Singur - a boon in disguise!!!

In recent days the main drama that is surrounding the politics of West Bengal is Singur and Nandigram. While Nandigram incident is hardly a past, Singur exercise has been revamped and up to a level where Tata Motors are threatening to pull out of the project. Incidentally, West Bengal's Leftist Govt. led by Buddhadeb Bhattacharya has given up usable farmlands to let Tata build this dream Nano Car project. About 1000 acres of land has been acquired and now the opposition Trinamool Congress led by Mamata Banerjee is up with a fanatic demand of return of 300 acres of land to the unwilling farmers from within the main factory area.

I am sure Mamata Banerjee's crazy demand not only portrays her characteristics but has been a reflection of her entire career. But I am not sure why the entire party do not have guts to go against her. If finally Tatas pull out of Singur the burden will fall on the TMC. I do not know but what political tricks they will show this deadlock as the failure of Leftist Govt. only. So as far as TMC goes the deal should have gone through with some decent compensation package, where TMC could have demanded to be present in some committee which will supervise the correct way to compensate the farmers. But till date TMC hasn't shown any sign of having any interest in breaking the deadlock, they have always come up as the party who wants to maximise in the political benefit out of this deadlock. Some of my dear friends who are anti-left, by fashion, will voice for Mamatadi since she is only one who is taking care of the interest of the farmers. I would still reason tall against them. Where was Mamatadi in Singur when the land was taken ? Only after the Nandigram episode ended and she found Leftist Govt. is again finding their grip in the soil, she triggered back with Singur. So should we term this movement as humanitarian or political. I guess any average IQ ed person will understand the difference and for those who are below that well they should not reason anything in life, period.

Now, coming back to the Leftist Govt. point of view. I am amazed when Govt. is not in control of the land that has been acquired then why is the Govt. trying to solve the problem. They should just put the ball in the court of the Tatas. Finally, at the end of the day Tatas will make insurmountable amount of profit out of this factory. So why are they not coming forward to any of these talks. Are they trying to portray they are just doing a favor on WB in building this factory. They should have shown some more solidarity. Are these the same Tatas that have built Tatanagar out of Jamshedpur?

I am not sure why the ancillory factory cannot be build in some other place than the main factory site. While many stalwarts have given the justification that is usually the case, so it should be now as well. Well there are lots of exception to this theory. Maruti factory in Pune has the two at different sites. Moreover, even if it is true there are so many new things in this Nano Project which have not been heard before like the price of the car. So will this different site concept does not deserve even a single consideration. I think this project is not a deal for ego, no matter who's ego, be it Ratan Tata's or Mamata Banerjee's or Buddhadeb Bhattacharya's. This project is above all and should have been dealt with some more solidarity and consciousness.

Moreover, the legal viewpoint of land acquisition is same all over India so the same trouble will be there in Karnataka and Gujarat as well. So why is the Central Govt. mum when the other states are offering 1000 acres land to attract the Tatas to pull out from Singur. Wont this be a blow to India as well? I think its high time we rise above our regional feelings and state wise politics and think of the India as a whole. India needs to rise and when the crisis comes Central Govt. cannot just take their hands off clean since this is the state whose ruling party has shown motion of no-confidence to them a couple fo months back.

Finally, even if we put the blames on all of out political and corporate parties for this extreme deadlock, we should consider the effect of Nano on India. A one lakh rupees car, who will and who will not buy this one. I would say almost 50% of people over age of 30 in urban India has the ability to spend one lakh for a car. Are Indian roads still ready for so many cars at a go. The answer is NO. One might argue that the cars will push the Govt. to build new roads and highways. I will ask where is the process? If everything would have went well for Tatas, Nano would have hit the roads by October 2008. Are our roads still good enough to handle this pressure? Is there any long term plan which will be start executing from now in phases, not only in urban India but also in connecting them ?

Ultimately, a major question to the world. Is the world ready for a cheaper car which runs on gasoline, in this age of rising gasoline prices and lowering of the supply?

I think we should find these answers first before we get hit by a Nano or sulk over the rotten deal in Singur. I am just a commoner and an average IQ ed Indian, what are our stalwarts thinking?

English, August

I never thought that a story can be told in such a leisurely fashion, with nothing particular plot in mind, just narrating the day to day incidence of someone at some job at some remote place in some country. Especially if the country is India, the job is that of an IAS and the person is none other than Upamanyu Chatterjee. His 'English, August' is one of the most relaxed narratives I have ever read. It does not rush through a plot to tell or some moral message to convey or some high voltage drama destined to be scripted in an upcoming Bollywood movie. Its just about daily life of an IAS officer in a remote town in central India. The story should be a reflection of Chatterjee's own life as an IAS.

'English, August' revolves round the main protagonist Agastya Sen (August), who is in this town of Central India to get his IAS training as a BDO in an Indian summer. The author tells us about the experience of a bachelor like Agastya in a god forsaken town of Madna and relentlessly judged by the married bosses and their wives. Overall its a nice time pass story to be read, specially by people like me who are in their 20s and still have not "settled down".

I am also looking forward to read the sequel to this, "The mammaries of the welfare state".

Calcutta Chromosome!!

I just finished reading the book 'Calcutta Chromosome' by Amitav Ghosh. This is my second read by this author. This book was written much before he wrote 'The Hungry Tide'.

This book deals about the story of Ronald Ross and his discovery of malaria being caused by anopheles bite. The author tries to link up the discovery of Ross as the contribution from a group of mystic people who prefers to stay silent in their operation and where up to researching a more complicated use of malaria virus in curing diseases like syphilis.

Over all the story is very readable and thrilling, specially the moments where slowly the role of this mystic society were uncovered by the two main protagonist of the story (Murugan and urmila). But at some places the plots where too obnoxious and it became evident that they were set up by force to justify the impression of being coincidental. The role of Antar and Tara as revealed at the end was a sudden shock.

It was nice experience reading this book, but I did not enjoyed it as anyway near I found 'The Hungry Tide'. The next one in the line is 'The Glass Palace". I have already heard good stuff about this one and really looking forward to read it.