UNNYAYANER PRATIK

Singur not OK, Tata reverses Nano out

Times Of India

On Friday (04/10/2008), a ''distressed'' chief minister heard Tata Group chairman Ratan Tata's message, loud and clear. He made fervent pleas to Tata to stay back and keep his Rs 1,500 crore investment, even argued with Ratan Tata that his decision wasn't correct but couldn't change the industrialist's mind.

The Tata Group chairman said he wasn't the one to blame for things coming to this pass. He squarely blamed Mamata Banerjee for pushing him to take the pullout decision, two years after his tryst with the Nano car factory in West Bengal.

''Our reason for leaving West Bengal is entirely because of the continued aggression and agitation by the Opposition led by Mamata Banerjee with total disregard for the rule of law, and not because what the state government has done or not done,'' he said at a press conference after a two-hour meeting in Bhattacharjee's office.

''If someone puts the gun on my head, I say either you remove the gun or pull the trigger. Ms Banerjee has pulled the trigger,'' Tata said.

Bhattacharjee made no public comment after the meeting with Tata, which, according to the industrialist, had left him ''exceedingly sad''.

But state industry minister Nirupam Sen voiced the government's collective grief. ''We could not even imagine that the main Opposition party, along with some political parties and individuals, would indulge in such narrow politics that would lead the project to ultimately wind up from our state,'' Sen said.

He said the state government repeatedly requested Tata Motors not to take such a decision ''because the people of the state, especially the youth want it.''

Unfazed with the pullout, Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee stepped up her defiance. ''It is a part of the joint gameplan of the CPM and the Tatas. The government should return the land it has forcibly acquired from the unwilling farmers in Singur,'' she said.

Ratan Tata's decision sent shockwaves across the state and among Singur farmers, who are left in the lurch, having given away the land and having lost prospects of jobs. And worse, Singur now appears headed toward a full-blown confrontation between those who had given up their land for a dream of a better tomorrow with those who cussedly held out and backed Mamata Banerjee in the hope of squeezing out more compensation from the government.

Tata promised that the group will try to absorb those who undertook training, somewhere else in the Tata family.

While those like Mamata Banerjee and CPM's Subhas Chakrabarty are busy doing the political accounting of the pullout, the suicidal agitation has dealt a body blow to West Bengal, no matter which party comes to power.

The Tata's leaving West Bengal will have an obvious effect on investors who were closely watching Singur before making up their mind on putting in money in this state. This is what Ratan Tata had also feared when he came to the city in August. ''The pullout will also cost the state. I don't know how many Rs 1,500 crore investments will come to West Bengal. I hope that the state doesn't get a 'troubled state' tag like some other parts of India where investors don't want to take the risk of investing,'' he said.

''When we came to West Bengal many people thought that we have gone mad. We came here still. I have always had a soft corner for this state and its rich potential,'' the Tata Group chairman had once said.

However, while announcing the shifting decision on Friday, Ratan Tata thanked the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee government for its investor-friendly policies and said the Tata Group would still consider locating some of projects in West Bengal in the days to come. ''We will continue to look at West Bengal even if the Nano project is dead. I think the time had come for the project and is gone. We can't let our project in a limbo,'' Tata said.

The Tata Group chairman didn't specify where the Nano factory was shifting to. ''We have proposals from three or four states who have promised us land and similar incentives. We will take a final decision soon,'' Tata said.

Responding to a question whether he could have waited for some more time instead of shifting the factory at huge costs, the indusrialist said: ''We waited for long hoping that things will come to normal. But the agitation was stepped up. We do not see any change on the horizon. We have a timeline to reach.''

Asked if any rival could be sponsoring the agitation in Singur, Tata said it was worth pondering over. ''It has certainly made us wonder from where the funds and logistic support came from,'' he said.

Left Front chairman Biman Bose came down heavily on the Opposition for its negative attitude towards development. ''The main Opposition's violent efforts would affect the interests of the farmers also,'' he said.