NEW DELHI: The National Front and Left parties on Jan.14 jointly demanded handling over Bombay’s law and order responsibilities to the Army and called for the resignation of Maharashtra Chief Minister Sudhakarrao Naik for his Government’s utter failure to stop communal killings. CPI(M) General Secretary ‘ Harkishan Singh Surjeet went a step further, demanding imposition of internal emergency in Bombay, in addition to the Army taking charge of the city to quell the orgy of violence.
CPI Genera! Secretary Indrajit Gupta, however, said such a step was not necessary for putting the Army in charge of law and order.
NF and Left leaders said at a Press conference here that they would send a delegation of Members of Parliament belonging to their parties to Bombay on Saturday to obtain a firsthand account of the riots.
The Press conference was addressed by Harkishan Singh Surjeet and Somnath Chatterjee (CPIM), Indrajit Gupta and A.B.Bardhan (CPI), Ram Vilas Paswan (NF) and Tridib Chaudhury (RSP).
The leaders also condemned the inaction of Prime Minister P.V Narasimha Rao, who they felt, had no sense of seriousness in tackling the conflagration in Bombay.
They deprecated the negative remarks made by the Congress leadership about party MP Sunil Dutt’s resignation over the continuing violence, They said Dutt was the only Congressman who had shown some courage by resigning from the Lok Sabha in anguish.
Chatterjee said the fundamentalist forces were openly demanding the massacre of the minorities and gaining ground every day due to the “negligence, if not collusion of the Congress.”
Paswan said in response to a question that banning the Shiy Sena would not serve any useful purpose as the ban on the VHP was ineffective because its leaders were continuing to make inflammatory statements.
Meanwhile, the Rashtriya Ekta Abhiyan campaign for national unity launched by the NF, Left and other parties and organizations have finalized some dates for rallies in major cities, Bardhan said.
The schedule is Jan. 20 Patna, 26th Amritsar, 27th ; Bangalore 30th : Bhubaneswar, 31st: Madras, February 2 Varanasi, 8th : Bhopal, 10th ! Jaipur, 13th : Nagpur. The date for Bombay has tentatively been fixed for February 16, Bardhan said the campaign for collecting five crore signatures for the pledge to national unity and communal harmony was under way in the districts all over the country. The signatures would be handed over to President Shankar Dayal Sharma on March 23, the martyrdom day of Bhagat Singh.
Article extracted from this publication >> January 22, 1993
