Notes from an Old Leftist in Fading Red Bengal
West Bengal. Photo: Al Jazeera English
A FEW MONTHS ago, waves of trucks from farming West Bengal drifting red flags spotted with hammers as well as sickles converged upon the Maidan in Calcutta.
The India of adoration to Shiva, Kali, as well as Microsoft Word unexpected vanished. Was we in Nicaragua? Romania? Was we immature again?
There was the design in the writings when we arrived of the group of white-haired aged men giving the clench-fisted comrade salute to the white-haired passed man, their comrade, Jyoti Basu. Basu was for many years West Bengals Chief Minister.
The shot resembled the relic from some Communist Bloc archive. Or the still from the filmmakers domestic ghost story. But not the Bollywood filmmaker. Too grim for Bollywood.
Strange to consider of the wintry clenched fist in West Bengal with the peaceful ponds as well as coconut trees. The CPIM (Communist Party of India Marxist) has ruled West Bengal for the past thirty 3 years. we realize this is obscene.
There is something wrong with my feeling nostalgic for all the years we never even knew the CPIM was in energy in Bengal. Communist parties with actual ruling Secretariats as well as cadre who know how to spit out the word reactionary from the suitable place low in the intestines, have been not easy to come by in the post-red world.
The CPIM is at large approaching to be degraded by Mamata Banerjee, Indias Minister of Railways, as well as her populist Tiranmool Party in subsequent years elections. This doesnt entirely greatfully me. Bengalis listen to this as well as say, Are we crazy? That helps ground me. we see them fussing over the grass in their ideological cemetery. Do! nt they know they themselves have been between the dead?
I hated the aged Communist parties whose dull exhortations upon class governing body fell upon the heads like poison rain.
But we admit to the low-grade love for the CPIM. we see them fussing over the grass in their ideological cemetery. Dont they know they themselves have been between the dead?
My apologies to the people of Bengal who underneath Communist rule have seen their state remain between Indias poorest. To be fair, the CPIM put by land remodel in the early years, expanded education, made West Bengal Indias first state to have the Minister of Environment. But an eternity of incumbency has led, people say, to complacency, to the mislaying of the domestic compass, to incompetence.
Everywhere we go in Calcutta we am chased by hammers as well as sickles. What if Mamata, humbly fabricated in the white sari as well as flip-flops in her posters, though said to be an autocrat, launches the campaign to shift travel names? Gone Karl Marx Street. Gone Lenin Street. Gone Ho Chi Min Street. Gone my sly smile of topographical vindication. Our victories have been few.
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