BENGAL PANCHAYAT POLLS

Mahajot Will Prove A Mahajhoot

 Sitaram Yechury

DURING the last week of April, I chanced to cross paths with the BJP president, Venkaiah Naidu in Kerala. I had gone there to speak at the mammoth youth rally and public meeting culminating the conference of the state unit of the Democratic Youth Federation of India at Kollam.  Unfortunately, the meeting was washed out by an unseasonal violent thunderstorm!  The BJP president, according to reports, was there to settle inner-party group rivalries in his party.  In a state like Kerala, where the BJP has never managed to win even a single assembly seat, one wonders as to what the different groups within the party are fighting about!

Speaking to media persons at Kollam, the BJP president thundered calumny and untruths claiming that the CPI(M) was terrorising people in Bengal and not allowing opposition candidates to  file nominations in the forthcoming panchayat elections. He went to the extent of threatening central intervention (read imposition of President's rule) in Bengal. At a `meet the press' programme organised by Kollam press club two days later, I had challenged the BJP president to produce one single person who was prevented from filing his/her nomination. Needless to add, the BJP president chose not to rise to the occasion. 

Parroting phrases coined by RSS/BJP pen-pushers amongst the media (and this tribe is increasing), the BJP president went on to describe the CPI(M)  as doing  kushti  with the Congress in Kerala while expressing dosti at Delhi.  It would, of course, be expecting too much from the BJP president to have even an elementary knowledge of the CPI(M)'s tactical line of seeking to  form a non-Congress political alternative to the communal forces in the country.  In the interim, when occasions arise in various states, the CPI(M) unambiguously declares its objective of  keeping the communal forces away from the government as the priority.  The CPI(M) does not subscribe to the theory of equi-distance  from both the Congress and the BJP  at the national level.

It was while I was in Kolkata on the 2nd and 3rd of May that I could understand the actual ground realities of the situation concerning panchayat elections in Bengal.  That was a time when a violent attack on the CPI(M) cadres was carried out by the Congress in the village Chopra in north Bengal.  A leading member of the CPI(M) district committee was killed.  Since April 3, thirteen CPI(M) comrades have been murdered. Many more are injured, nine in serious condition in hospitals. In these terroristic attacks against the CPI(M), the Congress, Trinamul Congress and the BJP have joined forces.  

UNFATHOMABLE DEPRAVITY

Not surprisingly, those who talk in terms of kushti  and dosti are the ones who have unashamedly entered into an electoral alliance with the Congress to defeat the CPI(M).  This is nothing new for the RSS/BJP.  They had done so in the last assembly elections in Kerala. In Bengal, the BJP has all along advocated a mahajot (grand alliance of all opposition parties) to defeat the CPI(M)-led Left Front.  The BJP's lack of morals and principles knows no bounds. 

In almost all districts of the state, in at least one-third of the seats, the BJP, Trinamul Congress and the Congress have put up common candidates. At least in other one-third where separate candidates are in the fray, reports indicate that there is agreement amongst them as to who should be supported in each constituency.  So much for the BJP's kushti with the Congress!  Sitting in the lap of the Congress, they preach morals to others!

The total bankruptcy of political morality of these three parties in West Bengal can be understood by the positions they have taken in the respective election manifestos that they have released. The BJP and the Trinamul Congress are fighting these elections together. The Trinamul Congress and the Congress had fought the assembly elections together in 2001.  Explaining why they left the Congress and joined the BJP again, the Trinamul Congress says that the Congress has politically exhausted itself and is in no position to fight the CPI(M).  The Trinamul chief, Ms. Mamata Banerjee, has often described the Congress as the `B' team of the CPI(M)!

Congress manifesto, on the other hand, states that the Trinamul split from the Congress in 1997 is to strengthen the CPI(M)! It explains its alliance with the Trinamul (during the 2001 assembly elections) stating that they fought the elections together only after Trinamul broke with the BJP during the  Tehelka exposure.  Trinamul's return to the BJP, the Congress explains, is because of the craze for a berth in the central cabinet by its power-hungry chief, who has neither principles nor ideology! The Congress charges the Trinamul Congress as being responsible for establishing the communal forces in West Bengal!

Yet, neither has any compunction in joining hands together in a mahajot to try and defeat the CPI(M)-led Left Front.  This mahajot has aligned with all sorts of forces  including the banned People's War Group (PWG) in south Bengal and the extremist  divisive outfit Kamtapur Liberation Organisation (KLO) in north Bengal.  Forget political morality, this mahajot does not even have elementary honesty. 

PEOPLE WILL DEFEND THEIR GAINS

It is against such brazen political opportunism and dishonesty that the people of Bengal are  rallying together in  larger numbers to support the Left Front.  The people of West Bengal have also seen that how, in the past, each one of these three parties have taken anti-people positions. During the unprecedented floods in 1999 and 2000, the Trinamul Congress went to the extent of asking the central government not to provide any assistance  to the  state government  on the ground that this was a manmade flood!  For Ms. Mamata Banerjee, even nature's fury is CPI(M) manufactured!

The call of these parties for "real panchayats" is correctly being interpreted by the people as an attempt to have the panchayats controlled, like in many other states, by the  vested interests  and the landlords.  In sharp contrast to this slogan, the Left Front, given its rich experience in developing democracy at the grassroots (see the article by Biman Basu in this issue), has given the call to carry forward and consolidate this process of democratic decentralisation. 

The Left Front manifesto promises to take power directly to the people.  The effort would be to involve the people through general bodies at the gram panchayat level in all programmes that will be undertaken by the elected panchayats.  In other words, the decisions of the elected bodies will need to be approved and sanctioned by the people.  In order to eliminate all possibilities of any corruption, it is proposed that the Auditor General will audit the accounts of all panchayats.  Thus, ensuring both transparency and accountability.

It must be reiterated that West Bengal is probably the only state in the country where more than 50 per cent of the resources for developmental activities are routed through the panchayats.  The panchayats are the custodians of the monumental land reforms initiated by the Left Front government which has resulted in the distribution of 10.73 lakh acres of land amongst 27 lakh landless rural people.  Over 15 lakh sharecroppers have been recorded who cultivate more than one-fourth of the total agricultural land.  These and many other benefits that the people of Bengal have received during the Left Front rule will surely be defended by the people from those political forces who seek to reestablish the dominance of the rural vested interests in these panchayat elections. 

As we go to press, it is very likely that the violence unleashed by this mahajot will escalate.  Many attempts would be made with the help of a compliant section of the media to orchestrate  fabricated  stories to create media sensation.  But the people of Bengal are used to such political forces  (farces) who did little at the ground level, but spewed fire and brimstone in the media.  Another victory for the Left Front in these elections will, once again, reaffirm its sincerity and commitment to advance the welfare of the people of West Bengal.