Saturday 1 September 2012

Public Meeting on "Bengal Under Mamata's Rule"

The agrarian question is one which the Left and the state governments that it led in India have historically attached utmost importance to. The record of the Left-led governments in West Bengal has been among the most noteworthy in this regard. While the net area sown in West Bengal as a proportion of net area sown in India was only 3.9% (as of 2003-04), the extent of agricultural land distributed under land reform in West Bengal as a proportion of land distributed in the country as a whole was 22.6 per cent. Of the total number of gainers from land distribution programmes in the country, more than half — a full 54.5 per cent — are from West Bengal. As on February 15, 2008, 50,39,665 people had been the direct beneficiaries of land reforms in Bengal, as recipients of agricultural land (29,71,857), recorded bargadars (15,10,657) and as recipients of homestead land (5,57,151). 55% of the recipients of agricultural land under land reform belonged to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribe (which is significantly higher than the proportion of SCs and STs in the state’s population (28.1 per cent). 

But a major reversal of such gains made by the working people during the tenure of the Left Front governments has been taking place today under the rule of the Trinamool Congress. Reports of large-scale evictions of peasants from their rightful land are pouring in from various parts of the state. Places such as Haroa block in North 24 Parganas, Bolpur block in Birbhum, Bhangar & Sonarpur blocks in South 24 Parganas, and Purbasthali block in Burdwan have witnessed the eviction of thousands of Adivasi, Dalit and Muslim peasants who had been landless earlier and were granted pattas during the term of the Left Front governments. The most brutal violence on Left Front supporters has accompanied this regressive turn of events – since May 2009, more than 450 supporters of the Left Front (the vast majority of whom are CPI(M) supporters) – have been murdered by goons belonging to the TMC or the CPI(Maoist). Other facets of the rule of the Mamata Banerjee government, such as the utter callousness shown by ministers and government functionaries in cases of assaults on women, attacks on the freedom of expression and so on have been relatively well-documented. All these and more shall be discussed in today’s Public Meeting, to be addressed by Malini Bhattacharya.

Sd/-
Akhila Vimal, Viswanathan V, Kopal (For the SFI Unit Organising Committee, JNU)



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