Political Culture to be Blamed

The recent killing of eight persons in Bogtui village of Birbhum district in West Bengal has once again underscored the potential of political rivalries turning violent. Eight persons—six women, one child and a man—were charred to death on March 21 when a gang firebombed the house where members from related families had taken shelter after the murder of Bhadu Sheikh, deputy pradhan of Rampurhat-I block panchayat, the same evening. Evidently, the violence was in retaliation to the murder. One more woman succumbed to her burns on Monday.

The State has reported several such incidents following the local body elections earlier this year. Only a week before the Bogtui violence, a newly elected councilor was shot dead at Panihati on March 13. On February 19, Anish Khan, a student activist affiliated to a Leftist outfit, was allegedly pushed to death from the balcony of his house in Kolkata.

Political violence in West Bengal has a long legacy. In 1970s, it were the Naxals who dominated the scene. The 35-year Marxist rule altogether changed the contours of political idiom in the State. The party which implemented the land redistribution under ‘operation Baraga’ established a vice-like grip over the rural populace with the party activists becoming the conduits of State funds to panchayats. With mass poverty and unemployment, the ‘rent-seeking cadres’ of the party were the only source of livelihood for a sizeable chunk of rural families. The competition for resources spawned political rivalries which often would trigger violence. The TMC did dethrone the CPI(M) from the seat of power in Kolkata in 2011, but imitated the copybook of the Marxist to entrench itself in power. No wonder that thousands of seats in local bodies in West Bengal have regularly returned party candidates without a contest. In 2018, as many as 20,076 or over 34% of Panchayat candidates were elected without a contest.

What however distinguishes the Bogtui violence is the feud between two factions within the ruling TMC over distribution of Panchayat funds or what is known as ‘Bokhra’ in Bengali. Bhadu Sheikh seems to have fallen victim to such a dispute with a rival faction and the retaliatory attack was much more bloodier and brutal. It also points to the fact that the underlying reasons for the violence are now more economic than political.

It was indeed refreshing to find Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee not balking from issuing an onthe-spot order to arrest the block president of her own party for being involved, during her post-violence visit to the village. Perhaps, the CBI inquiry ordered by the Calcutta High Court may unravel the reasons for the violence in its entirety. However, what is significant is the political culture in West Bengal where it’s not caste, community, land or religion, but ‘party’ that remains central to village kinships, rivalry and politics. Mamata or the TMC have not been able to alter this even a bit during the last 11 years of their dominance on the political scene.