CPI(ML) calls for ouster of Assam CM over police firing

Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) [CPI(ML)] Politburo Member Kavita Krishnan has called for the ouster of Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswas Sarma for police firing on “poor unarmed Muslims” protesting demolition of their homes in Darrang district of Assam.

Krishnan said in a statement issued on behalf of the Central Committee, CPI(ML) that the “massacre is the inevitable consequence of the climate of xenophobia and anti-Muslim hate created by the BJP.” She recalled how Union Home Minister Amit Shah repeatedly referred to “Muslims as termites” while speaking about NRC and CAA.

According to the statement, such dehumanising language by those in power always leads to ethnic cleansing, since it is intended to signal to the state machinery and party cadres that they must exterminate the targeted minority community.

She refers to the “shocking video footage which shows police armed with guns surrounding a solitary man, shooting him, then beating him when he falls to the ground with a bullet hole in his chest. A photographer associated with the Darrang DM’s office and embedded with the police force is then seen jumping repeatedly onto the dying man’s body. This video must serve as the ultimate warning for every sane Indian to rise against the hate-filled campaign of ethnic cleansing unleashed by the BJP’s Union and state governments. Muslims in Assam are today doubly vulnerable as they bear the brunt of Islamophobia as well as anti-immigrant hate.”

Krishnan has called for arrest of the Superintendent of Police, Darrang, who is the brother of the Chief Minister and under whose command the police opened fire. She had demanded the arrest of the SP and his team on charges of murder and has sought a court-monitored probe of the incident.’

The party has appealed to the people all over the country to protest against the massacre and demand justice and safety for the survivors.