Communists vs peasants

I wonder if the communist chief minister of the Indian state of West Bengal could sleep last night after at least 11 people were killed when his police forces fired on the peasants his party claims to represent.

Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee is an intellectual well-versed in history. He must know  he faces the same problem as China: Agitation by peasants driven off their land for industrial development.

I respect Bhattacharjee though I don't share his ideology. He is an honest, upright, Bengali middle-class bhadralok, which is the Bengali word for a gentleman. I myself am a Bengali  from West Bengal and understand the need for industrial development.

But neither he nor I can understand how the peasants feel. We are thinking of industrial development. They, on the other hand, face loss of land and their entire way of life. The government is paying compensation. But will a retrenched middle-class professional work as a labourer even if he can't find any other job? Why should peasants then be expected to willingly give up their land?

Some are fighting tooth and nail. Police were sent to Nandigram, a rural area more than 100 km from the state capital, Calcutta (Kolkata), to restore law and order yesterday. There was a bloodbath instead.   

Could it have been avoided? Only if the government did not want to build special economic zones or if the peasants were prepared to give up their land.

Not everyone sees the conflict in such stark terms. Critics have been saying the compensation is inadequate. Historian Sumit Sarkar has called it the biggest land grab since Indian independence for it's happening not only in West Bengal but in other parts of India as well.

But such criticism doesn't answer the key question: Should development be halted when it hurts the peasants?

The BBC has some good analysis in its South Asia section though it doesn't answer the key question.

In India, until the shootings yesterday, the media were more interested in the cricket World Cup tournament being played in the Caribbean. They were catering to their readers.

Bhattacharjee himself is a cricket fan. He won't be enjoying the live telecasts, though, after what happened yesterday.

I must admit I thought the opposition leader Mamata Banerjee was acting in her own interests when she led the protest against a government takeover of farmland to build a car factory near Calcutta. Budget cars are expected to be built there by the Tatas, who became one of the world's biggest steelmakers after buying Corus, the Anglo-Dutch company, two months ago.

But, after the shootings, it's impossible to ignore the depth of resentment among the villagers. They may have to be appeased even if it means slower economic growth.