‘Singur verdict landmark victory’

Chief minister Mamata Banerjee lauded the Supreme Court verdict on Singur as a “landmark victory” and said she could now die in peace. Claiming that the verdict was a vindication of her sustained movement against for-cible acquisition of land in Singur, 40 km from Kolkata, Ms Banerjee said it brought “tears of joy” in her eyes. “It is the victory of a long movement. I had dreamt of this verdict for so long. It is a dream come true. Even after I came to power in 2011 (in my first ten-ure), one important task had remained incomplete — the Singur issue. Today even that has been accomplished. I am so happy that I can even die in pea-ce,” a beaming Ms Banerjee said at Nabanna, the state Secretariat.

The chief minister, along with education minister Partha Chat-terjee and panchayat minister Subrata Muk-herjee, watched the coverage of the Supreme Court verdict on Singur on television. TMC MP and lawyer Kalyan Banerjee also called her from the Spreme Court and briefed her about the verdict. Later, addressing the media, the chief minister seemed elated about its timing. “This is a landmark victory — the first gift the state got after we rechristened it to Bangla,” she said, adding it was the victory of maa, maati manush and the victory of truth.

Ms Banerjee pointed out that the people of the state had given their verdict in favour of her Singur movement in 2011 by electing her to power. “Today the apex court’s ruling has given a seal of app-roval on out long fight to save the land of the farmers from forcible acquisition,” she add-ed.

She said that had noted writer Mahasweta Devi been alive, she would have been very happy. Outraged by the plight of the farmers of Singur and deaths of 14 persons in police firing in Nandigram, Devi and a number of Bengali writers, poets, painters, film personalities had extended the-ir support to Mamata’s anti-land acquisition movement and given a call for pariborton (change).

Ms Banerjee asserted that the method of land acquisition in Singur by the then Left Front government, led by Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, was illegal. “Wh-at we had said then, the apex court had endorsed today,” the Bengal chief minister said. Ms Banerjee declared that Mr Buddhadeb’s land acquisition was Left’s “historic suicide”.

This was a reference to Jyoti Basu’s famed “historic blunder” comment which he had made after the CPI(M) had stopped him from becoming the Prime Minister in 1996.

Ms Banerjee has convened a strategy meeting on Thursday to chalk out a mechanism to implement the apex court order to return the land to the farmers within 12 weeks. Ms Banerjee will address a victory rally at Singur on September 14 after her foreign trip.

“I want everyone to celebrate September 2 as Singur Utsav in every block in the state,” she said.