17 DEC 2014, Swatahsiddha Sarkar
The West Bengal government’s response to the Gorkhaland movement follows the same predictable pattern we have seen in Jharkhand, Nagaland, Kashmir and elsewhere. Attempts to resolve ethno-regional conflicts in India have a long history, and have coalesced into a single approach that presupposes the conflicts as being purely political phenomena. It is ironic, then, that the substance of this ‘political approach’ generally involves the use of punitive measures by state governments to compel contending groups to engage in negotiations. Within this framework, the recurring need is to discipline and punish unruly subjects. Those struggling for Gorkhaland know this well.
The state’s response was predictable and involved the deployment of paramilitary forces, the reviving of all pending cases against GJM party workers and leaders, and mass imprisonment.
The desire for self-governance in the Darjeeling hills is centred on two major claims. The first is the recognition of the collective social and cultural rights that earmark their distinctiveness from the Bengali ‘other’. The second is the aspiration to achieve self governance without jeopardising the sovereignty of the nation state. The contours of the Gorkhaland movement, which is over 100 years old, have been defined by the conflation of these positions – the politics of identity on the one hand, and the realisation of this identity through the politics of self-rule on the other. The movement has mobilised issues of ‘primordiality’ (language, culture, race, shared history, dress) and civility (nationality and citizenship) as important bases of articulation.
A long time coming
A separate administrative system for the Gorkhas of the Darjeeling Hills was first proposed in the early years of the last century, although it was not until the 1980s that the Subhas Ghising-led movement for a separate state reached its violent and vocal apex. In August 1988 the agitators accepted the provision of a Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC), which although falling short of complete autonomy, went some way to devolving power to the hills. Ghising took charge of the new Hill Council and became the figurehead of peace and governance, along with his party men. Outside the Sixth Schedule areas of the Northeast, the DGHC was the first sub-state, local administrative arrangement of its kind in India, and was later used as a post-conflict mechanism to restore normalcy in Ladakh, Jharkhand, and Bodoland. The enthusiasm and hope at the initiation of the Hill Council soon dissipated, however, and the DGHC has since shown itself to be a storehouse of corruption, political high-handedness and nepotism. As Ghising’s popularity waned, his authority was challenged by one of his close associates, Bimal Gurung, who founded a new platform, the Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM), in October 2007. Gurung usurped his former political boss in 2008.
A separate administrative system for the Gorkhas of the Darjeeling Hills was first proposed in the early years of the last century, although it was not until the 1980s that the Subhas Ghising-led movement for a separate state reached its violent and vocal apex. In August 1988 the agitators accepted the provision of a Darjeeling Gorkha Hill Council (DGHC), which although falling short of complete autonomy, went some way to devolving power to the hills. Ghising took charge of the new Hill Council and became the figurehead of peace and governance, along with his party men. Outside the Sixth Schedule areas of the Northeast, the DGHC was the first sub-state, local administrative arrangement of its kind in India, and was later used as a post-conflict mechanism to restore normalcy in Ladakh, Jharkhand, and Bodoland. The enthusiasm and hope at the initiation of the Hill Council soon dissipated, however, and the DGHC has since shown itself to be a storehouse of corruption, political high-handedness and nepotism. As Ghising’s popularity waned, his authority was challenged by one of his close associates, Bimal Gurung, who founded a new platform, the Gorkha Janamukti Morcha (GJM), in October 2007. Gurung usurped his former political boss in 2008.
With a new leader and political platform, the Gorkhaland movement received a new lease of life. Noticeable in the GJM’s approach was a decrease in conflict, and the presence of a peculiar blend of Gandhigiri and non-violence. The possibility of recourse to force was nonetheless implicit. On the whole, the movement remained largely peaceful in its new avatar compared to the struggle of the late 1980s. Still, the daylight killing in May 2010 of All India Gorkha League chief Madan Tamang sent shockwaves through the hills.
Gurung and his GJM have opted to follow ‘procedural’ democracy at the cost of ‘substantive’ democracy, and instead of boycotting parliamentary and Assembly elections (which Ghising and his GNLF repeatedly did), the GJM has used them as an opportunity to flex their electoral muscle. In parliamentary elections in 2009, and again in 2014, the GJM supported the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) instead of promoting its own candidate. It is not Hindutva ideology that enabled the BJP to repeatedly secure the single parliamentary seat earmarked for the district; rather, the GJM backed the BJP candidate Jaswant Singh (in 2009) and S S Ahluwalia (in 2014) – decidedly outsiders – and campaigned for them in the hope that if the BJP came to power at the Centre, they would fulfil the promise of considering the Gorkhaland issue made in their Lok Sabha manifestos.
Electoral politics in the Darjeeling hills is dominated by the Gorkhaland issue, and this focus is only likely to continue. There will be no break from this trend in the future unless the culture of ethnic bloc-voting changes. The incentives to do so are slim. The ascendancy of the GJM was founded on the strategy of bloc-voting, achieving significant results: as soon as the 2011 Assembly elections were over and the Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee sworn in as Chief Minister, the process of reconciling with the aggrieved hill leadership was initiated. The GJM initially welcomed the new state government, and a Gorkhaland Territorial Agreement (GTA) was signed between Trinamool and the GJM in July 2011.
Antim larai
When the central government gave the go-ahead for Telengana, and the Trinamool in Calcutta showed no signs of doing the same for Gorkhaland, Bimal Gurung resigned from his post as chief executive of the GTA on July 30 and began the ‘final struggle’ (antim larai). Besides mass rallies, the series of no-compromise protests involved road-rolling by naked youths, hair tonsuring by women and the etching of Gorkhaland slogans on naked bodies, among other symbolic gestures. The precipitating factor for the antim larai was the act of self-immolation that killed one protester (Mangal Singh Rajput – projected as the ‘war hero’ and the ‘only martyr’ in the recent Gorkha agitation – was born out of a ‘Gorkha mother’) in Kalimpong in July.
When the central government gave the go-ahead for Telengana, and the Trinamool in Calcutta showed no signs of doing the same for Gorkhaland, Bimal Gurung resigned from his post as chief executive of the GTA on July 30 and began the ‘final struggle’ (antim larai). Besides mass rallies, the series of no-compromise protests involved road-rolling by naked youths, hair tonsuring by women and the etching of Gorkhaland slogans on naked bodies, among other symbolic gestures. The precipitating factor for the antim larai was the act of self-immolation that killed one protester (Mangal Singh Rajput – projected as the ‘war hero’ and the ‘only martyr’ in the recent Gorkha agitation – was born out of a ‘Gorkha mother’) in Kalimpong in July.
The state’s response was predictable and involved the deployment of paramilitary forces, the reviving of all pending cases against GJM party workers and leaders, and mass imprisonment. Though the state government had earlier agreed to make efforts to release persons in custody (except those charged with murder) as per the provisions of the GTA tripartite agreement of July 2011, mass imprisonment emerged as a tool to exert pressure upon the movement’s leadership and rank and file. Over 1000 men and women who had joined the GJM’s programme were imprisoned.
Facilitated by the High Court’s verdict in Rama Prasad Sarkar vs The State of West Bengal, the state government adopted a ‘rough and tough’ approach, declaring all strikes ‘illegal’, and issuing an ultimatum to the GJM to withdraw within 72 hours or face dire consequences. The strikes continued in different forms, including a janta curfew – a novel form of protest in which people registered their dissent by remaining indoors and away from the danger of arrest. In response, the state government began withholding the salaries of government employees who remained absent from their duties on strike days, and ordered ration dealers to open their shops or have their registration cancelled. As part of the mass imprisonment, the state government also jailed a number of business scions for their alleged role in supplying the money and foodstuffs necessary to run the movement during August and September.
-himalmag.com
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