As an ideology communism may not be a bad thing, but those who practice it are the wrong minded people and in the name of 'principle' they do whatever suits them. Till recently (before Buddha became CM) CMP was trying to pull WB down as much as possible to ruin this state. Now the problem is so deep rooted and the leaders are so powerful and CPM's Red Brigade (read thugs) and their masters has become most influencial in the party, that it is very very difficult to change things in a hurry. People in Bengal may not like CPM but they do certainly prefered a Buddha than Joyti Bose.
BTW, by reading some of the comments it seems Refiff again has successfully put another article where people from one state can express their disliking towards other state and their people (specially if it is Bengal and Bengalis). From cricket to communism - it is same everytime. What a nice nation we have! Always love to hate.
RE:RE:communism and and WB
by Kunal Chowdhury on Apr 03, 2007 11:51 AM Permalink
Applaud you sir. First reply I see where there is balance, and not some BJP-bashing.
Before Communist rules the state, Bengal was the most industrial populated state, after they came in power they destroyed all Industries now they understand that without Industrialization Bengal will not be developed. Communist are very critical about privatization and other related matter now they are doing same thing
They tell u to adopt China Culture. Because china is Their Ideal country . They don%u2019t believe Vivekananda- Rabindranath-Shubas Bhose View who are known over all Indian's feelings. Communist only know how to get vote-bank - not improve W.B.-If u say their r huge different before 30Yrs. I want to sat that is wrong- because- time to time people are innovated / created new by themselves like that communist r innovated how to won next election with out give u ur actual needs.
I am also belong in farmer family(not reach farmer: my father income was Rs:25,000/Annum at 2002)- I have shared from that feelings
I am sorry to say that Mr. Srinivasan has clearly taken a very one sided view. Firstly, communism or communists are not the only theory or believers who have committed such mass blunders. I guess, the term fascism wouldn't have come otherwise, right? There were facists who gave birth to this term and meaning and their ideologies were not exactly similar to communist ideologies, right Mr. Srinivasan? Now, lets look at other great non(anti)-communist democracies. Shall we talk about US? Between 1990 and 2006, US has killed 2.65 million people in Iraq and more than 1 million in Afganistan. In one night the American bombardment in Iraq exceeded the TNT value of Hiroshima bomb (oops, that reminds me of Hiroshima as well which was not exactly committed by communists, I think). The recent US backed attack on Somalia faded away as just a small perturbation. I hope at least Rajeev has noticed that. Shall we talk about DEMOCRATIC Israel then? Probably there is not much point in continuing with this arguments because inside we all know that the so called democracies are much ahead in conducting genocides all over the world, sometime in the name of "establishing democracy" or in the name of "development". So, these incidents are not related to ideologies, they are related to the feeling of power. One little suggestion is that it might be meaningful to read about communism a little before drawing any black and white conclusion about it (the ideology).
Now, the Nandigram issue. Firstly, CPI(M) is hardly a communist team by definition. They are quite comfortably following the path that the rest of the country is taking although they claim that their policy always has the human face. This is certainly debatable because what we saw in Nandigram is identical to what we saw in Kalinganagar last year, or in Gurgaon Honda factory or in the Narmada valley for decades. I don't know why Mr. Rajeev hasn't drawn similar conclusions when in Kalinganagar ironically the same number of indigenous people were killed! So, please stop being partial. Even in Nandigram, few months ago a policeman and a local CPI(M) leader were killed, a local woman was raped and nobody felt anything! How all these can be justified Mr. Srinivasan?
The problem is, all over India and of course all over the world, the rulers are treating common people like insects. Millions of lives are going at the expense of few general statements. And we, the intelligents, are taking the sides of either one killer or the other. Probably, its time to think whether we are doing the right thing. What do you say Rajeev?
RE:Reality?
by biz Narayan on Apr 03, 2007 11:23 AM Permalink
The problem with Sugata Ray's are that when they get one award or publication, they would pull out themselves to describe the followers of goons like Marx and Mao as intellectuals.
Perverted they are, they have occupied the papers like TOI, HINDU so as not to criticize the theories before public, untill they are brainwashed by JNU intellectuals. Now a criticism.. and they find communists are not the only believers!
RE:Reality?
by KRISHNA PRASAD on Apr 03, 2007 10:35 AM Permalink
Mr. Ray, the article is not about US and its goondaism. It is about CPM and its draconian rule.The problem you should understand is that communists critise others and do the same thing in their state and claim it as right. i.e if other's do it, it is wrong and if they do it, it is right. This attitude only people are angered about and are watching with glee about what is hapening in West Bengal. A good example is their leader Raghavulu and his henchmen have ammassed wealth through illegal means in Andhra Pradesh and claim more ethical than others. That is the problem.
RE:Reality?
by Sugata Ray on Apr 03, 2007 10:53 AM Permalink
Sorry Mr. Krishna Prasad, probably you haven't read the title of this article which reads "Nandigram: Communism as fascism - I". So, it immediately takes a broader view attacking an ideology and charging all its believers. Moreover, I haven't supported the Nandigram incidents at any point, I just wanted to say that such happenings are very common all over the world (actually at much larger scale) irrespective of the ideologies the killers claim to follow. You may read Milan Kundera to find out communist brutality but shouldn't forget to read Noam Chomsky as well who talks about the America state. It is undoubtedly true that as far as mass killings are concerned, the US and its allies have done ridculously well and certainly superceded any other political groups of modern world.
I would have kept silent if the title of the article was "Nandigram: Power i.e. Fascism - I". Hope I could make my point clearer this time.
RE:Reality?
by KRISHNA PRASAD on Apr 03, 2007 03:37 PM Permalink
Mr. Ray, I am not saying what happened in non communist centers is right. What I am saying is the double speak of the communists. They speak differently in different places which is not acceptable to any decent human being
RE:Reality?
by Sugata Ray on Apr 04, 2007 10:12 AM Permalink
Are you sure that this double standard is only characteristics of communists? I am sure that it is not. Look at Bush and Blair's act on Iraq (there is no need to elaborate, I guess) or US's deals with Israel and rest of its non-allies. The naked violation of Kyoto protocol. The subsidisation policy within its own country and outside. The list will be endless. So, for sure these are related to the nature of the ruling process and nothing to do with any particular ideology. In fact, an ideology grows not eyeing a leadership problem but to provide an alternative general thinking. These are very easy truths, only we need to be open enough to accept them.
Communism has always been fascism...even China's phenomenal growth has been at the expense of freedoms.
-Of course, in WB, we not only have a regime that restricts freedoms and runs a fascist state, but absolutely none of the accompanying economics marvels that at least keep the people of China economically happy. -Shanghai is a stellar vision of a city, clean, beautiful modern structures, fast-paced...Kolkata is the most depressing place on earth, still relying on 18th century transportation, filthy and worn-out colonial buildings. -China thrives on foreign investment all-around...Bengal has scared away pretty much any investor, who can take their pick from any other state that would welcome them. -The industrialization of China had a great impact of decreasing the gap of wealth. In Bengal, industrialization has been put 'on hold' -Personal enterprise in Bengal is not part of the Communist agenda.
Whatever be the article - the fact remains that the richest state in the 60's has become a nowhere state in 2007. Enough data is available on this fact. Similarly communist and stalinist rule in the world has demonstrated real horrors which have now been so well documented that the commies cant refute them. Logically we can all attribute it to the communist rule in Bengal only just as we have to attribute all our other systemic ills to the Congress which has been ruling India since independence. Rather than commenting against the writer, i am only convinced as we dig deeper and deeper into data it will leave the commies even more embarrassed with the data. So i am really surprised that commies in Bengal really want to develop their state which itself exposes the fact that they dont know much about development - land or industry.
Communists are mass killers ever since they gained some popularity among masses.I really wonder how Bengal can be saved hereafter. Bueracrats will not allow democracy to function. Kluks and cussacks were killed in millions by stallin because people wanted to save their land rights. They don't want to listen to people, instaed they want to lead the people. Keralites hjave to live in other places because it is god's own country. humans can't live there. It is a very sad state. Communist preachers are very problamatic for a peacful world. they will destroy and demolish everything. They persecute anybody who doesn't believe in them.They have created a fearful world.We feel sorry for Bengalis and Keralites
Every ideology is having its birth(noramally out necessity) ,grothwh(engineering by the favoroble conditions) and its death(when unfavorable conditions starts).
No ideology is exception to this.Communism has evolved as tool to fight the capitailist exploitation.When the capitailist society itself adopted some of the points raised by communisim and the IT revolution and globalisation made the living conditions different than the last 20 years.
But we can say that The labour welfare laws and good working conditions are fruit of communist revolutions.
Of course we have better concepts than communism which can share the resources to all people.
I know some of the intellectual persons are still believe on communist. I am agree that communist gave the language of labour. But it the fact that, at the same time they teach their comrades to hate the reach man. Poor can not be survive by wakeening the reach. Unfortunately they misgude their local leaders and helps to close innumberable middle scale industry in the name of andolan. Now all the local leaders are the real zaminder locally. Buddha try to controll them, but it not possible because it is the addiction of power(dadagiri). Now communist tring to misgide the nation that they are the most intelligent person of the country. But the fact that now they are targeting poor people to get the attention of rich industrialist which is the reverse of their principle. But how it is possible ? because they already teachs the poor to hate the rich,so they have to kill the poor to teach again. The mass killing in Nandigram is one of the example,because most of the farmers of nandigrams were CPIM supporter. Singur was the startup of the action but CPIM apparantly able to manage the situation by police cadare. But from the lesson of singur nandigram was united to fight against police, so that was the problem for CPIM. Now the people of WB are almost habituated with this Party. But they should remember that histry never excuse them. They should realize that the power of people is more explosive than nuclear bomb. Industry can establish in purulia and in closed industry not in fertile land. Unfortunately CPIM still trying to prove themself as the friend of common people!
