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Left on the Left
This is a response to Indraneel Dasgupta’s essay “On Some Left Critiques of the Left” (EPW, 1 August 2009). I agree with him that industrialisation is necessary for West Bengal and manufacturing units would create a certain number of jobs for the poor. The recent agitations in West Bengal, however, if seen carefully, were not so much against the policy of industrialisation but against (a) setting up special economic zones (SEZs) and (b) the process of implementation of the policy.
This is a response to Indraneel Dasgupta’s essay “On Some Left Critiques of the Left” (EPW, 1 August 2009). I agree with him that industrialisation is necessary for West Bengal and manufacturing units would create a certain number of jobs for the poor. The recent agitations in West Bengal, however, if seen carefully, were not so much against the policy of industrialisation but against (a) setting up special economic zones (SEZs) and (b) the process of implementation of the policy.
First, Dasgupta has not made it clear whether he is in favour of SEZs in West Bengal and how a Left government can continue to remain leftist while supporting setting up of SEZs. It would require an extraordinary jugglery of Marxist theory to achieve this. Being not an economist, as a lay reader, I wonder whether it is impossible to achieve industrialisation in West Bengal without SEZs.
Dear Reader,
