Bengal battle

By backing the efforts of West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee to fight the growing Maoist presence in his state, prime minister Manmohan Singh and home minister P Chidambaram have amply demonstrated that on this vital issue there will be no compromises.

Political differences will not come in the way in the larger effort to combat these armed insurgents and if the affected state is not ruled by the  Congress, so be it. Bengal is among the more troubled states as far as Maoist violence is concerned and the Centre has agreed to back it in every possible way. That is welcome.

There is a sub-text to this alliance. Bhattacharjee has found the opportunity to score a point against his party's bete noire Mamata Banerjee, railway minister and Trinamool Congress (TMC) president.

The Centre's backing cannot but annoy Banerjee whose single point agenda is to fight the CPM government. She loses no opportunity to hit out at them; to see Bhattacharjee cosying up to the Congress is a red rag to her. But Banerjee's fulminations against Bhattacharjee seem to be of no avail. He has just shrugged them off and further snubbed her for being 'juvenile'.

At a more serious level however both Banerjee and Bhattacharjee have to deal with the real and difficult issues confronting the state. The Maoist challenge is one of them. The TMC leader can criticise the chief minister for not being effective against the Maoist threat, but she cannot take this issue casually. She cannot be seen to be sympathising with the Left extremists in order to snub the Marxists. As it is there are fears that Maoist elements have infiltrated the agitations she has led against the CPM government.

The people of the state are looking for an alternative to the jaded CPM government but they would not appreciate populism of the TMC kind. More than that, there is need for a mature handling of the issues and threats that confront the state.

The Bhattacharjee-Banerjee sparring makes for good sound bytes but the substantive issues are not to be forgotten. The rising danger of Maoist groups is definitely one of them. There is a need to call off this pointless name calling.

The CPM needs to get on with the job at hand, now that it has the backing of the UPA government while Banerjee perhaps could do with some sane and sober counsel of her coalition elders so that she can allow this crucial job to proceed for the sake of West Bengal.