Basu takes to the streets

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, DEC. 7. The veteran Marxist leader, Mr. Jyoti Basu, today took on the role of spearheading an agitation with ease, to protest against the indifference of the Centre in providing relief funds to flood-hit West Bengal.

A month after he stepped down as the Chief Minister of West Bengal, Mr. Basu took to the streets along with the CPI(M) general secretary, Mr. Harkishan Singh Surjeet, and his CPI counterpart, Mr. A. B. Bardhan to underline the State's feelings towards the ``apathy' of the Centre.

The few steps he took along with senior Left Front leaders and the dais he shared with many Opposition leaders at the dharna against the failure of the NDA government to release ``even a single paise'' to the State raised a faint hope for the proponents of the third front, till the Samajwadi Party poured water on it. Mr. Basu did not mince words as he took on the Trinamool Congress chief, Ms. Mamata Banerjee's flip-flop by supporting the State's efforts at all-party meeting on floods and later terming the calamity a man-made disaster.

He also criticised the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance government saying that after describing the floods as a national calamity, it neither promulgated an ordinance for constitution of a National Calamity Contingency Fund as per the 11th Finance Commission recommendations nor did it introducing a bill in Parliament on the recommendation.

Clearly unhappy with the Prime Minister's statement on the construction of a Ram temple at Ayodhya as an expression of people's intent and defending his three Cabinet colleagues, Mr.

Basu said the country was being ruled by ``barbarians''.

Although the Samajwadi Party president, Mr. Mulayam Singh Yadav, responded to the CPI(M) invitation to join the dharna, he said it was the Marxist party that spurned the opportunity to install Mr. Basu as the Prime Minister in 1996. The SP leader reiterated his ``anti-Congress-anti-BJP'' stance and his willingness to join hands for a Front on this condition.

Among the other speakers were Mr. Surjeet, Mr. Bardhan, Mr. Yadav, Dr. Raghuvansh Prasad Singh (RJD), Ms. Jayanti Natarajan (TMC), Mr. R. Margabandu (AIADMK), Mr. Tariq Anwar (NCP), Mr. Balwant Singh Ramoowalia (Independent). Ms. Shabana Azmi (nominated), Mr. Manoj Bhattacharya (RSP), Mr. Debabrata Biswas (Forward Bloc) and Mr. Harishankar Mahale (JD- Secular).

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