"Waste Bengal"

I am profoundly and actively uninterested in cricket, politics and world affairs. Though cricket and politics are supposed to be an integral part of our life, I prefer to stay away from these two religions. I don’t like writing about cricket and politics. In fact I don’t think much about cricket and politics. I like to surround myself with music, movies, playing the guitar, thinking about the uselessness of life, reading, writing and traveling.

I however got a little bugged when Jyoti Basu died and was called a son of the soil, a great leader, Beloved leader, leader of the people, a man of high principles, an ideological and ethical man.

I know we are all wretchedly two – faced, deceitful human beings. We are afraid to talk, criticize or disparage someone when the person exists on this earth, and scrutinize and evaluate his existence behind his back. We all have only pleasant, agreeable words to say when the person dies. But from time to time, we break this self implemented rule when we speak about Julius Caesar, Benito Mussolini, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin, Gen. Jorge Rafael Videla, Idi Amin, Francisco Franco, Che Guevara, Saddam Hussein, Indira Gandhi and others like them. I suppose I can break the self imposed rule and try to express my feelings for Jyoti Basu

Jyoti Basu contributed a great deal by taking Bengal back to 20-30 years behind the rest of India. There was a popular aphorism once: “What Bengal thinks today, the rest of India thinks tomorrow.” That was effectively changed to “Bengal’s constipated thoughts.” Progress came to a halt. We jokingly referred to West Bengal as ‘Waste Bengal.’ Recurrent trips would be made by him to London and surrounding cities, naturally during the summer season to flee the city heat bringing back ‘huge foreign investments.’ We never saw those MOUs out of the papers. All major and small organizations vamoosed from Bengal. Entrepreneurship died. People were afraid to open up business. There were lockouts. Strikes and bandhs became common. Every other day the comrades and cadres were on the streets, slowing or closing down business. Thanks to the communists, poverty increased and became a habit, so much so that I even was a bit embarrassed to move around in my car. The man on the street used to give a dirty look at car owners!

I never knew why we followed Mao Zedong or Stalin. On even and every trivial pretext, the cadres used to spill blood. No one dared to speak out. A slightest opposition to the party thoughts meant that you were either beaten up or you were cut to pieces. Individual thoughts were frowned upon. I remember the time when I use to speak out against socialism, communism and herd mentality, my communist friends used to threaten me by saying “From today you are our political enemy.” Let me explain by what they meant by ‘political enemy.’ If you disagree with their thoughts or ideology, they had a right to exterminate you. You could not go to the cops. They were filled up with cadres, top to bottom. You could not trust them. I felt like we were living under a ‘stasi establishment’ or the Argentina’s Military Junta and SIDE regime. The cadres were everywhere, in schools, colleges, universities, in the teachers’ society, legal world, panchayats, govt. officers, bureaucrats, everywhere.

We sat, studied, worked, slept and grew up without power for several years. The concept of Load Shedding came into being while Jyoti Base cooled himself in his AC environment.

While he got his education from Loreto School, St Xavier’s School, Presidency College and the The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, he prohibited English in Govt. Institutions, taking back Bengal by several years. Meanwhile the communists’ sons and daughter attended the elite English medium schools. Double standard was the characteristic of the communists. He encouraged strikes and bandhs while ensuring that his son’s business never had any problems.

He managed to stay in power and became the longest serving CM, because the Party had introduced a way to meddle with the voting system. It was called ‘scientific rigging.’ He was once known to have refused saluting the Indian Flag. Politics is cheap and dirty in India. Compared to him, these goons like Laloos, Mulayams and Mayawatis are saints. He never looked after the poor as they claim and still he managed to stay in power for more than 2 decades just because be was more hardnosed and merciless than all those thugs combined. His was a class which could be compared with Mao, Stalin and Francisco Franco. It was a reign of terror.

Whatever it may be, but we Indians are idiots enough and do not have it in us like those who brought down the statues of Saddam, Lenin or Stalin

Overall his reign and regime placarded a sentiment of “Shit Happens.”

Because of him, I am a displaced man from Kolkata.