NEW DELHI: <b>Senior CPM leader Suhrid Baran Dutta,</b> chargesheeted in the Tapsi Malik murder at Singur, was allegedly involved in infrastructure development work of the Tata Motors' small car project in West Bengal for "personal gains", a CBI probe has found.
"There is evidence to indicate that accused Suhrid Baran Dutta was involved in the infrastructural development work including selection of contractors for personal gain," the 17-page chargesheet filed by CBI in the court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate of Chandannagar in West Bengal alleged.
<b>Dutta, along with another co-accused Debu Malik, have been chargesheeted by CBI for allegedly entering into a criminal conspiracy and murdering Tapsi, who was leading the Trinamool Congress-led agitation against acquisition of land in Singur by the state government for setting up the Tata car project.</b>
The CBI quoted two employees of Kalimata Electric, which was given the task of installation of electric lines in the acquired land, saying they had paid Rs 1.58 lakh to Dutta in cash, who had promised them that the money would be used for purchasing electric poles.
"But investigations has disclosed that the electric poles were supplied by another contractor Ashim Barik" who had made the payment, the CBI alleged and claimed that there was a vested interest of Dutta, at present in judicial custody, in selecting contractors for Singur.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Charity begins at party office</b>
Pioneer.com
Balbir K Punj
In Communist-ruled West Bengal, people have risen in revolt against the continuing scandal of fair price shops and food riots have broken out<b>. The report on the riots showed how the entire ration shop network is dominated by CPI(M)'s apparatchiks.</b> Now developments in the other major Left-Front ruled State, <b>Kerala, have exposed the Communist attempt to take charge of all vital installations and break down the institutions that could challenge their drive towards supremacy. The battlelines have now been moved further -- to confront religious institutions as well</b>.
The Kerala unit of the CPI(M) has moved against the powerful Christian Church too by appealing to the Supreme Court against the High Court verdict on the private self-financing professional colleges issue. The din of confrontation with the Church recently reached a crescendo with the Church claiming that a dying, longstanding Communist leader and MLA,<b> Mathai Chako, was given the last rites according to Christian practices. The Marxists contested this claim of the Church and said that a Communist cannot revert to religion</b>.
The controversy led Marxist leader Pinarayi Vijayan to showering bitter words on the Church, accusing its leaders of lying. Earlier, the Church had warned the Marxists that it would resort to another liberation struggle, as it did in 1957, if the party persisted in getting control over the private professional colleges many of which are owned by Christian institutions.
The incident reminds one of another famous Communist -- Joseph Mundassery. A top leader of the party and a former professor, Mundassery was Education Minister in the first Communist Government of Kerala in the late 1950s. He was instrumental in drafting the education law to exercise Government control over the selection, posting and transfer of teachers in the private schools of Kerala, two-third of which were under the Church. The promulgation of this law led to the Church, the Muslim League, and the Nair and Ezhava communities among the Hindus banding together under Mannath Padmanabhan and creating a situation that forced the Centre to dismiss the Communist-ruled State Government.
Several years after the above events, Professor Mundassery lay dying. A priest was called to offer the last unction. The Marxists then raised a controversy over the claim that the relatives of the professor had manoeuvred the intrusion of religion and that he would not have agreed to the religious rites voluntarily.<b> The fact, however, is that the atheistic Communists are losing out to the theistic institutions among all religions and this is a cause for concern to the comrades. </b>The recent row over the last rites of a dying Communist MLA is only one such case in point.
Critics of the CPI(M) have recalled how<b> even the wife of the topmost Communist leader and former Chief Minister EMS Namboodiripad insisted on religious rites when he died and that she herself has been observing the religious rites as a widow.</b> Temples, churches and mosques constitute a strong religious force in the State with most of the educational institutions controlled by them. The Communists have not hesitated to look for opportunities to mollify them when needed. As recently as in the last Assembly election, the Communists' thumping victory owed to their making up with the orthodox elements in the Church and the Muslim masses.
The events in the prestigious Periyaram Cooperative Medical College Hospital have further exposed the Communist drive to dominate Kerala's politics by taking charge of the critical economic and cultural sinews of the State. The Kerala High Court observed mid-October that there was prima facie evidence that the election to the society that controls the medical college was manipulated and it refused to vacate the stay on them it had issued earlier.
The election held on September 23 was marked with enrolment of party workers as members, false voting and large-scale impersonation. So far that society was under Mr MV Raghavan, a Communist rebel who is with the present day Opposition UDF and was a Minister in the UDF Government that lost the election last year. As a rebel from their ranks, Mr Raghavan has been a CPI(M) target for long, with the Marxists attacking every institution that he had been instrumental in setting up in the North Malabar area of Kerala. The Periyaram medical college is one such institution.
<b>North Malabar, especially the area in and around Kannur, has been at the vortex of the Marxists' violence perpetrated on many institutions that could challenge their supremacy. The RSS has been at the receiving end - many swayamsevaks have been killed in broad daylight.</b>
<b>Marxists have made common cause with the Muslim extremists also in a bid to oust the Muslim League from its dominant position in that community.</b> Official investigations into a number of riots in the area have exposed these Marxist-extremist machinations. Workers of the Congress and even those of the CPI have been attacked in different instances in the Malabar area.
In fact the Kerala Government and the CPI(M) are in the docks over several deals. The most notorious is the party leaders' accepting huge sums from impugned businessmen. The media in Kerala has unearthed how the party organ Desabhimani had pocketed Rs 2 crore from one such businessman and another such donation from a lottery dealer who is also under investigation.
While the focus of these events has been on the Marxist party and its chief, Mr Vijayan, the Chief Minister, Mr VS Achuthanandan, too has come under the cloud as the media has provided details of a deal a confidant of his made with a Dubai-based fugitive from Kerala. In addition, the LDF Government itself had to cope up with a land scandal involving one of its Ministers -- from the allied Kerala Congress (PJ Joseph group) -- who subsequently had to quit.
Stung by these and other exposures within a short time after its return to power, the Marxists are employing the familiar counter-weapon of diversionary tactics.<b> Mr Vijayan and his party workers are attacking the media as agents of the CIA out to destroy the Marxists.</b> However, the media's agitation against such attacks forced the Marxists to desist from further attacks on it. Moreover, prominent newspaper<b> Mathrubhoomi, which exposed two of the largest corruption deals, is owned by a JD(S) State chairman, Mr Virendra Kumar. The JD(S) is part of the ruling LDF in Kerala</b>
Another diversionary tactic is the Chief Minister's much publicised demolition drive against encroachers on the Government land in the plantation town of Munnar. Here too, the LDF Government was suspected of wrongdoing when it sought to exempt party offices from such demolition even when they were found to have encroached on Government land: The CPI(M) was learnt to have been a beneficiary of this exemption. After all, charity begins at home.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->âWe shall not rest in our fight till the strategic ties with the US is snapped out,â PTI quoted Karat as saying. âUSA has also changed its tactics of making Pakistan its strategic ally as it has now realised that if it can get India as a strategic ally, the balance will be tilted in favour of imperialism and neo-colonialism.â<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
According to Chini historical protocol, any civil officer or leader or General of enemy country, who shows loyalty towards China, should be given respectable post according to his status in China. General's from enemy country gets gatekeepers job at external outmost wall of city. Civilian gets assistance position in city trade center, For Karat, best suitable job will be fish market or city Sewage secretary in Zhou County.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->While one has to appreciate Shri Prakash Karat's concerns over the dangers of India becoming an American poodle to which I have also been strongly opposed myself, one has reasons to be concerned over his apparent wish that India should instead become a Chinese poodle
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<!--QuoteBegin-k.ram+Nov 5 2007, 06:53 AM-->QUOTE(k.ram @ Nov 5 2007, 06:53 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Yielding to Beijing</b> http://in.news.yahoo.com/071104/48/6mtnx.html
[right][snapback]74918[/snapback][/right]<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->With christoislamicommunist terrorists ruling India, of course 'India' ignores the Dalai Lama in favour of China and 'India' is against Israel and for 'Palestine'.
India here meaning the 'Indian' government. However, the Dharmic population of India are pro-Israel and pro-Tibet, and anti-terrorism and anti-communist-China. How democratic it is that the government does not represent the majority at all...
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->New Delhi: The CPI-M on Wednesday attacked US President George W Bush by describing him as a âfoolâ.
The reason for the scathing attack was because Bush had compared Russian leader Lenin with the likes of Osama bin Laden and Adolf Hitler.
"He (George Bush) is a fool. I have heard that a few days ago he said Lenin, Hitler and Osama Bin Laden were alike," CPI-M General Secretary Prakash Karat was quoted by news agency PTI as saying.
Karat, who was addressing a function here to commemorate the 90th anniversary of Russia's 1917 October Revolution, added, âThe world knows he is weak in the knowledge of history but now it has also been established that George Bush is also a fool.â
Karat asked the party cadres to take a pledge to weed out imperialism from the world.
Karat is trying to be Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, but only difference Chavez is with Oil and Karat is with bankrupt West Bengal and Nandigram. Karat gets his daily instructions from Shantipath huge corner lot. I hope before election Unkle will release all dirty linen of Queen and Kura Karat to media and BJP. They know coalition is reality and Karat will never join hands with BJP, so for new equation dump Queen's die-nasty party.
<i>How a used car salesman operate!</i>
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Mass exodus as CPM men lay villages to waste </b>
<span style='color:red'>Pioneer report from battle zone Nandigram </span>
Hungry men, women and children, rendered homeless after CPI(M) cadre began to shoot and bomb their way into Nandigram this week, wailed in despair as the early winter fog lifted on Thursday morning. Having escaped the Marxist marauders with noting more than their lives, they cowered pitiably under whatever shelter they had found. Many were not so lucky: They have been spending the past many nights on the open sodden grounds of the local BMT High School.
Hundreds continued to arrive in an unending queue of vehicles of all sorts -- caught in a mass exodus, the likes of which this part of the country has probably not witnessed since the days of Partition.
<b>Wives and children bade tearful farewells to husbands and fathers rushing back to the 'frontline' to take up positions against the invading CPI(M) cadre</b>. A few km away, armed Bhumi Uchhed Pratirodh Committee (BUPC) members, who have been resisting acquisition of farmland since January, prepared for the last stand.
Though Thursday was largely incident free in Nandigram, the atmosphere was charged. Heavily armed Marxist cadre were continuing to make a steady advance from across their original position beyond Talpatti canal. The paddy fields just beyond the small town of Nandigram have become their launching pad. For a section of the Trinamool Congress-led BUPC leaders, the fight is all but over. But some diehards in villages like Sonachura and Garh Chakraberia, who are said to be carrying ampoules of poison in their pockets in a dramatic gesture of threatening to commit suicide rather than surrender to the CPI(M)'s militia, known here as harmad bahini, have decided to fight it out till the last man.
Though the turf war has been raging for nearly 11 months now, the CPI(M), whose cadre have been at the receiving end till recently, struck back with lethal force on October 27. Till then, BUPC was in total control of Nandigram Block I.
Taking advantage of the complacency that had crept in among BUPC members, CPI(M) cadre ran over Ranichowk, Satengabari and Takapura in Nandigram Block II to gain strategic advantage, ruthlessly putting down all opposition. BUPC activists were shot and houses were set ablaze. <b>But the BUPC activists fought back and regained control of Ranichowk and Satengabari.
Their gain was short-lived. Barely a week later, the CPI(M) militia launched a fresh attack, this time capturing most villages in Block II, apart from Ranichowk and Satengabari. The biggest loss for BUPC was Brindavanchowk, its 'operational headquarters'. The Marxist juggernaut continued to roll on and by Wednesday evening, CPI(M) cadre were knocking on the BUPC's doors in Nandigram proper</b>. Police personnel deployed to maintain law and order remained mute witnesses as thousands of villagers fled their homes and hundreds of rounds were exchanged across the ripening paddy. Bullets and bombs flew as in a war zone in the middle of a raging battle.
The BUPC activists tried to fight back the Marxist marauders but their opponents were too well entrenched. They had to retreat under the deadly firepower of the Marxist militia armed with sophisticated weapons, including self-loading rifles and 5.56 mm Insas rifles.
Asked about the mayhem unleashed by their cadre, CPI(M) leaders maintained that "Maoist guerillas are fighting alongside the BUPC". Though the BUPC received some support in the form of equipment and strategy from the Maoists, it is yet to be established that Maoists are actively involved in the fight for control over Nandigram.
Having gained much territory and "rehabilitated" party workers, the CPI(M) on Thursday appeared to have changed its tactics. It is now trying to break the BUPC's support base: CPI(M) leaders are moving around, urging villagers to return home. The 'truce', however, does not apply to BUPC leaders.
This has caused chaos among the BUPC's rank and file. While a section of the BUPC's top leaders has fled the battle zone, a sense of defeatism has begun to overwhelm those down the line. Meanwhile, CPI(M) cadre have begun to infiltrate the BUPC: One of them was detected on Wednesday and lynched.
With BUPC activists retreating into Nandigram town, which has been cut off from the rest of the world by the Marxists, the organisation's remaining leaders are making desperate efforts to restore morale.
On Thursday afternoon, some BUPC activists tried to storm Nandigram police station; they failed miserably. A short distance away, on the road to Nandigram, Medha Patkar of Narmada Bachao Andolan was set upon by CPI(M) cadre. She claimed she was punched in the face while the police looked on passively.
By Thursday evening, Nandigram was awash with rumours about a major attack being planned by the CPI(M) cadre later in the night. The relative calm during the day could turn out to be the proverbial lull before the final storming of Nandigram by foot soldiers of the CPI(M).
<b>At a shelter for 'refugees', a sobbing woman being nagged by her hungry children said, "Now all they have to do is remind villagers elsewhere of Nandigram. There will be no resistance to the CPI(M) anywhere." </b>Her husband is out there somewhere, manning the last post.
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Where is Moron Singh sleeping? Why he is ignoring worst kind of ethnic cleansing after 1947?
Where I can locate all roy, chatterjees Cedric Prakash, IMC, Rajagopal of Gujarat riots?
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Who's paying for Pinarayi son's UK studies?</b>
pioneer.com
VR Jayaraj | Kochi
Does a leader of the proletariat have the moral right to educate his offspring in academies which charge astronomical amounts in tuition and other fees even when he exhorts his comrades to lead intense agitations against self-financing professional colleges? Is it right for a communist leader who complains about lack of attention given to liberal arts by colleges to send to study abroad? Where does Pinarayi Vijayan, Kerala unit secretary of the CPI(M), who has no known sources of huge income, find the money to pay for his son Vivek Kiran's MBA course at Birmingham University where the fees and other expenses are in the range of Rs 50 lakh for two years?
Questions like these, which had made their way even into the State Assembly in the beginning of 2006, are once again hot subject of discussion in the Kerala CPI(M), which is ravaged by rampant faction fights between communist hardliners led by Chief Minister VS Achuthanandan and the neo-liberalists headed by none other than the party secretary.
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A stark choice faced by CPM: communism or islamism?
It is clear that both cannot coexist for long.
A remarkable short, powerful piece by Priyadarsi Dutta is a brilliant presentation of the sweep of over 70 years of bharatiya communist history.
Communists of today in Bharatam have proved themselves bereft of any ideology, particularly after their adoration for the nonagenarian Jyoti Basu (who continues to rule W. Bengal) who stayed in power ruling 1/3 of Bangla pampering the muslim vote-banks and weeping about CPM's historic blunder which prevented his becoming PM.
The dharma-chakra has turned full circle and Buddha and his coterie are caught in the administration of dumdum dawai stupidly recommended by Brinda K (and politburo). Just as commies in Bangladesh and Paki have become islamists, it is the next logical step for the commies of West Bengal to convert to islamism. And, migrate to Bangladesh as mujahir after conversion to islamism which is the logical next step, defying Ambedkar's world-view.
It will, of course, be logical for Bharatam to demand space in Bangladesh to resettle hindu's expelled from there after the sonar bangla cry became a tinsel shriek.
If Karats and Buddha (including Yechury and Biman Bose) want to convert from communism to christism or islamism or bauddham, they will do well to read some thoughts of great revolutionaries beyond MN Roy â Ambedkar, for example, or better stil, Chaitanya prabhu.
Of course, the option exists, to continue to perform durga puja and stay hindu, practicing and living by hindu sanatana dharma. But then, a start has to be made to understand the true import of dharma as abhyudayam and nihs'reyas as twin purushartha (and not pampering the twins called ) Idris Ali and Sultan Ahmed (close to Alimuddin Street), who, like communism, are mere footnotes in the history of hindu civilization. Try calling them Ali da and Sultan da⦠Even Buddha will figure out how impossible it is, in his next poem or drama as Taslima basks under the security cover of 10 Janpath thinking of the title of her next bangla novel. (What an irony: Salman Rushdie gets better protection from fatwa-s in a kafir land called England.)
I don't think Alimuddin Street movement has the trappings of the Khilafat movement.
Yes, indeed, we have a long way to go to come to grips with the muslim problem in bharatam. We have just started understanding the true nature of islamism and the imperative of reminding every muslim in bharatam that his or her pitr-s of generations, say, 800 years Before Present, were hindu, revering Kali-maa in Kolkata and also Dacca.
<b>Ambedkar noted: "Indian Christians like all other Indians are divided by race, by language, and by caste. Their religion has not been a sufficiently strong unifying force as to make difference of language, race and caste as though they were mere distinctionsâ¦Everybody infers that Islam must be free from slavery and caste. (While slavery existed), much of its support was derived from Islam and Islamic countries.
While the prescriptions by the Prophet regarding the just and humane treatment of slaves contained in the Koran are praiseworthy, there is nothing whatever in Islam that lends support to the abolition of this curse. But if slavery has gone, caste among Muslims has remainedâ¦If the depressed classes join Islam or Christianity, they not only go out of the Hindu religion, but they also go out of the Hindu culture. What the consequences of conversion will do to the country as a whole is well worth bearing in mindâ¦
The application of the Hindu Code to Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains was a historical development and it would be too late, sociologically, to object to it. When the Buddha differed from the Vedic Brahmins, he did so only in matters of creed, but left the Hindu legal framework intact. He did not propound a separate law for his followers. The same was the case with Mahavir and the ten Sikh gurus."</b>
<!--QuoteBegin--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->
Following his dramatic announcement in 1935 C.E. that he would adopt a new religion, Ambedkar considered Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, Jainism and Buddhism as possible options for him in India. They were all active religions, except for Buddhism, which, although originating in India had vanished by the twelfth century. Ambedkar asked, "Which of these traditions offers my community the most dignity, the most inspiration, the most empowerment to move ahead and to realize a good life or a good future or a good symbolic universe, a universe that makes me feel that life is worth living and there's a future for the world?" Buddhism seemed to offer the most for Ambedkar and his followers because it was an indigenous religion; it wasn't, like Christianity or Islam - something imported.
It took organised Muslim violence in Kolkata for the Left Front Government in West Bengal to requisition the Army. Panic gripped the capital of the 'liberal secularist' State Government at noon. Two CPI(M) local offices at Beniapukur were set ablaze. The mob raised slogans to demolish Muzaffar Ahmed Bhawan, the CPI(M) and SFI's headquarters on Alimuddin Street. Since the building is deep inside a Muslim locality, the comrades panicked and shut its gates, doors and windows.
The mob pelted stones at Kolkata Police. It avoided entering the notorious lanes and bylanes, fearing getting trapped, surrounded by Islamist swordsmen, already out on the streets. Finally, it was not the usual tear gas canisters of Kolkata Police but automatic rifles held by the soldiers of the Gorkha Regiment that finally struck fear in the rioters' hearts.
No deaths have been reported; except perhaps that of the Marxist-Muslim relationship. This has been an ironical relationship from the day when MN Roy raised the nucleus of India's Communist Party at Tashkent, with the mohajirs of the Khilafat Movement in 1920. The mohajirs showed more interest in military training than their Indusky Kurs (Indian school) -- the school for political training. Roy's book, Historical Role of Islam (1937), set the trend for Marxist historiography of condoning Islamic intolerance while blaming Hindus. The trend surprisingly did not change even after Communists were cleansed from Pakistan.
The violence in Kolkata has also exposed the Achilles' Heel of West Bengal's 'liberal secularism'. A panic-stricken CPI(M) bundling exiled Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen out of Kolkata means holding a cosmopolitan city hostage to the intolerant few, even after two-thirds of Bengal was lost to that intolerance in 1947. If the CPI(M) plays the Hindu card now, which is unlikely, it would mean Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee going former Yugoslavian President Slobodan Milosevic's way to face the reality.
Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee and her supporters feel that Muslim assertiveness is necessary for throwing the Communists out. That's why she has extended her "moral support" to the Muslim marauders in Kolkata. But if the CPI(M) plays the Hindu card, Ms Banerjee's grand designs will be defeated.
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Riot twins face music, but unfazed - Suspended, Idris Ali says he is proud of 'movement'
Kolkata, The Telegraph, Issue Date: Saturday, November 24, 2007
(Photos) Idris Ali and Sultan Ahmed: Unrepentant
Calcutta, Nov. 23: The Congress today suspended Idris Ali for his role in Wednesday's street riots even as Mamata Banerjee came under increasing pressure to act against Sultan Ahmed, who had admitted his boys' role in the violence.
State Congress working president Pradip Bhattacharya said Ali was suspended for an indefinite period. A notice, asking why he should not be expelled from the party, has been served on him.
However, the president of the Congress-backed All India Minority Forum was brazen in his defiance. "I feel proud to have been associated with the movement," Ali said.
"My suspension would cost the party dear during next year's panchayat elections," he added.
The forum led by Ali had called the morning peak-hour roadblock that turned violent on Wednesday. The army had to be called on the city's streets after 15 years as violent mobs laid siege to a part of the city.
The decision to suspend Ali followed a meeting of key Congress office bearers, including former state unit chief Somen Mitra, who is said to be his mentor.
Suspended, Ali, a former chairman of the party's minority cell, accused the state Congress of being "isolated from the minorities, particularly a vast section of the Muslim community".
"The leaders failed to understand the spontaneous protest from the minorities, particularly a vast section of the Muslim community in the state, against Taslima Nasreen's stay in Calcutta."
State Congress general secretary Jayanta Bhattacharya described Ali's remarks today as "gross violation of the party's discipline".
The leadership is left with no option but to expel Ali, he said.
Trinamul Congress sources said Mamata "snubbed" Sultan Ahmed today when he called her at the party headquarters to say he had no control on his "boys".
On the day of the violence, he said: "Why should I stop my boys? What happened today should serve as an eye-opener for the government."
A Trinamul leader said: "Didi did not buy Sultan's arguments."
A large section of the party's working committee has told Mamata that the general secretary post should at least be taken away from him.
The most vocal among them was Trinamul's minority cell president M. Nur Uzzuman. "The party's image has definitely taken a severe beating because of Sultan's involvement in the riots. He has to be removed," Nur said.
Like Ali, Ahmed remained unfazed.
"I was not born a Trinamul general secretary. So, I don't mind being removed from the post for sharing the concerns of a vast section of my community," he said.
<b>CPM & the making of a monster</b>
Swapan Dasgupta
When an edifice built on control begins to crumble, all sorts of peculiar creatures start emerging from the cracks. The uninhibited exhibition of hooliganism witnessed on the streets of Central Kolkata last Wednesday provided a vivid illustration of the CPI(M)'s slow loss of control over a State it has ruled uninterrupted for 30 years. If the "recapture" of Nandigram earlier this month was a desperate attempt to restore the party's total dominance on every corner of rural society, the State Government's decision to deport Taslima Nasreen from Kolkata was a panic-stricken bid to regain the confidence of the regressive forces it has systematically nurtured. The CPI(M), it would seem, is even prepared to accept a degree of collateral damage -- in this case, the party's alienation from the Bengali intelligentsia -- to meet the imperatives of political survival.
It's still too early to pass any judgement over the efficacy of trying to turn the clock back without undertaking an overhaul of the party's basic belief systems. What seems clear, however, is that the Communist endeavour to appropriate the liberal Hindu imagination has suffered a monumental setback. It was the Left's disproportionate influence in the citadels of intellectual power -- the arts, academia and the media -- which explained the unreal goodwill it enjoyed in national life. After Nandigram and the expulsion of Taslima, the Left is increasingly conveying the appearance of being a Stalin with halitosis.
The significance of the riotous anti-Taslima outburst in Kolkata should not be underestimated. Ever since its wise theoreticians identified Hindu communalism as the Enemy No 1 -- and that happened some 17 years ago -- the CPI(M) has pandered to the most regressive currents in Muslim society.
The CPI(M) first preyed on Muslim fears of an ascendant BJP -- Ayodhya and the Gujarat riots proved handy -- and then tapped into the self-destructive Islamist resurgence under the convenient garb of anti-Americanism. In West Bengal, it looked the other way as illegal migrants effected a demographic transformation of the border districts and even made Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee publicly express regret for daring to suggest that many of the madarsas in the State could do with lessons in modernity and patriotism. In other parts of India, it has entered into partnership with the mullahs to glorify suicide bombers in Iraq and Israel and simultaneously oppose any strategic partnership with the US. On the question of Taslima, the CPI(M) has obliged the forces of darkness on each and every count: It banned her latest book, it banned a Bengali journal that had defended her right to be critical of her own religion and, on Thursday night, it expelled her from Kolkata.
Can the cohabitation of godless Communists and self-professed soldiers of god endure? For nearly two decades, Islamist radicals have viewed its cosy relationship with the CPI(M) as a proverbial "covenant of security". West Bengal now hosts extension counters of frightening jihadi groups based in Bangladesh. The State administration has looked the other way because of the tacit understanding that there would be no subversion within the State.
The reason for the breakdown can be attributed to stirrings within local Muslim society. There is a section of relatively better-off Muslims which is anxious to assume political leadership roles in West Bengal. The CPI(M) does not have the structure and the flexibility to accommodate these aspirations. In its scheme of things, only card-holding Comrades can be allowed decision-making authority. Simultaneously, the Muslim leadership now believes it wields sufficient demographic clout to assume a frontal role in public life on terms set by the community. Prior to Nandigram, few had heard of Jamiat-i-Ulama Hind's Sadiqulla Chaudhury and before last Wednesday the identity of those who called for Taslima's departure was unknown. They have now demonstrated that they matter.
West Bengal politics is at an interesting turn. The CPI(M) has hitherto exercised total control. Sectarian Muslim groups now want a power-sharing arrangement commensurate with their numbers. Sixty years after Bengal took a breather, sectarian politics is making a menacing comeback.
<i>For any comments, queries or feedback, kindly mail us at pioneerletters@yahoo.co.in </i>
âWe have been here one week now. Our job should have been going out on house-to-house searches, seizing illegal arms and ammunition with which this place is brimming, arresting wanted criminals. I asked the SP two days ago to provide me a list of wanted criminals but I did not get it. I donât know why he is doing it. I have worked as an SP, I have never seen such behaviour,â Alok Raj, DIG, CRPF told The Indian Express.
âWe have been asked by the DGP, West Bengal, to shift our five camps from present locations. We have been asked to work in the areas of responsibility to be assigned by the East Midnapore SP,â he said.
After armed CPM cadres recaptured Nandigram from rival Bhumi Uchched Pratirodh Committee backed by the Trinamool Congress, the CRPF had been deployed in Nandigram, Gokulnagar, Rajaram Chowk, Khodambari-I and II.
The CRPF, deployed to instill confidence among the people and restore normalcy in violence-hit Nandigram, has accused the West Bengal Police of non-cooperation, saying such an attitude would delay return of peace in the area.
Amid blame game, CRPF DIG Alok Raj, supervising the operations of the paramilitary force in trouble-torn area, has proceeded on leave alleging non-cooperation from the State Government.
<b>The CRPF had on Wednesday apprehended a local CPI(M) leader Anup Mondal and handed him over to the police. On Thursday, the CRPF apprehended another CPI(M) activist Krishna Ghorai from Brindaban Chowk and took him to the police station.
However, the local police did not register any case and set them free ostensibly under instructions from the State administration. </b>
"When we took Ghorai to the police station, we were told that Mondal had been released. When we asked why, the police said they had instructions from the higher up," Raj told an agency.
<b>Both Mondal and Ghorai had been apprehended on charges of intimidating people returning to their homes from the relief camps, the sources said, adding that several other cases of serious nature were also pending against Mondal.</b>
"If this goes on, peace cannot return. We are making all efforts to instill confidence, but the police should also work with us," the report quoted Raj as saying.
Sources said that despite repeated requests by the CRPF for a list of local miscreants and criminals, the police have not furnished it.
While the CRPF wants to shift its camps from local school and college buildings to enable classes to be held, the local administration is yet to identify alternative sites, the sources said.
In Kolkata, State Home Secretary PR Roy, when asked about the DIG's allegation he refused to comment.
"I don't know who has said what. He (Alok Raj) has gone on leave. He will resume duty after returning from leave," the report quoted Roy as saying.
He claimed both the CRPF and the State police were working jointly in Nandigram
CPI(M) is killing people like birds in Nandigram
<i>Activist Debojit Datta, who has played an active role in convening the BUPC, writes of Nandigram from behind the battlelines.</i>
Something worse than death stalks Nandigram today. Fear. Cold stifling dehumanising fear. It is impossible to say how many people have really died in the last seven days or how many have been raped. No one has accurate figures. No one can really tell whatâs happened on the ground.
Locals say about 500 people are missing after they were rounded up from Sonachura, Maheshpura and Nandigram by armed CPM cadres on motorcycles, some wielding AK 47s and SLRs, over 9 and 10 November. What we know for certain is that thousands of people have fled their homes and are stranded in refugee camps across Nandigram.
Just in BMT High School, Nandigram over 2,500 people have gathered. There is a winter chill in the air. Most people are lying on unprotected ground, surviving on one round of khichdi in the afternoon and some dried puffed rice at night. Most are from proud self-sufficient homes. To be on relief is itself a kind of humiliation.
To understand what is happening in Nandigram â and by extension in Bengal â one has to go back to the beginning. Popular resistance to the CPM first began when the government announced the Tata small car factory in Singur early last year and began forcible acquisition of land. There was firing, lathi-charge, deaths, police deployment. This fascist approach to the takeover of rich agricultural land for industrial purposes was new to Bengal. Many farmers and landless tillers opposed the project.
They felt the car factory would dislodge them from secure agricultural homesteads and turn them into Class IV workers. Local anger and unrest was amplified by the intervention of the Trinamool Congress and SUCI. The government responded with brute force. Appalled by its high-handed approach and the absence of consensus, many activists and intellectuals got involved with the Singur struggle in solidarity. 56,000 factories are lying shut in Bengal. The state has almost 3.7 million acres of uncultivable land. Why not utilize that for industrial growth, people argued. Why take over fertile land?
At about this time, around July 2006, word began to spread of an impending chemical hub project in Nandigram. The proposed takeover of land straddled an astronomical 28,000 acres. A 100 villages. 38 mouzas. A land rich in rice, coconut, fish and betel leaf. A thriving economy. Unlike Singur, Nandigram has been a CPM bastion for over 35 years. Their assumption was that Nandigram would toe the line. But the unthinkable happened. The villagers broke rank.
Confronted by potential eviction, many like Maidur Hossainâs family, who have been staunch CPM supporters for decades, turned against the party. In early December, several activists like me conducted a survey of 600 families in Nandigram seeking peopleâs opinion on the impending project. Only 12 consented to sell their land.
In all my years of activism, I have never seen anything like Nandigram. The villagersâ resolve, unity and passion for their land have transformed my understanding. On January 2, 2007, the local CPM MP and strongman Lakshman Seth put up a summary notice announcing the acquisition of land.
On January 3, a peaceful deputation of villagers marched to the Gram Panchayat to enquire about the notice. They were brutally dispersed by the police. The events after that, right up to the massacre of March 14, are well known. Police brutality, attacks by CPM goons, and escalating public outcry on the one hand. And an unprecedented spontaneous resistance on the other. Villagers broke roads and cut off access. The Bhumi Ucched Protirodh Committee (BUPC), cutting across party lines, was formed. It was agreed that everyoneâs political identity would be subsumed by the larger common cause: the fight for land. Caught on the backfoot, the CPM government had to relocate the Salem Groupsâs chemical project elsewhere.
In the months that followed, however, tensions in Nandigram did not recede. The order to relocate the project was never given in writing and no one trusted the governmentâs word. As BUPC volunteers â including women -- continued to patrol their homes and land, CPM cadres, along with hired goons imported from outside, banked themselves in Khejuri -- separated from Nandigram by a narrow canal -- and continued their assault. They were determined to regain control of Nandigram. It had become too powerful a symbol. It had become a prestige issue. A turf battle. If Nandigram was not quelled, the contagion would spread elsewhere.
<b>CPM leaders like Benoy Konar, Lakshman Seth and Biman Bose have constantly exhorted their cadres: âMoro, na maro,â Seth has urged (âKill, or die yourself.â) âLift your saris and show Medha Patkar your backside,â Konar has taunted. âHave they been throwing rosogollas at us?â Bose has exhorted.</b> Consequently, the last few months have been riddled with sporadic kidnappings, rapes, bombings, and firing.
Drawn into a war-like situation, there has been some violence on both sides.
Then suddenly, over the last couple of months, the CPM ratched up the violence. With panchayat elections only a few months away, they opened a new battlefront in Block 2 of Nandigram: Satangabari, Ranichowk, Tankapura, Maheshpura. As Anuradha Talwar, president of the Khet Mazdoor Committee, says, âThey were determined to make an example of Nandigram. They wanted to tell the rest of Bengal, this is what happens if anyone revolts against us. Historically, this is the way all peasant rebellions have been crushed.â
From November 7 to 12, to use one of the villagerâs Abdul Qadirâs words, âThey killed people like birds.â Personally, I have never seen state machinery used in this fashion in a functioning democracy. On the 8th and 11th, around 38 of us activists, including Medha Patkar, sought police escort to enter Nandigram. Both times, the police turned its face away and stood inert as our cars were smashed and we were stalled for hours by rampaging CPM cadres.
Medha was dragged out of the car by her hair, my spectacles were smashed, and after we left, they burned the houses of those who had given us shelter in Kapashberia. The rule of law did not exist. Even the District Magistrate, Khalil Ahmed had no power. âDonât go in there. We will not be able to help you,â he said. Yet, in a surreal twist, the CPM had banners everywhere shouting, âWhy are you promoting terror in Nandigram? Give us an answer, Medha Patkar!â <b>Since the resistance began in Nandigram, the government has been floating the fantastic lie that the villagers of Nandigram are backed by Maoists. I know every constituent of the BUPC, and I know none of us are Maoists. It is a poor refuge to explain away the real truth of the movement in Nandigram.</b>
Fear can be a crippling thing though. Many villagers now do not want to speak of what they have seen or suffered because they are afraid of reprisal. As Anuradha Talwar puts it, âIt is like internal violence in a family. The wife will not speak up, because the husband will beat her again later.â Yet slowly, the stories are trickling in.
Stories like that of Nitaikaran, a 96 year old man who was beaten to death. Eleven of his family members, who had fled to the refugee camps, applied to the CPM functionary at Tekhali for permission to return to their home to cremate their father. Ten people are not needed, they were told. Let one go, we will take responsibility for the cremation.
Stories like that of the sisters Anwara Khatun and Ansuma Khatun, 16 and 18 years old, who were raped in Satangabari, along with their mother, Akhreja Biwi. Stories like that of Chandana Das who was molested at Kalicharanpura. Like that of Srikant Paik in Sonachura whose house was burnt and shop looted.
For the moment, the villagers of Nandigram seem to have been beaten into submission. All they demand is that they be allowed to return home in genuine safety, under CRPF security, in time to harvest their fields. But the lessons of Nandigram are not over yet. It has exposed the Left Front as nothing before: the Left has left the Left. Abdicated to fascism and a rabid economic programme.
This governmentâs craze for instant industrialization, its comfort levels with demolishing a whole class of people and turning them into servants, its disregard for environment, its pandering to corporates at any cost has already fractured its image as a pro-people government. The alternatives â Congress, TMC, SUCI â may be no better. But that cannot be a concern at the moment. As Gandhi said to the British: you leave first, then we will figure out who will govern us.
<i>Debojit Datta is a member of the Forum for Free Thinkers and the NAPM. He has played an active part in the constitution of the BUPC.</i>
<b>And quiet flows the Haldi⦠</b>
Source:The Week
<i>How the Marxist cadres and goons teamed up to 'liberate' Nandigram </i>
By Tathagata Bhattacharya/Nandigram
The Haldi river bordering Nandigram is quiet and in mourning. On November 5, six battalions of armed CPI(M) cadres surrounded Nandigram in East Midnapore. Their mission: to 'recapture' villages from the Bhumi Uchched Pratirodh Committee (BUPC)-a Trinamool Congress-led front against land acquisition for the proposed special economic zone (SEZ).
The cadres were armed with AK series rifles, INSAS rifles, SLRs, .303 guns and bombs. Three of the battalions were sourced from West Midnapore's Garbeta block, three to four hours from Nandigram, and were led by its <b>local committee secretary Sukur Ali.</b>
The other three battalions were from the West Midnapore's Chandrakona region, three hours from Nandigram, and were led by its <b>district committee member Tapan Ghosh. Both Sukur and Tapan are wanted by the CBI in a case relating to the burning alive of seven anti-CPI(M) activists in Chota Angaria.</b>
Each battalion had around 100 men, including dacoits and criminals from Bankura and South 24 Parganas. They were paid in advance for 'Operation Nandigram', and given a free hand to loot the villages, CPI(M) sources said. The 'operation' was reportedly finalised at a meeting between a member of Parliament, a state cabinet minister and zonal and local leaders in Khejuri, a CPI(M) stronghold, at the guest house of the Kolaghat thermal power plant.
The blitzkrieg began with the cadres spraying bullets on Nandigram's fringe villages of Satengabari, Jambari, Kanungochowk and Brindabanchowk. They torched and ransacked houses. Even cattle were not spared. Thousands of men, women and children fled to the block headquarters in Nandigram Block I.
BUPC activists wielding antiquated weapons, mostly muskets, fought back. The cadres ran out of ammunition, and were forced to withdraw momentarily. But fresh supplies arrived through the waterways, and the battle resumed. Soon BUPC activists ran out of ammunition. The cadres took twelve to thirteen villages in two days, bringing most of West Nandigram under their control.
<b>Opposition leader and Trinamool Congress leader Mamata Banerjee alleged that the cadres used the official launch of the district magistrate of South 24 Parganas to ferry arms and ammunition to their stronghold in Khejuri.</b> Earlier, West Bengal home secretary Prasad Ranjan Roy had commented, "Nandigram is a war zone and the attacks are happening from Khejuri." West Bengal Governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi dubbed the 'capture' of villages "unlawful and undemocratic".
Fleeing villagers trooped from the strategic Tekhali bridge-which runs over the Talpati canal that divides Nandigram from Khejuri-to the block headquarters, as CPI(M) cadres took control of the main road connecting Gokulnagar and Adhikaripara to the block headquarters. On November 8, massive firing in Maheshpur and Amgachia villages left many injured. The police remained mute spectators, even as thousands of villagers shook the gates of the police station. "We don't have orders," was what the officer-in-charge reportedly said.
On November 10, around 30,000 unarmed BUPC activists took out two processions to regain control of their land and homes; while one procession, of people who had taken shelter in camps in the block headquarters, marched from Nandigram to Maheshpur, another moved from the Sonachura village bordering Khejuri in the same direction.
The two groups were to meet at a point and move to Tekhali bridge. On the way, cadres surrounded them and sprayed them with bullets. The official death toll was put at three, with 20 injured; but witnesses said the toll was higher.
"The CPI(M) men carried away the bodies on vans towards Khejuri. Even the injured were not spared. Over 500 people were marched off to Khejuri," said a processionist. The Khejuri police rescued about 350 men-some of them were by then badly beaten up-from various schools in Khejuri. Many others, including some young women, were missing. <b>In Satengabari village, a 40-year-old woman and her two daughters, aged 14 and 17, were raped. The woman was admitted to Tamluk hospital.</b>
In Egra, which is around an hour's drive from Nandigram, a crowd intercepted two vehicles carrying injured people from Nandigram in the evening. <b>The Egra police arrested at least eight CPI(M) cadres. While Sukur and Tapan were among those held, the police changed their names. However, when they were produced in court, they gave their real names when photographs were produced.</b>
The rampaging cadres took Sonachura, Garchakraberia and Osman Chak, Kendemari and Hosenpur-the centres of BUPC's resistance in Nandigram Block I. Thousands of villagers fled to the camps in the block headquarters. By evening of November 11, the 'occupation' was complete.
Further, armed CPI(M) mobs stopped Mamata Banerjee from reaching Nandigram. The village was 'out of bounds' for the media, as all entry points-through river and land-were blocked. Even the CRPF men were turned back on the night of November 12.
Reports came in from Nandigram that after Sukur and Tapan were captured while trying to ferry the injured, CPI(M) cadres had changed tactics-many of the dead and the half-dead were being burnt in the brick kilns of Khejuri. Reports of gangrapes, too, have been coming in.
Sparks, claims and dissenting voices marked the aftermath. CPI(M) state secretary Biman Bose called the Governor's remarks unconstitutional and questioned his intellectual credentials. "Peace has been restored" in Nandigram, he said, adding that it was a "new sunrise". Prominent CPI(M) and CITU leader Shyamal Chakrabarty said, "Nandigram is now a liberated zone, free of terror. What is needed now is development."
RSP minister Kshiti Goswami was ashamed. He told THE WEEK: "Only the communists are capable of something like this, especially those dictated by Stalinist ideology. I have sent a letter to the RSP secretary, asking the party to let me resign. I don't feel like being a member of this government."
The violence drew flak from civil society. On November 12, a spontaneous bandh paralysed normal life in the state. Nothing moved. Even software engineers were not complaining. Many boycotted the Kolkata International Film Festival-which, interestingly, featured quite a few films on state repression.
<b>Ram to Krishna, CPM smells threat in Iskcon</b>
RABI BANERJEE
The Iskcon temple in Mayapur
Krishnagar, Dec. 7: The CPM in Nadia has described Iskcon
(International Society for Krishna Consciousness) as a "major threat"
to communists.
A document published on the occasion of the recent district party
conference says Iskcon helps "communal forces" like "the RSS and the BJP".
The Congress has been ac-cused of "hobnobbing" with the religious
group headquartered in Nabadwip, 100km from Calcutta, for support.
"Organisations like the RSS and some NGOs are fanning communal
passions in the district," says the document drafted by CPM district
secre-tary Ashu Ghosh.
"Our local leaders have been campaigning against Iskcon activities for
years. We have compiled information on Iskcon on the basis of reports
from our local leaders and sent it to higher authorities in the
party," Ghosh told The Telegraph.
In the chapter "Birodhi Shaktir Biruddhe Larai (Fight against
opposition forces)", the document says: "Iskcon-er bhumika kromosho
bipajjanak hoye uthchhey (The role of Iskcon is gradually becoming
dangerous)."
Ramesh Das, the Iskcon publicity manager, wondered "why the CPM has
branded us like this after ruling the state for 30-odd years".
He said several communist leaders like politburo member Sitaram
Yechury and Tripura chief minister Manik Sarkar have not only visited
its temples but also stayed over. "We were delighted to host them."
Das added: "We want to convey for their (the CPM's) information that
we have devotees from all walks of life and from all over the world."
The CPM denied the claim about its leaders staying there. "I've never
heard of it," said veteran leader Benoy Konar.
The Nadia CPM had earlier accused Iskcon of acquiring around 500 acres
in Mayapur in the name of small NGOs to bypass the land ceiling law.
Acting on its report, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee asked his land minister
to conduct a probe.
Minister Abdur Rezzak Mollah came to Nadia for the inquiry, following
which the government shot down the proposal for a Rs 500-crore vedic
village planned by Iskcon devotee and Henry Ford's grandson Alfred Ford.
The latest document, distributed among senior leaders of the district
during the November 30-December 2 conference, says Iskcon has become
an "agent of the Congress, Trinamul Congress and the BJP".
"It has established itself as a major force against communists here."
Party sources said the conference discussed the issue in the presence
of state secretary Biman Bose and industries minister Nirupam Sen.
It is indeed a very dangerous development. It is time for the State to intervene or it will again turn out to be a problem like that of Anand Marg. There is no dearth of scandals connected to the activities of this organization, particularly in the United States. However, it has been overshadowed by the facilities provided to the card holders from India who are provided free stay at this organizations premise across USA. This facility and the free food business in the Langer have ensured the popularity of this organization amidst a se3ction of the Indian population around the world and West Bengal is no exception.
Many of us in India have taken advantage of this organization during our private visits to the United States and free lodging and food. It also has some popular support amongst the Hindu Jagarani Sabha members based mostly in the United States and armed with broadband connections and sufficient $s in the Bank.Since it can be safely considered as a major supporting organisation for the Jagaran, some political parties may alos throw in their support. Given this limitation it is to be seen how the State Government of West Bengal can do anything against this organization.
Ravish I didn't see you demanding intervention against the Indian church and it's affiliations to the Vatican (with all it's child abuse scandals), why this special treatment for IKSCON?
Is it because it is challenging your commie gov't?
As and when such cases have come to the notice of the civil society, action has been taken against the culprits including Hindu and Christian priests. However, as you may be aware Christians number more than a million and the Church is a religious place quite different from the outfit of ISCON. The same stand is taken against the mosque or the gurdwara. The problem is that we Hindus are incapable of ensuring prevention of conversion. The banning of the opponents outfit is not the answer. The Hindu religion should be made so attractive that people from other sects will flock in.
The tragedy lies in the fact that present day Hindu Holy men are more interested in foreign trips to be serviced by wealthy NRIs. They have failed in ensuring the continued attractiveness of the Hindu religion within India. If you happen to be in any foreign country having sizable NRI population, just check the frequency and movement of these jet set gurus.
With regard to the Communists, the 60 odd seats that they get elected to is due to the fact that Hindus vote for them. They cannot enter the door of the lower house without support of Hindus. It is obviously the weakness of the Hindu jagarani Sabha, there is no point in blaming either the Christians or Muslims for this development in the Indian political scene. It is tragic for India that with so few members they are pulling the strings to change the destiny of the nation. BJPâs India shining has been the main cause for this situation. Let us hope that with Advaniji as the Prime Ministerial candidate, as reported an hour ago, the party will do so well in the next elections that Hindu jagaran can really start. However, there is a big if. How far the rest of the BJP outfit will support the new leadership during the elections? Let us hope for the best.
12-10-2007, 08:52 PM (This post was last modified: 12-10-2007, 08:53 PM by Bodhi.)
Forget what Hindu Jagrani Sabha should do. you have still not answered why you think communist govt of west bangal should "intervene or it will again turn out to be a problem like that of Anand Marg" (your words) whereas you have never seen a need for state to "intervene" in religion of love and that of peace - both of which have such a rosy record of spreading love and peace everywhere.
Or may be, yes you did explain your worldview:
<!--QuoteBegin-Ravish+Dec 10 2007, 11:04 AM-->QUOTE(Ravish @ Dec 10 2007, 11:04 AM)<!--QuoteEBegin-->Church is a religious place quite different from the <b>outfit</b> of ISCON.[right][snapback]75974[/snapback][/right]
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intervene you said? Your communist commissars will gleefully do what they did to Anand Margis on April 30, 1982 in Kolkata.
