ON the call of the CPI(M) Central Committee, thousands of people took part in marches and rallies across the country from August 1 to 7 in solidarity with the Party cadres and Left Front activists in West Bengal who have been experiencing continuous violence and attacks ever since the Trinamool Congress took over the rein of the state five years ago. Twelve CPI(M) and Left Front members and supporters were killed during and after the 2016 state election, taking the total number of cadres and supporters killed to 186 since the 2011 assembly polls. Over 3,000 were injured during the period. In the attacks, women have been specially targeted. Thirty-one rapes and 746 cases of physical assault and molestation of women have been reported. Even children have not been spared from physical assaults.

Such widespread violence and attacks on CPI(M) and Left cadres mostly went unreported by the mainstream media. To draw the country’s attention to the attacks on democracy in the state, the Central Committee of the CPI(M) at its June 18-20meeting had decided that the Party units all over the country will organise protest actions, in the first week of August, against the unprecedented violence unleashed by the Trinamool Congress post elections. The offensive has targeted ordinary supporters and the working people who have stood with the Left. Thousands of shops belonging to the Left supporters have been ransacked or looted. Peasants are not allowed to cultivate their own land in some cases. There have been evictions of patta holders and bargadars in some areas. Another method of terrorisation is to drive away the families from their homes. More than 11,000 people have been forced to leave their places of residence in the last two months since the election results were declared. Another instrument of oppression is the fines which are levied on the Left supporters and common people. Extortions and forcible collection of fines have crossed the figure of Rs 3.5 crore till the end of July. The solidarity call received huge support from the people all over the country.

The people of Tripura observed the solidarity week through protest rallies, processions and hall-meetings throughout the state. About 400 such programmes, in which more than one lakh people attended, were held across the state. Hall-meetings were held in sub-divisional headquarters and were addressed by CPI(M) State Secretariat members. The week-long programme ended with a hall-meeting at Rabindra Shatabarshiki Bhavan in Agartala on August 8. It was presided over by State Secretariat member Niranjan Debbarma and was addressed by Chief Minister Manik Sarkar, CPI(M) West Bengal state secretary Surjyakanta Mishra and Tripura state secretary Bijan Dhar.

Mishra started his speech referring to two incidents that appeared in the media on the day of the meeting, wherein two women -- a deaf and dumb and a girl from agricultural worker’s family -- died of injuries sustained in acid attacks. While the fault of the former was that she denied to withdraw a complaint against some goons and oblige to the police who negotiated with the perpetrators, the latter’s only fault was that her family members were CPI(M) supporters. The accused being TMC cadre, as usual, the police did not book the culprits. Such incidents are now everyday’s feature in West Bengal, he said. Explaining the severity and dimension of the state-sponsored attack on the Communists, Mishra said that unlike the terror in 1972-76 when it was confined to urban areas, this time terror has been unleashed in both urban and rural areas.

TMC goons got a free hand to make their reign free from any opposition. With this objective, they had driven thousands of Left Front supporters out of their villages. Most deplorable act of these miscreants is the attack on livelihood of people supporting the Left. Left peasants cannot till their own lands; workers cannot join factories; shop-keepers cannot open his shops; and service-holders cannot go to offices. Most shockingly, victims are being implicated as accused by police at the dictate of the ruling party. Most of the offices of CPI(M) and its mass organisations were either demolished, ransacked or forcibly captured by the TMC. Elected members of opposition parties, be it in Assembly, Municipal Corporations or Panchayats, are either not allowed to function or forced to resign or defect to the TMC. Leftists do not bother for numerical win or defeat. They are concerned with the people’s issues. It does not mean that the issues of corruption, price rise, unemployment, farmers’ suicide, famine in tea estates, strangulation of democratic rights, disorder in educational institutions and threat from communal forces are withered away because the Leftists are defeated in the election. We are sure, Mishra concluded, the people of West Bengal shall rise in unison against this brute force with the solidarity of democratic forces of the entire country.

Paying tributes to those who have laid down their lives and expressing solidarity with the thousands of people injured, ousted and subjected to inhuman torture and harassment while defending democracy in West Bengal, Manik Sarkar said what is going on in West Bengal is unprecedented in the country. The very base of the capitalist system is class exploitation. The Communists expose this fact to the masses and organise them in struggle against capitalism to achieve emancipation from capitalist exploitation. Naturally, the Communists are the eyesore of the ruling class. West Bengal being an advance post of the Communist movement, they mounted calculated attack on West Bengal. Trinamul Congress represents landlords, Mahajans, black-marketeers, monopoly capitalists and money-lenders. Only symbolic one-week solidarity programme will not suffice to resist the barbarous attack in West Bengal. We must intensify class struggle on each and every class issues mobilising larger number of masses. That would be the real solidarity with the fighting masses of West Bengal, Sarkar said.

Addressing the gathering, Bijan Dhar said the brutal attack unleashed in West Bengal should not be viewed in isolation. It is part of the imperialist and capitalist assault on the Communists the world over. Because only the Left parties vehemently oppose neo-liberal policies which are tools of exploitation in contemporary era. This is because only the Communists carry on struggles against the onslaughts of the ruling classes on the lives and livelihood of the common people. Regime change in a democratic system is a common feature in India – both in states and at the Centre. But when the Left faces defeat they are subjected to semi-fascist terror as we have seen earlier in Bimochan drive in Kerala in 1957, West Bengal in sixties and seventies, Tripura in 1988-93. The people of West Bengal will resist this onslaught very soon, he said. In his presidential address, Niranjan Debbarma warned the people of Tripura against the false promises of good governance being made by Trinamool Congress in the state.

In Kerala, public meetings, marches and rallies were organised throughout the state during the week. In all 14 district headquarters, huge public meetings were organised where thousands of people participated. The state-wide programme was inaugurated by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan in Thiruvanathapuram. He said he was confident that the Party in West Bengal will successfully defeat the goons of the ruling Trinamool Congress and once again emerge in the state. In 1970s too, CPI(M) faced similar attacks, he said and criticised other democratic forces that have been keeping mum on such widespread violence and terror against the Left.

CPI(M) Kerala state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan inaugurated the solidarity programmes in Thrissur and Palaghat districts. Addressing the gathering, he narrated the nature of the TMC attack against the Left forces in West Bengal. Continuous attacks on the CPI(M) cadres were nothing but an attack on democracy, he said. During the 2016 Assembly election, TMC goons tried to subvert the entire election process through such attacks and after the polls, the same forces using the administrative machinery to suppress the entire opposition, particularly CPI(M). Polit Bureau member M A Baby said West Bengal has been under undeclared emergency. He addressed programmes in Kottayam and Eranakulam. Polit Bureau member Hannan Mollah inaugurated Bengal solidarity programmes in Malappuram and Kasargode districts, while Mohammad Salim addressed public meetings in Kannur and Kozhikode districts. CPI(M) Central Committee member A Vijayaraghavan addressed solidarity meetings in Idukky and Pathanamthitta. The solidarity meeting in Wayanad was addressed by Central Committee member Elamaram Kareem, and Rekha Goswami addressed the meetings in Kollam and Alappuzha.

In Andhra Pradesh, solidarity programmes were organised in several places. In Guntur, the programme was addressed by CPI(M) Central Secretariat member V Srinivasa Rao. He said that during the 34 years of Left Front government, West Bengal achieved all-round development and lakhs of farmers and agricultural workers got benefitted. Expressing grave concern over the unsavoury developments in the state after Trinamool Congress assumed office, he said the police administration of the state is actively collaborating with the TMC goons instead of taking action against them. Over the past five years ever since TMC came to power in West Bengal in 2011, a reign of terror has been unleashed on the opposition. Specific wards and areas where the opposition fared well during the last election are being targeted with an intention to terrorise the workers and sympathisers of the Party. It is not just attacks on opposition but a criminal conspiracy to suppress the Left movement in the state, he sid and called for united resistance against this attack on democratic principles.

In Tamil Nadu, seminars in various cities on ‘Murder of democracy and unleashing of violence in West Bengal’ were held.

On August 5, Md Salim, Polit Bureau member of the Party, addressed a seminar organised by CPI(M) North and South Chennai district committees. The ruling Trinamool Congress (TMC), along with the official machinery of West Bengal government, was bent on silencing dissent by unleashing violence, alleged Md Salim. G Ramakrishnan, Polit Bureau member and state secretary of the Party also addressed the meeting.

In Coimbatore and Madurai, on August 1-2, Sujan Chakraborty, leader of the Party in West Bengal assembly, addressed well attended meetings, organised respectively by Coimbatore district committee and Madurai Urban and Rural district committees of the Party.

“Violence was not only against the CPI(M), but also against all Left, democratic and secular forces. The TMC is not ready to accept any voice of dissent,” he said. The state government was making all-out efforts to subvert all constitutional bodies such as Human Rights Commission and Election Commission, he complained. Stating that at least 60,000 families were forcefully evacuated with the help of police from their places of dwelling across West Bengal for having worked against the TMC, he said extortion was on the rise in the state.

He detailed in his speech about the re-election of Mamata Banerjee government and the unleashing of terror in the state. He attributed the following as the reasons for the defeat of the Party in the state.

1) The amount of terror in most of the areas.

2) The very calculated co-ordination of sharing of votes between TMC and BJP was beyond our imagination 

3) Impact of individual benefits schemes – which are there in many parts of the country.  But in West Bengal, it was never there.  This is for the first time.  It was not only giving cycle or mobile or computer.  Direct cash transfer to the individual’s bank account was made five days or seven days earlier to the day of elections.  The central government has also given Rs 8000 crores under different names.

All these things could not be assessed not only by us, but by anybody, Sujan Chakraborty said.

Explaining the character of the TMC, he said it is not like any other regional party.  TMC is fighting against communists. It wants to marginalise communists.  Unlike other regional parties, TMC is having the support of other national and international forces. There is a design of imperialists to weaken Left in India and obviously for that their special target is to weaken Left in West Bengal.  It is having a very well-knit arrangement, co-ordination, he said.  

In Jharkhand, meetings were organised in several places to express solidarity with the people of West Bengal. In Ranchi, a meeting was organised on August 6. CPI(M) Rajya Sabha MP Ritabrata Banerjee addressed the meeting, which was presided over by Rajendra Singh Munda.  CPI(M) Jharkhand state secretary G K Baksi placed a resolution in support of the CPI(M) West Bengal State Committee resisting the blatant attacks on the democratic rights of the people of the state. K D Singh and Bhuneswar Mehta of CPI, Anil Singh of RJD and social activist Vasavi also addressed the meeting. Another programme was organised in Dumka on August 7. It was addressed by former MP Ramchandra Dom.

The Delhi State Committee of the CPI(M) organised a public meeting on August 4 in solidarity with the people of Bengal and Party’s West Bengal Committee against the terror unleashed by the TMC and its government. CPI(M) Polit Bureau member Mohammad Salim was the main speaker at the event. Salim gave chilling details of the TMC's reign of terror. He said that the vulnerable sections -- the working class, Dalits, and women -- are the worst affected by the TMC terror. TMC is attacking activists, vandalising Party and mass organisation offices, often going to the extent of indulging in arson. He said the fact that BJP is complicit in the crimes is evident from their complete silence. He said this is not a struggle of West Bengal alone, all of us have to fight together to end TMC’s highhandedness in Bengal and that of BJP at the Centre. CPI General Secretary Sudhakar Reddy also addressed the gathering. CPI(M) Delhi state secretary K M Tiwari conducted the meeting.

Solidarity programmes were also organised in Punjab. Hundreds of people took part in the events expressing solidarity with the people of West Bengal. A rally was taken out in Hoshiarpur. It was led by CPI(M) Punjab State Secretariat members Raghunath Singh and Gurmesh Singh.