Peasants fire salvo

Statesman News Service

MALDA, Aug. 6: Senior CPI-M leaders would become upset if they go through the resolution on government’s policy on agricultural land industrialisation, adopted by the RSP-backed peasant wing at a recently concluded state conference in Kolkata.Sanjukta Kishan Sabha (SKS), an RSP-backed peasant wing, criticised the government’s “proximity” with the industrialists. In its printed report, the organisation has also criticised the government’s “directionless” decision of allotting the land at Singur to the Tata group for manufacture of vehicles.“It is unfortunate that lands are being allotted to the industrialists. Even the East India Company did not give up the lands for establishment of jute factories along the Ganga belts on a free hold basis,” Mr Ashok Choudhury, president of SKS, said in the report.They alleged that the government had not taken the consent of the State Planning Board while okaying the projects. The planning committee has for long been defunct, they further alleged. The report also claimed that the state at present has 16,67,085 hectares of non-agricultural land which could be used for industry. “Without making the proper land map, the government is harping on the agricultural lands just to satisfy the demand of the industrialists,” the report said.