Bengal burns, Chidambaram seeks explanation

New Delhi, Jan 8: All's not well in West Bengal as violence in Lalgarh turned for the worse. The number of those dead were found to be 8 and close to 18 injured in the clashes between party workers. Another 11 people died in the last 48 hours alone making the situation truly alarming.

While the blame game is on who will take responsibility for the sorry state of affairs in West Bengal, the Centre has taken the matter seriously and has summoned West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya to Delhi for a meeting with Home Minister P Chidambaram.

P Chidambaram said, "I drew his attention to this very grave incident and requested him to kindly reschedule his appointments and visit Delhi as soon as possible."

The Trinamool yesterday paraded the streets with the dead bodies of 3 party workers killed in the violence. Trinamool Congress Chief , Mamata Banerjee strongly condemned the violence. A villager from the place affected by violence said, "They want us to go for the training. We revolted against it and this is what has happened. They told us if we do not go for training, then they will kill us. The camps belong to Harmads (a slang used by locals in reference to CPM cadres) ."

The CPM accelerated tension further when they claimed the political clashes to the Trinamool and Maoists.

The West Bengal Governor MK Narayanan in a statement said that the Lalgarh violence was 'Bengal's day of shame' and added, “For our State it is a day of sorrow and shame. No State can accept such mindless discord. This has gone on for far too long. It is incumbent upon the authorities to begin to act decisively to preempt, prevent or quell attempts at violence, irrespective of the affiliations of the groups involved. A decisive stage has been reached for the Government to act, before it becomes a point of no return."

OneIndia News