WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON IN NANDIGRAM?
Lawlessness… that’s something so common nowadays that we use the term in the stupidest of circumstances. For example, when someone crosses the street where the zebra crossing has faded beyond recognition or never existed… when someone purchases a chocolate bomb from the nearby cracker store… when a petty thief decides to rob a passer-by… that’s lawlessness alright… but it doesn’t sound so serious and downright frightful until it takes the shape of a war-zone being formed a few hundred kilometers from a place which has the reputation of being the cultural capital of the largest (in terms of population) democracy in the world.
That’s the culture of Bengal, now, is it? Causing a war-zone to form in the middle of the time when the ruling party makes it a point to voice their discontent over their American counterparts for the war against Iraq… the events of March 14, which left 14 (who are they kidding? Even a 14-day old knows the number was way more than 14) dead in Nandigram, was blamed entirely upon the callousness of the ruling party, CPI (M) and its associates. And I believe the blamers were right. Our chief minister was more stubborn than the ass known to mankind as Mr. George W. Bush. And most of us, until that point, had a lot of respect for Mr. Buddhadeb Bhattacharya for being a Chief Minister who was, seemingly, a man of culture and good intentions. But all that crumbled into a dirty heap as he proved himself utterly clueless and inefficient in handling his party, his associates, and the police force, which he is supposed to control himself since he is also supposed to be our Police Minister.
Anyways, March 14 passed. And the CM seemed to be regaining the lost ground as he declared no farmland would be taken in Nandigram. It was shifted to Nayachar. Then, a CBI probe for the Tapasi Malik case was ordered by the CM himself which put some of his party pals in dire circumstances but certainly scored points for the CM. But then, what happened to those party pals remains a trivia. The case went to the dumps, and the CM was careful enough not to dig up the past. All this time, Nandigram was still kind of an independent zone controlled by the Save Farmland Committee, and the CPM supporters who were driven out of their homes were not able to return to their homes. NOW, NOW… the CM remained as callous as ever and did nothing to improve the situation there. He was busy with his dreamy multi-million dollar contract signings and fruitless art-exhibition opening ceremonies… I don’t remember if he made any comments on the state of affairs in Nandigram for a long time. Do correct me if I’m wrong. He dodged it all when he could’ve sorted it out in the heat of the moment. He had openly declared that no farmland would be taken, and it could be a befitting precursor to calling for state of normalcy to return in the war-zone. Alright, at this point, as far as I know, the opposition didn’t make a single move to bring normalcy to Nandigram either and so, they should be blamed equally for Nandigram remaining a touchy spot for so long! There must be a balance in everything, whether it is politics or normal life! To counter a bad force, there must exist a good one! But in Bengal… there’s bad and equally bad!
The CM’s almost-nil points plunged into negative once he reached what probably was the absolute height of idiocy when he decided to negatively interfere in the Rizwanur Rehman murder (or was it? Once again, who are they kidding?) case. But as much as I’d like to go on with that, I have to skip his cases of mis-governance and proceed.
A few days ago, the CPI (M) attacked the war-zone with new vigor, and with countless illegal ammunition, attacked Nandigram which, by now, had been turned into a mini-rebel kingdom, with rumors of Maoist intervention on top of everything. The reason for this CPM attack was to return its supporters who were ousted from Nandigram during or after or before the March 14 disaster to safety. And in attempting so, they put in danger the lives of so many who happened to be living in those villages and had nothing, absolutely nothing to do with any of those parties… TMC or CPM. Why the hell would they sign up to suffer? With full sympathy (I’m not a politician, so when I say I have sympathy for someone or something, I mean it!) to the homeless living out of their homes for all these months, would the villagers who are still living in the war-zone deserve do die or be raped or be ousted from their homes just because they were not ousted from their homes in the first place???
It’s become all so complicated now, with a call to bring Central Police Reserve Force (CRPF) to Nandigram to sort things out. Apparently, the cops (living up to their reputations) are doing absolutely nothing, in the footsteps of the minister who’s supposed to control them, in abating the violence… the war in Nandigram. And I may add, we are really lucky to have such a vocal and wise Governor in the form of Respectable Gopal Krishna Gandhi… great job, sir!
Let’s just hope everything is sorted out as soon as possible. There are people who are willing to sort it out, but frankly speaking, I don’t believe a single politician. They all are double-faced retards, no matter which party they belong to. People, eminent people who’re not politicians, are voicing their discontent over everything that’s going on… from the likes of authors, social activists and also revered film-makers like Aparna Sen and Rituporno Ghosh, Anjan Dutt, Goutam Ghosh… who boycotted the 13th Kolkata Film Festival in wake of the Nandigram war. And look what happened on Sunday, the 11th… the cops in Nandigram, who were more worthless than a bunch of baboons with malformed limbs, were more vigilant than a pack of night-dwelling owls (read: ‘ullu’ as they call it in Hindi) who lathi-charged and arrested a group which happened to include student protesters and eminent movie directors and renowned people from the cultural circuit. And that, too, on the very dwelling grounds that were made famous by the presence of these sorts of people in Bengal… the Nandan, Rabindra Sadan, Academy area. Nandan became a bit of a fort with the foreign visitors being scooped in and out of the premises amidst high security. Thankfully, the media is there to tell the guests what kind of chief hosts they’ve got.
And I was watching the opening ceremony of the Film Festival on TV when our CM was saying that a bouquet of films on Global Warming would be screened this year. Well, that’s a man who knows a lot about saving the environment, does he? Who’s next to promote films on Global Warming??? Frankly, anyone will do… anyone but a dung-brained fellow (syn. Any politician!)
Signing off,
F*** all politicians,
-Jesse (Jagannath)
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