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On Monday the Trinamul Congress leader and ace crowd-puller, Ms Mamata Banerjee, urged the West Bengal Chief Minister, Mr Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, to hold a "secret ballot" among the people of Singur to ascertain whether they were willing to give their land to the State for the construction of the Tata small-car factory and, more specifically, whether her party "was lying about forcible land acquisition" in the area.

To quote her (as reported in the press), she said: "Till now, the owners of 400 acres in Singur (out of around 1000 acres) have not accepted compensation to oppose the State Government's decision to acquire their land forcibly," asserting, "The people of Singur are with us as we are working hard to oppose the acquisition of farmland forcibly by the State Government. If the Government is serious in judging public opinion on the issue, it could go for votes in the area".

Making a big splash

Ms Banerjee is, of course, entitled to her views as a bona fide citizen of the republic and is also free to air them in an appropriate manner. As a politician, she is entitled to have recourse to every tactic in the book, the sole effort (in the present circumstances) being to make as big a splash she can in the psyche of the people of West Bengal, specially after her party's dismal performance in the last Assembly elections held under the hawk-eye of the Election Commission.

So, it can be argued that what she is doing as a politician is legitimate and understandable to the public at large — except of course for the beating up of select representatives of the Fourth Estate, the same tribe which she, and other politicians, court assiduously to get extra mileage through wide publicity in the print and visual media. The problem, however, is that her opponents are also playing by the same book and are telling the people openly that the charges she is making against them are baseless and misleading. Thus, on Sunday, Mr Bhattacharjee told people at Heria in East Midnapore district (near Nandigram which, like Singur, has also been in the news regarding land acquisition) that, at Singur, the Government had received the farmers' consent for as much as 96 per cent of the land acquired for the Tata project.

To Ms Banerjee this is nothing but an untruth, and her way of settling the issue is holding a referendum in Singur to get at the real story. Since (in its view) only four per cent of the farmers have not agreed to the acquisition move, the Government quite reasonably feels that holding a "secret ballot" in Singur would only tamper with the project schedule, the maintenance of which is, at this juncture, critical to the image of the State as a viable investment destination for major national economic players.

Initiating the process in Nandigram

What is important is that, in Nandigram where the situation is vastly different regarding land-acquisition, et al, the Chief Minister has left the entire issue to the people of the area. As he said, memorably one feels, "I thought if Haldia, once a sleepy hamlet, could develop into an industrial township, why not Nandigram? But it's all up to you all. If you don't understand this, we will shift the proposed chemical hub elsewhere."

If Ms Banerjee is talking about a referendum, the Chief Minister has already initiated the process in Nandigram. Will the Trinamul leader gracefully acknowledge this, even if it means losing steam for her Singur campaign?

Ranabir Ray Choudhury

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