Nandigram is a blot to West Bengal’s new image as an investor–savvy state. The CPI(M) is accused of unleashing a huge cadre-force to grab land from poor peasants. Intellectuals in Kolkata have taken to the streets to protest what they term as CPI(M) brutality.

Buddhadev Bhattacharya, the CM of West Bengal wants to industrialize Bengal, fast.WestBengal is a Marxist state in a capitalist country. Larger welfare of the people demands that capitalist avenues be opened up if the state is to grow. Dr. (Prof) Sunil Baran Mandal, a long time Party member and a powerful ideologue cum Branch Secretary explained to me the untold story of Nandigram. You can hear him here.

His main points are:

Nandigram should not be compared to other national or state level land acquisition projects. The Nandigram peasants did not want to give up their lands for the original land-deeds are in the name of long dead Pre-Independence Zamindars (feudal land owners). The present day peasants there had once upon a time themselves grabbed whatever land they could. The famous Leftists land-reform never happened at Nandigram. The landowners there fear they will miss out on land-transfer payments.

Work stops at Nandigram. Trinamool Congress workers entered the area. Sidiquallah Chowdhury, a former Congress worker, plays the communal card. CPIM workers are mercilessly hounded out of Nandigram and the adjoining villages. Their houses burnt, women raped and children beaten up. No mainstream media reported this.

Eleven months later homeless CPIM workers return. They are stopped by heavily armed Maoists who have entered from neighbouring Orissa and Jharkhand. The Maoists unleash a reign of terror. They start butchering peaceful CPIM cadres much in the same way they do routinely in backward Purulia. The CPIM has to now defend its own. There is no other way. Nandigram was never cut off from the world by CPIM. It was cut off by the Maoists. When the cadres enter the region to save their party-members, the opposition egged by the Maoists sent out frantic but false distress calls to the world. They say the CPIM has isolated and cornered them. The country chooses not to remember the martyrs of the CPI(M) there.

The CRPF is there. One jawan on condition of anonymity said that everything is fine but for the Maoists. They are living amongst the villagers there. The Maoists are chameleons, this jawan points out.

Some questions remain:

a) Why are Maoists so interested in West Bengal? Is it possible that the Maoists want to de-track and delay the industrialization of Bengal? Singur farmers, who had protested land acquisition for the Tatas, are now happy with the cash-compensation. The Jindal group has purchased land in impoverished Shalboni. The farmers there have thanked the company. Why this different attitude at Nandigram? How do the Maoists gain by keeping Bengal agricultural? Are they working for some other
state?

b) Was there an Intelligence failure at Nandigram? The Maoist menace should have been tackled much earlier. Is it possible that the Government acted too hastily without trying to sensitize peasants first about the need to industrialize?

c) Why is Medha Patekar so bothered about Nandigram? One needs to remember that more than 500 farmer have committed suicide in Gujarat. She never bothered to go there but comes running here. Her behaviour is more that of a celebrity’s than of a social-worker’s, a villager, Panna Maal, points out.

The prevailing view is clichéd and needs no repeating. Nandigram has lost its opportunity at development for some time to come.
L K Advani has urged the people of Nandigram to carry on with their
farming and forget this incident. Buddhadev has countered by saying
that when the people there come to their senses, it will be too late…
Only time will tell.