Statement on Maoist attack on police camp in West Bengal

Statement on Maoist attack on police camp in West Bengal

We the undersigned would like to express our deep concern at the
ongoing conflict in the Jangalmahal area of West Bengal where forces
of the CPI (Maoist) and the Indian government have been confronting
each other for the past year.

The regular incidents of violence have resulted in the tragic loss of
too many lives already- both of combatants and innocent civilians-
and needs to come to an immediate end. The systematic annihilation of
opponents and the gross violations of human rights by both sides in
the conflict are a serious setback to the task of building a more just
and humane Indian society.

In this context the attack by the CPI (Maoist) cadre on the Silda
police camp in West Bengal on 15 February killing 24 policemen
represents a severe escalation of an already ugly situation in the
Jangalmahal area. Coming at a time when there are active attempts
being made by many sections of civil society to get the Indian
government to call off its proposed ‘Operation Green Hunt’ against the
Maoists this provocative act by the latter can only result in a
hardening of attitudes all around.

While there are many genuine grievances of the local population
against the West Bengal state government and the security forces
operating in the tribal areas of West Midnapore – including arbitrary
arrests and killings- none of them can be used to justify the latest
Maoist action. In fact the purely military methods adopted by the CPI
(Maoist) are inimical to the task of finding both short and long-term
political solutions to the long-standing problems of the local people.

Use of violence for political goals, however lofty, cannot mean
violation of fundamental principles of humanity and there are also
basic norms and conventions that need to be adhered to. Every such
killing and violation adds to the spiral of grief, trauma and revenge
that is already consuming our polity; and from which the common people
desperately need relief.

Monday’s attack on the Silda police camp also represents a
contradiction of the CPI (Maoist)’s own stated position, through media
interviews of its top most leaders, of the need for talks with the
government of India and the prevention of an ‘all out war’. The
massacre of police personnel also shows a lack of seriousness on the
part of the CPI (Maoist) about its own publicly stated demand that for
‘any kind of democratic work, the ban on the Party and Mass
Organizations have to be lifted’.

The Indian State too should immediately stop all its violations of
human rights in the Jangalmahal area, sincerely settle the problems of
the local people and not use the latest Maoist attack as an excuse to
go ahead with further intensification of the conflict.
We the undersigned sincerely hope for a quick and peaceful resolution
to the conflict, which is putting at grave risk the lives of a very
large number of innocent people trapped between the Maoists and the
Indian State.

Prof. A. Marx, Chennai
Bhaskar Vishwanathan, Chennai
Praful Bidwai, New Delhi
Dileep Simeon, New Delhi
Apoorvanand, New Delhi
Aditya Nigam, New Delhi
Nivedita Menon, New Delhi
Amit Sengupta, New Delhi
Satya Sivaraman, New Delhi

A budget for the urban rich, not farmers

A budget for the urban rich, not farmers

Praful Bidwai

March 8 2008

CONTRARY to media hype, Indian Finance Minister P Chidambaram's latest budget does not set a new direction. Nor does it address the huge imbalances in India's recent growth pattern. The decision to write off farmers' loans worth Rs60,000 crores is a belated acknowledgement of the grave agrarian crisis, which has driven 150,000 farmers to suicide in a decade. The write-off is welcome. But it's not enough.

Sounds uncharitable? Consider that the recent problem with the Indian economy hasn't been lack of growth. It's lack of equity — income inequalities, and sectoral and regional disparities. The United Progressive Alliance's last full budget was to correct this. It has failed to do so.

The much-touted Rs60,000-crore debt write-off has disarmed and confused the Bharatiya Janata Party. This is undoubtedly the largest such write-off. But it pales into insignificance beside the various exemptions, rebates, incentives and concessions provided to corporate taxpayers and rich individuals.

Last year, the government wrote off taxes and duties worth a colossal Rs2.79 lakh crores in this manner! This mind-boggling amount is more than four-and-a-half times the one-time relief for farmers, and equals one-half of all taxes collected. It includes Rs1.48 lakh crores in customs duty exemptions, Rs58,655 crores in corporate-tax concessions, and over Rs38,000 crores in income-tax exemptions.

Yet, there was no furore or accusation of scandal over this — a terrible comment on India's economic discourse!

Now, full waiver only applies to loans from commercial banks, regional rural banks and cooperatives by farmers owning two hectares (five acres) or less.

But half such farmers borrow from local moneylenders. Seventy-seven per cent of marginal farmers owning less than 0.01 ha depend on moneylenders. So a majority of farmers are excluded from Chidambaram's waiver.

Second, only the loans of farmers owning two ha or less are writen off. There's 25 per cent debt relief to bigger landholders provided they repay the remaining 75 per cent. But it's unrealistic, if not mean, to expect highly indebted farmers to repay that 75 per cent. They wouldn't have borrowed the money unless they were desperate in the first place.

Third, a large proportion of India's heavily indebted farmers cultivate unirrigated, low-quality land with small yields above the two ha ceiling. This is especially true, say, of the suicide belt of Vidarbha. A farmer owning five ha there is often distressed to the point of suicide. He/she stands to get virtually no relief.

A far better alternative would have been to write off loans in inverse proportion to holdings and yields — say, Rs30-50,000 for the poorest, Rs15-30,000 for the less poor, and a smaller sum for others.

This would also have taken some of the burden off the nationalised/cooperative banks, which are unlikely to be fully compensated for the write-off. It's in nobody's interest to weaken the public banks — unless the hidden agenda is to set them up for privatisation.

In contrast to his miserly approach to farmers stands Chidambaram's generosity to rich income tax-payers, only 25 to 30 million people. Their taxes have been slashed to a point where they are the lowest in Independent India and among the world's lowest.

A person earning Rs5 lakhs — thus belonging to the top two per cent — need pay no tax at all if s/he uses all available exemptions. And someone who earns Rs10 lakhs — and there are only three lakh such Indians, comprising one-hundredth of the population — will only pay a total tax of Rs 2.7 lakhs.

The tax regime has thus become even more regressive. To match this, Chidambaram has reduced taxes on cars, two-wheelers, air-conditioners, refrigerators, etc. This will encourage profligate consumption, and bloat GDP — thus creating a growth bubble, while adding to greenhouse emissions.

Chidambaram's failure is glaring in six areas to which the UPA's Common Minimum Programme gives priority: the public distribution system, National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, health, education, social security, and reduction of regional disparities.

Instead of substantially expanding the PDS, he has raised its allocation by a paltry 3.5 per cent.

Forgotten is the goal of universalising it. The NREGA's district-wise coverage has been doubled, but its allocation raised by just 14 per cent.

The budget's health outlay is 17 per cent higher than last year.

But an annual increase of 35 per cent is needed over several years to raise public health-spending from the present miserable 0.9 per cent of GDP to the three per cent target.

As for social security, Chidambaram has ignored the thoughtful recommendations of the parliamentary standing committee on unorganised sector workers to give rights and entitlements, not flimsy schemes to which they contribute a premium. He has merely repackaged existing schemes for health insurance and passed them off as new. The UPA had promised to invest substantially in backward areas and states, and take urgent measures to reduce regional and subregional disparities in infrastructure, agriculture, industry and social development, which are now acquiring explosive dimensions — as the growth of Naxalism shows. The budget betrays this promise.

However, the budget has raised military spending by 10 per cent at a time when the defence ministry is returning about Rs4,000 crores unspent year after year. Including pensions, the defence allocation now stands at Rs121,160 crores — compared to a mere Rs34,300 crores for education.

Like the big tax breaks for the rich, this does not speak of balance or healthy public priorities.

(Praful Bidwai is a senior Indian journalist, political activist and widely published commentator)

The Left: Rethink or Perish

http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/15731

By Praful Bidwai
Source: Tehelka.com

Praful Bidwai's ZSpace Page

The Indian Left survived, even extended its influence, in the aftermath of Soviet-style socialism collapse. Yet in one year it has undone this and seriously damaged its credibility as a force which speaks for the underprivileged, the excluded, and which upholds the values and practices of inclusive democracy.

The Indian Left has in a single year managed to do through its own actions what all its opponents could not accomplish over eight long decades: namely, damage its credibility as a force which speaks for the underprivileged, the excluded and the wretched of the Indian earth, and which upholds the values and practices of inclusive democracy. This is starkly evident in the two major states where it rules: West Bengal, and to a lesser extent, Kerala.

In West Bengal, 2007 witnessed forcible land acquisition for a car factory in Singur, two planned episodes of armed violence in Nandigram, starvation deaths among long-unemployed tea-garden workers in Jalpaiguri and dirt-poor Adivasis in Purulia and Bankura.

Besides, there were food riots in nine districts against corrupt ration shop-owners linked to the Communist Party of India (Marxist), Rizvanur Rehman’s mysterious death amidst a party-police-business nexus, and the expulsion of writer Taslima Nasreen in place of a principled defence of her fundamental rights to the freedom of belief and expression.

2007 was no ordinary year. It marked 30 continuous years of the Left Front’s rule in West Bengal—a tenure unmatched in India and probably in the world. Nowhere else have Communist parties been mandated in free and fair elections to rule a country or province the size of West Bengal (pop 80 million) for three decades. This is a tribute to the relevance of Left-wing politics.

In Kerala, the Left Democratic Front came to power with an impressive majority, but now faces a bleak prospect primarily because of serious in-fighting within the CPM, and pressure from party state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan to follow pro-rich neoliberal policies, which are alienating the vast majority of the people.

The stench of scandal hangs heavy in Kerala, with lottery scams, sweetheart deals with shady businessmen, and expropriation of Adivasis. In the next Lok Sabha elections, the LDF may well lose the bulk of the seats it holds.

Nationally, the Left parties, comprised of the CPM, Communist Party of India, Forward Bloc and Revolutionary Socialist Party, are set to shrink in their parliamentary representation, and more crucially, their moral and political influence. The CPM is likely to be worst affected.

This could reverse the one-and-a-half decades-long trend under which the Left survived the international collapse of Soviet-style socialism, retained much of its moral and intellectual capital, and in many cases, extended its influence—defying the tendency towards a decline of Left-wing politics and a of the Right in most parts of the world, barring Latin America.

Neither the Left, nor the CPM in particular, has a strategy to resolve the ideological, political, and organisational crisis it faces. The plain truth is the Indian Left is less and less able to articulate a vision of social emancipation and present alternatives to corporate-led globalisation with all its enormous economic imbalances and social distortions. The Left must rethink—or perish.

The Left’s achievements must not be underrated. The greatest include land reform, an unblemished record of communal harmony and peace, stable, relatively clean governance, panchayati raj institutions, and above all, politicisation and empowerment of the masses. No other political current can claim to be such a principled upholder of democratic traditions and values. If the Left didn't exist in India, we would have to invent it!

In West Bengal, Operation Barga gave 2.3 million cultivators tenancy rights, and accounts for more than one-half of the total acreage transferred under Indian land reform. The state also witnessed a 210 percent increase in literacy and a halving of infant mortality. Urban poverty ratio declined to 14.8 percent, well below the national average (25.7 percent).

However, the Front’s record in some other respects is poor, as the official “Human Development Report” (2004) admits. Public spending and access to health services have stagnated. Some indicators—immunisation, antenatal care, nutrition among women, and number of doctors and hospital beds per lakh people—are below the national average. West Bengal has not opened a single new primary health centre in a decade.

Rural poverty decreased between 1983 and 1993-94 at an annual rate of 2.24 percentage-points. But the decline has slowed down to 1.15 points annually. To compound matters, W. Bengal has the lowest rate of generating work under the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act—a mere 14 person-days per poor family, against the national average of 43, in place of the promised 100 days a year.

Worse still, according to National Sample Survey (61st Round), “the percentage of rural households not getting enough food every day in some months of the year” is highest in West Bengal (10.6 percent), worse than in Orissa (4.8).

An alarming indicator is the number of school dropouts in the 6-14 age group. At 9.61 lakhs in West Bengal, this figures is even higher than in Bihar (6.96 lakhs). Of India’s 24 districts which have more than 50,000 out-of-school children, 9 are in West Bengal.

Yet another dark spot is the Front’s failure of inclusion in respect of the religious minorities. Muslims form 25.2 percent of the state’s population. But their proportion in government employment is an abysmal 2.1 percent, even lower than Gujarat’s 5.4. This represents, sadly, the downside of the LF’s record of protecting the minorities against communal violence.

Clearly, West Bengal has a long way to go before it can become a model. Regrettably, its leadership’s priorities have shifted towards elitism. It now obsessively promotes industrialisation at any cost, at the expense of peasants and workers. It has set its mind upon neoliberal projects like the Singur car factory and Special Economic Zones.

The results of the neoliberal orientation were evident in Nandigram in March and again in the first half of November, when the CPM forcibly "captured" two blocks, over which it had lost control.

The bulk of Nandigram’s people—including many CPM supporters—got disenchanted with the party because it tried to impose an SEZ on them, earmarked for Indonesia’s Salim group—a front for Gen Suharto’s super-corrupt family.

The SEZ plan was tentatively abandoned under popular resistance, led (but not exclusively) by the Bhumi Ucched Pratirodh Committee. But the CPM started a campaign of intimidation of ordinary people, turning thousands into refugees, and resulting on March 14 in a murderous attack on villages, accompanied by arson, loot and rape.

The attempt failed. CPM-BUPC clashes continued in recent months, and pressure grew to call in the Central Reserve Police Force. To pre-empt the CRPF’s intervention, CPM cadres launched their second bid to “capture” Nandigram, turning it into a “war zone”. The rest is history.

Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee presents the violence as a spontaneous clash between two organisations, in which the BUPC was “paid back in the same coin”. In reality, this was a clear case of abuse of the state police, and its subordination to the CPM. The CPM treated its political adversaries as another country’s enemy population.

This does not argue that the BUPC does not have goons in its ranksIt certainly does. But their power could not have matched the clout of armed CPM cadres backed by the state.

Nandigram-II was a grievous blunder, which betrayed the Front’s own core-constituency. No argument about “provocation” by the opposition, or a “conspiracy” between the Right and the Extreme Left, can justify the gunning down of innocent peasants.

Unfortunately, the CPM’s leadership has learnt few lessons from Nandigram. It remains obsessed with GDP-ism and boasts that W Bengal has the highest growth (8.55 percent) of all states. It has ruled out any rethinking on neoliberal policies. Even CPM general secretary Prakash Karat says: “we have to adopt industrialisation….we have to compromise. Industrialisation cannot be achieved without the help of capitalists like the Tatas.”

This approach is creating a rift, for the first time ever, within the LF and threatens to weaken its greatest collective strength: unity. The approach could eventually turn the Left into an elitist, Social Democratic entity favoured by the rich and middle classes. That cannot be the future of the Left as a viable and relevant plebeian force.

The CPM must decide whether it should fight for radical social change, or merely manage capitalism Chinese-style, however honestly. If it chooses the second option, it will go into historic decline. It must also make a decisive break with the undemocratic organisational culture it has inherited, which punishes dissidence and encourages a “my-party-right-or-wrong” attitude. Unless the Left undertakes ruthless self-criticism, it can’t effect course correction.

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What’s wrong with the CPM?

Hardnews

http://www.hardnewsmedia.com/portal/2007/12/1857

Left Front allies should withdraw from the council of ministers in West Bengal. Such a drastic step alone can trigger serious rethinking within the CPM

Praful Bidwai Delhi

As West Bengal's Left Front leaders continue to attract unprecedented flak and get politically mauled for the Nandigram crisis and their terrible handling of it, they would do well to recall what veteran communist BT Ranadive used to say about communist parties: “There is nothing more dangerously self-destructive than a communist party which has lost its way, which is on a wrong political course.”

Ranadive should have known. Just after Independence, he declared “yeh azaadi jhooti hai” (this freedom is false), and led the undivided CPI into the Telengana armed struggle, which it had to withdraw — at an enormous political expense and after a lot of bloodshed.

However, for all the mistakes he made, Ranadive was acutely aware, like all able political leaders, of the limitations of his/her own politics — in the CPI's case, ideological rigidity and organisational inflexibility, and a culture which stifles free debate. Together, these make an honest review of party strategies and their rectification extremely difficult.

This limitation has again become starkly obvious in the case of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM) in West Bengal after the carnage in Nandigram in the first half of November. Although today's CPM is politically a different animal from the undivided CPI of the 1940s — and has accepted, and genuinely internalised, the need to work within a democratic framework — it organisationally retains continuity with the old bureaucratic culture and is uncomfortable with free, open debate (as, of course, are Right-wing and Centrist parties too).

The CPM carries two additional burdens. First, in West Bengal, it is pursuing a neo-liberal economic policy course and squandering away the gains it made from the 'Operation Barga' land reform programme of the 1970s and 1980s and other progressive programmes. The Left Front government, which the CPM leads in West Bengal, is increasingly unable to create a model of inclusive, egalitarian democracy and participatory growth. Rather, its policies are becoming predatory upon the underprivileged. The Nandigram and Singur crises are examples of this.

The CPM's second burden is the cult of 'cadre power', which obsessively seeks to establish the party's unquestioned supremacy in every area it dominates. So powerful is this cult, especially in West Bengal, that the leadership unthinkingly caves in to it. After all, the CPM was built in Bengal by its dedicated cadres from scratch during the 1960s and 1970s, when it had to face the Congress, which relied on muscle power and the repressive State apparatus to deal with its opponents.

The CPM too absorbed that muscle power culture (as did the Trinamool Congress). That culture has now become a huge liability. In Nandigram, this came into play twice: in March, and again, in November this year. To put it simply, the Nandigram crisis was precipitated when the CPM decided to forcibly 'capture' two of the area's three blocks, over which it had lost control earlier this year.

The bulk of Nandigram's people — including many CPM supporters — got disenchanted with the party because it tried to impose a Special Economic Zone on them. The 25,000-acre SEZ was to be created by acquiring land for a 'chemical hub' for Indonesia's Salem group — a front for the super-corrupt family of dictator and kleptocrat General Suharto.

The SEZ plan was tentatively abandoned under popular resistance, led (but not exclusively) by the Bhumi Ucched Pratirodh Committee (BUPC), formed by the Trianmool Congress and Socialist Unity Centre of India (SUCI), among others. But the CPM just couldn't accept, indeed, even imagine, that it would not be the people's sole representative or lose some of its influence in Nandigram. To regain control over the area and all its economic transactions, CPM cadres started a campaign of intimidation and harassment of ordinary people, turning thousands into refugees.

On March 14, 2007, with police collaboration, armed cadres mounted a murderous attack on several villages, accompanied by arson, loot and rape. Numerous independent inquiries by citizens' groups established that pro-CPM thugs led the punitive expedition. The violence was planned. As was the cover-up that followed, including failure to examine allegations of rape and doctoring of the medical records of many victims.

A People's Tribunal, consisting of retired High Court Chief Justice SN Bhargava, veteran editor Prabhash Joshi, and reputed social activists, documented the relevant events, based on 39 oral and 135 written depositions by the victims. Its conclusions are chilling. They show close police-CPM collusion in intimidating, beating and killing people. The motive was to 'teach' SEZ opponents 'a lesson' and re-establish the party's supremacy in village after village.

The March 14 attempt failed. But CPM-BUPC clashes continued in recent months, and pressure grew to call in the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF). To pre-empt the CRPF's intervention, CPM cadres launched their second bid to 'capture' Nandigram. This turned Nandigram into what Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi called a “war zone”.

On November 1, say credible reports, state CPM bosses, including Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya and party secretary Biman Bose, decided that they would ask party cadres to launch a major offensive to capture the area, using brute force, while withdrawing the police. Accordingly, senior local-level cadres met that night in Khejuri, a CPM stronghold next to Nandigram, and drew up a detailed plan to attack 13 villages. The attackers, well-trained in the use of firearms, were mobilised from four different districts.

A multi-pronged offensive was launched on November 5-8 after ensuring the police would be absent. A second wave of November 10 pushed BUPC supporters from Maheshpur into Khejuri, taking 600 of them 'prisoners'. The final assault began the next day, using the prisoners as a 'human shield'. Within hours, the entire area was 'liberated'.

The CPM leadership, especially Buddhadeb Bhattacharya, has presented the violence as a spontaneous clash between two organisations, in which the BUPC was “paid back in the same coin”. In reality, this was a clear case of partisan abuse of the State machinery, and its subordination to the CPM-in complete violation of all democratic norms. There could be no weightier instance of the State's abdication of its fundamental responsibility to protect the life and limb of all its citizens.

The CPM-led government treated political adversaries as another country's enemy population and allowed party cadres to wage war against them using firearms. Besides, the charge ignores the fact that ordinary people unaffiliated to the BUPC had also turned against the CPM and were victimised by it through coercion.

This does not mean that the BUPC does not have goons and musclemen in its ranks. It certainly does. But their power could not have possibly matched the clout of well-entrenched CPM’s armed cadres who control the State machinery.

The CPM claims that Maoists had penetrated the area and were in league with the BUPC — a charge for which the police and the state home secretary (even the CRPF, as reports prove) find no hard evidence, and which is reminiscent of the US allegations about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Even assuming the charge is true, that can't justify a military-style attack on ordinary people, hostage-taking and vengeful violence, including rape, loot and arson. Even less does it justify the use of people as 'prisoners' and 'human shield' while attacking unarmed farmers and other working people.

At any rate, the growing spread of Naxalism, especially in the tribal districts of West Bengal, which are some distance away from Nandigram, is itself related to the neo-liberal policies that the CPM-led government is pursuing, with increasing deprivation and poverty in the poorest districts of the state.

Nandigram has eroded the CPM's moral authority, political capital and its ability to influence the UPA. It exposes the deep rot that has set in its West Bengal unit in the form of criminalisation, corruption, obsession with pro-rich neo-liberal policies, and arrogant contempt towards its own allies — the CPI, Forward Bloc and Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP). They now say the CPM alone bears “responsibility” for the “killings and violence” and for ignoring their pleas for reconciliation.

This dire warning to the CPM will become more effective if these parties remain in the Left Front, but withdraw from the council of ministers. Such a drastic step alone can trigger serious rethinking within the CPM on its policies, organisational methods, and relations with the rest of the Left.

Without such rethinking, the CPM is unlikely to reform itself and the Left Front retain its base. A special responsibility devolves on Left-leaning intellectuals, especially those belonging to the CPM. They must boldly point out the party's mistakes and demand urgent course correction.

Such correction must include a solemn commitment that no SEZ or chemical hub will be built at Nandigram, and a sincere effort would be launched at reconciliation and peace, with a guarantee that the thousands of displaced people can return home safe without recrimination or harassment. A radical reorientation of economic policy must follow.

In the absence of course correction, the CPM - which represents a progressive force that has made a positive contribution to Indian democracy — will suffer a terrible decline and degenerate into a status-quoist conservative party, which has lost its way, in keeping with Ranadive's dire warning. That does not bode well for Indian democracy. The Left is among the few currents in our politics fired by idealism and a commitment to principle, and a strongly pro-poor orientation. We cannot afford to lose this asset.

Praful Bidwai's article in the 'Dainik Statesman'

W BENGAL ON THE WRONG TRACK? THE SINGUR SYNDROME

http://www.mail-archive.com/sacw@insaf.net/msg00536.html
W BENGAL ON THE WRONG TRACK? THE SINGUR SYNDROME
Praful Bidwai
[From the South Asia Citizen’s Web; 25 December 2006]

As Ms Mamata Banerjee’s fast against the Singur project in West Bengal moves into its third week, and as the deadline for handing over land to the Tatas approaches, the conflict over the proposed car factory is coming to a head. One can only hope that a just solution is soon reached on acquiring land in Singur village. By the time these lines appear, a compromise may well have been reached. It is of the utmost importance that this be a sustainable and comprehensive settlement which includes the rehabilitation of all those who will be displaced.What happens in Singur will create a benchmark for all future industrial products in West Bengal, including export-oriented special economic zones (SEZs). Singur has become a new paradigm of development, and a test case for the ruling Left Front’s economic policies and its relations with the United Progressive Alliance. It’s not difficult to understand why Singur has become so controversial. At stake are 997 acres of land, and the livelihoods of 12,000 landowners and share-croppers. Given that the village is barely 45 km away from Kolkata, just off the Durgapur Expressway, the landowners know their land is valuable. At least 30 percent (according to one report, 68 percent) of it is multi-cropped. Some want higher compensation for it than the government has offered (basic rate, Rs 6 to 8.9 lakhs).Both the political Right and the Far Left have jumped into the fray by focusing on their discontent. The Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Left Front’s leading component, claims the landowners had written in their consent to sell 954 of the 997 acres of land. It also says it has rehabilitation and employment plans for the local population. It denies that the police used brute force against peaceful demonstrators. Most controversially, Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee dismisses all protesters as “forces opposed to Bengal’s growth”.However, according to the “status report” on Singur published by the government (see The Times of India, Dec 16), prior consent for land purchase was obtained only for 586 acres - and that too on the day the government started fencing off land. It had no consent for acquiring the rest (411 acres). It clamped Sec 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code, banning the assembly of five or more persons, and imposed the Land Acquisition Act, 1894 (LAA)-a colonial law whose application the Left parties rightly oppose in many states! The LAA permits forcible land acquisition for “public purpose”, but the Tata Motors factory fulfils no public purpose, as distinct from purely commercial objectives. It passes comprehension why the government agreed to procure a large contiguous plot on the Tatas’ behalf, rather than ask them to buy it themselves. In respect of SEZs in other states, the Left parties oppose such mediation by governments,. as well as the acquisition of multi-cropped land.There’s a problem about land value too. The government claims it’s paying Singur’s landowners more than the going market rate. But it’s known that less than half the market price is registered in land deeds. Extrapolating from recent purchases (e.g. at Dankuni, about 25 km from Kolkata), land in Singur could be worth about Rs 30 lakhs/acre. Matters are even more complicated because the bulk of Singur’s land belongs to absentee landowners, and is actually cultivated by share-croppers (Bargadars). The cultivators will get just 25 percent of the land value even if they’re registered under the land reform programme known as “Operation Barga”. If they aren’t, as is bound to happen with any large-scale programme, they will get no compensation. Their number is significant-estimated at 250.Even if they’re brought into the net, the compensation payable would still be meagre –only one-quarter of the land value. As for the 1,000 or so landless agricultural workers and other providers of village services like blacksmiths, mechanics and barbers, the less said the better. They will get wiped out without any compensation. This land transaction model will have a profoundly negative effect on West Bengal’s agrarian situation. “Operation Barga” not only registered share-croppers, it also reduced the landlord’s share in the harvest to one-quarter or one-third of the total. At Singur, that ratio will be reversed - a sign of what may be called counter-reform. The Left Front will have turned its back on the biggest and most successful land reform it executed in Bengal in its three decades in power.The West Bengal police used force against peaceful demonstrators, injuring at least four, and slapped serious charges upon them, including attempt to murder. This aggravates the state’s culpability. As does its bypassing of the village panchayat - in violation of Article 74 of the Constitution. One can and should criticise Ms Banerjee for her Right-wing politics, coercive tactics and opportunism. But that doesn’t exonerate the Front. This is doubly tragic. First, the Left should know that the land issue is at the cutting edge of today’s class struggles, which pit the poor against predatory commercial interests. Second, the Left had the responsibility-and a unique opportunity-to create a worthy model of consensual and humane land acquisition and full rehabilitation in Singur. This would have allowed the Left Front to redeem its indifferent record of rehabilitation in West Bengal. A recent study finds that the state has rehabilitated a measly 9 percent of the people displaced by the Damodar Valley project and other World Bank-funded schemes since the 1950s. This is a far lower proportion than Andhra’s 28 percent, Orissa’s 33 and Goa’s 34.Once instituted, the Singur Paradigm will be applied to a much larger area, over 40,000 acres, to be acquired near Kolkata for a host of other industrial projects, including SEZs and industrial parks, of the kind the Left parties oppose elsewhere. The Left Front government has received requests for a total of 125,000 acres from 20 Indian and two foreign companies. Among the latter is the favoured Selim group from Indonesia, known to be a front for the super-corrupt Suharto family which has looted national wealth. Singur’s significance or impact doesn’t end there. Singur is a concentrated expression of the pattern of industrialisation and development that the Left Front has embraced in Bengal. This pattern is led or dominated by private capital, and is weak on social development. The Front government seems desperate to attract private corporate investment, including foreign investment, at any cost, and irrespective of whether it generates employment, skills and other spin-offs, and contributes to public welfare.This means the Front is adopting the neoliberal model in which the corporate investor calls the shots and sets the market rules, leaving elected governments and other publicly accountable institutions helpless in directing investment into the most desirable areas to maximise public welfare. The Left Front vocally – and rightly - opposes neoliberal and corporate-led pro-globalisation policies at the national level.Of all Indian parties, the Left alone has a coherent critique of such policies, which are creating havoc through their vicious dualism, contribution to widening disparities, andcallousness towards the poor. If the Left follows a contradictory approach in the states where it rules, it will attract the charge that it practises double standards. This will damage its credibility, and also weaken its ability to act as a pressure-group on the UPA in favour of progressive policies. This pressure-group role is the central reason why the Left supports the UPA government from the outside. It would be tragic if this function were to get undermined.India’s Left parties, which today enjoy their highest-ever representation in Parliament, and which rule in three states, command a level of credibility and respect far in excess of their membership or direct political influence. At the present juncture, they are better placed than ever before to develop an alternative model of development and industrialisation which is not predatory on people’s livelihoods and does not squeeze the peasantry to fund the creation of factories and services.By persisting with the Singur model, the Left stands to lose in yet another way. Over the past decade or so, a healthy coalition has emerged between the organised Left, and civil society groups, grassroots people’s movements, and the radical intelligentsia Singur has created a serious rift within this coalition. Unless this is healed, it will weaken all its components and reduce their effectiveness. The Left Front must not sit on prestige on Singur, as Mr Bhattacharjee would like it to do. It must radically rethink and revise the Singur land acquisition plan even if that means the Tatas carry out their threat to relocate the project if land is not handed over to them by the year’s end. Far too much is at stake for the owners of a car factory to be allowed to dictate terms to the Left.