There is a clear alliance between the party of right reaction in West Bengal, the Trinamool Congress, and the Maoists as they try out a cynical strategy of violence to defeat the state’s Left Front government. By attacking the most organised and strong contingent of the anti-imperialist and left forces in the country, the Maoists are playing the role of being agents of the ruling classes. It is unfortunate that sections of the country’s progressive polity and intellectuals have ended up supporting such dangerous politics.
The Maoist assault in the three western districts of West Bengal – West Midnapore, Bankura and Purulia – started years before the Lalgarh incidents crystallised, even much before the events in Nandigram. From 2001 onwards the Maoists (the Peoples’ War and Maoist Communist Centre (MCC) earlier and from 2004 their joint party) have attacked and killed members of the organised left forces in Bengal. More than 100 CPI (M) workers had already been killed and hundreds forced to leave their homes in these districts when the Maoists, in November 2008, escalated violence to a different level by trying to kill the West Bengal chief minister with a landmine blast in Shalboni.
It is not possible to understand what is happening in these areas, unless one places it in the larger context of Maoist politics and strategy, and the specificity of West Bengal. The CPI (M) has a strong political base in these districts based on extensive mass support built through long and arduous struggles on issues of land and livelihood and to break the old exploitative structures.
After 1977, when the Left Front came to power, significant changes have taken place in the economic life of hundreds of thousands of people in these areas while panchayats have empowered them. This has been the reason people here have supported the Left Front, even in the recent parliamentary elections.
Given the CPI (M)’s popularity based on these achievements, opposition parties found the armed attacks by the Maoists useful in breaking the CPI (M)’s hold and have encouraged Maoist violence. The details of political geography are important here. Despite large areas of influence, the CPI (M) has been weak in certain pockets, particularly Lalgarh and Binpur blocks in West Midnapore. Factions of the Jharkhand Party controlled these panchayats and even won a few assembly seats with support from the Congress or the Trinamool Congress (TMC). The Maoists chose these very areas as their primary base. It was the Jharkhand Party at first, and now the TMC which has actively facilitated the entry of the Maoists.
Interestingly, many of the areas identified as most backward in these districts were run by the Jharkhand Party-led panchayats and they lagged far behind neighbouring villages in implementing developmental projects. For the last six to seven years, it is the Maoists who have aggressively opposed development works in these areas, further adding to the peoples’ woes.
Lack of Development? Of late, it has become fashionable to attribute underdevelopment as the prime reason and justification for Maoist mayhem in these districts. While underdevelopment is a reality, it should be remembered that West Bengal has the best record of land reforms in the country. Up to 2008, close to 30 lakh landless have been given land rights on 10.36 lakh acres of land. In addition, more than 15 lakhs have been recorded as sharecroppers. Among those who got land rights, 5.36 lakhs are tribals while 11.05 lakhs are scheduled castes. Similarly, among recorded sharecroppers 1.64 lakhs are tribals.
This remains unparalleled in the country. West Bengal is the leading state in awarding forest rights under the newly enacted law, though much before it was enacted at the centre, tribals in West Bengal have been given wide-ranging rights over forest areas.
In spite of remarkable achievements in these and some other sectors, poverty still persists. The Left Front government in West Bengal could, perhaps, have done better but it must be realised that it was working within the parameters drawn by the neoliberal policies of the Indian state which have further increased inequality all over the country. In a capitalist society like ours, development processes have an inherent class content, yet while fighting for a larger radical transformation of the socio- economic structure, we cannot forsake the struggles for immediate relief and near-term development goals. The Left Front in West Bengal has been trying, with a mixture of success and failure, to do exactly that within the given limitations.
Source: Economic & Political Weekly
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