PRAGOTI

A run of devastation called an 'agitation,' has had a temporary triumph. It has wounded the both the prospects of industrial investment in the state and the process of industrialisation.

However, we have not an iota of doubt in our hearts-and-minds that the negative 'agitationists' movement shall be met politically. People must come forward. The campaign-movement that would soon unfurl across the state and in the country must be conducted amidst the people, with the people.

Nirupam Sen, Politburo Member of the CPI(M) and Minister of Industry and Commerce, West Bengal responds after the wind up of the Tata small car project.

Kinjal Ghose brings out the politics of 'apolitics' and opportunist alliances that has characterised the opposition to the Tatas' project in Singur.

Such is the power of the media, that in recent months, the very names of Singur and Nandigram in West Bengal have become synonymous with forcible land acquisition by the state all over India. This is truly remarkable, because in fact no land was ever actually acquired for industrialisation in Nandigram after the violent protests against it. And it is widely acknowledged that the terms of acquisition of the 1000 acres required for the Tata automobile factory in Singur were the most favourable for the peasantry, of any such acquisition across India.

Kolkata, January 9 Even as Tata Motors is ready to unveil its much-hyped small car at the auto-expo in Delhi on Thursday, the state government has quietly started rehabilitating the residents of Singur, including those who lost their land to the company’s small car manufacturing unit there.

On January 7, the government distributed about 14 acres of land (out of a total of 53 acres earmarked for the purpose) among 100 people, a majority of whom were unrecorded bargadars who lost their livelihood as the land they tilled came under the project.