It now appears opportune to meditate on the discussion prompted by the letter "To Our Friends in Bengal." Some of you will no doubt recall the contents of this letter. The letter was published on 22 November 2007, in the Hindu newspaper, and can be read at http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/nandigram221107.html by those interested. Signatories of this letter included Noam Chomsky, Tariq Ali, Howard Zinn, Susan George, Victoria Brittain, Walden Bello, Mahmood Mamdani, Akeel Bilgrami, Richard Falk, Jean Bricmont, Michael Albert, Stephen Shalom, Charles Derber, and Vijay Prashad.
Given the fact that that the CPI(M) is now on its death-bed, let us also recall the response to this letter:
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"We (the undersigned) read with growing dismay the statement signed by Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn and others advising those opposing the CPI(M)’s pro-capitalist policies in West Bengal not to “split the Left” in the face of American imperialism. We believe that for some of the signatories, their distance from events in India has resulted in their falling prey to a CPI(M) public relations coup and that they may have signed the statement without fully realising the import of it and what it means here in India, not just in Bengal."
"We cannot believe that many of the signatories whom we know personally, and whose work we respect, share the values of the CPI(M) – to “share similar values” with the party today is to stand for unbridled capitalist development, nuclear energy at the cost of both ecological concerns and mass displacement of people (the planned nuclear plant at Haripur, West Bengal), and the Stalinist arrogance that the party knows what “the people” need better than the people themselves. Moreover, the violence that has been perpetrated by CPI(M) cadres to browbeat the peasants into submission, including time-tested weapons like rape, demonstrate that this “Left” shares little with the Left ideals that we cherish."
"Over the last decade, the policies of the Left Front government in West Bengal have become virtually indistinguishable from those of other parties committed to the neoliberal agenda. Indeed, “the important experiments undertaken in the State” – the land reforms referred to in the statement – are being rapidly reversed. According to figures provided by the West Bengal state secretary for land reforms, over the past five years there has been a massive increase of landless peasants in the state due to government acquisition of land cheaply for handing over to corporations and developing posh upper class neighbourhoods."
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"Singur was the chronicle of the fate foretold for Nandigram. There, land was acquired in most cases without the consent of peasant-owners and at gun-point (terrorizing people is one way of obtaining their consent), under the colonial Land Acquisition Act (1894). That land is now under the control of the industrial house of the Tatas, cordoned off and policed by the state police of West Bengal. The dispossessed villagers are lost to history. A fortunate few among them will become wage slaves of the Tatas on the land on which they were once owners."
"While the CPM-led West Bengal government has announced that it will not go ahead with the chemical hub without the consent of the people of Nandigram, it has not announced any plans of withdrawing its commitment to the neo-liberal development model. It has not announced the shelving of plans to create Special Economic Zones. It has not withdrawn its invitation to Dow Chemicals (formerly known as Union Carbide, the corporation responsible for tens of thousands of deaths in Bhopal) to invest in West Bengal. In other words, there are many more Nandigrams waiting to happen."
"In any case, the reason for the recently renewed violence in Nandigram has been widely established to have nothing to do with the rumour or otherwise of a chemical hub. Print and visual media, independent reports, the governor of West Bengal (Gopal Gandhi) and the State Home Secretary’s police intelligence all establish that this round of violence was initiated by the CPI(M) to re-establish its control in the area. We all have seen TV coverage of unarmed villagers barricaded behind walls of rubble, while policemen train their guns on them."
"With the plans it has for the future, regaining control over Nandigram is vital for the CPI(M) to reassure its corporate partners that it is in complete control of the situation and that any kind of resistance will be comprehensively crushed. The euphemism for this in the free marketplace is ‘creating a good investment climate’."
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"History has shown us that internal dissent is invariably silenced by dominant forces claiming that a bigger enemy is at the gate. Iraq and Iran are not the only targets of that bigger enemy. The struggle against SEZ’s and corporate globalization is an intrinsic part of the struggle against US imperialism."
"We urge our fellow travellers among the signatories to that statement, not to treat the “Left” as homogeneous, for there are many different tendencies which claim that mantle, as indeed you will recognize if you look at the names on your own statement."
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This rebuttal was signed by Mahashweta Devi, Arundhati Roy, Sumit Sarkar, and others. Those interested can read the entire rebuttal at: http://sanghsamachar.wordpress.com/2007/11/24/response-to-noam-chomsky-howard-zinn-et-al-on-nandigram/. (Moreover, a response to this rebuttal was issued by a subset of the original signatories although I cannot presently find that link.)
Personally, I was distraught that M. Mamdani and Tariq Ali signed the original letter.
Let me at this juncture, in any event, suggest a suitable political conclusion: U.S. leftists should join the peoples of Kerala and West Bengal by giving the CPI(M) its last rites. My own view is that Liberation and/or independent leftists (e.g., the signatories of the rebuttal) deserve widespread solidarity. The Congress deserves little, if any, political support. It is, effectively, the party that has taken no satisfactory measure against those responsible for the Gujarat pogrom, for example.
Enough is enough.
epoliticus