Hyderabad: The need of the hour is to see Left parties emerge strong across the country, said eminent journalist and Social Activist, Teesta Setalvad. Speaking to newspersons during the media briefing jointly organised by the Telangana Union of Working Journalists, AP Union of Working Journalists and Hyderabad Union of Journalists at Sundarayya Vignana Kendram, here on Thursday, she said that whatever is possible to be done to strengthen Left parties to emerge stronger and vibrant  
 
She felt that the Left parties should be more pro-active stand on castes and communalism.  “I believe they will do it,” she opined. Teesta pointed out that splintered Opposition allowed the pro-fascist government at the Centre. “We cannot afford the luxury of the splintered opposition,”  she said.  She called upon Dalit and economically backward communities to actively participate in politics and fight for their rights. Unless you understand castiesm, you cannot understand communalism, she added.

Speaking on the Alair and Seshachalam encounter cases, the social activist termed it as extra judicial killings and said its terrible to hear the word ‘encounter’  On the foreign funds to the Sabrang trust, an NGO which she was associated with, Teesta said that they had receive meagre funds from aboard and there was no misuse of it.

“We submitted 5000 original documents to disprove the allegations against the NGO. Unfortunately, the Gujarat High Court did not take into consideration the affidavits’ and original documents that were submitted to it,” she added. On the 2002 Gujarat riots, she said. “If you are holding seminars, workshops, doing cultural programmes, you are not much of a threat. When you move courts and get 120 persons convicted, the State turns vindictive.

We managed to convince the Supreme Court to monitor 10 major trails related to 2002 Gujarat riots,” said Teesta.  “Because of the petition we filed in the Supreme Court asking for transparency in the investigation, the court appointed SIT. According to us, the SIT did 30 per cent of the work because of the fact the SC was monitoring the cases and managed to get 120 convictions.”
 
She further said the government at the centre was hell bent on scaring  us and paralyzing our work so that 120 convictions that were given by the Sessions Court could be reversed in the upper courts. “According to me, this is 100% RSS government. The government is driven by the extreme right ideology which is anti-constitutional,” she stated Teesta informed that Communalism Combat-a monthly magazine will be re-launched in the e-format soon.