India / Singur : Hoax of Development

Source: Report of The Special Group

Two opposing “industrialization / development” ideologies:

A) Ethically right or pro-people approach – social progress through elimination of social oppression, famine, poverty and enhancement of human freedom and well-being, struggling for a better world.

B) Mercantile or anti-people approach – Development as accumulation of wealth in terms of goods as well as services through investment of capital. It subscribes to and imitates the western model of development. Which is why, it strives toward enhancement of private property, appropriation of capital and industrialization. This developmental approach should be put into question for three reasons stated below:


1) It has never brought forth any convincingly positive result till date in any third world country of the world.

2) Local or national communities have neither say nor any affirmative participation in this brand of developmental process.

3) The market logic is at work in every human sphere by putting it at stake.


It goes without saying that, in Singur issue, WB govt. is harping on the second recipe, which is strongly recommended by Monmahan Sing and his cohorts in the centre.

We knew Manmohon’s special affinity for the World Bank where he, himself, once worked as economist (the fact his administration and himself prefer to conceal from the public eye).

Since the structural reform he heralded in 1991, the majority of Indians have experienced a gradual decline in the quality of life-situations – massive downsizing in public institutions, retrenchment, closure, lock-outs on the one hand and on the other, the official economic growth is shooting up. Let’s have a look at the table above.

What impression do we get by closely scrutinizing the above table? Does the GDP growth really seem to guarantee the employment opportunities – the platitude so much reiterated by Monmahan’s administration in the Centre and their Leftist cronies in West Bengal?

"From agriculture to industrilisation" - slogan mongering by CPI(M) before the last Assembly elections, had already forecasted some urgent "industrialisation" drive the government would undertake with the Tatas in West Bengal. We remember the drama played by Buddhadeb at his first appearence before the media after the left front victory.

While he was answering to the questions before the media camera, a man suddenly emerged from the wings to deliver him a chit. He took a few moments to have a quick read, feigned as if he got a grand surprise news he wanted to share with the people. But as it was a top secret as well as a rare and very special opportunity for his government and the people, he pretended to shy at the disclosure of the whole document. He simply boastfully uttered, "We have just received the confirmation; The Tatas have agreed to set up a plant in West Bengal". I am not disclosing the matter in detail right now, unless and until everything is finalised". Everything had been pre-planned!

In fact, in the name of "industrialisation" and "development", WB govt is virtually creating a SEZ in Singur, where the investors (The Tatas) would be allowed to procure goods and services without payment of duty, would be thus exempted from all kinds of duties and tariffs and would be pampered on labour issues.

In short, Singur will be the land of freedom for investors; they will be provided with all the necessary means to maximise their profit by restricting the rights of the labour force to its minimum.