Under the banner of Gana Mukti Parishad, they said that Opposition parties should ensure one-to-one contest against the Left Front candidates to prevent division of anti-Left votes in the state.
Noted litterateur Mahasweta Devi, educationist Sunanda Sanyal and Amlan Dutta said that this was the right time to unite the Opposition parties.
They believe that the Left candidates can be defeated if the Opposition selects a single candidate in every seat in the three-tier panchayat polls.
Earlier, the intellectuals had organised protest rallies against the Left Front government on various issues like Nandigram, Singur and the unnatural death of Rizwanur Rehman.
After the March 14 police firing at Nandigram and “recapture” of villages there by the CPM workers in last November, intellectuals sharply criticised the role of the Left Front government of West Bengal as well as the CPM leadership.