck from the constituencies falling under the districts of West Midnapore, Purulia and Bankura.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee alleged on Friday that some local news channels had ganged up with the opposition to make a hue and cry over rape and violence in the state and reiterated that there was a conspiracy to kill her.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is not ready to give credit to Narendra Modi for development work in Gujarat and feels her own model is much better and has paid good dividends.
Three persons, including husband of a Communist Party of India-Marxist candidate, were killed on Monday and several others injured in violence during the second phase of panchayat elections in West Bengal where 75 per cent polling was recorded.
81 per cent voter turnout recorded in West Bengal, 80 per cent in Assam.
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