Mamata shows green signal to Reds at rally

For the first time since November 2008, from when the Maoists began “ruling” Lalgarh, this hamlet witnessed a public rally where the Trinamul supremo, Ms Mamata Banerjee, echoing the home minister, Mr P. Chidambaram, urged the Maoists to “shun violence first and sit for talks”.

In Delhi, the Congress declared its “moral support” for the rally.

The rally, which was publicised as an “apolitical” event, gave the minister, keeping an eye on the Assembly elections, a chance to present a rosy future for Junglemahal.

“All the violence and misunderstandings need to be ended. There should not be any more killing. Be it a policeman, a social worker, a mediaperson, a TMC supporter, a CPM man or even a Maoist — all are human beings and deserve to live,” Ms Banerjee told thousands of people. The Maoists had declared support for the the rally, and the PCPA had canvassed support for it.

“Just tell me, what do you want? Where do you want to meet? But you have to stop the killings first,” she told the Maoists.

Mentioning the talks between the Centre and the Maoists that was negotiated by Swami Agnivesh, Ms Banerjee said, “The killing of Azad was not right. We pray for his soul. But the peace process that was initiated by Agniveshji must start again. If needed we will go to Dantewada and Chhattisgarh also.”

She was referring to the encounter killing of Azad alias Cherukuri Raj Kumar in Adilabad in Andhra Pradesh in July.