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Mar 23, 2007

Combating the Naxalist menace

The believers and practitioners of the Maoist ideology have once again shown their power and capacity to liquidate 'class enemies' by assassinating Sunil Mahato of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha on March 4 and 55 security personnel on March 15, 2007 in the Dantewalla district of Chhattisgarh. The Maoists have claimed that 'Red Corridor' of 'liberated zones' is under their control and their writ runs in the areas of their influence.

The Maoist groups which are leading the 'violent war of liberation' do not believe in following democratic forms of struggles for the redress of grievances of the 'exploited tribals' or the 'oppressed peasantry' because they believe that 'agrarian oppression' indulged in by Indian feudal and semi-feudal classes can be fought only through 'democratic revolution'.

It deserves to be clearly stated that the so-called Naxal movement has experienced many 'splits' during the last 40 years on the issue of their characterisation of the Indian State and the practitioners of the politics of bullet have seen many separations because of serious ideological rifts in their movement.

Dipankar Bhattacharya, the general secretary of the CPI(M-L) declared on December 10, 2006 that the party is trying to find 'a middle ground — from being at odds with the system to one that has now come to terms with parliamentary democracy'.

The late Vinod Mishra, an authentic Naxal leader, left the path of the 'doctrine of class annihilation' and established Indian People Front to contest parliamentary elections to achieve the goals of democratic revolution.

But the PWG is practising the politics of 'liquidation of class enemies' by launching violent struggles against the functionaries of the central and state governments and also against the oppressive landlord classes.

The central question is, how has the Indian government, central and state, responded to this ideologically committed believers of the politics of gun in the 13 states affected by Naxalite violence?

First, the BJP of Jharkhand and Chhattisgarh has practised a flawed ad hoc policy of confronting Naxal violence in their tribal belt. The worst strategy was evolved by Chhattisgarh which in 2005 launched a Salwa Judum (Peace Mission) campaign against Naxals and this strategy of 'tribals versus tribals' has brought great reprisals from heavily-armed Naxalites.

Witness the March 15 Naxal attack when 34 out of the 55 security personnel killed belonged to Salwa Judum's Special Police Officers. It has been repeatedly established that Salwa Judum anti-Naxal tribal forces are a sitting duck before the highly armed Naxal groups.

Union home minister Shivraj Patil admitted on March 15 that the death count in Chhattisgarh on account of Naxal attacks has increased by 57.22% during 2006. What else was the home minister expecting if tribal volunteers of Salwa Judum are pitted against Naxals, who claim to be fighting for the cause of tribal liberation?

The Sarpanch, Rani Bodli Pandu Gota, stated after the Naxal attack of March 15 that "when the police recruited our children and set up a police post in our village, we were told that we will be protected against any Naxal attacks. However, they have left us to fend for ourselves."

The crux of the issue is that the central and state governments have been vacillating and they have tried to follow policies of either 'placating the Naxals' or of 'confronting them'.

Dr Manmohan Singh has described Naxalism the 'single largest threat to India's internal security' but the approaches adopted towards the Naxal problem, as revealed in the annual reports of the ministry of home affairs, have not sent any clear message to the state governments .

Unlike major communist political formations of India, the Maoists completely reject the path of democratic struggles. But have the policy makers realised that the Maoists are practitioners of undemocratic and anti-democratic methods under the garb of a socially progressive ideology?

Has the central government evolved a coordinated approach with the state governments while dealing with the challenge of practitioners of the politics of bullet?

Unfortunately, the challenge posed by the Maoists has not been properly responded to by the Indian state. First of all, only the armed forces of the state should be involved while dealing with the well-armed Naxal groups.

Therefore, the Chhattisgarh government must abandon immediately the idea of creating special police officers of poor and ill-trained tribals. The very idea of creating a Salwa Judum (Peace Mission) of tribals shows that the functionaries of the state have not realised and recognised the fact the Maoists are an undemocratic social group.

Many state governments have shown 'adhocism' while dealing with violence indulged in by Naxals. N T Rama Rao, the founder of Telugu Desam Party and a former CM of Andhra, a Naxal-infected state, followed the soft policy of 'bringing the misguided boys (Naxals) into the mainstream of society.'

Every AP chief minister since then have vacillated between talking to the Maoists and taking them on frontally with the result that the Naxal challenge has not come to an end in that state.

Similarly, the central government has not made up its mind while dealing with Naxals. If the policy makers think that Naxal problem has its roots in the existing unjust social order it is expected that policies for eradicating the social causes which have led to the emergence of Naxal phenomenon would be implemented and the results of this thinking will bear the fruits.

If the Indian state believes that methods adopted by Naxals are obstructing the implementation of democratically-evolved developmental policies, and 'development with democracy' cannot take place because of the violence practised by the Naxals, the state should respond by adopting a bullet versus bullet policy.

The ideological cloak worn by the Naxals should not convince the policy makers that they are dealing with the messiahs of the poor and exploited strata of society.

Maoism is a violent anti-democratic force in society and the challenge of such undemocratic violent groups has to be met with the might of the Indian state. The Indian state functionaries have to realise that the democratic structure is under threat by the self-appointed messiahs of the poor. The sooner the better.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/Opinion/Editorial/Combating_the_Naxalist_menace/
articleshow/1800652.cms

Idea Cellular and IBM Ink a 10 Year Business Transformation Pact

MUMBAI, INDIA - International Business Machines (NYSE: IBM) and Idea Cellular Ltd. (Idea), a leading Indian GSM mobile services provider and an Aditya Birla Group company, today announced a 10 year business transformation pact to integrate, innovate and transform Idea's business processes and IT infrastructure. The pact is designed on an innovative risk - reward revenue sharing model. It covers all of Idea's existing operations and potential new additions. The 10 year pact, depending upon Idea's business revenues and circle expansion, would size around US$ 600 million to US$ 800 million.

Announcing the pact, Mr. Sanjeev Aga, Managing Director, Idea Cellular Ltd., said, "Idea is focused on innovation led growth. Our partnership with IBM will bring value to our customers, employees and shareholders. We will harness IBM's power to support Idea's explosive growth with robust, best-in-class solutions that address scalability, complexity, innovation and cost control, to provide Idea with the most advanced business processes globally."

Mr. Shanker Annaswamy, Managing Director, IBM India and South Asia, said, "IBM will bring its deep global expertise in business transformation and innovation to enable Idea to meet its customer value, business growth and productivity objectives. We are delighted to partner with the Aditya Birla group. This win reinforces IBM's position as a leading partner to global telecommunication companies."

The partnership between Idea and IBM will enable Idea to:

-- Accelerate time-to-market of new services to delight customers and enhance loyalty

-- Leverage opportunities from the convergence of voice, data, video and wireless technologies

-- Add new revenue streams to provide a competitive edge

-- Empower business with analytics tools for focused market segmentation and cross selling

-- Improve end-to-end customer management to drive efficiency

-- Provide advanced revenue assurance capabilities for top and bottom line growth

The pact with IBM will enable Idea to meet the needs of its 14 million current subscribers and future growth. This will be through supporting end to end transformation of business critical processes including billing, revenue assurance, and credit collection, subscriber management, business intelligence, fraud management, customer relationship management, e-billing and payment, and customer self care. IBM will also undertake the management and support of Idea's IT Infrastructure. All IT department employees of Idea would play a key role in the transformation, either as Idea employees or as IBM employees.

About IBM

For more information about IBM visit www.ibm.com.

About Idea Cellular Ltd.

A leading GSM mobile services operator, Idea Cellular accesses licenses to operate in 13 telecom circles in India. With a customer base of more than 14 million, Idea Cellular has operations in Delhi, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Haryana, Uttaranchal, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Goa, Andhra Pradesh and Kerala. With the planned expansion into Mumbai, Bihar and Jharkhand, Idea's footprint will cover nearly 70% of India's telephony potential. Idea is listed on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) and Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) in India.

Idea Cellular is a part of the US $ 12 billion Aditya Birla Group, India's first truly multinational corporation. The group has a market cap in excess of US $ 20 billion, operates in over 18 countries, and is anchored by 88,000 employees belonging to 25 nationalities. For more information log on to www.ideacellular.com.

http://www.sys-con.com/read/351772.htm

Bihar's fiscal liabilities alarming: CAG

Patna: The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has described as "alarmingly high" the fiscal liabilities of Bihar and termed as "unsatisfactory" the State government's achievements with regard to various social sector schemes.

"The fiscal liabilities of Rs 46,495 crore amounting to 76.72 per cent of the Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) are alarmingly high. The area of concern in state finances is that the State's own resources as a percentage of revenue receipts have declined from 27 per cent in 2001-02 to 23 per cent in 2005-06," CAG said in its report for the year ended March 2006, which was tabled in Bihar Assembly by Deputy Chief Minister, Sushil Kumar Modi, on Friday.

During 2005-06, revenue receipts of the government at Rs 17,837 crore showed an increase of 14 per cent as against 21 per cent rise in revenue expenditure at Rs 17,75 crore over the previous year.

Capital expenditure of Rs 2084 crore was below the estimates projected in the fiscal correction path, it said.

Referring to the 'Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan' (SSA), a Centrally sponsored scheme aimed at universal elementary education for all children in the age group of six to 14 years by 2010, the CAG said the implementation of the scheme suffered due to under-utilisation of funds received from the Central Government.

"The pupil-teacher ratio far exceeded the prescribed norm of 40:1 and dropout rate was as high as 63 per cent," it said.

http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/004200703240350.htm

Three burnt to death in Bihar

A woman and her two children were Friday burnt to death over a land dispute in Bihar, said police officials here.

'The three family members were burnt by some people who wanted to teach them a lesson over a property quarrel in Gopalganj district,' a police official said.

A complaint has been lodged against the accused, he added.

Police have begun investigation into the case and launched a manhunt to nab the culprits

http://www.indiaenews.com/india/20070323/44410.htm

'Unhealthy' tax structure in other states hits VAT collection in Bengal

Kolkata, Mar 23 Deviation from the value-added tax system in several states is hurting revenue collection in West Bengal, its newly appointed commissioner of commercial tax, HK Dwivedi, said.

"States like Karnataka and Delhi have resorted to some price-based taxation system for items like footwear, which is a deviation from the VAT system. This unhealthy tax structure is hurting the state and so we have vehemently taken up the issue with the empowered committee on VAT," Dwivedi said while addressing members of the Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

The commissioner said VAT collection in the current fiscal is likely to surge 17% over the previous year. Terming the growth figure encouraging, he said it is still lower than the national average of 24%.

In 2005-06, 62,000 traders got themselves registered under VAT. In the current year, 24,000 have been added to the list. "This year's figure is expectedly lower as the previous year was the first for VAT implementation," he said.

He called upon traders to be more transparent in their disclosures---a precondition for any future tax simplification and rationalisation. "There should be mutual trust, without which it will not be possible for any further simplification and rationalisation of norms".

http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=158891

In wake of West Bengal massacre: Indian workers must advance an independent socialist programme

Facing popular opposition across India over the police shooting of scores of peasants in Nandigram last week, West Bengal's Left Front government, led by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), (CPM), is desperately maneuvering to contain the crisis.

On March 17, the Left Front parties announced that the state government will not expropriate land in Nandigram to set up a Special Economic Zone. They further declared that the massive police presence in the area will be scaled down "in phases," and that land acquisition for Special Economic Zones in West Bengal will be temporarily suspended.

Fourteen peasants were killed and at least 75 injured on March 14 when police fired on peasants protesting government plans to seize 10,000 acres in the Nandigram area for a Special Economic Zone to be run by the Indonesian-based Salim Group. Buddadeb Bhattacharjee, the state chief minister and member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) political bureau, sent 4,000 heavily armed police to reassert government authority in the area. Evidence is now emerging that CPM goons joined in the police attack.

In a manifestation of deep popular anger, people across West Bengal staged a general strike on March 16. Protesters blockaded roads and railways throughout the state. In Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal, marchers confronted the police. Schools and colleges were closed and government offices recorded only 20 to 25 percent attendance. Police mobilized by the government arrested some 1,400 people across the state.

Mass anger was such that three Left Front constituent parties—the Communist Party of India (CPI), the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP) and the Forward Bloc (FB)—expressed support for the strike. They thereby sought to distance themselves from the actions of the CPM chief minister, although he was acting in support of neo-liberal economic policies that have been sanctioned by the Left Front as a whole.

Also backing the strike was an opposition front that is led by the right-wing Trinamul (Grassroots) Congress and includes the Hindu-supremacist Bharatiya Janatha Party (BJP). These bourgeois parties, largely discredited among the working masses, are seeking to exploit mass sentiment against the West Bengal government to promote their right-wing agenda.

The Trinamul Congress and BJP are ardent supporters of economic "reforms" designed to attract international investors at the expense of the living conditions of working people. India's previous national government, a coalition led by the BJP, initiated the programme of Special Economic Zones, which the current Congress-led ruling coalition is vigorously carrying forward across the country.

The CPM and its allies bear full responsibility for creating conditions in which these right-wing parties can pose as defenders of the toilers against a nominally "left" government that seizes land on behalf of Indian and international capital.

At the national level, the Left Front is sustaining a United Progressive Alliance (UPA) coalition government that is led by the Congress Party, the Indian bourgeoisie's traditional governing party. This government is presiding over soaring food prices and mounting unemployment, while lavishing state funds on the military and on infrastructure development projects demanded by the financial elite to facilitate the exploitation of India's natural and human resources.

Unless the working class advances its own independent socialist political programme to solve the problems of the rural poor, reactionary forces—the Congress government and its right-wing BJP and Trinamul Congress rivals—will be given free rein to manipulate the outrage of the toilers at the crimes of the "socialist" Left Front so as to push Indian politics still further to the right.

Already, many press pundits have exulted over the fact that the West Bengal government's complicity in savage repression has gravely undermined the Left Front's political credibility.

Commentators have singled out the Left Front's public opposition to the UPA's push for changes in labour laws and other right-wing reforms, predicting that the crisis will make the Left Front even more politically pliant.

In the days immediately following the March 14 massacre, the CPM and its principal Left Front allies, the Communist Party of India, the Forward Bloc and the Revolutionary Socialist Party, held several emergency meetings. Some of the CPM's allies had threatened to quit the West Bengal government in protest over the police action at Nandigram. This was, however, a ruse, designed to put some distance between themselves and the massacre and exploit the Nandigram tragedy to give themselves a greater say in the governing of West Bengal.

At the conclusion of the meetings, the Left Front partners decided to intensify their collaboration in carrying out the government's pro-investor agenda.

Bhattacharjee has refused to offer any apology for the massacre and continues to imply that the peasants' opposition to the government's land acquisition programme has its roots in a combined right-wing-Naxhalite (Maoist) provocation. However, he now admits that he failed to "assess the situation" correctly and promises greater consultation with the other components of the Left Front.

As an act of contrition, Bhattacharjee paid a visit to the headquarters of the CPI rather than insisting the CPI leaders visit him.

The day after the massacre, CPM elder statesman Jyoti Basu publicly criticised Bhattacharjee for "keeping the Left Front cabinet and even the core committee of the cabinet...in the dark." Citing his "long political experience," he warned that the CPM cannot run the government alone. "It must be a coalition government," he insisted.

The Left Front government's policy of creating Special Economic Zones in West Bengal is part of the Indian ruling elite's drive to integrate India into the world economy. Basu, as the former chief minister of West Bengal, paved the way for neo-liberal economic reforms in the state, including dispatching government and business delegations to major Western capitals to solicit foreign direct investment.

In the first four decades following Indian independence, the two Stalinist parties—the CPM and CPI—pursued national-reformist policies, pressing for social reforms within the framework of India's bourgeois republic. While the CPM and CPI differed over the extent to which they were willing to collaborate in parliamentary politics with the Congress Party, they both vehemently upheld the Stalinist-Menshevik theory of two-stage revolution.

They claimed that the legacy of imperialist oppression and feudal backwardness meant that for the foreseeable future the working class could aspire to nothing more than serving as the ally of the purportedly progressive "anti-feudal" and "anti-imperialist" elements of the Indian bourgeoisie in consolidating Indian capitalism.

Thus, in the early and mid-1970s, as the Indian bourgeoisie's state-led national development project was beginning to unravel and India was convulsed by working class and peasant unrest, the CPI was formally allied to Indira Gandhi's Congress, going so far as to support Gandhi's declaration of a state of emergency. The CPM, meanwhile, made common cause with the Janata Party—an alliance of bourgeois parties stretching from the Jana Sangh (forerunner of the BJP) on the right to the social democrats.

The West Bengal Left Front government emerged in 1977 as a by-product of the CPM's subordination of the working class to the Janata Party. In the 1977 West Bengal election, the CPM initially proposed to give its Janata allies a majority of the seats in a Left-Janata electoral alliance. When the alliance disintegrated due to Janata's insistence on an even larger majority, the Stalinists were stunned to find themselves swept to power on wave of worker-peasant discontent.

In its initial terms in office, the West Bengal Left Front government carried out limited land reforms, which secured it a strong constituency among the rural masses. At the same time, the Left Front faithfully abided by the constitution and political conventions of India's bourgeois republic.

However, since 1991, the Stalinists have abandoned their traditional national-reformist policies. The CPM and the Left Front, no less than the Indian political establishment as a whole, have participated in the dismantling of India's nationally regulated economy and the drive to fully integrate India into the world capitalist economy, supporting privatisations, deregulation and cuts in agricultural price supports and public and social services.

Just before last year's state election, as part of his attempt to prepare a further shift to the right, Battacharjee declared that he would pursue investor-friendly policies even though he claimed to remain personally convinced that humanity would ultimately evolve in the direction of socialism. "I am trying," he said, "to work on the basis of accepting the present reality.... [S]ince we are practical, we know it is wise to be capitalist at the moment when the whole world is wooing capitalism."

Over the past last few months, the CPM and Battacharjee have intensified their campaign to push for the rapid "industrialisation and development" of West Bengal. They argue that the key to economic prosperity and social, economic and cultural advancement is to convince Indian and international capital to invest in West Bengal.

The events in Nandigram are the bloody result.

In claiming that foreign capitalist investment will produce trickle-down benefits for the masses, the Stalinists are echoing the neo-liberal ideologues.

The globalisation of production within the framework of capitalism has created deepening social inequality in every country of the world. The drive for profits by multinational corporations in the advanced countries has been accompanied by attacks on wages, social welfare programmes and other benefits. In the backward countries, the hundreds of millions living in poverty have become the source of cheap labour for international capital.

The stark reality in India is that these policies have not alleviated the conditions of workers or the rural poor. Thousands of peasants have committed suicide in recent years due to unbearable conditions.

"Industrialisation and development" cannot be achieved for the benefit of the vast majority of society, as the CPM claims, by integrating the country into an exploitative world capitalist system and wooing international capitalists who scour the globe for the cheapest possible labour and the highest possible rates of profit.

At the same time, the vast revolutionary developments in science and technology could be harnessed to eradicate poverty and raise the living standards of the masses throughout the world, including in India—but only on the basis of an international struggle to overthrow the capitalist profit system and establish a planned, socialist economy.

In opposition to the policies of the ruling elite and its appendages, the CPM and the Left Front, the working class must advance its own programme to address the social problems of working people and the landless and poverty-stricken rural poor. This means reorganising the economy for the benefit of vast majority of the people, rather than a privileged elite.

This programme can only be achieved, as part of the struggle for international socialism, by mobilising the working class in alliance with the oppressed peasantry to establish workers' and peasants' governments—in the form of the Union of Socialist Republics of the Indian Subcontinent and South Asia.

The International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) and its organ, the World Socialist Web Site, advance this perspective. We urge socially conscious workers, youth and intellectuals to consider this perspective and join the struggle to build a section of the ICFI in India.

http://www.asiantribune.com/index.php?q=node/5034

Catch-22 in West Bengal

The policies that kept the Left Front in power for 30 years are proving major obstacles in the state's bid to industrialise.

In 2005, the West Bengal government started acquiring farmland in Bhangar, 25 km from Kolkata, for a 100 km, four-lane expressway and township to be constructed by Indonesian giant, the Salim group.

Soon after, Trinamool Congress leader and former railway minister Mamata Banerjee lost no time summoning a rally, attended by more than 50,000 people, to protest the appropriation of farmland for industry. Significantly, Abdur Rezzak Mollah, the Left Front's land reforms minister, raised questions about viable rehabilitation packages for farmers who would lose their land. Subsequently, in state elections in 2006, the Bhangar assembly seat, which had been a CPI (M) stronghold for decades, was narrowly won by a Trinamool Congress candidate.

Though the protests were localised, Bhangar was a clear signal that the ruling four-party Left Front would see turbulent times over land acquisition. Yet, within the year, Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee announced plans to acquire larger tracts of farmland as the state's industrialisation drive went into high gear.

Soon, more vocal protests were heard in Singur, 40 km north of Kolkata, and Nandigram, 150 km south of the city, respectively, locations for the 1,000-acre hub around Tata Motors's small car project and the 14,000-acre Special Economic Zone (SEZ) for the Salim group.

Last week, when villagers in Nandigram were killed in clashes with the police, West Bengal became a national symbol of the evils of unfettered industrialisation in general and SEZs in particular.

One of the world's longest-serving Communist governments now suffers the ignominy of being labelled "anti-people". Indeed, as the CPI (M), the leading constituent of the Left Front, has discovered to its chagrin, its faithful rural support base is proving inconveniently intractable in the state's bid to stoke industrial investment.

This has put the Left Front government in a bind. With returns from agriculture diminishing, the state urgently needs to industrialise. To bootstrap the process, however, the state needs more than 1,00,000 acres of land. Half of this must come from agricultural land, which covers 68 per cent of the state's land mass.

A land ceiling Act, which limits the acquisition of agricultural land to 12.5 acre, has meant that most of the acquisition must be done by the state rather than the private sector (the Act has now been referred to a standing committee for possible amendment).

Yet, as Nandigram has shown, the government cannot take the rural support base, which sustained it for for three decades, for granted in this land acquisition drive.

Ironically, the spectacularly successful land reforms that handed land to small farmers and share-croppers (or bargadars) in the seventies (known as Operation Barga) have become a source of weakness. West Bengal's land reform programme was unique in that, unlike Punjab and Haryana, it created a green revolution based on a small peasant economy. With high-yielding seeds and deep tubewell irrigation provided by the state, Bengal was able to achieve high yields — two or three rice crops a year — with average landholdings as small as 5-7 acres.

Today, West Bengal produces around 8 per cent of India's cereals and is one of the country's principal vegetable producers.

The flip side of this unique green revolution was that, as a generation of landholders passed on, multiple inheritors have acquired even smaller plots of land. Today many own just three or four bighas (three bighas = one acre).

Over the decades, growing land fragmentation, declining soil fertility and a falling water table have made farming an unviable business for Bengal's 1.2 crore farming community. This fact is evident in a paradox highlighted by economist Omkar Goswami. Writing in the Kolkata daily The Telegraph, he pointed out that despite impressive growth in agricultural productivity and farm incomes, rural household consumption in West Bengal was 9.6 per cent below the national average in 2001-02.

"It doesn't speak well of a state that lays claim to agrarian dynamism [that] its rural households consume only 4.3 per cent more than the average rural family in Bihar," he writes.

Not surprisingly, the second generation of small-holders has been uninterested in farming, increasingly turning to the cities for jobs. Today, almost half the rural population earns its income outside agriculture.

No one understands these inherent contradictions in West Bengal's economic future better than Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, who took charge in 2001, and a small element within his government.

As state industries minister Nirupam Sen told Business Standard, "The success in agriculture cannot be sustained. We need to take the pressure off agriculture and land is required for industrialisation."

Yet, industrialisation in West Bengal had always been a controversial issue. Powered by its rural support base in the seventies and eighties, the Left Front government did little to support industry.

In turn, plagued by state-supported union problems and a chronic shortage of infrastructure, industry began retreating in favour of more congenial locations elsewhere in India. Big groups like the Birlas, Hindustan Lever, Britannia, the Thapars and so on sought to locate their new investments in the west and north.

Despite being isolated within his party and the Left Front, Bhattacharjee's efforts have largely been to try and reverse decades of neglect. But globalisation has changed the nature of the game. Integration and economies of scale require vast tracts of land to be acquired for industrialisation. Indeed, the state has attracted numerous projects that require thousands of acres ( see chart), that will displace large numbers of people on fragmented land-holdings. In Nandigram alone, the Salim group's chemical hub would have displaced more than 40,000 people.

Till the Nandigram crisis, the pro-changers in the government seem to have assumed that the Left's stranglehold on the countryside precluded the need for sensitive and well-crafted communication and rehabilitation programmes ahead of the land-acquisition drive.

This apart, years of industrial neglect have also meant that, unlike Gujarat and Maharashtra, there is no credible demonstration of the benefits of industrialisation. Outside of Kolkata's polluted outskirts, there is little to convince the rural populace to substitute the seemingly solid assurance of land ownership for the ephemeral gains of factory jobs.

Certainly, on the outer edges of east Kolkata, where vast tracts of farmland have been given over to mega-housing projects and factories, there appears to have been no virulent protests to land acquisition.

At Singur, some 4,000 farmers representing 300 acres of land have refused to accept compensation. But most other landholders here were absentee farmers with jobs in Kolkata who were willing to sell their plots. Thus, despite sporadic protests here, the Tatas have been able to power ahead with the project, albeit under heavy police protection.

A wall enclosing the land is already up and workers from Shapoorji Pallonji, the Tatas' major contractor, have started building roads and levelling the land. The first Rs 1 lakh small car is expected to roll off the ramps by 2008.

Nandigram, however, was a potent demonstration of Bengal's Catch-22 situation. It is an isolated and starkly backward group of 40-odd villages in which the inhabitants own land, but little else. Most villages here have no electricity, few pucca houses, and landholders subsist on three crops of rice and vegetables.

Betel leaves represent the only commercial crops and brick kilns constitute the only industrial activity. Annual incomes vary between Rs 18,000 and Rs 20,000. Literacy rates here are as low as 27 per cent, against the state average of 64 per cent. Many of Nandigram's younger sons travel up the river to the industrial hub of Metiabruz to work at low-paid jobs.

Certainly, the plan to set up a chemical hub here made both business and economic sense. Nandigram is close to the port of Haldia through which a pipeline would import the raw material. The hub would, as Sen said, "change the economic pattern of Nandigram".

For the villagers, however, this transformation is far from evident, not least because no one from the party has made a case for it. As they see it, they will lose their land and livelihood. "What will I do with the compensation money?" asked Sudarshan Pain, who farms one acre of land and runs Ma Kali retail outlet selling fertiliser and pesticide.

He and many others, mostly over 30 years, also doubt their employability in the Salim group project. "What jobs can they give us? They will need engineers and computer specialists, we only know how to farm," said Pain. "Tell them we don't want any change, we want to live just as we have been doing for years," an elderly woman added.

Ironically, last week's tragedy here took place after Bhattacharjee had unequivocally announced that the SEZ would be scrapped following virulent protests in January this year.

But by then poor communication stoked by simmering discontent boiled over into pure political rivalry. With the local administration cut off from the area by road blockades, the local CPI (M) strongmen, fearing a loss of control in other parts of rural Bengal, decided to reassert their power.

The police were ordered in on so-called intelligence that Maoist guerillas were operating in the area. In the ensuing confusion, they fired on villagers including women and children who had been pushed to the front. The death toll is yet to be officially verified. Police sources did not rule out the presence of lumpen elements of the Left who committed atrocities as well.

After a stormy meeting of the Left Front a day later, Bhattacharjee merely reiterated what he'd said in January — that there would be no SEZ in Nandigram. Meanwhile, the area has become a green fortress, subject to brutal political rivalries between the Trinamool Congress and the CPI (M).

In the aftermath of Nandigram, the state government has finally understood that the success of its industrialisation programme depends on winning the battle for the hearts and minds of rural Bengal. As Sen has promised, "The state will go beyond compensating people. They will be rehabilitated."

Meanwhile, investors, though worried, appear to be backing chief minister Bhattacharjee. No one has pulled out yet, though they admit that Nandigram might set back their plans for a time. The Salim group says it will continue to look at other sites in the state.

Adds Venugopal Dhoot of Videocon, which has heavy commitments in the state, "I believe in Buddhadeb, he is very pragmatic." B K Birla, who has seen Bengal in its anti-industry days, says, "Nandigram may not happen but industrialisation in West Bengal will continue."

On the whole, most investors take the view that such problems are inevitable and, as with all such issues in India, will eventually sort themselves out. Backed by a state economy that is growing at 7 per cent, a relatively literate workforce and a growing market, Bhattacharjee has the strong backing of one set of stakeholders for his reform programme. His challenge is to extend this mandate to the other major stakeholders to achieve the inclusive growth to which he aspires.

http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage.php?autono=278671&leftnm=5
&subLeft=0&chkFlg

Posco reviewing investment plans in India

Frustrated over delays in getting approvals for its Rs 52,000 crore steel project, South Korean steel giant 'Posco' is reviewing its investment plans in India while looking at other options in south-east Asia.

The company has told the Centre and the Orissa government that "if matters were not sorted out within the next two-three months, then it could re-consider its investment plans in the country," official sources said.

The Korean giant has sought categorical assurance from the government on various issues pertaining to its 12 million tonne project. Posco officials have asked the Navin Patnaik government to spell out its stand on its project "as it cannot afford to wait for an indefinite period," the sources said.

When contacted, Posco India officials declined comment.

Meanwhile, Posco's Chief Executive Officer Ku Taek Lee met Commerce and Industry Minister, Kamal Nath, Friday apparently to discuss the progress of its project.

Posco, which had signed an MoU with Orissa government in June 2005, is facing stiff resistance from locals at its project site in Jagatsinghpur district. The protesters allege the company wanted to acquire the land at a throwaway price.

The company was also actively toying with the idea of shifting to Vietnam, which has a huge potential market and an investment-friendly climate, a government official said.

"They have committed to the project, but are worried that nothing is happening on the ground," the official said.

"Many investors are watching the progress of Posco's project in India and are saying it is not a safe destination for investment," he added.

http://www.hindu.com/thehindu/holnus/006200703240360.htm

Orissa economy showing signs of overheating: Survey

Bhubaneswar, Mar 22 Industrial investment has contributed significantly in strengthening the economy of Orissa during the 10th Plan period, according to the Economic Survey 2006-07.

The SDP growth rate during the first four years of the 10th Plan period was 7.26% as against the targeted rate of 6.2%. This robust growth was attributed to an 11.3% of growth achieved by the industry and minerals sector, according to the survey. The rate had been 3.89% during the 9th Plan period.

The share of the manufacturing and minerals sector, which was 19.03% of the NSDP in 1993-94, has increased to about 24.17% of the NSDP by the end of the fourth year of the 10th Plan (2005-06).

The state government in 2001 announced a revised industrial policy resoulution with a view to create an investment friendly environment by reducing bureaucratic and procedural bottleneck.
"The policy shift has already created a positive impact on the economy as well as on human development scenario", according to the survey tabled in the state Assembly on Thursday.

"The state government has signed as many as 65 MoUs with various industrial houses involving a total investment of around Rs 2,98,229 crore. Out of which, substantial progress has been achieved in case of 22 units with proposed investment of Rs 74,258 crore. Another 26 units entailing an investment of Rs 1,47,346 crore are at the land acquisition stage."

The survey says the infant mortality rate in Orissa has come down to 65 per 1,000 live birth in 2005-06 from 96 per 1,000 in 1997. It, however, expresses concern over high poverty rate, the widening gap between per capital income in Orissa and the national average, low productivity in agriculture, and large-scale unemployment.

http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=158760

2 crore looted from Bank of Baroda in Orissa

BHUBANESWAR: Miscreants looted nearly Rs 2.2 crore from the Badbil branch of Bank of Baroda (BoB) in Keonjhar district on Friday. The incident took place 10 minutes after the bank opened in the morning and the whole operation was over in about 30 minutes, police said.

Police are investigating the possibility of Maoists' involvement in the robbery. Badbil, located close to Jharkhand, is surrounded by thick forests and dominated by Maoists.

Special squads have been dispatched for search operations, particularly in areas bordering Jharkhand. No one has been arrested so far.

"The description given by bank officials indicates that the miscreants were from neighbouring states. They seem to have planned the robbery meticulously," Keonjhar SP G S Upadhyay said.

The robbers did not face any resistance as the bank had only one security guard whose gun was in the strong room at that time.

The robbers beat up some bank officials and locked them up in the strong room along with some customers, police said.

"The bank had about Rs 2.76 crore in the strong room. While fleeing, the dacoits left behind some bags containing currency notes of Rs 10 and Rs 100 denominations," police said.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/NEWS/India/2_crore_looted_from_Bank_of_Baroda
_in_Orissa/articleshow/1800435.cms

Emami to diversify into cement, inks pact with Chhattisgarh

Kolkata, Mar 23 Kolkata-based FMCG company Emami is diversifying into the cement sector. It signed a memorandum of understanding with the Chhattisgarh government on Friday for setting up a 4 million tonne cement plant with an investment of Rs 1600 crore. A 100-mw captive power plant will also be set up, at a cost of Rs 400 crore.

The company has applied to the state for limestone mining leases, and to the central government for allocation of a coal block.

Speaking to FE, Aditya Agarwal, director, said: "We have submitted applications to other state governments like Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Orissa for setting up such plants. We want to commence production in the next three years."

The diversification would bring about business synergy for the company as it is also present in the real estate sector.

A new company will be formed by Emami for this project. The debt equity ratio for the project would be 2:1.

A company official said it may raise funds through the capital market.

The two-phased integrated project, each phase contributing 2mt, will help generate direct and indirect employment for 2000 people, the company said in a release.

http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=158892

GOVERNMENT RECEIVES PROPOSALS FOR GROWTH POLES

The National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector (NCEUS) has proposed the formation of Growth Poles in different parts of the country with a view to integrating with a geographical location a number of clusters of production units engaged in manufacturing services and non-farm activities and facilitating the expansion of production and employment in small and micro enterprises. The Growth Poles would incorporate the concept of the scheme of Provision of Urban Amenities in Rural Areas (PURA) advocated by the President Dr. A.P.J. Abdul Kalam.

The Government has received proposals for certain geographical locations for the formation of Growth Poles in different parts of the country. The proposals have been received from the States of Chhattisgarh, Kerala, Rajasthan, Uttaranchal, West Bengal and North East for the following areas: Kondagoan in Bastar District, Chhattisgarh; Kollam District in Kerala; Sikandra in Dausa District, Rajasthan; Chamoli District in Uttaranchal, Domjur-Panchla in Howrah District, West Bengal and South Western Kamrup in Assam.

The detailed Project Reports for the States of Chhattisgarh, Kerala, Rajasthan, Uttaranchal and West Bengal are under preparation in consultation with the respective State Governments. The proposal from North East for South Western Kamrup in Assam is under process.

The National Commission for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector under the Chairmanship of Dr. Arjun Sengupta was constituted to examine the problems of the Unorganised Sector (also referred to as Informal Sector) and suggest measures to overcome them.

http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=26362

news@jharkhand.org.uk Jharkhand News Network www.jharkhand.org.uk

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