Lalgarh Movement – Mass uprising of tribal people in West Bengal
Last update: Dec 19. This article, consisting of reports, eye-witness accounts, analysis and photos will be updated regularly as the movement evolves.
Latest Articles on Sanhati
December 26, 2008
- Sambhu Singh vs. South City: the battle against corporate retail and real estate in a microcosm - Partho Sarathi Ray
Living in eternal negligence – A political travelogue on the tribals in the Sundarbans, Bengal - Koel Das. Journal
Return of the terror law: Implications for peoples movements and a petition - Articles
30 years of destitution: India’s largest energy hub and the people of Singrauli, U.P. - Articles
Stalin, the Kolkata Film Festival, and Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee - Articles
Airport cities: The new paradigm - Articles
Notes from a ghost town: a day in the Naihati industrial region, Bengal - Articles
Katwa, West Bengal: Farmers deny land claim - Resistance News
December 14, 2008
16,632 farmer suicides in India in 2007 - News
“Malnutrition” a sanitized term for “starvation”? - a death in Belpahari - News
Fact-finding report and video on Jindal SEZ in Salboni, West Bengal - Campaign Literature
Naihati industrial region, Bengal - closed factories, vulnerable workers - Campaign Literature
Poultry farmers in the fatal grip of monopoly capital in Bengal - Journal
TB Hospital sold for 1 rupee – Private players jump into medical education in West Bengal - Journal
NREGA implementation crumbles in Bengal; PBKMS files PIL - News
Ominous developments in Orissa: Sangh Parivar critic arrested for writing book - News
Fighting terror: PM says human rights may be abrogated, Bengal DGP advocates torture - News
December 10, 2008
Accumulation by Dispossession under the Aegis of a “Communist Party” - David Harvey on Bengal - Dipankar Basu and Debarshi Das. Journal
Vigilanteism in Bengal after Mumbai 2008: a modest proposal - Resistance News
Tata pushes for bailout fund for India Inc - free markets at work - Resistance News
Indian Prime Minister’s security robs 5,000 villagers of power in Bengal - Resistance News
Climate change and India: ominous reports from UN convention (UNFCC 2008) - General Articles
December 5, 2008
ShramikShakti Newsletter November 2008 - Campaign Literature
Space relations of capital and significance of new economic enclaves: SEZs in India - Articles
Singur Updates: Farmer commits suicide, Tata sheilds “trade secret”, faces resistance in Sanand, Gujarat - Resistance News
Dunlop tyre company in Bengal shut down: Workers blamed for resisting salary cut - Resistance News
November 9, 2008
Lalgar in West Midnapur, Bengal, on a warpath over Jindal’s Salboni SEZ and police repression - Resistance News
Anti-mining and anti-SEZ struggles in Salem, Tamil Nadu: A summary - Front Page
Dispossession of weavers in Varanasi and the need for an artisans movement - Front Page
The Global Economic Crisis: a five-part study [ updated Nov 17] - Dipankar Basu, Sanhati
Where is red in your sky, comrade? - Sankar Ray. General Articles
BESU Shibpur, Bengal: violence, arrests, and university officials pandering to their political masters - Resistance News
Class analysis of Indian agriculture: from Towards a New Dawn Newsletter - Camp. Lit. Booklets
Matongini Mohila Samiti: Newsletter, September 2008 - Camp. Lit. Booklets
Booklet on anti-people history of Tatas: SEZ-birodhi Prachar Manch - Camp. Lit. Booklets
Leaflets from FAMA on Nov 10 rally, Metro Cash and Carry, and a letter to Mr. Gandhi - Camp. Lit. Leaflets
Booklet from FAMA on entry of big capital in retail in Bengal and India - Camp. Lit. Booklets
October 23, 2008
Political Economy of Contemporary India: Some Comments on Partha Chatterjee’s theoretical framework - Dipankar Basu and Debarshi Das, Sanhati. Front Page
Probing the politics of the annual destitution of 4 million in Damodar valley flooding - Santanu Sengupta, Sanhati. Front Page
David Pugh’s report on India’s anti-displacement movements: the unedited version - Resistance News
Real estate projects in Rajarhat face farmer resistance - Resistance News
Niyamgiri, Orissa: Mass Convention Against Supreme Court Verdict allowing Vedanta mining - Campaign Literature
Recent updates on Singur - Resistance News
Armed tribals protest Arcelor Mittal plant in Jharkhand - Resistance News
Video lecture: The 2008 US economic crisis: a Marxian analysis by Rick Wolff - Pictures and Videos
For older articles, click below.
30 years of destitution: India’s largest energy hub and the people of Singrauli, U.P.
“Singrauli will turn into Singapore,” - Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, 2008
Across the nation, up to 60,000,000 people are estimated to have been displaced by power, irrigation, mining and other development projects since independence.
Return of the terror law: Implications for peoples movements and a petition
Sign petition to demand repeal of draconian laws
Implications for peoples movements
Press Release from Kolkata activists: deep anguish over laws - Dec 24, 2008
Acts of Terror and Terrorising Act – Unfolding Indian Tragedy - Dec 19, 2008
Double-barrel strike on terror - Dec 16, 2008
Airport cities: The new paradigm
One of the aspects of neoliberal accumulation in India and Bengal has been the steady creation of real estate enclaves, hubs, and gated cities. A new chapter in this process is the impending concept of airport cities, with the usual promises of job creation, downstream employment, and development. An idea imported from highly developed nations, the aerotropolis, as it is called, will demand the creation of attendent SEZs and the provision of infrastructure like water and electricity by local taxpayers. A land acquisition notice for an airport city in Andal (Burdwan, West Bengal) was served in December 2008.
Notes from a ghost town: a day in the Naihati industrial region, Bengal
By Parimal Bhattacharya, Dec 2008
Every night, at 11 pm, Moumita Pan waits in the dark with her schoolbooks for the electric light to come on. A student of Class XI, she has to race through her studies before the light goes out again at two in the morning. Moumita is the only girl in the workers’ quarters of the Jenson and Nicholson plant at Naihati, closed since 2004, who has cleared the Madhyamik and has not dropped out yet.
16,632 farmer suicides in India in 2007
Suicides by farmers of Maharashtra crossed the 4,000-mark in 2007, for the third time in four years, according to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). As many as 4,238 farmers of the State took their lives that year, the latest for which data are available, accounting for a fourth of 16,632 farmer suicides in the country.
Ominous developments in Orissa: Sangh Parivar critic arrested for writing book
Writing against Sangh Parivar and Brahmanism is ‘inflamatory’ or ‘War agaisnt State’ - The Orissa police proves it by arresting a Bhubaneswar based critic of Brahmanism and RSS. Mr.Lenin Kumar, editor, Nishan was arrested day before yesterdey for writing the book ‘”Dharma Naanre Kandhamalare Rakta Nadi”.
Anti-mining and anti-SEZ struggles in Salem, Tamil Nadu: A summary
Salem, in Tamil Nadu, South India, is the scene of mining operations and an impending SEZ site. Various players, from SAIL to the Jindals to the infamous Vedanta corporation, are vying for mining rights in the area. An IT SEZ is on the cards. Local struggle is developing.
The Global Economic Crisis: a five-part study
By Dipankar Basu, Sanhati. This series will also appear parallely on Radicalnotes
The global economic crisis currently underway is, by all accounts, the deepest economic crisis of world capitalism since the Great Depression. It is necessary for the international working class to understand various aspects of this crisis: how it developed, who were the players involved, what were the instruments used during the build-up and what are it’s consequences for the working people of the world. This understanding is necessary to formulate a socialist, i.e., working class, response to these earth shaking events. In a series of posts here on Radical Notes, I will share my understanding of the on-going crisis as part of the larger collective attempt to come to grips with the current conjuncture from a socialist perspective, to understand both the problems and the possibilities that it opens up.
Dispossession of weavers in Varanasi and the need for an artisans movement
Varanasi in North India, which employed 700,000 people in handloom a decade back, now employs only 250,000, with 47 reported cases of suicide. In the face of liberalization, silk cloth imports, indiscriminate mechanization, loose control over cheap imitations, rising price of silk, etc. weavers, like other artisans, are being dispossessed. This article discusses the inefficacy of existing government schemes, and suggests ways forward, stressing the need for an artisans’ movement in the country.
Political Economy of Contemporary India: Some Comments on Partha Chatterjee’s theoretical framework
Dipankar Basu and Debarshi Das, Sanhati. Open for comments.
Sifting through the divergent viewpoints thrown up by attempts to make sense of the recent political history of West Bengal, one is led to the conclusion that the tumultuous events have taken many, if not most, by surprise. With the benefit of hindsight one can probably say this: a combination of an insensitive state power, an arrogant ruling party, lapping-it-up corporate interests, and cheerleaders-of-corporate-sector-doubling-up-as-media orchestrated a veritable assault – a perfect storm. Yet the peasantry, initially without the guiding hand of a political party – indeed at times against the writ of the party – fought on. Through this episode Indian political economy seems to have stumbled upon the peasantry while it was looking for a short-cut to economic growth through SEZs.
Probing the politics of the annual destitution of 4 million in Damodar valley flooding
By Santanu Sengupta, Sanhati. Translated from ShramikShakti Newsletter: August 2008. Open for comments.
The lower Damodar river valley in West Bengal is the home of the Damodar Valley Corporation or DVC, the first multipurpose river valley project of independent India, whose stated aims are flood control, irrigation and generation and distribution of electricity. It is also the site of horrendous annual flooding that has brought ruin to over 4 million people for over a generation. This article probes the disparity between the stated objectives of the project and its performance, and the dangerous politics of big dams that has wreaked havoc on the lives of millions in Bengal.
Statement on Singur from Sanhati
October 12, 2008
Months of unflinching resistance by the people of Singur, especially landless labourers and marginal farmers, against the unjust and violent farm land acquisition by the West Bengal government has finally forced Tata Motors to withdraw its small car project from that area.
A list of exploitative companies in North India, and what they do
This is a small but typical list of companies in the Gurgaon area of North India, which commit flagrant violations of existing labor laws and get away with impunity. Their practices are listed below, in the form of first-person reports from workers, gleaned from Gurgaon Workers News. In most cases the minimum wage for industrial helpers of Rs. 3510 is not paid. If it is paid, then the working-times are way beyond the fixed 8-hours day and 6-days week. In most cases the over-time exceeds the legal restriction – maximum 50 hours in three months - and is paid at single rate, though according to the labour law it should be paid double. Hardly any workers receive the Provident Fund (PF), nor do they get ESI, medical insurance, which they are entitled to by law.
Farewell to the Tatas: Costs and benefits of the Tata-Singur Project, a detailed dissection of the deal
By Dipankar Basu, Sanhati. Open for comments
Costs: the total cost of the Tata-Singur project incurred by the exchequer, and hence ultimately the tax payers, will be approximately be Rs. 3000 crores on a net present value basis when we add up the costs pertaining to the land subsidy, the tax holidays, the soft loan, the real estate gift and the subsidized electricity using an interest rate of 11%. This is about 58% of the total realized industrial investment in the state of West Bengal in 2007.
Responsible corporates? The crimes of the Tatas enumerated
Introduction 1. Helping Killer Carbide - the Dow Chemicals nexus 2. Bypassing Democracy (a) Dictating Indian Policy (b) Holding on to Corporatocracy (c) Business with Military Junta 3. Desecrating Tribal Lands (a) Parched Earth Tactics (b) Chrome Poisoning (c) Luxury Resort in Tiger Country 4. Violence and Massacres (a) Gua Massacre (b) Kalinganagar Massacre (c) Singur Oppression 5. Toxic Dumping (a) Saline waste (b) Hell on Earth (c) Mountains of Waste, Jugsalai (d) Joda Mines (e) Coal Slurry Dumping 6. Hazardous Incidents (a) Founder’s Day Fire 7. Strong Anti-Labour Policies (a) Worker Suicides (b) Sub-contracting and Fostering Insecurity (c) Lay-offs (d) Union busting (e) Killings 8. A Historical Record as Collaborators of British Imperialism (a) Drug Running (b) Empress Mills (c) Fueling British Expansionism (9) Tatas opposed by the people
The US financial crisis: locating the real locus of the debate with Rick Wolff
By Rick Wolff
In US capitalism’s greatest financial crisis since the 1930s Depression, status-quo ideology swirls. The goal is to keep this crisis under control, to prevent it from challenging capitalism itself. One method is to keep public debate from raising the issue of whether and how class changes — basic economic system changes — might be the best “solution.” Right, center, and even most left commentators exert that ideological control, some consciously and some not. Hence the debates where those demanding “more or better government regulation” of financial markets shout down those who still “have more confidence in private enterprise and free markets.” Both sides limit the public discussion to more vs less state intervention to “save the economy.” Then too we have quarrels over details of state intervention: politicians “want to help foreclosure victims too” or “want to limit financiers’ pay packages” or want to “weed out bad apples in the finance industry” while spokespersons of various financial enterprises struggle to shape the details to their particular interests.
Who committed the real violence at Graziano Transmissioni?
Who committed the real violence at Graziano Transmissioni? - Kavita Krishnan
Graziano Workers Solidarity Forum formed
Hidden Costs of the Tata-Singur Agreement
By Dipankar Basu, Sanhati. Open for comments.
The Tata Group of Companies is one of the largest business conglomerates in India today with about 100 large companies in its fold. With the might of the Indian State firmly behind it, monopoly capital in India has started a move to aggressively acquire foreign assets. This short note examines the true character of agreements like the one `struck’ between the TML and the West Bengal government. It is important to understand how such `agreements’ look like under a neo-liberal regime.
The dislocation of 15 million fishworkers and environmental degradation: an introduction to ongoing changes in Coastal Zone Regulations
By Suvarup Saha, Sanhati. Open for comments.
Coastal Zone Regulations in India are currently being changed and manipulated. It is necessary to examine these changes closely and understand the political and economic currents that motivate them. The 8200 km long coastline of India provides livelihood to 15 million people and is one of the richest environments in the world - changes and amendments in protective regulations thus have widespread effects, effects which are being swept under the carpet by political parties, from the right to the parliamentary Left. This is an introduction to the issue.
Perspectives on the U.S. financial crisis
The U.S. financial crisis: some views from Monthly Review
The Greed Fallacy: By Arthur MacEwan, Dollars and Sense
Hard Truths About the Bailout
Free market ideology is far from finished: By Naomi Klein
Crisis of Capitalism and the Left: By Emir Sader
Understanding the demand for Gorkhaland : An introductory note
Open for comments
Voices for a separate state of Gorkhaland are once again echoing in the hills of Darjeeling and the surrounding areas. These developments are certainly disturbing for the uninformed Bengalis – they fail to understand why such a picturesque and otherwise “peaceful” place would like to secede from their province. They also feel sad at the thought of losing something so beautiful, something to be proud of. Sometimes, there is the knee-jerk reaction among some of them – a refusal to part with the region. With the state government and the mainstream media purposely continuing to feed on this ignorance and pride, it becomes important to put together a historical account of the developments in Darjeeling and thereby address questions regarding the right to self-determination of the people staying in this region. The hope is that such an introductory account of the evolving situation in Darjeeling would help the democratic-minded people to come to a rational decision.
Tales from the Gorkha region: crimes, oppression, and the fading memory of Baburam Dewan
By Siddhartha Mitra, Sanhati. Translated from ShramikShakti, June 2008
“Son, do not feel ashamed about my death; instead, feel proud of it, because this self-sacrifice of mine is for the greater good of the 6000 workers of the Chongtong tea-estate. We are still able to provide ourselves with two meals a day; but the thought of the frightening situation of the others in the tea-garden is making me unbearably anxious
– these were the words the Baburam Dewan wrote to his son in a letter just before he took his own life.
The ongoing Singur siege: populist, social democratic, and horizontal responses to neo-liberalism
By Kuver Sinha, Sanhati. Open for comments
There is an ongoing siege in Singur, West Bengal, the site of the Tata Nano project. The Trinamul Congress, led by Mamata Banerjee, has demanded that of all the land acquired by the State Government using the colonial Land Acquisition Act of 1894, 400 acres be returned to farmers who had been unwilling to sell. The Krishi Jomi Jibon Raksha Committee or KJJRC (Save Farmland Committee) is the broad umbrella organization carrying out the struggle. Various civil society groups have rallied behind this call, as have landed farmers, landless labourers, and sharecroppers of the area.
Public health privatisation in Bengal
By Indira Chakravarthy, Guest Contributor.
As a complement to Dipankar Basu’s piece on the “achievements” of the CPM government in West Bengal on the economic and social fronts (http://sanhati.com/front-page/857/), I would like to share a few facts/concerns about the health status of common people in W Bengal. Using publicly available data, Dipankar had demonstrated that West Bengal’s growth story was rather unspectacular when compared to other Indian states. Now, I would like to raise a related but different question: has even this below-average “economic growth” translated into improvements in the social sector for the common people?
A history of the brutal Rajarhat land acquisition, Bengal’s new IT hub
By Santanu Sengupta, Sanhati. Translated from Rajarhaat - Uponogorir Ontorale Arto Manuher Kanna
Rajarhaat, near Kolkata, is Bengal’s new IT hub and a hotspot for real estate investment. Within no time Rajarhat has become the hotbed of real estate investments with companies like DLF, Keppel Land, Unitech group, Singapore-based Ascendas, Vedic Realty, etc. coming in. Land prices have soared. The first phase of DLF’s Rs 280 crore (Rs 2.80 billion) IT project has been operational since 2005 and a second IT park is on the cards. Wipro, Infosys, IBM - all the major IT houses are in operation here, on subsidized lands. A wireless hub is in the offing. Contrasting with Singur-Nandigram, official state versions have given the picture that Rajarhat’s land acquisition from the mid 1990’s onwards has been peaceful. This is an acount of the immense bloodshed that lay behind this acquisition, in a decade when the civil society and media wasn’t interested.
‘Testing’ Time for a ‘Civil’ Nuclear Deal: Reflections ahead of the NSG meet
By P.K. Sundaram, Guest Contributor. August 20, 2008. Open for comments.
India’s desperate diplomacy prior to the NSG meet on August 21-22, 2008 reveals the not-so-hidden truth about the deal – at a time when there is a need for renewed focus on disarmament, India rehabilitates nuclear energy corporates in order to circumvent nonproliferation regime and secure its right to conduct nuclear tests. And it finds supports from the Bush nuclear strategy bent on reducing nonproliferation into counterproliferation.
We have no value - sharecroppers and labourers in the ongoing Singur crisis
Reporting from Singur – Shamik Sarkar, Sanhati. 19th August, 2008. Comments enabled.
It has been over a year and a half that 997 acres have been sealed off by Tata’s fences here. But many landowning farmers have not accepted compensation. In the last week of July, 2008, the Krishi Jomi Jibon Jibika Raksha Committee (Committee for saving farmland, life, and livelihood) gave the call to “outsiders working in Tata’s plant” to leave Singur, “to protect the rights of unwilling farmers, Bargadars, and agricultural workers”. After that, Trinamul leader Mamata Banerjee declared that there would be a continuous blockade of the project from August 24th. The pressure of the movement forced workers who had been coming to the site from outside to stop.
What is the state of workers in the new industrial zones of Tamil Nadu?
This conversation with a worker from Tamil Nadu, appeared in Shramik Istahar, May 2008. It has been translated by Koel Das, Sanhati.
I was conversing with Sudhakarda. Sudhakar Raut, originally from Orissa, used to work in a reputed private engineering factory in West Bengal. He lost his job after being victimized in a lock-out while fighting against the injustice of the factory owner. I met him a couple of days back when he talked about his experiences over the last one year.
Flashpoint Chengara - landless Dalits, the Left Democratic Front, and terror
A historic land struggle has been unfolding at Chengara in Pathanamthitta district, Kerala, involving about 7500 families, which includes all sections of landless people, the majority of them being Dalits and Adivasis. Landless people have claimed land in the Chengara estate, a rubber plantation, which had been leased to the Harrison Malayalam Plantation by the government of Kerala. At present, the lease is invalid and the property has lapsed back to the government. The landless people who have flocked there from all parts of Kerala demand that this government land be redistributed to them. These marginalised people have thereby demanded a say in what must be done with government land in Kerala: given the present political and economic climate, the likelihood is that this land will be taken over by the state only to be assigned unconditionally, or with minimum conditions, to the multi-nationals.
Dynamics of rural proletariat: labour shortage in agriculture, NREGA, aspirations, and the nouveau riche
Introduction: rural proletariat in Haryana and Punjab
Aspirations within misery: labour shortage in agriculture
The NREGA and the control of rural proletariat
The teenage guns of the nouveau riche
Is tenant eviction at the heart of the Bengal government’s new agrarian thinking?
By Shubhendu Dasgupta. Translated by Debarshi Das, Sanhati
One of the many aspects of the land reform programme was security for tenants. Those land owners who would not cultivate the land themselves, would lease out the same to the tenants. This is called tenancy cultivation – or “barga” cultivation in Bengal. Those who would lease in the land on barga cultivation would be called “bargadars”.
Aspects of Nuclear Power
1. Nuclear Reactor Hazards : Ongoing dangers of operating nuclear technology in the 21st century
2. Nuclear Power: no solution to climate change
3. Pros and cons of nuclear power
4. The nuclear ’solution’ to climate change
5. The Nuclear crisis in France
Nuclear Deal, ‘National Interest’ and the Indian Left
By P.K. Sundaram, Guest Contributor. Open for comments.
It is the Indian Left’s concurrence, rather than its disagreement, with the idea of a nuclear future (including nuclear weapons) that has made its case weak and inaudible to the larger masses.
Fighting Neoliberalism: Does West Bengal Show the Way?
By Dipankar Basu, Sanhati. Open for comments.
Mindless economic growth through unfettered operations of the “free” market, that is often portrayed in the mainstream media as a panacea for all of India’s economic problems, has now been shown to be seriously flawed as a sensible strategy for economic development. Active, pro-people state intervention through sound policies is essential for making any meaningful dent on the problems facing our country today; and this includes, if historical experience is anything to go by, even the achievement of sustainable, broad-based economic growth. In every known case of successful industrialization and economic development, be it England or Continental Europe or USA or Japan or the East Asian tigers, the State has played a pro-active role in directing investments, mobilizing resources to finance that investment, protecting fledgling industries from undue competition from abroad, and so on; it is, therefore, inconceivable that any state, or the country for that matter, can make that transition without State intervention through effective policies for agriculture and industry. State governments subscribing to this viewpoint would claim to have put this political philosophy into practice, especially the one in West Bengal.
Behind the IAEA Safeguards Agreement: What the Nuclear Deal Entails
By M.V. Ramana, Guest Contributor.
With the submission of the safeguards agreement to the IAEA and the challenge to the government from the left parties, there is now renewed widespread debate about the nuclear agreement with United States. Much of the debate on the deal has been between what can be broadly called the nuclear hawks and the nuclear nationalists. The nuclear hawks believe India’s nuclear programme is a great success and more than able to take care of itself. They see the deal as imposing unnecessary constraints on the programme and making more difficult the creation of the large nuclear arsenal, including thermonuclear weapons (hydrogen bombs), that they believe is essential for India to be a ‘great power.’
The Indo-US Nuclear Pact and the Hoax of Nuclear Power
The Indo-US Nuclear Pact and the Hoax of Nuclear Power - By Dipanjan Rai Chaudhuri
India’s Nuclear History: A Brief Outline
Choosing the Wrong Future: The U.S.-India Nuclear Deal - By Andrew Lichterman and M.V. Ramana
Wrong Ends, Means, and Needs: Behind the U.S. Nuclear Deal With India - By Zia Mian and M. V. Ramana
Class Struggle and Resistance in Zimbabwe
1. Revolutionaries, resistance and crisis in Zimbabwe – Munyaradzi Gwisai
2. His Excellency Comrade Robert: How Mugabe’s ZANU clique rose to power – Stephen O’Brien
3. No to a government of national unity! Only united mass action will defeat Mugabe! – International Socialist Organisation of Zimbabwe
Click here to read Class Struggle & Resistance in Zimbabwe [PDF, 400 KB] »
Liberalism Betrayed? The Maoist Electoral Victory in Nepal
By Saroj Giri, Sanhati. Open for comments.
The workers chanted “Allende, the people are defending you: hit the reactionaries hard.” The mood of the masses was militant. They were waiting for a lead that never came. - Tariq Ali, Allende’s Chile
Is the Maoist victory in the Constituent Assembly elections in Nepal a challenge to the liberal consensus and hegemony or is it its expansion, or worse, its intensification, co-opting the Maoists in the process? It could be either, mostly depending on which way events unfold in the coming days. The ‘meaning’ of the Maoist victory calls for a critical examination even as it promises an interesting and politically salient expose of the intricacies and dangers of trying to beat liberal democracy in its own game. Liberals, both left-wing and right-wing ones, have welcomed the Maoist victory though with caution and sometimes clenching their teeth, as a victory of the ballot over the bullet and a step forward for democracy and peace in Nepal. Those on the revolutionary left have however hardly allowed their pleasant surprise at the results to underestimate the enormous risks of ‘right-wing deviation’ and capitulation that the present path entails for the Maoists.
The May 2008 Pogroms: xenophobia, evictions, liberalism, and democratic grassroots militancy in South Africa
By Richard Pithouse, Guest Contributor. Durban, 16 June 2008.
This essay examines the issues of xenophobia in present-day South Africa, in the light of the riots of May 2008. It starts by looking at eviction in the Harry Gwala settlement and the role of various poor people’s movements like Abahlali baseMjondolo, Anti-Eviction Campaign, and the Landless People’s Movement. It then looks at the riots, making the point that most areas under the control of militant organisations of the poor that have been in serious conflict with the state had no violence. The essay evaluates the ideas of Michael Neocosmos in theorizing xenophobia, coming to the conclusion that “For Neocosmos xenophobia and authoritarianism are a continuation of apartheid oppression that are, in the end, a product of liberalism. He proposes, against the state centric politics of liberalism, a recovery of popular emancipatory politics…[it] is the practical politics that was able to defend and shelter people targeted in the May pogroms, and has previously, although covertly, offered the same protection from the state…”
A man-made famine - India and the world in the Great Hunger of 2008
1. India’s Emerging Food Security Crisis: The Consequences of the Neoliberal Assault on the Public Distribution System - Analytical Monthly Review
2. A man-made famine - Raj Patel, The Guardian
3. The World Food Crisis: Sources and Solutions - Fred Magdoff, Monthly Review
4. Manufacturing a Food Crisis - Walden Bellow, The Nation
5. Global food crisis: ‘The greatest demonstration of the historical failure of the capitalist model’ - Ian Angus, Socialist Voice
6. Soaring prices are causing hunger around the world - Washington Post Editorial
7. The World’s Growing Food-Price Crisis - Time magazine
Corporate encroachment and the Panchayat elections: A rural montage
By Shamik Sarkar, Sanhati. Open for comments.
I. Beliya village, Haruda, and promises of development
II. Singur, its sharecroppers and laborers, and the Opposition
III. Corporate hands in rural Bengal
Human Rights Organization Masum under attack for coordinating People’s Tribunal on Torture
June 12, 2008
Manabadhikar Suraksha Mancha (MASUM) had organised a People’s Tribunal on Torture (PTT) on 9-10 June. The police have started a case against MASUM claiming the tribunal to be illegal. On June 12 a huge police force raided MASUM’s office (26 Guitendal Lane, Howrah 711101). To protest against this, a meeting has been planned at MASUM’s office, today, on 13 June at 4pm. Please come and send this news to all.
Detailed report on incident from The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders.
A brief overview of the Indian poverty debate
By Alita Nandi, Sanhati. Open for comments.
Click here to read the technical version of this article [PDF, English, 120KB] »
In the early 1990s various liberalisation policies had been introduced in India and India had started to experience higher growth rates (compared to pre-liberalisation period). The official poverty estimates published by the Planning Commission showed a decline in absolute poverty levels from 36% in 1993-94 to 26% in 1999-00. The question that became important at this juncture was, “Did the advantages of this high economic growth reach all echelons of society, in particular the ‘poor’?” And so the official reports at this time showing a reduction in absolute poverty levels created a stir. Some old issues about poverty measurement and some new ones were brought into the foreground and heavily debated and discussed. Here I attempt to trace out the key issues of this debate.
Disadvantaged Social Classes in the Panchayat system: Social Democratic Half-truths
By Dipankar Basu, Sanhati. Open for Comments.
In a recent article in Macroscan, Jayati Ghosh (JG hereafter) has argued that West Bengal is a “pioneering state” with regard to panchayati raj institutions and other measures aimed at decentralization of state power in India. The author shows that when one uses the correct index in the analysis, these conclusions vanish into thin air - of the states studied, Maharashtra, for example, outperforms West Bengal in participation of disadvantaged classes in Panchayats, even though it has never had the benefit of a progressive, left-wing government. The author suggests that this may be due to a vibrant culture of grassroots social and political activism, nurtured and led in no small measure by the radical left.
Talk To Naxals; Focus On Development, Land Reform
By Suhit Sen, The Statesman
A team of experts constituted by the Planning Commission has cottoned on to something the Prime Minister doesn’t seem to comprehend. It has pointed out that Left-wing extremism is not just - we could go further and say not at all - a law-and-order problem. It is a phenomenon that arises from a complete lack of development, desperate poverty and the dehumanisation that arises from it, and injustice and inequality. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh does not agree, of course - not long ago he had characterised extremism as the most virulent disease that afflicted India’s body politic and Naxals as the Public Enemy Number 1. He should take time off his admittedly onerous duties to pore over the report.
On the Naxalite Movement: A Report with a Difference
An EPW commentary by Sumanta Banerjee on the recent Planning Commission Report, “which while meticulously arranging the latest facts and figures, rigorously examines the causes of the continuing economic exploitation and social discrimination in the adivasi and dalit-inhabited areas even after 60 years of independence. It is significant that this particular expert group was set up by the government in May 2006, in the background of increasing Naxalite activities in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Jharkhand and Orissa.”
Tumi Maharaj Sadhu hole Aaj! - Real estate land-acquisition in HindMotors
Leaflet from Gana Udyog
B.L.R.O. Srirampore: I won’t commit this to paper. However, there is one set of rules for common people, another for the Birlas. I can’t do much from my chair. We are servants who obey government directives. Decisions come from much higher up.
(1) Land-acquisition in HindMotors for real-estate: A Timeline
(2) Background
Panchayat Election 2008 results and the future of the CPIM
By Pinaki Mitra, Sanhati. Open for comments.
This article analyses the reactions of the CPIM leadership to the recent election reversals, gleaning from the reactions certain classic maladies of the Party itself. It then looks back at the CPIM’s history of compromises, ending with the dilemmas it now confronts.
People strike back at CPIM’s neoliberal policies: Tremor after tremor at the Panchayat Elections
Panchayat Elections 2008 Final Tally:
Panchayat Samiti: Total - 329. LF - 189, Opposition - 131, No Result - 9.
Gram Panchayat: Total - 3220. LF - 1585, Opposition - 1498, No Result - 137.
Brutalized Singur and Nandigram vote out CPIM’s anti-people policies
Enemies of the State - Women and men who choose the margins
Enemies of the State: Women and men who choose the margins - By Ashok Mitra
Mumbai’s Rebels: Those Who Couldn’t Remain Unmoved. Profiles of Anuradha Ghandy, Arun Ferreira, Vernon Gonsalves, Shridhar Shrinivasan - By Bernard D’Mello
Nandigram from May 5-11, 2008 - APDR report
Factsheet on incidents regarding Nandigram from May 5 to 11, 2008 - APDR report
Government vs. CRPF: Lakshman Seth and his arm-twisting - May 12, 2008
Nandigram on the eve of the Panchayet Elections - A MASUM report
May 10, 2008. Click here for a cartoon of today’s Nandigram!
On getting information of the continuing disturbances and police inaction in Nandigram, our fact finding team reached violence-torn Nandigram today and has gathered shocking information from the villagers. Since last night musclemen and goons alleged to be supporters of the largest ruling party CPI(M) flaunting red flags resorted to bloody violence in the area. These miscreants snatched away voter identity cards of many villagers and beat them mercilessly even on the mere suspicion of not being supporters of the ruling party.
They insist your show must be cancelled! - cultural coercion in a post-Nandigram Bengal
By Tapas Sinha. Translated by Suvarup Saha, Sanhati
The phonecall came on the 10th of April. One of the organizers of the Champdanga Theatre Festival was on the line. On the receiving end was thespian Koushik Sen, who has been active in the civil society movement of Nandigram.
Mahamichhil for Nandigram and reflections on the people’s movement
Kolkata witnessed another Mahamichhil on May 9, 2008. To (a) protest against the reign of terror unleashed by the CPI(M) on the eve of the panchayat elections, aimed at cowing down voters all over the state, and (b) especially to condemn the atrocities being perpetrated by CPI(M) workers in collusion with the state police in Nandigram.
Who is Ajay TG? Political arrests and the tightening noose
Update May 12, 2008: PUDR condemnation statement, Petition of solidarity
The People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) strongly condemns the arrest of Ajay TG, widely recognized film maker, journalist and human rights activist by the Chhattisgarh police in Raipur on 4 May 2008 and calls for his immediate release.
Bondimukti Committee members arrested for protesting political arrests
Bondimukti Committee members protesting against political arrests were attacked by police and have been fasting at College Square, Kolkata, from May 6 2008 in protest.
No choice for forgotten Santhals in Bengal
By Shyam Sundar Roy
About 500 voters, belonging to over 160 Santhal families living under Shiromoni gram panchayat in Midnapore Sadar block, do not know which party to vote for in the ensuing panchayat elections, as they say none of them are ready to help them.
From Chhattisgargh to Manipur: The many faces of Salwa Judum
Manipur will arm its civilians to fight militants: A Salwa Judum in the making? - May 3, 2008
Chhattisgargh’s purification hunt - By Shubhranshu Choudhary
4 farmers commit suicide everyday in Chhattisgarh - the highest in the country - By Shubhranshu Choudhary
The Panchayat elections and self-empowerment of the rural poor
This is a translated version of a leaflet from the Krishak Committee (KC), written and distributed at the advent of Panchayat elections in West Bengal. The Sharamik Sangram Committee (SSC), a small fraternal organisation of the Krishak Commitee, leads the union at Hindustan Lever.
My Name is Radharani Ari and This is How My Consciousness Was Raised.
Honourable Chief Minister, I am the same Radharani Ari of Nandigram. How many more times will your cadres rape me?
Yes, I am the same person. The same Radharani Ari, resident of Nandigram Block, village – Gokulpur. Whether or not you remember me, I am not too sure, although by now the entire state of West Bengal has heard about me. I did not catch the limelight due to some creditable act of mine but on account of my misfortunes. I am a housewife of, by now infamous, Nandigram.
Looking back at Khejuri: Our men, their men – the straw men
This eyewitness account appeared in November 2007, and presents an alternative first-hand view of the highly publicised Khejuri camps. It has been translated by Atreyi Dasgupta, Sanhati.
…One of the little ones, when asked his name, immediately parroted, “We need industry, or else how can we have development”. He was ten years old. His sister was just beside him, and she said, “We don’t know how long we have to stay in this condition. If we ask these people, they say, everything will go back to normal in a few days. But where is that happening? You know didi, our friends in Nandigram told us that they have resumed their studies. What will we do?”
Will the “Great Indian Middle Class” show up, please?
By Partho Sarathi Ray, Sanhati. Comments enabled
Where is the “Great Indian Middle Class”? Where are those conspicuously-consuming, frequently-flying, gizmo-toting, big car-driving, globalized offsprings of our jet-setting “new economy”? Don’t we see them all around us: living in highrises with blue-tiled swimming pools, with people living a few miles away getting water once in three days, shopping in glittering malls built on the land of evicted slums, driving around in Toyotas and Chevrolets on roads choked with traffic? From all accounts, and appearances, we have reached the heady days when the Indian middle class has finally arrived. They are the ones who supposedly constitute one of the biggest markets in the world, for whom multinational corporations are falling over one another to invest in India, for whom our governments’ policies are directed, for whom roads and airports are built, for they ARE the “people” of India. This great middle class is our hope, the engine of growth for our economy. So - where is it?
Does Land Still Matter?
By D. Bandyopadhyay
The national economy is growing at double digit rates but neither industry nor non-agricultural activities in rural India provide livelihood for millions of rural workers. The annual growth of agricultural output decelerated from 3.08 per cent pa during 1980-81 to 1991-92 to 2.38 per cent pa during 1992-93 to 2003-04. It is this failure that underlies the spurt in rural violence that has highlighted once again the issue of the poors’ access to land, water, and forests. It is gradually being recognised that further deterioration of economic, social, and political conditions of the rural poor can neither be arrested nor reversed without a significant policy shift towards a comprehensive land reform program.
Predatory Growth
By Amit Bhaduri
Over the last two decades or so, the two most populous, large countries in the world, China and India, have been growing at rates considerably higher than the world average. In recent years the growth rate of national product of China has been about three times, and that of India approximately two times that of the world average. This has led to a clever defence of globalisation by a former chief economist of IMF (Fisher, 2003). Although China and India feature as only two among some 150 countries for which data are available, he reminded us that together they account for the majority of the poor in the world. This means that, even if the rich and the poor countries of the world are not converging in terms of per capita income, the well above the average world rate of growth rate of these two large countries implies that the current phase of globalisation is reducing global inequality and poverty at a rate as never before.
Sibpur BESU - Coercion to join the SFI - Terror and the administration-police-criminal nexus
The political landscape in colleges across West Bengal is barren - the SFI wins mainly uncontested almost everywhere, through an intricate mechanism of nepotism, selection and campus terror.
The students of Sibpur BESU are facing an assault of the college administration- local goons-police. The Vice-chancellor Nikhil Ranjan Banerjea is orchestrating the assault, the aim of which is to terrorize students into joining or supporting the students’ wing of the major ruling party. It is not an accident that all those who are being arrested by the police are distinguished by their non-allegiance to this students’ organisation.
Stages of Revolution in the International Working Class Movement
By Dipankar Basu, Sanhati (Open for comments)
This article attempts to throw some light on the following two questions: (1) How does the classical Marxist tradition conceptualize the relationship between the two stages of revolution: democratic and the socialist? (2) Does the democratic revolution lead to deepening and widening capitalism? Is capitalism necessary to develop the productive capacity of a society? The answer to the first question emerges from the idea of the “revolution of permanence” proposed by Marx in 1850, accepted, extended and enriched by Lenin as “uninterrupted revolution” and simultaneously developed by Trotsky as “permanent revolution”. This theoretical development was brilliantly put into practice by Lenin between the February and October revolutions in Russia in 1917. The answer to the second question emerges clearly from the debates on the national and colonial question in the Second Congress of the Third International in 1920. From this debate what emerges is the idea of the democratic revolution led by the proletariat as the start of the process of non-capitalist path of the development of the productive capacity of society, moving towards the future socialist revolution. Rather than deepening and widening capitalism, the democratic revolution under the proletariat leads society in the opposite direction, in a socialist, i.e., proletarian direction. Promoting capitalism is not necessary for the development of the productive capacity of a country.
Civil Liberties under Attack: The “Maoist” Scare and Mithu Ghosh
Today we are witnessing the sharpest assault on democratic rights since Emergency. And as before, the reason is an upsurge from below, in the current case in resistance to the imposition of neoliberal policies. A most ominous event is the recent arrest, by the police of CPI(M)-led left front government, of Mithu Ghosh, an activist of Sharamik Sangram Committee (SSC) and Krishak Committee (KC), along with a senior leader of Nandigram movement and his son on 12th February, 2008 from Sonachuda, Nandigram West Bengal. An allegation of Maoist link under section 120B, 121, 121A and 153 of IPC was charged.
You see, we do back calculations here - Rural employment and Panchayet realities in Bengal
By Swati Bhattacharya. Translated by Debarshi Das, Sanhati
We want work, work, work, work and work. - Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, Chief Minister, West Bengal
Anukul Das was from Sonaga village, Gosaba Gram Panchayat (South 24 Parganas District, the Sunderban region). He demanded the right to work for minimum hundred days from Panchayat. Presently he is in the Andamans seeking work. His wife Shikha Das says, he got only nine days of work in two years. So, he went to submit the application for unemployment dole with some other villagers. Panchayat did not want to accept to application, hence they forcibly submitted it. A few days later, works started in the area, and they did not find any. They were allotted works in Rangabelia, about four kilometres away. Cost of travelling to and fro is twenty two rupees per day. One hour by boat, one more on foot. It was absurd to accept such a proposal. Panchayat members had told them openly: you complained about us, we will provide no work to you.
On the CPIM’s draft political resolution
Capitalistic socialism: New Oxymoron - By Sankar Ray
Irony of recent history - A critique of the CPIM’s draft political resolution - By Sankar Ray
Citizens’ Report on Nandigram with specific stress on gender violence
As a result of an initiative by women’s groups, organizations and individuals, an 11-member team of citizens from Kolkata comprising teachers, social activists, researchers and students visited Nandigram on November 24, 2007. Concerned about the repeated disruption of peace in the region, the team decided to go to the affected areas and talk to the local people with the objectives of expressing solidarity with the survivors of violence, documenting people’s needs in the current circumstances, and drawing up recommendations. One of the chief aims was also to investigate the nature and range of sexual violence and its use as a political weapon, towards pre-empting further such occurrences of violence against women.
Click here to read Independent Citizens’ Report on Nandigram [.doc, English 330KB] »
Nude mentally challenged patients - Bengal’s public healthcare at a time of private bonanza
It has been argued that big capital investment in West Bengal “creates a wonderful opportunity to make much larger investments in public education, healthcare, public transport, environmental protection, and other public goods.” (Amartya Sen). On the other hand, the argument has been made that a government with a neo-liberal mindset does not care about people who, because of their purchasing power, are outside the market. If the government has money, it will make malls and flyovers, at the cost of public health. The problem is not one of intention but definition.
The situation in a state mental hospital, a mere 6 km from the seat of government at Writers Building in Kolkata, displays the typically dysfunctional nature of public healthcare, amidst all the rhetoric of development.
Singur brutalizer gets medal, cadres get Nandigram land, cash incentives for officials: Laissez-faire in action
Friedmanite neo-liberalism advocates minimization of the involvement of the state. In reality, neo-liberal policies are imposed and facilitated by the state - from nepotism and incentives to disappearances and massacres.
1. Singur: IPS officer accused of torture awarded Seva medal by Chief Minister - March 3, 2008
2. Bengal govt to distribute vested Nandigram land to party supporters - February 27, 2008
3. Cash Incentives for Officials Who Take Initiative for Land Acquisition - February 2, 2008
Economic Growth: A Meaningless Obsession?
By Amit Bhaduri, B.N. Ganguly Memorial Lecture; CSDS, Delhi, November 2006.
We are living in India at a time when the media is continuously transmitting confusing, even conflicting, economic signals. If we restrict ourselves to the English language print as well as electronic media, our comfort level is likely to be high. The economy is growing at a high rate, the stock market is booming, our foreign reserve is at a comfortably high level, and freer trade is bringing to our doors a variety of goods and services simply unimaginable even a couple of decades ago as a mark of the benefits of globalization. What is more, we are daily reminded that India is poised economically and politically as an emergent world power.
Dankuni - Resistance to Massive Land Acquisition for Real Estate
The “development” process in West Bengal is taking place in a two stage mechanism - conversion of agricultural land into industrial land, and conversion of industrial land into real estate. Land acquisition in Dankuni clearly demonstrates how the aim of the “development” process is really the extraction of maximum profits by private enities from resources, in this case, land. Real estate provides the maximum profit, therefore functioning factories in Dankuni are being shut down to acquire land for a housing project by the powerful DLF group.
Agro-Science Fair in Bolagarh, West Bengal
The ‘Agricultural Science Fair 2008’ was organized by Bolagarh Gana-Bijnan Samiti on 25-26 January, 2008 at the Jeerat Colony High School in the Hooghly district of West Bengal, India. Extensive discussions and programs were carried out on the role of multinationals like Monsanto in promoting genetically modified seeds, pesticides, and fertilizers. Alternative bio-friendly methods of agriculture were discussed.
Anti-POSCO rally and program in Kolkata
February 13, 2008. Kolkata: A rally from College Square to Utkal Bhavan (an office of the Orissa govornment) took place and was followed by a mass-deputation in Utkal Bhavan against the proposed POSCO project in Jagatsingpur district, Orissa. The program was organised by 18 organizations. After a demonstration in front of Utkal Bhavan the protesters conveyed their solidarity to the POSCO movement in the form of a memorandum to the government of Orissa. The authorities at Utkal Bhavan received the memorandum on behalf of the government of Orissa. Afterwards, anti-POSCO activists including Biswajit Roy shared their experiences with political organisations and human rights activists at the Indian Radical Humanist Associations Hall in a discussion called Posco Ebong Tar Protirodh. Activists involved in the protest movement against illegal and extensive stone quarrying in Asansol and Birbhum were also present to express their solidarity to the people of Orissa and speak about the conditions in the regions where they work.
The 18 organisations which organised the program were: APDR, Chhatra-Chhatri Sanhati Mancha, Little Magazine Samannay Mancha, Lok Seba Sangh, Nandigram Ganahatya Birodhi Prochar Udyog, Sahanagarikder Jukta Mancha, Hawker Sangram Committee, TASAM, USDF, NAPM, Sanhati Udyog, PaschimBanga Khetmazoor Samiti, Ganamukti Parishad, Janasangharsha Samiti, West Bengal Gandhi Peace Foundation, Bondi Mukti Committee, West Bengal Government Employees Union, and National Fishworkers Federation.
Malnutrition death in Singur and the Nano-flyover syndrome
1. February 10, 2008 : Kalipada Majhi, a sharecropper rendered jobless in Singur after land acquisition, died from malnutrition.
2. In an article called The Nano-flyover Syndrome, Sunita Narain examines what subsidises the cheap Nano, and who actually pays.
Tall Claims: Employment generated by Haldia Petrochemicals
By Dipanjan Rai Chaudhuri and Purnendu Chakraborty
These articles calculate the actual employment figure in downstream units of HPL for 2005 to be less than 19,301. We are being asked to believe that, in 2 years, the figure has increased from less than 19,301 to 50,000+89,900, an increase of more than 7-fold. The figure of 89,900 is also suspiciously close to 89,895, which is the employment figure for ALL new projects implemented in the state between 1991-2002 (Source: Frontline). It seems that either 89,000 is a favourite number, or that all employment in the state has come from HPL.
Burma’s Freedom Fighters: From Port Blair to a Kolkata Jail
February 4th, 2008, marks the tenth anniversary of the illegal detention of 34 Burmese freedom fighters in Bengal. The Solidarity Committee for Burma’s Freedom Fighters, whose members include Ashok Mitra, Lakshmi Sehgal, and others, carried out a Dharna in protest.
Personal accounts of prisoners and press release of the protest are included.
Neoliberalism, the U.S. economic crisis, and the phases of capitalism
Neoliberal Globalization Is Not the Problem - By Rick Wolff
2008: The Demise of Neoliberal Globalization - By Immanuel Wallerstein
Putting the U.S. Economic Crisis in Perspective - By Leo Panitch
Some critiques of CPI(M)’s 19th Congress and stance on capitalism
On Jyoti Basu’s Embrace of Capitalism as the Only Road to Industrialisation - By P.J. James
CPI(M)’s 19th Congress: The Social Democrats Stand Further Exposed - By K.N. Ramachandran
Study on Closed and Re-opened Tea Gardens in North Bengal
By Anuradha Talwar, Debashish Chakraborty, Sarmishtha Biswas
This study, dated September 2005, was conducted in the wake of the crisis in the tea industry in the Doars between 2002-2004.
Contents: (1) Conditions in re-opened gardens - wages, ration, hours of work, occupational health and safety, drinking water, electricity, housing, transport for school-children, medical facilities, creches, maternity benefits, fringe benefits, latrines and urinals (2) Conditions in closed and abandoned gardens (3) Workers’ dues - tabled by tea estates, categorized under provident fund, gratuity, salary, and total dues (4) Opening agreements (5) Likely non-viability of plantations (6) Role of unions - CITU, UTUC, INTUC, WBTGEA (7) Role of government (8) Plantations Labour Act, 1951
Click here to read study on closed and re-opened ta gardens in North Bengal [PDF, English, 400 KB] »
ShramikShakti Newsletter - January-February 2008
Contents: (1) SEZs stopped in Goa (2) CPI(M) exults over the Nano (3) BJP in power in Gujrat and Himachal - effects on state and national politics (4) Dankuni - huge land acquisition plans (5) Civil society, Karl Marx, and the CPI(M) (6) Economic development and employment generation - a debate (part 2) (7) Vote-based front or unity of struggle? (8) Pollution of drinking water - in search of the source (9) Singur and the High Court verdict (10) Ganashakti’s hypocrisy (11) GM crops - agricultural science meet in Bolagarh (12) Bolagarh - lessons from the polls (13) Movement in Kandi - protests against corruption in public distribution system and cal for permanent flood resistance measures (14) Benazir’s death and contemporary Pakistan (15) HindMotors and the recent elections
Click here to read ShramikShakti January-February 2008 [PDF, Bengali, 612 KB] »
Buddha Weeps in Jadugoda
Click here to watch documentary: Buddha weeps in Jadugoda [Youtube video, six parts]
Click here for photos of affected children
Ragi Kana Ko Bonga Buru (Buddha weeps in Jadugoda) documents the devastating effects of uranium mining by Uranium Corporation of India Limited at Jadugoda, in Jharkhand. For the last thirty years, radioactive waste has been dumped into the rice fields of Adivasis. The complete disregard of the authorities to radioactive waste management rules wreaks havoc on the daily lives of villagers and children, with genetic deformities becoming quite common.
About director Shriprakash Prakash: Shriprakash has directed and produced many documentary films during the last 15 years. He is also the chief co-ordinator of Kritika, a group working in the Jharkhand region since 1990 in the areas of culture and communication. With his films he has attempted to capture the struggles and aspirations of indigenous local communities in Bihar and Jharkhand, and to give them a voice.
Kalboishekhi in Poush: The Aftermath of Nandigram
By Garga Chatterjee, Sanhati
The events in Nandigram have possibly changed the trajectory of contemporary political discourse for good. West Bengal’s “leftist” government started a policy of forcibly acquiring land from peasants, dependents on soil and other communities that live off the soil. Incident after incident followed where discontented locals spontaneously organized, into Krishi Jami Raksha Committee, Bhumi Uchhed Protirodh Committee, Uchhed Birodhi Committee, and more.
What the myopic can’t see
For some time Mr Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee has been advising the Bhumi Uchched Pratirodh Committee to disband the organisation since the state government has “abandoned for good” the plan to acquire farmland at Nandigram, while the outfit’s nomenclature means it was formed for resistance against displacement from land.
Forest Rights Act implementation in Bengal - Front allies join protests
A The Telegraph report, January 9, 2008
The RSP and the Forward Bloc have joined NGOs in alleging violation of forest villagers’ rights following a government notification declaring vast swathes of the Sunderbans and the Buxa Tiger Reserve “critical wildlife habitats”. It has, they said, made hundreds of forest villagers vulnerable to the threat of eviction, though the CPM had been championing their cause at the Centre.
Work for Everyone and Amartya Sen
By Dipanjan Rai Chaudhuri. Translated by Kuver Sinha, Sanhati
On the whole, Amartya Sen has distanced his support from the West Bengal government’s disregard for peoples’ suffering and the protest that has emerged in its wake, its shameless espousal of SEZs and its brokering of land for big business. At a time when people of the state are registering their dissatisfaction and protest in the face of daily harrassment from the biggest party of the government, even such indirect criticism from Sen is helpful. But the fact remains that Amartya Sen is a supporter of the West Bengal government’s basic industrial policy. If we strip away all the embellishment, the logic is “to remove poverty, we must increase income”. This “income”, however, is the neo-liberal economist’s “income” – comprising, in the example of the Singur factory, the Tatas’ profits, bank interest, government revenue, and, only as a fourth component, the wages of the employees. In an unequal society like India, an increase in this “income” may leave poverty unaffected or even in an enhanced state…
Goa scraps all SEZs, Center says not so fast!
PANAJI: The Goa government on (1/1/2008) decided to scrap all Special Economic Zone (SEZ) projects in its bid to end the long-drawn public agitation which at one stage threatened to jeopardise New Year celebrations.
The Centre on Wednesday questioned the authority of the Goa government to recommend scrapping of notified special economic zones (SEZs). After a meeting of the board of approval (BoA) commerce secretary G.K.Pillai said: “There is no provision under law (for states) to recommend de-notification. They have no locus standi to withdraw the notifications to the SEZs.”
Press Conference: Recognition of Forest Rights Act and its sabotage - rallies in North Bengal
Nagarik Mancha and NFPFW invite you to a meeting at the Calcutta Press Club on Wednesday 9 January 2008 between 3pm and 5pm to discuss and to develop a strategy for a broader campaign for forest people’s rights.
How long will a Government that talks about people’s rights keep on betraying the interests of more than a crore of forest-dwellers? How long tribals and other forest dwellers will be treated as intruders, thieves and destroyer of national property in their own forests? We solicit your support in this Campaign which seeks to find an answer to these and many other questions.
Binayak Sen - A mother’s appeal
By Anasuya Sen
I am a woman in my eighties. When we were young, people were inspired by the examples of karmayogis who were patriotic, motivated by ideals of service, wise and virtuous. We considered ourselves blessed if we could follow in their footsteps. I had so far been a silent spectator to the injustice and violence that pervades our free democracy today, but only because I was personally untouched by it. But now, as an aged mother, and outraged by the blows of injustice, I wish to break my silence. Inconsolable in my pain at the age of eighty-one years, I now wish to make a humble appeal to the people of free, democratic India.
ShramikShakti Newsletter, December 2007
Contents: (1) Brutal assault on Adivasi tea-garden workers in Assam (2) The 29th November attack on Anti-Posco Movement (3) Buddha at it again - says he’s wrong (4) An interview with Avash Munshi of SSKU on the upcoming elections at Hindmotors (5) On Taslima Nasreen (6) Economic development and employment generation - a debate (7) Nandigram and the Nuclear Deal - an understanding between Congress and CPI(M) (8) Nandigram’s effect clear in Rail Union Elections (9) Cancel SEZ, Posco go back! - ShramikShakti’s interview of Abhay Sahu (10) Nandigram will hold its head high - an eye-wtiness report from the relief camps (11) CPI(M) attacks peaceful anti-acquisition rally in Birshibpur (12) Under U.S. supervision - whither Pakistan? (13) France - workers go on unprecedented strikes
Click here to read ShramikShakti, December 2007 [PDF, Bengali, 720 KB] »
Democracy at Gunpoint - A Report on the Repression of Anti-Posco Movement as of 5th December 2007
This report, and many other resources on Posco, are available from the Environmental Protection Group, Orissa
Contents: (1) Message from Rajendra Sadangi, Convenor, Loka Pakhya (2) Summary of situation (3) Detailed Report: (a) Government of Orissa’s moves (b) Local Administration’s moves (c) Police moves (d) Posco’s moves (e) Situation in Dhinkia (f) Situation in Nuagaon (g) Situation in Gadakujanga (h) Political Responses Against The Govt’s Moves (i) Status of the Movement (j) Overall Situation (k) Demands
Rape and its proof – And that’s how life is
An op-ed by Jagori Bandyopadhyay in Anandabazar Patrika, December 13, 2007. Translated by Suvarup Saha, Sanhati.
We need proof. The government does not take any action until there is sufficient evidence to prove the crime. This is how it should be; this is how it is. Plain words. Plain, yet not so simple. The government will act once it has enough evidence to justify its action. Very good. But the journey from accusations to establishment of crime in the eyes of the law is not a trivial process. Can the Government shrug off its responsibility in ensuring that this process, the journey itself, is executed in a free, fair and lawful manner? These thoughts occurred to me as I was listening to the charges and counter-charges that accompanied the accusations of mass rapes in Nandigram.
Land Acquisition Bill and the Panchayet: things to expect and fear. A case study on Salboni
By Debarshi Das, Sanhati
When the government is not in the scene does the acquisition process become hostage to unwilling, ignorant peasants and scheming speculators? Do the entire paraphernali