Gorkha leaders to meet Buddhadeb today

KKolkata, May 22 : The leaders of the Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM) will meet West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee here today to discuss about a separate State for Gorkhas comprising Darjeeling, Terai, Dooars and Siliguri.
The leaders of the Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM) will meet West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee here today to discuss about a separate State for Gorkhas comprising Darjeeling, Terai, Dooars and Siliguri. A four-member GJM delegation comprising, Vice President Pradip Pradhan and two central committee members Amar Lama and Anmol Prasad will attend the meeting.According to sources, they will submit the proposed map of Gorkhaland to the Chief Minister and urge him to raise a bill in the State Assembly and send it to the Centre after formally passing and recommending it.The Gorkha people led by the Gorkha National Liberation Front (GNLF) started agitation in early 1980s demanding a separate Gorkhaland state.Subsequently, Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC) was set up under the GNLF supremo Subhash Geishing to administer the hills.The Central Government in 2005 had announced to accord sixth schedule status to the GNLF-led DGHC that would ensure greater autonomy to the governing body.Opposing the sixth schedule status for Darjeeling, the GJM, a rival of GNLF led by new hill leader Bimal Gurung has been demanding Ghising’s resignation and setting up of Gorkhaland state for long.The Communist Government in West Bengal is opposed to the demand for a separate state for the Gorkhas. (ANI)

Nandi Payback CPM bleeds in land-and-minority backlash; loses 3 councils, gains 1

Calcutta, May 21: The Left today suffered the biggest poll jolt since the 2001 Assembly verdict as it lost two districts to Mamata Banerjee and one to the Congress in the panchayat polls, raising the question whether land acquisition for industry was exacting a heavy political cost.
Shaken though it was by the loss of Nandigram-scarred East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas, the CPM announced: “There will be no going back on the policy of industrialisation.”
Murshidabad was its sole — and big — revenge on the Opposition as it won the district back from the Congress, but it had only 13 of the 17 zilla parishads (district councils) in the bag compared with 15 in 2003.
Land acquisition for industry was an issue in the two south Bengal districts of East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas, though not in North Dinajpur, where the Left could not forge unity among its constituents.
In East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas, both heavily minority-dominated districts, fears over losing land took a religious colour, fed by the discontent among the minorities brought out by the Sachar Committee report.
East Midnapore gained notoriety because of the prolonged violence in Nandigram over an aborted land acquisition attempt while South 24-Parganas will be the site for large projects to be built by the Indonesian Salim group.
In neighbouring North 24-Parganas, which the Salim road project will touch and where notices for land acquisition have been issued, the Left won by the thin margin of three, with Mamata’s score having soared from two to 16.

The results in West Midnapore, Burdwan, Bankura and Purulia, where too large tracts of land have been taken over for industry, are a warning against jumping to the conclusion that the panchayat verdict is a slap in the face of the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee government’s industrialisation drive.
In all four districts, the CPM has not only won but has posted huge victories, even improving on its 2003 tally in some cases. The difference, however, is that in these four districts, there was no controversy over acquiring land.
Chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee refused comment on the results.
Benoy Konar, the CPM state secretariat member who addressed the media today instead of the party’s Bengal secretary Biman Bose, said: “It will be simplistic to infer that people voted against industrialisation. We failed to convince farmers in these two districts (East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas) where people have apprehensions about losing land.”
The apprehensions overrode expectations of benefits from the showpiece Tata small-car project at Singur, where the CPM lost all three zilla parishad seats to Trinamul. In 2003, the CPM had won the three but had lost the Assembly seat to Trinamul in 2006.
If Nandigram led to the loss of East Midnapore for the CPM, the party won Hooghly, of which Singur is a part, though not with the ease of 2003. Trinamul opened its account in the district, grabbing 11 seats.

Mamata was distributing rasogollas after the results became known, finding a reason to smile after two consecutive routs in the 2004 Lok Sabha and the 2006 Assembly polls, which halved her 2001 MLA count of 60.
“Jene rakhoon, etai CPM-er sesher suru (Make no mistake, this is the beginning of the CPM’s end),” she said.
“In 2003, we had only 16 zilla parishad seats. But this time we have been able to wrest not only two zilla parishads on our own but even won over 120 zilla parishad seats.”
Mamata interpreted the results as a “mandate against state-sponsored terrorism”, but added that the people had also voiced their protest against the move to “grab farmland from the poor in the name of industrialisation”.
The chief minister can expect more trouble arising out of this conclusion for his industrialisation programme. Trinamul said it would not “allow the administration to take away an inch of land from unwilling farmers”.
Although the Congress lost Murshidabad, the victory in North Dinajpur was being seen as an achievement for Priya Ranjan Das Munshi, the Union minister who had called on Congress supporters to vote for the strongest candidate in their areas, even if it meant backing Trinamul.
If this led to an informal coming together of anti-Left forces in North Dinajpur, the Left itself was bitterly divided in the district, as it was also in South 24-Parganas. (The Telegraph)

‘Surprised’ CPM swears by industry Finger at farmer fear & front rift

Calcutta, May 21: The CPM today said it had no inkling that it would lose the whole of East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas, on the other bank of the Hooghly, despite the violence and resistance over land acquisition in Nandigram.
Neither was it prepared for a wafer-thin victory in North 24-Parganas, where resistance to land acquisition had been snowballing over the Salim Group’s expressway project nor for the sizeable erosion in its support base in five other districts in south Bengal.
“We were apprehensive about the outcome in North Dinajpur and confident of regaining Murshidabad. But we had no idea that we would lose East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas,’’ party state secretariat member Benoy Konar said.
However, he shrugged off the loss of three zilla parishad seats in Singur, saying they were part of a Trinamul stronghold that voted its candidate to victory in the 2006 Assembly polls.
Although the Left Front election manifesto had played down the row over industrialisation and land acquisition, Konar admitted that the farmers’ fear of losing land had taken its toll in East Midnapore and South 24-Parganas.
“It’s proved that our cadres had got alienated from farmers to some extent and failed to fathom their grievances and pain. The Opposition fanned the fear psychosis,’’ he added.
It was another matter that the CPM state committee had failed to “review” its Nandigram “mistakes”, as called for by the party’s central committee, or censure leaders like Lakhsman Seth for their strong-arm tactics.
The failure ended in the endorsement of the armed recapture of Nandigram by party cadres last November.

Nevertheless, Konar said the party would not go back on industrialisation. “We won’t budge from the path of industrialisation since it will be a betrayal of the people’s mandate. The people of South 24-Parganas and East Midnapore would later realise their folly and appreciate the need for industrialisation.”
If the CPM’s failure to convince voters about its intentions regarding industry led to its setback at some places, the acrimony among front partners like the Forward Bloc and the RSP over industrialisation and land acquisition resulted in the loss of North Dinajpur and South 24-Parganas.
The disunity, which came to the fore over Nandigram, became worse over seat-sharing, leading to mutual bloodletting in South 24-Parganas’ Basanti. “It was not the usual bickering over seats but the political difference among the allies that confused even a section of the Left voters,’’ Konar said.
The allies sounded happy today. “The CPM paid the price for forcibly acquiring land and for ignoring our words of caution. It’s to blame for the disunity among partners. We hope it will change it’s attitude now,’’ PWD minister and RSP leader Kshiti Goswami said.
CPM state secretariat member Madan Ghosh said the government’s land acquisition policy was not to blame, but the manner in which it was executed in Singur and Nandigram.
“The farmers’ apprehensions about losing their land overrode the dreams of industrialisation in some areas. Unlike in Singur and Nandigram, where there were shortcomings in taking people into confidence, we convinced and persuaded the residents of Raghu- nathpur in Purulia and other places in Bankura and Burdwan to part with their land. The acquisition was peaceful and we did well there,” Ghosh said.

In Burdwan’s Salanpur, where Bhushan Steel has proposed a steel plant, in West Midnapore’s Salboni, where Jindal Steel is setting up its plant, and in Raghunathpur, where Jai Balaji and several other companies are investing, the CPM has done well.
“There was no impact of Nandigram or Singur on these places,’’ said Burdwan CPM secretary Amal Haldar.
In Burdwan, where Videocon and Abhijeet Group are setting up their projects and an airport is being built, the CPM has got absolute majority.
Shyam Pandey, the CPM’s Salboni zonal secretary, said: “We were with the people and convinced them about land acquisition. Also, the Jindals have offered an attractive compensation package.”
Manindra Gope, the party’s Purulia district secretariat member, echoed his comrades. “We spoke to the people about the need to acquire land for the steel project and they understood.”(The Telegraph)

Hill council sacks 109 teachers

Darjeeling, May 21: The DGHC has decided to terminate the services of 109 ad-hoc teachers of hill schools with effect from June 1, citing “irregularities in their appointments”.
All the teachers were appointed in January-February 2008, when GNLF chief Subash Ghisingh was still the caretaker administrator of the DGHC.
The termination order, issued by the education department of the council, reads: “As approved by the administrator, DGHC, in the case file collection No IV-9 Secondary Cell/Edu/dt 2.05.08, the services of the following contract teachers are no longer required by the DGHC from 1.6.2008.” The order has been signed on May 17, 2008.
The DGHC has cited Clause 4 of the agreement signed by the teachers — where there is provision for immediate termination of services as and when desired by the council — for the decision.
“The teachers were appointed in January-February this year. We have found irregularities in the appointments,” said the current caretaker administrator of the DGHC, B.L. Meena.
Sources said the sack-order came through largely because there were too many ad-hoc teachers in DGHC schools. The 904 schools under the council have 1,524 ad-hoc teachers. The sources added that these appointments were largely political, where the standard teacher-student ratio of 1:40 had not been followed.
Members of the Hill Organiser Secondary Teachers’ Association, a body of ad-hoc teachers, refused comment.
“On May 16, the Teachers’ Association was dissolved under instructions from Bimal Gurung (the president of the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha) and a new body formed. However, the executive committee of the new body is yet to be formed and I cannot comment on the termination issue,” said Gangaram Pradhan, the former secretary of the Association.
Of the 109 teachers about to be sacked, 68 are in high schools.
Binay Tamang, the media and publicity secretary of the Morcha, said: “Our committees looking after the ad-hoc workers in the council have said all appointments made after November 5, 2007 have to be scrutinised. Many of these appointments were political in nature.”
Around 7,000 employees working in the DGHC since 1988 are on six-month contracts.
(The Telegraph)

Backlash fear after victory

Nandigram, May 21: Mamata Banerjee may have swept East Midnapore but over 1,000 Bhoomi Uchchhed Pratirodh Committee supporters who had fled home after CPM cadres threatened to bash them up are scared to return home.
Malati Das of Simulkundu said: “The CPM supporters came to our house frequently before the polls and said they would pick their targets selectively if they won and beat every one of us if they lost.”
The 40-year-old widow had fled home with her two sons and a daughter on May 12, a day after the elections here.
Around 500 people from Simulkundu, Sonachura, Southkhali, Satengabari, Keyakhali, Gokulnagar and Gangra have taken shelter in the block development office.
Malati said she was “happy that the CPM had lost” the zilla parishad. “But that doesn’t mean we can return home. The CPM has told us they will beat us up even if they lose.”
The district CPM leadership denied the charges. “Allegations that CPM workers are threatening villagers are baseless,” said district secretariat member Ashok Guria.
Nandigram I block development officer Shantiram Gorai said: “We’ll escort them home after the counting process is over.” (The Telegraph)

Shocked-out in north and south Left stays, rivals make use of rift

Cooch Behar, May 21: The Left Front has held on to the zilla parishad in Cooch Behar, but the infighting among the allies has made way for the entry of the Congress and the Trinamul Congress.
In the last elections in 2003, none of the 26 seats in the zilla parishad was won by the Opposition. The CPM had bagged 18 and the Forward Bloc seven. The one remaining seat went to a CPM-backed Independent.
This time, however, the seat strength rose to 29. The CPM contested in 18 and the Bloc in nine. In the remaining two seats, both the allies fought each other. In both these seats, the CPM emerged victorious. The reversal was in a seat in Dinhata II block. In the 20 seats that it contested, the CPM emerged victorious in 19. The Bloc, on the other hand, won eight of the 11 it contested this year.
While the CPM could not improve its position, the Bloc share was up by a single seat.
In a major setback for the CPM in the district, the man projected to be the next sabhadhipati of the zilla parishad lost out to the Trinamul Congress. The keen contest took place in Seat 22 of Dinhata subdivision where Trinamul’s Shefali Barman won against the CPM’s zonal committee secretary, Tarapada Barman.
In Seat 21 of the same division, the sitting zilla parishad member of the Bloc, Deb Narayan Kalwar, was defeated by the Congress candidate.
The anti-CPM coalition, consisting of Opposition and Front allies that had raised its head against the CPM following the February 5 firing on Bloc supporters, is yet to make its presence felt. “These alliances were mainly in the other two tiers, the panchayat samiti and the gram panchayat, and their effects are bound to be felt only when the complete results emerge,” a senior Bloc leader said.
Two panchayat samities held by the CPM in the Tufanganj subdivision have already been wrested by an alliance, which comprises the Congress, Trinamul, BJP and the Bloc.
The counting for the panchayat samities commenced late in the evening. District Bloc secretary, Udayan Guha claimed that the results were as his party had projected.
“I had said earlier that despite a portrayal of Front unity at the zilla parishad level, the CPM had fielded Independents against us in six seats. But they failed to have any adverse impact on our performance,” said Guha.
The CPM’s district secretariat member, Benubadal Chakrabarty, while denying the allegations, said: “The Bloc made matters easy for the Opposition and saw to it that Tarapada Barman lost. Now tell me who the actual traitor within the Front is,” said Chakrabarty.
Counting disrupted
Police fired four rounds of tear gas shells to quell a crowd of Trinamul Congress supporters who had started throwing stones at the counting centre at the Falakata block development office this afternoon, reports our Alipurduar correspondent.
One police constable was injured after being hit by stones.
Counting was disrupted for around 45 minutes before it restarted around 6.15pm.
(The telegraph)