The closed Nano factory in Singur

Tarun Sau, in his early twenties, returned home from Pune last week with a singular mission — to cast his vote on May 7, an act redolent with both revenge and hope.

Tarun is among the few hundred youths in the villages around the aborted Nano plant in Singur who had qualified for special training by Tata Motors, and is now completing the course in Pune.

Tarun is not alone. As we spend the whole day in the hinterland around the “factory”, in the bylanes of Gopalnagar and Barabheri, in Purbopara and Joymollah, it becomes clear that beneath the overwhelming sense of gloom, there is also a glimmer of hope. Villagers on both sides of the political divide are waiting for next Thursday to dawn; both are united on one thing: “Vote shob porishkar kore debe (the vote will make things clear).”

Mamata Banerjee may have turned Singur into an international symbol of peasant revolt against industry and gathered a rainbow coalition of activists and romantics, opportunists and anarchists, behind her agitation last autumn. But here at Ground Zero, there is a smouldering anger against her for driving out the Tatas and providing nothing in return. And a deep disquiet among her supporters.

Gopalnagar wears a deserted look and the first person we meet refuses to get into a conversation, barring a sarcastic, “Why bother to come here now? Singur more gachhe, Singur ekhon shoshan (Singur is dead, Singur is a graveyard).”

A young woman bathing in the village pond is equally reluctant to talk to strangers. But her voluble sister-in-law, Shoma, is more forthcoming and the word “hataash” (despair) recurs frequently in her discourse. “There is a sense of despair here ever since the Tatas went away. No one, not even those who were agitating outside for days on end, ever thought that the factory would actually shut down. Gaachhe tule diye moi kede naua holo (literal translation: The ladder was removed after putting us on the tree).”

But there is hope, too. “I had gone to visit my relatives last week. And they told me that Ratan Tata had said he had come to Singur to do business, not politics. That means that he may return — after the vote,” says Shoma.

If the factory comes up, not only will there be employment and business but, she hopes, the road in her village will get paved. It will be easier to travel to Singur town which is only a few kilometres away but takes hours to reach in the absence of buses and autos.

Now that Shoma has broken the ice, other villagers slowly join in. Sukumar Sau, who gave away his land at the outset and received compensation, takes the argument beyond Singur. “Everyone talks about the need for change. Yes, we too want change but not change if it means chaos. Pariborton mane ki ashanti, asrinkhala (should change result in chaos and destruction)?”

Pipes up his brother Bishwanath: “Mamata Banerjee only knows how to destroy things, not to build an alternative. Did she do anything for Bengal as railway minister? If you go to Singur station, every single rail employee is a Bihari because the last three rail ministers were from Bihar…” he says, insisting that all those who voted for Trinamul in the panchayat elections last year are now ruing their mistake.

The Sau brothers may sound like CPM activists (which they deny) but the sentiment is not confined to just a pocket or two.

At the Shahanapara area of Barabheri village, a group of unlettered old women huddled outside a mud hut confess that they long for the return of the Nano. They have no land and used to work as maidservants in town or sell vegetables at the local haat. “But when the factory was being set up, I managed to sell a lot more vegetables,” says Lakshmidhara.

The elderly widow beside her says: “I have heard that Ratan Tata is not happy in Gujarat, maybe he will come back here — once things become clear after the vote.”

None spells out his or her political preference but it is clear that all those who hope that the Nano will return — or at least some other auto factory will come up in its place — plan to vote for the CPM this time.

The CPM may have won Hooghly parliamentary seat in 2004, but it lost the Singur Assembly seat that falls under it in 2006. In the panchayat elections last year, Trinamul trounced the CPM by a margin of over 18,000 votes. The unstated sentiment among the villagers is that if the CPM wins Singur this time, the “mistake” of the past will be undone and the factory may come alive again.

According to them, many voted for Trinamul not because they were against giving land but because they hoped Mamata’s agitation would get them a better price, get their sons and daughters (who did not meet the initial criteria set by the Tatas) jobs.

At Purbopara, die-hard Trinamul supporter Basudeb Das vehemently denies the charge. He and several others in Purbopara were active in the resistance movement and were among those landholders who refused to take compensation. He is still “100 per cent” with “Didi” and craves for the land that sustained him all these years. “Land is our mother — can you think of selling your mother?” he asks.

But he, and especially his wife, admits that they, too, are in the throes of despair. “Our land is gone, we have no money, soon we will be begging in the streets,” they say. All his three sons are working away from Bengal — as carpenters or goldsmiths (a large number of Singur’s rural residents, in fact, make a living out of carpentry or in the gold and diamond industry in western India). The proud farmer is ashamed to live off them today.

They too are waiting for “the vote”. Das’s wife candidly says: “We do not know what to do. If Didi wins, she will get our land back for us. That is our hope.”

In Joymollah, Sheikh Muzamal Mondol echoes Das. He too had refused compensation money and agitated for the return of the land. And now he has become the butt of banter and ridicule. “Do you think land that is once taken away by the government is ever returned? And even if it is, do you think you will be able to cultivate it again?” asks Sheikh Giaussidin Mondol, telling his old “chacha” to admit that he had been taken for a ride by “politicians” and is now left high and dry.

Both uncle and nephew agree that whatever happens or does not happen will depend on the vote. The voting figures in one Assembly segment of a Lok Sabha seat are usually of little consequence. But in Singur it is a matter, if not of life and death, then certainly of despair and hope.