It was November 2007. A block in the East Midnapore district of West Bengal had suddenly gained nototeity. A group of people trying to protect their lands from being acquired had been shot dead by the police. Many women had been raped. A dhuti panjabi wearing gentleman, sitting in a palatial building in Kolkata had drawn a dividing line between the perpetrators and the victims. “They are being paid back with the same coin”, he had said. I was at the university then. The students’ union (rather the union of a particular political party which waved red flags with a hammer and a sickle drawn on it) had called for a path sabha a meeting in front of the administrative building. The agenda was, rubbishing the claims of a white sari wearing, puffed faced lady, who was the chief of another political party which waved white flags with three flowers in green drawn on them, that all the violence in the aforementioned district was being fanned by the former party.
A bespectacled moustached, doctoral student, was to address the path sabha. And he shouted “gulir jawab guli, dharshaner jawaab dharshan”, a bullet for a bullet and a rape for a rape. He then went on to sing paeans about the heroics of the supporters of the first party, how they killed people and raped women and teenagers to “recapture” the block. And then the request (rather an order), that we would take out a rally the next day to protest against the protests of the protestors.
This was again reiterated at a general body meeting at 10 in the night. We were reminded of our duties as responsible supporters of our ”priyo sangathan” our beloved organisation. This effectively meant that “walk the rally you fuckers or we are going to kick the shits out of you”, which is precisely what was done to those who gave hints of the sangathan being not priyo to them.
All of us joined the rally and walked on the state highway just outside the campus. Who would like to be kicked around by 15 well built men in a 20 by 20 room, hands tied behind the back, legs tied, and rubber water pipes and cycle chains taking turns to make marks on the buttocks and the back? Neither would any girl like to be branded as a ‘maagi”, a crude bong word for a woman of questionable character. So walk we did.
The slogan for the rally was gulir jawaab guli, dharshaner jawaab dharshan.
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what can i say?
ReplyDeletefirst,i will be objective and tell u abt the writing!!
but second, being subjective, i will write abt the idea!!
the piece has lot of emotions..angst and perhaps rage too, aginst what u feel abt that particular party!! u cud not have taken ur revenge at a better time when the whole world is heaping praises (in the form of condolonces) to that man in white dhoti and punjabi living in that palatial mansion!! but seriously the writing is quite terse and vibrant!! u tug at one string of this verse..and the whole music of the verse flows! really good!!
but personally, i can never speak against whole political movement of students! and that rings true for every political ideology!! i feel that even a right student movement (although a bigger nuisance than the left one) is much better than the usual "neutral" approach prevalent in many places!! since we have already debated a lot on this issue i would not repeat them!! just to add to that, what if somebody rises up the ladder and makes the effort to change how they opearte!! i like the way Rahul Gandhi puts it by saying just because i am a product of the rotten system that does not mean i cannot change it!! An effort iself would pave the way for many such efforts!! but i agree, that what SFI hoodlums practice in the name of student activism in some places of bengal is actually goondagiri!!
Maybe, i would have to be a product of that context to fully empathize with u!!
Iz tis a tribute 2 jyoti Basu??questionable!A man who carried the clout n ruled fr nearly three decades n one of the longest serving CM!!!btw m nt appreciating his party bt the power he wielded over the years iz really appreciable!!the blog reminds me of the honest election commissioner KJ Rao who was the man behind bringing back the democratic set up in Bihar or say the genuine voters to the ballets!!!Wen he was deputed as the oberver for W Bengal elections he found that the situation was far worse then that of Bihar to an extent that supposedly situation became out of control fr him!!fake voters,fake voter list n continous threats!!n an iron man like KJ Rao had to pull bak in between a lot of hue n cry!!!that means the communists won over a man of strong conviction !!!I hav never understood wat thsi communists want!!Most of the top notch comrades in Bengal are the richest!!thay sit at the top of everyone!!they exploit ppl!!they agitate ppl!!they don even leave their own party members if they see them nt agreeing to their decisions!!!they bet that they are the only one who care fr the the really underprivellged ,poor n marginal ppl!!n wen farmers get killed in Singur u can see these comrades in fab india Kurta making plain bland statements!!many of the comrades have been accused of living lavish lifes!!Surjit sing Barnala,CPI(M) who headed the Polit Bureau(correct me if I am wrong) was accused of spending an amount of Rs.3-4 cr in his nephew' marriage!!As the communists took over thw WBengal regime the era of industrial decline began!!Industrialists began to fled frm WB!!Labour Agitation and strikes was a common thing!!Agn wenever u switshed on the television the common news frm WB was that "today the comrades have called a band",Gherao n all that words that carries doom n sinister connotations!!U get in Kolkata n u can see hungry n destitute ppl laying down on roads!!Wat the hell thay have made of a one time commercial centre!!!I hav a hell lot of things to write bt I wud stop here!!If any of the comrades by fluke get2 to read tis blog he will kill me rather then u!!!thats the way they operate!!!
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