CPI-M offers olive branch to Mamata Banerjee, Lalgarh toll touches 8

Kolkata : While one more Lalgarh firing victim died on Friday and another was killed in a fresh clash in West Bengal, the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) spearheading the ruling Left Front government has sent an SMS to Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee for talks to halt the violence in the run up to assembly polls.

West Bengal Housing Minister Gautam Deb reportedly sent an SMS to Banerjee which said: “I am sure that you are in heavy mind in view of growing violence, perpetuated by different quarters in the state.

I would like to talk to you with a proposal to make a break on this episode of violence.”

He has requested the Trinamool leader and Railway Minister for an appointment for talks.

West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee’s consent was sought before the SMS was sent, the minister said.

“We have to stop this killing in thousands of villages of West Bengal. Top leaders of CPI-M, Congress and Trinamool Congress should sit together and appeal through public forums to their workers to resist violence,” said Gautam Deb.

“Mamata should give up her ego and come forward for peace talks, else at this rate hundreds of others would die before the polls,” he said.

Trinamool Congress has trashed the offer as political gimmick.

“He is sick. This is nothing but gimmick,” said Trinamool Congress leader Partha Chattopadhayay without naming Deb.

Trinamool Congress leader Madan Mitra confirmed that he had got a call from the state minister for peace talks, a Bengali TV channel reported.

Meanwhile, in the latest political clash one person died in Burdwan district’s Ketugram on Friday.

The Lalgarh firing toll also rose to eight on Friday with the death of another woman in Kolkata’s SSKM Hospital.

With the latest death, eight villagers, including three women, were killed and 17 injured in the volatile Lalgarh area on a Jan 7 firing blamed on the armed cadres of the ruling communists by the Opposition.