Author: Editorial
Publication: The Indian Express
Date: January 5, 2001
Buddhadev Bhattacharya might be
making serious efforts to change from being a stodgy Marxist to a bhadralok,
at least since he took over the baton from comrade Jyoti Basu as the chief
minister of West Bengal. But if the recent spate of violence in Midnapore
is anything to go by, the CPM cadresseem to be turning from bad to worse.
According to reports over 100 Trinamool supporters, including their leader
Mamata Banerjee, were injured recently, some of them seriously. Apparently,
the truckloads of Trinamool supporters who were making a beeline for Keshpur
-- a Trinamool stronghold which the CPM had "captured" in the last two
months -- were attacked with bombs. After the Trinamool partymen returned
home, many of them were fired upon in the darkness of the night in the
neighbouring districts of Bankura, Burdwan and Hoogly. The Keshpur violence
is not an isolated incident. Widespread violence has been perpetrated by
the Marxists in the Bengal countryside ever since the CPM lost the crucial
Panskura bypoll last year and failed to retain control over the prestigious
Calcutta corporation.
While CPM cadres have gone berserk
in rural areas, paranoid party leaders, jittery about losing their stronghold
-- which they had held for the last 24 years -- have justified the violence
on the ground. The situation in West Bengal today is comparable to that
of the sixties and the seventies, when the CPM was trying to penetrate
the state's countryside. Political conflict had turned extremely violent.
In the first phase during the mid-sixties, the party faced both the violence
of Congress louts and the frequent imposition of the President's rule by
Indira Gandhi. In the second phase, during the late seventies, the CPM,
having learnt the lessons of power from the Congress, unleashed state violence
at the various Naxalite groups and a Congress party in Opposition.
Since 1977, the CPM has enjoyed
an untrammelled monopoly in the state. In the initial years the party brought
about some radical structural changes such as tenancy reforms, land to
a section of the landless, institutionalisation of Panchayati Raj, and
enhanced agricultural growth rates. But, as the maxim goes, absolute power
did corrupt the CPM absolutely. The ledger folio scandal that rocked the
state ran into thousands of crores. Subsequent years witnessed a de-radicalisation
of the party. Land reforms made good politics as long as the rich landowners
were being attacked, but it began becoming unpopular when family farms
began getting targetted. There has hardly been any registration of new
land pattas in West Bengal since 1992. The new economics of liberalisation
also caught the CPM on the wrong foot. As long as the challenge was from
the Congress, the CPM had the moral highground. But soon a firebrand Mamata
led the charge, through her street fights and mahajots. The largely ossified,
geriatricMarxist leadership have clearly run out of new ideas. They simply
do not know how to face the latest challenge. If they continue using the
political language of the sixties and the seventies by hurling bombs and
brickbats, the assembly elections in May may well turn out to be a bloodbath
-- which has the potentials of turning the tide in the state.
