In Buddhadeb’s reforming West Bengal, red carpet still means a chakka jam

And yet there is no escaping Bengal’s ghost from the past: a record three bandhs and one ‘‘chakka jam’’ have grounded the city. And there is more—one more bandh tomorrow.

Those responsible are the usual suspects: the Naxalites, the Trinamool Congress, the Socialist Unity Centre and the CPM-backed trade union CITU. Their reason, also predictable: hike in petroleum prices.

Even intervention by an outraged Calcutta High Court directing the CITU to call off its ‘‘half-hour Chakka Jam’’ yesterday proved futile—at noon, party activists forced buses to park right in the middle of arterial roads blocking access. The result: a 30-minute chakka jam paralysed the city for at least 120 minutes during rush-hour.

This on a day when Infocom 2004 was being inaugurated with over 100 IT companies, including Microsoft, Compaq and Reliance participating.Bad timing isn’t something that worries protestors: SUCI called a bandh on November 18, a day before Wipro opened its first set-up in Kolkata. So Azim Premji’s optimism was tempered with some off-the-record hardtalk by his lieutenants. Bandhs have to stop, said one senior executive.

But no one listened. Four days later, when top scientists from over 40 countries met at the Indian Statistical Institute, it was the turn of the Naxalites. Judicial intervention, sweating corporates and public inconvenience—nothing matters. The Trinamool Congress is the sponsor of tomorrow’s bandh and once again, the issue: petroleum price hike. Trinamool’s Mamata Banerjee is in no mood to comply with the court order. For the record, in June 2002, the HC bench of Justice A N Roy and Justice A K Mitra had minced no words: “..The political contribution of West Bengal in the recent years (the past is as glorious as the present is dark) is the philosophy of no work and protest without purpose…As Bengalees, we hang our heads in shame that this should be so.” The Court did not have the machinery to enforce an injunction order against a bandh, they said.

But CPM insiders say that slowly, the mood in the party is changing. A 30-minute chakka jam, they have realized, could reverse months, if not years of an image makeover. ‘‘There is a move within the party,’’ says one leader, ‘‘to find a solution to this menace. The right to strike is the last weapon for workers’ rights but not a bandh.’’ The Marxists may seek to draw a specious line between these two but on the ground it’s all blurred. Consider Sports Minister Subhash Chakravarty. After one of the bandhs last fortight, he said: ‘‘The time has come when people will bash up sponsors of bandhs.’’ And then, days later, he was the one to announce the CITU’s chakka jam.