In Darjeeling,a new dawn

After the elections come the expectations. The people in this hill region will be keenly watching whether Gurung can help Gorkha families get jobs,solve Darjeeling’s acute drinking water crisis,get roads built and provide health care and education to their children.

Their hopes for the future are,of course,tempered with their experiences from the past.

Memories of an inefficient and corrupt two-decade administration under the Subhas Ghising-led Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC),are still fresh. Ever since Ghising,chief of the Gorkha National Liberation Front (GNLF),started a movement in 1980,demanding a separate state for the Gorkhas living in Darjeeling,the region has been rocked by strikes and protests.

Urmila Rumba,a former teacher of Loreto College in Darjeeling and a Gorkha Janmukti Morcha central committee member,says she is hopeful the new GTA will set Darjeeling on the road to development. “We can never forget our dream that is Gorkhaland. It is our aspiration and all of us are emotionally attached to the cause but sometimes you need to think practically. And that’s what we did. Our people are tired of continuous strikes. This place needs development. That is why we decided to accept the people’s mandate and settle for the GTA.”

At the prestigious St Joseph’s School,North Point,students are hoping that bandhs will soon be a thing of the past. At present,the school has 1,200 students,of whom 250 are from other countries.

Father Santy Mathew,principal of the school,says,“It is a great relief for us. We have gone through bad times and now we are really happy and hope that the peace lasts. I remember in 2008,when our boarders left their hostels to go home,an indefinite strike was called in Darjeeling. All roads were cut off and our students were left stranded. I received at least 600 calls that day from worried parents. We pleaded with the political leaders and they finally allowed our students to reach the railway station and the airport.”

Ashwin Kanan,a class XII student,says,“I could not understand why we needed to be identified as Gorkhas and non-Gorkhas,instead of being identified as just Indians. The only thing I understood was that because of this identity problem,I missed my classes.”

Summer rush

This summer,tourists came flocking to Darjeeling and hoteliers,tour guides and transport operators had their hands full. Hotel owners in Darjeeling town and Kurseong sub-division say they have seen a 40 per cent increase in the number of tourists in the last four to five months. That,they say,is a sign that things are returning to normal in Darjeeling.

Samir Singhal,secretary of the Janmukti Hotel Owners’ Association in Darjeeling,says,“We have 275 hotel owners as our members. Then there are 200 hotels operating in the hills,which are not registered with us. The number of tourists we have received in the last five months,we have not received in the last 10 years. After the second phase of the agitation for Gorkhaland was launched in 2008,tourists stopped coming to Darjeeling. But after a new government came to power in West Bengal last year,development and political stability have helped bring in tourists,” he says.

Dhiren Pradhan,owner of Alice Villa,a heritage hotel in Darjeeling,says,“Hoteliers,tour operators and businessmen have all made a profit in the last six months. I have had a record number of tourists in my hotel this season. From June 2011 to June 2012,3,544 tourists,including 316 foreign tourists,have stayed in my hotel.”

Shakir Ahmed,a small-time trader who owns a curio shop on the Mall,says,“All movements come to an end when people go hungry. During the agitation,we did no business and it was very tough for us to feed our families. But now with peace restored,we are back in business.”

Workers in Darjeeling’s tea gardens are happy too. Over the last few years,tea gardens in Darjeeling have seen frequent strikes and much violence. In the last five years,violent protests led by trade unions have left three managers dead and 22 injured.

Shanti Rai and Rekha Chetri,who work in a tea garden in Darjeeling,say,“What did we get in the past five years of the movement? All we know now is that we have to earn at least Rs 90 a day to feed our kids and send them to school. We do not want any more strikes.”

Darjeeling has 87 registered tea estates. According to official records of the Darjeeling Tea Association (DTA),55,000 people in the hills work in the tea gardens as permanent employees and 16,000 as temporary labourers,recruited in the gardens during peak season.

Swaraj Kumar Banerjee,owner of Makaibari Tea Estate in Kurseong,says,“In the past five years,we lost many months,both during the production and processing periods. However,after the new government took over in West Bengal,we have seen the police and the administration working to restore law and order in the area.”

Estate owners say that in 2007 and 2008,the estates had to be shut for two months each. In 2009,they were shut for two-and-a-half months and in 2010 for a month-and-a-half. In 2011,before the Assembly elections were held in West Bengal,the GJM did not allow tea consignments to be taken out of the gardens for a month-and-a-half. However,after that,there have been no strikes in the tea gardens.

Sandeep Mukherjee,principal advisor and secretary of DTA,says,“Tea production in the hills picked up in 2011. This year,it will go up further. We have got rid of the strikes and the embargo on tea dispatch. Moreover,the trade unions which used to create disturbances in the tea gardens and hamper production have been marginalised. The tea gardens are now ruled by GJM units,and we have signed an agreement with them to maintain peace.”

The sceptics

In this season of hope,not every one is happy. Gurung and his men have many detractors too. Almost all important political outfits in Darjeeling boycotted the polls for the Gorkha Territorial Administration,complaining that Gurung and his party were “sell-outs” who had abandoned the dream of a separate state for Gorkhas.

Govind Chhetri of the Communist Party of Revolutionary Marxists says,“The Union Home Minister and the West Bengal Chief Minister will attend the swearing-in ceremony. There will be words of mutual praise. But we know that the GTA elections were a farce and the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha won uncontested. What kind of democracy are we living in and how will this be different from the period ruled by Subhas Ghising?”

Bharati Tamang,wife of Madan Tamang,the Gorkha League leader who was murdered in 2010,says,“My husband’s killers have not been brought to book yet and the government used the evidence against the GJM leaders as a bargaining tool.”

B K Pradhan,president of Darjeeling Civil Society,a non-political outfit,says though Bimal Gurung and his party are making many promises to the people,it remains to be seen how many of them will be fulfilled. “We are watching them closely. However,the main opposition to Gurung now comes form the Gorkha Task Force (GTF),an all-India Gorkha pressure group.”

GTF spokesperson Enos Pradhan says,“The GTA will never serve the purpose of the 1.25 crore population of Gorkhas in India. We demanded Gorkhaland to secure the identity of the Gorkha people. And our movement will go on until we get Gorkhaland. GTA might appear as a solution to the crisis in Darjeeling and it might bring some development to the area,but it is essentially a civic body and will never satisfy the interests of the Gorkhas.”

Point of difference

The Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC) was set up in 1988 with Subhas Ghising as its head. Ghising remained its chairman from 1988 to 2005 for three successive terms. The fourth DGHC elections were due in 2005 but the government decided not to hold elections and instead made Ghising the sole caretaker administrator of the DGHC. In 2007,Bimal Gurung,a close aide of Ghising,broke away and formed a new political party called the Gorkha Janmukti Morcha (GJM). Gurung launched a virulent campaign against Ghising. In March 2008,Ghising was forced to resign as caretaker of the DGHC. Ghising was finally banished from the hills to Jalpaiguri. After Mamata Banerjee came to power last year,the GJM signed a tripartite agreement with her government and the Central government on July 18,2011,for the formation of the GTA in the Darjeeling hills.

GTA has 45 seats and five nominated members. The DGHC had 28 seats.

DGHC started with 19 departments in 1988,while GTA will start with 54 departments along with 14 executive members.

Power in the DGHC was centralised and rested with Subhas Ghising who was the chief of the DGHC. In GTA,power has been decentralised and there will be a chairman and chief executive who will run the GTA along with other executive members.

DGHC did not have the power to prepare the budget for its departments. It would receive funds as part of the state government’s budget. However,GTA can have its own budget and can allocate funds to various departments.

DGHC was given an annual grant of Rs 22 crore by the Central government while GTA will receive a grant of Rs 200 crore every year for the next three years.

DGHC did not have the power to create posts of Group C and Group D and it could not generate employment. GTA will have the power to create Group D staff.

DGHC did not have the power to amend any rule. However,GTA has the power to prepare its regulations and send them to the state government as recommendation.