The Hindu : National : Nandigram: “split among intelligentsia unfortunate”

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Wednesday, Nov 21, 2007
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Nandigram: “split among intelligentsia unfortunate”

Special Correspondent

KOLKATA: Film actor and Padma Bhushan awardee Soumitra Chattopadhyay on Tuesday described as “unfortunate” the schism within the West Bengal intelligentsia over Nandigram and attributed it to “some kind of mechanism that is operating behind it.” He, however, did not elaborate.

Mr. Chattopadhyay’s participation in a rally here by intellectuals and other personalities on Nandigram on November 15, a day after a protest rally was taken out by a group from among the intelligentsia, raised suspicions of a division within the intelligentsia over the Nandigram issue. It also found a place in the rhetoric of some Opposition parties and, more recently, of the Maoist leadership in the State.

Calls for consensus

On a recent open letter to him sent by the CPI (Maoists), accusing him of having “sold” his “protesting self to Buddhadeb [Bhattacharjee],” he told The Hindu: “I am least worried and will not respond to such lies [that have been] levelled against me.”

Mr. Chattopadhyay said there were many “who had taken advantage of the State government” and had only now felt it fit to “condemn the violence at Nandigram now instead of doing so in the past 10 months.”

“I appeal to all sections of people, including the intelligentsia, who had taken different stands on the Nandigram issue, to evolve a consensus in the condemning the past violence there,” Mr. Chattopadhyay said.

“I, along with Mrinal Sen, had appealed to the State government to provide compensation to the Nandigram victims, irrespective of which political party they belonged to,” he pointed out.

Mr. Chattopadhyay said: “I am not a political expert but have been strongly condemning the death of 14 persons [on March 14 in Nandigram]. After so many months of violence in an area that had virtually turned into a liberated zone, the homeless were getting back,” he said, wondering why the sudden condemnation “today at a time, 10 months later, when the homeless were able to return to their homes.”

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