CPI(M) describes attacks on SFI members as 'Taliban model'

Kochi: Terming the recent attack on SFI members in a college in Kochi as "Taliban Model," the CPI(M) on Wednesday said it would carry out extensive campaign to "expose" the activities of radical Islamic outfit Popular Front of India (PFI) and its allied organisations in Kerala.

The CPI(M), shocked by the "brutal killing" of SFI leader Abhimanyu in the attack allegedly by activists of PFI, its student outfit Campus Front and political offshoot Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI), said they organise such "planned killings" to disturb peace in the state.

Read: 20-yr-old SFI leader stabbed to death inside Kerala college, 3 others injured

"SDPI is carrying out Taliban model attacks," said an official statement of CPI(M) carried by party mouthpiece Deshabhimani.

It said the party has lost nine workers so far in such "brutal attacks" carried out by activists of PFI, Campus Front and SDPI in the state.

The CPI(M) said statewide campaigns will be organised to "expose" their activities in the state.

The first such campaign will be organised across the state on July 10, it added. Meanwhile, SDPI has justified the killing of 20-year-old student from a poor Tamil tribal hamlet from backward hill region of Idukki district, saying the attack was not one-sided and the death of Abhimanyu happened when the activists of Campus Front defended themselves.

The statement of SDPI state president Abdul Majeed Faizy came yesterday as the police carried out raids in its offices in many parts of the state to nab the culprits allegedly involved in the killing of the student.

Arrest of only three persons were recorded so far in connection with the incident.

Police has said only two or three students belonging to the Campus Front were part of the gang of around 15 persons allegedly involved in violent attack on SFI workers over a minor issue of graffitti on the college wall.

The CPI(M) has alleged that rest of the attackers were either workers of the PFI or SDPI.

CPI(M) state secretariat member and former Rajya Sabha MP KN Balagopal said the nature of wounds afflicted on Abhimanyu and two other students reveals that the attack was carried out by trained, professional killers.

"This itself reveals that they were trained professional killers and their intention was to establish their base in the campuses in the state by terrorising students," Balagopal told PTI.

Political analysts say that the killing of Abhimanyu, a second year degree student of Maharajas College, will force the CPI(M), which has been fighting against right wing Hindu outfits for the last four decades, to fight growing Islamic fundamentalism with equal measure.

Political parties including BJP in the state have several times accused the CPI(M) of adopting a 'soft approach' towards the "growing" activities of PFI and its allied outfits in the state.

BJP's former state president and Rajya Sabha MP V Muraleedharan alleged that the CPI(M) was playing a 'hide and seek' on the killing.

"The CPI(M) is still reluctant to clarify their stand on jihadi outfits which executed the killing of Abhimanyu.

His killing is a clear indication of growing jihadi terrorism on the soil of Kerala," Muraleedharan said.

Muraleedharan urged Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan to end the hide and seek game on the issue and curb activities of 'jihadi elements' in the state.

Rejecting the BJP allegations, Balagopal said CPI(M) and the government headed by it would continue its fight against the menace of communalism irrespective of colours--whether it is majority or minority.

"Both the communalism are a threat to progressive Kerala society.

The CPI(M) and other progressive forces will continue their fight against them and eliminate their ideologies from the minds of the people of the state," said Balagopal, who is also a former leader of SFI.

A 20-year-old SFI leader was stabbed to death and two others were injured in an attack allegedly by members of a pro-Islamic outfit at the Maharaja's College in Ernakulam on July 1 night.