Reference Auto

Mamata Banerjee’s aspirations of wresting power from the CPM in Kolkata’s red bastion Writers Building may be fulfilled, but can she fulfill the people’s aspirations that have surged sky high and find a quick-fix solution to their problems even though finances of the state are in shambles with West Bengal’s debt burden standing at almost Rs 2 lakh crore?

She has to do a fine balancing act between industry and agriculture — allowing industrial houses to set up shop in Bengal at the same time see to it that arable land is not given to industries as this may antagonise farmers.

Even though she has been dubbed by “so called analysts” as a “bad administrator” who may prove to be a disaster for Bengal, it would be wrong for anyone to pass a judgment even before she has taken up her assignment in Bengal.

Her passion for her state, which has been clearly indicated by the railway projects and trains she had given West Bengal during her stints as railway minister, does give a clear indication that she would like to roll out the wheel of progress in the state.

Even though the task to revive the state is an uphill one, Mamata will have one advantage over the CPM: She can unilaterally take decisions that may bring in development unlike former chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, who had to consult his party before taking decisions.

Although Bhattacharjee was pro development, he couldn’t take up projects, until the Left Front brass gave a go-ahead. In fact, mixing party with governance has proved fatal for the CPM-led government.

Here, Mamata has a big advantage: She is set to be both the party as well as the government herself, and no one can come in her way if some crucial decisions need to be taken to put the state on the track of development.

There are a host of problems she has to inherit. Unemployment rate in the state is almost 10 per cent compared to the national average of 8.3 per cent.

In the 1980s, the CPM-led Left Front banned English in primary schools. This has dented the job prospects of thousands of youth and left them unemployed.

Manufacturing ebbed during the Left rule, forcing companies like ITC, Shaw Wallace and others to shift base away from Bengal and hundreds of industries closed down.

Bengal has also been spiked on the education front. Law and order in rural Bengal has plunged to a new low.

Among the achievements of the Left Front government was putting West Bengal on top in production of commodities such as fish, rice, pineapple as well as vegetables. The party also initiated land reforms in rural Bengal, which benefitted farmers immensely. 

Mamata will have a mammoth task of reviving West Bengal on all these fronts at the earliest as the people will want a quick-fix solution.

But to get industrial houses back to Bengal would take at least a couple of years, whose benefits would be reaped in five-seven years. So, if Mamata goes in a fast lane to set up factories, the holistic benefits would only be felt in the long term.

She has to overhaul the existing education system, the benefits of which will take time to trickle in. Also, public healthcare in Bengal is in shambles. More hospitals need to be opened and discipline imbibed into the staff, including doctors and there’s no quick-fix solution here either.

Also, she will have to rein in the rampant corruption and red-tapism that has engulfed the state government departments and revive law and order in the state.

So, there is an astronomical task at hand. Unfortunately, contrary to people’s expectations, there is no quick-fix solution to all these issues and Mamata’s government will need at least five years or one full term for the benefits of her “pro-people” policies to seep in.