India: On Nandigram and Singur
Written byNeha Viswanathan
An update on the Nandigram issue at Kafila. Where the state swoops down to grab land. “Singur, unlike the impressions outside, is still fighting with strength and spirit. Thousands of bargadars, labourers and also landholders are not for the forcible occupation of land although fencing of 997 acres of the land, protected by the sheer police force i.e., the State’s might stands.”
Written byNeha Viswanathan
18 comments
I dont think that it would be correct to create and maintain a false sense of romance about a people’s movement around Singur. Whosoever thinks so, i am sorry to say has not followed the pattern of events.The truth of the matter is that Mamata a failed politician saw a trump card in Singur to revive her dead career. She has milead the poor people to stay poor and grow potatoes throughout their lives. Dont we all know that progress the worldover has happened only when agrarian societie’s have moved on to industrialization. Lets have the farmer of singur also have prosperity. Dont let the debt ridden poor farmer remain poor or rather add fuel to fire and scare him. Mamata you are responsible for every farmer who commits suicide in Singur. Its you who is making the shove a push in singur for the poor peasants. Please check in the url – http://singurland.blogspot.com to get the correct picture
If industrialisation means killing innocent women and children and a gross violation against humanity, then i guess singur is better off without it. How can india, a democracy allow such violation of justice? If you read the article on singur in statesman, perspective on 31st may, it seems that west bengal is under the rule of a autocrat like hitler. this is indeed shocking.
sorry, i mean nandigram, not singur
if you really want correct picture of Singur, untainted by the romance of peoples’ movement as potrayed by the Mamata Bannerjee’s and Anuradha Talwar and Medha Patkars of the world, then do log in and check out these 2 sites run by a group of progressive indians who are on the ground and in there. The url’s are
http;//singurland.blogspot.com and the other is – http://singursingur.blogspot.com. The truth is so different. The panchayat elections are a proof. The CPI(M) picked up all seats in Singur and Nandigram. The people’s mandate is out and its a slap on the face of Mamata and the fraud activists. Do have a look. Enlightening.
Its a shame for democracy! This horrible incident has shaken the world. People can’t believe that they are staying in free India. The first and foremost thing is to find the culprits and punish them to the highest extent or else another Nandigram will happen again! As top of the administration CM should resign. An unbisaed enquiry should be carried away and should finish sooner than later. I hope people of bengal react positively to this incident in the next elections to come!
It is a matter of shame that such of type of politicians like CPM leaders are still exists in this century . Such type of brutality we have seen in the middle age by Chengis Khan and Nadir Shah . I am astonished how such uncivilized and inhuman and brutal politician grown up in the 21st Century .
The existence of such type of brutal , inhuman and uncivilized politician is the shameful to whole mankind.
When CPM retook Nandigram, it was labeled illegal and violent by so called intellectuals. Where were they when thousands of CPM supporters where forced out of their villages into refugee camps for the last 11 months? Was that not illegal? Was that not violent?
What has land acquisition got to do with forcing people out of their hearth? Even after CM Buddhadeb Bhattacharya clearly stated that land will not be taken, why did they not allow the people and administration to return to Nandigram? Was that not a violation of the Constitution of India?
The Governor, Dr. Gandhi, had time to visit injured BPUC cadres and Mamata when she was fasting. Ironically, he did not have time to visit the tousands of CPM supporters living as refugees who had been forced out of their homes by TMC-BPUC-Jamiat-Maoist combine. He is clearly biased, and maybe on a secret payroll of some anti-communist entity. He, as governor, has lost his qualification to be the governor because he is clearly biased. He should be impeached.
As for industrialisation, I am all for it. Thousands of educated Bengalis have to go to Mumbai, Chennai and Bangalore to work because there are no auitable jobs in Kolkata. They are also the children of Bengal. The government must provide jobs to them. If they are only going to work for the farmers and ignore the educated class, the educated class will migrate to other states and contribute to the economies of other states and West Bengal will lag behind.
As for the “innocent” people killed in Nandigram, I would object to calling those people “innocent” who hurled bombs at the police and eventually got shot and died. Let us call a spade a spade.
Mamata is hell bent on destrying the economic progress of Bengal. She is trying to sacrifice the interests of the state just to re-surge her sinking political career.
This is from a man who was born and brought up in Bengal, but today has to live outside Bengal because Bengal cannot offer me a job suited to my qualifications. Thousands of people like me are suffering and we want to live in our own state and earn as much as people like us are earning on Mumbai or Bangalore. This can happen only if there is industrialisation.
I think what has happened in Nandigram is a terrible terrible shame. And what is even worse than the shameless crime of the CPM goons is the even more shameless cover-up by the supposedly sensitive West Bengal CM, Buddhadeb Dasgupta.
If civil society has to assert itself, it has to do so here and now. We don’t want more Gujarats, more Bhagalpurs, more Nandigrams in this country anymore. What we have is enough of a crying shame as it is.
I commend the citizens and intellectuals of Calcutta, who on both counts (Rizwanur’s and Nandigram’s) rose as one voice to speak out against these atrocities. Nandigram must be brought back to normalcy soon. The goons of CPM must be punished and severely dealt with. The courts must intevene and ask for the dismissal of the State government and Mr. Hypocritical Prakash Karat must understand that if he has any decency, he needs to stop behaving like any other typical politician (a la Modi for whom there is no love lost), stop worrying needlessly about the nuclear deal and behave like a human being first and foremost.
The policy on SEZs cannot come at the cost of the livelihood of the poor and the destitute of this nation. This kind of undemocratic behaviour, which sits very well with the communists in Bengal and elsewhere, smacks of a brute state of affairs that does credit to the military junta in Burma or North Korea rather than a nation state that’s supposed to be a modern, progressive one such as ours. This is a sickeningly familiar story for the people of this country who continue to live on the margins. And it cannot be allowed to continue this way forever.