[Reader-list] Answer to an attempted blackmail

[moinak biswas]

some of us thought of writing this up.
moinak

Why Didn't You Shed Tears for Eleven Months?


  - Why don't you say if you find what happened in Nandigram between  
November 5 and 11 condemnable or not? What is made conditional here?  
The protest, the grief, or both? If protesting against an act of  
atrocity is to be made conditional how is your argument different  
from the Hindutva leaders in Gujarat who kept on asking us why we  
didn't protest against the Godhra incident? Why don't you just say  
you support an action where party cadres and hired goons are  
gathered,  are provided with arms and ammunition, the police is asked  
not to make a move, the CRPF is blocked on its way, the state ensures  
your protection, and you go on a rampage inside Nandigram. After all,  
you do not mean if someone grieved over the incidents of the 'eleven  
months' and also protested against your murderous assault you would  
offer him/her a state reward.

  - You say the protesters never shed tears for the unfortunate 1500  
or 2000 or now 3000/3500 or nobody knows how many. How should one  
know, if you do not allow anyone save the blessed ones to enter the  
area marked 'protected zone'? Not even the media unless they pass the  
'friendly' test?

  - Granted, numbers don't matter here. No question people suffered.  
As a matter of fact, they were made to suffer. Hence the all- 
important question: why did the administration let them suffer? Would  
it be far-fetched to suppose that it normally counts among the usual  
duties of a responsible government that people under its  
jurisdiction, when in difficulty, need to be looked after? We pay  
taxes and elect our government so that in the event of such human  
plight, caused politically or otherwise, our fellow citizens are  
taken proper care of by the administration, regardless of political  
affiliations. It would take only a tiny percentage of the money the  
party earns from 'friendly' donations, or of the Chief Minister's  
Relief Fund, to arrange proper accommodation and food for the CPI (M)  
sympathizers ousted from Nandigram. For what reason was this never  
done? Is it wrong to say that the reason became clear after November 5?

  - How come the Khejuri camp managed to rain bullets almost every  
night on Nandigram since March? Even if these were retaliatory or  
self-defensive, where did the hapless villagers get such ammunition?  
 From the Maoists? Mr. Biman Bose made a public statement pointing  
out the necessity of throwing back something more effective than  
rasgullas from the Khejuri side in retaliation. None of us supported  
the continuing exchange of fire across the Talpati canal. The  
question is: who fought from the Khejuri side? The government? The  
comrades-in-arms of the Marxist revolutionaries caught by the CBI in  
the Janani brick kiln immediately after March 14? Or the 'assets of  
the party' from various time-tested encounters like Garbeta?

  - Your complaint: the opposition didn't allow the administration to  
function for eleven months. Assuming that our administration is too  
gentle to offend anybody's tender feelings, especially that of the  
parties and forces of the opposition, and conceding respect for the  
sensibilities of a responsive government, the question remains since  
when the government decided to depend on the permission of the  
opposition to follow the rule books under which any government  
administration normally runs.


-         Your possible answer to this last observation: the  
administration did try to intervene and restore normalcy on 14th  
March and that resulted in those unfortunate matching figures - 14  
dead, and many injured. Hence no police action. Sounds pretty  
invincible as an argument to believers. The non-believers' response  
might be slightly different: When was the equation between  
administrative intervention and cynically planned police action  
really finalized? The 14th March action seems cynically planned for  
two reasons: One, there was no immediate cause that necessitated the  
action on that particular date. The Khejuri relief camps were more  
than a couple of months old by that date. Two, the workers in league  
with a particular political party placed themselves curiously close  
to the police force in action on14th March, often exchanging clothes  
and shoes, as the reports go.

  - This takes us back to 3rd January and the Khejuri episode. A  
supposedly unauthorized notification was issued announcing land  
acquisition for purposes of industrial development in the form of  
something called a chemical hub. Nobody apparently was clear about  
the nature of the hub, nor did the government ever care to clarify  
it. There is no clear answer till date if it was any clearer even to  
the government. This notification by a leading light of the Haldia  
Development Authority led to trouble and violent clashes - all  
amongst people who were supporters of the left.  The notice was said  
to be withdrawn with alacrity. The Chief Minister announced with his  
usual aplomb that the notice may be torn up and thrown away. He  
should know that simple tearing and throwing would not invalidate the  
notice, if it was ever valid at all. The notice needed to be  
withdrawn, which can be done only through the issuance of another  
notice cancelling the earlier one. It  is not known if that has ever  
been done. Was the still-born notice being tried as a test case in  
January? That was allegedly the beginning of those eleven months.

-
  -  People said to be displaced from their homes, threatened with  
armed attacks and forced to leave their normal area of living,  
sheltered in relief camps by sympathetic individuals or self-help  
groups or political parties or even a responsive local administration  
would certainly make sense and deserve our admiration. The number of  
the displaced persons or their living conditions in the camps should  
normally be a matter of factual description and to that extent an  
empirical entity. But that was not to be. Those 'eleven months' was  
to be soon shaped into a logical category to be used as the major  
premise of an Aristotelian syllogism of the following kind:

  A. Given the human tragedy during those eleven months
  B. Tears needed to be shed for the suffering humanity but were not.
  C. Tears now being shed when the displaced of the eleven months  
make arrangements for their own rehabilitation.
  D. Conclusion: These tears then are malicious and politically suspect.

  A fine piece of deductive argument. One basic principle of a sound  
logical deduction is that it must not be productive. This is to say  
that the content of the conclusion must entirely be contained in the  
premise. It must not contain anything that is not there in the  
premise itself. This brings us to those eleven months. Another  
principle of deduction says that the conclusion cannot be true (mind  
not valid) unless the premise is true. A relevant question is: how  
true is the premise? To break it up into sub-questions:


How many people were locked up in the Khejuri camps? Who locked them  
up there? Who looked after them?  Was there any attempt on the part  
of the inmates to flee the camps? What was the relation between the  
inmates and their local guardians?
Did any guard need to be posted to see to it that no one may escape?  
Did the inmates collectively urge upon the guardians to make  
arrangements for their safe return home on a particular auspicious  
date? Or the arrangements were made by the guardians themselves, and  
the inmates merely nodded their heads when they learnt about the plan?



Sorry to answer you with so many questions. We simply wanted to ask  
why don’t you shed tears ever?






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