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The award of Rs 765.78 crore compensation to Tata Motors over the scrapped Singur Nano plant, by an arbitral tribunal, could not have come at a worse time for the Trinamool Congress government, which is gearing up for a Global Business Summit next month.
The Opposition, which has renewed its corruption campaign against the Mamata Banerjee government after the arrest of another minister over a scam, has found a new handle to beat the TMC with.
It was the TMC’s sustained campaign against land acquisition for the Nano plant that had eventually forced the Tatas to pull out. While the agitation had also propelled the TMC to power, felling the Left Front government, it now dogs the ruling party’s bid to shrug off an anti-industry image.
The Bengal Global Business Summit is to be held in Kolkata on November 21 and 22. Mamata recently went on a much-publicised 10-day visit to Spain and Dubai as part of preparations for it.
TMC leaders said that the award to the Tatas will have little effect on the Summit, and that everyone knew how serious the CM was about bringing in investment. At the same time, the West Bengal government is said to be considering approaching courts against the award by the tribunal, with West Bengal Finance Minister Chandrima Bhattacharya confirming the same.
The arbitration proceedings had been between Tata Motors and West Bengal Industrial Development Corporation Ltd, with the company seeking relief for loss of capital investments due to the scrapped plant. The amount of Rs 765.78 crore is to be paid to the Tatas with 11% per annum interest going back to September 1, 2016 “till actual recovery thereof”. Besides, the Tatas are entitled to get Rs 1 crore towards the cost of the proceedings.
A senior TMC leader said: “Our leader (Mamata) has made it clear that agriculture and industry go hand in hand in Bengal. Singur was our victory and a win for farmers, with land returned to them. As far as the new development (the Tata Motors claim) is concerned, there are legal avenues. We will pursue those.”
BJP leader Suvendu Adhikari has called the ruling awarding compensation to the Tatas a “landmark” one. “Mamata Banerjee destroyed the prospects of Bengal’s industrialization. Generations of job seekers were denied employment close to home. The land returned to farmers cannot be used for agricultural purposes now. She turned gold into ashes,” he posted on X Monday.
Adhikari, the Leader of the Opposition, added that the order “doesn’t just rub salt into Bengal’s industrial tragedy… but also pegs back the State’s frail economic condition further into a dark endless tunnel”, accusing Mamata of doing this for her own selfish interests.
BJP state president Sukanta Majumder pointed out that the Tatas had moved the Nano plant to Gujarat, after facing the obstructions in Bengal. “When the Tatas left, they said they were leaving Bengal for one M (Mamata) and going to Gujarat for another M (Narendra Modi). The latter became the PM of the country, and the former destroyed Bengal.”
CPI(M) state secretary Md Salim also attacked the Mamata government, saying the state was “paying for the arrogance and destructive politics” of the TMC.
Tata Motors had announced the setting up of the Nano factory on May 18, 2006, with the Left Front government facilitating 997.5 acres of land in Singur for it. In December 2007, Mamata sat on a 26-day hunger strike as part of the agitation against the land acquisition. On October 3, 2008, Tata Motors announced it was taking the project out of Bengal.
On August 31, 2016, the Supreme Court ordered that land be returned to the farmers from whom it had been acquired.
Apart from Singur, the TMC had led a land agitation in Nandigram while in the Opposition.
The Singur agitation was included in the state history textbooks after the TMC came to power.
May 18, 2006: Tata Motors announces a Nano factory in Singur, 997.5 acres of land is acquired for it
July 18, 2006: TMC leader Mamata Banerjee sows paddy near the project site as a symbolic protest
January 21, 2007: Tata Motors starts construction at the site
December 3, 2007: Mamata starts an indefinite hunger strike in Kolkata
December 28, 2007: Mamata ends her fast
August 28, 2008: Mamata starts a dharna near the Nano site
October 3, 2008: Tata Motors decides to move out of Singur
May 20, 2011: Mamata leads TMC to power, becomes CM
June 14, 2011: Singur Land Rehabilitation and Development Bill passed in the Assembly
August 31, 2016: SC orders that land be returned to farmers
