Mamata Banerjee at the Desh debate at Kala Mandir on Sunday. Picture by Pabitra Das nAnother picture on page 19

Bengalis want change, even Mamata Banerjee thinks so. What about Singur? Well, Singur was all about change, too, according to her.

Change is good, the leader who many say epitomises Bengal’s reluctance to change, said on Sunday at a debate organised by Desh, an ABP Group publication. Then came a flurry of examples and the trademark emotional fuzzy logic to prove that Bengalis, contrary to popular opinion, have always been harbingers of change rather than a community opposed to it.

Sample 1: “Nasa theke bhasha, kothay Bangalir obodaan nei? (From Nasa to literature, where have Bengalis not contributed?).”

Irrefutable.

Sample 2: “We talk of globalisation, administrative and political reforms today, which Swami Vivekananda did decades ago. Raja Ram Mohan Roy spoke out against Sati and Vidyasagar introduced widow remarriage.”

Applause.

Sample 3: “The same Left government that had tried to prevent computerisation later introduced computers because the people of Bengal wanted change. One cannot stall change even at gunpoint.”

Ouch!

But what about her own party’s role in Tata Motors’ exit from Singur and the impasse in Nandigram? Mamata said she was not against industrialisation, but against industrialisation at the cost of agriculture. “One needs all body parts to become a complete person. The same thing can be said about change and progress. We need agriculture, industry, education and culture.”

The Trinamul leader said the unrest in Singur, Nandigram and Lalgarh were “examples of change from Leftist leanings”.

“This is also change. One can say that the colour of change has changed,” Mamata said.

If Mamata was fiery as usual, information technology veteran Rajarshi Sengupta — who also spoke against the motion — was witty. Together, they countered every argument that Sushim Mukul Datta, a former chairman of Hindustan Unilever, and Swapan Chakravorty, the head of Jadavpur University’s English department, laid out for the motion.

Datta had said that the Bengali’s overt fondness for the past was symptomatic of his/her dislike for change. He cited the hype around former footballer Diego Maradona, whose recent Calcutta trip resembled a state visit, and the neglect of Bengal’s present players as an example of the average Bengali’s penchant for living in the past.

“Change means uneasiness and disruption of peaceful existence, which is why the average Bengali is averse to change,” Datta said.

Mamata, who spoke last, turned this theory on its head by presenting the past as the reason to be optimistic about the future.

Chakraborty said accepting change and desiring change were not the same thing. He explained that wanting change meant desiring change as a united group with a specific goal in mind, which was different from acceptance. “Even Leftist thought in Bengal has failed to evolve because we are averse to change.”

The editor of Desh, Harsha Datta, moderated the debate.