final results of the panchayat election in west bengal are out:
<img src='http://bp2.blogger.com/_UwwzmzFWHXA/SDYwO9fD3BI/AAAAAAAACRc/SWRm6nY7Y7I/s400/23zzbuddhabig.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image' />
Gram Panchayats:
1597 Left (down from 2303 in 2003)
1479 opposition (up from 744)
Panchayat Samitis:
183 Left (down from 265 in 2003)
126 opposition (up from 40 in 2003)
Left routed from Nandigram and Singur - both of which overwhelmingly went to Trinamul and SUCI.
If this is in rural areas, imagine the situation in uban areas with access to information!
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->How CPM captured, and holds on to rural Bengal
By Nitish Sengupta
Deccan Chronicle, 22 May 2008
In the past week or so, during the panchayat elections in West Bengal, the CPI(M) cadre in Nandigram, Khejuri, Keshpur and many other pockets in the state have gone crazy violating criminal laws and constitutional rights in order to retain their physical control over their areas of influence. The CPI(M) men committed murders, raped women on a very visible scale and physically prevented independent intellectuals and human rights workers from visiting Nandigram â including such well-known persons as filmstars Aparna Sen and Saoli Mitra, not to speak of political leaders like Mamata Banerjee. The CPI(M)'s Lok Sabha MP for that region has openly entered into verbal confrontation with the commanding officer of the CRPF in the area, actually threatening him in the face of television cameras. They have physically beaten large numbers of men and women, snatched their voter identity cards and confined them to their homes in an attempt to prevent them from going to the polling booths to cast their votes. All this has happened in the open, with the CPI(M) leadership not showing any sign of remorse or regret, or even trying to reassert control over their belligerent cadre.
People often wonder how the CPI(M) has been able to retain control over rural West Bengal for as long as three decades. The answer lies in the fact that they have been making full use of the resources of the panchayati raj institutions gifted to them unwittingly by Rajiv Gandhi, who introduced the practice of giving direct finances from the Centre to the panchayats and even amended the Constitution for this purpose. Since that time the CPI(M) has retained full control on the panchayat elections so that they can directly gain access to its great resources and can claim that all the welfare and development measures undertaken by the panchayats, many of them coming from the Centre, are actually being done by their party. Unlike most other states, the CPI(M), after coming to power in West Bengal during a phase of absent-mindedness by the people in 1977, started the practice of fighting panchayat elections on a political basis and getting control over the panchayats, which they have not given up since then. To help them to win elections they resorted to making their cadre take physical control over vast rural areas. Ordinary voters are simply not allowed to vote. At times non-CPI(M) candidates are prevented by physical force from submitting their nominations, thereby ensuring the election of a large number of CPI(M) candidates unopposed. In order to retain this physical control, the cadre has been armed to the hilt, having their own guns, bombs, swords, spears and other weapons, which they use without any restraint against their political opponents. The police force has been politicised to an extent unknown anywhere else in this country. Most of the policemen recruited in West Bengal over the last two decades are CPI(M) cardholders or at least CPI(M) sympathisers, as are schoolteachers in the districts. Politically subservient station house officers have been posted in all thanas. They do not register any criminal complaint without a nod from the local CPI(M) boss. They even refuse to register FIRs in the normal course, although they are under obligation to do so under the Criminal Procedure Code. It is the secretary of the local CPI(M) unit, popularly known as the LCS, who is the main power centre in rural areas. Even ministers look for his recommendation in most cases. There has thus been a massive politicisation and criminalisation in rural areas of West Bengal. In every parliamentary constituency, the CPI(M) takes care to retain one Assembly segment under its tight physical control so that no matter how voters elsewhere vote, nearly 100 per cent polling in favour of their candidate in this segment usually ensures the victory of the CPI(M) candidate.
Strangely enough, the leadership of the CPI(M) in West Bengal, outwardly known as bhadralok leaders for their culture and intellect, choose to turn a blind eye towards the criminal activities of their cadre and the widespread violation of constitutional provisions and fundamental rights, as well as the usual provisions in our criminal law ensuring human rights. This explains why, unlike their counterparts in Kerala who know how to court defeat once every five years or so, the CPI(M) in West Bengal has never known defeat and has been uniformly successful in all elections to the Lok Sabha, the Assembly and panchayats over the last three decades. It is an amazing case where the proletariat of Karl Marx fell victim to Lenin's party, and Lenin's party in turn fell victim to the Stalinist and Maoist cadre. One does not know when West Bengal is going to be rescued from this captivity, which has destroyed its spirit, intellect and culture for several generations, not to speak of the steady economic decline which has downgraded what was once the foremost state of India during the halcyon days of Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy into one of the most backward states in the country.
Today the CPI(M) stands isolated not only from the intellectuals, artists and other right-thinking sections of the people, but also from its own political allies like the Revolutionary Socialist Party and the Forward Bloc within the Left Front. Even the CPI(M) patriarch, Jyoti Basu, who built the United Front from scratch, lamented that the Left Front today is as good as non-existent. There are reports of armed clashes between the CPI(M) on the one hand and its allies in the Left Front on the other, leading to the death of people and destruction of property. It is only the CPI(M)'s cadre in the rural areas, a law unto themselves, who are sustaining their political party in power.
Dr Nitish Sengupta, an academic and an author, is a former Member of Parliament and a former secretary to the government of India
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
http://cpmindia.blogspot.com/2008/05/how-c...ral-bengal.html
<img src='http://bp2.blogger.com/_UwwzmzFWHXA/SDYwO9fD3BI/AAAAAAAACRc/SWRm6nY7Y7I/s400/23zzbuddhabig.jpg' border='0' alt='user posted image' />
Gram Panchayats:
1597 Left (down from 2303 in 2003)
1479 opposition (up from 744)
Panchayat Samitis:
183 Left (down from 265 in 2003)
126 opposition (up from 40 in 2003)
Left routed from Nandigram and Singur - both of which overwhelmingly went to Trinamul and SUCI.
If this is in rural areas, imagine the situation in uban areas with access to information!
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->How CPM captured, and holds on to rural Bengal
By Nitish Sengupta
Deccan Chronicle, 22 May 2008
In the past week or so, during the panchayat elections in West Bengal, the CPI(M) cadre in Nandigram, Khejuri, Keshpur and many other pockets in the state have gone crazy violating criminal laws and constitutional rights in order to retain their physical control over their areas of influence. The CPI(M) men committed murders, raped women on a very visible scale and physically prevented independent intellectuals and human rights workers from visiting Nandigram â including such well-known persons as filmstars Aparna Sen and Saoli Mitra, not to speak of political leaders like Mamata Banerjee. The CPI(M)'s Lok Sabha MP for that region has openly entered into verbal confrontation with the commanding officer of the CRPF in the area, actually threatening him in the face of television cameras. They have physically beaten large numbers of men and women, snatched their voter identity cards and confined them to their homes in an attempt to prevent them from going to the polling booths to cast their votes. All this has happened in the open, with the CPI(M) leadership not showing any sign of remorse or regret, or even trying to reassert control over their belligerent cadre.
People often wonder how the CPI(M) has been able to retain control over rural West Bengal for as long as three decades. The answer lies in the fact that they have been making full use of the resources of the panchayati raj institutions gifted to them unwittingly by Rajiv Gandhi, who introduced the practice of giving direct finances from the Centre to the panchayats and even amended the Constitution for this purpose. Since that time the CPI(M) has retained full control on the panchayat elections so that they can directly gain access to its great resources and can claim that all the welfare and development measures undertaken by the panchayats, many of them coming from the Centre, are actually being done by their party. Unlike most other states, the CPI(M), after coming to power in West Bengal during a phase of absent-mindedness by the people in 1977, started the practice of fighting panchayat elections on a political basis and getting control over the panchayats, which they have not given up since then. To help them to win elections they resorted to making their cadre take physical control over vast rural areas. Ordinary voters are simply not allowed to vote. At times non-CPI(M) candidates are prevented by physical force from submitting their nominations, thereby ensuring the election of a large number of CPI(M) candidates unopposed. In order to retain this physical control, the cadre has been armed to the hilt, having their own guns, bombs, swords, spears and other weapons, which they use without any restraint against their political opponents. The police force has been politicised to an extent unknown anywhere else in this country. Most of the policemen recruited in West Bengal over the last two decades are CPI(M) cardholders or at least CPI(M) sympathisers, as are schoolteachers in the districts. Politically subservient station house officers have been posted in all thanas. They do not register any criminal complaint without a nod from the local CPI(M) boss. They even refuse to register FIRs in the normal course, although they are under obligation to do so under the Criminal Procedure Code. It is the secretary of the local CPI(M) unit, popularly known as the LCS, who is the main power centre in rural areas. Even ministers look for his recommendation in most cases. There has thus been a massive politicisation and criminalisation in rural areas of West Bengal. In every parliamentary constituency, the CPI(M) takes care to retain one Assembly segment under its tight physical control so that no matter how voters elsewhere vote, nearly 100 per cent polling in favour of their candidate in this segment usually ensures the victory of the CPI(M) candidate.
Strangely enough, the leadership of the CPI(M) in West Bengal, outwardly known as bhadralok leaders for their culture and intellect, choose to turn a blind eye towards the criminal activities of their cadre and the widespread violation of constitutional provisions and fundamental rights, as well as the usual provisions in our criminal law ensuring human rights. This explains why, unlike their counterparts in Kerala who know how to court defeat once every five years or so, the CPI(M) in West Bengal has never known defeat and has been uniformly successful in all elections to the Lok Sabha, the Assembly and panchayats over the last three decades. It is an amazing case where the proletariat of Karl Marx fell victim to Lenin's party, and Lenin's party in turn fell victim to the Stalinist and Maoist cadre. One does not know when West Bengal is going to be rescued from this captivity, which has destroyed its spirit, intellect and culture for several generations, not to speak of the steady economic decline which has downgraded what was once the foremost state of India during the halcyon days of Dr Bidhan Chandra Roy into one of the most backward states in the country.
Today the CPI(M) stands isolated not only from the intellectuals, artists and other right-thinking sections of the people, but also from its own political allies like the Revolutionary Socialist Party and the Forward Bloc within the Left Front. Even the CPI(M) patriarch, Jyoti Basu, who built the United Front from scratch, lamented that the Left Front today is as good as non-existent. There are reports of armed clashes between the CPI(M) on the one hand and its allies in the Left Front on the other, leading to the death of people and destruction of property. It is only the CPI(M)'s cadre in the rural areas, a law unto themselves, who are sustaining their political party in power.
Dr Nitish Sengupta, an academic and an author, is a former Member of Parliament and a former secretary to the government of India
<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
http://cpmindia.blogspot.com/2008/05/how-c...ral-bengal.html