GJM resorts to violence for political currency

Opportunism is par for the course in politics, but it seldom factors in the inconvenience that ordinary citizens face. At the peak of the tourist season, the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM) decided to launch an agitation ostensibly to protest West Bengal Chief Minister’s proposal to make Bengali compulsory for students of Class 1 to 10. What could have been resolved across the table took a violent turn, prompting the CM to call in the army to restore law and order.

Thousands of tourists were stranded as protesters indulged in arson and stone-pelting — government-run buses were set on ire, and a 12-hour shutdown paralysed the region. The game plan behind a GJM-orchestrated unrest is fairly simple. Having lost political currency, it is now trying to brandish the rusty weapon of a separate Gorkhaland state. Banerjee didn’t want the Bengali language to be an imposition on people who don’t speak or write it. In fact, she had clarified that Bengali would not be made compulsory in schools in Darjeeling and in certain areas of the Dooars and the Terai.

But the GJM, sensing Banerjee’s growing popularity in the hills — the TMC won the civic body polls in Mirikh — is trying to claw its way back. For the first time in 45 years, the state cabinet had held a meeting in Darjeeling. It was an attempt at integration with the people of the hills. The rabble-rousers have managed to set it back once again, merely by exploiting the fears and anxieties of a populace.