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Alert sounded in West Bengal

KOLKATA: The West Bengal government has sounded an alert in the Maoist-affected areas of the State in the wake of the jailbreak in Chhattisgarh on Sunday.

The State government, however, is not considering banning the outfit, Home Secretary Prasad Ranjan Ray said here on Monday. The Maoists are active in parts of Purulia, Paschim Medinipur and Bankura districts, he added.

Security is also being tightened inside the State Secretariat and its vicinity after a poster signed by the Communist Party of India (Maoist) was found pasted on the building wall last week. The poster condemned Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee and other senior party leaders for their role in Nandigram.

“We have to find out how some outsiders could come and paste the poster on the wall of a protected building like the State Secretariat,” Mr. Ray said. Four police constables on duty had been suspended.

In the Assembly, Trinamool Congress and Congress members raised the issue of Maoist presence in the State. They demanded a statement from Mr. Bhattacharjee over the presence of a poster on the Secretariat wall.

Discussions on an adjournment motion moved by a Trinamool Congress MLA was disallowed by Speaker H.A. Halim, who said the party did not have the required presence in the House for such a motion. Leader of the Opposition Partha Chatterjee later questioned the Speaker’s ruling, claiming the required number of MLAs was present.

Congress MLA Manas Bhunia demanded a statement from the Chief Minister on the activities of Maoists and the steps taken by the government to curb them.

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