Take Opp propaganda seriously, but keep your cool -- CPM to workers

Take Opp propaganda seriously, but keep your cool -- CPM to workers
SANTANU BANERJEE

CALCUTTA, SEPT 15: A political report of the CPI(M), prepared during the two-day state committee meeting held earlier this week, has asked party members to take the Opposition's propaganda blitzkrieg on the law and order issue very seriously.

Terming the Opposition's strategy ``a plot'' to create ``confusion and disaffection among the people'' the report advises party members to counter the attack by organising a people's movement.

Interestingly, the report -- circulated among the party members and the media -- does not rule out the ``possibility of more violence'' in the state in the coming months. Contrary to Chief Minister Jyoti Basu's recent speech urging party workers to hit back when attacked or provoked by Opposition workers, ``blood for blood'' policy, party cadres have been asked to keep themselves cool in the face of such provocations.

The Opposition will intensify its propaganda in the run-up to the Assembly elections to create a credibility problem for the ruling Left Front, the report warns, adding that it will greatly contribute to the people's disaffection towards the state government unless handled carefully. The party, therefore, must intensify its mass-contact programme, the report suggests.

It also recommends an 11-point programme to combat the onslaught by the media and the Opposition. ``While the continuity of developmental programmes should remain unhindered, party members must involve the people and build up resistance to thwart the Opposition-sponsored terrorism.''

The agenda thus drawn up also suggest a special thrust on wooing intellectuals, the middle-class, professionals and others who contribute to guiding the people's opinion. The report asks the party to take to the masses the anti-people policies of the BJP-led NDA Government at the Centre which is adding to their socio-economic miseries.

It also lays special emphasis on fighting the ``deliberate disinformation campaign against the economic performances of the LF Government for the past 23 years''. ``There is no denying the fact that despite 23 years in power, the LF government couldn't solve all the problems of the people. This isn't possible either,'' the report claims.

The party's growing political intolerance against the media is also manifest in the report. ``What could be said in our favour was ignored both by the Opposition and the media.'' It also hints that the media -- in league with the Opposition -- has joined hands to tarnish the image of the CPI(M)-led Left Front government.

Incidentally, only yesterday, The Indian Express bureau chief and two other journalists from the Ananda Bazar Patrika were injured when Opposition Trinamool Congress workers hurled bombs at the car in which they were travelling.