Articles by D Bandyopadhyay

Beneficiaries of Land Reforms: The  West Bengal Scenario  by  Anil K Chakraborti in association with Apurba Kumar Mukhopadhyay and Debesh Roy; State Institute of Panchayats and Rural Development, Kalyani, Nadia, Government of West Bengal, Spandan, Kolkata, 2003; pp 154, Rs 150.

The spectacular growth in agricultural production in West Bengal in the 1980s was preceded by a programme of land reforms launched by the state government. This redistributive operation created a favourable ambience that enabled agriculture to thrive. Productivity growth in the 1990s decelerated after that initial spurt. In order to reverse the decline, the state now needs to complete the process of agrarian reforms, and beef up its agricultural infrastructure.

The report of the working group on decentralisation appointed by the Karnataka government and the bill to amend the existing panchayat law in the state which has been circulated by the government go against the basic objective of the 73rd Amendment of ensuring 'maximum democracy and maximum devolution'.

The Indian nation cannot march forward with a major segment of its largest minority group remaining backward, illiterate, unenlightened and weak. It is the duty of every section of Indian society to help in the mainstreaming of this section. But the issue of modernisation of madrasa education brings up the vested interests of fundamentalist elements trying to protect their turf and the political system which strives to utilise the backward for electoral gain. Strangely, the interests of the non-secular religious groups and those of the so-called 'secular and progressive' politicians merge, reinforcing one another.

Operation Barga, the showpiece land-reform package of the Left Front government in West Bengal, was projected as the culmination of the failed Tebhaga movement of the 1940s. But just as in the Tebhaga movement, Operation Barga has left untouched the question of the future of the recorded bargadars and of giving 'land to the tiller'. The author provides a historical perspective of the attempts at land reform in Bengal.