Present situation in Hills

The Gorkha Janmukti Morcha is not in the mood to relax its agitation with party supremo Bimal Gurung today asserting the movement would build up further after the ongoing 72-hour strike.
On the first day of the strike called to pressurise the central government to create a separate Gorkhaland state, the GJM president called a press conference at the party office in Darjeeling wherein he said, “Our agitation will not stop now. After the 72 hours pass, we will announce a slew of programmes,” he said.
Party heads will convene a meeting on August 1 to chalk out and
announce the next phase of the agitation. Gurung minced no words in slamming chief minister Mamata Banerjee for the present situation, saying she was capable of going to any extent to foment trouble. “She (Banerjee) plays with blood and will do anything including ordering firing on our supporters to squash our peaceful agitation,” asserted the GJM chief.
Gurung, however, refused to be bogged down by the dogged attitude of the Trinamool Congress chief. “We are taking a big risk and agitating. Anything can happen to us including getting killed. But we will not give up now. We will continue with our democratic form of agitation,” he said, adding he would teach the state government a lesson at some point of time.
He also termed the Gorkahaland Territorial Administration a failure and put the blame on the state government. “The state government is always creating obstacles to the smooth running of the GTA. Neither the agreement nor the act has been followed in earnest by the state government. The GTA became a failure right from the time when we had to move court to remove the GTA principal secretary,” pointed out Gurung.
He also threatened to resign from the post of GTA chief executive after wrapping up some “important” work that he did not divulge. “I will resign from the GTA CE post in a couple of days and take to the streets for the Gorkhaland state demand. But I will do this after finishing some unattended work,” said the GJM president.
Gurung also took a dig at the Opposition in the Hills, saying time has now come for them to stop the war of words through newspapers and take to the streets instead. “I have always welcomed the Opposition to struggle together for the separate statehood demand. But they have always stayed aloof and only chose to criticise our movement from the comfort of their office. But now they must come out into the open with their flags for the Gorkhaland demand and shed sweat and blood,” asserted Gurung.(EOI)