After LF debacle, Forward Bloc leader attacks Buddhadeb

Kolkata, May 16 (IANS) With the CPI-M led Left Front heading for what could be its worst performance in West Bengal, expelled Marxist veteran Abdur Rezzak Mollah Friday blamed the party's rigidity and its leaders' arrogance for the drubbing.

While Mollah targeted Communist Party of India-Marxist politburo member Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, a senior leader of LF constituent All India Forward Bloc also blamed the former chief minister's attitude.

"The biggest reason is the party's rigidity and the arrogance of the leadership. When a change in the leadership was indispensable, the party preferred to stick with same leadership.

"As the party head and brain, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee has to take responsibility and admit his arrogance lead the party and the Front to suffer this ignominy," Mollah said.

"The party stands for secularism but its leaders practice pseudo-secularism," Mollah told IANS.

AIFB leader Naren Chatterjee castigated Bhattacharjee for keeping himself busy in paying tributes to Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez, when LF supporters were becoming the victims of political violence in North 24 Parganas district.

"When over 125 of our supporters were attacked and injured in Haroa, the party preferred paying tribute to Gabriel Garcia Marquez, instead of rushing to Haroa and standing beside them," Chatterjee said referring to the May 12 incident in North 24 Parganas where CPI-M supporters were injured in an attack allegedly by the Trinamool activists.

"We were not able to reach out to the people, we were outmaneuvered by the Trinamool and the BJP which has largely benefited from the division of votes of the opposition and made inroads into our vote share," former state minister and Revolutionary Socialist Party leader Kshiti Goswami said.