Taking a cue from Trinamool’s playbook, the Bharatiya Janata Kisan Morcha (BJKM), a BJP affiliate representing farmers, intends to hold a three-day-long dharna (December 14-16) in Singur, 40 kilometres from Kolkata. BJKM has said that the unwillingness of the ruling Trinamool or the local administration will not deter supporters from holding the programme.
Singur is the location where Tatas had, once, planned their small-car factory, but had to shift out in 2008 after a sustained agitation led by Mamata Banerjee was organised, concerning land acquisition for the factory.
Mahadev Sarkar, state president, BJKM, told Deccan Herald that farmers, especially with limited resources, are not in a good shape. Sarkar claimed that two farmers in the state also died, allegedly by suicide, because of harsh economic conditions.
“The state government is creating obstacles to prevent us from organising our agitation,” Sarkar said. “We have given an intimation to the local police station. We want to do it adjacent to the expressway, for which we are taking approval from the highways authority,” he said.
A delegation representing the farmers’ wing met West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar, on Saturday, to present a memorandum. “All farmers, including potato, paddy, tobacco, silk, flower and vegetable farmers are under severe distress due to the collapse of the government mechanism in the agriculture sector,” the memorandum stated.
It also alleged that “due to heavy rains, potato farmers faced immense difficulties and owing to poor infrastructure, were unable to prevent crop damage”.
State General Secretary of BJP, Sayantan Basu, told Deccan Herald that the issue of the state’s farmers has been raised by the party, already, and the programme is to definitely take place. Sarkar says that Singur has been opted for as it’s the place where the Trinamool came to power talking of farmers and change.
Opting for Singur as its site for the farmers’ protest highlights bigger political trends in the state.
Political analyst Shikha Mukherjee observed: “There seems to be an attempt to politicise the process of industrialisation, something that has happened in Bengal, time and again. The BJP and the Left are advocates of promoting industrialisation of West Bengal.”
Mukherjee added that while the Left is actively interacting with the local population where a mining project is expected to come up, the BJP is talking of farmers in Singur, which was supposed to be a factory site for manufacturing cars.
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