Once Bengal's Turning Point, Now Nowhere on Campaign Maps, Singur Pays the Price of Politics |
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Singur: “Why do you want to go there now?” auto-rickshaw driver Abhijit Ram asks.
“Is there anything left of the factory? Everything has been razed to the ground. Two decades ago, Singur had found a place on the national map, buoyed by the promise of the Rs 1 lakh Nano car. Now that’s gone. There is no trace of Tata in Singur. There is no employment either,” Ram says.
Singur was the political turning point of Bengal. The movement in opposition to the factory there led to the ushering in of the Trinamool Congress government in 2011.
Now, the area is home to neither industry nor an agricultural revival.
Today, after 15 years under the governance of Trinamul Congress, how is the politically significant arena doing?
Singur’s story traces back to the 2006 Bengal assembly election, when the Left Front’s campaign slogan, “Krishi aamader bhitti, shilpo aamader bhobishyot (agriculture is our foundation, industry is our future),” struck a chord with voters across the state, securing their return to power.
Just three days after the formation of the seventh Left Front government, then Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya announced plans to set up a motor car manufacturing plant in Singur. Singur is located in Hooghly district, 33 kilometres west of Kolkata. The project was to be undertaken by Tata Motors.
Soon after, Tata revealed that the car to be produced at the Singur plant would be called the Tata Nano, priced at around Rs 1 lakh. At the time, no other four-wheeler in the market came close to that price point. The announcement sparked excitement.
The state government initiated the process of land acquisition for the small car project. A decision was taken to acquire 997.10 acres of land across the gram panchayat areas of Gopalnagar, Beraberi, and Kamarkundu in Singur block. The move was driven by the expectation that a large industrial enterprise like Tata would establish a manufacturing unit in Singur, bringing industrial development and economic opportunities to the region.
“We did not hesitate when we learned that a well-reputed industrial house like Tata Motors would set up a factory on our land. We decided to hand over our land to the government without a second thought. Almost everyone in the village shared the same opinion,” says one Asit Das, a villager of Rupnarayanpur Daspara in Gopalnagar gram panchayat.
Farmer Asit Das from Rupnarayanpur. Photo: Madhu Sudan Chatterjee.
“The income we earned from agriculture each year was limited. In comparison, the lump sum compensation we received after land acquisition, if deposited in a bank, promised much higher returns through interest. Moreover, there was an assurance that one member from each affected family would be offered employment in the Tata Nano project. No one wanted to miss such an opportunity. We handed over our land to the land department of the West Bengal government and accepted the compensation cheque,”........