Voice of Development and Trajectories of Governance: The Changing Role of Civil Society, emergence of Social Capital and the West Bengal Politics (2007-2017)

Abstract

<p><em>Acquiring private land for public purpose is nothing new to India, but in last few decades, it has been acquired in rapid rate by the government for the public purpose with various promises. To the advocates of development believed that acquisition of land is essential for the structural adjustment and generate rapid industrialization which in a way assure &lsquo;efficient and accountable governance&rsquo; (Kundu, 2004). In the post liberalization period, the erstwhile left front government, for attracting the industrialist, they offered them very fertile land which they acquired from poor farmers at a negligible price in different places of India and West Bengal (Roy, 2014, 150). But it was a drastic policy step with severe consequences for the lefts in the electoral politics. After the acquisition of land at Singur, the then opposition party TMC mobilize rural left support base in their favor of capitalizing the sensitive issue. </em></p> <p><em>The movement against land acquisition at Singur was an unique incident which led by rural farmers but interestingly, the urban centric civil society led by academia and intelligentsia also supported and campaigned for the unwilling farmers which later became the prominent political agenda for legislative election that overthrown the un-interrupted left front rule (1977-2011) in West Bengal. Not only that, West Bengal government has opposed to the passing of the much debated land bill even in the parliament. But just after completion of a single term in the power, two contrasting picture came into forefront. It has been noticed that, Govt. is more or less sensitive in the issue of land acquisition but they are not equally treating every instances of land acquisition with equal importance. It raised the question about the silence of civil society in the issue of land acquisition but people whose livelihood is directly associated with the land get united among themselves based on their similar problem, interpersonal trust and obviously on the question of their legitimate right which can be theoretically analyzed as an important example of interplay between formation of social capital and the practice of governance.</em></p>

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