Left failed to tackle Maoist menace: A B Bardhan

Communist Party of India-Marxist general secretary A B Bardhan stirred up a a storm by admitting that the Left had not done enough to tackle the Naxal menace.

In the backdrop of Thursday's Maoist ambush in Gadchiroli and the beheading of a policeman in Ranchi early this week, the CPI-M stalwart said these acts are condemnable but felt that using army and air force to combat Naxals will set a bad precedent. "Ambushing policemen and killing them as has been done in Gadchiroli area is wrong and condemnable," CPI Bardhan told media-person in Thiruvananthapuram.
 
On the use of army and air force personnel for offensive against Naxals, he said "Using army and air force to combat Maoists will set a bad precedent and the collateral disaster of such a course would be serious," Bardhan said. "The Army has a specific role, Defence Minister A K Antony has said that the ministry does not think that army should be used for offensive action," he said.
 
"We totally dissociate with the political strategies of Maoists. But using army to put them down is not justified. Instead, police and paramilitary forces should be used." Maintaining that his own partymen have been victims of Maoist violence in areas like Bastar in Chhattisgarh, he said the extremists should be fought politically and a "socio- economic dimension" should be evolved to solve the issues faced by people in Naxal-affected areas.
 
Bardhan said that the Maoists were actually giving an excuse to the government to "unleash state-sponsored violence
against people" and admitted there was a failure on the part of mainstream Left in tackling issues of most backward areas.

Additional inputs: PTI