The upcoming election for Gorkhaland Territorial Administration (GTA)—a local autonomous body in West Bengal’s Darjeeling hills—has turned into a divisive point in the state’s politics. Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM), which happens to be an ally to the ruling party Trinamool Congress, has now taken measures to protest the election for the autonomous body administration in Darjeeling hills.
The state government had announced earlier that it intended to hold the election for GTA on June 26. However, GJM had asked the state government earlier this month that the election be deferred until the unexecuted portion of the tripartite agreement of 2011 was implemented.
Bimal Gurung, president of GJM, went on a hunger strike on Wednesday, demanding that the election be deferred till the 2011 agreement’s clauses were met.
Raju Bista, BJP MP from Darjeeling, said that if the state government was so interested in the welfare of the region, it should hold panchayat elections instead, which had not taken place for two decades. Bista viewed the GTA election as a move that could jeopardise future tripartite talks. He asserted that a permanent political solution, within the ambit of the Constitution, was needed in the region.
Bishnu Prasad Sharma, a BJP MLA from Kurseong, said that the Bharatiya Janata Party was against the GTA election and would not contest it. He was hopeful that a new round of tripartite talk would take place soon.
The Gorkha National Liberation Front was also not in favour of the election. The Hamro Party, a new political outfit in the region that did well in Darjeeling municipal elections earlier this year, and the Bharatiya Gorkha Prajatantrik Morcha, which was formed last year, would contest the GTA election.
Meanwhile, Bharatiya Gorkha Parisangh, an apolitical organisation, stated that it was “opposed to the idea of GTA as an alternative to people’s aspirations for statehood”.
“For us the election is a non-issue, it is the idea of the GTA as a whole that we are opposed to,” Munish Tamang, the working president of the Parisangh, told DH.
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