Pushed to a corner politically by Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and fast losing ground in Darjeeling hills Gorkha Janmukti Morcha chief Bimal Gurung is planning to revive the demand for Gorkhaland, GJM sources said.
Disturbed by Banerjee’s “ploy to divide Darjeeling population” by creating more and more community-based boards — a la lepcha development board that she created a few years ago much to the chagrin of GJM chief — that threatens to erode Gurung’s mass base he has called for a fresh agitation for a separate Gorkhaland State.
Addressing a party meeting Gurung is known to have told his supporters to fan out among the people and “prepare them for maximum sacrifice that is associated with sustained movements.”
The GJM chief who is also the Chairman of the Gorkhaland Territorial Administration has made it clear among his followers that the party will come out of the GTA arrangement and hit the streets soon. For this the party is planning a bandh to begin with, sources said.
“Our experience shows that future of Darjeeling lies not in the GTA which is increasingly becoming irrelevant as the powers that be are reluctant not even to give the administrative autonomy that was promised in the GTA accord,” Gurung has said adding that the people of Darjeeling have begun to look at the current State Government with distrust particularly because of its move to divide the local population.
Gurung is against what he says, “dividing people of Darjeeling by creating more and more number of councils.”
Referring to a fresh demand for a separate Gorkhaland State Gurung hastold the meeting that in the White Paper released by the then Jyoti Basu Government it had been accepted that Darjeeling was never a part of Bengal. Rather during the British period it formed a part of Sikkim and Bhutan.
“How can a State claim an area which was never its partIJ” Gurung asked saying the people of Darjeeling will have to prepare themselves for the supreme sacrifice and a sustained movement to extract their demand.
Historically speaking Darjeeling and Kurseong sub-divisions belonged to kingdom of Sikkim and Kalimpong belonged to Bhutan. After the Anglo-Bhutanese war, Sikkim ceded Darjeeling and Kurseong to British India while Bhutan gave Kalimpong. The three sub-divisions were then joined to form Darjeeling district which was merged with Bengal by the British Government.