Anti-GJM parties hold public meeting in Darjeeling

DARJEELING - The Democratic Front (DF) - an umbrella organisation of anti-Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM) parties - Monday held a public meeting in Darjeeling town to pay tribute to slain All India Gorkha League (AIGL) president Madan Tamang.

This was the first public meeting organised by the group in Darjeeling after Madan Tamang was slain May 21.

Tamang was hacked to death in broad daylight near Chawkbazar, when he was preparing for a party meeting. Both the West Bengal government and the DF have blamed the GJM for the killing.

All DF leaders who addressed the gathering reiterated the charge against the GJM and also criticised the state government for failing to crack down on the culprits.

Tamang’s widow Bharati Tamang, the new AIGL president, said that recently a delegation of party leaders met Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee to demand a Central Bureau of Investigation enquiry into her husband’s murder.

“But he requested us to show faith in the CID (Criminal Investigation Department of state police) investigation and also assured us that the culprits will be punished. More than 50 days have passed since the brutal killing, but not a single person accused in the case has been arrested,” she said, demanding immediate arrest of the culprits.

R.B. Rai, former Darjeeling MP and president of Communist Party of Revolutionary Marxists (CPRM), an ally of DF said: “The state government is saying that CID is progressing well in tracking down the culprits, but all the senior GJM leaders, who had masterminded the crime, are roaming freely across the hills before the very eyes of the police. So how can we have our faith on the CID and the state government?”

Around 8,000 people attended the five-hour meeting, triggering major traffic snarls in Darjeeling. However, no untoward incident was reported, police said.