People's Democracy

Take Message Of Industrialisation Among The Masses: Biman

Biman Basu addressing the sit-in rally in Kolkata

B Prasant

THE Kolkata unit of the Bengal CPI(M) organised a 30-hour sit-in rally in downtown Kolkata calling for industrialisation, agricultural development, prosperous villages and towns, and overall growth. Besides addresses by CPI(M) leaders, what made the rally eminently distinct were songs, recitations, and plays. State secretary of the Bengal unit of the CPI(M) Biman Basu was the principal speaker at the programme, which drew thousands of the denizens of the metropolis.

Identifying and explaining the imperatives of industrial development, Biman Basu noted that the successful industrialisation drive undertaken by the Bengal Left Front government was never away from the interests of the mass of the people. The ongoing process of communicating to the people of Bengal the need for industrialisation and dwelling on the various aspects of the process of industrial development must be done with courage and patience so that there was no scope for a wrong message to slip in anywhere.

In the meanwhile, the Bengal unit of the CPI(M) has launched a wide campaign towards this end. Rallies, large and small, marked by massive attendance are being held throughout the districts. Group meetings are in progress where use of loudspeakers is restricted because of impending school-leaving and plus-two examinations. 

Lakhs upon lakhs of the following publications have been widely circulated, edited in Bengali, Hindi, Urdu, and English. 

• Singur and Industrialisation 

• Not Agriculture versus Industry but Industry on an Agricultural base 

• Ensure Development of Agriculture and Industry: Remove Obstacles 

• Advance Removing All Obstacles

• From the Edges of the Farmland to the Luminescence of Growth (A VCD on the atrocities of the Bengal opposition)

The Bengal unit of the CPI(M) has also printed a leaflet on the issues touching industrialisation and development and have circulated it among eminent men and women of note in various fields of activities.

Biman Basu said that those of the elements of reaction, who would pose as ‘friends of the kisans,’ had been notorious for their violence against the redistributive land reforms of the two UF and the later LF governments in Bengal. At places such as Keshpur in the district of Midnapore during the turn of the century, the Trinamul Congress, the BJP and their running mates had told the rich farmers that ‘operation Barga’ would be reversed provided they helped with funds for arming the ‘anti-Communist crusaders.’ Subsequently, the mass of the people ensured that the so-called Keshpur line was assigned to the dustbin of history.

Biman Basu also pointed out that it had been the opposition of the union government and the lack of cooperation of the Pradesh Congress that projects like the Haldia Petrochem and the Bakreswar thermal power plants had to be set back by scores of years. The opposition worthies had refused to join an all-party delegation in 1985 that had met the union government demanding clearance of the way for industrialisation in the state.

The enemies of the people, said the CPI(M) leader, would never want to see development proceed apace in Bengal. The rightists and the ultra left are all united behind the nefarious game that is anti-people and anti-poor to the core. The Left Front chairman harboured no doubts that a united Left Front and the pro-people Left Front government would defeat these conspirators by involving masses of the people in the process of development of Bengal. Raghunath Kushari, secretary of the Kolkata unit of the CPI(M), too, addressed the rally, among others.