Singur volte-face just a comma
The party of "historic blunders", CPI(M), has seen many phases during its history. It has always been full of Machiavellian curvature, to use political parlance. The latest sample came from none other than its general secretary Prakash Karat when he stated that West Bengal needed industrialisation.

If that were so, why did his party drive most of the established industry out of the State by organising intimidating strikes, bandhs, gheraoes and similar demonstrations. Not long back, Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee used to proudly proclaim that the word gherao was his party's contribution to the English dictionary. What he forgets is that just after Partition, Bengal was the fourth most industrialised State of India.

A belated realisation of the urgent need for pro-reform policies dawning on Buddhadeb proves how driving industries out was a high cost political blunder committed by his party down the ages. Till a few months back, Karat was a hardliner and used to warn Buddhadeb against trying to create a climate for fresh industrialisation.

But Karat's recent writing reflects a change in his attitude too. In an editorial in the party's Bengali mouthpiece Ganaskakti, he has sent a strong message to the anti-reform lobby within the party and has warned Left Front partners that for political survival, they must understand the capitalist economy's original characteristics for development. "Those who don't believe in the need to change strategies are deceiving themselves," he says.

Karat's volte-face comes in the wake of intensified party quarrel over the agricultural land acquisition issue.

Till recently, the CPI(M) was giving other parties lessons on SEZ and land acquisition methods, citing the Bengal model. And what was that model? The State Government had procured 998 acres from peasants in Singur village, 45 km from Kolkata to give it to the Tatas for a small car factory. The forcible acquisition caused agony to affected farmers. Thirty per cent of the acquired land is highly fertile and of more than one crop variety. The other 70 per cent is no less productive.

The Bengal Government offered compensation to farmers at Rs 8 lakh an acre though the market rate is six times more. Another problem lies in the fact that a lot of land is cultivated under the bataidari (share cropper) system. Most farmers do not have proper ownership documents and, thus, have been left in the lurch. In short, the Left violated its own norms. In contrast, Gujarat is a leading example in SEZ creation where Modi's Government has not acquired land. It has been left to entrepreneurs to purchase the land directly at the price settled between buyer and the seller.

An internal rift has erupted in the CPI(M) over land acquisition in Nandigram and Singur. Karat has warned his partymen, the Left Front partners and social activists like Medha Patkar against raising a banner of dissent on this issue. He has compared their stand with that of pre-Bolshevik revolutionaries and Narodeniks (who finally lost people's trust as they became terrorists and gave up their revolutionary moorings), who believed in uprooting Czars, but backed the thesis of village and agriculture-based economy.

The Narodeniks considered industrialisation a retrograde development. Karat hinted that the anti-reform lobby within the party was not only behaving like Narodeniks, but also becoming a tool in the hands of big media and "misguided pro-Left social activists like Medha Patkar."

"It is a matter of regret that people like Patkar are actually helping anti-Marxist political parties like the Trinamool, BJP and the Congress," Karat said.

One can recall that the Marxist hypocrisy, moreover, is crystal clear. In June 2003, the central committee of the party denounced non-Left State Governments for allegedly "giving away thousands of hectares either on sale or on lease at throw-away prices to MNCs and domestic monopolists", and now one can compare it with the Ganashakti editorial which contrasts their earlier stand.

During the 60s and 70s Marxist Trade Unions' most popular chant was "Tata, Birla murdabad" and it continued for over two decades. Today, Bengal comrades are unfolding the red carpet to the same Tatas. Communists have had a history of committing blunders ever since the Independence movement when, during the World War II in 1942, they sided with the British as Soviet Union was friendly with UK. In the process, they stabbed the interest of their own country. But for the socialistic addiction, India would have attained better economic growth than even China.

Courtesy: www.dailypioneer.com, February 04, 2007