If Lalgarh is burning today, government of West Bengal is responsible for the same. It is only due to their failure to protect its own people from the atrocities committed on tribals by none other than their own police force and ruling party cadres. Torture and harrashment of tribals of Lalgarh is going on unabated since last eight years or more. Rampant corruption in development programs have pushed those tribals from poor to pauper.
Worst was yet to come for those poor tribals. JINDALs, a powerful industrial and mining corporation, had laid its eagle eyes on the land of those tribals to set up a steel plant. In the name of development, both State and Union government did every thing that they failed to to with those tribals in last six decades. Tribals were never consulted even before inking their lands in the MoU. Height was that when the tribals strongly made it known that they are not going to hand over an inch of their land, almost each and every household was seen as Maoists. After participating at the foundation stone laying ceremony, the return convoy of the Chief Minister came under attack of the Maoists. This was the turning point in the lives of those tribals. In the name of searching for Naxalites, houses were allegedly raided regularly in the wee hours of night, women were forced to show genitals to prove that they are not males, Male members were picked up branding them as Maoists, merciless beating, destroying properties, pushing them to jails on false cases became the daily routine of the police who worked on the dictates of the CPM party cadres who behaved as goons, moving in police jeeps. Any one who visits the area will find that the genuine anger of the tribals is due to their continued neglect and sufferings by none other than the very authorities who are duty bound to protect their lives and properties. The truth of Lalgarh is that the tribals have completely lost faith and trust towards the administrative machineries. If any body is to be blamed for the present akward situation of Lalgarh, it is the state administration who has worked as a puppet in the hands of a private industrial house. It is the state administration who have failed to control its police and nab the goons operating in the guise of party cadres of the ruling party in power who have done everything possible to unleash terror and atrocities on poor tribals. A fact finding team of nine JNU students who recently visited the area have stated in their premilinary report that reads as: “It was just the continuation of extreme state terror and police atrocities that the people of the regions have tolerated since 2000. What is unique this time is the resistance.” Their report is enough to expose the hard reality that exists at Lalgarh. The report says; “Almost all the families in the area have some one or the other booked for being a ‘Maoist’. 90 year old Maiku Murmu of Teshabandh was beaten to death by the police way back in 2006. Young school girls allegedly were regularly molested by the police on the pretext of ‘body check’, women were forced to show their genitals at night during ‘raids’ to confirm their gender. Before every election, 30-40 people from every village were picked up as ‘Maoists’ in order to debilitate the opposition. The incident of Chhotopelia, where a number of women were ruthlessly beaten up and one of them Chhitamoni lost her eye, virtually broke the limit of patience of the people. They have now risen up against this long drawn police atrocity.” What is surprising is that disturbed by the Lalgarh events, PM Manmohan Singh has asked Tushar Chowdhry, Minister of State for Tribal Affairs to submit him a report why more and more tribals areas of our country are in the grip of violence and what is the reasons of their anger? The PM should rather tell the people of the country that the root lies in their own faulty mining policies and corrupt people who have made the lives of tribals like hell. The huge natural wealth that is stored beneth the soil of habitats of tribals has become their biggest curse. Man Mohan Singh should also read the last letter that Shaheed Bhagt Singh wrote to his father, before he was hanged by British. This is very much relevant in present perspective. "Let us declare that the state of war does exist and shall exist so long as the Indian toiling masses and the natural resources are being exploited by a handful of parasites. They may be purely British Capitalist or mixed British and Indian or even purely Indian. They may be carrying on their insidious exploitation through mixed or even on purely Indian bureaucratic apparatus. All these things make no difference. " “ .....The war neither began with us nor is it going to end with our lives." - Bhagat Singh” Bhagat Singh at his age, in those days could see that the natural resources are being exploited by a handful of people. Today, we do not have British parasites but yes, Indian and Purely Indian cronies do carry exploitation with the use of our bureaucratic appratus. Compare present situation in which tribals are trapped; think for a minute, are our present rulers any less than British to unleash brutalities on poor tribals to please powerful industrial and mining corporations?
