Calcutta Diary

November 17, 1973 Calcutta Diary A M THESE are uncertain times to flaunt the avocation of a soothsayer will be the sheerest of folly. This state may or may not be shut down on November 17, the bandh announced for the day by the nine Left parties, protesting against the government's policies which have fed the price spiral and demanding the release of political prisoners, may or may not be a roaring success. Even if there be deep welled-up discontent about the government's waywardness among the people, they may have for the present lost their faith in the efficacy of collective action. They may have, again for the present, lost their faith in modalities of the traditional Left movement. It could also be that the bulk of those who in the past used to man the barricades for the Left parlies are still dominated by the psychosis of fear. This is a new phenomenon. Political workers, who have been a part of what is known around these parts as the mass movement for the last thirty or forty years, who, till a few years ago, could command the respect of people from different strata of society for their sacrifices and integrity