Maoist leader who vouches Jihad garlanded with footwear by Yuvamorcha

Yuva Morcha protests against Maoists

Pioneer News Service | Kannur

Bharatiya
Janata Yuva Morcha activists on Saturday blocked the leaders and
workers of Porattam, a Maoist organization, from holding a Press
conference at Kannur. The Yuva Morcha activists blocked local Porattam
leader Kuttyattoor Thampan and made him wear a garland made of footwear.

The
Yuva Morcha activists had come in a demonstration to protest against
the Maoist leaders. As the situation grew worse, the police intervened
and took Porattam convener MN Ravunni and other leaders away from the
Press Club.

What infuriated the Yuva Morcha was Ravunni’s
statement that extensive hunts were going on in the country as part of
“ruling class terror” in the name of extremism. He had also said that
the LDF Government also was taking a position that supported this
manhunt in the country.

The Yuva Morcha alleged that Ravunni had
been talking in support of terrorism. Following the protests by the
activists, who came to the Press Club as a demonstration shouting
slogans, the area witnessed some tension and this led to police
intervention. Other Porattam leaders Aneesh and CN Ajithan had
accompanied Ravunni.

Porattam workers had been conducting an
extensive poster campaign in Kannur town for the past one week in
Kannur and there had been rows between them and the Yuva Morcha
activists. The problems on Saturday were said to be a consequence of
this.

Porattam had last hit headlines in the State in October
after Ravunni was arrested after the Kerala Police, its Intelligence
wing and the Central Intelligence Bureau launching an intense operation
to identify the relations of Maoists and the activists of Islamist
organizations.

Intelligence officials had then suspected that
there was some kind of cooperation among the Maoists, workers of
Islamic resistance organizations and former operatives of SIMI. They
were also looking into matters like whether there had been any joint
operations so far in Kerala, whether there had been any exchange of
material and information and whether they had any plans for the future
to work in unison.

Sources indicated that the arrest in early
October of Ravunni had connections to this effort of the police and
intelligence agencies. The Palakkad police had arrested Ravunni, who
had already served several years of prison term for Naxalite actions
decades ago, in connection with Porattam’s own operations, but reports
had said that the real intention behind it was to inquire about the
outfit’s relations with Islamist organizations.

Porattam was
perhaps the only extremist communist organization which still followed
the path of revolution as envisaged by Mao Zedong while all other
Naxalite groups had either adopted democratic approach or given up the
model of the Naxalbari uprising as the guiding force. Porattam was also
immensely interested in the issues related to Adivasis and Dalits in
the State.

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