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CPI(M) : Strategy drawn up to increase party influence |
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The CPI(M) politburo, which met for two days in Kolkata on September 12-13, is reported to have finalised a plan for extending the party’s influence in states across the country where it is yet to be a dominant political force. The plan also aims at consolidating the party’s strength in areas where it has been able to establish a significant presence. The strategy drawn up by the politburo is to be placed before the party’s central committee at its three-day meeting beginning in the national capital, New Delhi, on Sept. 24.
Jyoti Basu plea to retire turned down
The politburo on Sept. 13 turned down veteran leader Jyoti Basu’s request that he should be allowed to retire because of age and ill-health. He has spent 66 years in active politics after he came back from the United Kingdom in 1940 after reading law. The veteran leader is now 93 and not keeping good health. Earlier also, Basu had expressed his desire to retire in September 2005.
CPI(M) general secretary Prakash Karat later said Basu had been asked to stay on till the next party congress in 2008. “We are aware that his health and age have robbed him of the agility - the brisk pace at which he worked in the past - but his advice and experience will benefit us.” Basu would continue both in the CPI(M) politburo and the central committee.
The politburo gave the go ahead to West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee’s industrial policies and decided to sell his Special Economic Zone concept as a national development model.
The two-day meeting discussed the ongoing controversy over the Government’s decision to acquire agricultural land for industry and infrastructure and also the Opposition’s threat to launch prolonged agitation against the policy. “We want the manufacturing industry to develop in Bengal. This project is very important for the state,” party general secretary Prakash Karat said, alluding to the proposed Tata Motors car manufacturing unit at Singur. The Trinamul Congress and the Congress have threatened that the “project would not be allowed at the cost of displacement of farmers.” Karat, however, argued that the “displacement” for the Tata project could not be compared to the “eviction of farmers” in Haryana, Maharashtra or Chhattisgarh. “I have been told that West Bengal will prepare a detailed land use policy,” he said.
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