Land Acquisition And Deadly Clashes In India Essay Sample

In January, 2007, a massacre had left fourteen people dead and seventy injured in the heartland of rural West Bengal in India. The police had played a dubious role in the entire act and the state government was put to question by the media and the entire nation. The land of Nandigram, an isolated strip in the interiors, was the place of controversies after the Communist state government had declared to strip the lands off the innumerable farmers and build industry to increase the economic growth of the land.
I could study this case by looking into the web resources regarding this historic event that shook the state from its roots. I could consult the local media reports to get evidence and detailed information regarding the painstaking incident. The incident could be tagged as the latest atrocity of Communism towards the proletariat.
The locals had impeded the police forces from entering their village by obstructing the roads with huge trees that were cut down for the purpose. The matter had soon hogged the attention of the national media and a land that had lived in oblivion for so many years after the independence from the colonial overlords, had suddenly been pushed in the limelight for all the wrong or disturbing reasons.
One such person, a family friend, who lived in Kolkata, a few kilometers from Nandigram, had observed the situation very closely, being extremely vexed by the metamorphosis of events. During a conversation with the family, he had expressed his concern about the matter. I could interview him to know of the general reaction among the urban mass at the time of this incident. Media had gathered in unison at Nandigram to record the event that signified the modern day revolution of the proletariat against a so-called Communist government, to the sheer irony of history. Allegedly, innumerable comrades of the party in power had gathered around the small village and attired themselves in police uniforms. Then, armed with arsenal, they had penetrated the land along with the police force of the state of West Bengal. I could look into the videos of the electronic media to have a first-hand view of the comrades in disguise.
Farmers were shot to death by the ominous state machinery and the comrades. Media had recorded the series of events and it was aired all over the world to the insurmountable disgrace of the Communist government. Human right activists and the opposition party had readily taken up the issue and a vast mass agitation all over the state of West Bengal put the administration in a compromising position. The Chief Minister had to apologize and pull back all the forces from Nandigram. The local newspapers available on the internet could be of substantial historic value in understanding the series of events. The government had then scrapped the plan of constructing the industry uprooting the hapless farmers from their lands they tilled.
It had come to light that several women were raped by the comrades who were clothed in police uniform. The inhuman brutality that was meted out to the simple farmers could never receive just retribution.
Local farmers were interviewed by the media and they had expressed their grief and trauma to the entire world. The deceased and the raped had left the land shaken, a wound that could never be healed. I could find out these videos to understand their mental states and pain. Women were interviewed too. They had expressed disgust and utter trauma after the atrocious event. Children were left without parents and the horror of the event had scarred their tender mind for life. I could access the archive in the internet and also listen to the opinion of the government at that time in reply to all this. The Salem group, who were to be assigned the land for the industry did not come to the state for business after this incident.
The issue had sparked off debates concerning the dichotomy of native preservation and agricultural pursuits and the penetration of industrialization for the economic advancement of the land. The event had stripped the garb of ‘proletarian showmanship’ from the attires of the so-called Communists in India. They were left with embarrassment, if not guilt and had to compromise their place from the governance in the elections that followed after this uprising. The Nandigram uprising was the modern-day example of the omnipotence of the mass which had the valor and grit to revolt against the powerful state administration with a collection of sticks and knifes as their arsenal. The oppressors were not tolerated. The event had signified the deep sentiments of the rural people regarding their lands which they had carried forward through lineage— the lands which were not just their property, but their ‘home’ where they lived and nurtured their dreams.
This incident could make one have an insight into the socio-economic clashes that had shaped Indian economy since then and also the state policies regarding the acquisition of land for industrial growth of the land.