NEW DELHI: The Assassination of Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh is yet another political blow to the National Front Left Front (NFLF) alliance, feel Left parties.
Both the Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPIM) and the Community Party of India (CPI) feel that the tragic development will boost the chances of the Congress, particularly in Punjab, and also make the Akali parties think again on their recent Criticism of militancy in the State.
“It will have serious repercussions and the extremists will feel encouraged. The Akali parties will be demoralized and the minority community will naturally be solidly behind the Congress. The Left, which has always fought boldly against the militants, will continue to have its pride of place,” said CPI (M) general secretary Harkishan Singh Surjeet last week, after a visit to Chandigarh.
The CPI (M) leader said the Akali parties which were trying to oppose the Amritsar declaration (seeking an independent Khalistan) will now stop the attempts to distance themselves from the extremist factions.
“IT would like them to pick up the fight against militancy but 1 don’t think they will have the heart anymore,” Surjeet said, implying that the fear of terrorism will now dictate the people’s vote for the general election.
Effectively then, the “fear vote” dashes the NFLF combine’s hopes that the Akali Dal (Badal) group might ally with them for the elections. For some weeks now, leaders of the NFLP alliance held talks with Prakash Singh Badal exploring avenues of an alliance. It appeared that Badal, who has traditionally been an ally of the BJP, was not averse to the NFLF. His announcement that he did not support the Amritsar Declaration’ was also seen as a conciliatory gesture to the NFLF combine, However, Beant Singh’s assassination has changed things.
Article extracted from this publication >>September 8, 1995
