Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan on Monday warned the Congress against “glorifying” Maoists, hitting back at the Opposition amid allegations of a staged encounter and the arrest of two alleged Maoist sympathisers.
“Don’t portray Maoists as lambs,” the CPM leader said, accusing the Congress of legitimising the rebels and their activities.
Vijayan’s comments came in the Assembly in reply to the Congress’s notice for an adjournment motion on the arrest of the two pro-Maoist student activists under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), a dreaded law the CPM has itself opposed in the past.
Vijayan and his LDF government have been under fire since four Maoists, including a woman, died in the alleged encounter deep inside a forest in Palakkad early last week before the ruling Left lurched into further controversy with Friday’s arrests.
Tribal activists from the area had said state police commandos staged a fake encounter to kill the Maoists who were ready to surrender. But police claimed the Maoists died in retaliatory fire.
The chief minister told the Assembly the Maoists had fired the first shot. “They had not come there to surrender. They fired first,” he said.
He cited past killings by Maoists in several states, saying they had not only murdered security forces but also innocent people and asked the Congress to stop “glorifying” the rebels.
“They had killed policemen, CRPF personnel and innocent farmers in several states like Chhattisgarh, Odisha and Bihar. But the UDF (United Democratic Front) are portraying them as ‘holy souls’,” Vijayan said.
The opposition had demanded Vijayan’s resignation over booking the two law students from Kozhikode under the draconian UAPA.
Police had claimed that Alan Shuhaib and Thaha Fazal were seen distributing pamphlets containing Maoist content.
While Shuhaib is a CPM functionary in Kozhikode, Thaha is a DYFI leader.
“The police report said that Maoist material were recovered from them and Thaha even shouted pro-Maoist slogans at the time of his arrest,” the chief minister said.
He, however, said that his government would not allow the misuse of the UAPA and assured the House of an examination of the action.
The chief minister reminded how his government had already instructed the state police chief to re-examine all UAPA cases before filing chargesheets. “This government had scrapped six UAPA cases filed by the previous government,” Vijayan said, responding to allegations by Congress.
The CPM expressed faith in the LDF government about preventing the misuse of UAPA. “The CPM’s position is against slapping UAPA on the two students,” the CPM state secretariat said in a statement released on Monday.
