:: Antara Dev Sen

Bangla trippers

Antara Dev Sen

Oct.29 : Now that Orissa has become Odisha, I am told that West Bengal is all set to become Bangla. Yes, "Bangla". Not "Bengal", which would be too easy, just dropping the meaningless "West" from the name of this eastern state. Especially since it has no counterpart anymore — East Bengal became East Pakistan and then Bangladesh several decades ago. The only counterpart West Bengal has is in one of it’s own football teams: East Bengal, the great rival of Mohun Bagan. Alas, life is not a ball game, and a name change for the state is long overdue.

But no, we wouldn’t dream of going for the straight and easy. Just "Bengal" would be too anglicised for this age of cultural nationalism and fiddling with history by changing place names. Would we then go back to the age old Bengali name, "Banga"? It’s been in use for centuries, going back to when the country looked up in awe at Anga (now roughly Bihar and Jharkhand), Banga and Kalinga (now Orissa, er… Odisha). You can see it was a long, long time ago. Bengal is also referred to as "Banga" in our National Anthem, and Bengalis continue to go weak-kneed and teary-eyed over their beloved "Banga-bhoomi" even now. So "Banga" would be the natural choice, right? Wrong. It may be the traditional name, the identifier stamped in our National Anthem, the name coursing through the veins of a full-blooded Bengali, but it is clearly not smart enough for the lords of names. They want "Bangla".

Not that there is anything wrong with Bangla being the name of a state. It is already the name of a language — one of the world’s biggest languages, spoken by 230 million people. It is the national language of our neighbouring country, Bangladesh or the "Country of Bangla". Well, yes, it could lead to a bit of an identity crisis for the state, if another nation is known as it’s own country, but we live in confusing times. With some practice, you would get used to it.

Such delicious confusion just shows that the state is readying to become Bangla. No, not the language. I think they have the country liquor in mind.

What? You haven’t heard of the cheap and cheerful Bangla? It’s the chosen liquor of the masses of Bengal, the inspiration for poets and artists of modest means, the intoxicating initiator into adulthood of young enthusiasts. It stimulates areas of the brain you didn’t know existed, hyperactivates the tongue and instils in you a confidence that was last seen during the charge of the Light Brigade. And through the stellar performance of Bengal’s powers that be we have had a fascinating experience of such unmistakably Bangla behaviour.

Take railway minister Mamata Banerjee’s changing responses to the "hijacking" of the Rajdhani Express. The moment she heard of it, she blamed the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M). They did it, she said. It’s them, the CPI(M)! You can’t blame her, that’s her reflex to any bad news. Some say, "Oh, God!" She says, "CPI(M)!"

Unfortunately, her Lalgarh friends the PCPA (People’s Committee Against Police Atrocities) claimed responsibility and scribbled their demands for the release of their leader Chhatradhar Mahato all over the train with a graffiti artist’s dedication. Mr Mahato, who had spearheaded the Lalgarh agitation backed by the Maoists, was arrested by the state police for his close links with the Naxalites. Ms Banerjee, who had firmly supported Mr Mahato and his deeds in Lalgarh but was now trying to distance herself tentatively from the Maoists, swiftly suggested a dialogue with the PCPA for the release of the passengers. Meanwhile the police — and the joint forces of the state and Centre delegated to fighting the Maoists — had arrived, and the "hijackers" fled.

This is particularly embarrassing for Ms Banerjee because she was that very day meeting P. Chidambaram to demand that the joint operations by the state and Centre against the Maoists be stopped. She wanted the Army instead. And she wanted President’s Rule in Bengal.

Of course, no one in their right senses would want the Army to be brought in for a long-term law and order problem. Horror stories of continuing atrocities from Kashmir and the Northeast have given us enough reason to keep the Army out of civilian life unless there is a huge emergency. But then Didi’s dadagiri is not based on logic. Or on the best interest of the people of her state. It springs from her obsessive rivalry with the CPI(M) leadership. Reason has no place in her scheme of things. Personal ambition and dramatic rhetoric are more than enough.

For good measure, Ms Banerjee has also claimed that West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee is a killer, is masterminding the Maoist violence and should be arrested. On a modest personal note, she has claimed that the CPI(M) tried to kill her in a car chase.

Not surprisingly, the railway minister did not once call the chief minister to discuss the train "hijack" drama in Bengal. Instead, she made several calls to Union home minister Mr Chidambaram in Delhi and Naveen Patnaik in Bhubaneswar, from where the train had started.

Meanwhile, Mr Bhattacharjee had also been making a mark in press conferences. First he brushed aside questions about freeing kidnapped police officer Atindranath Dutta from the Maoists by releasing 26 tribal women in custody. (Why were elderly tribal women in custody anyway?) Then he owned up and said sorry, won’t happen again. Then he mentioned how the Maoists had killed these two police officers — to the shock and horror of their families since they are declared missing. Swiftly he said sorry, just a slip of the tongue. Of course they are not dead, just missing. Mamata Didi sprang upon him like a wildcat on a pigeon, and marched off to Union home minister Mr Chidambaram in Delhi, brandishing the wives of the two police officers, demanding explanations.

Sadly, her thunder was stolen by the train hijack that was not a hijack. To the trained Bangla eye, it was merely a train gherao, the kind that happens routinely where trains are stopped and demands made by agitators. But then, "hijack" sounds far more impressive.

"If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense", said Alice, of Wonderland fame. "Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn’t. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn’t be. And what it wouldn’t be, it would. You see?" What? You don’t see? You will, once you get used to the state of Bangla.

Antara Dev Sen is editor of The Little Magazine. She can be contacted at sen@littlemag.com