At the Shivir: Relief Camp

The team arrived at Nandigram town on 28^th Nov. at 11 am, amidst a mass CPM rally / meeting held at the Sitananda College Maath (Grounds). This was the first “Jana Sabha” called by the CPM after the first instances of violence erupted in Nandigram.

We witnessed a mass of villagers thronging to the College Ground to attend the CPM meeting. The narrow town roads were blocked by thousand of villagers flagging the red CPM ‘jhanda’, who were called upon to attend the meeting to show the support base of the party. We asked them which villages they belonged to. There were villagers walking all the way from interior villages like Keshavpur, Gokulnagar, Kalicharanpur, Sonachura, Khejuri, etc.

We had trouble wading through the mass of people even with a police pilot escort clearing the way in front of us. Nevertheless, we managed to reach our first destination to collect testimonies and facts, a school that has been converted into a makeshift relief camps.

Place: Brij Mohan Tiwari Siksha Niketan
28 Nov. 2007
Brij Mohan Tiwari Siksha Niketan in Nandigram Block-I has been acting as the shivir or relief camp, whereby those fleeing away from the villages in the wake of the violence that has rocked Nandigram since January of this year as well as the recent spate in November again, has been taking refuge in.

The camp initially had reported 3000 people taking refuge in it since January. But the number had dwindled to around 250 the day we visited the camp. Fresh influx had occurred again from 6^th Nov. onwards after the re-eruption of violence in November.

The shivir acted as relief-cum-medical camp for the villagers driven away by the fighting between Bhoomi Ucched Pratishod Committee supporters and the CPM supporters. This camp mainly had BUPC supporters or those fighting for the “andolan” to save their land being acquisitioned under the SEZ. At the shivir, relief and medical aid was provided. The Nandigram Bazaar Committee, Bharat Sevashram, NGOs gave us rice, food materials and blankets.

A similar high school has been turned into a relief camp at Khejuri village, which is a CPM strong-hold, where most of the villagers who support CPM had taken refuge.

The battle lines are drawn between BUPC and CPM cadre across the Bhangabera Bridge, with the CPM dominated Khejuri at one side, and the BUPC taking hold on the other side from Bhangabera Pada, Sonachura onwards. This was the bridge where continuous firing and shooting continued for the past 11 months, ever since the first discontent arose in January. We came to know the stories through various testimonies of the people in the camp.

Place: Brij Mohan Tiwari Siksha Niketan
29 Nov. 2007
On the morning of 29^th Nov, we went back to collect some papers at the relief camp, and interviewed a young man named Sunil Prabhat who was claimed by the government to be a Maoist. The CPM backed TV channels ran the story as well as the newspapers reported the CPM fed lines the next day, of CPM supporters of catching 2 Maoists, Sunil Prabhat and Prabir Ganguly, and handing them over to the CRPF, who in turn let them go. We found Sunil Prabhat holed up at the shivir and got his side of the story.

Sunil was accompanying a group of young activists who had come to Nandigram on Medha Patkar’s call to document cases of violations in the villages in the aftermath of the Nov. clashes. He was an environmental activist involved with the Yamuna Bachao Movement in New Delhi, and believed in the Gandhian way of Satyagrah.

He had gone to Jambari Village with four others to gather case documentation by getting testimonites from villagers. When they started asking questions, the villagers shared their dismay with them at being forced to join the CPM meeting on 28^th Nov. at the Nandigram College Ground.

The local CPM supporters their got agitated with their line of questioning and started asking them aggressively what was their business there. The others got scared and left the village. But Sunil and his interpreter, Prabir Ganguly, were determined to stay behind to interview the villagers further. Seeing only the two of them, the CPM people got more abusive and started threatening the villagers who were helping Sunil. Prabir also got scared and fled from the village.

The CPM people soon gheraoed Sunil, and he was only saved when Chandan Pal, one of the helpful villagers, got him onto a bike and rushed off to the Gokulnagar CRPF camp. They were chased by about 20-25 CPM supporters. On reaching the CRPF base, the CRPF escorted him till the Nandigram School shivir where we later found Sunil. We got the news that Chandan Pal, who had returned to his village after dropping Sunil at Gokulnagar, was beaten up by the CPM people for helping Sunil.

Soon the dubious story of two Maoists started running on the TV. Sunil was scooted away from Nandigram by hiding him amongst a TV channel crew leaving for Calcutta.