MAMTA, FRIEND OR FOE OF SINGUR FARMERS

MAMTA, FRIEND OR FOE OF SINGUR FARMERS

The Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Bill, 2011 is a political game played by Mamata Bandopadhya, the chief of Trinamool Congress, the ruling party in West Bengal Government of  eastern India. Her very first step after coming to power, is all but to prove to the people that she lived upto the commitment, to return the land to the farmers. To note, the tragic part is that ‘Mamta di’ is no better or above than a political person. Power and power to retain and regain could be the ultimate pleasure. She might not be wearing more than a pair of slippers or draping anything other than a taat saari, but her hunger for power is no less than that of Mahabrata’s Dritarastra or the Libyan president Gaddafi.

The Singur bill is the   card, she played to for gaining power and is playing it to retain and regain it. This bill will bring little satisfaction to the farmers, whose emotions with their ancestral land or farming land were exploited; thus was the result of Singur tragedy, which has gained red pages in history.

The farmers, who have sold their land to the government, will be the real suffers. They have sold away their land for two reasons. I.e. for cash money, secondly for an assurance that at least one member of their family would get employment in the Tata Motors company. There was also a proposal to set up a commercial complex to provide alternative livelihood to land-losers in the vicinity of the project area. Alas! None of these factors bear any hope in today’s Mamta regime. Thus, we see that this section of the farmer’s society is completely shattered. A survey, will surely prove that the money they received have already been spent on their basic needs.

11,00 farmers have sold their land at rate that prevailed 50 years back. Out of 997.17 acres of land acquired, 400 acres will be returned to the 2,200 ‘unwilling farmers’, who did not take any money from the government. Out of these 400 acres of land, the title rights of 244 acres of land were not clear, when the land was acquired by the previous government. Land compensation against the land was not paid because the farmers could not produce papers to support their title claims. Hence, it would be difficult for the state government to ascertain whom to return the 244 acres of land.

According to the bill, land will be returned to those people who did not sell their land and compensation will be given for the last five years that they were not able to use the land. But, what about those people who sold their land for an assured job in the proposed factory. The plant would have initially employed 2,000 persons directly, and later created employment in excess of 10,000 jobs. 767 individuals have been already trained.

 Now, a vital question arises, did Mamta Bandopadhya, the revolutionary chief minister, the self-proclaimed friend of the poor farmers and people, have any plan for these landless farmers