Didi o Didi... !!

‘Fall of Bastille’ took place on 13th May, 2011. No, I am not referring to the French Revolution which is still the ‘ most significant turn’ in world History, but I am talking about ‘Jasmine Revolution’ as told by many in Bengal led by firebrand Mamataa (this is her new spelling, may be for certain Numerological purpose) Banerjee. With the change of guard in West Bengal after 34-year, many people have believed now they can see the ‘change’ (in Bengali Paribartan).
Mamata led government is only 11-month old, and by this time as expected she is redefining the terminology of ‘democratic autocracy’. You may question, why I am taking the word ‘autocracy’, it is simply because her party is ‘one man army.’ Whatever ‘Didi’ will decide that will be final, if anyone tried to modify the script the fate will be either Dinesh Trivedis or Kabir Sumans!! The only thing count in this party of ‘Maa-Mati-Manush’ is loyalty points (towards Mamata of course)!!
I am not going into any details of the governance issue. Those who can see with or without glass can easily see the ‘change’ in the real sense of the term. So, no use wasting time here. Rather I would like to like to draw attention to the embedded nature of cartoon & politics.
Kutty, R K Lakshman and many others have earned their ‘bread & better’ only through political cartoons. Right from Nehru to Indira, Sonia, Rahul, Lalu, Vajpayee, Manmohan singh, Advani, Mayawati, Jayalalitha & almost all the politicians come regularly on the cartoons. There was time politicians used to feel sad had they missed the front page of the daily on that day’s cartoon! Take for example; Lalu Prasad Yadav-he is probably the politicians who had been caricatured, cartooned maximum no. of time both in regional & print media. Critics say, he also ruled Bihar in an autocratic manner, but did he put anyone behind the bar for making his cartoons?
So, what made didi so angry? Why didn’t she tolerate this kind of simple joke? For that matter, the cartoon those who have seen is not at all abusive, it is a line from Satyajit Ray’s ‘Sonar Kella’ where it was discussed how to get rid of ‘Dushtu Lok’ ( Evil person)! In the cartoon Indian Railways have been depicted as ‘Sonar Kella’ (Golden Fort) which was shown by Mamata to Mukul (present Railways minister) & Mukul was asking about ‘Dushtu Lok’ Dinesh Trivedi who was vanished & Mukul would get it (assumed)!!
Actually, the problem is not in the cartoon, it is the problem of Narcissism. Mamata is so pompous that whoever even jokingly saying anything against her, he/she is becoming her target. She is driven by the aphorism ‘I can’t be wrong!’ But she knows she has been doing so many things which are not right, so it is actually a battle within. Thus, she has become so intolerant.
Just before West Bengal Assembly Election, city intelligentsia rallied against Left Government with the-then CM Budhhadev Bhattacharya’s pictures on hand where it was written “ I am a man-eater” ( Ami Manush Kheko)” “I have done no wrong by killing people” (Merechhi besh korechhi), “My hands are stained in blood” (Amar Duhat Rakte makha) etc, (& many of these slogans were either exaggeration or wrong), still no one was put behind the bar as our Constitution has given us the Fundamental Rights of Freedom of Speech & Expression (Artcle. 19A).
Didi, who I always believed is a very good actress on the political stage, actually is not able to act anymore. Her true self is unfolding before the people & she is losing temper every now & then. Once she was storming the police station for releasing her party goons, calling rape a ‘framed incident’, demolishing ghettos for expansion of roads and justifying her acts, painting the city blue etc. etc. She has told ‘Ganatantra (Democracy) in place of Dalatantra (Party diktat), what she is doing now? No, I am little wrong , her’s is not even party-driven, it is almost the rule of ‘Great Dictator!’
Some years back when Left went for ‘Operation Sunshine’ (driving out the hawker from pavements), she sat at Gariahat crossing to beg for them, now when she is doing the same thing, and no one is there to say anything! Before coming to power she told ‘No Mao-Fao’, now she only has instructed the joint force to continue and as a result there were some success too!! There is plenty of such kind of examples.
I believe, this toon-tamasha has actually made her scared, because she is slowly understanding her frantic remarks, eccentricity is not at all going well with the public, and this is a high time to consolidate power. And how to that? The answer is witch-hunt!!
This has to bear in mind; she is actually running a state government single handedly. 11 months is a long time in politics and naturally she has become tired. Fear, insecurity coupled with narcissism she is running the state as her household.
The cartoon is just the beginning; to cover her shortcoming and failure to deliver the election promises plethora of things are waiting for us! Indeed West Bengal now is in real danger! Didi justifies all her act through Rabindranath Tagore, I don’t know which lines will be suitable for her now. I would rather suggest her to read ‘Samanya Khati’ (Little Loss) to understand the condition of the state!
Those who are telling ‘Mamata has changed after coming to power’ they are wrong. She was never a different person, her pretensions gone well with the mass and to get rid of the Left they have voted her to the power! Now, by taking the self-destructing route, Mamata is actually making a statement for future why sometimes democracy is not very useful tool in a state like India!
Didi, this is high time to change yourself or else there will be similar war-cry for ‘Paribartan’ may be less than 5 years of time.

PS: I might be put behind the bars for this article

The Blue Turban

A technocrat in his famous blue turban has done everything what was expected from him. From scope of Management education to Economic Reforms, Double dip in world economy to India’s success story- he touched upon all aspects and cleverly referred Lokpal Bill as ‘a topic of discussion’ under the broader spectrum of governance failure! Politician in him compelled him to say some words on Bengal politics too.
Yes, for the first time ever the Prime Minister of India, Dr. Manmohan Singh has graced the IIM Calcutta’s campus at Joka to deliver the Golden Jubilee speech of the institute. West Bengal Governor Mr. M K Narayanan and West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee were his companions in the programme. He started his campus touring by planting a sapling. Then straight into the auditorium where guests, faculty, students and staffs were waiting to listen to him.
Nothing ‘unpredictable’ happened in this campus unlike IIT Kharagpur where he went later for the Convocation and students protested before him in support of Anna Hazare and his demands for Jan Lokpal Bill. IIMC was a fort with police and security personnel were busy maintaining the PM’s security!
As expected, the Lokpal Bill controversy has taken a backseat amongst this august audience. He brought the reference of Corruption under governance failure issue, where he touched upon the danger of inefficiency and Cronyism if ‘aam aadmi’ is forced to pay bribes to government agencies. He brought back the memory of Licence Raj and wide spread corruption related to that. Abolition of the same has helped in curbing the unfair practices.
But the name which he carefully avoided is Anna Hazare, the man who has shaken the conscience of the nation. His campaigns, not even for a fraction of seconds found any direct mention in the speech. Rather he welcomed debate on Lokpal Bill inside the Parliament! And those who have (read Anna Hazare) different views must send their representatives to the House to discuss. The underneath message was that Ramlila Maidan is not a suitable place for this. Black money, pending reforms of judiciary all were present when he was telling ‘government is open to discussion for Lokpal Bill, which is now with the Standing Committee.’
He was never an orator, rather he always reads out the rehearsed scripts with his scholarly approach. This time too, there was no exception. Shades of Economist Manmohan Singh came out over and again in his speech. He took silent pride in the fact that twenty years back he advocated and brought in Macro Economic Reforms which is till date yielding ‘great results’ in market economy. That time a controversial step actually had shown India a positive side of growth path by widening the way for more capital investments in form of Foreign Direct Investment, Merger & Acquisition etc.
PM rightly made the audience think the positive side of Japan, Korea and Chinese successes of economic prosperity. As this is an ‘Asian Century’ so this is a high time to think beyond Dollars and Euros, but never write them off. He is confident that India will achieve the objective of sustainable inclusive growth at the 9% rate, though in this year it is a bit slow!
But the real show stealer is Mamata. At her original and spontaneous best she said, “IIMC is first national institute of Bengal (sic)! IIMC was founded on 14th November, 1961. This is not only an asset but foundation of India. Tomorrow is in your hand for its students and research programmes.” This is not a big mistake on CM’s part that Kolkata is proud of Calcutta University (1857) and Jadavpur University (1905) which she has forgotten to mention. In her style, which is known as ‘didism’ she gave back the shawl to a student which was presented to CM as a memento! Clapping continued till the end!
Again to the PM. What was his message to the students, he requested all the future managers to maintain transparency in decision making. He focused on the fact that for IIMC only Kolkata is on the global management map! He fondly recalled the achievements of IIMC alumnus Indra Nooyi in business circuit and Malli Mastan Babu in mountaineering! They would inspire and encourage the future managers what he strongly believes.
Mamata on stage and nothing political about it, how could that be? Dr. Singh emphasized on the fact the ‘lost glory of Kolkata must be reclaimed’ as change of regime has taken place recently. He said that, there were times when Kolkata was known for its creativity and a thriving learning centre. Time has come to rejuvenate West Bengal polity, economy and human endeavours!!
But what was completely remained untouched that how could policy reforms initiate the change in social reforms and when reforms would be seen from a multi dimensional angle, rather than treating it as an economic & financial explanation! Why the government is so busy with 9% growth rate when 40% of the population doesn’t get full square mill every day? I believe too much focus on reforms actually widened the gulf between rich and poor. If poverty is not eradicated, how could India become the numero uno contributor for Asian Century?
The man who is known as ‘the honest’ person of Indian politics is unfortunately nicknamed as ‘Manmohan Singh Ghotala’, thanks to series of scans. Had he been more transparent on the Jan Lokpal Bill today, that might have given him certain edge, though this is what I personally believe.

Friday the 13th: The ‘Red’ letter day

The Great Fall.
The longest running Communist government in a state has had its end on Friday, the 13th. This might not be as suspense thriller as the Hollywood blockbuster is, but it’s no less than a roller coaster saga for the Left as well as Mamata Banerjee!!
This is very much a predictable result. Opinion Polls and Exit polls have already given almost the same numbers as what the TMC Alliance and Left have got. So, that it would be ‘Left’s poll for exit’ was assumed. Officially though, run up for this moment has begun 2 years back. First phase of ‘Paribartan’ was seen in Loksabha election of 2009. Civic body elections too didn’t give any scope to stimulate confidence in CPIM. For mishandling of Singur, Nandigram and to some extent Rizwanur Rahaman death case, the war cry for ‘Change’ had gradually acquired a strong support base. And the Tsunami called ‘Paribartan’ indeed has washed away the Left even from their traditional strongholds.
The mandate is clear. Bengal has not only voted against the Left but also for the TMC-Congress alliance. Had it been only negative votes, alliance couldn’t have got 2/3rd majority with almost all the standing ministers losing including the CM Budhhadeb Bhattacharya. Alliance was successful enough to convince people that why they should vote for them. Moreover CPIM has continuously lost contact with the grassroot level. Almost three and a half decades in power made them overconfident. By the time they started taking the ‘corrective’ measures, it was already very late. And the ‘Mamata’ factor... In my previous articles (‘Winds of Change’ & ‘Paint it Green’) I have already talked about her: from whimsical to mature, how she transformed herself. Why people have started to see her as the best alternative to Left. With ‘never-say-no’ mentality she actually brought Jasmine Revolution here.
It is learnt from the CSDS survey that richest and the poorest have voted for the agent of change i.e. Didi. Why is it so? Just rewind a bit. Many believe that Higher Education & Industry was destroyed by CPIM. No English education in the Primary Level too has angered the rich & the urban upper middle class. On the other hand, ‘CPIM is taking away land from the poor’ the clever campaign by TMC was enough to make their mind change. They had the ready reference of Nandigram-Singur-Lalgarh.
Many Left sympathizers left heartbroken, the Rightist supporters are falling short of words. Expectation from the new government is enormous. Now, they want to see the actual ‘Change’ as promised in the manifesto. It can be surely said that people won’t wait another 34 years to witness change.
Mamata, by dedicating this victory to ‘Ma-Mati-Manush’ has told that this is the ‘second independence of Bengal.’ Pranab Mukherjee has already promised her a special package for Bengal for economic reconstruction as WB in debt-trap. The other challenge would be how she resolves the on-going ‘Hill’ problems and ‘jangalmahal’ and Maoist insurgency. With the ‘temporary’ end of the Communist era in Bengal, this time industrialists might be surer to invest here. Didi has announced to bring reforms in law and order, education, health and in other sectors. But the first & foremost challenge is definitely to maintain peace everywhere. Rural Bengal has bled long in vendetta politics. This should stop at once. It must be ensured that no one is without shelter in fear of being killed by the political enemies. I hope here it won’t be the beginning of Tamil Nadu way of politics where government and opposition always target each other. I wish CPIM will play the role of a Constructive opposition and won’t protest all the policies of new government like last 34 years opposition did.
State-Centre relation in Bengal too would change now. Predictably, centre will shed off its hostility towards this state. UPA II government has got enough boosters in the just-concluded assembly elections. Other than Tamil Nadu, they have performed well. Though they have won in Kerala by a whisker.
As the biggest ally of the UPA II, Mamata has so long opposed new land acquisition bill, pension bill and some other important bills. As soon as mandate was for her, she told a television channel that she wants new land policy. It is learnt, the bill is due to pass in the next session of the Parliament. Now whether she takes the same stand in these bills, would be a continuing focus. As of now centre won’t go against much of her will, as, if her party withdraws support, UPA II will be in big trouble. In West Bengal TMC has got absolute majority, so they don’t need Congress at all to run the government. Loksabha election is another 3 years away, so Congress has time, so they might adopt ‘Go slow’ policy in these contentious issues.
What is the road ahead for CPIM? As some are saying, is this really the end of Communism in India? I think, no. CPIM has lost contact with people and real issues related to the poor. They have got 5 years of time to go back to the basics from where they had begun. In the grass root level there are corruptions, nepotism and ‘brigades of opportunist members’, this practice must be put to an end. In order to channelize energy and confidence among the party members, CPIM has to start afresh. The Left here has already realised that there were huge percentage of negative voting for them. They have lost 7% of their dedicated vote-bank, whereas TMC has gained 19%. People have the ultimate authority to reject and select, so they have to find out why the electorates don’t want them any more. Organisational capability is not everything.
I believe, the biggest problem for CPIM is the disjunction between the Politbureau and the general mass. Politbureau decision is not always in consistency with the ground realities. Some are merely theoretical. Now Prakash Karats must learn from V S Achuthanandans. Hats off to the octogenarian for his efforts, he has almost done it in Kerala. Many are saying in Kerala, LDF has achieved a moral victory.
However, ‘Change’ is constant in democratic politics. Everywhere in the world and in India there is change of guard in elections. Because West Bengal was an exception, the change has resulted in so much of discussions, celebration, and frenzy.
Getting elected consecutively for 7 terms is history from all aspects. Long term in power always has a negative angle. It gives a certain contentment on the part of the government that the incumbent doesn’t have any alternative and whatever they are doing is good for the people. Electorates are taken for granted.
I belong to that generation who hasn’t seen any other government other than the Left front in my state. I was born when they were already in their second term. So we also don’t know what Green Revolution can bring to us. We have heard the ‘reign of terror’ by Sidhhartha Sankar Ray government from ’72-’77, we have not seen that. So veterans fear the repeating of that dark history.
But I am optimistic, after all Bengal is getting her first woman Chief Minister!! My only scepticism lies in the fact that if Didi remains current version of herself, we will see ‘dictatorship’ of ‘Durga in a crumpled Sari’!! Hope floats, ‘Paribartan’ might be seen in didi too...!!