Bengal CPM blames it on Third Front

May 25, 2009 left Leave a comment

Overlooking the Opposition’s role in its debacle, the Bengal unit of the CPM has instead concluded that voters’ rejection of the idea of Third Front has led to its worst performance in the recent Lok Sabha polls.

Party’s poll managers on Sunday sweated it out at the state committee meeting to identify the reasons why 3.5 per cent of their committed voters voted for the Trinamool-Congress alliance in the state…More

Control-C and Control-V works in IT, not in politics: CPI

May 22, 2009 left Leave a comment

The Communist Party of India (Marxist), on Thursday, said the move to create a third political alternative cannot be a “cut and paste arrangement” on the eve of the elections and can emerge only through sustained popular struggles.

“The CPI (M) had all along, in the Political Resolutions of successive Party Congresses articulated the need for the creation of a third political alternative that can effect a progressive shift in the policy trajectory of the country. Such an alternative cannot, obviously, be a cut and paste arrangement on the eve of elections. This can only emerge through sustained popular struggles. There are no short cuts,” it said in an editorial in the party organ People’s Democracy…More

Third Front had no juicy carrots: Karat

May 22, 2009 left Leave a comment

In its first formal admission that its pre-poll strategy — of which CPM general secretary Prakash Karat was the chief architect — was a failure, the CPM Politburo today admitted that the Third Front was seen as neither “credible nor viable.”

After an eight-hour meeting yesterday, where leaders from West Bengal were said to attributed their rout to the Third Front fancy and the decision to withdraw support to the UPA, the Politburo decided to share the blame saying “state-specific factors” were also responsible for the defeat…More

Jaitley says instability held out by the Third Front helped UPA

May 22, 2009 bjp Leave a comment

BJP national general secretary Arun Jaitley on Thursday attributed the National Democratic Alliance’s election debacle to the “legitimate desire” among the people for political stability.

This desire was triggered by the pre-poll prospect of political instability thrown up by the Third Front trying to emerge as a balancing force with respect to the formation of a government at the Centre, he added…More

We had doubts about third front: CPI

May 21, 2009 left Leave a comment

CPI on Wednesday launched an indirect attack on CPM, presumably against West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and CPM general secretary Prakash Karat, stressing that there was a “need for humility and total absence of arrogance in the behaviour and attitude of all Left leaders and activists in relation to people.”

CPI sources said, “In West Bengal we have been pointing out the arrogant behaviour of Bhattacharjee during Singur and Nandigram but CPM never listened to us. We had doubts about third front also.”

This seems to be a reflection of long-felt anger of smaller Left parties against CPM as the third front idea was aggressively pushed by Karat…More