[Reader-list] Nandigram-Time for an Alternative Left in Bengal-Aditya Nigam

[Tapas Ray]

Dear Shuddha and others,

Let me begin by noting that I have not had an opportunity to visit
Nandigram and my observations are based on media reports.

The impression I have gathered from these reports is that a very large
number of people from both sides of the divide - CPI(M) and BUPC - had
been homeless for several months until the latest "liberation". I
think no one will disagree that all of them needed to go back home.
But to be successful, and meaningful in the long run, this process had
to be one of reconciliation. The March 14 carnage showed that
occupation is what the ruling party had in mind, not reconciliation.
At least that is the impression I have gathered.

One shudders to think what would have happened in South Africa if the
ANC had decided to take a Nandigram-like approach after the end of
Apartheid. This is not to trivialise the anti-apartheid struggle, nor
to suggest that the CPI(M) in nandigram suffered at the hands of BUPC
as much as black Africans did under the apartheid regime. My intention
is only to point out that even after suffering so much, South Africa's
blacks had not gone on the rampage after their liberation from
apartheid rule.

To return to Nandigram - even after the March 14 massacre, things
probably could have been mended substantially if relief,
rehabilitation and justice had been provided to the victims. But,
according to the EPW article cited recently, these were in short
supply. By the way, one wonders why the only action that one hears
being talked about with regard to police officials responsible for the
death of 14 people, as well as arson and rape on March 14, is their
transfer from one place to another. (And even that, apparently, has
not been completed eight months after the massacre.)

All this seems to show that the government and the ruling party had no
intention of healing wounds, and now the violent "liberation" of
Nandigram cannot but drive the wedge even deeper.

So what is their intention - not just in Nandigram but also in the
state as a whole? The answer that suggests itself is that their goal
is complete control, in raw physical terms.

It may be that raw coercive power, the threat or actual use of
violence, never lies too far below the "battle of ideas" in politics,
even democratic politics. But I think the point is to keep it buried,
so that people can exist in a way that is qualitatively different from
the medieval and the barbaric. I think we really need to get back to
talking instead of killing in West Bengal, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, or
what have you. This may sound inane, as it's being said all the time,
but it needs to be repeated over and over again, with the hope that
those who matter will one day listen.

Tapas



On 12/11/2007, Shuddhabrata Sengupta <shuddha at sarai.net> wrote:
>
>
> Dear All,
>
> The sad reality of CPI(M) style thuggery in West Bengal has attracted
> some attention on this list over the past few months. The news from
> Nandigram, as recent posts from Peter Griffin, Tapas Ray and others has
> shown continues to be disturbing. I am enclosing below, a text by Aditya
> Nigam that was recently posted on www.kafila.org that many on this list
> may find of interest.
>
> best
>
> Shuddha
> ----------------------------
>
> Time for Alternative Left Platform in W Bengal
> Aditya Nigam
>
> The CPM mask is off. Beneath it you can see the face of the totalitarian
> face of the Biman Boses, Benoy Konars and Brinda Karats. Much more is to
> come in coming days but one thing seems to be becoming clearer with each
> passing day: it will be wrong now on, to count the CPM as a Left wing
> force (at least in West Bengal). Unless we are able to shed this
> misleading idea, we are likely to misread the situation in the state
> completely.