KOLKATA: The Calcutta High Court on Monday verbally suggested that the CPI(M) could set up its bookstalls during Kali Puja instead of Durga Puja, while hearing a petition over the denial of permission for temporary stalls of Marxist and progressive literary works during Durga Puja in Naihati and Bongaon in North 24 Parganas in West Bengal.
The petitioners told the court that they had been putting up bookstalls at the two locations during the Durga Puja festivities for the past five decades.
Advocate Shamim Ahmed, representing the petitioners, argued that the authorities had refused permission this year, citing “a direction from higher authorities”.
Justice Saugata Bhattacharyya, while hearing the plea in the High Court on Monday, questioned whether the petitioners’ long-standing practice gave them an automatic right to set up the stalls.
The judge verbally proposed that they could instead install the bookstalls during Kali Puja, scheduled to take place about a fortnight later. When Ahmed requested the matter be released from his court, Justice Bhattacharyya said he would consider that on Tuesday.
The CPI(M)'s cultural wings traditionally set up bookstalls near pandals across West Bengal during Durga Puja.
Triggering a political slugfest in September, the Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari had asked Durga Puja committees not to allow CPI(M)'s bookstalls near pandals if they use the term 'Sharodotsav' to describe the festivities and diminish the religious character of 'Durga Puja'.
While speaking in the West Bengal legislative assembly on September 10, Suvendu had asked Durga Puja committees across the state not to allow the CPI(M) bookstalls outside pandals if the party refers to the festival as 'Sharodotsav' instead of 'Durga Puja', saying the term minimises its religious character.
Suvendu had accused sections of the Left of selectively targeting 'Sanatan Dharma' and the saffron colour, and urged puja committees to prevent such bookstalls from operating.
"A section of professors, who are so-called Leftists, are attacking 'Sanatanis'. They are selectively targeting the saffron colour. I would ask all Durga Puja committees that if the Communists write 'Sharodotsav' (autumn festival) instead of 'Durga Puja' at the book stalls they set up, they should not be allowed to operate," he had said.
The CPI(M) and its affiliates set up bookstalls near Durga Puja pandals every year, selling Marxist and progressive literature, party publications and other books, while using the festival to reach out to people.
In 1954, the first such CPI(M)-associated book stall was set up in Park Circus on the initiative of veteran Communist leader Muzaffar Ahmed.
The practice became particularly significant as party workers and local leaders were generally discouraged from directly participating in religious events.
After the Left Front's defeat in 2011, such red-cloth stalls became less common during the previous Trinamool Congress regime in the state, though they continue to be organised at select locations.
The Chief Minister had said his objection was not to the sale of books during the festival but to what he described as an attempt to deny or minimise its religious character by the use of the term 'Sharodotsav', literally Autumn festival.
The High Court’s verbal suggestions came at a time when the CPI-M leadership plans to put up around 110 stalls in Kolkata, like last year, triggering a confrontation with the ruling BJP, which is looking to widen its presence during the Durga Puja festival across the state.
The CPI-M Kolkata district committee would write to Lalbazar requesting Kolkata Police permission for setting up its bookstalls in the city.