24th February, 2012
KOLKATA: A fantastic sight greeted the nation
with a beaming Mamata, out from a meeting with the PM, nonchalantly blaming the
‘butchering’ of 2 senior leaders of the CPI (M) Bardhmaan district unit on
internal feuds. This wasn’t the first instance when the ‘mercurial’ CM had
pronounced judgment of criminal cases even before the investigation had begun.
While the national media are in a twist trying to divine the rationale ( a rare
commodity in this case) behind her statement, ‘ask the state government’,
arguing the ‘firebrand’ leader’s eternal ‘opposition’ character, the moot point
is her deliberate derailment of one of the most heinous cases of political
murder in the country.
How did she know what to say? It was only hours
after the murder & she was closeted with South block officials. Her party
leadership, had by then, out of great individual initiative had propounded 3
other reasons for the murder, none of course, indicating the truth. Why was
there a twinkle in her when the press asked her about the deaths? Is it simply
co-incidental that the local police had stood as innocent bystanders while two
senior leaders were being bludgeoned to death?
This incident, which shocked the entire nation
& sparked off a spontaneous protest by people across Bengal & parts of
the country, clearly seems to be one of pre-meditated, well-plotted murder.
That it was done in daylight, in full public view, in the benign presence of
policemen demonstrates the sense of immunity enjoyed by the Trinamul cadres.
This also happens to be repeat attempt on ex-MLA Pradip Ta’s life & an hour
after he had complained to the police about Trinamul’s attempt at inciting
violence around a peaceful rally about the 28th Feb General Strike.
While 4 of the assailants, belonging to the
Trinamul party have been arrested & the investigation is sure to reveal the
entire truth of the conspiracy & the depth of involvement in the higher
echelons of the TMC, the 2 issues that clearly emerge are; 1) The ruling party
& its government plans to consolidate her electoral gains, not by
development, but by unleashing terror on the Left organization. 60 workers
& leaders have been murdered since they took over power. 2) The totalitarian
leader of TMC, Smt. Mamata Banerjee is one of the most cynical political
leaders to rise in post-independent India & she is committed to destroying
all modern institutions, including the most important, Democracy.
Every act, be it the ordinances brought while
the state assembly is in session, annulment of the representative governing
bodies of the educational institutions, freedom of speech of the opposition
parties & media, making the police & administration subservient to
herself in blatant defiance of service rules, the focused attack on the rights
of the working people, trade unions, etc are aimed at silencing every voice of
opposition. People are taking increasing note of her Goebbelsian speak,
celebrated artists & activists have already dubbed her ‘Fascist’, common
people wonder as to the ‘Change’ they have wrought on themselves.
Every political party represent class interests,
irrespective of their common pre-poll refrain of working for the majority, the
poor. The communist parties are the only ones to solely & truly represent
the working classes & the poor. The CPI (M) represents no other class &
fights all ideological & structural bulwarks built against the achievement
of a proletariat state. After decades of great work, both rural & urban,
since coming to power in ’77, that too in the face of stiff opposition from a
partisan center, the CPI (M) led Left Front government faltered in the eyes of
the politically mature people, who voted for Mamata accepting her ‘more
socialist than thou’ promise. They had felt that the Left government had veered
away from their class focus & Mamata Banerjee would deliver their enhanced
aspirations. Highlighted by the shrill & partisan campaign of the entire
bourgeoisie mainstream media, licking their chops at the possibility of a Left
defeat, the travesty occurred.
None months down the line, Mamata’s class
orientation is clear now. Dismantling the democratic governance in educational
institutions, she centralized all power in hand-picked elite from the temples
of US imperialism. She sought to disenfranchise the poor students in the
government-run schools by pushing elitist subjective criteria such as parental
interview, etc. Her party unleashed a
reign of terror on the schools & colleges, while an expert group applied
their minds at creating a world-class ‘Edu Hub’ in her favourite PPP mode.
Privatisation emerged as a key policy parameter. In a state where the Left
govt. has created infrastructure which almost covered 100% of primary
education, the ‘market potential’ seems limitless.
She destroyed the existing public healthcare,
which a record 73% of the state’s population used during the Left Front rule,
the world witnessing unprecedented levels of child deaths across the state. It
was sickening to say the least when not one out of the 177 hospitalised in an
illicit liquor poisoning could be saved in Diamond Harbour, adjacent to the
state capital, Kolkata. This is after some of them survived up to 4 days post
the fatal consumption. She & her administration was quick to be seen next
to victims of a disaster in an elite private hospital, but not one stood next
to the families of the poor in Diamond Harbour. Why? The CM was busy in a beach
festival & thought that the financial compensation announced by the
government was enough. A consistent weakening of the public health
infrastructure could only push the poor to the growing private health sector.
In one of the most bizarre incidents to hit
Bengal were the 34 farmer suicides after a great harvest. A record crop after a
good monsoon saw farmers across the state driven to suicide by the deliberate
policy direction of the government. While the procurement price itself was a
cash loss for the farmers, the murderous policy was sharpened by not providing
funds to the grain procurement agencies. Hardly 10% of the target was bought
after 2 months of the Kharif harvest. This has destroyed the entire village
economy, painstakingly built by the Left & now estimates put the Rabi crop
as low as 50% of the target. Is this merely cynical inaction or a clear ‘class
policy’?
The first act of the Trinamul government was to
take back the distributed pattas of land, whose paper work remained incomplete.
This amounts to thousands of acres. The party has, in turn, driven out
thousands of poor peasants from their land. The historic implementation of the
Land Reforms policy after the left came to power in ’77 distributed small
parcels of land to 28+ lakh farmers, sharecroppers, etc. West Bengal, from
being a deficient state with food production standing at 74 lakh tones became a
surplus state with food production standing at 174 Lakh tones in 2010-11. The
CPI (M) & the left had to fight huge battles with the entrenched landlords,
backed by the Congress to reverse the historical injustice meted to the poor
farmers of Bengal. The current agrarian crisis achieves 2 objectives; one, of
forcing the poor & marginalized peasants to sell off their land to the
kulaks, & second, they along with the impoverished farm workers fatten the
reserve labour army in the cities.
It would be a grave historical mistake to think
of these policies as a product or either mercurial or infantile disorder. Her
party’s reign of terror on the people’s only voice, the left & particularly
the CPI (M) is born out of a clear strategy; 60 killed, 5000 critically
injured,40,000 homeless & Rs.4 crs fined from party sympathizers/voters in
just 9 months of coming to power, can only be the result of a ‘Pogrom’, backed
by the administration. It is not coincidental that after a million+ people marched
to the state capital from all over the state disregarding all roadblocks
created by TMC, this desperate ultra-right lumpen formation chose to kill a
fearless trade union leader & party organizer in Bardhamaan. The twinkle in
the CM’s eye is not a coincidence. Her unconstitutional decree against the
right to strike is not just a tactical political reaction. The systematic
efforts at destroying democracy & throttling all avenues of people’s
protest against her anti-people rule is but a throwback to history & in
line with the current effort of global imperialist forces to accelerate the
apocalyptic act of cornering the last dregs of surplus residing with the poor
people of the poor countries of the world. The Indian government too has been
systematically aiding this process across the country, the left ruled states of
West Bengal, Kerala & Tripura being the only exceptions. These are the only
places where the voice of the poor & the wretched boom louder than the
rich.
The attempt is that of ‘wronging’ this
historical ‘right’ in Bengal. It helps that the rein of the party & the
government is in the hands of just one person, no fear of democracy queering
the pitch here. The fight in front of the people, as demonstrated at the
Brigade & again will on the 28th of Feb., when the exploited
classes will bring the whole exploitative machinery to a grinding halt, is in
sustaining this class struggle & stopping the darkest of all anti-people
forces, the Mamata led TMC, before it causes irreversible
damage to the social & economic infrastructure created for the people in
the last 34 years.
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